They actually recently (within the last few months) agreed to join a larger grid. So that should be a bit less of a problem this year. It is Texas though, so there’s always the chance they turn around and shoot themselves in the foot.

I still use DDG as my “daily driver” (I know there are better options for privacy and avoiding big tech, but I haven’t yet found anything independent that is good enough for me to switch to full time yet). I bookmarked Stract a while back, and it proved useful a few months back when Microsoft had an outage that took down Bing and by extension, Duck Duck Go. I do like Stract, their index seems to be enough larger than MoJeek (another independent search with their own index) that it gives me better results.

Stract might not be as open as I’d like, but it’s nice to have as an option, and I’m never going to complain about having more search providers with independent indexes.

The kind who never knew the world before he got into politics, and the kind who think the things he says are funny memes and want to sow chaos in a poll that doesn’t have any real weight. If they had to be serious, more of them probably would be, but it’s not unusual for kids to goof off and be chaotic when they know their voice doesn’t have direct influence on anything that matters.

If it was just AliBaba drop shippers it would probably be better, but rather than drop-shipping they’re basically a US based warehouse and distributor for drop-shippers to be able to sell their garbage with 2-day shipping.

Yeah, from what I watched of the rally, it felt more like an attempt to gaslight supporters into thinking they have it in the bag and that the only way they can possibly lose is if they are cheated. So I expect the blitz of “the election is being stolen” propaganda will start any day now, probably before we even get to election day.

I’ve been using Syncthing-Fork (on F-Droid) for the extra features it has. I wonder if that developer will be able to continue.

Slap an anti-Musk bumper sticker on it. That would be enough to switch me from judging to thinking you are cool.

I have had someone tell me that they’d rather live in an economic system “like we have in America” where people have a chance at rags to riches, than a system “like Germany, where the social safety net means the average person doesn’t have a chance at making it big.”

If anyone ever tells you wealthy people are intelligent, don’t believe them.

Not saying 6 figures isn’t an insane amount of money for a speaking fee, but Obama was getting $400,000 in 2017. Obama is arguably a better speaker, and Melania doesn’t get as many gigs as Obama did (there was a period in 2017 when he did 3 events within a couple months, which caused quite a bit of outrage on the right about his speaking fee), but 6 figures isn’t all that unusual for former Presidents/First Ladies (Michelle’s is reportedly around $200,000).

So more like Judas and Goliath then?

Hopefully they’re living their best lives at home while he’s out traveling the country being awkward at doughnut shops.

Watching Trump’s press conference from Mar-a-lago the other day, and hearing his excuses for why he isn’t out on the road campaigning, it struck me that the narrative that he’s moping around depressed that he’s losing isn’t the whole story.

He’s got Vance out pretending to campaign, while he and his buddies are sitting around coming up with plan B. He’s probably had calls with dozens of Republican governors and is getting teams of “alternate electors” together (the Stephen Miller interview on Ari Melber’s show made it pretty clear that they still see that as a perfectly legal strategy). Donald may know “it’s over” but that just means he’s going to get more desperate and we’ve already seen what desperate Trump can do with 2 months of prep, I’m not looking forward to seeing what he can do with 5 months.

Because good people - the people who would make the best leaders, aren’t narcissistic enough to believe they should run for president. They’re happy helping in whatever way they can, but they generally don’t have the audacity to think they have any business trying to run for the most powerful position in government. Partially because they’re humble, but also they aren’t in it for power, they just want to help people.

There’s definitely a conversation to be had that the role of president should be one of humility and neighborliness, but there’s a group of voters in America who just want somebody who can throw their dick around on the world stage and intimidate the rest of the world like a pro wrestler. And most politician types try to be both the helpful neighbor and pro wrestler, but end up seeming fake and not very genuine because usually both the macho and the neighborly aspects are an act, and they just want power.

When those of us who actually bothered to vote for Biden in our primaries this year, Kamala was on the Ballot as well. And while I can’t speak for everyone, I voted with the understanding that Biden probably wouldn’t live to complete a second term, and my vote was as much for Harris as it was for Biden. Harris was democratically elected as Biden’s replacement if something happened to him. It’s valid to say the circumstances were a bit unexpected, but we still voted with the understanding that she was almost certainly going to have to step up at some point.

Just don’t literally eat Elon, unless you want to overdose on ketamine.

It would make his whole “shark vs electrocution” rant a moot point if he can’t swim at all, which sounds very on brand for him.

Sex-ed is now just Ezekiel 23:20 “There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.” (NIV)

Technically their beloved KJV is a bit less graphic, “For she doted upon their paramours, whose flesh is as the flesh of asses, and whose issue is like the issue of horses.” But that gets funny in a different way since “asses” as a more common use these days.

In some ways it makes sense if one or more candidates are people we know very little about, just to give us all time to get to know them, and to give them time to reveal more about who they really are. But when we already know as much about the candidates as we do this year, 3 months is more than enough.

Katie Porter isn’t doing anything now that she lost her Senate bid to Schiff, and has made some fans even in conservative circles for her whiteboard explanations and takedowns of pharma CEOs and pentagon overspending.

I know a bunch of people say Kamala needs a white man for VP, but I’m not sure that tracks logically, sexists aren’t going to suddenly be okay with a woman just because she has a man as VP.

If you want to fight voter apathy in later years, getting young people tuned in and engaged is probably the best way to do it. Sure, there’s always the chance they still might not show up now, but showing you are listening to young people still helps solidify your party as worth supporting and can lead to stronger support when they get older and are more likely to find the time to get out and vote. 22 year olds don’t stay 22, and the recent trend of people not becoming more right-leaning as they hit middle age might be in part due to Obama and others making young people feel heard 15 years ago. Saying “young people don’t vote, don’t listen to them” is short-sighted at best.