The problem isn’t that anyone can sue anyone, the problem is that these laws give legal standing for anyone to sue anyone. Normal lawsuits have to pass a certain bar to establish legal standing, and if you don’t pass that bar your case gets thrown out. These laws essentially skip that part by giving blanket legal standing. I don’t know if that would stand up in a higher court, but it’s a dangerous precedent that they’re establishing.

I’ve been testing out Bluesky. Too early to give it a final rating, but it’s been cool (if relatively empty) so far.

It's more accurate to say that the British prevented either themselves (through inaction) or China (by treaty/law) from having any practical control. If you'd bother to read the wiki article OP linked you'd know. China should have had jurisdication, but Britain techincally had (imperialist) jurisdication. The result was a no-man's land until Britain finally gave up.

EDIT: missed a word

What the fuck are you talking about? In actual reality it was a product of capitalism. Specifically British imperialist capitalism in China. It took until the mid 80’s (40 years after the Communists came to power) for the British to allow China to have control over the area and it was turned in to a park less than a decade later, clearly indicating that the Communists were in no way interested in continuing the existence of the dystopian walled city.

Is there a Charlie Cinematic Universe now? lol

You're preaching to the choir haha that's not even close to my favorite Isbell song, but it is great. He's a rare talent who can make non-country fans like me enjoy country. Him and Sturgill Simpson.

Hey Antik, since we have active mods now would you mind removing the LW_NewModWanted account? I might be missing something, but it seems like I can't do it since I'm lower on the mod list. However, it seems obvious that that account is not meant to remain a mod on communities with active mods.

Also, wondering if you can confirm something for me. I intended to remove this post since we don't need more mods for the time being. However, it appears all posts by a mod are technically mod posts. Is the fact that this is technically a mod post and LW_NewModWanted is higher on the modlist than me the reason I don't see an option to remove it?

Definitely a 10/10 band. For my money, them and Drug Church are the most interesting of the bigger punk bands out there today. Not that Drug Church is pop-punk lol

EDIT: Should also mention that Meet Me @ The Altar is also doing some real cool shit

I’m removing this as firmly off-topic

Thanks for the list! (Although Isbell is decidedly not pop punk despite being very good lol)

For real, who seriously had the thought “you know what, we need another adaptation of that one book from decades ago. We could try adapting some of that guy’s other work, but why bother? I know we tried the goofy, fun spin and the dark, gritty spin, but I’m sure we missed an angle on that one kid’s book.”

More importantly how did the guy who had that thought not get kicked out of the pitch meeting immediately?

“Who controls the past now controls the future. Who controls the present now controls the past.” - “Testify”, Rage Against the Machine (also Orwell in 1984, but I wanted to mention the RATM song since it slaps so hard)

I thought I replied to this message, but it doesn't appear to have posted.

I'm thrilled that the worker's got sick time and credit where it's due to anyone in the admin who helped make that happen. It doesn't change the fact that the admin, with the help of AOC and others in Congress broke a strike. That's a terrible, dangerous, anti-worker precedent to set, and shame on anyone who voted for it and Biden for signing it.

If I ask someone for $20 bucks for lunch and they kick me in the shin before giving me the money, am I supposed to be thankful and forget the fact that they just kicked me in the shin? Congress kicked workers in the proverbial, collective shin by blocking them from their right to strike.

Here's a decent article from Jacobin written by an RWU representative making exactly that point: https://jacobin.com/2023/04/railroad-workers-united-aoc-strike-vote-rank-and-file

And here's a decent rundown of the situation from a decent socialist source (even if it is Trot): https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/04/19/jaco-a19.html

Listen, I'm thrilled that the workers got their sick days and credit where credit's due to anyone in the admin who helped secure that, but that doesn't make my point inaccurate. The Biden administration helped deny railroad workers their right to strike. That counts as breaking the back of the strike, even if after breaking their back they turned around and gave them (at least part) of what they were asking for. Breaking strikes via a literal act of Congress is a deeply upsetting, dangerous, and anti-worker move. Full stop.

In contrast to the IBEW statements you've quoted up above, look at the contrasting tone from the RWU in a recent Jacobin article:

RWU made crystal clear by our words and actions throughout contract negotiations that, while we were of course in full support of seven days of paid sick leave for railworkers, RWU would never be in favor of any legislation denying railroad workers our human right to withhold our labor when all else fails in our struggle for safe working conditions and dignity, regardless of whatever concessions may be dangled.

RWU was and is in favor of any legislation that would grant any relief to the barbaric working conditions we contend with — but we would never concede our right to strike. We thank Ocasio-Cortez and other members of the House of Representatives and the Senate for their votes in support of sick leave. But we are not happy at all with her or others in both chambers who voted to deny railroad workers the right to strike.

(Emphasis added by me)

What I want to see is for her and anyone else calling themselves a socialist to work to be a socialist power outside of the Democratic Party. The DNC is rotted to the core by the money and influence of the capitalist class in a way that, if not irreversible, is hopeless in the short to medium term. Just look at all of the explicitly capitalist Democratic leaders, including younger ones like Buttigieg.

If you want to pursue socialism, the DNC is the wrong place to do it. Hell, looking at history I think putting eggs in the electoralism bucket is fundamentally flawed. Look at the failed German revolution that helped make room for the ascension of the Nazis thanks to “socialists” making extreme compromises and undercutting socialist revolutionaries to instead work within bourgeois political parties.

For anyone who wasn’t previously convinced that AOC was a simple Dem operative rather than the socialist she was masquerading as, here you go. No serious socialist would back the reelection of an old white dinosaur who broke the rail strike’s back the way Biden did. The fact that DSA didn’t revoke her membership after that is a black mark on them as an organization.

Try working out to the Gimp version. I imagine the experience will be significantly different lol

That seems….unlikely.

I for one am shocked.

The only Tesla owner I know is a Musk-loving, ancap, STEM-bro who probably makes around $160k.

As an engineer, I often find being surrounded by engineers to be exhausting lol