Manchin at least was a ‘D’ seat a fraction of the time, but instead it’s a regular ‘R’ seat now; imo it was a trade down. With Fetterman it’s just a complete waste since we could have an actual Democrat in that seat. I feel it’s more like a Sinema situation.
Sinema officially did a flip to Independent, I wouldn’t be surprised if Fetterman does the same. All the more reason to primary corporate aligned incumbents and vote progressives in though; which currently occupy less than five seats officially in the Senate and about 100 seats in the House.
I question if Don Osborne would even want to be on the Democratic ballot. It would dilute his sell as an Independent if he was running in the Democratic primary at all.
I’m not sure on the rules, but they probably do not have primary rules in place for ‘None of the Above’ since that’s not a great sell for the state’s Democratic party if that ever won. It could also be gamed by people changing parties for the primary just to vote ‘None of the Above’ for the other side of the aisle’s candidates.
My view on the situation is that this is an example of Democrats taking possibly the wrong lesson from 2024 or at least trying a strategy that didn’t work at all back in 2024. It was a bit more strategic at the time to back Independents in more Red states. However, I think actually backing a progressive and trying to educate people about a progressive platform would sell much better than some “appeal to everyone Independent” candidate which doesn’t encourage Democrats to turn out and does not encourage Republicans who like the more radical candidates.
I’m personally in the boat of seeing kids as adding to one’s life rather than draining it and making dreams rather than taking them away. But having kids is something my partner and I want. My only other dream is to ever own the roof over my head, but that’s not totally likely.
I feel that having kids would not seem as daunting for more people if we had real safety nets to support people that would even consider being parents. Such as free daycare, a basic income, universal healthcare, and stipends specifically to pay for costs associated with kids like for diapers, bottles, books, ever changing clothes sizes, etc.
Hear me out, they could just offer a non-profit insurance option through the state; this would make private companies need to be offering better benefits to consumers to stay competitive. There is no need to remove baseline benefits for people at all.
Individual Senators do have power when their peers are trying to pass something or prevent something.
That’s how Senator Lisa Murkowski ®, from Alaska, was able to get her state special concessions negotiated in order to pass the unfavorable OBB bill which was anything but beautiful.
Probably that the rural, least populated parts of the country hold a disproportionate amount of political power and this is a consequence of that. Well that and the deliberate defunding/deconstruction of our education system.
I feel that half the problem is pushy people and the other half is those same people getting FOMO.
A normal person isn’t going to care, but people that see legitimately everything as ‘their prerogative to anything they want’ are the types that are going to have anger, coursing in their veins, the second they get a whiff of something ‘exclusive’ that they are not privy to.
Also, we’re one country right? If we’re one country then everyone’s voice should matter. And currently, there’s not even a strong reason for some people to show up to the polls when their state already swings over 20+ points in one direction.
People in both red, blue, and purple states would all be better represented from the popular vote being in place.
Considering how land has more political power than people in the US, the voting system is still a major issue.
If we had the National Popular Vote for US elections, then more people living in deep blue states would have more reason to show up to vote when their candidate already is going to win by well over double digit points in their state.
When low population states are overrepresented in Senate and Presidential elections, then we can end up in a ruled by the minority situation.
I feel like the split between leftists and liberals really isn’t that big at all, assuming the people being talked about aren’t diehards behind people like Schumer or are scorched-earthers. There’s a vein of liberalism that builds towards the same exact goals that are leftist in nature.
I see progressive liberalism for instance being focused on working within what currently is built out to get to those goals of helping people reach self-actualization and living stable lives without having to be concerned about if you’ll be able to retire, have healthcare, have childcare, housing, food, disease, or other common concerns.
At what point is something considered an entirely different belief system though?
Part of why there are so many different sects of Christianity is because belief systems can differ quite a lot on what the focus is for followers of the faith.
Even Mormons are considered Christian, but many Christians would put them in their own category since they have an entirely different holy book that they follow.
Maybe it comes back to the word for ‘Christian’ being this less meaningful, all encompassing, definition. In which case, I feel there’s an argument to be made that having at least some other way to show distinction matters, whether that’s a new word or phrase entirely.
For the sake of conversation though, I feel there is some utility in using the word we are already familiar with, in this case ‘Christian’, and making a compelling definition, in the context of the conversation, based on the values echoed in the text. I feel that we can still hold the general understanding that this is a narrow definition, but it’s one made based on those values that we may want to see encouraged.
TL;DR: It’s difficult to have a conversation about any group of people that is made up of a wide assortment of people from different walks of life.
No judgment since I think many anime shows are not worth the time, but anime is just another medium, like books, more than anything. If there’s a genre of something you like on another medium, then there probably are some decent shows for that genre in anime.
Lots of anime is written with a specific audience in mind, such as the most well known anime shows being written for teens and young adults. Even more, most anime has a specific gendered audience as its target audience.
I personally didn’t care too much for anime until I watched some very high quality shows that pulled me more into the medium.
Notably all red states as well. There’s other voting systems I’d suggest but I believe it’s worth waiting till they can’t ban them first.
Wow that changes a lot about the title.
Taking it at face value you’d walk away thinking this is the dominant attitude in most of the western world, when that’s not the takeaway at all. A title like that just makes most men and women think their country is more conservative than previously thought. Talk about not helping young people that have more balanced views.
If there’s a form of Ranked Choice Voting in the primaries, such as STAR Voting or Ranked Robin, then the DNC will have a much more difficult time pulling shenanigans.
First Past the Post voting in the primaries favors moderates and extremists, but an issue with moderates is that they don’t excite voters with big life changing policies. So no one, except people already bought into preventing the worst option, show up to vote in the general elections. Which makes it harder for everyone.
More states need to get forms of Ranked Choice Voting implemented, specifically STAR or Ranked Robin voting if we want to see more progressive wins.
Biden was a pro-business Blue. I’d put him a couple steps left of center for his green energy initiatives though.
I think politics is a bit of a spectrum in reality, so not everything politicians do fit nicely on a left/red bar chart when we’re trying to talk about where they stand.
I feel that communicating your concerns with other parents and their school can help. I feel it can make sense to have some forms of socialization when they are in middle school or high school, but even then you’d want a pretty locked down system, imo.
I feel that not every parent is going to let their kids use technologically to talk to their friends, especially not all the time. That’s not how I grew up and I was fine developmentally speaking. As a parent you can seek out other parents that live by similar philosophy locally for your kids to have as friends as well.
What a refreshing conclusion to the story, it’s nice to read about these positive outcomes where the couple grows from the experience.
Open communication is one of the core things that makes relationships last imo.
Both likes and dislikes, imo. Bad actors and their bots can make it appear as though their stance is a widely held belief, they can dog pile dissidents, they often attack a straw-person for a point you never made to pull others against you and derail the conversation, etc.
With user level tools at your disposal, such as on BlueSky, you can at least coordinate a response to flag potential bad actors and even have the options to mute/block them by default. If your account were to be hacked and publishing disruptive content which was not something you would post, then your account could end up on these mute/block lists and you’d need to communicate the issue with the individuals that maintain these mute/block lists.