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Joined 11 months ago
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Cake day: January 1st, 2024

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  • Thing is, this already happens, it’s just currently more in the billionaire’s favor because instead of tax it’s a “donation”. You’re proposing the same system that already exists with lobbyists and Super PACs, just more enforced. No one is going to bite that bait when they can just pay Scheister and Swindel, Attorneys at Law, to cut a private deal with the CEOs and senators of their choice, be completely unbeholden to public opinion about it, and not be required to do it again next tax season if it’s not profitable to do so.

    Besides, I’ve had quite enough of rich assholes deciding that this year they’re going to donate $80m to exterminate the gays / to shut down solar startups / to arm all the cops with rocket launchers. In every situation, given the choice, they will always invest their money into whatever is most immediately profitable to them, morals or longevity be damned. This would cause our already easily-purchased politicians to be even more easily purchased and with semi public approval, as Elongated Muskrat now has a legal right to billionaire hero-worship? No thanks.

    The special billionaire tax isn’t an awful idea. The perks attached to it are most definitely an awful, no good, very bad idea. If something like this did get implemented it would be an absolute requirement that the investor have no say in where these taxes are spent. They may advise in certain directions, but final say should be up to a jury of some sort.









  • MLK advanced civil rights by being a nuisance. Gandhi pushed Britain out of India by being a nuisance. I’m sure there are others.

    It is in the nature of protest to be disruptive. It has to be. If it isn’t, it gets ignored. Climate change is getting ignored. What would you rather they do, go deface an oil refinery? That’ll just get them arrested and the news suppressed. Big public displays that can’t be hushed are the only way to make sure your message reaches the world. These folks have been considerate enough to make sure that message didn’t permanently damage its canvas. I don’t know what more you could ask from them.


  • Ah yes, it’s holding back the massive sweeping wave of change currently going on to fix climate change.

    No, don’t be a dumbass. It’s raising awareness, because it’s obvious nobody is giving a shit about this really fucking massive problem that is directly on our doorstep. Painting Stonehenge isn’t going to accomplish anything except be a nuisance, but being a nuisance is how you compel people to get shit done non-violently. MLK and his sit-ins pushed civil rights forward by being a nuisance. Gandhi pushed Britain out of India by being a nuisance. If you accept the status quo, the status quo will remain. You have to get out and make noise and attract a following if you want the folks in charge to pay attention to your existence.

    Trust me, you want them painting on Stonehenge for attention. This is the non-violent option. When this is ignored long enough, the non-violent option will be shelved and that’s when people will suddenly start paying attention.

    “Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.” - John F. Kennedy, 1962






  • I mean, you say that, but a new player looking to get into Stellaris or CKII is looking at a $300 bill if they want all the content. In fact that’s what prevented me from getting into Stellaris, I own the base game, but when I discovered I’d need to shell out an additional several hundred dollars, even during a sale, for not only new species but just for base game mechanics, I stopped in my tracks.

    Compare with Civilization, I own Civ V and Civ VI and all the released content for each, pretty sure I bought each of those for less than $20.


  • If we had an appropriate scheduling for it so that it could be properly researched and manufactured we could just treat it like every other plant-based medicine we have (of which there are VERY many) - isolate and extract the compounds you’re interested in and recombine them in a pill or gel or aerosol form. Making supplements or tinctures or whatever, from cannabis, wouldn’t be any more difficult than creating aspirin from willow. The only reason it’s difficult is because it’s so highly scheduled that nobody is allowed to work with it.