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
Nah, seems like progress, that she is apparently recognizing it as half real!
What specific changes have you experienced over at Twitter that keep you away?
Part of the complication is that we've had generation after generation of politician outright misleading, or I would say lying, to the public about what the program is and how it works. So we have this really big perception problem to deal with now.
For example, one of the really big lies is that people pay into the program to fund their own retirements. That's not how Social Security works by law. The money people put in is required by law to be spent just like any other tax revenue, so that money is already gone, even though politicians have flat out told people otherwise their whole working lives.
That makes it tricky to do something like raise the payroll taxes since a lot of people will consider that a breaking of the agreement they thought they had. They thought they had already paid to fund the program, so the increase in taxation sounds unjustified and unfair.
Anyway, it's all a huge mess now, and everyday all of the problems are being kicked farther down the road as politicians continue to be dishonest about the history and current status of the program.
Wow
Today the Board of Supervisors approved our ordinance to ban City leaders from requiring appointed commissioners to submit undated resignation lett...
I think this highlights the role of #QT in being part of the #conversation, as it not only encourages the explicit link back to the source content, but it presents the context without requiring the follower to jump through the extra step, breaking their flow to go and find that context.
I would say that I'll always discourage screenshots. Not only does it break the link of the conversation, but using images to present text has accessibility and efficiency issues.
Part of what makes conversations valuable is seeing even the stuff a person disagrees with. If a conversation isn't worth spreading at all, then it's probably not worth replying to anyway.
Like you said, part of conversation, not just self-promotion, but that applies to promoting your own side at the exclusion of the other as well.
@dsacer keep in mind that raising the cap on income covered by the SS tax also raises benefit payouts. That's why the cap is there in the first place, to avoid paying more benefits to people who don't need it.
Anyway, I'd say either path, automatic benefit cuts or revamp to make the program sustainable, would effectively be killing the program, either as people understand it or as it is implemented.
The end result is the same: if nothing is done, the program ends, technically or perceptively.
We're already working with a sunsetting program, and the question is whether to do something about that.
The thing this, and so many responses to it, miss is that #Mastodon is effectively only one of many different applications posting to the same #Fediverse.
A person doesn't have to write longer things somewhere else and boost them through Mastodon. Instead the person could simply write the longer things, and that is that. The content will show up on Fediverse whether it is written through Mastodon or write.as or whatever else.
The real way to look at it is that Mastodon limits what a person can write. Other programs don't have those limitations, which requires threading to make up for the artificial restrictions.
So you don't have to jump through Mastodon hoops to get around those limitations, you don't have to use Mastodon at all. Use the interface that works best for what content you want to share.
Right, but that does confirm that it is good for us all.
Even if some people find it extra good, while some people find it just simply good, that's good for us all!
volkris
boosted
Journalists will never stick around this app long term sadly unless it adds quote posting. We desperately need it to communicate effectively, build on each others ideas, and add crucial context to posts. These are things replies simply do not accomplish. Also quote posting or reblogging does not = harassment! Tumblr, for instance, has had the feature since the beginning. We need it here now too 🙏🏻
@joeinwynnewood @stopgopfox@libretooth.gr
Wow, I don't know what kinds of companies you're familiar with, but yeah companies do tend to stick their noses into plant operations to make sure the plants aren't going way off track and doing bad things.
And by analogy, I would say it's REALLY REALLY IMPORTANT to keep law enforcement from going off track and doing bad things.
I don't know why you seem so trusting in law enforcement agencies, but history tells us bad things happen when they're allowed to operate without such oversight.
Something of a dumpster fire, that is...
From repeating talking points that have been long debunked through a presentation that looks like it can barely get the words out through inconsistent proposals for coming together over divisive topics... this is a train wreck.
The thing is, if Republicans really did want Social Security to end, or whatever the actual claim is, they wouldn't have to do anything.
The program is mathematically unsustainable as the administrators of the program have been warning for years. If Republicans wanted to cut Social Security they wouldn't have to face the public blowback of acting against it. They could just sit back and let it cut itself.
The whole story about Republicans wanting to cut Social Security is just really out there fear-mongering. It doesn't match the reality of how federal finances are working out.
And we really need to call out the politicians trying to sell that, well, conspiracy theory.
volkris
boosted
The best thing the Biden administration has done on infrastructure is waive Buy America provisions the president signed into law. Tonight, the president promised to enforce those regulations. https://reason.com/2023/02/07/biden-promises-to-stop-waiving-his-own-terrible-buy-american-mandates/
When I read a post like that, the thing that jumps out at me is that it kind of overlooks the actual human journalists participating in the journalism.
It focuses on this abstract notion of journalism, but that's just what we call humans engaging in that enterprise.
We do need journalists to step up and do better. I'd rather focus on that because I think it's a better way to find a solution to the problems we see than get lost in these abstractions of what journalism does or what the news does.
Journalists, be better.
@joeinwynnewood @stopgopfox@libretooth.gr
By law the DOJ answers to the president, which is the way it is held accountable through checks and balances.
The very notion that the DOJ is independent of its own chain of command is necessarily and literally proposing that it act outside of law, which again, clearly puts it as answerable to the president.
The rules say the answer to the president. When you talk about them being independent you are flat out saying the rules don't apply to this law enforcement organization.
We are of course free to amend the Constitution to give the police their own branch of government, but that sounds pretty sketchy to me, but either way until that happens it is flat out putting them above the law to say they are not bound by the existing legal structure in the US.
@joeinwynnewood @stopgopfox@libretooth.gr So you're saying employees of the DOJ think the DOJ should be more powerful? :)
But no, they're wrong. The Constitution provides only three branches of the US government, and having the DoJ answerable to a president who can be held accountable for it is part of the bedrock principle of checks and balances of the US Government.
It's natural that they want more power. We should naturally be distrustful of giving more power to the police and letting them act so outside the law.
The topic of #CitizensUnited came up, and since I pulled up this quote, I'll share it here.
There has been SO MUCH misinformation about what CU actually said, so I always encourage people to read it directly, especially since Kennedy writes with a certain artistry.
Here's one quote that I always find to capture the essence of its reasoning, showing that it's all based on individuals associating, not so much corporations:
"[The rich always have access] yet certain disfavored associations of citizens—those that have taken on the corporate [or union] form—are penalized for engaging in the same political speech.
"When Government seeks to use its full power, including the criminal law, to command where a person may get his or her information or what distrusted source he or she may not hear, it uses censorship to control thought. This is unlawful. The First Amendment confirms the freedom to think for ourselves."
https://tile.loc.gov/storage-services/service/ll/usrep/usrep558/usrep558310/usrep558310.pdf
@joeinwynnewood @stopgopfox@libretooth.gr
No, I would say that the person responsible for the department is responsible for the department always and at any time.
And that is key to the design of the US government.
It is all on the head of the president. Intentionally, that is how we are supposed to hold those agencies accountable.
@joeinwynnewood @stopgopfox@libretooth.gr @Teri_Kanefield
Right but that stuff has been debunked as a kooky conspiracy theory.
@radicalresilience Oh gosh, Fediverse is definitely very very inefficient. Any distributed platform has to be because it requires a ton of duplicated effort and overhead.
That's the tradeoff.
We've already seen a lot of instance admins expressing surprise that the platform takes a lot more resources than they expected, and that's just a symptom of it.
The way #ActivityPub and #Mastodon are designed they even melt down external webservers that aren't part of Fediverse. The system is just that unconcerned with conserving resources.
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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