WatDabney

It's the state of mind caused by simultaneously believing two (or more) things that conflict with each other.

Like all conservatives, he wants to do unto others as he would not want done unto him.

Can't starve people to death if other people are allowed to give them food.

And while they’re arguing about who’s causing the most chaos, the rest of us are left wondering—how did it get this bad?

Actually, that's easy.

It got this bad because our system is so warped and corrupt that most politicians can no longer even pretend to run on policies and principles. If they get elected, they're going to do one and only one thing - they're going to serve the interests of the wealthy individuals and corporations that pay them the fattest bribes. They obviously can't run on a promise to do that, but they can't promise to do anything else because they're not going to do anything else. So they run on hatred and fear - they run on things like "ELECT US BECAUSE THE IMMIGRANTS ARE EATING YOUR PETS!!"

It really is just that simple.

And if the world were a just place instead of a twisted shithole designed to maximize the privilege of a relative few wealthy and empowered parasites, you could work fewer hours, make the same or even more money and afford a house.

But instead the system has been warped so that you have to work long hours for insufficient pay and still can't afford a decent life, and all so that a relative few executives, board nembers, bankers, investors and politicians can siphon off the bulk of the wealth you generate so that they can buy more houses and bigger yachts.

No - actually I was talking worldwide. Russia's just a notable example.

And I would say that all of the things you listed are, directly or indirectly, consequences of the fact that wealthy authoritarian parasites have warped societies to their benefit regardless of the harm done to others, so are actually examples of exactly what I'm talking about.

News flash for wealthy authoritarian parasites around the world, because you all seem ignorant of this fact:

Declining birthrates are a direct result of the simple fact that more people all the time decide that they have no desire to bring children into this world, and that in turn is a direct result of the fact that you've turned this world into a warped, corrupt, toxic, authoritarian shithole.

You have no one to blame but yourselves.

Nice.

I've been threatening off and on all day to make this exact point and have even started a couple of posts to that purpose, but it never quite came together.

Now I don't need to - I can just agree.

More than anything else - more than an opportunist or a hypocrite or a liar or a fraud - Vance's primary attribute and defining characteristic really is simply that he's an asshole.

And those are the people this whole thing is intended for.

You'll note that none of the people involved responded to attempts to get further statements or clarifications from them. That's because they know it's indefensible bullshit. They said it just so that it would get out there so that the faithful would see it and add it to their credo, and now they're going to ignore it.

She's bludgeoningly obviously compromised. All the way through, her rulings, and the timing and circumstances of them, have not been made in the service of enforcing law, but engineered to benefit Trump.

So really the only question is whether or not justice will prevail. If this is still in any sense a nation of laws, she'll be removed (and hopefully sanctioned for her rather obvious bias and/or corruption).

But to all appearances, this is not a nation of law...

And I guarantee that billionaire Larry Ellison blithely believes that he'll be exempt - that all of this surveillance will just be used against the little people. And he's almost certainly right.