Prelude to the Apocalypse

[BulletMagnet]

There are a lot of atrocities this administration continues to commit that I haven't posted about because doing so would be a full-time job, but I did feel the need to highlight this one, as it really does kind of sum up the whole goddamn thing:

Back when Elon Musk was looking to start an electric car company and private banks refused to loan him any money to do it, he instead got his startup capital in the form of taxpayer dollars from a Department of Energy subsidiary known as the Loan Programs Office.

In case you couldn't already see the punchline coming, DOGE is all but killing it.

I love the internet archive. Only makes sense they'd try to destroy that too.

In case you were under the delusion that they would stop there...

[Lemnear]

There are a lot of atrocities this administration continues to commit that I haven't posted about because doing so would be a full-time job, but I did feel the need to highlight this one, as it really does kind of sum up the whole goddamn thing:

Back when Elon Musk was looking to start an electric car company and private banks refused to loan him any money to do it, he instead got his startup capital in the form of taxpayer dollars from a Department of Energy subsidiary known as the Loan Programs Office.

In case you couldn't already see the punchline coming, DOGE is all but killing it.

I love the internet archive. Only makes sense they'd try to destroy that too.

In case you were under the delusion that they would stop there...

Too bad his attacker had shitty aim...

[BulletMagnet]

Literally just some of the stuff I read about today:

Now that we've started arresting judges, how high up the judicial branch could this go? Precisely as high as you'd expect.

Think your right to vote has been infringed? Too fucking bad.

The most important part of any effort to cut waste in the USA is, of course, to funnel even more money to the Pentagon.

Poll numbers not as high as you'd like? Obviously the pollsters are enemies of the people who need to be investigated.

No worries about any of that, though: we've got strongly worded letters.

[Sima Tuna]

I'm psyched for the new "empty shelves" initiative of the Trump Regime.

[BulletMagnet]

Turns out I actually forgot to include this doozy in yesterday's post. Because this is what Draining The Swamp looks like, right? Y'know, in case this didn't already make the picture clear enough.

Slightly more recently, for those who want to enter the country "The Right Way" and officially apply for asylum - hope you're able to fork over a grand. And if you want to sponsor an unaccompanied minor? That'll be $8,500.00, please.

Oh, and just for good measure, anyone who says the "three-fifths compromise" was bad is engaged in "DEI radical revisionist history".

[BulletMagnet]

If anyone from the US wants to take a bad trip without the need for controlled substances, pull up any article or video from before the election summing up Project 2025, and feel the truly awful chills down your spine as it reads like a point-for-point recap of what this administration has done over the past few months.

Once you've recovered from that, if you still follow any political commentators who ever said "all the concerns about that manifesto are overblown", or know anyone who voted Republican in November but insists "I had no idea it would turn out like this", please, please make a mental note to never trust a word those people say ever again.

Thank heavens Canada and Australia have managed to retain at least a shred of the basic common sense this country threw into the trash and lit on fire.

Oh, and for a quick parting shot, longtime patrons of this thread know that I have long ridiculed the notion that the right acts based on "deeply-held beliefs" of any kind - if anybody needs a specific example of why, here you go.

[BryanM]

Kanye antics are getting slightly out of hand lately. In a thread asking about a certain relative of his, an anon posted "it's not really our business frankly" and a wiser, handsomer anon replied "my brother in christ, the man said 'tweet sent'"

As for the sock puppet in chief, I didn't know or had forgotten how his ex wife (that he had raped at least once) died falling down some stairs before a non-disclosure agreement expired. And he buried her at his golf course (she hates golf) with a flat cheap plaque in the ground overgrown with grass and weeds.

Was interested in a paper by some research regarding long term storage with graphene. Particularly at the rate the bits could be altered: if RAM was effectively obsolete one day, it would be a huge, absolutely massive deal. There's still so much more that's physically possible left to be achieved...

Well the empty shelves'll be great. Embargo'ing ourselves is some 11th dimensional chess indeed...

"deeply-held beliefs"

Eh they have lots of things they believe. Mostly fear and envy over better looking, smarter, younger, stronger men with larger penises than they have. That's around 80% of it yeah.

If you invest your entire life into doing what you were told, being a chia pet and the most loyal of cattle, and you're fucking miserable... And then these hippies keep telling you it was all a waste and you could have been happy from the start by not being an unpleasant narcissistic piece of shit, then of course you can't escape the misery pit.

If you could you wouldn't have fallen into it in the first place. They've lived their entire lives inside a fiction... as we all must, imperfect beings that we are.... but not all fictional models of reality are equally as wrong or rational.

It is pretty rad we have to seriously contemplate the possibility of supreme court justices being arrested now...

If it's any comfort, I've heard people claim stupidity can only last until material reality catches up. When shit breaks and you need an egghead to fix it, even the biggest dumbass will just want to be able to buy his damn coffee or whatever.

Personally I was much more sure of the merits of accelerationism 20 years than I am now. If things do turn out ok, I'll ascribe the reason less to the material needs of the public, and more to stupid creepy metaphysical forces like a forward-functioning anthropic principle.

At this point, I'm more ready to believe in dumb plot-armor of an observer (aka, me) than I do of humanity as a whole having any redeeming qualities of note..

[ChurchOfSolipsism]

Thank heavens Canada and Australia have managed to retain at least a shred of the basic common sense this country threw into the trash and lit on fire.

That was indeed good to see. I so wish my people (which is, Germans) had also been able to put 1 and 1 together and not vote for the right wing scum that is the AfD, but alas, they got 20% in our last elections and polled highest of all parties acouple of weeks ago. We'll see if the classification as a right-wing extremist party by the office for the protection of the constitution will open at least a significant portion of people's eyes.

[ryu]

We'll see if the classification as a right-wing extremist party by the office for the protection of the constitution will open at least a significant portion of people's eyes.

Spoiler: it won't

[ChurchOfSolipsism]

We'll see if the classification as a right-wing extremist party by the office for the protection of the constitution will open at least a significant portion of people's eyes.

Spoiler: it won't

It's easy to be cynical about it (trust me, I teach politics and it's really hard for me to not be), but one representative of the AfD already left the party due to the office's decision. We'll see.

[BulletMagnet]

So much for the "emergency" Trump keeps invoking to declare himself a despot.

As I've said for years, the people who scream the loudest about the "existential threat" posed by foreigners and gangs are by far the least concerned when it comes to actually addressing the problem as opposed to exploiting it to justify racist shit. I guarantee you will not hear a single word from the "nativist" fucksticks about this.

[Sima Tuna]

The goal is to break government and cause pain. Nothing else.

[orange808]

The goal is to break government and cause pain. Nothing else.

For the people pulling the strings, it's about the money.

It's always been about the money and it always will be. The people with the capital look for suckers. They need power hungry fools and hateful cunts: an army of useful idiots and ready made puppets--while the richest hide in shadows and enjoy living absolutely perfect lives (to the limits of technology itself) while doing anything and everything they want to do at any given moment.

It's really about the money. Trump didn't come up as a grassroots surprise candidate. He was intentionally put on stage as a puppet. It's not possible for a grassroots pleb to become president in America's corrupt fake democracy system. We can debate how effective Trump has been and some buyer's remorse, but our overlords still prefer him over someone like Bernie Sanders. Anything is better than reform or a return to the accidental brief postwar economy.

Most human beings are fucking idiots; we are a mob of stupid jeering dumbshit fucking morons. Our rich overlords know this and they exploit stupidity at every opportunity.

[BulletMagnet]

Turns out not even Trump's own intelligence apparatus can support his bullshit "we're being invaded" fig leaf, so now when pressed for why it's acting like the other branches of government don't exist it just mumbles "state secrets" like the gaggle of prissy little bitches it is.

At least we got one more piece of good new out of Australia, made even more satisfying by showing that, even in a country known for its toughness, Trump supporters are just as pathetic a bunch of quivering pussies as anywhere else.

EDIT: Still need more pussies? Have some more pussies.

[BryanM]

Gemini Plays Pokemon beat Pokemon a while back... It didn't exactly capture much attention (it's not exactly the most entertaining thing to watch, with how slow it has to go since it's using a tiny dot of the datacenter's full ~2 Ghz), but honestly it's a StackGAN moment for me. It strongly suggests that if you put a language model in the pilot seat of a holistic system (which can be a homunculus of both conventional software and other neural networks that work within other domains) during training runs with the upcoming round of scaling, it should very well be possible to create things capable of reliably performing long term tasks and jobs.

Darri3D released a prototype episode of his America's Funniest Home Videos content today. It doesn't feel like it's more than three to five years that it'll be indistinguishable from the real thing.... At which point, well...............

You know how Hollywood has moved away from having 'star' celebrities? Instead of some prima-dona that asks for hundreds of $mill, you can just grab some schmuck happy to be there and give them peanuts. You can't own Arnold Schwarzenegger, but you can own Spider-Man. And he'll never age or die.

Eventually the economics will get to the point where filming actual people doesn't make sense. In the short term, special effects artists would be the first against the wall. And when it gets to the point where soap operas are all AI (maybe all the way down to the writing itself), that's pretty much when you know humanity is screwed. We'd all be animals living (hopefully) in a big zoo.

Old shitheads like Russia's elite who think it's still the 1800's and you can just conquer land through war and expand your empire, seem so absurdly out of touch with the future reality we're looking at. I guess they're out of touch with our modern reality as well, where you conquer lands with capital and not direct mass murder and rape...

I guess that's the core mental deficiency of fascists. If they were smart or patient people, they'd understand what the optimal way to be evil is. They're anti-rationalist, people run by emotions instead of reason.



That line in Jacob's Art In The Pre-Apocalypse has stuck with me lately: That it's every generation's decision if the world will have more or less suffering in the world. And we've all collectively decided there should be more.

Vaush likes to point out that nobody saw FDR coming... I would like to believe that Trump is Hoover, and the data constantly says it's possible. The post gen-x generations hate this shit. It's just, once again.... machine god manifesting within a fascist country. Perhaps not ideal.

[Sima Tuna]

Eventually the economics will get to the point where filming actual people doesn't make sense. In the short term, special effects artists would be the first against the wall. And when it gets to the point where soap operas are all AI (maybe all the way down to the writing itself), that's pretty much when you know humanity is screwed. We'd all be animals living (hopefully) in a big zoo.

With shitty popcorn entertainment, one hardly even needs to wait for AI to be able to take those jobs. Soap operas, webnovels, YA novels, cozy novels, webcomics, sleazy romance novels... All of these could probably be taken by AI either now or in the very near future.

Which is good, because the current USA administration is very much in favor of social safety nets to catch these many people when their jobs fall through and they wind up unemployed and angry, struggling to stay off the streets and looking for somebody to blame. Trump's administration is well known for its pro-worker, pro-humanist policies.

The post gen-x generations hate this shit.

Sure, I'll buy that. If we all survive the next four years (by which I mean the process of free elections survives), it's possible we could have a left reckoning movement in the USA that kicks out conservatives and leaves them in the cold for the next 16 years, which is about how long it would take for a new generation of voters to be raised who had never experienced Trump or Dubya.

The problem right now is the Trump Administration has given no indication that it is willing to abide by laws, checks and balances or the will of the people. And every indication of doing the opposite except in a few situations where the sentiment is so overwhelmingly against them that they fear to cross those lines YET.

[BulletMagnet]

Trump's brilliant plan to lower American drug prices? Blackmail countries with price controls to allow big pharma to charge them more, and assume that those corporations will, out of the goodness of their hearts, finally declare "at last, we're making enough money, we don't need any more" and charge American consumers less.

This is how you get a government "initiative" to lower drug prices that results in pharma stocks rallying.

To anyone who voted Republican this past election (because I haven't even gotten into the hundreds of billions they're looking to cut from Medicaid), for any reason, I'm sorry, you're just an irredeemable piece of shit. Fuck you.

[BryanM]

I'd be mildly surprised if we still had elections come the midterms. I'm not even sure we'll still have airports by then...

Thankfully I suppose it doesn't matter. Not like they'd have enough seats in the Senate to remove him from office. Not like legislation matters.

That one movie, The Great Dictator, where Chaplin tries to appeal to Hitler's humanity at the end is such great retroactive cringe. If fascists had humanity in them they wouldn't be fash.

Also Nintendo once made a game with Hitler in it. Also had Jesus nailed to a cross with 8-bit blood and everything. Unlike the Detective Club stuff... they don't seem to want us to remember that one...

[Blinge]

I'm sorry, you're just an irredeemable piece of shit. Fuck you.

Well that'll win them over.

[BulletMagnet]

Well that'll win them over.

There were several different polls taken around the administration's hundredth day, asking Trump voters if they were still satisfied with their choice: across the board, over 90 percent of them said they were perfectly satisfied with the results, and the most common misgivings cited were along the lines that the administration hadn't been reactionary enough. And this wasn't just card-carrying Republicans, either; the mythical "reachable non-MAGA" voters were just as gung-ho about what they've seen so far.

These people will not be won over, and even if you're thinking purely strategically it's a complete waste of time trying to appeal to the tiny handful who might, as opposed to the tens (if not hundreds) of millions who are sick to their stomachs at what's happening but the only alternative on offer is appeasement shit. Trump's voters support him specifically and proudly because they want to inflict suffering on groups they don't like, and so long as he and the GOP deliver on that front their supporters will continue to cheer them on, no matter how irreparably they destroy the both country and the world.

[BryanM]

Fuck me, I thought you were stretching things since I had heard people say there was a ~25% disappointment among their voters, but you're right. Only ~12% of 'non-MAGA' republicans say they regret their vote, with the 43% of them saying they're disappointed. What a bunch of cuckolds.

Yeah, taking delight in their self-inflicted suffering is the only silver lining in all this. Got yourself fired/deported or otherwise unpersoned? Wonderful. Keep winning. It sustains me.

[orange808]

Fuck me, I thought you were stretching things since I had heard people say there was a ~25% disappointment among their voters, but you're right. Only ~12% of 'non-MAGA' republicans say they regret their vote, with the 43% of them saying they're disappointed. What a bunch of cuckolds.

Yeah, taking delight in their self-inflicted suffering is the only silver lining in all this. Got yourself fired/deported or otherwise unpersoned? Wonderful. Keep winning. It sustains me.

It shouldn't, though. Even if these people did come around, the neoliberals will conveniently weaponise Trump to smear any future reform efforts. Not that we will get organised ever again, anyway. Sanders caught our unified rich overlords off guard once, but it won't happen again. The rich work in lockstep and game the duopoly to maintain a facade of democracy; it has no top-down chain of command, but it doesn't need to be organised tightly. Greed is a unified compass that naturally points all of them to the destination. No need to coordinate a meeting when everyone will naturally arrive at the same location, is there? The rich won't let anything get better.

All Trump is doing is poisoning the well. Even if we somehow get "out" of this, nothing will ever really change--and very little of what he's doing will ever be "undone", because neoliberals love corruption.

There's also a lot of Hillzbots repeating their usual smug "laptop class" talking points. If you go to the leopard face meal reddit, they regularly blame Bernie for this--and real lefties are downvoted into oblivion. It's just the same shit.

[BryanM]

Good things happening really are black swan events you can never be certain of. FDR basically came out of nowhere. AMLO and his allies had to work his ass off for decades, and now Mexico is like the only country going in a better direction.

Vicente Fox can only cope and seethe at the indefinite over 60% approval rating they have.

There's also a lot of Hillzbots repeating their usual smug "laptop class" talking points. If you go to the leopard face meal reddit, they regularly blame Bernie for this--and real lefties are downvoted into oblivion. It's just the same shit.

They really do poison the well exactly like the fascists do. Like I kept saying every single day back in 2015, these people are more dangerous than the nazis. In order to even GET to fight the nazis, we have to defeat them first.

You can't protect your house when your room-mates keep opening the door to let fuckin' vampires inside, laughing as they eat your friends and family and beloved pet dog.

Fortunately terminally online freaks (*waves*) are not normal people. They're an extreme minority, the problem is capital elevated them to positions of power. Their representation in the actual voting block are just like 'non-MAGA' republicans: Cuckolds who'll go blue no matter who. ie, irrelevant.

Of course this is all hypothetical, there aren't going to be elections anymore and we'll eventually be replaced with robots. There's a reason I was depressed as hell during the entirety of 2016, that was our last shot to do anything good through political means. Now whatever happens to our civilization as a whole is in the hands of fascists and tech companies. Whee.

---

I watched that art in the pre-apocalypse video again, as I do once or twice or fifty times a year. It really struck me how fuckin' easy it is to sell leftist politics compared to corporate politics: There are slogans that cut right to the bone like "Billionaires own the government. Tell me again this isn't capitalism."

They had her hold hands with the Cheneys. Anyone who doesn't admit that they're paid to lose at this point is an absolute clown and I hold them in contempt as much as the accidental self face-eaten people.

[BulletMagnet]

Just in case anyone needed an excuse to return to the tech apocalypse, I can't help but note that The Party of States' Rights insisted on sneaking a provision into the "One Big Beautiful Bill" (because their lips totally aren't spot-welded to Daddy's cock) that prohibits individual states from implementing any and all limitations on AI for ten years. Measures to boost AI, however, are fair game.

As one commentator rather sagely put it, thank goodness nobody in the administration has any sort of vested interest in the uncontested spread of AI, else we peasants might imagine something could possibly be slightly untoward.

Speaking of the Big Beautiful Dic...Bill, if you see headlines stating "the rich get the biggest breaks, but taxes are reduced for everyone" they're omitting a crucial part of the story: even if you don't care that by any measure it skyrockets the national debt (another Deeply Held Belief bites the dust...again), and further discount the fact that the tariffs and cuts to Medicaid and other social services will more than cancel out the meager scraps the non-wealthy get on taxes (and you shouldn't, though many "analysts" do), not only are the high-end breaks permanent while those for lower earners are temporary, the latter will actually increase, and significantly, after Trump (presumably) leaves office, to the tune of, by 2031, those earning less than $30,000 will see a 20.6% hike, while those making under $15,000 will be shouldering an increase of 74.3%.

And remember, said bill is only stalled at the moment because a bunch of Republicans screamed that it didn't utterly disembowel the proles enough.

One more time: if you voted for this state of affairs, you are a willing tool of the plutocrats, a shitty citizen and a shitty human being, not necessarily in that order. Fuck you.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Just in case anyone needed an excuse to return to the tech apocalypse, I can't help but note that The Party of States' Rights insisted on sneaking a provision into the "One Big Beautiful Bill" (because their lips totally aren't spot-welded to Daddy's cock) that prohibits individual states from implementing any and all limitations on AI for ten years. Measures to boost AI, however, are fair game.

As one commentator rather sagely put it, thank goodness nobody in the administration has any sort of vested interest in the uncontested spread of AI, else we peasants might imagine something could possibly be slightly untoward.

Speaking of the Big Beautiful Dic...Bill, if you see headlines stating "the rich get the biggest breaks, but taxes are reduced for everyone" they're omitting a crucial part of the story: even if you don't care that by any measure it skyrockets the national debt (another Deeply Held Belief bites the dust...again), and further discount the fact that the tariffs and cuts to Medicaid and other social services will more than cancel out the meager scraps the non-wealthy get on taxes (and you shouldn't, though many "analysts" do), not only are the high-end breaks permanent while those for lower earners are temporary, the latter will actually increase, and significantly, after Trump (presumably) leaves office, to the tune of, by 2031, those earning less than $30,000 will see a 20.6% hike, while those making under $15,000 will be shouldering an increase of 74.3%.

And remember, said bill is only stalled at the moment because a bunch of Republicans screamed that it didn't utterly disembowel the proles enough.

One more time: if you voted for this state of affairs, you are a willing tool of the plutocrats, a shitty citizen and a shitty human being, not necessarily in that order. Fuck you.

Suppose if the Democratic presidential nominee, Kamala Harris, had won the presidency, would she have done what Trump has done (implementing DOGE, cutting various government entities including doing away with the ADA {American Disabilities Act} act passed back in 1990 by President Bush Sr., raising tariffs, etc.) since taking office back in January, 20th, 2025? The USA would've gotten it's first ever female president -- something for the record/history books for sure, indeed (plus America's first ever "First Gentleman" with her husband, Doug Engleman). There's talk/chatter about Kamala running for the upcoming top California spot helmed by Gov. Gavin Newsom as she does have a house in Southern California.

On the news today, 5/18/2025 -- there was mention/talk about of a cutback of tariffs to a more respectable (and reasonable) 30% and 10% with China (rather than the insane amount of 145% and up) as both the American & Chinese superpowers are interlinked in regards to shipping & receiving imports/exports for everyone's liveilyhoods (not to mention the upcoming 2025 Christmas shopping season being affected by the tariff increases to the point that with some retailers (it doesn't make viable and economic sense to receive merchandise goods to sell to the masses at a higher pricepoint passed on to the general public for said price hikes -- if that's the case, then so be it) not being to get their allotted holiday wares to sell whatsoever, then they're really screwed "big time" with folks not being able buy the much wanted & desired presents for their loved ones -- meaning less holiday merchandise to sell on the retailers' shelving).

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[Sima Tuna]

not being to get their allotted holiday wares to sell whatsoever, then they're really screwed "big time" with folks not being able buy the much wanted & desired presents for their loved ones -- meaning less holiday merchandise to sell on the retailers' shelving

That's going to happen already, from all accounts. What gets ordered in Q1 is sold in Q3 iirc. The gap from the lack of shipping during the 145% tariffs is going to hit at some point and there will be shortages. Will it hit during the christmas rush? Or will the situation be stabilized in time? I think that's up for debate.

The damage to "christmas" won't be so much to families unable to buy things. The real damage will be the thousands of small and medium size businesses that file for bankruptcy because they require christmas sales to keep their business in the black.

Consumer spending is the bedrock of the entire system and Trump's tariffs are taking a wrecking ball to it. 145% was essentially a blockade on all products from China. 30% is low enough that these companies will still ship stuff to us, but a 30% price increase is still massive in an economy where consumer debt is at all time highs and people are using Klarna to pay for Doordash. We are debt spending our fucking cheeseburgers now. There is no blood left in this stone! It's done.

[BryanM]

Fast food is a real meme now. Luxury dining at luxury prices, eh?

Here's my old man rant:

Back in my day, the Burger King Whopper cost $1. Not $3. Not $0. ONE DOLLAR.

When I moved to San Antonio and visited their Burger King, they asked for TWO dollars. 'What kind of godless land is this?' I wondered, perturbed at seeing something so unnatural. So against the grace of god and the natural order of things.

Argh.

Earlier this year I had lunch with family, and when asked 'where do you want to go' ten thousand times relented to 'how about iHOP?' Most of the menu is price-gouged flour, but I remembered that the hamburgers there were pretty reasonable. Something like 4 to 7 bucks for a nice burger, fries, there may or may not have been a pickle or some kind of other side.

Got shut down and went to a local joint instead.

Checked the prices on the iHOP website, it was like $17 for something like I vaguely remembered. Lots of $0.20 slabs of bread being sold for over ten buckeroos, too.

Corporate demands more profit, and the only way to make more money when your customer base is shrinking is to make the number go up. People can only eat so much in a day, after all.

I get some joy in hearing about the industry suffering. They should suffer some more, pricing things like they're a real three star restaurant. Neither god nor the devil could conceive of such a thing, only a horrible lovecraftian shoggoth could.

One of the very few bright points of my mis-alignment with normos is that nobody eats liver, despite it being a delicious way for your body to not wither and kill itself like so many miserable Americans seem to be absolutely obsessed with doing. I get it's physically impossible to eat it for every meal due to vitamin A poisoning being a thing, but at ~$3 a pound it's crazy these monkies are sleeping on this sweet deal.

Funny how they can afford to pack and ship the liver and still make a worthwhile profit at like $3.10 a pound, eh.

[Sima Tuna]

Sardines are another great non-normie food. You can load up on protein cheaply and sustainably with sardines. The price for sardines now is the same as it was 10 years ago. Throughout all of covid, the price went up not a jot. I can only assume because almost nobody buys them. Yet every store still stocks them!

They do vary quite a bit in quality (considering "sardine" is not a single species of fish iirc.) So you will have to try a few until you find a reasonably consistent brand. Even within the same brand, they source from different locations at times and you will want to find a brand that maintains consistency in both flavor and texture. But once you do find that, sardines packaged in water are about the healthiest and cheapest protein source you can buy. The taste is comparable to tuna but moister and with better flavor. I can eat them out of the tin, but you can use them in just about anything you want. Tacos, sandwiches, salads, crackers with mustard, whatever you want.

A can of sardines is a dollar and it's been a dollar since I've been buying them, nearly 15 years ago. You can get sales sometimes for even less but generally you won't spend more than a dollar for a can. You might pay a dollar fitty or $2 for a larger can with some premium smoked herring or something.

Fast food is a joke these days. The food used to be $1 and taste like it should be $1. Now it costs $10 and tastes like it should be $1. Considering the high price of food at the grocery store, I really can't afford to pay the inflated prices of other people preparing my food + tips + delivery fee (if you get food delivered.)

The Klarna thing is really indicative of how much Americans are struggling though. Using Klarna to cover fast food. I also think a lot of Americans are doomspending right now because they have no hope. They'd rather spend all their money immediately (and even go into debt) because they believe hyper-inflation is coming and their money will soon be valueless anyway. I don't see many people in the USA talking about their high hopes for the future, especially not in terms of their personal finances and quality of life.

[BryanM]

The Klarna thing is really indicative of how much Americans are struggling though. Using Klarna to cover fast food. I also think a lot of Americans are doomspending right now because they have no hope. They'd rather spend all their money immediately (and even go into debt) because they believe hyper-inflation is coming and their money will soon be valueless anyway. I don't see many people in the USA talking about their high hopes for the future, especially not in terms of their personal finances and quality of life.

Hm, the new blanket sales tax sure is gonna help everyone I'm certain. Good thing we cut services and income taxes. I was worried a hungry kid might get a free sandwich and learn something. (Banning counties and entire states from giving kids free meals is so emblematic of their evil. Yeah, we don't want those little shits getting a free ride. That's what's most important to care about right now.)

It's kind of crazy how all fascists seem to want to destroy their own country. Russia plunking its present and future into the garbage can for no reason is especially insane; stories about criminals being allowed to go home sooner than regular drafted citizens are insane. Fascists are insane.

The future fate of money is a weird one. Sam Altman wrote an essay a long time ago called 'Moore's law for everything' that really does convey the libbed-up perspective on the matter. That having machines do everything will cause hyper deflation and you could buy a mansion for like a thousand bucks or whatever.

The leftist perspective is of course, once they don't need our labor, why would they want to keep us around or take care of us. Fascists certainly have a solution in mind for that problem.

Ugh, talking about libbed-up capitalist realism, there's this guy on Youtube called Dave Shapiro who is a bit on the crankpot side of things when it comes to AI predictions. He wears a Next Generation T-shirt and cosplays as Picard. I found him amusing to listen to in the background sometimes: I like to defend his crankery because at least he has the courage to be interesting, right?

Guessing timelines has always been profoundly unfair in my opinion. If someone says AGI is coming in 40 years, if ever, they're a very serious person. But if they say it's coming next year, they're a crazy pants-on-the-head lunatic. However, if in reality it comes in 10 years, the pants-on-head lunatic was more accurate!

Now tell me, does that seem fair to you?

It's like reverse Price Is Right rules. If you're even a month under you're a clown. But if you're ten thousand years too late, you're a reasonable and sane person. Nothing Ever Happens is considered sane and rational, Something Will Happen is considered unhinged, dangerous, and insane.

Anyway, I bring Dave up because the #1 thing he seems to be interested in is post-labor economics. Something I find profoundly weird because he's really interested in it, the talk-about-it-all-day kind of interested. I've thought about it a little bit, in that we might want to pay people to have fun and perform hobbies together to create some reason and incentive for humans to interact and bond with other humans. But nothing more deeply than that.

It obviously would be some combination of energy rationing, fend-for-yourselfism, and shoving people into a nice meat grinder for fertilizer. That's in the utopian outcomes.

But in the less speculative here and now, it really hits home how conditioned we are to value things in terms of money. How people are willing to let their bodies rot because taking care of it even the tiniest bit doesn't make money. Destroying their bodies in exchange for money. Caring about things, but only if it can make you some money.

Ben Carson being able to separate siamese twins joined at the head but having no interest in knowing things in general sure is a testament to something or other. I really find him inspirational for people who think they're 'too dumb' or can't do something. Cracked-out sex-addicted drug addicts can make music, you can too. If Ben Carson can perform brain surgery, you can do anything. All it takes is exposure: If you put in the time and effort on something, you'll eventually become competent at it. It'll take years for some things, but progress can be made little by little with even as little as five to ten minutes a day.

A can of sardines is a dollar and it's been a dollar since I've been buying them, nearly 15 years ago.

Hmph it's almost like inflation is bullshit and the minimum wage being the same as it was 17 years ago has a kind of anchoring effect on things.

[Sima Tuna]

Hmph it's almost like inflation is bullshit and the minimum wage being the same as it was 17 years ago has a kind of anchoring effect on things.

At least for products that a) many people already don't buy, b) many people don't need to buy (non-essential,) and c) which are healthily competitive.

There are multiple canned fish brands in every store. Plenty of people won't buy canned fish at all, so the canned fish guys can't all jack up their prices in concert. Their buyers would just buy less or not buy any. And fish is one of many protein sources and there are many alternatives.

So the canned sardine market is kind of a microcosm of what a healthy, truly open and free trade market would look like, isn't it? There's no monopoly stepping in with greedflation to force you to buy sardines at $5/can because you have no other choice if you want to eat meat at all. With a lot of other products, it becomes really obvious how monopolies and crony corporatism drive up costs for ever-increasing profits. Because the little fish aren't an in-demand, hip, fashionable, easily-marketed product with a single-company stranglehold in the market, they can't just charge whatever the fuck they want.