I've been wrong before, but once realized, I don't hesitate to correct that behavior or belief out of some selfish fear of losing face.

That's a level of introspection that most MAGAs are incapable of, and those who are tend to be narcissistic enough to not care. It's truly a set of mental health issues, and it runs deeper than their outward hatred implies.

I read a while back about how there's really strong correlation between people who are capable of certain levels of thoughts and where they fall on the political spectrum. The argument was that people with lower neuroplasticity tend to be more conservative, which can be explained by the fact that lower neuroplasticity makes learning and maturing, or overcoming any level of cognitive dissonance, is difficult to the point that it can cause them discomfort or even pain. This makes them more likely to be attracted to politics and policies which confirm their preconceptions rather than challenge them. It also makes them much less likely to accept any kind of fault in cases like this. It's a lot to do with why cults are almost always religiously conservative - - someone else has the duty of thinking for me, and I can go on hatin' the gays! Even the woo-woo cults always prop up some "enlightened" leader, and the followers get agitated or violent when that enlightenment is challenged by anyone.

The other end of the idealogical spectrum have people who are capable of that introspection and are able to identify when there are deficiencies in their emotional maturity or understanding of something. They're physiologically more able to recognize these situations and effect a change within themselves, and it's why we on the left tend to be less outwardly angry, more respectful, and more willing to grow.

tl;dr: empathy makes MAGA brains hurt, and they need therapy.

For sure, you never lose your right to complain. But be fair to yourself too, even if you complained incessantly, you stuck it out (and what is a Linux user without incessant complaining?).

The point is what you said though, they could very easily solve an issue that could be preventing a large group of potential users from adopting... because the maintenance team doesn't want to update the installation guide or the file names. Again, it's a very Linux thing for them to take that position. And that's why I end up recommending an Ubuntu spin to people, even though I think the whole package that Mint presents is nicer out of the box.

I keep coming back to KDE time and time again. It's so easy to mess with, I can set it up exactly how I like it without much effort, and it always looks good because someone else did all the work making themes and widgets I use.

That said, I love XFCE, I'm just trash with CSS so it takes me forever to get it how I like, and on my Surface I can't get the scaling to work so everything is beyond tiny.

I guess it's just another type of... Draft dodging.

Dammit, now I'm gonna have "da da de dah dah dah da dee dee dah" looping in my head all day.

Doesn't change the fact that I'd be happier than a pig in shit if my (already blue) state was annexed by Canada.

I respect your opinion and agree on many points, and in many cases. I will contend with your argument that the military acts monolithically and wordlessly executes illegal orders, however, particularly because in its wording you apply a blanket onto 3 million people while failing to acknowledge the counter.

The military in the US is beholden to not only the Constitution and the laws of the country, but also the UCMJ, under which we are explicitly and implicitly prohibited from taking part in any partisanism or taking any action which would even imply that the military and Executive are at odds. We can argue the necessity and limits of that policy but that's not the point here. The news will readily report on the sensational--"Navy Sailor arrested at protest," "Soldier participated in attempted coup on January 6th," but they can't get clicks from "NJP article 134," "Sentenced to Leavenworth 6 years following trial and holding in brig."

Neither one of us knows what orders those pilots received. If they were directed to, and chose to, execute an order they knew to be unlawful, they absolutely deserve to be investigated, tried, and sentenced. Is that more than the victims of this atrocious act were allowed? Yes, but two fascist acts don't cancel each other out. I can't stress the point enough that this should never have happened, and we should be doing what we can to rectify it, but retribution is not justice.

But if they were lied to, told to fly from one airport to another per today's schedule, and their listed cargo was just "personnel, materiel," it's not reasonable to lay blame on them like that. Likewise, it's illegal for them to talk about what happened to anyone outside need-to-know unless it's released in court, so we'll probably never hear what actually went down.

Have people executed unlawful orders? Yes. Have they been absolved of responsibility? Sometimes, yes. Should they be held accountable to their level of responsibility, and are they? Typically, yes. That's the biggest difference between police forces and the military, and my other point of contention with your argument.

I agree that when a Nazi sits at a table with nine people who don't tell him to leave, you just have ten Nazis. But whereas the police will band around the Nazi to protect him because he wears the same color clothes, the military will eventually jail the Nazis when they're found guilty of crimes. It's just past the sensationalized news cycle so you have to look for it rather than being presented.

Not all of us are fascists, and not all joined because we wanted to blow up brown people. I wanted to be an engineer but couldn't afford college when I was 17, and was offered a pretty good salary with benefits out the gate, plus the opportunity to have my degree paid for. Even during the Iraq invasion when i joined, I had no interest in actually doing anything related to warfare.

But a lot of the guys I work with, whether they've always been like that from the start, because they think it's funny, or because they're willfully ignorant, don't think the same way. There's also huge disparities between thoughts in the branches as a whole, as well as intellectual stratification in the branches. For example, it's a lot more likely that you'll find fascist ideals in the Army and Marines than the Air Force and Navy, but you'll still find free thinkers in the more educated parts of the "fighting" branches and idiots in the ones focused on tech. The smart ones are worried, the dumbasses think it's lulz.

I do find it funny (in a sad, sad way), though, that a lot of the people who have been openly supportive of the Fascists' policies in the past now say things like "I don't really pay attention to politics lol" or claim/admit that they don't vote. Now that it's clear that their ineptitude has led us to a place where the country's soft power is nil, the benefits every servicemember enjoys are at risk, and they're probably going to go up against China within the next couple of years, they're suddenly not as vocal about their position. I can't wait to retire and put this all behind me so I can focus on more important things. One more year and I'm done.

All that said, politicians really like to prop the military up as a huge, monolithic entity that always thinks, acts, and votes identically (and conservative to boot), and this simply isn't true. Anyone smart enough to think past "brown people bad/MURICA FUCK YEAH" realizes that the military benefits program is the most successful socialist movement America has ever had.

I have to go to work so I need to cut it off here, but that's the start of my rant. Thank you for attending my TedTalk.

Legal disclaimer: I do not speak for the military, the government, or anyone working in either. There's your disclaimer, Whiskey Pete. I'm compliant with the words on your DODI now.

Man this statement, while already sour, aged like fucking milk.

This is Ohio, for anyone else that didn't get that from anything on the article or anywhere you'd expect to see it on the website.

Idk man, that sounds an awful lot like ~~socialism~~ waste, fraud, and abuse.

Just in case: /s

Well of course they did/do. They're the ones in charge right now.

Caveat: I'm not a statistician, but my job requires that I interpret large pools of raw data to interpolate outcomes for even larger systems. Think using 30 respondents and a week of observation/collection to represent 2500-10,000 respondents over the course of a year. The way I collect, analyze, interpret, and present my data is scrutinized heavily from every angle (as it should be) but still very susceptible to biases. Fortunately, I'm super autistic and it's basically impossible for me to lie so I'm considered really good at what I do.

These surveys are typically done via methods that are prone to significant statistical errors. For the most part they use phone calls, Facebook ads, emails that most people under the age of 65 just delete (or never even see because it's caught by spam filters). This, combined with the fact that the type of people who will reply to these sort of questionaires are always more right-leaning skews the data even further.

If someone approached you on the street asking you to take a survey, about Pervert Hoover what would you do? Uncle Jerry, who's known for providing his unsolicited opinions about librulz and the gays, and Aunt Elaine who doesn't want to get backhanded at home so she just stands there usually count as two respondents.

That's not even touching the bias almost always introduced by the question and answer formats. "Do you agree with the President's policy of deporting people with legal residency status due to excercising their First Amendment Rights? (Y/N)" is a totally different outcome to "Do you agree with the President's national security policies? (Y/N)"

These articles are always written to imply they've surveyed everyone in the country, done the math to adjust for selection bias, and written the survey questions to be fair, but time and time again that's proven to be untrue, or at least inaccurate. The interesting (and honestly the only good news we hear anymore) is that even with all of the cards literally and figuratively stacked in the orange skidmark's favor, he's only getting as positive an outcome as he is.

And there's also the need for clicks and ad revenue.

TL; DR: these things are bullshit and always produce wildly inaccurate results skewed in favor of the dumbest outcomes.