Zaktor

joined 1 year ago
[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 day ago

He needs people he can relate to.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 12 points 1 day ago

Yes, of course, in the campaign where she ignored the left, campaigned with and for Republicans, and abandoned minority groups, the real problem was wokeness. While there's always a factional blame game after an election loss, never in history has the argument from the centrists been so detached from the actual campaign that occurred.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz -2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

You need to keep reading my posts until you get it through your head that I didn't pick 5% or 1% or 0.1% because there was an estimate of increased casualties, it's just an expression of the degradation being marginal. None of the numbers mean anything. One is worse (Trump), but on this issue not by a lot, and when someone is voting emotionally because they know people who have been killed, they may not be in the head space to see a small difference as more important than their anger.

You can talk about passionless objective voters calculating death percentages all you want, but that was never the topic of conversation. I'm not in that population, I made my calculation and a little less death is worth it, but I don't blame anyone who lost a relative, watched Harris and Biden barely even give lip service to them and their community, and then told them to go fuck themselves. Haha, leopard sure ate their faces, what idiots.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz -2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

"Hey, I hear an absolutely horrible and heartbreaking thing is happening, time to get in some election commentary" isn't cynicism, it's "told ya so".

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 day ago

I think the masses of voters who are much less easy to influence. They're not on Lemmy debating the topic or waiting for a community leader to decide the strategy. They probably didn't even do any sort of deep game theory about playing chicken and scaring the Democrats. They just got more pissed off as the news came through, as the Democrats made excuses and acted like nothing needed to change, and as people in their community reported deaths. We can debate and shout and rationalize here all we want, we can suppress the topic for the greater good, and all that will have zero impact on electorate-level perceptions. They're not here, there are too many for us to individually convince to change their mind, and they're probably not even open to listening to a coldly rational argument about lesser evils and other topics.

Even the people organizing these campaigns didn't have the influence to change their votes. Uncommitted endorsed Harris! But the whole thing was never in their control. They can only report the temperature they're feeling in the community and suggest moves they think would help get people back into the tent. Those Democratic operatives and elected officials should have the potential to influence Harris. They have names people know, and phone numbers to people of importance. If she was so corrupt and blocked off that even they couldn't reach her then we kind of do need the reckoning that could come from such an abject failure to keep the coalition together. There's no "push her to be better after the election" in that case.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz -1 points 1 day ago (3 children)

That's what I did. Here's two in easy form:

Topic: "Israeli drones shooting children in Gaza deliberately 'day after day', UK surgeon tells MPs":

You know what would help this situation? Letting a fascist become President of the United States. Again.

Topic: "Continuing 'Ethnic Cleansing' Campaign, Israel Blows Past US Deadline for Gaza Aid"

Don’t worry, just like how it was only fair that Ukraine and American minorities get genocided if Gaza was going to get genocided, abstaining voters have likewise decided it’s only fair for the West Bank to suffer genocide if Gaza is going to suffer genocide.

Current genocide happening, but let's instead talk about how it's somehow going to be worse in January because the real importance is the election.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 day ago (1 children)

“I think it is clear that Congress has a responsibility to act. We have legal tools here. And as I said, we cannot approve the sale of arms to a country that is in violation of our own laws on this."

F15s were just the next thing to be sent.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 1 points 1 day ago

Are fighter jets not "arms"? They were just the next arms transfer being talked about at the time.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz -1 points 1 day ago (3 children)

It's not a "right" figure, it's an expression of small differences. Stop trying to do math and just read what I'm writing. 99 vs. 100, 99.9 vs. 100, really bad vs. slightly more bad, whatever expression you'd prefer. The difference in impact is limited because Biden has presented practically no restriction or resistance.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz -1 points 1 day ago (5 children)

In the last day this story has been posted 4 times with heavy engagement on each post. And whenever every anything related to Israel and Gaza has a glib "told-ya-so"/"it's going to be worse in January!" comment.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 0 points 1 day ago (5 children)

I'm not counting bodies, I'm saying the relative dedication to genocide is not significantly different in impact. The material difference from Biden is literally just the 2000 lb. bombs, with an unquantifiable and unreliable hope that Democrats would snap out of it and start doing better. Hope meant it was worth trying for, because a change could be a big deal, but very likely the real difference in death come January 20th is going to be minimal compared to the death that Biden has already overseen and allowed.

[–] Zaktor@sopuli.xyz 5 points 2 days ago

A useful aspect of Lockdown mode (on top of it potentially being quick) is that you can still get into the camera without unlocking it (for me it's a double tap on the power). When you're locked down they can't navigate to your photos, but you might want to be able to record things.

 

Harris only received five percent of Republican votes — less than the six percent Joe Biden won in 2020 when he beat Trump, as well as the seven percent won by Hillary Clinton in 2016 when she lost to him. While Harris won independents and moderates, she did so by smaller margins than Biden did in 2020.

Meanwhile, Harris lost households earning under $100,000, while Democratic turnout collapsed. Votes are still being counted, but Harris is on pace to underperform Biden’s 2020 totals by millions of votes.

 

Israel’s ousted defence minister, Yoav Gallant, has reportedly said the army has achieved all its objectives in Gaza and that Benjamin Netanyahu rejected a hostages-for-peace deal against the advice of his own security establishment.

Gallant was speaking to hostages’ families on Thursday, two days after being sacked by Netanyahu, and reports of his remarks quickly surfaced in Israeli media.

“There’s nothing left in Gaza to do. The major achievements have been achieved,” Channel 12 news quoted him as saying. “I fear we are staying there just because there is a desire to be there.”

 

The editors of Israel's oldest newspaper on Wednesday published an editorial decrying the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from northern Gaza amid a ferocious Israeli offensive there that's killed more than 1,000 people over the past three weeks.

Original paywalled editorial in Haaretz.

 

Vice President Kamala Harris proposed increasing the long-term capital gains tax rate to 28% for wealthy Americans during an economic speech in New Hampshire on Wednesday, breaking with the policy laid out by President Joe Biden in his 2025 budget by suggesting a lower rate.

The current long-term capital gains tax rate – 20%, plus an additional 3.8% tax on higher earners – is paid when an investment is sold, or gains are realized. The Biden budget proposes raising that rate to the top rate he wants to levy on ordinary income – 39.6% – for households with taxable income over $1 million. Harris, the people familiar with the matter say, believes 39.6% is too high.

While Harris still supports taxing the wealthiest individuals and corporations at higher rates – as Biden’s budget also calls for – she believes that a lower capital gains rate would incentivize investors to put more money into startups and small businesses. She has also proposed increasing the corporate tax rate to 28%, up from the current 21% rate set by Trump’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017.

 

Progressive Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) announced Wednesday that there are currently enough votes in the Senate to suspend the filibuster to codify Roe v. Wade and abortion rights if Democrats win control of the House and keep the Senate and White House.

“We will suspend the filibuster. We have the votes for that on Roe v. Wade,” Warren said on ABC’s “The View.”

She said if Democrats control the White House and both chambers of Congress in 2025, “the first vote Democrats will take in the Senate, the first substantive vote, will be to make Roe v. Wade law of the land again in America.”

 

A new budget by a large and influential group of House Republicans calls for raising the Social Security retirement age for future retirees and restructuring Medicare.

For Social Security, the budget endorses "modest adjustments to the retirement age for future retirees to account for increases in life expectancy." It calls for lowering benefits for the highest-earning beneficiaries. And it emphasizes that those ideas are not designed to take effect immediately: "The RSC Budget does not cut or delay retirement benefits for any senior in or near retirement."

Biden has blasted Republican proposals for the retirement programs, promising that he will not cut benefits and instead proposing in his recent White House budget to cover the future shortfall by raising taxes on upper earners.

 

Harlan Crow (of the Clarence Thomas patronage scandals) donated the max individual donation ($3,300) to Cornel West's campaign, which invited obvious criticism.

Text of his response on Twitter:

As an independent candidate and a free Black man, I accept donations within the limits of no PACs or corporate interest groups that have strings attached. I am unbought and unbossed. Despite my deep political differences with brother Harlan Crow (who is an anti-Trump Republican), I’ve known him in a non-political setting for some years and I pray for his precious family. I find it hypocritical for those who highlight his $3300 donation to my campaign but can’t say a mumbling word about the PAC-driven billion dollars to support the genocidal attack in Gaza sponsored by their candidate! I’m fighting for Truth, Justice, and Love! Onward!

Frankly, the pleasant words make this look much worse than just saying "if some asshole wants to send me money, I'll keep it". Sounds like someone he wants to keep on the good side of, but y'know they're only political differences, not stuff that really matters.

view more: next ›