As a bicyclist, I see that we have Schrödinger’s Cyclist: Too poor to be able to afford a car like “normal” people, but also a rich elitist who can afford to commute by bike.

Also, Schrödinger’s Bike Lanes: A conspiracy by car-hating politicians to punish drivers, but also an amenity that only rich elitists get in their neighborhoods.

Decades ago, a group calling itself The New Party tried to eliminate the spoiler effect of third parties through the practice of electoral fusion, that is, allowing the same candidate to run and appear on the ballot under more than one political party. That way, they’d know where their support came from. But the Democratic Farm Labor Party (Minnesota’s Democratic Party organization) went to court to shut it down, offering the specious argument that it would confuse voters.

Would the corporatist, establishment Democrats allow an upstart progressive movement into its primaries?

Waiting times are atrocious here in the U.S. The earliest in-person appointment that I can get with my GP is about 6 months out. Non-urgent surgeries are sometimes take close to a year. A friend recently had to keep a bladder drain in after surgery for an extra week because there were no doctors who could do the 5-minute removal available.

Anybody who says that long wait times are unique to public health systems is lying.

Just by random chance, I saw a Toynbee tile in the street in St. Louis. I’d heard about the mystery on the Internet, and was quite excited to see one in person.

Oh, I also saw Thong Cape Scooter Man several times.

Reminds me of this webcomic about the Oenophile’s Quandry.

Very few food products have an expiration date printed on them. A lot of them have a “Sell by” date, which is not an expiration date. We have a local milk producer that prints a “Sell by” date on their bottles. The rule of thumb is that if it’s stored in proper refrigeration, unopened, it’ll keep for 2 more weeks. (Plus another week to use it up.) But it’s impossible to explain that people. The disgust reflex is strong, and you can almost watch it on their faces as it overrides people’s rational faculties. (Honestly, that experience helps me understand the recent election results.) As a result, the store that I worked in would as a rule of thumb take the milk off the shelf 3 days before the “Sell by” date, even though it’d be good for another 3 weeks. Milk that didn’t sell, we had to pour down the drain.

One time when I was working there, I had to deal with an irate customer who returned some fancy cheese hors d’oeuvres that she’d received as part of her pick-up order because the package had a “Sell by” date on it that was a couple days past. I refunded the cost of the item, and when I took it back to the cheese department, our cheese monger explained that the date was really only useful for the store to keep its stock rotated. The product didn’t spoil after that date; in fact, it got better for several months as the cheese aged. But, we agreed, it’s impossible to explain that to people.

So, to the question, also while working there, I made a delivery to an elderly woman whose son ordered groceries for her. She had a number of items that she didn’t use before the “Use by” date, and asked if I’d take them. One of them was a container of plain yogurt. I don’t use a lot of yogurt, mainly as a condiment for Indian dishes, so I didn’t even open it until about a month after the “Use by” date, and finally finished it probably 3 months after. (Just don’t let it warm up, open only briefly, and always use a clean utensil to scoop it out.) It still tasted fresh and enjoyable.

I still have butter in the refrigerator with a “Use by” date in 2023, because I bought a lot of it when it was cheap (on sale and employee discount), and put it in the freezer. I have eaten canned food several years after the “Best by” date. The heuristic is easy: It it smells good, it’s edible. If it smells off, toss it. But I know that there are plenty of people out there with a hair-trigger disgust response, who are convinced that the moment the clock ticks over to the date printed on the package, the contents turn to poison. This heuristic probably grosses them out. Oh well, people aren’t rational.

Along those lines, monarchist is bad, too. The wealthy in the U.S. are notoriously touchy about being called aristocracy, and I maintain that it’s because nobility not only punctures the meritocracy myth, but also carries with it the idea of noblesse oblige. They don’t want any obligations to the peasants. (Won’t be lauded as a great philanthropist for the dribs and drabs they give to charity, if it’s expected!)

Take a look at the finances of automobile-oriented development. “Highly unsustainable” and “heavy debt” are the bywords there. As long as we’re spending that kind of money, shouldn’t we at least make ourselves happy?

And Joe pardoned Hunter for whatever they “find” next on that laptop, so, y’know, both sides.

/s

Liberals (which I’m taking to mean Democrats) didn’t “fix” gay marriage. Right up until the Iowa Supreme Court decision, in the early 2000’s, the argument in Democratic circles was that gay-rights organizations should pipe down, settle for civil unions, and stop making gay marriage an issue. They were afraid of handing the Republicans a weapon. It was the gay-rights organizations that pushed it through the courts, and prominent Democratic politicians like Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and Joe Biden “evolved” their positions to support it. I mean no criticism by the use of quotes. Kudos to them for changing their minds, but it wasn’t liberals that made it happen.

Those dead-eyed monstrosities stare deep into my soul and give me a case of the howling fantods, so yes, agree.

As Yeats famously wrote:

The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.

Seems it’s happening again.

I feel like this perspective needs a bigger audience, since it explains a whole lot about the incel/alpha backlash, and the gender divide in U.S. politics.

First thing I thought of was the “Elementary School Musical” episode of South Park.

Where this analogy falls apart is in the implicit assumption that this is just a one-off situation. (I mean, most people only have two parents.)

What happens when it’s an iterative phenomenon? (Politics is an ongoing thing.) Then, the situation in the analogy turns into the classic “negotiating with terrorists” scenario. The received wisdom is that one should never negotiate with terrorists, because once they learn that terrorism works they’ll do it again.

Maybe make it cousins. Do you choose the option whereby two cousins die, or just one. What if choosing just one now increases the danger of more dying later?

Oh Lord… 😔

Who will they tip over the side next?

Perhaps a better, real-world example is that this moral calculus says that the Democrats should abandon trans people and trans issues. The logic is inescapable: Trans issues turn away a lot of voters, and it’s a really strong talking point for the other party. If they win, the Democrats could protect the LGB community, and women’s rights.

Surely it’s better to protect the LGB community and women’s rights, but not trans people, than to protect none of them, right?

(NB: This is rhetorical. I don’t believe it.)

Abortion rights initiatives won in 7 out of 10 states where they were on the ballot.

Sometimes you do it the hard way to send a message.

It’s not accelerationism at all! It’s fatalism.

Accelerationism is, “It has to get worse before it can get better.”

My point here is, “The system that only allows for getting worse will never get better.”