Which could be true in the same way Reagan freed the Iranian hostages.

Our collective anuses.

We can ignore the Geneva Conventions starting with Pete Hegseth.

It'll happen. Three minutes later, they'll discover what a bad idea it is to kick people out of the army in the middle of a recruiting shortage. Nothing will be learned and they'll skip along to the next bad idea.

So we use a black hole to bend space time and look into the past where it isn't. We know where it isn't in the past.

If the US does end up dropping out of NATO and Europe keeps it as a military alliance, they should think about kicking Turkey out. It's held on for geopolitical reasons that only the US really cares about. It's otherwise been a problem child for decades.

It's way more pleasant than a drive. We also have an EV, and while we can make that range, charging infrastructure isn't good in northwest Wisconsin, and the Twin Cities are falling behind there, too. Southeast Wisconsin and Chicagoland are much better.

Trains are generally a better environmental option than EVs, anyway, and they can be a more practical option if we fucking try.

Even as it is, I prefer taking the train on this route if possible.

Other way around. Amtrak does have priority on all tracks per the 1973 Amtrak Improvement Act. However, this isn't enforced, and the rail companies are kicking and screaming to keep it from being enforced.

Northeast coordinator is where Amtrak is at its best. Their coverage of the rest of the country is only barely worthwhile on cost and time.

As bad as it is, when it does work out, it's way, way better than flying.

Took a trip to Minneapolis on Amtrak from Columbus, WI (closest station to my house in Madison). Everything is so much more low key than air travel. Seats are fairly comfy, and have legroom that might even beat first class air travel. Food is . . . no worse than airlines.

Most of all, I didn't feel tired at the end of the trip. Air travel always makes me want to spend the rest of the day in bed.

We'd probably go out of Wisconsin Dells next time. It takes the train an hour to go between the Dells and Columbus, and the extra drive time is less than that. But we also found this wonderful pizzeria not far from the station in Columbus, so idk.

Did some math on the Social Security Admin actuarial tables a bit ago. For a 79 year old man, he has a 30% chance of just keeling off on his own in the next 4 years. Probably higher than that, because he's not in good health and eats a lot of McDonalds.

That's the beauty of MkUltra. You don't get to volunteer. You'll find out decades later why you had an incredibly weird day of freaking out.

I think people might overstate how much the Overview Effect would help.

John Glenn's time in congress had him oppose nuclear proliferation, fix safety and environmental problems at nuclear weapon storage facilities, and to clean up nuclear waste. He also supported the B-1 bomber program, was wrapped up in the Keating Five corruption scandal, voted against gun locks for transferring pistols, and voted against a underage tobacco usage amendment. He generally supported every defense department budget bill.

Bill Nelson voted for the Patriot Act--just like everyone else in the Senate except Feingold--and also voted against a mandate for a 2007 complete withdrawal from Iraq.

It's all a mixed bag, at best. It's not going to magically transform our political system.

Not everyone comes out of that shifting to a less authoritarian position. For most people, it does seem to do that, but not all. Psychedelics are common among white supremacists, and it tends to make them even more authoritarian.

https://www.liberalcurrents.com/psychedelics-and-the-far-right-the-psychnautzi-effect/

Switch up "unscathed" for "have some kind of functional country with a democracy not particularly worse than what we've had".

Start building unions, mutual aid, and other grassroots political support. It's time to start getting out of our post-election shock and turn frustration into action.

The part that saves it is that Vance can't generate the kind of support that Trump does. He'd definitely fuck stuff up, but fascism is so much about The Guy that anybody but Trump would not be able to build militant support. That is, the kind that makes reporters afraid to say anything bad about the Administration.

It consolidates it, but that means the in-group is smaller. Fascisim is a death cult in the long run as it has to keep everyone focused on an enemy, but they have to invent a new enemy if they defeat that one.

https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/umberto-eco-ur-fascism

For Ur-Fascism there is no struggle for life but, rather, life is lived for struggle. Thus pacifism is trafficking with the enemy. It is bad because life is permanent warfare. This, however, brings about an Armageddon complex. Since enemies have to be defeated, there must be a final battle, after which the movement will have control of the world. But such a “final solution” implies a further era of peace, a Golden Age, which contradicts the principle of permanent war. No fascist leader has ever succeeded in solving this predicament.

Same management energy that succeeds in going bankrupt running a casino.

It's an overlooked way to combat fascism. Get them to eat each other in a corner rather than taking out their rampant sexual frustrations on the rest of us.

North America is more than the continental USA.

Canadian passenger service isn't much better than the US. Mexico isn't too bad.