You’re being generous. I’m part of a lot of communities that are clearly not being moderated.

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But not having books on your shelves is not a green flag, it just might not be a red flag.

He might be federally barred from office. On March 4, 2024, his insurrection trial will start and if he is found guilty it would be very difficult for any legal system to state he can still hold federal office.

Federal courts might call this a non-justiciable political question. Individual states might bar him from the ballot, but good luck getting a lot of red states to do that.

Liberals: I learned my lesson making predictions in November 2020.

You mean 2016.

insurance is part of health plans. There is a deductible and an out-of-pocket max, which are both designed to protect you from those catastrophic risks. But because those catastrophic risks are best addressed by preventative care, and regular checkups, and freakin’ gym memberships, so the economics of insuring health becomes the economics of health incentivization, fucking around to figure out what it takes to get people to take care of themselves in advance rather than waiting but not getting people to go to doctors for frivolous issues.

health insurance isn’t really insurance either.

it’s like a health services subscription plan with a million convoluted rules.

Hamas’s goal is not to make you think they’re the good guys, their goal is to eradicate Israel and the Jewish people, and/or to die trying. They’ve been turning sentiment in their favor.

Plenty of people argue that Hamas is not a terrorist organization.

Israel is relatively popular in the US, but younger Americans and many circles within academia are rabid antizionists, as I think you’ve seen. Many are calling to “globalize the intifada.”

Hamas has not succeeded in making the average westerner think terrorism is good, but they have succeeded in normalizing terrorism, making more people think that “terrorism” is an Islamophobic term, making more people think that Israel does not have the right to exist, and emboldening antisemites on the right and left. Younger generations are more and more aggressively antizionist as time goes on.

Settler expansion is a problem that’s more complicated and less exciting to people than the war. It makes sense that antizionists want us to focus on the war and just use settler expansion for color.

This study from the GWU Program on Extremism is an important read on the topic of Hamas’s presence in the US over time.

My electric toothbrush works in four 30-second increments. Each 30 seconds is plenty of time for me to cover a quadrant. I slowly go over the outside, inside, top/bottom, gums in each quadrant. Maybe if I was meticulously brushing each tooth one by one, I could see the issue, but that’s not necessary, is it?

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oh hey there, I recognize you

Hasn’t Batman also, in some media, gone blow for blow with Superman-level opponents without dying? Like, he’s not as strong as them, and superhuman strength isn’t technically a superpower he has, but…

No. Even if you could match the current fictional character’s tech and computing power and budget and incoherent physical strength, those really are not what make Batman Batman. It’s the intellect, the iron will, the sheer level of badassery that can only be achieved in fiction where an author has him appear behind the villain just to show what an impossible nightmare Batman truly is.

Being able to pretend that he’s Bruce Wayne sometimes certainly helps, though. He’s a good actor.

I don’t think any secret agent could rival any of those fictional characters. They have incredible plot armor, depending on the scenario. James Bond is an idiot who fucks every woman who moves, even when he knows they’re there to trap him, but has a magic dick that hypnotizes them onto his side.

Batman with prep time is an unstoppable force who could take down every army in the world at once if he really needed to.

No, no human can compare to these characters.

(sorry, I don’t know why I never posted this, I have way too many tabs open)

You know this is propaganda right? That number never came from Hamas go find them quoting it as fact, I’ll wait.

Well, let’s see, where did the Telegraph get its 8,000 number from?

On Sunday the Hamas-controlled Gaza health ministry claimed the death toll among Palestinians passed 8,000, with most of them women and children.

… gee, I didn’t even have to dig one layer deep, the Telegraph itself tells you it’s from Hamas. =/

Let’s focus on the 500, though, who cites the number as a Hamas claim verified by literally nobody else?

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/19/world/middleeast/gaza-hospital-blast-deaths.html

And who else commented on the number?

the Al-shifa hospital director, who estimated it was half of that.

But Hamas just knew in less than 20 minutes, somehow, that it was 500.

The number came from an interview with a doctor right after the attack and it was mistranslated on Aljazeera.

Does the doctor work for Hamas?

Gee, I wonder how a Hamas employed doctor managed to count 500 dead bodies within 20 minutes. Israel is still trying to tally its dead, but Hamas managed to pronounce 500 people dead just in time to falsely accuse Israel of attacking the hospital on Al Jazeera?

I love software freedom, federated networks, proper encrytption, and all of that too.

But I’m not kidding myself into thinking that it’s worth losing friends over. Do facebook and IG suck? yeah. But that’s where the social network is. The product isn’t the software, it’s the network.

That’s kind of the point of the fediverse, that we can expand to achieve a large-scale network that creates the same positive network effects as a social network like… well, more like reddit or twitter, primarily due to the norm of anonymity, probably not a replacement for facebook, but…

Anyway… I think that, depending on the specifics, it might actually be a good idea to federate with Threads, just to expand the network, gain mainstream appeal, normalize the fediverse, and drive engagement here.

Pizza with pineapple, night drive, Singing in the shower, a bit too much sweetness (but I’m thin) poor comedy or something like that?

something like that. I like “singing in the shower,” it’s cute and not too common and there’s really nothing wrong with it.

How do you stroke a giraffe’s head?

Is that what you meant?

I like metal, rock, Glukhovsky’s books and shrek (I gave up writing about sci-fi and r&m to sound more normal)

I think “Glukhovsky” just sounds like a much, much more obscure way of saying “sci-fi.” And I think Shrek kind of sounds… both like something everybody likes, and like a childish thing to focus on. Like, I like Shrek, but it is a children’s movie series that came out in 2001, so how about…

I like metal, rock, sci-fi literature (I’m a big fan of Glukhovsky), and (something else, maybe something more abstract, like “ordering dessert” or “the sound my cat makes when I pet it” or “comfy sweaters” or "food that’s just a little bit too spicy* or something).

then…

Looking for my next ex (joke)

… nope. I understand the joke. You do not want to make a joke that takes people to a negative place. Also, this particular joke is a cliche, so it’s not even funny anymore.

You say Hamas wants all Palestinians to be martyrs.

I pointed out how much Hamas loves it when Palestinians die.

what is the disconnect?

why do you people think Israel wants to kill civilians? Do you really think the IDF is just hundreds of thousands of monsters who love killing? What is wrong with you people?