the UK has 2 out of 3 of those

Change “shooting” to “knifing” and its 3 for 3. The UK has a huge hooliganism problem. The country is rife with domestic violence. But no (non-police) guns!

I was going to say… I don’t see the UK anywhere on this map

Republicans saying they hate Communism, then doing a Nicolae Ceaușescu speed run.

Given the glut of unwanted children from our abortion prohibition, we’ll be needing a lot of new adoptive parents in the near future.

If you live like a billionaire and you grift like a billionaire and you have borrowing capacity like a billionaire…

Trump hasn’t become rich

For a not-rich guy, he sure does seem to live the high life.

Why hide what is clearly quite popular?

Corporate media has the public totally sold on oligopoly. Elon will run our country into the ground and the Talking Heads on his payroll will tell the whole country how hard they need to clap.

And if you won’t, we all know the cops will.

It flies over heads because its a political fiction that people don’t find consistent with reality.

People like this go on dates, get laid, get married, get divorced, go on more dates, and get married again all the time.

Their spouses vote Republican. Their kids vote Republican. Their friends and neighbors vote Republican. They all move to big conservative retirement communities and vote Republican together forever until they die.

This idea that rich fucks with big families don’t live happily in their big homes all prattling on about how much better they are than everyone else is painfully naive

I’m not a fan of any appeals to gatekeep energy use to “just essentials” instead permitting growth

There’s a huge gulf between essential and wasteful.

hostility never changed anyone’s mind

Chronic abuse absolutely shapes human perception and behavior.

In this case, a lot of Lemmy has been so battered down by “China Bad” propaganda that they’ll straight up deny the threat of climate change to justify rejecting Chinese manufactured goods.

The argument is always “solar/wind still use chemicals” and never “this is the net reliance on extractive industry by energy source”.

That said, general energy conservation is still important. You can’t cut emissions if all your new power just gets funnelled into Grok style AI.

They were at the inflection point back in 2008. They’ve been full tilt towards the improvement side of the curve for nearly two decades.

Europeans demolished their manufacturing sector when they stripped all the wiring out of the walls during the austerity years.

You can’t blame people for buying foreign when you’ve been defunding domestic infrastructure for over a decade.

I can fix him

the life expectancy of a 60 year old man is still another 20 years.

Also, importantly, Americans (born in 1980 as a reference) have a 95% chance of living to see age 60.

Even in relatively poor and disadvantaged states (W. Virginia or Mississippi) you’re looking at 92-94% odds.

We’ve solved for a lot of the early mortality threats common to prior generations - childhood diseases most prominently. We’ve also seen a general improvement in public health with respect to smoking and drinking. And workplace safety has improved dramatically as we shifted from Ag Labor to Industrial work to Office jobs.

And yes you can live healthier to have better odds of getting higher on that chart.

Living healthier means keeping your stress low, saving time for exercise, and limiting your intake of fast food.

But these are luxuries primarily reserved for the already wealthy. Luxuries afforded through cheap service sector labor.

Like so much else in this country, good health is paid for with a labor tax on the poor.

$100B for generically engineered babies.

Not one penny on education or health care.

And you know none of these kids are getting vaccinated.

The man with the perfect dick size, but he ejaculates in ten seconds and immediately lapses into a coma.

We still need some of us to be willing to clean up the shit to preserve the truth.

People like this exist and you can find them. You just won’t have them advertised to you. Real journalism exists, but its speaks floating in a sea of disinformation.

I can only be so upset a people for failing to find it. There but for the grace of God go I.

I’m not sure I understand how your last sentiment relates

A great deal of informed opinion and intelligently dissenting views have been actively suppressed at the educational, political, and industry levels.

Whether you’re Cori Bush or Norm Finkelstein, you’re fighting and uphill battle just to be recognized.

“If you don’t vote my way then you must be an idiot” is the endless refrain of the losing party. I hear it every election cycle

Had Harris been the one edging out Trump on a razor thin margin, it would be conservatives whining about American voter stupidity.

But if all these people are so thick headed, why do politicians find it so hard to get them to vote their way?