I would definitely consider an electric truck. I’m especially intrigued by the Slate truck, but it seems like that’s still a few years from coming to market.

I don’t need another SUV, I need a small truck. My wife’s SUV has all the passenger space we need, I need something with a bed.

Yes, there are different sized trucks for different use cases. Yet, larger trucks became the norm and smaller trucks essentially disappeared. Did everyone start hauling more? Somehow I doubt it.

I have a big truck. I got it to haul our travel trailer, but we don’t have our trailer anymore. I would love to downsize but there aren’t a lot of options these days. I would love it if Chevy brought back the S-10. They stopped selling it 20 years ago, around the time everyone started to convince themselves that they needed a half ton or larger truck.

And the meeting will look something like this

It’s tough because “the left” isn’t a monolith. There are people who are socially left but economically centrist. Similarly, there are people who are economically left but socially more conservative. Support for an economic system does not necessarily determine support for any one of various social causes.

I would argue that most “leftists” in the West are socially progressive liberals, who are perhaps critical of some aspects of neoliberal capitalism, but aren’t necessarily strongly committed to abolishing capitalism in favor of socialism or communism. In that regard, they are not economically left, or only slightly economically left. A lot of Western leftists are far more focused on addressing social justice issues within capitalism rather than completely changing the system.

There just isn’t one, singular “left.” I think there is a very vocal social justice movement in the West and that is what most of us think of when we think of the left, but that group does not have exclusive ownership of all leftist thoughts and ideas, even if they might think they do and even if they try to police the views of other leftists who might but necessarily agree with them on every issue.

The US is Israel’s sole benefactor, and as such Netanyahu has a strong incentive to influence US politics to support the Zionist cause.

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I’m sure these neoliberals wish they could just do what they did in Chile in the early 1970s: overthrow a democracy and replace it with a neoliberal dictatorship.

Admittedly, they don’t necessarily want a permanent dictatorship, it’s more a means to achieve their final goal, which is a neoliberal technocracy. They believe that neoliberalism has been proven to be the best socioeconomic system - the culmination of, and end of, all human history - and that if we can just get the right technocrats in power they can tweak and adjust things just right so as to get neoliberal capitalism back on track. It is, after all, the last and only system human beings will ever need (according to them).

He probably wants to force them to sell the team back to Dan Snyder, too. Trump and Snyder do seem to be men cut from the same cloth.

I rarely cry. I didn’t even cry all that much when my dad died a few years ago, but I’ve been doing it more and more since. Maybe I needed some time for my emotions to loosen from their moorings. Odd things can set me off now. I bawled like a baby during Guardians of the Galaxy 3. I was alone, though. Had my wife or someone else been there, I probably would’ve just sucked it up and pushed it down.

Is it the one with the Mangione Enterprise heir with an ivy league education?

Yes, it is. Because he gave up all of that to take a stand.

I hate this country so fucking much.

Which society? There are many societies on the Earth today, and I predict that some of them will experience relative peace, security and prosperity, while others will experience conflict and instability.

Yeah, I mean, duh. Of course it’s too late to STOP climate change (barring some miraculous discovery). That’s been true for some time. The globe will continue to warm and the climate will continue to change, rapidly. However, it is not yet determined how much the globe will warm, how much the climate will change nor how rapidly.

According to Climate Action Center, the most likely future emissions scenarios will result in warming of between 1.9C and 2.7C by the end of the century. The climate models aren’t high enough resolution to project the next 75 years of every community on the planet, under each emissions scenario. We don’t know how warm it’s going to get or how much the climate will change, so we don’t know which societies will collapse or exactly how many people will die in any conflicts that might start as a result of climate migration or disputes over land and resources, etc. We just don’t know. We don’t know what’s over and what isn’t.

It’s looking like we’re going to land somewhere between generally pretty bad but manageable to the collapse of all civilization. No one knows. I have a feeling we won’t know for sure it’s over until after it’s well and truly over.

I was born and raised here in the United States, just like my father, and his father, and so on for several generations. You fuck off. You and your disgusting fucking federal government. May you all rot in hell.

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I think most reasonable people would agree that there are many objectively good things about the modern world, but progress isn’t a strict good/bad binary. Often, progress results in both good and bad circumstances.

For instance, I think most reasonable people would agree that modern medicine is a very good thing. Vaccines and antibiotics have saved countless lives. Also, more advanced agricultural technology has allowed us to grow more food and feed more people. However, progress has also resulted in significant ecological damage, depletion of natural, nonrenewable resources and a significant loss of biodiversity. I think most reasonable people would agree that these are very bad things.

I don’t think the point is to ignore the very real, important positives about the modern world, but to point out that there are still things that need to improve, and unintended negative effects of progress that need to be dealt with.

I appreciate that for you the modern world is overall good, but that’s not necessarily everyone’s experience. Some people do feel purposeless, depressed and worn down, despite being relatively wealthy and comfortable, especially compared to humans of past eras.

“Well in those days Mars was just a dreary, uninhabitable wasteland - much like Utah - but unlike Utah it was eventually made livable”

The national urban poverty rate plummeted from 52.9% to 38.1% in six months, while extreme poverty halved to 8.2%, marking the sharpest decline in decades.

President Javier Milei’s administration achieved this while slashing public spending by 5% of GDP and navigating a 1.7% economic contraction in 2024. Key drivers included targeted welfare programs and inflation control.

The government expanded the Universal Child Allowance (AUH) to cover teens up to age 17 and increased food card coverage, directly aiding vulnerable households.

So they cut spending overall, but expanded their Universal Child Allowance. I mean, that right there is probably what did most of the poverty reduction. The article doesn’t really say where the spending cuts came from. Could be they just cut a lot of waste, but it could be they’ve made cuts to important government services, and the effects haven’t necessarily been felt yet.

The IMF projects 5.5% GDP growth for 2025, fueled by rebounding consumption and investment. This turnaround challenges conventional wisdom that austerity inevitably harms vulnerable populations, showing market-oriented policies can coexist with poverty reduction when paired with precise safety nets.

Does it? Again, we don’t know what’s been cut and we don’t know what the long term effects of those cuts will be. All we know is that they made significant cuts overall, while also expanding two specific safety net programs. Admittedly, that has resulted in a significant reduction in the urban poverty and extreme poverty rates, for now, which is undoubtedly a good thing, but only time will tell if those will last.

This reads like neoliberal propaganda, but honestly Javier Milei is right of even most neoliberals. I seriously doubt the expansion of the Universal Child Allowance and the increased food card coverage will last. I’m certain Milei will want to cut those programs, at some point. He is anarchocapitalist adjacent, so I’m sure he wants to get as close as possible to no government spending at all, eventually.