Bwaaahahahaha! You fool. An over 35 year old clip of Biden being tough on crime is what you’ve got? Quit now. 😂

At that time Trump was publicly calling for the lynching death of 5 boys who were known to be innocent of all the charges against them, he still is. He had recently paid out millions in fines for racist redlining at his NY properties. Way to remind us of the public lynching supporting racist he is.
For a long time after this, Trump supported the democrats and these same drug policies.

Do you not know your party STILL wants MORE mandatory sentencing and MORE disparity between crack and cocaine….you actually think Don Jr shouldn’t ever be prosecuted for his blatant current full blown cocaine addiction despite it being obvious he was high as a kite as he did government business, but Hunter should get life for recovering from a private crack addiction 5 years ago (past the 3 year statute of limitations). 😂

Biden said jail for Hunter too…if he had been CAUGHT with the crack or if he had refused treatment in 2019…or if he’s convicted of a crime with a prison sentence.

He said all this about mandatory sentencing well over 30 years ago when the pitfalls of mandatory sentencing and underlying racism of considering crack different from cocaine weren’t as obvious.
Yes, his support of mandatory sentencing and different sentences for crack than for cocaine was misguided in hindsight. At the time the Regan CIA’s responsibility for flooding the inner cities with crack and causing the epidemic of crackheads wasn’t understood, but the damage it was doing was.

Dark Brandon has done not one thing to keep Hunter out of jail. Not a word of protest, no interference whatsoever. Rant and cry all you like, no one has presented a single word of evidence indicating he has. Not even the fake whistleblower actors the GOP paid to testify. 😂
You cannot say the same for Trumps or the Trump administration, which pardoned dozens of its own members for committing serious crimes against America and We The People for Trump and then were set free by decree.

Keep whining and crying Bobby boy. Every MAGA tear gives Dark Brandon more power, makes Trump weaker and sadder, and makes your friends see you as weak and someone to be cuckolded. Better keep an eye on your wife and kids, they think you’re a loser and a nutjob, and may be out the door already just like Melania.

Enjoy upcoming indictment 5, 6, and 7!
Enjoy the next 2 years of public trials with discovery exposing more disgusting, abusive, illegal subversion of the government by MAGA, more blatant lies they sold you, more avoidable deaths caused by divisive policies, and always more and worse debauchery. 😂 😂 😂

How, exactly, do we “not let them get away with it” when 1/4 - 1/3 of Americans happily accept the nonsense without thought, and another 1/5+ think MAYBE it’s true, maybe not, but they’re too intellectually incurious and lazy to find out.

Thinking people don’t need to be told any of this, it’s blatantly obvious to anyone who puts forth the tiniest effort to look into any of their claims and the intentional bastardization of accepted terminology to create scapegoats they can target.

The question is how do we get people to start thinking again? I fear as long as “smart” phones and social media are legal, we won’t.

Yes, it’s Brooks, so there’s hope….but it’s also the 2020’s, so the pushback they’re going to receive from all the groups that can’t laugh at themselves would send most producers screaming for the hills. Can you imagine trying to make Blazing Saddles today? Anyone involved would be permanently blacklisted (no pun intended).
We NEED people to (re)develop senses of humor, and realize that everyone, including themselves, is ridiculous at times and deserving of being laughed at. That nothing is sacred and everyone and everything is fair game.
I HOPE movies like this could help with that, but I doubt it.

We call people like that... actors.

*quality *doublepromote

And if you haven't seen it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaaC57tcci0


Coincidentally, this is one of the sites i used to regular prior to social media and widespread smartphone use. I think taht's why I keep it on my regular loaded tabs. Can't find all of my comments because of siftpocalypse or siftmageddon or whatever we called it when the servers went poof~! Ive lost a hard drive or two in my day. Rough stuff.

Speaking of which, we should make an effort to revive this site and get some more sifters sifting. We do have something unique here, something I miss from record stores and Blockbuster, actual human curators of content.


actual human curators of content
^ we don't have algorythms, we have voting
We don't have bots, we have people

I, for one, am sick of over-monetized-bullshit that all sounds the same constantly being shoved in my face, so i end up here. Maybe some of us are still affected by the crazy propaganda bug, +cough cough+ but the debates look closer to an actual townhall than one infected with too much nonsense for its own good.

Perhaps this would be better in a sift talk post. :-p

Hey there. Devil's advocate here.

Should we tell people who eat poorly to fuck off, too? What about any people who go off of their doctor's advice?

Don't get me wrong, I'm heavily in your corner. I would say the pandemic is a special case, not because it takes up hospital beds unnecessarily (which most of them do since heart disease, the #1 killer, is a disease of lifestyle), but because it immediately puts others in danger, outside the hospital.

The question of freedom vs. public health is easy in this case, but when does it become overreach? On the other (very far) end of the spectrum is eugenics.

News, Eric Garner pt. 2. I just wish I would have been there because instead of standing there filming I would have tackled that officer.

We need people to start standing up for one another against this shit.

*promote *quality

Survival of any species is dependent on variety. If we all did the same thing, eventually we would get wiped out by something that we all respond wrongly to. We need people to behave a little differently, even if we think it's wrong - because we might actually be wrong.

As a bartender, I cannot comment politically on what patrons discuss politically. I work in a restaurant that pulls talented people from all around the world (work visa, student whatevers, etc). It has been so difficult for us to share the american culture with everything that is going on these days. Immigration laws have become more strict. The way news media portrays the government is disgusting. Yet, we have a long list of people that want to come here and learn. Where I work we want people to be better, be fair, honest, and work towards a positive contribution.

*sigh*

This video is spot on.

"that doesn't justify using people in laboratory experiments"

uhhh, exactly how does holodoc think medical science works?
We use people in laboratory experiments all the damn time. It's called double-blind testing and it means that very sick people get given a placebo that we know does nothing.

I don't remember this episode, but I'm surprised at this lack of nuance from Star Trek.

And holo-space-nazi is right... it's funny how ethics go out the window when one of the main cast members life is threatened. But if a red-shirt is on the table....

Anyway, there's a massive difference between USING knowledge obtained by unethical means and GAINING knowledge by unethical means.

Don't get me wrong, medical ethics is really important. But throwing away knowledge after the fact is not only pointless, it's immoral. Especially in this case, where you're not even using the person who did the research, just a digital representation of them.

Really? Explain why. It's in there, as clear and codified religious law.

I'll give you a synopsis:

God established the law because of sin:

Galatians 3:19

Why then was the Law given? It was added because of transgressions, until the arrival of the seed to whom the promise referred. It was administered through angels by a mediator

The seed it is talking about is Jesus Christ, referred to by this prophecy in Genesis of the coming of the Messiah:

Genesis 3

14The LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this, Cursed are you more than all cattle, And more than every beast of the field; On your belly you will go, And dust you will eat All the days of your life; 15And I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.

Sin came into the world through the transgression of Adam. Because of sin man was separated from God because God is holy and cannot dwell with sin. Because of sin God gave us the law as Paul referred to. Jesus, the new Adam, satisfied all of the moral requirements of the law by living a perfect life. He reestablished the relationship between God and man:

Romans 5

17For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive an abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ! 18Therefore, just as one trespass brought condemnation for all men, so also one act of righteousness brought justification and life for all men. 19For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous

This is what it means when it says He came to fulfill the law. He brought everything full circle back to the way it was before man first sinned. That is why the law is no longer necessary, because we are made right with God not by obeying the law, but through our faith in Jesus Christ.

When Jesus died on the cross He said "It is finished". It is translated from a greek word "tetelestai", which means paid in full. It something a merchant would stamp on a loan document that was paid up. He said that because He fulfilled the law and paid our sin debt on the cross.

This doesn't mean that there aren't any moral requirements for Christians, but they aren't the same as the ones given to the nation of Israel. We are under a New Covenant and the law of Christ:

Luke 22

19And He took the bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, “This is My body, given for you; do this in remembrance of Me.” 20In the same way, after supper He took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is poured out for you.

Galatians 6

Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.

Christ gave us commands to obey, one of which you mentioned: love your neighbor as yourself. Also, love one another as I have loved you and many others. All of the 10 commandments were reiterated although there is a deeper meaning and interpretation to some of them now. Do not commit adultery now extends to lusting after a women in your heart. Jesus also said that hating someone is murdering them in your heart.

The civil and ceremonial laws of Israel no longer apply exactly because Jesus did fulfill the law.

Treating others like you would have them treat you, the golden rule....what Jesus told you is the most important rule.

When Jesus taught us to treat others as we would have them treat us, it has force because He is morally perfect. We are morally imperfect. We tell people to do things we don't do, and tell people not to do things we do do. Can you name a single human being on whose shoulders we could place objective morals? If you can't then you can see the problem, I hope

Btw, here is a great educational site which is completely free

https://vmcontenders.org/all-courses/

I hate hearing people try to sell me on the speech at the end of the Fountainhead.

It doesn't matter how you dress it up, we call people who blow up buildings terrorists.

The last couple of decades I've really begun to see the military as corporate welfare. We have a force capable of crushing, literally crushing any non nuclear power nation 20 times over. We can never use that force against a significant nuclear power nation like Russia or China lest we risk WWW3, the war that will REALLY end all wars (by humanity at least). Our tech is also pretty much useless against a guerrilla force because they can melt across borders and into the local population.

Our outdated technology still would destroy any of the nations other than Russia or China. We have shit mothballed and decaying that would do so. We have a fucking stockpile of main battle tanks that we will never use, but we keep building them and storing them because, apparently, if you let the people go who know how to make them you can never replace that knowledge.

All the while, we let people get mired in school debt, credit debt, and increase our national debt because we need to crush some unknown force. We spend a fraction of what we should be spending on space exploration and colonization. I could go on, but why bother.

If you have any doubt, just look at the F35. By the time it is all said and done, we will have close to half a trillion sunk into that fucking debacle and it STILL isn't functioning capably. Russia and China haven't got anything close to it and we don't need it against anyone else. You could take that money and give close to 2 grand to every single man, woman, and child in the country. Instead we basically are lining Lockheed Martin's pockets.

https://democracyjournal.org/arguments/keep-it-simple-and-take-credit/

"Implementing these kinds of policies are also no road to electoral success. Peoples’ lives are hard enough without tax credits and savings accounts and eligibility forms and government phone calls that determine whether one’s household income puts one in the bracket for this or that plan or benefit or subsidy and on and on. No voter is thanking anyone who puts them on this road, even if there’s a small pot of money at the end of it.

And forget the annoyance—the amount of immense mental energy and social capital required to keep track of, comprehend the eligibility requirements of, and then successfully apply for these benefits is a de facto regressive tax on people whose lives are too materially difficult to deal with arcane bureaucratic bullshit. That is, those people that need the help the most.

So what to do? No more savings accounts, no more cleverly hidden help that people won’t even notice, no more tax-preferenced, means-tested, government-monitored, website-reliant, bronze/gold/platinum-benefits-so-long-as-you-apply-during-open-enrollment. Just give people the stuff they need.

This shouldn’t even be a liberal-socialist divide, although it seems to have become one in recent years. When society decided citizens should be able to read, we didn’t provide tax credits for books, we created public libraries. When we decided peoples’ houses shouldn’t burn down, we didn’t provide savings accounts for private fire insurance, we hired firefighters and built fire stations. If the broad left takes power again, enough with too-clever-by-half social engineering. Help people and take credit."

As Lambert Strether of Corrente says: universal, concrete, material benefits.

I look at it in a simple way: words having meanings; people have motivations. A conversation has a context, and in your example the passerby isn't aware of that context. If she chooses to eavesdrop and feels offended, well, while I do feel sorry for her...it's really not any of her business what you and your brother are conversing about. You might as well turn to her, give her a once-over and criticize her choice of pantsuit. She doesn't know you; she didn't ask for your opinion; and your retort probably made her upset.

Should people try to be aware of their surroundings and try not to say inappropriate things? Of course, but that's just common courtesy...like not commenting on a funky smell at a funeral visitation. Political correctness is fine if we all agree, but we usually don't. And therefore we get people who virtue signal over others because they refuse to kowtow to the newest linguistic fashion.

Now, I'm a fairly polite guy. I hold open doors, give up my seat, offer to carry heavy packages, smile, wave and nod greetings to many strangers, etc. Yet I still occasionally get someone who disagrees with my legitimate use of a term (as I understand its meaning). Generally, I still apologize...but I don't then re-evaluate my language ability. I'm not willing to let the connotations of words take on new, questionable-yet-popular meanings.

I've had a Native American friend laugh at me for asking what he preferred I say: redskin, indian, aboriginal, first people, etc. I've also asked a "retarded" person if they preferred if I said "intellectually challenged." He preferred retarded because...wait for it...he had a lot of trouble saying the other one. Now that's irony.

I think my heart's in the right place. I was taught to be polite, and I try to be at all times. But it gets under my skin to have a total stranger "chastise" me when they know nothing about me. Frankly, I find it more offensive to interrupt and belittle a stranger than it is to overhear some stranger's questionable utterance.