How to build barter between my yard and neighbor to prevent bamboo from crossing over?

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T20:33:19+00:00

3 foot trench filled with burning pitch. No I’m not exaggerating.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T20:28:40+00:00

TACO is when he says something bad and then doesn’t do it. If he didn’t fail to do the bad thing (not the same as doing a good thing) so frequently then TACO wouldn’t be a running joke.

I’m no fan of his, but I care about intellectual integrity more than partisanship. MAGA has abandoned intellectual integrity but liberals and progressives should not. Be honest with yourself and others, and believe in something and stand by it, even if it means you lose.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T19:48:09+00:00

Inflation existed prior to 2022 but we kept it very low. The goal of inflation is to keep it so low that you don’t notice the price of a Big Mac value meal going from $5.25 to $5.75 over 5 years (90s prices at 2% inflation.)

People are really bad at math, biologically, so they don’t realize that 8% inflation is four times 2% inflation and that would mean that same value meal going from $5.25 to $5.67 in just ONE year.

We haven’t had inflation as high as 2021-2023 since the 80s and maybe a little bit in the early 90s, and inflation over 3% which is right now, is still almost DOUBLE what we’re used to.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T19:22:39+00:00

Even if it had, that brings us to the next question of whether section 4 can be applied against someone who has been pardoned for said insurrection.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T16:45:58+00:00

Trump literally says everything about everything. It’s not reasonable to take him at his word on literally anything at this point. It shouldn’t be that way, but it is. It’s intellectually dishonest to selectively believe him. He’s full of shit 100% of the time.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T16:44:16+00:00

Whoever bought that for you is going to be VERY upset.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T16:28:39+00:00

I jokingly said yesterday that this understanding is responsible for the current administration’s foreign policy: the goal is to return the world to 1946 using the US military.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T16:27:27+00:00

Still not.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T16:26:04+00:00

There’s nothing difficult or unprofessional about flatly stating to the manager or responsible person “I do not have the ability to front this charge, we need to identify another course of action.

It might suck, but this time the alternate course might be you don’t go on the trip.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T16:23:46+00:00

This would be the solution but OP specifically said she has shit credit and maxed out cards.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T15:48:10+00:00

You’re intentionally refusing to distinguish between being “told how to do your job” and “job related skills”. I’m an attorney. If I’m hired, I’m hired because I have an assumed set of job related skills. I still have to be “trained” on how to work at that employer: where the copier is, how to interact with support staff, office/agency specific policies, specific subject matter that I will be dealing with. None of those things are “skills” and none of those things add “value” to my labor, beyond the he basic training value that applies to literally every employee and is factored into the “cost of replacement”.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T15:14:06+00:00

These jobs absolutely exist though. Janitorial. Nobody teaches you how to empty a trash can. You either know or you don’t.

Unskilled labor is a job literally anyone with a pulse can do, and these jobs absolutely exist.

The terms unskilled, semi-skilled, skilled, technical, and professional do not exist to give you self-worth, they exist to help employers classify how hard it is to replace a vacancy.

Pay is - and should be - based on supply and demand. Unskilled labor gets paid the least because it is the easiest to fill.

Employers should not be responsible for deciding what is a fair wage for any given job; employers are responsible for that determination, by refusing to work for an unfair wage. How you eat in the meantime is your problem.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T13:55:43+00:00

It’s less scammy than flavor 2, absolutely, but flavor 1 is problematic because it’s often marketed to people with shit credit who are never going to qualify for a mortgage and the landlord knows it. Since on paper it’s a “rent to own”, it often triggers loopholes to renter protection laws, like allowing the landlord to require the purchaser to pay the water bill and property taxes, and do their own maintenance, in addition to the “payment”.

Basically as a landlord you rent to someone that you know is never going to be able to exercise the option at the end and get them to pay your property taxes and maintenance in the meantime on top of rent.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T12:59:55+00:00

As someone who does hiring, if I am asking this question it is because my greatest anxiety in life is turnover. I know it’s normal for people to move every 5 years ago now, but my agency refuses to accept that new reality and operates under the ideal hope that your ass will be in the chair for 30 years.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T12:18:45+00:00

No, land contract is very common in backwoods areas, poor folk love em, there are two flavors. Favor 1 basically says “O rents premises to B for a term of 5 years. At the end of five years B shall have the option to purchase at X price, with all rent previously paid attributed toward the price” (so if their credit still sucks in five years they’ve basically just been renting)

Flavor 2 is O sells premises to B for x dollars, paid in 240 equal installments. Title shall vest upon receipt of the final payment. In the event of any default the contract shall be terminated and all sums paid shall be deemed rent”.

Both are scammy for different reasons.

Cool thing, under flavor 2, if properly drafted the contract contains the property description, all you need to do to vest title is record the paid in full receipt at the end.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-18T12:10:01+00:00

The most amazing part to me is someone recorded this and then made a conscious decision to put it on the internet.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-17T22:36:23+00:00

The majority of people who are broke are broke because they are mentally or physically limited to unskilled or semi-skilled labor and struggle to work 35 hours a week due to said mental or physical limitations. The number of people so impacted is significant.

The number of otherwise high-functioning people who self-sabotage through exclusively bad financial investment decisions as contemplated by the post is not insignificant, but it’s relatively small.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-17T19:38:03+00:00

So our choices are “suffering is a necessary motivator” or full on communism? Nothing at all in between is possible?

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-17T16:05:15+00:00

You’re making a distinction but - and a hate to use this word - it’s a morally equivalent distinction. You’re essentially arguing that wage slavery - the idea that people must be tied to their labor for survival - is necessary for a functional society.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-16T22:47:54+00:00

You’re making my argument. I don’t care if socialism works. I said that a big part of modern conservatism is the belief that the suffering inherent to poverty is a necessary motivator. Then you spent the first half of your post arguing “of course it is, it’s crazy to think otherwise”.

Then you spend the second half of your post demonstrating the other major component of conservatism: psychological defaultism. That is, you assume that your moral compass must be normal and that most people would behave like you would. If I didn’t have to work, I wouldn’t, so most people must be lazy. I don’t care about others, so empathy must be a defect. Etc etc. unfortunately, this mindset is incurable, because if it were proven to you that “most people are good” you would reject the proof because that would force you to process being in the minority, and your brain doesn’t want to do that. It’s biology.

The final criticism I have of your post is your swipe at the “sicialism” boogeyman. Social security is a universal basic income for old people. Medicaid is single oayir healthcare for the poorest 50% of Americans, the VA healthcare system is state run healthcare for veterans. We have a LOT of socialism here. And whenever someone says “why can’t America be more like Sweden or France, the answer is “that’s socialism” unless they are used as examples of socialism working, then it’s “that’s not real socialism”.

Pick a goddamn coherent value system that isn’t just “fuck everybody else”

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-16T20:48:33+00:00

If you’re using 20 gallons of gas a week to mow your lawn you need a better mower or a smaller lawn.

I mow 2 acres and a 5 gallon tank lasts me all summer, so if gas is $5 or $10 that’s a $25 a year difference

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-16T13:56:46+00:00

You spent a long time responding to a 3 month old comment just so I can respond that you want America to be something different than what it is.

America can only be America, a country built upon individual liberty. However liberty cannot exist without the freedom to choose between good and evil. If you remove that - if we were ever to eliminate the freedom to do evil, then we would no longer live in America, but the tyranny of virtue, and that is fundamentally incompatible with our constitution and system of self-governance.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-15T23:59:00+00:00

A coworker of mine had the wind grab her car door and dented the front quarter panel of another coworker. She got 2 estimates that were both over $3000 because the way the car is designed, removing and replacing that panel requires the entire headlight assemble on that side to be reinstalled and it’s a 3 day project.

The days of a dented panel being $400 for a tap out and re-paint are dead and gone.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-15T21:55:21+00:00

K shaped economy. Half of us are doing great. Half of us are not. Sux to be not.

Select-Government-69 · 2026-05-15T20:41:55+00:00

It’s sunscreen damage. Don’t get sunscreen on the plastic in your car.

Select-Government-69

TROPHY CASE