Baffled European

Tag: voter suppression

  • I guess we’re not in Arkansas anymore

    Here’s a heartwarming story. Voting makes a difference. It’s nice to see democracy in action.

    Over 64% of Arkansawyers voted Republican in the last election, with only 33% for Harris. State elections show a similar pattern. I think it is fair to say that a clear majority of voters are happy with these results and no doubt enthusiastically support the policies of the party they elected.

    So let’s have a look at how this is turning out. It seems the tariff policies have really hit Arkansas farmers. More than a third are expected to declare bankruptcy this year. This has a knock-on in other areas of the local economy, with crop-dusting, machinery dealers and maintenance, and even rural banks taking a hammering from loss of business. The agriculture sector is describing the situation as a disaster.

    There is only one course of action available for these proud, independent frontiersmen: to pull themselves up by the bootstraps and go to DC to beg for government money. Some people might call them welfare queens. Others say that this is basically communism. But they are wrong, because it’s different in this case.

    Unfortunately, they are dealing with a man who has extensive experience in bankruptcy and he considers it normal practice. Somebody will make money picking up all these businesses for buttons, and that’s what matters.

    I assume Arkansawyers will vote Republican next time as well. If they get the chance.

  • You can do anything with computers these days

    It’s 2025, a quarter of the way through the 21st century. I’m stuck by the way I still so often think in 20th century terms. I was wondering how the administration will spy on its citizens and I initially imagined millions of inoffizielle Mitarbeiter informing the government about the indiscretions of family, friends and colleagues. The answer is staring me in the face as I write.

    Beyond destroying government departments, DOGE has been consistently targeting databases. Getting these is illegal, but that’s hardly a problem. They can now move all the data from all branches of government into a single dataset. At this point, the government can find out literally everything about anybody they want.

    On top of this is social media. They’ve already got AI trawling through everybody’s accounts, looking for signs of dissent. It’s just practice at the moment, getting rid of foreigners. It will work for everybody else just as well soon enough.

    It’s something AI is very good at. Fast and cheap. Produces pretty good results. It will make frequent mistakes, but that’s no problem. Collateral damage. None of those obeying Grok are going to question who to sack or disappear. It’s not their job and it takes too much time anyway. Who cares if you ruin a person’s life anyway? Empathy is causing the Downfall Of Western Civilisation.

    The best we can hope is that Peter Thiel is incompetent.

  • Whatever it takes

    It wasn’t the tyrannical behaviour. Not the repeated violations of the holy First Amendment. Nor was it the destruction of government agencies. It certainly wasn’t the persecution of the transes. Gangsterism on the international stage was excused. So was insulting foreign leaders and betraying long standing allies. Sucking up to dictators was tacitly approved. The outright contempt for the rule of law is something that people are conditioned to by now. Even blabbing out state secrets in a video conference is no cause for concern.

    A stock market crash, though, that’s a different matter. That’s what brought millions of USAians out to protest across all 50 states. Each person will have their own reasons, but the important thing is for them to see they are together. And it’s only a start, but that’s important in itself.

    However, ordinary people are not the only protesters, with rumours of various oligarchs complaining privately to the reality TV host. The crash last week wiped out over six trillion dollars. Just two months ago, the Wall St. traders were exhilarated by their new freedom to say “pussy” and “retard”. Owning the libs. Was it worth it? Do they have any influence?

    The USA seems to be trying to create as many major crises as possible, while simultaneously destroying all government capacity to deal with them. At some point, something must break, and very badly.

  • The worst idea ever

    Why are they all such massive racists?

    Racism is not a law of nature – it’s a human invention. It has its origins at the start of the 16th century, at a time of the Reformation and the discovery of the New World. People were trying to make sense of a world that had suddenly changed. Racism seemed to offer answers to their questions. Trouble was, all the answers are wrong.

    It has been challenged from time to time by people looking for some sort of evidence or basis to its claims. It always fails these challenges and then mutates into a new form that is immune from the last challenge.

    The most recent setback was the shoah, which most people – though evidently not all – consider a very bad idea. That’s by no means its only crime. Racism has a solid record of persecution, oppression, extortion, torture, rape, murder, war and genocide. It has no predictive power for anything and has zero virtues.

    It’s been a popular mass delusion for centuries and has drenched our culture with its poison. It’s so well established that we grasp for racist tools such as affirmative action as part of our attempts to undo some of the mess. Like everything else racist, these are also useless.

    The entire leadership of the USA believes unquestioningly, reflexively, in this baseless garbage. It dominates their thinking and decisions. And it’s total bullshit.