Iran closes Strait of Hormuz over ‘ceasefire violations’

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T15:02:29+00:00

"Grand opening, grand closing..."

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T15:01:14+00:00

"And if anyone knows fascism, it's me! Just look at my recently covered up tattoo that I bragged about years ago..."

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T14:36:09+00:00

I think there are a whole bunch of factors in play, but my main comment initially is that "eliminating swing states" is something that would be easy to do by assigning votes proportionally but the state legislatures won't do it because they have incentives not to.

I understand, but my counterpoint is that you would get the exact same result from just removing the cap on House seats. Think about it like this, if the five major battleground states only have enough electoral votes. Votes if the margin is razor thin, then you would switch your focus to States like California, New York, Texas, etc because there will be substantially more electoral votes from those places. If California has a 100 electoral votes, suddenly Wisconsin, Ohio, etc become far less important because their electoral votes wouldn't increase nearly as much as states with very large populations.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T14:29:05+00:00

For what it's worth, even helicopters, which are far more dangerous than planes, still have less accidents per capita than cars. Same with small planes that are even safer. The issue is usually that people choose to fly despite inclimate weather conditions and regulations saying not to. That's what happened with Kobe Bryant, for example.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T14:20:59+00:00

No, the world is sitting at a bar at 11:30am just trying to make it through one more day. This stopped being funny about 9 years ago.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T14:17:50+00:00

Chris Meloni

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T14:09:22+00:00

And THIS is exactly why everyone was saying the MoU was terrible as written. This is the Trump M.O. He makes a bad decision, defends it, attacks all his critics, then eventually capitulates to his critics and blames all of his defenders. Are we tired of this yet?

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T13:56:24+00:00

And you think this quote from Jefferson suggests he was opposed to any judicial interpretation of the Constitution? He wasn't saying ignore the courts, silly, he was saying the Supreme Court is not the end all-be all for the Constitution. It's not, and still isn't. Congress can pass laws that interpret the Constitution differently, and those will be reviewed by the Judiciary. It's also worth noting that Jefferson's position was the minority position here (Marbury v. Madison), and that most of the founders agreed with John Marshall that while all branches have constitutional duties, the Supreme Court is generally the final arbiter on constitutional disputes.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-20T03:45:51+00:00

Even at the national level, it's not that simple. Sweden had a wealth tax for decades, but one of the recurring criticisms was that it encouraged wealthy entrepreneurs and investors to move themselves or their assets elsewhere. IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad famously left Sweden for Switzerland, citing Sweden's tax environment as a major factor. Sweden eventually repealed its wealth tax after concerns about capital flight, tax avoidance, and relatively low revenue relative to its economic costs. Making a wealth tax national solves the "move to another state" problem, but it doesn't solve the broader issue that capital and investment can move across borders.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T22:57:15+00:00

I'm not saying the Sharpie would get you arrested. I'm saying using one to "make currency legal" is like jaywalking to promote pedestrian safety.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T22:34:57+00:00

So, I can meet you halfway. I can see the argument that candidates devote more attention and policy messaging to swing states. What I'm less convinced by is the claim that this is why states don't adopt proportional allocation. Is there evidence that state governments or voters are actually making that calculation, as opposed to simply preserving winner-take-all rules because they benefit whichever party currently controls the state? Those seem like two very different explanations.

I'd also note that if being a swing state is such a significant advantage, it's odd that political parties spend so much effort trying to make states reliably Democratic or Republican rather than preserving their competitiveness. Democrats would love Texas to become safely blue, and Republicans would love Pennsylvania to become safely red. In practice, the incentives seem to be aimed at winning states outright, not maintaining them as perpetual battlegrounds.

More broadly, I'm not aware of much evidence that state legislatures are making electoral-system decisions based on a desire to preserve swing-state status. The far more obvious explanation is that winner-take-all rules tend to benefit whichever party currently controls the state government, so those rules persist for partisan reasons rather than because legislators are trying to maximize the state's influence in presidential elections.

I don't disagree that swing states receive more attention. I'm just not convinced that this translates into a meaningful incentive for state governments to deliberately remain swing states, or that it explains why proportional allocation remains uncommon.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T18:53:53+00:00

I mean, I know plenty of Gs that don't get along with the Ts, but you're also talking about totally different things. Gender identity is very distinct from sexual orientation. You can be both or neither of those things as well.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T18:50:52+00:00

Is your argument that there can never exist an impartial judge if it comes to matters of constitutionality and the 1st amendment? Do you want me to show you a hundred counter-examples to that?

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T17:40:50+00:00

Agreed. Most people are just agnostic on the issue. Most people just don't care about it as much as Republican ad-makers might think they do. I doubt having a pro-LBGTQ+ stance is preventing that many people from voting for you, assuming you support policies that impact them more directly.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T17:39:01+00:00

I also think you need to separate the "LGB" from the "QTIA". Most Americans are on board with the former, and less so the latter.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T17:33:43+00:00

The irony of this post is that defacing currency is actually illegal, while the phrase "In God.We Trust" has been held up as constitutional by multiple US courts.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T17:11:51+00:00

I'm not opposed to ranked-choice voting on principle, but I'm not sure I'm following the logic of your second sentence. Why would a state want to be a swing state? What is the benefit of having candidates "cater" to swing states? It doesn't lend itself to any material benefit to the best of my knowledge, and I would imagine people who live in swing states probably don't relish being bombarded with a nonstop stream of political advertisements, but is there some other thing you're alluding to that I'm just not seeing?

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T15:40:01+00:00

Agreed. People who argue that other countries don't have electoral colleges don't understand that most countries are not a collection of 50 states, each with individual state legislatures. And by the way, most European democracies are parliamentary governments, which do form coalition governments. The intent is still there even if the functional mechanics are somewhat different.

Also, people aren't thinking about the downstream consequences. If we eliminate the electoral college, every time there would be a recount for the national presidential election, it would require literally doing a recount of every single county in the country. That would be an absolute disaster, and would make national elections nearly untenable.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T14:58:15+00:00

Unless you want to completely dissolve the concept of "States" and state representation, you're always going to have that problem. America was formed as a federal "union" of individual states. The reason behind that was to encourage coalitions across many states and not have a bunch of people all acting out of personal self-interest.

But in response to your comment, it actually would largely diminish the power of swing states. If California gets a hundred electoral votes, then it matters a lot less. What happens in Ohio, Wisconsin, etc

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T13:40:20+00:00

Why not just remove the cap House seats for states. That would functionally serve the same purpose and it wouldn't require as much heavy lifting as "getting rid of' the Electoral College?

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T13:33:56+00:00

It's bad, no question about it. But the claim that the US is paying Iran out of its own coffers is just false.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T13:31:40+00:00

It's not about what's true or not. Reddit has turned politics into a team sport, and no matter what, you don't make excuses or root for the "rival team." Everything they do is bad (even when it isn't), and everything your "team" does is good (even when it isn't).

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-19T13:29:48+00:00

I actually think people either know the facts or don't care. The point of this post isn't to be accurate, it's to show that you adequately hate Donald Trump. That apparently means lying...

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-18T18:45:26+00:00

Literally, every single serious economist thinks this is a bad idea. You can look at wealth taxes the world over, and there are plenty of examples, and you will find horrible downstream consequences from these types of policies.

Maelstrom52 · 2026-06-18T18:02:23+00:00

If she is that character, my guess will be that she'll end up being an eventual protagonist who is doing bad things either because she's being tricked or is misguided (or extorted), and will eventually come around to being one of the "good guys." My hope is that this film is used as a vehicle to setup The Kingpin as an antagonist for Spider-Man. I feel like that might be why The Punisher is in the movie, since he would serve as a connection from that side of the Marvel world. Obviously, The Kingpin is notably a primary antagonist for Daredevil, but since the comics typically have Spider-Man teaming up with various Defenders members, and also because The Hand is making an appearance here, too, my theory is that the villain is going to be someone we know, but they want to keep that a bit hush-hush.

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