We’re in weird times tho. The wealth gap isn’t just widening, it’s fucking Usain Bolt sprinting away from us. The rich get richer, the poors get to eat the bag of shit that trickles down. So yeah, I’m sure there will be a rapid recovery to a healthier, sustainable economy… If you are in the top 1%. If not, well, you should have just worked harder and got rich dummy.

After a remarkably short court hearing, Elon Musk has found the presiding judge in his own case guilty of “the woke mind virus” and sentenced him to 47 years in jail. The jury watched the ruling read in Musk’s own halting and strange speech, collectively shrugged their shoulders, and went home. “Well he has all that money,” said Anne Sodding, one of the jurors on the case. “He must be right, I guess.” Mr. Musk has declined to comment and was last seen driving his Tesla Cyber Truck the wrong way down a one way street exiting the courthouse.

I work in this space. There’s a wide variety of reasons, a company being dumb and greedy is definitely among them but typically just a tiny part of the equation. The biggest thing is certified vendors. The military/government is incredibly strict with who they’ll contract with. Which means the supply is incredibly limited on many things, which in turn means that companies will ratchet up prices a crazy amount in part to deal with the goofy standards that the government requires on their goods but also because they know the demand far outweighs the supply.

There is also the burden of time. The US government drags their feet an INSANE amount on projects. It scales with size as well. The larger the project the slower things move almost every time. It very frequently gets to a point where they need stuff done right now because they waited too long and will pay pretty much any price to do it.

There is also the fact that the military is operating with a budget chalk full of “fuck you money.” In short, money is immaterial. Half the time they don’t even look at the price, whatever it costs doesn’t matter, just get it done and get it done right.

My company marks up shit an insane amount and I know for a fact pretty much every other certified vendor is as well. I dunno about 8k% (lol) markup but honestly that doesn’t shock me. The prices I’ve seen are jaw dropping. And they pretty much never get negotiated or rejected.

This was my thought. Like I find it VERY hard to believe his set wasn’t at least somewhat vetted beforehand. I cannot imagine they’d just let a comedian go up there and have absolutely no idea what he was going to talk about. That just seems like a total dumbass move so maybe it’s possible with Trump

It’s always so interesting (or heartbreakingly depressing) for me to hear this. I have seen that to some extent where I live, although very tepidly. However, when I go visit friends and family in much more red areas I feel like I’m going into bizarro world. People are doubling and tripling down. It’s like a weird arms race or something between trump and his sycophants as they desperately try to keep up with each other in terms of bigotry and just overall insanity and/or stupidity. I have absolutely no doubt in my mind that, in those areas, they ate this stuff up and asked for seconds.

It would make me incredibly happy if this was some sort of breaking point and it actually did open some eyes but having been there and seen the countless gigantic trump/Vance flags hanging from the bed of outrageously lifted pickups, I just don’t see it.

Lmao these folks must have forgot where they are. We don’t punish our billionaires here in the great US of A. They’re special, amazing, and definitely way too busy to worry about silly little things like laws or prison like us poors.

Right this is a pretty awful example of English as a language. Like if I talk to a skibidi brainrot kid today I’d hear all sorts of shit I wouldn’t understand at all like:

“Bruh I literally I need to get on my sigma grindset and start mewing so I can looks max and pull that shmlawg gyatt with the rizzle. Then I can stop gooning like a beta sussy imposter. Bet she won’t fanum tax my bussin’ glizzy or there’ll be a whole bunch of turbulence and I’d literally hit the griddy on her. Only in ohio tho. Skibidi!”

I wouldn’t really say that means I don’t understand English as a language. Just that people are weird as hell with slang.

There’s a lot deleted here so I may have missed it but I’m just curious, what would you prefer her to say? Like you are totally right that politicians famously make promises they don’t keep but would you prefer her to just say nothing? Or to say the opposite? The other guy has a plan that will increase taxes/costs on everyone but the top 5%. Is that better? Should he also not say anything?

Definitely more although not by a ton I’d say. but the Trump superstore wasn’t there in 2020 so I think that absolutely plays a part in the increase of pro trump stuff around town lol.

Unfortunately. I had the exact opposite experience. Trump/Vance signs friggin everywhere and even a damn trump megastore where they sell all things trump lol. Saw a dude walking down the street today before I flew out wearing a shirt that said “this is my pride flag” and it was just a picture of Trump’s face. YMMV I guess haha

I feel like there’s a suicide something or other all over Japan and it makes me sad. Just off the top of my head I can think of this, the suicide forest, the sea wall on Mitsubishi Island, nijino bridge, that one train station in Tokyo… Shits depressing

All that matters is if that corpse has a big R next to its name.

I gotta say… I’m not necessarily a huge fan of Kamala but she is a pretty terrific speaker. Granted the bar has been buried underground for a bit now so my reference may be skewed but it is pretty nice to just see someone eloquently speak, be coherent, respectful, be decisive and concise, and actually say meaningful answers to each question. I have a feeling being in a courtroom for so long may have helped. As well as a career in law and government. Almost as if relevant experience is important or something… But I digress.

I will poop in my pants if any of the Fox news loyalists think anything other than she made a complete ass of herself. You and I both know she could say absolutely anything and it wouldn’t matter. It will get spun to make her look like a complete moron and the viewers will just gobble it up. Their site right now is 100% negative about the interview and there’s no doubt in my mind there’s a lot more where that came from.

The number of times I’ve basically seen this exact same thing happen in history is crazy. It’ll be something like “Well ole Bill Jesterbong discovered the Gilded Anusbangle in August of 1827 on the island of Nebraska. Naturally, he built a hide in a tall fir tree and camped in it for 3 weeks straight shooting and killing all 1382 Gilded Anusbangles to see if their hide could be useful or if they were tasty. Turns out they were not. The Gilded Anusbangle is now extinct.”

I truly believe they do care. They just somehow, some way, don’t see the lunacy, immaturity, and blatant disregard for… pretty much everything even resembling decorum or political legitimacy. I live around some very maga people and their opinion of him is just so strange and opposite of virtually every single instance I see of the man. And I feel like I view things in a pretty non biased light. At first anyways.

I truly believe that the bulk of the support is just an incredible example of the power of media (and now social media) to just dominate one’s thoughts.

I had the exact same experience a few years ago. A lender did some quick math within like 20 minutes of talking and was like “I think we could go ahead and lock you in at loan in the mid 600’s”

Lmao we could never in a million years dream of affording that. Idk wtf that dude was thinking but I can’t even begin to try and figure out how I’d be able to afford that mortgage unless it was like a 3,000 year 1.08% loan or something.

There are places alllllllll over California right now where you can get a burger and fries or onion rings or shit another burger for way less than $30. This includes giant chains and tiny mom and pops. Sounds like that place just sucks at finances or running a business or both lol.

He tells it like it is. You just don’t get it. But also he’s never serious. Unless I want him to be. Then he’s serious. But usually he’s joking. Unless it’s in bad taste, then it’s just not what you think it is. Or maybe you’re a snowflake. Idk the pieces are all there, one of those things should get me out of this…