ugh. i can imagine how hard it is to deal with people you care about spouting MAGA talking points, sounds like no fun at all. one side of my family is prone to supporting 45 (to varying degrees) - I tend to avoid them. luckily i have other family and friends who i don’t need to worry about spouting bigotry and…

This reads too much like a suicide note. I hope you’ve got people to talk to- friends, family, doctors, whoever. I know you didn’t ask for any advice, but here’s some anyway: Maybe take a break from the news, or at least scale it way down. The world may be going to hell - I know it may feel like it a lot, and there…

Is that a cloud or an Imperial Star Destroyer? I was praying for Giant Meteor but I’ll take what I can get :)

Do you drink milk? Yeah, you drink some plain ass milk that any idiot can buy, you drive a Nissan Sentra, you live in a suburb, you work as an office manager, you have two kids and you go to the movies once a month and life is just passing you by. Your unremarkable life will ultimately be forgotten. Meanwhile, members…

Excellent point(s)- unless you’re in the supreme court, chances are roughly zero that your vote will determine the presidency. I wish people paid more attention to state and local offices, because there’s a better chance your vote will decide elections.

Sounds like you’re talking about campaign finance reform, the electoral college, gerrymandering, etc. And you’re right, those in power got there because they were able to take advantage of their money and the existing rules, laws, and norms (the system), and once in power were allowed to rig it further in their…

Getting to hear from a smaller number of candidates (which could still hit double digits, by the way!) is a avenue for voters to actually learn about policy.

That’s a great question, and I’m not entirely sure, but I have some thoughts/theories. Obviously laws can be changed, and “the system” is composed to a large degree by laws, right? Even the constitution can be changed, although that’s usually a lot harder than, say, changing the tax code...

Maybe, although a lot of those people may steer even harder into “it doesn’t matter who i vote for, change is impossible, fuck everything, even protesting and organizing is pointless, i’m staying home.”

First: when we’re dealing with issues as urgent as global warming and health care - literally life-and-death issues - maybe some yelling is appropriate.

speaking of grifting, i stole this photo from you. it’s mine now!

One thing I’d like to see is more loopholes closed. No, you can’t move your money to the Cayman Islands or Ireland. Sorry! No more gigantic companies paying nothing in federal taxes. I don’t even know what all the loopholes are - does anyone really? - but we’ve got too many of them and that’s how we end up with rich…

Maybe everyone on Splinter should vote, to “put their money where their mouth is” ... or maybe some of us should just go around and pick up trash instead. Or smash the windows at city hall. Or storm Area 51. I don’t know. I disagree with the sentiment “Don’t blame me, I voted” - some votes got us INTO this mess! There…

I don’t currently follow Trump on twitter, but I follow who he follows. I’m not sure that even makes sense to me. Maybe I’m better off leaving twitter altogether. I’ll probably hear news about his tweets one way or the other...

I can relate to a lot of this. I’m ambivalent about voting (unlike many here, I’m not convinced that “it’s your civic duty to vote; you have to do it” and that voting is the most important tool to change society), but... I don’t think things are as hopeless as they seem. Sure, we went from Obama to Trump, but the…

Vote. It takes literally 10 minutes.

testing testing 1 2 3

I don’t think he’s a DINO, I think he’s genuinely another “Third Way” centrist- pretty common in the Democratic Party - I think he’s a cause/symptom of a Democratic Party that may be more tumors than healthy cells. Just my two cents.

I... uh... I’m not sure what to make of this, if anything. I wish this TMZ shit didn’t matter as far as choosing a person to RUN OUR GODDAMN COUNTRY, but here we are...

I’m stuck in the grays for now, but I was interested in the language aspect too. I wrote: