It is going to hurt, and to my understanding it’s already begun impacting businesses. The only salve I can offer is that us Americans are going to hurt a whole lot more. Hopefully, Liberal is able to maintain power up there, and is working on new trade deals with new partners. Nothing the U.S. produces is really unique, so alternatives can be found, but it’s going to take time to set-up new agreements.
It would be a whole lot cooler if we had actual dragons hoarding all this, as opposed to metaphorical ones.
There really aren’t any other moves to take. It’s either this or lie down.
Also, I will say that tariffs can be a lot easier to manage if you only implement them against one of your trading partners. While major imports from that trading partner, and any goods produced with any of those imports, will see a price hike, most Western countries have very diversified economies and can make up the difference elsewhere. The real trouble begins when you start having blanket tariffs affecting all of your major trade partners, which seems to be Trump’s plan.
I didn’t know people could spin from pure happiness. This can all be traced back to him, I bet the only thing he’d be mad about is that he couldn’t be king too.
It’s also extremely disingenous to claim that our country doesn’t support Trump. A majority of Americans are happy to support the status quo that Trump represents. They’re just mad that the billionaires have dropped the mask and stopped using lube while fucking them, but they still want to be fucked. They voted for neoliberal exploitation this election, just like they voted for neoliberal exploitation in the last dozen elections. If Americans really wanted to avoid fascism, they should have started doing something about it at least 40 years ago.
Well, I managed to avoid my mother’s mistake of marrying one of the first guys I seriously dated, so I haven’t had to go through a divorce yet like she did. However, she’d owned two houses by now, and I’ll be lucky to get one before 40. Seems like no.
Absolute apeshit pandemonium. Countries don’t typically become nuclear powers overnight, global powers would get freaked out trying to figure out where they got the fissile material from. Russia might just assume Europe and attempt to glass the continent, though one would hope the Ukrainians would pre-emptively strike and disable parts of Russia’s nuclear arsenal with the opening salvo.
This post and the numerous replies affirming our clones wouldn’t try to kill us makes me wonder, what is the basis for this trope? Is it just the assumption that any doppelganger must be evil? I wonder what the cultural origins are, would it be European fae?
Anyway, I’m pretty sure my clone would still try to kill me, but it’d be doing so out of kindness. I’ve always wanted to die on my feet in combat, and I’ve never wanted to live, so we’d kinda be fighting over who gets the privilege of death. Whichever one of us wins has to keep going, while the other gets released.
Don’t be in awe of that. I drink it black because I have made poor decisions in my life, and the coffee is less bitter than I am.
My familial line. Sorry nerds, the buck stops here. I’m not gonna force anyone else into this hellscape against their will. If I ever adopt, they can keep their familial names.
I’m wondering if the people suggesting it for planetary travel have played Portal 2. It uh…it doesn’t end too well when they try.
Like, I can only shoot two portals ever? Single-use would imply only being able to shoot one portal, but that doesn’t seem very useful.
Also wasn’t portal travel hella toxic? To the point that it killed Cave Johnson? I sure as hell won’t be using it to save time on my commute or anything.
I think I’d have to use it for violence, like sending a war criminal off a large building, but you couldn’t even really have fun with it. Everyone fantasizes about launching a billionaire straight into space, but you’d need multiple portals to get them into a situation where they’re building momentum first.
Also, if there’s no material emancipation grids, are the portals just there forever? The portal gun doesn’t have an off switch or a way to deactivate existing portals.
I mean, Musk et al absolutely were meddling in the German election, there was a post last week examining a study that concluded far-right AFD friendly posts were getting boosted on TikTok and X prior to the election.
I feel like our standards and definitions of “free” elections have been utterly fucked in the social media age. I don’t know if Musk actually hacked voting machines, and I doubt any fake votes were cast, but does it really make any difference? If someone is voting for AFD because they’re trapped in a disinformation bubble on X, how much different is that from just buying votes? Musk is controlling that voter either way.
I’m not really sure what we’re meant to do about it, but I think this is a crisis-level threat to Western civilization. If we can’t figure out how to have elections free of interference, democracy is going to keep sliding over to fascism.
Germans managed to buy themselves time, but I’m still worried by AFD’s gains. It’s good to hear Merz is at least unwilling to form a coalition with AFD, but I don’t know how long that’s going to last since Merz is a piece of shit too.
A CDU/CSU + SPD coalition seems like peak neoliberalism though, so fascism is going to knock on Germany’s door again. Hopefully those plans to ban AFD seriously materialize before then.
Please, Reagan would be fucking thrilled. After the Republicans installed their dream government style in Russia after the Soviet Union collapse, it’s been their goal to bring it to America. The only thing that would make Reagan disappointed is that he didn’t get to be king.
As much as it pains me, same. Lots of Americans are going to die, but at this point we deserve it. We’ve been sleepwalking into fascism for over 40 years, and have ignored every single warning we were given. I used to care about us being united, because I know what the fate of red states will be if Balkanization happens, but now? Fuck 'em. Let’s just split apart so we no longer have to support all these MAGA welfare queens in Alabama and Mississippi. Let corporate interests swoop in and go full classical colonialism on their weak economies. If they really want to work in sweatshops for nickels, fuckin let them. My blue state is strong enough to stand alone, I know most other blue states are, so what’s the point in defending the people a collapse will hurt the most when they voted for it?
You should have had that nervous eye twitch for the last 40 years, the U.S. was doing plenty of fucked up shit even when we were projecting calm security. The first Trump presidency was the wake-up call to the rest of the world to start cutting ties with us, it actually blows my mind how little there was in place internationally for when he won again. Sanctions should have been placed on us, trade agreements dissolved, we should be getting isolated right now. I’m sure we’ll get there eventually, but it might be too late by then.
Y’know the interesting thing is, I’ve never had a poor old person talk condescendingly to me about economic prospects. The elderly widow taking public transit, counting their coupons, and desperately trying to stretch their dead husband’s pension check has never lectured me about pulling myself up by my boot-straps. Similarly, I’ve never called any of these people a Boomer pejoratively. To me, the stereotype of a Boomer has very little to do with age, and everything to do with socioeconomic status, and I absolutely will keep insulting the Boomer fucks that pulled the ladder up behind them.
Now this is science I can get behind! Let’s get someone behind me!
Huh, I really thought the other members of the Five Eyes would be kicking us out. Well, I guess if they don’t want to remove us, we’ll start making plans to leave.