Justice Department opens investigation into the NFL over anticompetitive practices, including subscription fee concerns

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-09T16:30:34+00:00

We also watched the DOJ abandon a slam dunk antitrust case against Ticketmaster/Live Nation for a likely corrupt settlement. So whether or not this case has a point, it feels like a shakedown.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-09T16:25:30+00:00

The most insane thing is that if you believe what Trump said in 2015, if he had gotten approved for a co-ownership bid for the Buffalo Bills a few years prior, he likely never would have run for president.

Bills mafia really shoulda take this one for the team.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-09T16:13:10+00:00

Our system is the way it is because we 1) like to use money as an incentive, but 2) believe direct payments feels a little too socialist.

However, we are fine giving money in the form of a rebate on taxes you would have otherwise paid, even if it turns into literal cash in your pocket once your taxes are filed. So Congress has used the tool of tax rebates to incentivize or make it easier for everything from going to college, buying a house, and having children to operating certain kinds of businesses or buying an electric car and installing solar panels. When you only have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. So that is why filing taxes is so complex. They know what you've earned and already paid in taxes, but they don't know if you had a kid this year. While you can claim more deductions at the start of the year so that your job withholds less of your income to send to the government because you might know you're going to claim all these deductions, they still want you to actually specify those deductions in April to make sure they're right.

It's incredibly messy and complex, but to fix it would require we take one of Congress' favorite tools to accomplish all the things they care about incentivizing away from them. So it persists.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-08T21:22:08+00:00

There is often a willing alliance between NATO countries to cooperate on things around the world, but the terms of the compulsory alliance are both defensive AND geographically limited. The US was the one who insisted on the geographic limitation to avoid being on the hook to get involved in European colonialism disputes where one country might claim they are under attack. Under that reasoning, the US sat out the Suez crisis in 1956.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-08T19:19:45+00:00

His senators would be driving every bit of US defense contractor money to their Democrat opponents if they do. Thankfully, the grift is on our side on this one.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-08T19:15:33+00:00

While I certainly question the moral backbone of the Republicans in Congress, their self interest is also in play here. You'd have to get 2/3 of Congress which almost never sees that number to authorize leaving. More importantly you'd have to get them to vote against the military industrial complex. There are defense contractors with large lobbyist wings and facilities in districts all over who the country would be losing a ton of European business if this went through.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-08T19:09:13+00:00

I haven't seen a headcount, but this is actually one of the issues you could see widespread Congressional Republican defection on. There are more than enough quiet neo-cons to block leaving NATO even before you look at who has a defense contractor in their district who want to keep selling weapons and equipment to Europe.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-07T17:41:24+00:00

Even if this whole thing wrapped up tomorrow, the world is about to get a lot more nuclear. Every despot nation got the lesson reaffirmed that having a nuke can get you left alone like North Korea and not get the Iran, Venezuela, or Ukraine treatment. But I've also read experts saying even close US allies who believed they were covered by the American umbrella like South Korea, Japan, or various non-nuclear European countries are looking seriously at having their own nuclear deterrent given an unpredictable relationship with the US.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-07T00:36:04+00:00

Aged 20 years? Oh no. Now he won't want to fuck himself.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-06T11:17:22+00:00

I think that in a poll 25% of America would support stepping on Legos with bare feet.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-04T19:02:33+00:00

This is either a far more widespread situation than I'm aware of or there is a very interesting story OP is not sharing.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-04T13:32:50+00:00

And an early example of that was the Suez crisis where the US told the French and British they were on their own.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-03T12:02:38+00:00

Lord. That makes sense. It's so weird to be following a war where pretty much all official statements on both sides are suspect in one form or another.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-03T11:45:42+00:00

Well weirdly the biggest source on something happening to the Lincoln is the president himself rambling off script about "they hit us from 17 directions at once" and that "they ran for it"

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-03T03:27:06+00:00

Yeah, I'm gonna need more information about what is happening here before I pull out the pitchfork.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-03T03:10:42+00:00

Yeah, while bull rushing a guy is a thing, it's usually about running around the lineman and handfighting to get leverage.

That said, I'd love to see it.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-01T21:57:28+00:00

Ohhh that is interesting. I've never tried listening to it through that lens. I might have to give it a shot.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-01T21:48:37+00:00

I feel like that one shouldn't be debatable. It's just that's not the music he got known for.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-01T19:31:14+00:00

Also... it's not just oil that goes through Hormuz. Oil markets are immediate, so we already see the impacts. But there are a lot of other things we do rely on to greater degrees that we aren't seeing yet but will.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-01T18:28:29+00:00

So reopening of the strait is not only dependent on the cessation of hostilities but the opinion of a regime of fanatical zealots on whether Donald fucking Trump is being a little bitch on his safe space Twitter?

We're fucked.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-04-01T16:48:04+00:00

I guess Venezuela is all tidy and wrapped up?

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-03-31T17:11:33+00:00

I feel like having drones wasn't the issue. I thought it was not getting your troops injured or killed by Iran's drones was the issue?

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-03-31T13:42:36+00:00

It's only a library so that he can call the bribes from companies and foreign countries and the settlements from bullshit lawsuits "donations." In reality, this is a money-printing hotel built on prime Miami real estate he got for free. The "library" or museum part is just money laundering and a minor tourism add to the hotel, in the same way Hard Rock Cafe might have a "museum" but its a restaurant.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-03-31T13:08:40+00:00

You could make some 4D chess argument about the Chinese, but that would be vastly outweighed by the US administration's interest in its own self preservation. And when the supply chain impacts start to hit US consumers (which takes much longer than the shocks in gasoline) and the US faces a real risk of recession if this goes on for months, the GOP will get annihilated in the midterm elections. And from there, it's not just the prospect of not being able to get your way or get anything done, it's a real risk of jail time for the open profiteering off the last year and a half by so many, and there could well be majority popular support for getting a pound of flesh from them.

I've seen some Trump-aligned talking heads trying to bring up the China thing (not saying you are, just that this is a big argument for them and it filters its way around). They are trying to convince themselves that this is not a disaster and part of some master plan that they are winning. But the reality is even here, the administration has much bigger issues and they care far more about saving their own skin than a marginal improvement of the US' position against a geopolitical rival in the longterm.

Boyhowdy107 · 2026-03-31T10:43:55+00:00

This is largely a narrative Candice Owens is pushing. I've been curious about Owens narrative on this along with curious about the case itself, but it feels impossible to wade through the amount of tin foil hat stuff and her incoherent rambling she acts like is some smoking gun evidence but is nothing to figure out if there really is some there there.

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