After all its not hard to make a corporation in the US

…A US corporation is subject to US laws.

ByteDance is subject to Chinese laws.

If TikTok wants to do everything that it’s currently doing, but under US law and under US scrutiny, they’re more than welcome to do so. But they’re currently evading any serious scrutiny. Hence the reason to shut them down if they refuse gov’t oversight.

National security interests are the interests of the people though.

The fundamental issue is that, assuming I’m not leaking national security information, I can say nearly anything I want on Facebook, Twitter, etc. (as long as I’m not in violation of their terms of service). The US largely does not censor people using the power of the gov’t. If I am an authoritarian communist, I’m more than welcome to spread these views on any American social network that I choose without gov’t interference. I can spread anti-vax and Q nonsense if I wish, and the worst-case scenario is that my neighbors will stop talking to me. I can attack the very foundation of the country if I want, as long as I’m not spreading military secrets.

This is not the case in China. Spreading pro-capitalism and pro-democracy messages can quickly get you arrested. Trying to share accurate information about what really happened in Tianamen Square in 1989 can result in you disappearing. Words and phrases are actively censored by the gov’t on social media. The Chinese gov’t takes a direct role in shaping social media by what it promotes, and what it forbids. Anything that’s perceived as an attack on the political system of the country, the party, or any of the leaders (remember the internationally famous tennis player that abruptly disappeared when she accused a local party leader of sexual assault?) will put you at risk.

This isn’t a case of, “oh, both sides are the same”.

The Constitution doesn’t only protect American citizens, it protects everyone

Uh, no. It doesn’t protect everyone, not by a long shot. The US constitution doesn’t guarantee Chinese citizens, living in China, the right to freedom of the press.

…And this isn’t about which speech they’re allowing. This is about who controls the platform, and how they respond to gov’t inquiries. If TikTok is divested from ByteDance, so that they’re no longer based in China and subject to China’s laws and interference, then there’s no problem. There are two fundamental issues; first, TikTok appears to be a tool of the Chinese gov’t (this is the best guess, considering that large parts of the intelligence about it are highly classified), and may be currently being used to amplify Chinese-state propaganda as well as increase political division, and second, what ByteDance is doing with the enormous amounts of data it’s collection, esp. from people that may be in sensitive or classified locations.

As I stated, if TikTok is sold off so that they’re no longer connected to China, then they’re more than welcome to continue to operate. ByteDance is refusing to do that.

Eh, trying everything they can to make a policy stick isn’t that far different in my mind to things like John Yoo’s pro-torture memos; they’re trying to warp the law in order to do what they want to do, rather than trying to work well within the boundaries of the law. I’ve seen plenty of Dems that say Republicans opened the door, and so it would be foolish of Dems to not walk through, but I’d argue that Dems should be trying to close the door. I’m generally opposed to a strong executive, since I’m broadly anti-authoritarian.

And yes, I recognize that there’s no way in hell Biden gets the student loan debt relief passed by the current congress, and yes, that’s shitty.

TBH, Dems have absolutely done the same thing before. A super-easy example is Biden’s policies to forgive student loans (which, BTW, I’m fully in favor of; it was just done in such a way that it wasn’t legal). There’s currently a case underway right now regarding the Lloyd Austin throwing out plea agreements with Guantanamo Bay detainees; there’s a pretty solid argument that he doesn’t have that legal right.

My point is that Bush et al. pushed the limits of what was legal, and in general stopped doing those things when courts told them that they weren’t allowed to. OTOH, Trump has absolutely, 100%, flagrantly violated the law and court orders many, many times.

Most people don’t split their ticket when they vote; if someone votes Democratic for president, it’s likely that they end up voting Democratic in most other races on the ballot as well. That’s especially true if they’re actively voting against Trump, and the other candidates are endorsed by Trump. So, if I was a Republican trying to take control of the Senate and retain control of the House, that would be a risky strategy.

As far as the other possibilities go, IDK. It doesn’t seem likely because…

…Many of the Republicans currently endorsing Harris are been vocally anti-Trump for a long time now. It’s not new that they’re anti-Trump, but it is new that they’re actively endorsing a Democrat. I don’t think that they’re trying to actively work to get Trump elected by some subversive means, and it seems like the numbers of people that would work on–versus the number of Reagan-era Republicans that would take it at face value–seems very marginal.

Staffers are basically just office personel.

Staffers are usually True Believers. They want to work for an administration because they believe in the person, and believe in the policy. That, BTW, was why Trump had such ferocious turnover; people become disillusioned at a blistering rate.

That’s such a fucking stupid take from someone that doesn’t even have a grade-school understanding of politics.

The Republicans endorsing Harris don’t like her, and they don’t agree with any of her policies. They probably do agree with much of the bullshit that comes out of Trump. On the other hand, the Republicans endorsing Harris genuinely believe in America, and in the idea of democracy. They clearly see that Trump is an enormous threat to democracy in the US, and that he’s doing everything in his power to break the system that they believe in, even if his specific policies are things they agree with.

Whether I like Bush Jr., or Cheney (either one, really), or George Will, or any other Republican endorsing her, or not, they are still people that believe in the rule of law. Trump does not believe in the rule of law. These Republicans largely believe in letting voters decide, even if they’ll jerrymander the shit out of districts. Trump does not. These Republicans don’t believe that this country can survive a second Trump presidency, and they would rather lose the Presidency, the House, the Senate, and possibly a few seats on SCOTUS, than watch our democracy die.

The book is brilliant, even if it’s difficult to read and follow. The satire of art criticism is just so on point.

…And it’s hard to know if the Navidson record and house never really existed or not (in the context of the book) because of the way Johnny is slowly unraveling. It’s got strong elements of cosmic horror to it, along with razor-sharp satire, and the delineation in writings styles between Johnny’s personal narrative, Zampano, and the various journal articles are written really sells the entire piece.

Disagree on VR, depending. I use a VR dry fire training system, and it’s def. improved my real-world shooting.

as for the sign… the people who actually made the sign don’t give a flying rat’s ass what’s on it.

Pre-press is part of my job. I care about the quality of the art and whether or not the text prints correctly. I send a proof to the client after I’ve checked those thing, and they verify that the text, etc. is correct, that we have the correct size, material, and so on. If someone sends me artwork that’s going to end up printing at 26dpi, then I’m going to let them know that it’s going to look bad. If they send raster text that they’ve blown up 5x and is all bitmappy, I’m gonna let them know that they need to fix that.

If the text is in Latin rather than Spanish? Not my concern.

That’s not necessarily valuable, exactly. Yes, companies charge a lot for consumer ink jet printer ink, but prices go down dramatically when you’re talking about commercial printing. A two liter bottle of high-end dye sublimation ink runs about $200 (might be up since I last bought in 2021), and the dye sublimation ink for the HP printer I operate costs about $700/10L.

If your printer has replaceable print heads that aren’t part of the ink cartridge, and if you can retrofit a bulk ink system, then you quickly find out that ink is pretty inexpensive.

I’ve seen plenty of bonds on furniture fail, rather than the wood. It seems most typical on things that are a dowelled construction rather than a mortise and tenon joint. I’ve seen it most often with chairs, since they’re under a lot of stresses. Maybe I’m in a uniquely bad environment that’s harsh on wood glue; I don’t know.

Titebond 3. It’s a pretty easy choice; it has one of, if not the highest strengths of wood glues on the market, and it’s water resistant. If you want the wood to break before the glue does, that’s the stuff you want.

A quick check online says that Samsung–which has about 25% of the global market–sold at least 1M OLED televisions and 8.3M QLED televisions in 2023. So, let’s say that they sell 9.5M televisions annually (I’m not sure if the numbers are global or US-only); that’s $190M in pure profit from advertising alone. For a billion-dollar plus corporation, that might seem small, but it’s certainly enough to get them to take notice.

If you really believe the things you’re saying, you need to check yourself into a hospital. The odds that this is rea–as opposed to being a delusion–are very, very low. Some of the things you’re talking about are mutually exclusive; for instance, Hell’s Angels don’t mix with Bloods, because Hell’s Angels is a white MC (or, has enough wildly racist members that no non-white person is likely to get patched in), and the Bloods are a black street gang. These are not groups that play together. Then you add in right wing militias, which have very nearly zero crossover with either of them. (And Freemasons? They’re just a fraternal order, not really any different than the Kiwanis Club.)

If your therapist didn’t believe you, and was trying to get you on medication, that’s a really, really strong indication that you need medication.