volkris @volkris@qoto.org
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
Keep in mind that we voters are the ones awarding those congresspeople as we actively reelect them, affirmatively going to the polls and saying, "Yes, you did a good job, have another term in office."
We don't just sit back while things happen. They don't get power unless we voters decide to stand up and give it to them.
We must remember our power and not act like we have none.... or we effectively won't.
The different branches of the US government can't trade their constitutional roles by law.
Congress, for example, can't make the Speaker and Majority leader take the place of the Supreme Court just by passing a bill, in contradiction of the Constitution.
For the same reason legislation can't transfer Congress's authority to mint money over to the Executive Branch.
So, while Congress may authorize the minting of (fine) specific platinum coins, it cannot legislatively give unbound minting authority to the Executive.
Such legislation would be invalid under the Constitution that puts that in the hands of Congress.
@LizaBrings @mlanger @DWTSquawk7600
I for one didn't see it.
Nah, it's not just about money and connections in this case.
It's also about popular figures promoting the "We have to help!" line, politicians enjoying the photo ops that come out of it, and the general public agreeing, or at least shrugging and accepting it.
We, as a country, believe we should support those people living on beaches for some reason. So that's the government we get.
We could be hands off, but we'd rather watch that money being spent, at our expense.
The sad thing is that the problem WAS already solved as the political branch of the US government decided, in light of so much analysis, to legally identify Yucca Mountain as the nuclear waste depository.
Unfortunately, the political decision was administratively, and almost certainly illegally, overridden by Obama.
And so we were set back decades and left with a mess on our hands.
Here's @jwz providing a sample comparing reach and engagement with content on #Mastodon / #Fediverse
Sure, a small sample, but it does show surprising levels of engagement vs followers.
( a #QT )
I've seen a few folks saying that despite fewer followers Mastodon has better reach, so I looked up the numbers for my last few posts: twit followe...
Congress, not the Treasury, is assigned the authority "To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;"
For the Treasury to unilaterally coin a platinum coin without authorization would be clearly illegal.
@cautionarytale@mastodon.world @GottaLaff
But this situation was caused by Democrats passing large spending bills without identifying sources for the money they authorized to spend.
If it was a GOP plan all along to hold hostages, then we really need to be holding accountable the Democratic congresspeople who handed them to hostage to hold.
There's no reason for them to have passed spending bills without borrowing authority, but that's how we got put in this position.
Well, often enough we DO effective analysis, but it doesn't matter since at its core a political institution like a government is political. It acts on subjective valuations of officials and subjective valuations of the humans being governed.
Florida is a great example. We know the negative results of continuing those subsidies. The analysis is done. However, we decide to continue those policies anyway because that represents the subjective valuations we make as a country.
Keep in mind the third option: it's not just a question of government supporting the property vs government condemning and demolishing it, but there's also simply having the public treat the property with a hands off approach.
Let the owner develop the land if he wants to, just without public subsidizes to support that private enjoyment.
@amaditalks @simontoth @rlux@hachyderm.io
If that's what the phrase means then I'd say it's a poorly worded phrase that could use some tweaking to better communicate with people who aren't already in the particular choir.
@ArenaCops @SrRochardBunson @thejenniwren
It's always funny when people start to treat the Constitution as if it was a Nostradamus composition to be decoded through some special set of steps to find the secret hidden meaning between the lines.
No, the Constitution was very clear on this particular point. Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech.
It says absolutely nothing about ethics or tolerance or harm or anything else there. It simply says Congress shall make no such law.
We are of course free to change this. We could amend the Constitution to actually talk about tolerance and limits and community standards or whatever else we would like. I would say it would be a bad idea, but at least we need to recognize what the document says before we talk about ways we might want to improve the federal government.
@SrRochardBunson @ArenaCops @thejenniwren
I don't think it has to do with morality at all since the power to regulate speech is a very practical power with very real-world implications to the authorities who would naturally want to use it in their own self-interests.
We don't have to get into matters of conformity to values in order to say that powerful people, particularly politicians, would have incentives to control what people are saying if they could.
The US first amendment restriction is one binding the hands of powerful politicians out of a recognition that regulation of speech is not a power that should be available to them, regardless of morality.
@ArenaCops @SrRochardBunson @thejenniwren
Well now you're getting into the differences between laws in different jurisdictions.
In the US it is unconstitutional to criminalize speech period.
But yes, the US has more protections for free speech, including hate speech however that might be defined, than many other countries.
@ArenaCops @SrRochardBunson @thejenniwren
Dogs and cats living together!
I think you have an over estimated opinion as to the power of legal authority (and authoritarianism in general) to make people behave well.
But you also misunderstand a lot of the laws you cite.
For example, you can say anything you want even if you are also held responsible for misleading audiences. That's not a law against speech; it's a likely civil path to recover damages caused by that speech.
But mainly we don't need to promote large amounts of political power out of fear of what might happen should the world not be tightly controlled.
There are dangers down that road.
You specifically said you were talking about a time before the pandemic, so you can't really pivot now and start bringing up the pandemic as factoring into the comparison.
It hadn't happened yet.
We can call out Biden's bad policies regardless of anything involving Trump.
But that's the opposite of his position.
Whether a person agrees with the argument or not, his stances is that some of the material in the course is obscuring Black history by spending course time and resources focusing on other issues like LGBTQ+ interests. He has pushed the College Board to revise the course to focus more solidly on the history of Black communities in the US.
You might reply that LGBTQ+ is part of Black history, and that's fair, but it's important to recognize that DeSantis is actually arguing. Not against Black history but against a course that he believes is insufficiently focused on exactly that.
@shiruken@octodon.social @molly0xfff
*shrug*
Crypto transaction fees can be about the same, or less than, credit card transaction fees.
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
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