Funny events in anti-woke world

Agema

You have no authority here, Jackie Weaver
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He killed more people than Trump by implicit means and explicit means, and I would argue in the future he will continue killing Americans due to just his reckless climate policy. But he killed fewer Americans than Trump, and yes he would have handled covid better. I will admit that. But he has done more long-term damage to the world, and to America than Trump ever did.
It is too soon to say whether Bush or Trump did more damage to the world and/or the USA.
 

XsjadoBlayde

~it ends here~
Apr 29, 2020
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Colorado judge on Wednesday barred Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters from supervising elections due to the leak of voting-system BIOS passwords to QAnon conspiracy theorist Ron Watkins. Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold and Mesa County registered elector Heidi Jeanne Hess had petitioned the court for a ruling that Peters and Deputy Clerk Belinda Knisley are unable to perform the functions of the Designated Election Official for the November 2021 election.

The "court determines that the petitioners have met the burden of showing that Peters and Knisley have committed a breach and neglect of duty and other wrongful acts," Mesa County District Court Judge Valerie Robison wrote in Wednesday's ruling.

"As such, Peters and Knisley are unable or unwilling to appropriately perform the duties of the Mesa County Designated Election Official. The court further determines substantial compliance with the provisions of the code require an injunction prohibiting Peters and Knisley from performing the duties of the Designated Election Official."

In August, Watkins released photos of information on Dominion's Election Management Systems (EMS) voting machines, including an installation manual and "BIOS passwords for a small collection of computers, including EMS server and client systems," as we reported at the time. While Watkins, a former 8chan administrator, was trying to prove that Dominion can remotely administer the machines, the documents actually showed "a generic set of server hardware, with explicit instructions to keep it off the Internet and lock down its remote management functions."

Peters, who promoted Trump's conspiracy theory that voting machines were manipulated to help Joe Biden win the 2020 election, "'holed up' in a safe house provided by pillow salesman and conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell" when the FBI began investigating her, according to an August 19 Vice News article. Her location was described as a "mystery" for a while, but she appeared at an event in Grand Junction, Colorado, last month.


Peters brought outsider to confidential meeting
Judge Robison's ruling details how Peters brought a man named Gerald Wood into a meeting on a "trusted build" software update that ensures a secure chain of custody for the voting system. The meeting was intended only for authorized staff, but Wood was not a county employee even though Peters introduced him to staff "as an administrative assistant with her office who was transitioning from the motor vehicle division to the election's division." The judge wrote:

During the Mesa County "trusted build", confidential passwords were required. The passwords were maintained on a spreadsheet contained on a laptop [that Colorado Department of State Senior Voting Systems Specialist Danny] Casias brought with him from Denver. At some point, during the four plus hours of the "trusted build" process, video and photos were taken of Casias' laptop and the passwords contained on his screen.

Later, the confidential passwords were publicly posted to an online social media site. On August 2, 2021, the Secretary learned that the confidential passwords had been publicly disseminated and an investigation began.

After Griswold's complaint against Peters, the court held a September 28 status conference during which "the parties agreed that the facts were undisputed, and an evidentiary hearing was unnecessary." Robison thus decided the case based on the pleadings and exhibits.

Though Peters originally presented Wood to staff as an administrative assistant, "Peters and Knisley now describe Gerald Wood as a 'consultant' hired by Peters to copy the voting equipment computers," the judge's ruling said in a section listing the "undisputed" facts of the case. "There was no information provided to the Secretary that Peters or Knisley obtained a background check of Gerald Wood," even though Colorado election rules require background checks for anyone accessing secured areas with election equipment.


Cameras in Election Department disabled
The trusted build meeting was scheduled for May 25 and May 26, 2021. On May 17, "Knisley sent an email to the Information Management Department requesting that the cameras in the Election Department be turned off." Knisley's email "did not provide any basis for the request," but the cameras were turned off that same day, the ruling said. Knisley also "requested that the cameras be 'turned back on' on August 1st."

Peters authorized Wood "to take an image of the vote-tabulating equipment prior to the 'trusted build.'" On Sunday, May 23, Wood went into the secured election-system area with an electronic access card he was provided. On that day, he "copied the hard drives of the voting equipment computers before the 'trusted build.'" The confidential passwords were photographed during the trusted build meeting, and Wood copied the hard drives of the voting equipment computers a second time after the meeting.

After the meeting, "State Department staff returned to Mesa County and discovered that the server computer had two incorrect settings" that "could result in a security vulnerability." Specifically, the secure-boot setting was disabled, and an option to boot from an optical drive was enabled, the ruling said.

Griswold issued an order on August 17 that removed Peters from election oversight, and the Board of County Commissioners designated former Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams as a temporary replacement. Knisley is facing criminal charges, and "Mesa County has prohibited Knisley from being at her work site or conducting any work for Mesa County," the ruling said. (Knisley was charged with second-degree burglary and a cybercrime.)

In addition to prohibiting Peters and Knisley from further Mesa Count election work, the judge confirmed Williams as the Mesa County Designated Election Official until the November 2021 election is completed.


Peters claims ruling erodes “checks and balances that make our elections fair”
Peters said she will appeal the judge's "decision to remove a duly elected clerk and recorder from her election duties," and hopes "the Colorado Supreme Court will restore control of local elections to locally elected officials."

"This power grab is a stunning abuse of office and overreach by Secretary of State Jena Griswold, which should alarm all Coloradans," Peters said, according to Colorado Public Radio. "If this decision stands, it will fundamentally shift the power of running local elections from the county clerk to a Secretary of State in Denver, eroding the checks and balances that make our elections fair."

Though Peters publicly cast doubt on Dominion voting machines, Colorado Public Radio pointed out that "Colorado's audits show that the state's election was accurate and fair and a recent test of the county's new voting equipment from Dominion found the machines correctly tabulated all sample ballots."

"Clerk Peters seriously compromised the security of Mesa County's voting system," Griswold wrote in a statement on the judge's ruling. "The court's decision today bars Peters from further threatening the integrity of Mesa's elections and ensures Mesa County residents have the secure and accessible election they deserve."

The court ruling "does not affect Peters' authority over other aspects of the clerk's office, including motor vehicle registrations and business filings," Colorado Public Radio wrote.

Judge: Peters lied and “failed to follow the rules”
Peters spoke at a rally last month, claiming that "some powerful people don't want us to look at the facts" and are "trying to remove me as the Mesa County recorder just for doing my job." As the Public Radio report noted, Peters claimed in court filings that she brought in Gerald Wood because she "was trying to preserve records and to better analyze how Colorado conducts system updates."

But Peters' actions enabled a serious security breach, the judge's ruling noted. "The confidential passwords could only have been obtained by a person physically present at the voting system in Mesa County. The Secretary described the publication as a 'serious breach of voting system security protocols, as well as a violation of Election Rule 20.6.1.'"

"Peters was untruthful with the Secretary and her staff by stating that Gerald Wood was an employee of Mesa County and was an administrative assistance [sic] in her office," the judge wrote. "Peters failed to follow the rules and orders of the Secretary by facilitating and allowing a non-employee (Gerald Wood) without a disclosed background check to have access to a secured area via a Mesa County access card."

Additionally, "Knisley aided Peters in her wrongful acts by requesting that the cameras be disabled," ensuring "that the wrongful behavior of Peters could not be viewed," Robison wrote. As evidenced by the circumstances leading to the passwords leak, "Peters and Knisley also failed to take adequate precautions to ensure that confidential information would be protected."
Not sure how Ron is still legally allowed to run for Congress with all this shit. What a writhing mess.

Also, Peters is still in hiding, saying she "was trying to preserve records and to better analyze how Colorado conducts system updates" ...well why the fuck did you order the cameras to be turned off you disingenuous cowardly kunt?
 
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Dwarvenhobble

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Every tweet in that rant is a banger, and every tweet is more insane than the last, and it started with "elevating alternate sexual archetypes in the marketplace"

Is this what drugs feeling like?
Normally I can at least understand where it's coming from even if I don't agree with some of the more out there things said.

This one though I can literally only guess at based on vague idea.

This is what I interpret it to mean and explanation as to what I think as to why they're saying it (and to be clear it sounds kinda insane)

For the left it's not about doing the work well be the appearance of being a good worker.

(See people on about how it's awful companies are employing coders who are terrible at interacting with people, because clearly the role of a coder is to smooth talk people not produce code right? However the boss who interacts with a coder will likely know them more than the coder who just pumps out masses of code thus a bad boss will see the smooth talker as having more value. You are a good worker not due to your work but you fitting into the company and seeming to be good)

You have nothing of you own in the end though because it is all shared, the techniques the methods etc nothing is truly owned or created it is all for the glory of the speedrunning community.

(I think this comes down to the idea of communism being about the achievement of the whole movement where the idea of personal achievement and success isn't as celebrated as what it means for the whole. From what I've seen of speed running there's often a lot of "This person found this thing what will it mean for the future of the community and runs" )

This is being used in speedrunning to create a new sexual desirability characteristic by making people well known or giving prestige for stuff.

(Believe it or not there's a lot of weird stuff going on in the speed running community such that even a moderately successful speedrunner can be seen as desirable to some in the community, no really it's a very weird world from the small amount I've seen such that a like 3,000 follower speedrunner of no real note ended up in a bizarre controversy where he shared a room with a girl to set her up to be banned from GDQ as a way to prove his love and dedicated to another girl he'd hooked up with several times)
 

Agema

You have no authority here, Jackie Weaver
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Also, Peters is still in hiding, saying she "was trying to preserve records and to better analyze how Colorado conducts system updates" ...well why the fuck did you order the cameras to be turned off you disingenuous cowardly kunt?
Many whistleblowers will carry out technically illegal activities, which they will also attempt to conceal, in order to expose greater wrongdoing. After all, Peters arguably believed that the authorities were corrupt and would squash her attempts to expose corruption. Likewise we might accept that such releases may cause harm (e.g. to national interest) in some way. Thus was what she did in mechanism so different from Chelsea Manning? Were Peters exposing a genuine scandal, we would accept this subterfuge that she took.

The issue is really that she was delusional and made a colossal error of judgement, and now that it is clear she undermined election security for nothing, that she will not take responsibility for it.
 
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XsjadoBlayde

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Many whistleblowers will carry out technically illegal activities, which they will also attempt to conceal, in order to expose greater wrongdoing. After all, Peters arguably believed that the authorities were corrupt and would squash her attempts to expose corruption. Likewise we might accept that such releases may cause harm (e.g. to national interest) in some way. Thus was what she did in mechanism so different from Chelsea Manning? Were Peters exposing a genuine scandal, we would accept this subterfuge that she took.

The issue is really that she was delusional and made a colossal error of judgement, and now that it is clear she undermined election security for nothing, that she will not take responsibility for it.
Hm there are pretty noticeable differences, such as usually whistleblowers have actual insider knowledge they are trying to get out to the public, not reading baseless conspiracy theories online which then cause them to act without any knowledge or proof. Also whistleblowers go to as many trustworthy news outlets as possible to get the message out, not post to some creepazoid troll admin of a site known for hosting child porn and Nazi memes, etc etc.
 
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Silvanus

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Well then surely you can show me the bill the UK passed with the precise number of doses of insulin they bought.
It's not a "bill" to order resources; these things are usually handled departmentally in the UK. But sure, the usual stockpile level for insulin is 1.5 million doses, which is approximately 7+ weeks' worth.

Or it might get millions of signatures and pass, because it's a persuasive topic and the writers spread the word of it through various media. Since we're in the realm of hypotheticals now.
It would need over 30 million votes. And that would need to be the norm for basically every resource the country needs on a weekly or monthly basis. That's pie-in-the-sky thinking.

It might be an election, it might be some other method.
So if it's an election, then you have elected representatives.

And if it's not, then you have no detail on the alternative.

Not really no, in any good democracy the only data not available to the public are supposed to be state secrets.
That just simply isn't true. As a recent example, Chris Whitty & Patrick Vallance's formal advice to the UK government isn't just readily available.


Procedure is a big word here, because it's the word I've been using. Knowing procedure is not at all related to what you've been arguing, but what I've been saying they'd be taught. You've been saying that being elected makes them inherently effective at knowing how to govern. If you're going to turn around and say it's because they can ask people for data and the nitty-gritty of legal writing, then you're going to have to admit I've been right since the start in saying there's nothing special about them and their work can be accomplished by any rational persons.
Underlining mine, because for the umpteenth time, that isn't what I've been saying. There's nothing "inherent" about this; people are hired for a specific job. That doesn't make them supermen.

You're right in one sense, in that any suitably rational, invested, knowledgeable person, if given access to the same data and procedural stuff, is going to be able to fulfil the job. That's not what direct democracy is requesting, though, is it? It's requesting that every person in the country, regardless of rationality, investment or knowledge, have equal standing in fulfilling that job.


They're also outnumbered by the opposition, largely agree with the opposition on many issues (if you had them vote on issues instead of personalities), and because of representative democracy were a hairsbreadth away from ruling largely unopposed and also because of representative democracy, the group that did win isn't ruling at all. No, I feel secure in my position.
They're outnumbered, in the US, by an opposition who you also feel are an equal part of the problem. And they wouldn't be a "hairsbreadth" from ruling; they would be ruling in direct democracy, just as much as anybody else.

Their motions wouldn't somehow immediately start being rational, intelligent notions for the betterment of society, in complete contrast to how they've acted for the past 5 years.


There's no accountability now and I fail to see how they can pass the buck if they directly voted for or against something.
There's accountability in that the citizenry can recall a representative (with as little as 10% triggering a process, here in the UK). There's accountability in that how every individual MP voted is a matter of public record and publicly available online (I check it frequently). We can see our MPs personally at surgeries. We can vote them out of office.

If everybody in the country is equally culpable? "Eh, it was just one vote. And besides it went bad cos of how it was handled, it's the civil service's fault".


You're the one who says they're scared of the average person making decisions because they're selfish assholes. Don't try and pretend that's changed now.
It hasn't changed, because those aren't my words.


Some decisions simply affect a larger group than the one raising the issue in the first place, thus they cannot be decided by that group. So you pick someone (possibly through election, though you could just as easily ask someone if there are no objections) to take your idea/demands to a broader group, and from there things are decided in how it's handled.
"If there are no objections"... sorry, from fucking who? If I'm just asking my mate, do I then shout in the street to see if anyone objects? And where do they take them-- just to City Hall, to sit among the hundred others awaiting a referendum?

Literally the word for most of these organizations that are referenced for their data or viewpoints are called Non-Governmental Organizations.
Uhrm... do you actually know what an NGO is? A lot of them have direct relationships with governments. They're simply outside of gov control.


And what's to stop a group of politicians from drowning others in requests?
I told you. Limits on the docket. It's literally someone's job to stop this happening.

Because elections are fairly narrow in definition and not necessarily required to be democratic.
Ooooook. So you would elect people. To represent the interests. But it wouldn't be representative democracy.
 

XsjadoBlayde

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Ugh, sorry, gotta share the despair before buggering off.


Scott McKay has marshaled his fan base to engage in sometimes hostile activism at school board meetings against mask mandates.

The audience at a meeting last month of the Ankeny, Iowa, school board exploded over the prospect of the board reinstating a mask mandate, with parents shouting at board members who supported the mask rule.

“We know where you live!” one parent yelled at the school board members. “We’re going to stalk you!”

The scene, which ended with the board voting to reimpose the mask rule, looked like so many other school board meetings across the country this year over coronavirus restrictions. But the Ankeny school board has become a larger flashpoint in the fight over mask mandates in schools, thanks in large part to a leather-clad, tomahawk-toting QAnon personality named Scott McKay.

McKay, a middle-aged former bodybuilder whose followers call him “Patriot Streetfighter,” has used his sizable online platform and frequent use of violent rhetoric to turn the Ankeny mask debate into a national event among followers of the QAnon conspiracy theory, urging his followers to bombard specific school board members with complaints.

Despite his bizarre demeanor and online presence, McKay has marshaled his fan base to engage in sometimes hostile activism at school board meetings against mask mandates—despite his own recent experience with a COVID outbreak at one of his rallies.

McKay inserted himself into the Ankeny mask debate in late August when he devoted an episode of his online Patriot Streetfighter talk show to the “Iowa Mama Bears,” Ankeny mothers Emily Peterson and Kimberly Reicks. The pair have become rising right-wing personalities for their opposition to mask requirements in Ankeny schools, hobnobbing with Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) and QAnon celebrities like former Trump national security adviser Michael Flynn.

During the interview, the women urged McKay’s viewers to specifically contact pro-mask mandate Ankeny school board members Amy Tagliareni and Lori Lovstad.

McKay, who uses “fork” as a euphemism for “fuck” in what’s become a sort of catchphrase for his fans, urged his audience in menacing terms to “carpet bomb these boneheads with emails” and “beat the shit out of them.”

“You forkin’ scumbags will not walk away from this clean,” McKay said in his video, addressing the school board members. “Believe me. Because when this army, the Patriot Streetfighter nation comes at you, you’re forked. So I would say, run the white flag up the pole now because if you haven’t realized at this point with these ladies that they’re coming, all you shitheads, there will be nowhere to run. There’s nowhere to run. You’re all hypocrites, you’re forkin’ scumbag losers.”

McKay said he wanted to see a world where officials like Lovestad and Tagliareni were “yelled at” and “scorned” wherever they went.

“Ok, Lori Lovestad, you now have been called because this particular episode is probably going to get about half-a-million to a million views,” McKay said, later adding, “You want to be famous, now you are.”

In the school-board video, McKay also promoted the idea of using violence against police officers who enforce coronavirus restrictions.

“Sooner or later, we the people show up with arms, outnumbering you 50-to-1,” McKay said. “Then at that point, you’re going to have a decision to make. Do you want to go home, or do you not want to go home to your family?”

McKay didn’t respond to a request for comment. Lovestad, citing concerns for her and her family’s safety ahead of an anticipated Patriot Streetfighter event in Iowa, declined to comment.

McKay’s ability to direct his audience to harass the school-board members demonstrates hyper-partisan anger now targeted at school board officials across the country. And it reveals how the right’s focus on school boards this year has allowed fringe figures who openly advocate for violence to grab the spotlight.

McKay styles himself as a sort of QAnon biker, frequently wearing leather chaps and a leather Harley-Davidson in his public appearances. He rides a motorcycle with a “Patriot Streetfighter” paint job. Last weekend, McKay posed in the crowd at a Trump rally behind the podium in his leather outfit.


But nothing is more crucial to McKay’s branding as the “Patriot Streetfighter” than his tomahawk. McKay poses for pictures with his fans with the tomahawk, uses it as a prop onstage, and incorporates it into the Patriot Streetfighter logo.

McKay has told his fans that the tomahawk, which includes a pipe-like fixture he claims can be used as a “peace pipe,” represents a threat to politicians and government officials. Following traditional QAnon thinking, McKay claims the world is run by a 1,400-year-old cabal that commits Satanic rituals against children.

At a rally in Nebraska, McKay explained the tomahawk’s significance. If the Democratic officials McKay claims make up the “cabal” will resign peacefully, he’ll share the peace pipe with them. But if officials refuse his demands, they’ll face the tomahawk.

“It’s symbolic of what we are going to do to the political class in this country,” McKay said as he cut the air with the blade, later adding, “If they choose to maintain their current course and the destruction of humanity, the only thing left in this peace pipe is the blade of war of the American people.”

It’s difficult to gauge the exact size of McKay’s audience, because he often creates new channels on platforms like YouTube after earlier accounts are banned. Still, he’s clearly managed to amass a somewhat large audience that’s willing to turn out to see him in person. Starting in the summer, McKay started touring the country, often speaking to crowds of hundreds at each stop. McKay’s tour raised enough money to pay for a wrapped bus that declared him the “full throttle truth hammer.”

McKay’s rallies play host to some of his most violent language. In an indoor July 11 rally in Pennsylvania, McKay addressed the audience of hundreds of unmasked people with the tomahawk in his hand and the butt of a handgun sticking out of his waistband. McKay urged them to become involved with their school boards, then quickly transitioned to imagining the deaths of his political enemies.

“I can tell you, in the long game, this doesn’t stop for me until these people that are doing what they’re doing to kids are dead,” McKay said. “I’m going to keep raining down this thunder, I’m going to do it every forking day.”

That Pennsylvania rally took a turn a few days later, when McKay and a number of his associates, including his 81-year-old father, became sick. In posts on the social media app Telegram on July 19, McKay acknowledged that a number of people who attended the rally had become ill with an unspecified disease. But McKay added that he was taking hydroxychloroquine, suggesting that he had contracted COVID-19.

“Many people came down sick from the Penn State event,” McKay wrote. “Many of you have heard about it and those rumors are true.”

Minutes before posting about the apparent coronavirus outbreak at his rally, however, McKay posted a picture of himself lifting up his mask on an airplane to flout mask rules.

As McKay and members of his entourage remained sick on July 22, he began to blame the outbreak not on lax coronavirus safety measures at the Pennsylvania rally, but on a “toxin” attack from “the deep state.” On July 31, McKay announced that his father, a well-known figure to Patriot Streetfighter fans, who called him “The General,” had suffered a stroke caused by the coronavirus.

“The targeted attack on the Penn State event that took down my team and my entire family resulted in a COVID clotting massive stroke on The General,” McKay tweeted on July 30, blaming “deep state motherfuckers.”

On Aug. 6, according to an obituary, McKay’s father died. McKay has insisted his father’s death was caused by shadowy forces, vowing “massive retribution.”

While some prominent one-time QAnon promoters like Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene (R-GA) have distanced themselves from the conspiracy theory in the wake of Donald Trump’s defeat, McKay has continued to embrace some of the most outlandish facets of QAnon belief, even adding on some of his own. In a recent broadcast, he claimed that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) is secretly an anti-Democratic “white hat” working for conservatives.

“AOC is a white hat that is running an operation to completely demolish the left,” McKay said, adding that Ocasio-Cortez had been paid $52 million in funds to an offshore account by benevolent forces to bring down the centuries-old cabal.

Along with the “Iowa Mama Bears,” McKay’s show has become a hub for other coronavirus conspiracy theorists. A Canadian police officer is under investigation after appearing on McKay’s show.
 

Cheetodust

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This twitter rant. This is just one out of 14, be sure to read the whole thing and be amazed.


And of course the real reason to post this ... the memes!
Wow... That was fantastic.

First of all, hot take that Elon Musk is the most fuckable man in the world.

Second of all I absolutely love the fact that he talks about speed runners essentially handing people the tools to beat them, that a speed run is just built on the work people have previously done and therefore isn't the accomplishment of the speed runner. Like it's literally Kropotkins argument against private property.
 

crimson5pheonix

It took 6 months to read my title.
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It's not a "bill" to order resources; these things are usually handled departmentally in the UK. But sure, the usual stockpile level for insulin is 1.5 million doses, which is approximately 7+ weeks' worth.
Oh what's that? It's delegated and politicians don't have to know how many doses the country needs? Imagine my shock.

It would need over 30 million votes. And that would need to be the norm for basically every resource the country needs on a weekly or monthly basis. That's pie-in-the-sky thinking.
We've literally just established that politicians don't order resources directly, so that's bullshit.

So if it's an election, then you have elected representatives.

And if it's not, then you have no detail on the alternative.
D e l e g a t i o n.

In any case, as you've pointed out repeatedly, your whole argument is against someone else, someone who might have a silly idea of how horizontal hierarchy works. I didn't come in to make arguments on their behalf, I came in because you laid out broad arguments against the very idea of direct democracy which were stupid.

That just simply isn't true. As a recent example, Chris Whitty & Patrick Vallance's formal advice to the UK government isn't just readily available.
That's why I specified good democracy. Their statements to the government should absolutely be open to see for all.

Underlining mine, because for the umpteenth time, that isn't what I've been saying. There's nothing "inherent" about this; people are hired for a specific job. That doesn't make them supermen.
Yet your actual arguments have said the opposite. You can deny it all you like, but you've been saying the equivalent of "I'm not racist, but"

You're right in one sense, in that any suitably rational, invested, knowledgeable person, if given access to the same data and procedural stuff, is going to be able to fulfil the job. That's not what direct democracy is requesting, though, is it? It's requesting that every person in the country, regardless of rationality, investment or knowledge, have equal standing in fulfilling that job.
Elected bodies carry a semi-random cross-section of the population they're elected from, by definition. They are equally as rational as the people they're drawn from. If you're saying politicians are statistically rational, then you have to admit the population they're drawn from are statistically rational. If you're saying the population is statistically irrational, you have to say politicians drawn from them will be statistically irrational.

They're outnumbered, in the US, by an opposition who you also feel are an equal part of the problem. And they wouldn't be a "hairsbreadth" from ruling; they would be ruling in direct democracy, just as much as anybody else.
They'd be allowed to vote, as they do now. But they would have to actually win on policy votes instead of personality ones. The actual race between Trump and Biden was close enough that they nearly won four more years of policy that would have been unpopular, with no way for the people to stop the policies, even the ones his voters hated. If you outsource your decision making, you don't get to complain when the person decides poorly.

Their motions wouldn't somehow immediately start being rational, intelligent notions for the betterment of society, in complete contrast to how they've acted for the past 5 years.
Likely not, but they'd have less power to enact their bad policies.

There's accountability in that the citizenry can recall a representative (with as little as 10% triggering a process, here in the UK). There's accountability in that how every individual MP voted is a matter of public record and publicly available online (I check it frequently). We can see our MPs personally at surgeries. We can vote them out of office.
It's ironic that the actual source of accountability in your system is direct democracy. Seeing how they voted is no source of accountability, neither is voting them out at the next election.

If everybody in the country is equally culpable? "Eh, it was just one vote. And besides it went bad cos of how it was handled, it's the civil service's fault".
You mean what people do now in representative democracy, making this problem not at all unique?

It hasn't changed, because those aren't my words.
They are your words.

"If there are no objections"... sorry, from fucking who? If I'm just asking my mate, do I then shout in the street to see if anyone objects? And where do they take them-- just to City Hall, to sit among the hundred others awaiting a referendum?
Yes and yes. Generally we're going to be talking about more than a single household with an idea, and there's generally a more formalized setting for discussing ideas (like biweekly meetings or something, depending), but it is largely that straightforward. If you're picking someone to express your ideas to another body, you don't need a bunch of campaign promises and shrewd dealing, you need a guy to go over to the next town with a list. It doesn't need some big set of promises or formalized election, "Hey Bob, can you take this list we made to the next town?" is perfectly viable.

Uhrm... do you actually know what an NGO is? A lot of them have direct relationships with governments. They're simply outside of gov control.
A few of them have disgusting ties to governments, but theoretically they aren't appointed by governments and while they can receive government commissions, they are supposed to be self-standing.

I told you. Limits on the docket. It's literally someone's job to stop this happening.
And this doesn't work in direct democracy, because...?

Ooooook. So you would elect people. To represent the interests. But it wouldn't be representative democracy.
I never said that. I explicitly said you don't have to have elections to have democracy.
 

AnxietyProne

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This republican monster locked up likely politically powerless African American children for watching a fight.
This is what happens when you have a For Profit prison system.
 

Terminal Blue

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For the left it's not about doing the work well be the appearance of being a good worker.
That's capitalism baby.

The entire point of capitalism is to strip labour of value. That's what it's been doing for hundreds of years now, until we're at the point we are now where labour essentially has no value whatsoever. Very few of us will ever have any real stake, financial or emotional, in the outcome of our own labour, so why care about it? Caring about your work, worrying about doing the work well, taking pride in your own work, is a scam. After all, it's not your work, no part of it belongs to you. Companies and employers can and will pretend to be your friends, they can try to motivate you by appealing to your emotions and making you feel special, but I think most people kind of know on some level that it's a lie. So why bother? What compelling reason do any of us have to care about doing our work well?

You have nothing of you own in the end though because it is all shared, the techniques the methods etc nothing is truly owned or created it is all for the glory of the speedrunning community.
Even if that were true. How is that different from other form of labour?

But I don't think it is true. Because ironically, being part of a community means that people do know who you are. If you achieve something, if you invent a new technique or just execute something really well, then other people in that community will notice. Community, even online community, is a very powerful thing. Creating something which other people will see and associate with you can meet a need. Heck, creating something purely for your own amusement and then sharing it voluntarily, rather than being coerced into doing something to make other people money, is a more tangible form of ownership than almost any of the actual paid work people do.

This is being used in speedrunning to create a new sexual desirability characteristic by making people well known or giving prestige for stuff.
I mean, I know there's a certain breed of conservative men whose political views have made them so thoroughly repulsive to most women that they can't date or have normal sex lives, but most people have sex, which implies that most people are to some extent sexually desirable.

Like, I feel like what's really making conservatives mad here is the refutation of this weird red pill myth that women only experience physical attraction, and even then only for alpha chads with big muscles and ridiculous jawlines. If someone is successful at speedrunning, that's at least interesting. It's not really surprising to me that people who find the same things interesting hook up, and it probably shouldn't be surprising to anyone willing to give it any thought.
 
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AnxietyProne

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Like, I feel like what's really making conservatives mad here is the refutation of this weird red pill myth that women only experience physical attraction, and even then only for alpha chads with big muscles and ridiculous jawlines. If someone is successful at speedrunning, that's at least interesting. It's not really surprising to me that people who find the same things interesting hook up, and it probably shouldn't be surprising to anyone willing to give it any thought.
Speaking of conservatives getting mad, this makes a good segueway into another thing I've always wanted to address about the right and anti-woke types; this notion that, if people disagree with you or call your opinion shit, it's automatically validation and confirmation that you said nothing wrong and that you're "living rent free" in their heads.
 

Agema

You have no authority here, Jackie Weaver
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Hm there are pretty noticeable differences, such as usually whistleblowers have actual insider knowledge they are trying to get out to the public, not reading baseless conspiracy theories online which then cause them to act without any knowledge or proof. Also whistleblowers go to as many trustworthy news outlets as possible to get the message out, not post to some creepazoid troll admin of a site known for hosting child porn and Nazi memes, etc etc.
Yes, I agree - Chelsea Manning had a vastly better case. But the basic mechanism of trickery and illegality to acquire the data to whistleblow is acceptable - or at least, defensible as long as the case (wrongdoing exposed) is.