He faces probation or up to four years in prison.
It's been reported that only 10% of felons are given jail time for similar convictions. You have to wonder if such remarks after his conviction, indicating he's learned absolutely nothing, may lead a judge towards the harsher punishment.
Also, let's take a moment to applaud Alvin L. Bragg.
Alvin L. Bragg, the Manhattan district attorney, risked his reputation by indicting Mr. Trump in a case that some prominent Democrats said wasn’t strong enough to have brought against a former president. Instead, Mr. Bragg cemented his place in history as the first prosecutor to convict a former president.
The wealth gap is certainly an issue. Typically, Americans are more prosperous under Democratic presidents and while that may be true on paper in select areas, it's apparent that most people are still hurting. On paper, Biden has been a remarkable president and has saved Americans billions if not trillions. Saving money is different than putting money in their pockets though. To say, yeah - but it could have been so much worse, means nothing to most people.
I'm not sure how this played out but there was a plan...
A study by the liberal Institute of Taxation and Public Policy predicts Mr. Biden's plan would increase by more than $100,000 a year what someone in the top 1% of earners pays Uncle Sam. President Obama in 2013 raised taxes on that same group by $83,000. President Trump in 2017 cut their taxes by about $50,000 a year.
The top 1% of Americans earn about 20% of all income in the U.S., but they pay nearly 40% of all federal income taxes. The Biden plan will put even more of the tax burden on the wealthy. "It's time for corporate America and the wealthiest 1% of Americans to just begin to pay their fair share," he said Wednesday in his speech to Congress.
And wages are up compared to inflation for the past year. But eventhough inflation is still at a comfortable-ish sub 4%, the future looks questionable.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1351276/wage-growth-vs-inflation-us/
But to the greater point, when people are struggling to put food on the table and upgrade appliances or save for the future, they're going to get stressed. They're going to become afraid and they're going to search for answers - even if those answers are wrong, it's what they want to hear. Keeping this wage gap wide, keeping the middle class down, gives politicians power.
That certainly seems reasonable and maybe you're right.
For similar reasons, people are (rightfully) protesting Biden due to his policies with Gaza. I know that in the presidential primary in my (super blue/Democrat) county last month, 10% of the votes cast by Democrats (16,216) were write-ins and 90% of those (14,625) were for non-people ("uncommitted", etc). As it turns out, practically the same number of people cast protest votes as votes for Trump (14,740). Biden still got 144,000 votes so losing 14,000 to Trump isn't so much of a concern. My greater concern is about how easily people are being manipulated - across the board, across the world - and how people are losing sight on the possible crumbling of the country they live in. Not to mention only 20% of my county even bothered to vote.
Totally unrelated.. actually, maybe not totally, this conversation has me going back and checking on some voting records. The 2020 election was the highest voter turnout in Philadelphia for 25 years. It was also the highest turnout in the United States for a century. So when Trumpers claim 'the election was rigged because Trump got more votes than any other president. How is it possible for Biden to get more votes than him?', they're ignoring the verifiable facts that the election had a record high turn out. It's been all downhill since they've been denying these election results.
I think it might already be done.
Hopefully I'm just overwhelmed with the news cycle but it seems like people really don't care much about intellectualism. This country has been on an anti-intellectualism path for a decade or more. If people don't care to know stuff, how can we progress?
This group has been told over and over that what they believe is factually untrue. You can point at the sky and explain it's blue and offer the scientific explanation for it being blue yet they will claim that it's red with no evidence at all (just that the pillow guy says so). This used to be a fringe group and I totally get that a small segment of the population has particular perspectives but the fact that it's becoming common place is just mind bending. I don't understand how people can be shown facts and continue to lie to themselves. How hurt can you be? How prevalent is mental instability? What could we possibly do to make people feel better and give a crap about themselves and their communities?
That means not just voting but talking with people around you, volunteering and donating
Honestly, I give up. If you've already decided you're voting for Trump, you do not exist in the same reality as me. There is absolutely zero redeeming quality about the person or his politics. He literally does not care about the United States, the Constitution, or the people voting for him. A vote for Trump isn't a vote for president, it's a vote for a cult leader. I'm not equipped to fix what's broken in your head.
The part where he said his trial was rigged was where I got really worried.
He is taking every possible opportunity to dismantle the foundation of this country for his own self interests and his "lock her up" cult followers are eating it up. They believe him over the facts, precedents, science, and laws. They believe these universal truths are "rigged".
Meanwhile, his own appointed judge is presiding over another of his cases who may actually be interfering with it.
I'm pretty open to taking a step back and looking at things from both sides. Your political affiliation doesn't explicitly mean you're impervious to propaganda or brainwashing. Although, it's apparent one group is more weak minded and unbothered by the larger scope of their actions. I find these people to be immoral and self-righteous and disgusting and I'm embarrassed as an American to be associated with them. It's not easy to be comfortable with strangers out in public these days.
I genuinely believe most of us mostly want the same things. Corporations and politicians have divided us and created the polarization for their benefit. We have to even the playing field. We need Ranked Choice Voting. We need to fund elections exclusively with tax payer dollars.
So, the silver lining I'm hoping for is that after this inevitable civil war, we can make elections truly democratic.
In an analysis of comparable cases brought by the Manhattan district attorney’s office, about 10% resulted in imprisonment.
Mastodon seems like it could work relatively well.
The other side of the issue though is for social media to feel "social" now, people, consciously or not, want to feel connected to brands and advertising and popular culture. Social media, now more than television or magazines used to, generates our water-cooler moments. It generates the content we sit right here and discuss - it generates memes. These fringe alternatives aren't popular because the they lack gravity. Gravity comes from investment. Investment comes from potential; typically, potential to make money.
But yeah, group ware, et al, could work for smaller groups. The friction there is getting people to install, and give a crap about, another app on their phone.
What used to be apps for catching up with your friends and family are now algorithmic nightmares that constantly interrupt you with suggested content and advertisements that consistently outweigh the content of people that you choose to follow.
In the case of Facebook, the decline is either reflected in — or directly facilitated by — two specific features: People You May Know and the News Feed.
Yep. I was screaming to bring back the chronological timeline when they pushed out the "beta testing". I actually stopped using social media regularly because I was missing events that were happening in my neighborhood. There was no point once they chose what to show me. But, I'm not the target demographic for their platform.
Someone who wants to interact with their community and keep in touch with their friends and family is not what social media is for. It's for selling ads. It's for maintaining your attention. It's for engagement and making you feel a way they've determined will keep you scrolling.
And honestly, it's tough to complain. The more successful a platform becomes, the more content is uploaded and viewed. This doesn't cost them nothing. Without charging to use or upload to the platform, they have to sell ads. The more engaging the ads are, the more successful business are with posting those ads. So they double down and post more ads - they engage more with the audience the platform has directed towards them. It just keeps snowballing from there until the platform no longer represents what it did initially.
The actual problem is that no one is willing to pay for "social media". They'll pay out the butt for streaming services and two-day delivery but connecting with real people and getting unbiased investigative news, not so much.
The second link is interesting. I’m in the Philadelphia area which is one of the greater percentage increases. I’d like to know what exactly is being indexed.
I’d be interested in learning what items increased and by how much over time.
Edit: I guess this covers that question https://www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.t07.htm#cpipress7.f.4
I’m not seeing specific items in that link. I’m thinking, for example, a 3 lb chicken, a pound of 80/20 ground beef, a pound of honey crisp apples, a head of romaine lettuce, etc.
I'd be interested in seeing a price comparison of some specific items over the course of the last four years.
I'm well aware of the reporting and personal stories people have shared about rising inflation. Inflation is real. Price gouging is real. Climate change, environmental factors, livestock disease are real. I am not at all questioning that. However, I am curious as to how these factors have had little impact on my personal shopping experiences.
I live in a major east coast city. I buy 85% of my groceries from a local produce market. I rarely buy packaged foods or prepared items. Most of my groceries are local in-season fruits, veg, protein. I've been paying the same $5-$6 for a dozen eggs for nearly ten years. My grocery bill for the week is typically $80.
So, it's been weird observing, from a distance, the conversation about inflation and how people are struggling to buy groceries.
I'd like to know if and / or how a small grocery store can maintain prices for over half a decade. Is it because the products are limited in their interactions with others - less inflation due to shipping it all over or compensating for rising prices of ingredients (milk, flour, eggs, etc). Is it because the metrics for "bills seem high" is based on grocery items I'm not purchasing. Is it based on geographic location or the store items are acquired? Is it because people are buying more at the store to take home rather than spend money out for dinner (because that certainly has increased). Is buying local actually a life hack for saving money?
I mean, I'm reading the chart and it's saying prices are up 21% since '21 but I am not personally seeing that. I'm curious as to why that may be. The 22% for 'food away from home' though, I can absolutely confirm in my experience.
So, the word you want to use is insufficient. That is not the same as neglecting.
These religious fanatics are using one of the fundamental privileges this country affords them to restrict that same privilege for others.
I don't know if "neglecting" is right word. High-speed rail projects get a $6 billion infusion of federal infrastructure money
Thank you. I really don't understand how people feel it's okay to reject math and the meanings of words. Moreover, their inability to accept they don't know everything and instead live a life where they believe they're more intelligent than facts and science is a little heartbreaking.
Personally, if I were going around using a word to describe something and someone told me I was incorrect and offered a source, I'd thank them for correcting and educating me.
It's upsetting to me that seemingly intelligent people are unable to live in reality. Living in a delusion means a lot of the judgements you make can impact others.
All you have to do is read some words. You could have learned something in a quarter of the time it's taken you to respond to me. You could have spread facts to others like yourself. You've simply chosen to mad at one thing while blaming something else unrelated. All you have to do is direct your frustration towards the group and policies you're mad at. It's very simple.
You're probably pretty smart but you're really coming off here appearing quite ignorant and stubborn. I'm trying to help you remove the nearly transparent veil you're having trouble seeing through. You've rejected a scientific mathematical measurement to make yourself feel better. There's no defending that. Please swallow your pride and take five minutes to read and another five minutes to understand your confusion.
Practically every email I've received in maybe the past year has started with "I hope you are well". I even had an LLM draft a placeholder email for me and it started with the same thing. This has not always been the case and it's strange to me that everyone I interact with begins their emails with this line. Frankly, it's annoying AF.
What gives? Who started this? Why has it become so prevalent? More importantly, how do we stop it?
While I'm at it, if you work in tech / customer support, I urge you to speak with your supervisors to minimize the boiler plate copy paste trash you insert into your emails. People dealing with shit that's not working as intended or desired do not have the mental or emotional capacity to wade through your platitudinal nonsense. Get to the fucking point.
Please watch the entire video before commenting.
The take away, in my opinion, was much less about the Chinese migrants than it was the story of the specific location they were coming through and how and why the process of legal immigration is broken. It seems so, so easy to fix this problem but it’s clear “the border” is being used as a political pawn to divide us for political gain.
The community around buying and selling gear and just watching awesome stuff pop up for sale regularly is one of the reasons I've stuck with the site for so long.
Other than FredMiranda, e$ay, Craigslist, I'm not sure what other options there are (I'm not on FB).
Is there any chance something like photomarket could pop up in the fediverse? What other sites are you trading on?
This is a rant.
It stems from the recent Joe Rogan comment about Biden which turned out to be Trump. I'm an indie-leaning "progressive" who found this to be an important moment to call out for everyone.
The video, summarized: Joe Rogan is proved wrong when claiming Biden said "one of the problems about the Revolutionary War was that we didn't have enough airports". Rogan goes on, "If you had any other job, and you were talking like that, they'd go, 'you're done'". "It's just the media narrative..." Then the actual Biden video is pulled up for him showing that Biden is quoting Trump, "This is the same stable genius who said the biggest problem we had in the Revolutionary War was that we didn't have enough airports". "Is that fake?", Rogan says. Producer, "It's not fake, here's the video..." Trump, "our army manned the airports, it ran the ramparts, it took over the airports, it did everything it had to do." Rogan, "Oh, he fucked up.." His guest, "that's the thing about the media today, you gotta look into it."
My comment: >Is there a sub for instances like this where people say something about "the other side" only to be immediately shown that it was their "side" who said it? >This post is iconic should be pinned to the top of every social site.
Soon after, I received a message from r/JusticeServed (a sub I don't actively participate in) saying, >Hello, You have been permanently banned from participating in r/JusticeServed because you broke this community's rules. You won't be able to post or comment, but you can still view and subscribe to it. >Note from the moderators: >You have been banned for participating in a subreddit that has consistently shown to provide refuge for users to promote hate, violence and misinformation (joerogan). >This fully automated ban has been performed by a bot that cannot determine context. Appeals will be provided for good-faith users upon request. You can reply to this message and ask for an appeal. Any other messages will be ignored. More information on the appeal process here: https://www.reddit.com/r/JusticeServed/wiki/botbanned
My appeal did not include kind words. I called them out for being fascists and being part of the reason why Reddit has become a shithole. My appeal closed with asking not to be un-banned. Then I received this message,
>We are willing to reverse the ban only if you plan to stop supporting the target subreddit. Regardless of context, contributions you provide to the target subreddit is a material form of support. >Posting, Commenting, and Voting in a subreddit or on an item is a signal to Reddit and their advertisers that the participant believes that the community or comment or post has a legitimate reason for existing and serves a purpose for them. >There is no place for hate, violence and purposeful disinformation on Reddit. Those sub's advertisers should not be rewarded for the traffic metrics you and your peers provide to them by showing up and inflating those numbers. >They don't care what you say. They are just happy to have you continue to show up and refresh the page. >If this is something you can accept, to stop participating in the target subreddit, then please reply. If the bot hits you again for the same subreddit, you will not be unbanned a second time. >If you don't want to stop helping the target sub and their advertisers, then you can just ignore this message.
I responded, in part, with a full throated 'you can go fuck yourself'. This lead to a harassment warning from Reddit. I also noted the sub's 'motto' - "Too many times justice fails to prevail. These are not those times." For fucking real. I had also pointed out that what they're doing is analogous to DeSantis banning me from entering Florida just because I live in Philadelphia.
Dear JusticeServed, this is called cutting off your nose to spite your face.
I mean, this is the kind of shit that makes people more sympathetic to Musk and Rogan. I am not in support of nationalism or racism or misinformation. What I am in support of is common fucking sense.
It's very likely that had I maintained my composure I would have had a successful appeal. I didn't want to appeal to be unbanned though, I wanted to bring attention to their hypocrisy.
https://www.reddit.com/r/JusticeServed/comments/10jxlfk/justiceserveds_2_million_subscriber_extravaganza/ >With the overturning of Roe v Wade, we saw a couple of subreddits pinning mod endorsed celebration threads. Why anyone would want to celebrate people losing rights is beyond me.
Rights? What rights are you supporting, JusticeServed? Certainly not Freedom of Speech. Spying on people and censoring them for actions they take in other communities sounds a lot like fascism to me.
The take away here is that we shouldn't put so much emotional weight on stupid shit like this that ultimately doesn't matter in our real lives. And in our real lives, we should be more cautious with judging people. Your current mood and state of mind can easily cause you to misinterpret someone else's words and (re)actions. We should all be more mindful to take a breath before reacting to something emotionally triggering. And, of course, fuck Reddit.
For well over a week, I've been unable to sign into Lemmy.ml with Lemmios. I'm not having an issue with other apps like Memmy.
Without naming names, there's a well advertised grammar editing tool that's available either as an app download or browser extension. This is something I'd value for a number of reasons (good grammar is important!) but I'm super cautious about anything I'm giving permission to watch what I'm typing.
Ideally, I'd prefer to select text and have it analyzed on-demand using on-device intelligence. I'm on a Mac and it seems like Pages isn't cut out to check grammar. Also, there's no way in heck I'm paying $30 a month for a subscription.
Edit: I just want to acknowledge my request for something I'd value and then saying I don't want to pay for it. I would certainly pay for something if it met my needs but this function isn't something I'd personally value at $30 a month or any monthly subscription ($30 a year sounds reasonable). Moreover, if there's any suspicion of an application using my data for their own profit, they are not getting my money. So, in this case, for the sake of data privacy, I would prefer to pay for something (preferably once - grammar shouldn't need updating).
I was just watching some Headbangers Ball on Archive.org when the lyrics to this video by Queensryche struck me. I don't know that I ever heard this song before but I was around back then and recall plenty of "protest" / anti-government, anti-capitalist, anti-coldwar songs on the radio and MTV. It has me reflecting on the state of politics today and how things have shifted and twisted.
From 1988...
For a price I'd do about anything Except pull the trigger For that I'd need a pretty good cause Then I heard of Dr. X The man with the cure Just watch the television Yeah, you'll see there's something going on
Got no love for politicians Or that crazy scene in D.C. It's just a power mad town But the time is ripe for changes There's a growing feeling That taking a chance on a new kind of vision is due
I used to trust the media To tell me the truth, tell us the truth But now I've seen the payoffs Everywhere I look Who do you trust when everyone's a crook?
Revolution calling Revolution calling Revolution calling you Revolution calling Revolution calling Gotta make a change Gotta push, gotta push it on through
I'm tired of all this bullshit They keep selling me on T.V. About the communist plan And all the shady preachers Begging for my cash Swiss bank accounts while giving their Secretaries the slam
They're all in Penthouse now Or Playboy magazine, million dollar stories to tell I guess Warhol wasn't wrong Fame fifteen minutes long Everyone's using everybody, making the sale
I used to think That only America's way, way was right But now the holy dollar rules everybody's lives Gotta make a million doesn't matter who dies
Revolution calling Revolution calling Revolution calling you Revolution calling Revolution calling Gotta make a change Gotta push, gotta push it on through
I used to trust the media To tell me the truth, tell us the truth But now I've seen the payoffs Everywhere I look Who do you trust when everyone's a crook?
Revolution calling Revolution calling Revolution calling you Revolution calling Revolution calling Gotta make a change Gotta push, gotta push it on through
Gotta love the top comment, “If sincere, what a great move, and a great recognition of the need for preserving historical truth and solidarity.”
This might be the wrong place to ask this question but, as someone who has owned more Apple products that I could count, I'm interested in reducing my dependency on them (and tech, in general) moving forward.
A significant portion of my life has included spending time and money on devices and applications to "make my life easier / more productive". It's becoming all too apparent though that this has created a reliance on technology that can become difficult to separate from if a company, such as Apple, makes changes that are displeasurable or disruptive to the habits I've adopted my daily life.
I mean, my bluetooth trackpad is acting wonky right now, so that's not fun. Wired always works. Is there too much technology?
I am not a fan of having to keep a phone on me at all times. It's always in silent mode and visual notifications are kept to a minimum. I can and do sometimes go two to three days without even knowing where my phone is. If I leave the house, I more often just take my Apple Watch and a note pad. (However, with the realization that Apple is changing the Watch UX with OS10, I'm not so sure I'll be using it much longer.)
I'll go through my phone once in a while and delete apps I rarely use. If I need something, I can easily reinstall it. The only things I really need a phone for are Maps for navigation, Safari to open a restaurant's menu, to manage my Apple Wallet, to get a Lyft, to view my Fitness / Health info, and to access an MFA Authenticator app.
After my Apple TV, my iPad is probably my most used device, closely followed by my Mac mini. (I have a MacBook for work - I don't consider that part of this conversation.) Thinking about it though, I could probably eliminate the iPad in favor of the desktop experience. Since there is not Finder replacement on iPad, I need a MacOS computer to mange my music, photos, files, etc. Although, I hate sitting at a desk more than I need to already for work. If MacOS Finder were available on an iPad, I might be able to ditch a desktop computer.
I just checked Screen Time on my phone - I'm averaging about 1 Hour / Week. My iPad is about 4 Hours / Week. Why do I even have these devices?
So, my problem is that I need(?) each of these devices for just a small handful of tasks. Stepping back from it, it feels stupid that I have all this crap. It's a lot of money spent and it's a lot of opportunity for something to break my daily habits. Although, speaking of habits, I have to admit I feel an addiction to these things that prevents me from getting rid of them.
Aren't we all addicted to out devices? Are we actively encouraging or reducing our dependency on technology and what affect does this have on our mental well being?
I'm wondering if anyone has taken steps to replace or eliminate devices or experiences. How are you living a minimalist technology life?
For example, I'm on Lemmy.ml and I've joined !photography@lemmy.ml, !photography@lemmy.world, and !photography@kbin.social. In this example, it's not very different from the number of similar groups on Flickr but, in comparison to Reddit, it seems like the decentralized platform can be a little unruly.
How are you going about joining different communities and managing your engagement? Are you only participating on the community on your instance? Are you joining and posting in as many instances that seem relevant?
When I followed the instructions shown when selecting "Set up 2-factor authentication", there's a pop-up that says to reload the page. When I did that I was immediately signed out and was unable to log back in without a 2FA key.
Click 'Save', then manually reload this page, scroll down and use the '2FA installation link' to obtain the oath URL for your authenticator.
I admit to spending too much time on Reddit during my work day as a distraction. It's a problem. What's worse is that Reddit has become so full of uninteresting content that I spend most of my time downvoting things that aren't at all relevant to the sub they're posted in. And with a lot of the front page subs being offline, the experience is dreadfully worse.
Reddit is barely any different from any other social media platform now. People just want to argue for the sake of arguing and getting hive mind support without any interest in the relevance or context of the original post (ie., no one reads the articles). Reddit has an algorithm just like any other social media platform to push engaging content to the top so they can get more ad revenue. I've been saying it for years now, Reddit is trash. But damn is it addictive.
I'm thankful for Lemmy and KBin and Mastodon (and my RSS reader) for providing interesting, relevant, chronologically posted content with a minimal amount of dilution. I don't spend as much time here but it serves the purpose of informing and entertaining me for a five minute work break without the frustration of "being social media".
