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A Trump shaped hole in the GOP will cause a temporary crisis. Many Trump-loyal voters will scorn meatball ron and nikki haley and anyone else who could currently be viewed as in opposition to Trump. Eventually a new empty suit will arise that the trump voters don't hate, but there's little chance they'll have the authentically transgressive fascist energy that Trump has. They'll be the 'competent fascist', and the media will be delirious with joy at a non trump republican no matter how much they suck. But they'll struggle to mobilize the base the same way Trump did.
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Jan 24, 2024 03:17
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The midterm results have led Republicans to believe that there's a sizeable enough faction of their base that is slavishly devoted to Trump and Trump alone, hence why McConnell never went for the killshot during the second impeachment. The GOP won't die and will still control the blood red states, but until someone emerges from the vacuum as party leader we won't know what the focus is going to be, and if it's a further drifting right then it goes back to the issue of primary voters selecting someone who's not palateable for the electorate at large. Trump isn't going to name a heir because that takes attention away from him, and so it'll be a battle of Junior trying to coast off of daddy's name vs. the MAGA crowd trying to turn the Trump worship onto themselves vs. establishment GOP like Tom Cotton hoping to try and rein the crazies in vs. something possibly worse that sprouts from Trump's grave like President MTG. The issue with the theory is that we won't know until Trump is cold in the ground and who knows what the landscape will look like once that occurs.
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Jan 24, 2024 03:19
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selec posted:There is no return to normal ever. And I don’t even mean that in the ole can’t ever wade in the same river twice way. I think that the GOP can never be “normal” again but it doesn’t mean it can’t be sold that way in NYT op eds. If Haley did get it after Trump died, it’s still never going back. The base wouldn’t allow it. The GOP created a monster, and now the monster they created is going to kill them.
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Jan 24, 2024 03:27
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zoux posted:https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/1749950152381493252 His competition was pretty horrific. I'm surprised they did as well as they did.
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Jan 24, 2024 03:29
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Tiny Timbs posted:His competition was pretty horrific. I'm surprised they did as well as they did. You have to figure people didn't bother to turn out for the primary if he's not on the ballot, thus leaving just the primary voters to be people who really want to to write-ins and the others that think Phillips or Williamson have a chance somehow. Angry_Ed fucked around with this message at 03:32 on Jan 24, 2024 |
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Jan 24, 2024 03:29
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Angry_Ed posted:You have to figure people didn't bother to turn out for the primary if he's not on the ballot, thus leaving just the primary voters to be people who really want to to write-ins and the others that think Phillips or Williamson have a chance somehow. There's also  At least some voters are going to think "write in? Nah, I just want to click a button or color an oval and go home".
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Jan 24, 2024 04:01
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I mean the most logical thing to me is that you should assume they’ll do a whole hell of a lot worse when Biden is actually on the ballot. No? I can’t process the opposite insinuation.
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Jan 24, 2024 04:03
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the coming climate induced migrant crisis will probably ensure that ultra right politics survive and in fact thrive in america in the coming decades. heck probably a good chunk of this thread will become ultra-right. sorry!!!!
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Jan 24, 2024 04:59
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Mia Wasikowska posted:the coming climate induced migrant crisis will probably ensure that ultra right politics survive and in fact thrive in america in the coming decades. heck probably a good chunk of this thread will become ultra-right. sorry!!!! If you get enough migrants moving around earth as parts of the world become uninhabitable, I'm not sure there's a thing the right or anyone on this thread could do to stop it whatever their politics.
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Jan 24, 2024 05:15
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selec posted:There is no return to normal ever. And I don’t even mean that in the ole can’t ever wade in the same river twice way. I think that the GOP can never be “normal” again but it doesn’t mean it can’t be sold that way in NYT op eds. If Haley did get it after Trump died, it’s still never going back. The base wouldn’t allow it. Yeah, in a way I have (a tiny bit of) sympathy for some of these conservative voters because they know they're getting screwed just like everyone else in our late stage capitalism hellhole, and a lot of them are aware that the previous Conservative leaders have been feeding them lies about it. They're frustrated, angry, scared, and don't know what to do. But between the decades of poisoning from right wing media, lack of intellectual curiosity or outright disdain for logical consistency, addiction to the fear and rage, and inherent racism in American culture being exploited by those same leaders they've directed their fury out at the poor, the minorities, the culture war bullshit targets as being the cause of their problems. They're driven by hate and spite and resentment now. Trump has tapped into that. He bucks the system and conservative leadership that his voters can tell is screwing them while still validating their wrong-headed beliefs about why. Trump inflicts revenge on liberals and RINOs alike, and does it in a way that justifies all the worst parts of themselves; he gets to act like they wish they could. I don't know if anyone besides a Trump could have done it, because you need pathological narcissism united with enough wealth to escape all consequences for your actions and without any self-awareness or intelligence to do the simpler things that are in your self-interest (like repeatedly defaming your rape victim) but that well of resentment was already there. Trump was just able to wrench it away from the corporate overlords that created it in the process of making their pet audience
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Jan 24, 2024 05:19
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https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/calif-pot-company-valued-1-6-billion-worthless-18622076.php The pot business in California is not going well. quote:Calling itself the “Apple Store of weed,” MedMen skyrocketed to national prominence in 2018 just as California’s new legal weed market was launching. MedMen’s executives claimed that their sleek retail locations were the future of legal weed. With locations in places like Beverly Hills and West Hollywood, the company predicted it would cash in massively on California’s booming legal weed economy, which at that time was projected to sell as much as $20 billion in pot a year. It's not medical there, anyone 21 and over can walk into a store and buy what they want. Why do people prefer buying illegally? Cost? Novelty, the "counter-culture" aspect to it... it's no fun if it's too easy? It's not something you can consume in large quantities the way one can with alcohol? Decades of "Legalize it!" lobbying and around 5 years later, no one cares that it's legal...
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Jan 24, 2024 05:20
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C. Everett Koop posted:The midterm results have led Republicans to believe that there's a sizeable enough faction of their base that is slavishly devoted to Trump and Trump alone, hence why McConnell never went for the killshot during the second impeachment. The GOP won't die and will still control the blood red states, but until someone emerges from the vacuum as party leader we won't know what the focus is going to be, and if it's a further drifting right then it goes back to the issue of primary voters selecting someone who's not palateable for the electorate at large. Trumpism is an empty suit from a policy perspective; it's a cult of personality around one person who a majority of the Republican primary electorate adore (despite the election denialism, which is deeply unfortunate but appears to be the case seeing the NH results) because he is so personally offensive to people they view as liberal elites who look down on them. There's no distinct policy legacy compared to business as usual to be left behind or fought over. The larger problem and change maker for the post-Trump GOP than the legacy of Trumpism (assuming we avoid the worst case scenario of him winning and then successfully refusing to let go of power again) is that the dog finally caught the car on abortion and their stance is deeply unpopular among women and everyone except the religious-right Republican core. https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/fact-sheet/public-opinion-on-abortion/. Once/if Trump-the-election-denier is no longer on the ballot and inflation is no longer running hot recently, Republicans are going to start losing a lot over abortion in a visible manner and the knife-fight between the true believers on one side and pro-choice moderates & people who just want to stop losing because of it on the other is much more likely to alter the party.
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Jan 24, 2024 05:26
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Wheeljack posted:https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/calif-pot-company-valued-1-6-billion-worthless-18622076.php The taxes on it are absurd, it's like 25%-40% just for the convenience of walking into a store front. Basically every time you order online, the delivery person gives you their personal contact info so you can just buy from them directly instead of paying the taxes.
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Jan 24, 2024 05:29
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I am skeptical of taxes as the actual reason for the failure of many companies in the state-lawful cannabis space (which is what SFGate attributes as the cause in a linked article). In practice it's an area that was flooded with speculation and product, and regulation and enforcement was incredibly poor in part because of the influence of money, including large amounts of money from illicit enterprises, tobacco and VC. There was always going to be a major market collapse. Meanwhile, in related news, the same sources of funding have gone hard into quasi-legal (actually unambiguously illegal) opioids sold as dietary supplements: Gas-Station Heroin’ Sold as Dietary Supplement Alarms Health Officials quote:Tianeptine, found at convenience stores, at smoke shops and online, can mimic an opioid. It is among a growing class of substances that are difficult to control. This last paragraph is particularly significant: one of the lines of argument used by the industry here is that these products are a way to treat opioid addiction. In practice users appear to just be swapping what they're addicted to. FDA is aware of the prevalence of the products but is both massively underresourced for large-scale enforcement action, and is keenly afraid of adverse caselaw if one of the (wealthy, somewhat politically influential) companies finds a way to try to undermine the agency's authority. I'll note the article relies heavily on poison control center reports, which are massively underinclusive when it comes to this sort of product, and that some of the (poorly sourced) quotes are just industry talking points, in particular "if you make it illegal then people will just do it anyway" futility rhetorics. This is another of the places where mandatory product registration for dietary supplements would be a major reform and save a lot of lives. Discendo Vox fucked around with this message at 07:46 on Jan 24, 2024 |
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Jan 24, 2024 05:35
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Wheeljack posted:
One thing America has always done well is grow agricultural products in ridiculous bulk, but instead of lowering taxes and selling more product, states buck modern capitalist theory and continue oppressive tax regimes that encourage illegal sales. But give housing developers tax breaks and states are first in line to offer favorable deals.
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Jan 24, 2024 05:37
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zoux posted:Also Biden won with like 75 percent. I have to say, even for an incumbent president, this is pretty impressive.
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Jan 24, 2024 05:50
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Papercut posted:The taxes on it are absurd, it's like 25%-40% just for the convenience of walking into a store front. Basically every time you order online, the delivery person gives you their personal contact info so you can just buy from them directly instead of paying the taxes. Yep. The cumulative tax rate for weed in my current town is 37.25%, plus the fun of having to pay cash anyway since they can't get a CC processor to work with them even in a recreational-legla state, plus the markup for the place having to pay rent and have a massive storefront + hired security instead of just being a dude with stuff in his trunk, etc etc. My wife bought a literal single THC gummy and it was $8.00. Plus, you have to add into their revenue shortfalls that just because the state legalized it doesn't mean the cities did. Some zoned that poo poo out of existence the moment it became legal (or just refused to allow permission to open in the first place) or required separate permits for delivery versus dispensary store front, sometimes separate tax structures for each, etc. The state made legal weed uncompetitive with illegal, yet another mess of the state's own creation.
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Jan 24, 2024 05:54
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Angry_Ed posted:You have to figure people didn't bother to turn out for the primary if he's not on the ballot, thus leaving just the primary voters to be people who really want to to write-ins and the others that think Phillips or Williamson have a chance somehow. Yeah Biden has about 60,000 votes once you process the write-ins and Trump has about 180,000 with a lower share of the total, people aren't voting in the unauthorized Democratic primary NH Republicans held to own the libs.
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Jan 24, 2024 06:38
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Wheeljack posted:https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/calif-pot-company-valued-1-6-billion-worthless-18622076.php One of the complaints I hear online about legal weed is that the gourmet store-bought stuff is so super-powerful, since that's what the market thinks people want, that it's taken people who grew up with stems-and-seeds ditch weed for a loop.
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Jan 24, 2024 06:51
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Yeah, poo poo being way too strong and being taxed to hell, I'm not surprised things aren't going well. A lot of the major cannabis companies are having trouble staying afloat. Also, I do think there is a difference between 'no one cares that it's legal' and 'the market cannot sustain $1.6 billion companies'. If these companies actually cater to the market and focus on more sustainable business growth, I'm sure it can thrive. rkd_ fucked around with this message at 07:04 on Jan 24, 2024 |
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Jan 24, 2024 07:02
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Wheeljack posted:https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/calif-pot-company-valued-1-6-billion-worthless-18622076.php I think the biggest problem is that the decades of "Legalize it!" lobbying are not finished, since it's not yet legal. Some states have changed their laws, but since it's illegal Federally most banks and credit card processors care a lot that they can be harshly penalized, seized, or shut down if they get involved with the businesses. So on the front end pot businesses have to operate in cash in an era when card and phone payments are vastly more popular (especially among younger people), which translates to needing more security and having a higher risk of theft. On the back end, the lack of a bank account cuts the business off from modern financial instruments, so they can't access lines of credit and business loans to help smooth out cash flow problems or fund expansion, can't cut checks (or direct deposit) to employees or to pay state taxes and fees, and other services. Some local credit unions will take the risk of working with a dispensary, but they charge exorbitant rates because they consider it high risk. There are follow-on effects from this - since making money is much more difficult than it is with a fully legal business, people who know what they're doing and have other options are likely to decide to operate a business that doesn't have those drawbacks. I expect the rest of the regulatory structure around the industry is a hinderance too, which further discourages people who are good at running businesses to get involved. The increased price from high taxes and higher costs for the business probably wouldn't be prohibitive alone. But I think once you combine the higher prices with the fact that consumers have to use cash instead of convenient card or phone payments like they would at a legal business and the fact that personal purchase and possession is either legal or illegal-but-unenforced, there's really no incentive for an individual to use the legal stores over the illegal ones. The SAFE act at the Federal level would make a big difference if it was passed, since it would protect banks who do business with legal marijuana operations and let them operate like regular businesses - they could then move out of the early 20th century for things like accepting payments, paying employees, and getting loans. EDIT: Anecdotally, my brother runs a plant nursery (primarily landscaping plants, some food plants) and got into legal hemp/CBD for a while when they first legalized that in my state. Growing the plants was pretty easy, and there were more buyers than he had inventory (plus they absolutely loved working with someone who acted like a professional instead of realizing at the last minute he had accepted more orders than he had grown). These are the low THC plants which don't count as a scheduled drug for federal laws, so he didn't have any banking issues. But just dealing with sorting through the uncertainties of new regulations and the testing requirements made the whole operation not worth the effort, so after one (maybe two) years of trying it he gave up and went back to safe, profitable sales to landscapers. Obviously some people are still growing and selling it around here, but the fact that the environment drove off someone who could easily handle the physical and regular business requirements is pretty telling to me. Pantaloon Pontiff fucked around with this message at 07:29 on Jan 24, 2024 |
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Jan 24, 2024 07:18
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Wheeljack posted:https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/calif-pot-company-valued-1-6-billion-worthless-18622076.php Cost is my guess. I don't live in California, I live in NJ (it's legal here too), but I can get a 60% discount going to the grey market. In the NJ dispensaries, I'm paying 65-70 for an eighth of cannabis that's of a decent quality (but sometimes has a harvest date two months in the past). Alternatively, I can go to the guy I've been going to for a decade and get an ounce for $170 of comparable or better quality. The only tradeoff is I get more choice at the dispensary, but with the gigantic discount, I don't care about that, and I still get to pick between a strain or two. I go to the dispensary for occasional vape oil or edibles, and I skip the flower.
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Jan 24, 2024 13:46
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An eighth will generally go for about $45 in Connecticut but you can get an ounce in Massachusetts for about $100 if you go to the right place. Doubt there's any habitual smokers buying their stuff legally in Connecticut; if you buy it enough that the cost means anything to you our dispensaries aren't worth it. Good in a pinch, though. The taxes are definitely annoying. I imagine California still has a strong legacy of individual growing, so there are probably a ton of grey market suppliers relative to other places.
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Jan 24, 2024 13:48
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After the gag ruling came down, Trump posted this on his Truth Social page: Notice anything...suspicious about this photo?
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Jan 24, 2024 13:51
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Cimber posted:After the gag ruling came down, Trump posted this on his Truth Social page: Trump grew some fingers between Tuesday and now? God, you can tell the right-wing shitheads by the way they use AI.
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Jan 24, 2024 13:56
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Young Freud posted:Trump grew some fingers between Tuesday and now? Thats one. There is more!
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Jan 24, 2024 13:58
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His hands are too large and he's kneeling backwards in the pew.
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Jan 24, 2024 14:04
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Trump entered a sanctified space without bursting into flames?
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Jan 24, 2024 14:04
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The pews are overlapping.
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Jan 24, 2024 14:11
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Cimber posted:Thats one. There is more! His hands are big?
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Jan 24, 2024 14:20
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Yeah. Hands are big, too many fingers, the pews are backwards and his jacket is leather. Plus he has angelic aura to him, but that could be by design.
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Jan 24, 2024 14:33
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and his hair looks totally fake!
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Jan 24, 2024 14:37
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Speakin as someone who has actually been inert gas asphyxiated stroke, seizures are risks of inert gas asphyxiation. Partial hypoxia from it being done wrong increases the risk. just to safely kill animals being used in scientific experiments is an endeavour. Prison executioners aren't going to be better.
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Jan 24, 2024 14:54
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Young Freud posted:God, you can tell the right-wing shitheads by the way they use AI. AI art is basically getting rejected by smart/talented people, and embraced by stupid and stupid-adjacent (e.g. grifters). If it hasn't already, it's going to replace Minions as being the preferred visual vehicle by which the most gormless people try to give shape to their thoughts, such as they are.
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Jan 24, 2024 15:09
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Wheeljack posted:https://www.sfgate.com/cannabis/article/calif-pot-company-valued-1-6-billion-worthless-18622076.php quote:The collapse of MedMen, which has operated in multiple states including Florida and New York, can’t be blamed entirely on the larger problems in California. In 2019, the company itself was blamed for recklessly burning through cash, and its executives were accused of spending lavishly on their own expenses, including 24-hour armed guards, private planes and luxury cars. By 2020, MedMen was already falling behind on its bills. 
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Jan 24, 2024 15:19
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Wheeljack posted:Decades of "Legalize it!" lobbying and around 5 years later, no one cares that it's legal... California legalized medical marijuana with ridiculously low requirements two decades before the ballot measure in 2016. It was already effectively legalized long before fully being legalized. For people already buying weed nothing changed and the legal shops were no better than what you were doing before
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Jan 24, 2024 15:45
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Kalit posted:I have to say, even for an incumbent president, this is pretty impressive. It's actually one of the lowest percentages for an incumbent president in New Hampshire for their own primary in the last 50+ years. Nixon had 67.6% in 72, George HW Bush had 53% in 92. Reagan, Clinton, W, Trump, and Obama were all higher, though Regan did run unopposed. Nail Rat fucked around with this message at 16:00 on Jan 24, 2024 |
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Jan 24, 2024 15:57
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Really wish I could see the prompt they used to generate that and if there were specific instructions on hand size.
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Jan 24, 2024 15:58
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Sub Par posted:Really wish I could see the prompt they used to generate that and if there were specific instructions on hand size. Trump's natural speech patterns are a pretty good match for AI prompting already "a picture of trump in church praying and his hands are huge, just the biggest hands, the greatest, everyone's saying it, really big hands folks"
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Jan 24, 2024 16:03
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like trump would ever debase himself to only having three sleeve buttons. This is a man who bucks convention and rolls with five
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Jan 24, 2024 16:03
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