EndRedStateSubsidies

And my boss still says I'm one of the best on the team... 🤷🏼‍♂️

Some of this is objective. Some is just nostalgia.

You can still download music and play wow. On this front you probably miss simpler times when you weren't aware of problems you are now or resent responsibilities that took you from things you enjoyed and make you feel old.

On the other hand, society globally is markedly worse than before COVID with substantial right-wing shifts.

Unfortunately, end of days accelerationists and techno fascist billionaires have been working quite hard to make the world a worse place for several decades...

So I largely agree. Personally, in terms of skills and assets, I'm in a much better place than I was 2000 years ago. However, in terms of happiness and hope for the future... I actually still had some then.

Yes, they are part of the system. You're so eager to disagree you don't understand you're making my point.

You all won't be able to fix anything if you're more focused on what feels good to yell about you can't focus on the root cause.

Exceeding true which ends up meaning either technocratic democracy or representative Republic.

The techno route basically requires the best possible reddit where subject matter experts can weigh in and formulate options that are explained and then people can read the synopsis and vote. Idealistic but within the realm of doable.

Representative Republic would require wages comfortable enough to not compel corruption. I'd say no public trading but the stock market and all it entails are one of the largest sources of corruption. Market makers and every kind of derivative would have to go. The only thing that should be allowed is buying stock your support or selling stock you no longer want to own. Everything else is a haven for crime and theft against the working class.

But most of the problem with most solutions is that the bad guys have all the money and the masses are stupid and easily misled..

Yeah, there's a body of research about social media both used to foster animosity as well as complacency.

Yes, it's technically technologically tryable but not practically politically possible.

I think you misunderstand. I don't see that as the fix. A system like that would only work with an educated populace that understands more than the bare minimum to get by, if that.

The only real fix is a populace that can think critically and is informed, but even that's not easily attained at this point as there's so much money to be made with institutionalization.

Basically get something like reddit/lemmy as a social forum. You use it for business reviews, running for office, looking for jobs, raising issues and crowd sourcing solutions. Make it block chain with each state hosting a node. Make every user verified and use it for voting. It's absolutely a solvable problem it's just that all the money and power is actively working against progress.

I've been wondering if something like the United Countries of North America type of EU but that still leaves all kinds of questions about the military and how much blood the road from here will take.

Absolutely. Great video on the matter: https://youtu.be/xDgzgDSInt0

People, at least Americans, today aren't capable of it for multiple reasons, most of them systemic and intentional.

Decades of cuts to education and the social fabric have rendered most of the populace too ignorant about everything for giving them a say being a good idea.

Like term limits. How many people would vote for term limits without doing any research to find out they basically always make things worse because they keep out the people that want to spend their lives in faithful public service while there are no shortage of stooges corporations can push through.

So, you have the third of the country that voted for fascism. Pretty bad...

But then you have the other third that's convinced voting for Democrats that spent 50 years empowering fascism will save them.

Then you have the third that's completely disengaged because they don't care.

Direct democracy can't work as long as people believe capitalism serves anything other than the ruling class.

I always keep in mind the first doctor to advocate washing hands after handling corpses was laughed out of medicine and died alone in an asylum ironically enough from sepsis.

To that point, the vast majority of research on nutrition is done on the presumption carbohydrates should be the foundation of our diet. Even "low" carb diet studies with have 30% of the calories coming from simple carbs. Oddly enough, the human body works much differently and much better when you don't give it -any- sugar: https://youtu.be/cST99piL71E

I can expand, but briefly, sugar acts like a sandblaster through your heart and shreds the endothelium (the finger-things that move things in and out of the bloodstream). LDL is a repair van that drives around with cholesterol and saturated fat to repair the plaques. (HDL brings empty LDL back to the liver) The entire logic of blaming cholesterol for heart disease is like blaming bandaids for stab wounds. Doctors say eat less fat and more "healthy whole grains" (carbs) and the liver makes more cholesterol. Doctor sees cholesterol is still high because the body needs it and prescribes statins which impair production. This leads to nerve pain because it's what literally every nerve in the body is insulated with.

The problems with cholesterol stem from it sitting in the bloodstream and glycating due to prolonged sugar exposure. Sugar staying in the bloodstream is basically ketoacidosis, so clearing sugar is a priority that results in LDL gumming up and going bad, essentially.

I can expand on this, but basically the human body needs predominantly fat with some protein and actually zero carbs.