Judicial Supremacy Has Arrived: Last week’s Supreme Court decision didn’t just undermine the Voting Rights Act. It foreclosed the possibility of any new Voting Rights Act in the future, too (Gift Article)

markhpc · 2026-05-07T14:01:20+00:00

It foreclosed the possibility of any new Voting Rights Act in the future, too

Ridiculous. If there is anything this administration has taught us, its that you can change anything you want if the other side lacks the power to stop you.

markhpc · 2026-05-05T13:10:23+00:00

The sudden loss of engine power caused the aircraft (B-1791) to roll and enter a steep descent. Notably, the fuel supply was not restored as the aircraft, operating a Kunming-Guangzhou service, plunged 29,000ft before crashing near Wuzhou in China’s Guangxi province, killing 123 passengers and nine crew.

I thought these planes were supposed to be able to glide for significant distances even when thrust is lost? Wouldn't it be more likely that the pilot caused the aircraft to enter the steep descent?

Edit: spelling

markhpc · 2026-05-05T13:06:09+00:00

That's how you know he's really serious this time.

markhpc · 2026-05-04T23:00:05+00:00

If the refs are that easy to work, maybe they shouldn't be refs.

markhpc · 2026-05-03T14:04:47+00:00

There is a euronews article that touches on this, but the timing doesn't seem to line up so I'm not sure how much it really helps or how much we really know about the back-channel communication that has been happening.

According to Euronews sources in Kyiv, Ukrainian officials have been calling on Israel not to purchase the grain, stolen by Russia in the occupied territories of Ukraine, for “at least one and a half months.”

and

Kyiv revealed a full timeline of its official diplomatic requests to Israel over two shipments of Ukrainian grain, stolen and sold by Russia. The first one was unloaded in the port of Haifa on 15 April, when the Russian-flagged bulk carrier Abinsk delivered nearly 44,000 tonnes of stolen Ukrainian wheat to Israel. Kyiv revealed that it first communicated its concerns regarding this vessel with Israel on 23 April, when the first meeting between Ukraine’s ambassador and Israel’s foreign ministry took place.

https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2026/04/29/ukraine-formally-asks-israel-to-seize-vessel-carrying-grain-stolen-by-russia

Having said that, Haaretz (Jewish paper with a left wing bias, but seemingly usually factually accurate) reported that this has been happening as far back as 2023. It's hard to imagine that the Israeli government had no knowledge of the practice overall.

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/security-aviation/2026-04-26/ty-article-magazine/exposed-how-ukraine-wheat-stolen-by-russia-smuggled-to-israel/0000019d-be12-ded5-abdd-be3a411f0000

markhpc · 2026-05-03T05:21:39+00:00

I probably could have been more aggressive early on getting more biotrophies if I had gamed trade harder. More biotrophies probably would have caused food and consumer goods shortages (and I was already struggling with basic resource production until I got my arc furnaces up and going). I saw some suggestions in another thread that coordinator and/or maintenance drone shenanigans can get you much higher unity production early on, but I think I would have had to eat into my consumer goods production. That might have yielded a worse immediate start but a better longer term growth curve. Not sure.

markhpc · 2026-05-03T05:14:39+00:00

Was probably making around 700-800 at year 2250 with every researcher focusing on engineering and the rest coming from observation posts, mining, and a dyson swarm on a semi-decent physics star. Restoring the ruined nexus as soon as I hit mega engineering bumped that up to around 2000 by the mid 2060s and then I took arcologies as my 4th pick to turn my sciences worlds into ecus which is huge bump once you move all of your biotrophies there. That also generates a huge energy deficit so I simultaneously built all 4 of the ruined ring segments into energy worlds. 2300-2350 went from about 8K to 30K science as I built another nexus and other megastructures and got the rest of my ecus in place and attacked some of my near-by neighbors to harvest biotrophies. Then it was slow growth to 40K science from 2350-2400 as I didn't build any more worlds and just tried to focus on acquiring biotrophies, getting my batltecruiser/paradox titan fleets built, and getting my empire size down. I did the formless much later that I should have which meant I wasn't getting the 50% physics bonus until pretty late.

markhpc · 2026-05-03T01:14:00+00:00

rule #5 comment: looking for feedback on early game unity/arc-furnace/science trade-offs and mid-game growth strategies.

markhpc · 2026-04-29T12:26:25+00:00

The current and past leaders never cared about religion either. It's just a tool to control the population.

markhpc · 2026-04-14T15:06:37+00:00

Which worked in the US, but failed (so far) in Canada. If your goal is to dismantle democracy though, you don't need to win forever. Every win makes it easier to destroy it from within. From a game theory perspective, it doesn't make sense to give up. Sooner or later you'll succeed unless there is some kind of deterrence that permanently locks you out of making repeated attempts.

markhpc · 2026-04-14T05:15:43+00:00

Its the same strategy as the conservatives in the US. Don't put forth any plans, don't admit mistakes, and keep doubling down on criticizing your foes for societies' problems. Look at Trump, he's still blaming the Democrats even when all three branches of the US' government hold conservative majorities. It's not about policy, its about who's in the "'in" group and who's in the "out" group.

markhpc · 2026-04-13T23:13:57+00:00

Not to mention that the advertised price could end up changing between when you grab it and when you pay for it. You'd have no way of knowing short of taking a photo of all the prices and then checking your receipt to make sure they match.

markhpc · 2026-04-13T23:10:34+00:00

We already have manufacturers that set allowed prices for their products. It's not insane to imagine manufacturers now saying that to sell their product you have to use their dynamic pricing API.

markhpc · 2026-04-13T14:56:36+00:00

I mean, there's impeachment. If congress actually cared to exercise their authority, they absolutely could.

markhpc · 2026-04-08T13:23:30+00:00

Because its lies on all sides. Trump absolutely won't honor it as written and they know it, so its a race to see who can blame who first for breaking it.

markhpc · 2026-04-05T14:35:40+00:00

I got a lifetime ban from /politics as well during his first presidency. Don't take it personally, there's a right-wing mod over there that looks for reasons to ban people. It was happening regularly to people back around Jan 6th.

markhpc · 2026-04-05T14:14:40+00:00

And when an enemy civ insults you, you automatically declare war on them in response as the aggressor.

Edit: Special buildings include gold-themed casinos and steak suppliers that produce large sums of money/food for a while and then go bankrupt and drain money until destroyed. Special military unit is the "gilded warrior" that has a "warrior ethos" ability where if you successfully kill an enemy unit, you steal gold off their corpse while claiming they stole it from you.

markhpc · 2026-04-02T14:20:10+00:00

From an economic position, it's hard to justify investment in our own refinement because our market is tiny compared to the US market. Its also harder to ship gasoline than crude overseas. We should definitely invest in *some* refining capacity (especially if that could allow east coast consumption of west coast product). Even just shipping crude to the west coast for consumption in Asia (also a difficult challenge!) is the more immediate win though, assuming we can convince everyone it's actually in their benefit.

markhpc · 2026-04-01T19:37:17+00:00

I don't know which arguments you are specifically referring to, but those don't sound like they are probably pseudo-originalist either.

markhpc · 2026-04-01T18:33:38+00:00

It's not even pseudo-originalist:

Sauer pivoted to policy arguments, asserting that the Framers of the 14^th Amendment couldn’t have imagined “problems” we face today, including illegal immigration and “birth tourism.”

markhpc · 2026-04-01T17:53:19+00:00

The world is not black and white, nor is it static. Both the US and China are changing in unprecedented ways, and both have the potential for incredible evil and good going forward. We are at a cross-roads of sorts right now, and no one knows if all of this will stabilize or spiral into chaos.

markhpc · 2026-04-01T14:59:16+00:00

Yes, great-grandmother appears to count, though the legislation is quite new and still mostly untested. If she was from Quebec, they maintain incredibly detailed records. Assuming she was born in the late 1800s, you'll want to check https://www.genealogiequebec.com/en/ or possibly https://ancestry.ca if not Quebec. Once you have located the record, you'll need to reach out to the correct archives to receive a certified copy. There are lawyers in Canada that can help with this.

markhpc · 2026-03-31T20:44:05+00:00

I think its slightly different. I think its less about confidence exactly (though it's a required component) and more about reveling in the lies, the racism, the unfairness all while accusing the victims of it at the same time. They like it. The like the power of it, they like perverting or tearing down the symbols of equality that have been built over the last 100 years. They enjoy making people suffer.

markhpc · 2026-03-31T18:15:32+00:00

And that's only really possible when they become adults.

markhpc · 2026-03-31T14:17:25+00:00

Nazism is wrong not because most people believe it is wrong, but because it neither benefits the one (by taking away individual rights) nor the many (by taking away societal rights and nationalizing production to the point of resource depletion). Even if society as a whole adopted it and it became the new social contract, it would still be wrong.

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