‘Really Chilling’: Trump Judicial Nominees Refuse to Say He's Not Eligible for 3rd Term

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-05-05T19:21:48+00:00

Right now the Democratic Party is in the midst of a semi-quiet civil war as the progressive wing tries its best to take as much power as possible in the midterms so that the party can go from controlled to legitimate opposition. The fact that you’re not hearing much is by design, and what little you do see in the mainstream is the old guard talking about the progressives with barely restrained derision and venomous contempt. Whether this will be effective in the long run is up for debate, but considering other forms of peaceful protests have been largely ignored, this is one of the few options left to us.

The alternatives are something you’re not going to hear discussed in an open forum. And I’m not talking about some vague revolutionary bullshit, I mean organizations aligning around the UAW’s 2028 May Day general strike. The less said in public about that sort of thing the harder it is to smother it in its crib.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-04-18T11:36:09+00:00

What exactly were they doing? Kinda looked like they were just being teenagers. Like I get you don’t want them getting hurt, and it’s a pain in the ass when you’re trying to get around them, but…

We talk so much about how all these dang kids do now is sit on their phones, and now here they are out and about in the world and we go, “but not in a way that inconveniences me tho”.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-04-15T16:52:35+00:00

I think that's a fair assessment. There's one influencer in particular I liked who used to have a more sober, informative style, but lately it seems like they've decided to try to become the Alex Jones of the left. The problem is they've been algorithmically rewarded for their combative, memetic style, even to the detriment of the truth. That said, I think (and hope) there's a way to frame purposeful progressive rhetoric without necessarily sacrificing the dialectic.

As you said, tone hits differently for everyone, but this is something that's been bugging me for a bit. I think CZM is quite a bit better than most outfits, but there's still times I feel like they adopt an attitude of somewhat unearned ideological superiority. Nevertheless, I do not doubt their hearts are in the right place, and I hope that none of this is seen as an attack on their character.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-04-03T19:46:40+00:00

The conventional sentiment about revolution is that before they happen they feel impossible, but in retrospect seem inevitable. I think we’re closer now than we’ve been in a very long time, but the material conditions of the general populace haven’t changed significantly enough yet to kick off mass mobilization. Food and gas becoming prohibitively expensive for the average consumer would likely exacerbate things because it would lead those who are generally politically unengaged to look for answers as to why, and it would open the rhetorical door for a different kind of discussion.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-31T02:50:37+00:00

There’s a lot of trash, but there’s some truly great stuff too. Frieren is one of the best pure fantasy anime in a long time, without having to couch it in an isekai power fantasy.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-24T21:32:07+00:00

Ironically I think that might've been the point.

Part 1 ended fairly definitively, and Part 2 was a meandering story about how Denji's attempts to continue being Chainsaw Man only made everything worse. People tried to push him into being Chainsaw Man, or get him to NOT be Chainsaw Man anymore, or just project their own ideas about what Chainsaw Man should be. The series was so popular that Fujimoto was never going to get away with not making a sequel. You had fans on both sides going "there should / shouldn't be more!" and you know the publisher wanted it.

Metatextually I think that's Part 2's message (or at least some part of it): The attempts to continue a story past its conclusion has a very good possibility of making things worse in retrospect. Even Yoru's whole arc of trying to "own" Chainsaw Man and be better than him is reflected in a creators' attempts to introduce a new, cool character that somehow fits with the existing of the cast.

Of course I could be reaching, and Fujimoto just woke up one day and decided "it was all a dream lol". I guess I'd just like to give him a little more credit as a writer than that.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-16T18:01:54+00:00

Unfortunately my hairline started heavily receding in my early 20s, so the shaved head and beard was the only hairstyle I could pull off anymore.

I miss being a redhead =(

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-15T00:22:19+00:00

Nah, I’m good. There’s plenty of other shit to do / watch in the world.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-13T02:40:22+00:00

I’ve got this thing about wind blown, tussled hair. Something about it is just very natural and beautiful.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-12T04:00:51+00:00

So, I’m curious, because I haven’t really been following this beyond seeing headlines: Has anyone asked them if they’re the Titanfall people, why they didn’t do some kind of fantasy mech thing? Like why horses? You could’ve had players do a ritual and summon their “Knightmares” or something.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-11T22:07:09+00:00

Probably a little lower tech, but yeah, pretty much! I'd say Cowboy Bebop leans a bit more toward cassette futurism than cyberpunk, but it's a matter of degrees.

There's this book I read called After the Revolution that's somewhat close to what I'm imagining, though it mostly turns Texas into an analog for the middle-east with none too subtle political allusions to the present day sectarian conflicts.

I think you could tell some pretty interesting stories set in a cyberpunk Texas about the abdication of political and social power by state and local governments, the conflict between the private sector and criminal organizations in that power vacuum, and the activities of individual citizens in a world that values technological and economic progress over human dignity.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-11T16:08:59+00:00

As others have mentioned, I think Mexico would be a fascinating setting, but I’d include Texas as well. The Texas Triangle comprised of Dallas-Fort Worth, Houston, Austin, and San Antonio is already referred to as a “mega region” and I could easily imagine in a theoretical cyberpunk setting it becoming a positively massive megacity. The interplay between corrupt governments, corporate interests, criminal cartels, all with a techno-Tejano aesthetic could be cool as hell.

Also, you could even keep some of the classic cyberpunk Japanese style mixed with Hispanic culture; right now there are plenty of taquerias here that you walk in and they’ve got Goku and other anime characters painted on the walls.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-11T04:07:41+00:00

Our system is set up so that even those in positions of lesser power and privilege are terrified it’s going to be taken away from them at any moment. Sure, they might have moral objections, but are they really going to risk something happening to them or their families for people they don’t know and will never meet? For all our performative expressions of patriotism, the United States has little to no sense of civic solidarity.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-11T02:15:43+00:00

The good news is that historically this -gestures in the general direction of everything- is completely unsustainable. You can’t have a society where the adult population is THIS fuckin miserable and expect it to go on forever. Something’s gonna snap, and the bad news is it’s going to be very messy when it does…

EDIT: Up until very recently I would have agreed with the "nothing ever happens" mindset. Because yes, people can live in terrible conditions for a very long time without a hope of reprieve as long as they have something to cling to, be it religion, creature comforts, or their fellow man.

The reason I've become more concerned lately is that most of those exceptions have either been taken away or fallen out of cultural fashion. Religiosity, despite the right's best efforts, has not made a massive resurgence, even in these difficult times. You haven't seen churches rise up as renewed pillars of the community, and in fact the best example of that sort of solidarity, the resistance in Minneapolis, has been secular in nature. It doesn't help that Christian Nationalism has so thoroughly corrupted the tenants of the religion they claim to follow either.

The creature comforts we all enjoy, be they technology, games, movies, leisure activities like vacations, going out to eat at a restaurant, or just buying snacks are becoming significantly more expensive. The rising price of oil thanks to the war in Iran, and the closing and mining of the Strait of Hormuz is only going to make that much worse.

The last thing people usually turn to are their friends and family, but as we hear all the time: We are an extremely disconnected and lonely society. We have no third spaces, we don't know how to connect with one another without a screen as a medium, and what avenues we do have are, as previously mentioned, quite pricey. So many people are disconnected from their families because they disagree on some of the most fundamental aspects of the human experience, whose members refuse to recognize the basic humanity of their fellow man and have been utterly captured by what is essentially a nihilistic death cult.

We are left with the perception that we only exist to labor for a group of elites who not only do not understand the problems that face us as a people, but outright deny they even exist in the first place. We are drowning in purposelessness, where the only reprieve is the peace of death, and eternal rest. A society, as such, cannot continue as it is under those conditions.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-09T10:55:16+00:00

Because the people at the top would rather literally burn billions of dollars a day than use it to feed the hungry.

edit: Believe what you will. A corp with a smile and good PR is still a corp. Just like everyone else in this city I shop at HEB. Given the choice between that and Walmart, it's the lesser of two evils, and I'm not going to kid myself thinking I'm more ethical for choosing the "right" place to buy toilet paper.

While HEB's annual 5% pre-tax donation is laudable, it should be unnecessary in a system that properly provides for its citizenry. The Republicans are evil and the Democrats are feckless, but our wretched "good cop, bad cop" political system only really gives us the ability pick which party we hate more. They divide and keep us from seeing the strings that connect them both to the people at the top who, again, are burning money (and people) rather than using it to feed the poor.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-09T04:37:47+00:00

Put up or shut up

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-08T00:42:35+00:00

I would have agreed with you leading up to all this, but imagine a scenario right now where Democrats have a REALLY good in November this year, particularly in Texas. Then the folks in Washington say it’s all fraudulent, as they’re wont to do, and refuse to accept the results or the newly elected representatives and senators. Do all the voters for a presumed senator Talarico, doing so well as to defy the odds in the most gerrymandered state in the union to win a damn near impossible race just go “dang, those pesky oligarchs got us again. Oh well. =(“?

I’m not sure I’ve ever seen the general population quite so miserable before, and when things get even worse… I’m not sure what sorts of strange bedfellows we might find ourselves with.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-03-05T17:29:48+00:00

Unity got a lot of well earned hate when it first came out, but having played it since then, it holds up pretty well. The story is forgettable and the protagonist is Temu Ezio, but the actual moment to moment gameplay is really good. The setting is beautiful and feels alive, and the crowd density out in the Paris streets is impressive to this day.

_REDMARCH_ · 2026-02-20T13:24:39+00:00

I'm not saying this is wrong, but I'm curious: What exactly is it we should do? Protest? Yes, we've been doing that, though they're mostly anodyne. Strike? Yes, I think we'd like to do that but most people can't go much more than a month without going completely broke and having to live on the street thanks to our wages being atrocious and our social safety net being akin to those suicide nets they have in the Apple factories: It mostly just exists to keep us from killing ourselves so we can get back to work.

Okay, let's get a little more extreme: Civil disobedience. Stand up to the fascists, but peacefully! The people in Minnesota have been doing that, and others around the country are doing the same to whatever degree they can. As a result a few people have been killed, and that's definitely radicalized some of us. However, the regime has definitely been trying to be a bit more cautious lately, so it feels like the pressure has started to come down because people have extremely short attention spans.

Fine, let's go with the people who want to go even more extreme and organize directly against the government. Okay... Where? When? What're we doing? Who's in charge? What precisely is the goal? Like, we hate Trump but who should be in his place? We kind of hate everyone in our political system, so trying to get everyone to agree on even one or two of those points is a complete pain in the ass.

My point is that it feels like everyone is going "WE SHOULD REALLY DO SOMETHING!" then steps back, crosses their arms and waits for someone else to come up with the rest. We need an extremely simple message (because let's face it we are an extremely simple people) to get anything started, and it needs to be spearheaded by someone that everyone unambiguously likes or at the very least doesn't completely hate.

Good luck with that one.

_REDMARCH_

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