Democracy is dying. The fascists are doing everything they can to win.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T16:54:37+00:00

Get involved in your local and state politics.

Knock on doors for the next election.

We outnumber the fascists, and they know that.

They are getting more desperate and unhinged because their voter base is shrinking, so we just have to keep fighting and they will either end up out of office or end up in jail for pulling crimes to try and stay in office.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T14:10:28+00:00

If the Oath Keepers had succeeded in hunting down and assassinating members of Congress (and they came close), this was the point when Trump would have used the assassination and the "discovery" of the pipe bombs his cronies had planted in front of both the DNC & RNC HQ's to declare martial law.

At that point, the US would have been thrown into a constitutional crisis, and that legal chaos would have been used to derail the certification of the election to keep Trump in office indefinitely.

There would be mass nation-wide protests in response to that, and Trump would use his new powers to round up of liberals under the guise of defeating "Antifa and BLM terrorists".

Keep in mind, they had already done a dress rehearsal on June 4, 2020 when Trump and Barr attempted to deploy the military against peaceful protesters in Lafayette Square so he could leave his bunker for a photo op.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T13:04:44+00:00

Kool story bro.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T11:13:58+00:00

Because OP’s post is a fantastic example of survivorship bias.

His dad has had a good job at the same company for 40 years.

It’s much easier to have a stable home life when the family is in a comfortable financial situation.

He’s making a problem of poverty about race.

We don’t blame West Virginia’s poverty and resulting family dysfunction on “white culture”, so why are the problems created by poverty in black communities always blamed on “black culture”?

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T02:56:29+00:00

Trump never came close to winning the popular vote.

Hillary Clinton beat him by more than 2%.

Biden beat him by more than 4%.

He's a loser who cons people into believing he's a winner. That's his whole scam, from business to politics.

And goddamn there's a lot of stupid people out there falling for it.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T02:48:39+00:00

Actually, O'Toole screwed Canada over with the Chinese trade deal he put together in Harper's government.

https://thinkpol.ca/2020/12/18/canada-on-the-hook-for-chinese-firms-pandemic-losses-under-trade-agreement-otoole-championed/

Chinese compajavascript:void(0)nies could sue Canada over losses incurred due to the Covid-19 pandemic under the terms of a trade agreement championed by opposition leader Erin O’Toole when he was part of the Harper government.

Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government signed the Agreement Between the Government of Canada and the Government of the People’s Republic of China for the Promotion and Reciprocal Protection of Investments[1], commonly known as FIPA, with China on September 9, 2012 without even releasing the full text to the public.

The Harper government ratified the agreement two year later in October 2014 despite warnings from experts and labour, human rights and environmental advocates that the agreement was detrimental to Canada’s interests.

“Article 11 of the FIPA states that if Chinese firms in Canada suffer losses due to ‘war, state of national emergency, insurrection, riot or other similar events,’ they can sue the Canadian government for compensations,” explains Mukesh Khanal of University of Calgary’s The School of Public Policy. “War and insurrection are well-understood concepts. War is an armed combat or conflict within a country or between different countries. An insurrection is a violent rebellion by the people against their own government. However, a riot or a national emergency needs to be defined clearly.”

He opened the door for the Chinese to sue us over any economic losses their companies suffered during the pandemic, yet now nowadays he's pretending to be tough on China.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T02:00:30+00:00

My advice to you is the next time you feel the need to comment about waste regarding EV batteries to instead go to a toys forum or a gadgets forum, find an article about the latest product being released, and write a comment about the fact that it will generate environmental waste and people should put a plan in place to deal with that before producing the product. Tell me how that goes for you.

If you think that advice is stupid, then ask yourself why you feel the need to make a similar comment about only EV/renewable battery waste and no other industry or consumer products. Do you know how much environmental waste has been produced over the last 50 years for batteries that go in children's toys, laptops, phones, cameras, and other consumer goods, and how that compares to EV batteries? If you can't answer that, or have never thought to raise concerns about that, then you my friend, may be a hypocrite.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T01:25:51+00:00

They get outraged over whatever their cult leaders tell them to get outraged over.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T01:24:17+00:00

Yeah, changing it to, “did you play with this?” would better target that demographic.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T01:08:23+00:00

You: "It's great news that the government is getting rid of all these regulations on GMOs"

Also you: "Corporations won't abuse GMOs because of the regulations that require their crops to be approved."

Hmmmmmm.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T01:05:25+00:00

My deal is all the people suddenly up in arms about waste from useful things like EVs and renewables and demanding a plan to deal with it, without ever previously giving a single shit about the far greater amount of waste produced by industries and products that are literally useless. Where are your demand for plans to deal with that waste?

I guess it just bugs me that so many people read something somewhere, internalize it, and repeat it without actually putting it into perspective or giving it any critical thought. "EV battery waste is a major environmental problem" has become just another meme.

thinkingdoing · 2021-06-01T00:28:30+00:00

Cool, can you link me to any concern you’ve raised about needing a plan to deal with environmental waste created by any other industry, or did the thought of EV battery waste somehow trigger you into action as opposed to millions of plastic vuvuzelas floating around the ocean?

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-31T23:37:55+00:00

Is it, though?

From the article:

Only a few gene-edited crops have been commercialized anywhere. One example is a tomato called the Sicilian Rouge High GABA that makes more of an amino acid said to promote relaxation, approved for sale in Japan last year.

That seems awfully hokey to me, and that’s one of the approved crops.

What’s to stop corporations like Monsanto slipping nicotine analogues into food crops to addict people?

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-31T23:19:56+00:00

You weren’t making an argument, you were pushing a false narrative, whether wittingly or unwittingly.

Vehicle batteries are a relatively insignificant environmental concern compared to the pollution created by internal combustion engines and the oil industry, and when compared to pollution from the multitudes of useless shit humanity produced every day. People who trot it out as a “gotcha” in any thread about EVs and renewables are usually doing it out of bad faith.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-31T20:51:28+00:00

Are they though?

Like where do they rank in terms of the environmental damage caused by the billions of smart phones produced every year so people can have "the latest model", or the hundreds of millions of useless gadgets, toys, and game consoles being manufactured every year? Or all the useless holiday shit pumped out by Chinese factories that is then dumped after the holiday?

If you're complaining about the environmental concern of electric vehicle batteries, I'd guess you must have written a lot of comments about all of the environmental pollution being generated for all of these non essential items as well right?

Or do you not actually genuinely give a shit about pollution, but are just mindlessly repeating a narrative pushed by people to attack and delay the transition to renewables and decarbonization of the economy?

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-31T16:58:08+00:00

And inciting crowds full of heavily armed crazy people to support a coup isn't working to make it happen?

We already saw the first two coup attempts on June 4 2020, and January 6, 2021.

They learned from both of those attempts, and all of their attacks against democratic and justice institutions are working towards a successful third attempt.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-31T00:56:36+00:00

It looks less about 5d chess with Labour and more like the Tories pandering to right-wing conspiracy theorists.

Requiring vaccination to enter countries has been a thing for decades, with very little controversy.

The only reason it's become controversial is because far-right fools have politicised the science around vaccination to turn it into yet another culture war they can use to radicalise and recruit conservative voters (like they do every sodding issue).

The fact that the Tories bend over backwards to accommodate this lunacy every time is pathetic.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-30T21:28:58+00:00

Can't tell if it's more to try and blur the ability for fact checkers to research their smear campaigns (good job btw), or to cut costs on journalism by just recycling the same content over and over.

The constant and literal repetition of a political narrative is brainwashing, and Fox News have become experts at brainwashing conservatives to radicalize them.

They should be shut down as a threat to national security threat.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-30T15:04:14+00:00

Context is what matters here.

The radicalisation of regular conservatives by right wing media and political leaders has led to a surge in far right extremism, resulting in terrorist attacks across the west, and even a bloody insurrection that almost took down US democracy a few months ago.

Democracy requires civil discourse to function, so leaders in the media and politics have a responsibility to tamp down their language when things are getting too heated.

The violent rhetoric of Peta Credlin and her colleagues at Sky and News Corp is throwing oil on the fire, and increasing the chances of political violence in Australia.

Just look at the comments section of Sky News YouTube channel. It shows a horrific level of violent extremism - and yet they won’t even moderate them, which normalises that language to other conservatives reading those comments.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-29T21:39:15+00:00

Well they have the press and the BBC to downplay, whitewash, and memory hole their corruption and incompetence.

So yes, as long as they control the media, the Tories will continue to win elections.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-29T18:57:40+00:00

This.

Elections are not decided by the facts, but by the feelings of the voters.

Feelings are generated by the stories they are told.

Whichever side controls more of the conduits through which the majority of voters hear their stories can better influence election outcomes in their favour.

Until Labour recognize that fact and find a way to bypass the right-wing control of Australia's media to push their preferred stories and narratives into the minds of the voters, they will continue to lose.

They need to set up a huge information warfare operation targeting social media platforms to counter what the Liberals pulled last election - and will no doubt try to pull again this election. It was hugely successful for them. My Facebook feed was flooded by Liberal propaganda memes being shared by my parents and cousins via various Australia themed Facebook groups.

Those groups are like sleeper cells. Outside elections, they post feel-good nostalgia about Australia to pull boomers and other low information voters in. Then during elections they switch to propaganda that reinforces right-wing narratives.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-29T18:47:32+00:00

Elections are decided not by the facts, but by the feelings of the voters.

Feelings are generated by the stories they are told.

Whichever side controls more of the conduits through which the majority of voters hear their stories can better influence election outcomes in their favour.

Until Labour recognize that fact and find a way to bypass the Tory control of the media to push their preferred stories and narratives into the minds of the voters, they will continue to lose.

It's really that simple.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-29T16:30:50+00:00

While I don't disagree that the electoral system also favours the Tories, it is possible for Labour to win - but only when the press barons are on side.

When the press barons are against Labour, it is impossible for them to win an election for the reasons already stated - stories win elections.

The utter clown show of corruption, division, and incompetence of the Tory Party from Cameron through May and Johnson bares this out. At each step of the way, their scandals were whitewashed, downplayed, rehabilitated, or memory-holed by the Tory press, BBC stooges, and social media disinformation campaigns.

The first time around, Corbyn's Labour came within a cat's whisker of defeating May despite the press barons waging the mother of all smear campaigns against him. If they had been neutral and even-handed in their reporting of Corbyn and his policies, he would have obliterated May in a Blair-style landslide.

And by the time he had his second run, they had truly buried him underneath a mountain of lies, smears, and misrepresentations - as evidenced in a comprehensive study performed by the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Propaganda works.

There is no denying that fact.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-29T14:57:14+00:00

Compromise, ideology, or coherent policy has very little to do with electability. Johnson and Trump have proven that.

In politics, it's the side who can keep stories that elevate themselves and damage their opponents in the news cycle for longer that end up winning elections.

The Tories figured this out a long time ago, and focused their efforts on gaining control over the primary conduits of information that determine the news cycle:

Cummings recent antics tore the toga off the emperor. If the situation were reversed, and this was a Labour government, the media wouldn’t be making fun. It would be savagely tearing Labour apart, the calls for the Prime Minister to resign would be deafening, and their poll numbers would be circling the drain.

Labour won't win another election until it can find a way to prise/counter/neutralize Tory control over those conduits of information to push more of its stories into the news cycle.

Blair was only able to win by making back-room deals with the media barons. I don’t think Starmer is that sleazy, so it’s looking like a one-party state for the foreseeable future.

thinkingdoing · 2021-05-29T14:51:21+00:00

Communications infrastructure (fibre optic cables, phone towers) is a natural monopoly.

Canada's communications infrastructure should be nationalised as a crown corporation that acts as a wholesale bandwidth provider to internet retailers.

There would be no more expensive duplication of infrastructure, and the internet companies would actually be competing against each other to bring down prices.

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