Flocklesscrow

We were made, not only in his image, but also with his incredibly fickle emotional dysregulation.

What is the flavor of romance?

100%

The year is 1788, and we are all French peasants...

Straight up theft. In a more functional government, there would be an agency with real teeth that you could report them to for that kind of behavior, with something other than fines-as-the-cost-of-doing-business.

Puh-lease. None of the conglomerate mega corps that have ruined the economy face any real competition. Where is the fucking invisible hand of the free market? Economies of scale? Did you just go through undergrad Econ or something? With no perspective of capitalist offshoring of labor costs, of greasing political wheels to leverage government subsidies that form cartels of major industries? No lens into the corrosive nature of lower cash velocity due to years of stagnating wages with negative net growth via inflation and the dramatic rise of previously illegal stock buyback programs in lieu of actual corporate reinvestment? To say nothing of the 14 years of open-purse strings monetary policy doled out by the Fed as they gave every corp under the sun free money and bailed out the airlines AND the automakers for their folly time and again. Do you want to underscore the capability trap that these zombie corps now face as they've jockeyed their cash in finance junkie schemes for a decade and a half rather than produce ANYTHING of actual innovation, while their C Suite jump from ship to ship like hordes of golden-parachuted rats?

The implosion of the US middle class at the hands of these same corporate conglomerates will be a shot heard round the world, when the other shoe finally drops. See how your economies of scale serve then.

And now they'll never be able to reboot Mighty Max

Switching pensions to 401Ks aligns the interests of the rank and file plebes and Professional Managerial Class with the upper crust. So the plebes are forced to root for their own incremental gains while the actual Capitalists rake in enormous profits for zero labor investment. Which is why we haven't gained any real capabilities in the US for the last 15 years, as most companies favored a finance junkie strategy, and the majority of the middle class is worse off than they were 10 years ago, while rampant inflation and unchecked price gouging ensures that any modest wage increases are still net negative.

Is this the famously "free market competition" before which we're all expected to bend the knee?

Clowns in a clownshow.

100%

The gun-totin, "don't tread on me," larping persona crowd have always been first in line to bend the knee and lick the boot of the weakest strongman.

Uvalde's tragedy is a complete example: 400 armed, "trained," professionals, all too cowardly and incompetent and deficient in character to actual do the job they thump their chests over.

Every Conservative boast about strength and power is performative nonsense to mask their deep and unabiding fears and insecurities.

In other words, not liking cilantro is a genetic defect

The Father, the Son, and the Holy Goose