I still use my Gmail account and proud to say that I will use it forever. Even though Google have gone to the dark side, I will keep my Gmail mainly because my email address was created way back before they forbid anyone having a strange sounding email address. My email address is a relic from the olden fun days.

I have Proton email and will ditch it soon.

They are trying to drill it into people’s head until the name becomes normalised and accepted.

Very strange indeed to pick Smedley. But actually like with many secret plots, if you go into the details, the conspirators can be surprisingly inept. The December plot to overthrow the Russian tsardom and replace it with a republic comes to mind. It failed because of lack of coordination, communication, and one of the major co-conspirators lost his nerve at the last minute and thus did not add numbers to the troops of rebels. There was plenty of idealism but it lacked the nerves and good plan execution.

Found a conspirator.

Although seriously, it’s mentioned in the Wikipedia article that the investigating committee said there is strong evidence of the plotting. They didn’t prosecute anyone becaus of course rich people won’t be prosecuted. I have read rumours that Franklin Roosevelt may have made some backroom deal.

Technically, the Holocaust did not start with deportations. What the Nazis did first was make it hard for Jews to live in Germany by harassing and taxing them heavily to make them leave. It is only when Germany conquered much of Europe that they had to deal with so many Jews and other minorities in occupied countries. At first, they did plan to deport Jews to Madagascar, but it’s not feasible because of geography and war. They also cooperated with Palestine Mandate to allow Jews to leave. But only a trickle of Jews managed to reach the safety of the Middle East until it was stopped eventually, also due to the complications of geography and war. What the Nazis arrived at instead is to exterminate the Jews; hence the term " the final solution".

Yeah, I believe Americans who consider themselves “independent” are something like 40%. In essence, Americans are still moderates all things considered. If the US has proportional representation government, there’d be a hung parliament, or maybe even a ruling progressive party because it will be easier to elect a third party.

OR SOLD TO A US BASED BUYER (I’m personally thinking this is the Muskrat’s doing, but that’s all conspiracy)

If true, Musk may have bought shares in companies that deal with data and wants to simply profit. I have had a work colleague who got rich buying stocks and is bit of a fan of Elon Musk. He admits that private data is basically the new gold but the masses is all too unaware or uncaring for it. So you might be on to something with this.

The older I get, the more I understand what Franz Kafka had been saying. I have no love for the Republican Party or any other “party of small government”, but they have a point about bloating bureaucracy.

A car company complimenting Hitler’s painting is nothing compared to making business deals with Hitler. Ford and GM still have subsidiaries that operated and built for Nazi Germany despite the US declaration of war in World War 2.

Things haven’t really changed. Corporations will typically side with fascists when it comes to it.

Dammit so we can’t stop Skynet!

You’re neither the sperm nor the egg. You’re the combination of both the sperm and the egg. 50/50 of what you are came from your mother and your father.

Not trying to glorify wars, but what I’m saying is that some wars have a purpose or cause at least. Like the Napoleonic wars is about new type of government under new found liberal values versus the old system of absolute monarchy that values stability and familiarity. The current war in Ukraine is about stopping imperialism and the wanton violation of international rule (there isn’t technically any rule because international laws are non-binding but that is a different topic I won’t delve for now).

As an aside, I like how the intention of the original poster aged like milk. No one sees “The Great War” as great by those who survived it and by the future. It is not talked about positively in the same way as Napoleonic wars or the Second World War (except if you were an Axis soldier or civilian victim of war crimes of course).

True. But athletes are still people and they are allowed to be themselves.

Also, maybe the players are tired and grumpy after the match.

To be honest, I think a lot of Lemmy users are old and yearn for the older technologies simply because they have been more familiar with them than newer ones. They would have used the first gen of a technology, which may not be efficient, and dismiss it altogether, without realising that subsequent generations of that technology improves over time.

I have had that realisation of cognitive bias when I had Bluetooth headphones back in early 2010s. The wireless connection isn’t great and gets cut off every now and then. I dismissed the technology as less efficient than wired earphones. It was over the years with the popularity of airpods that I gave wireless earphones another chance. And honestly, the Bluetooth connectivity vastly improved than I expected and I would not go back to using wired earphones again on regular basis because I don’t have to deal with the wires getting tangled or yanked. I only use wired ones as backup if my wireless earphones went missing or broke.

Sorry to say this to OP, but it seems that you’re being an old man yelling at the clouds. Look, I’m also old and I admit I have had that moment of yelling at the clouds too. We will have that more moments as we age.

Precisely. The problem with some original movies is that they’re not great. Of the thousands of movies made every year, probably only a hundred will receive wide recognition and praise, let alone a tidy profit. There is a reason why people are typically skeptical of indie movies.

I knew this line will come up.

Look, I abhor billionaires who exploit workers and people (I don’t condone the murder of the UnitedHealth CEO but i understand), but is there evidence that Chuck Feeney underpaid his staff? So far, I hear nothing. I will change my opinion when I hear good evidence against him.

But here is the more important question, do cashiers or cleaners deserve director level salary? All people deserve to earn decent wage to keep food and roof over their heads, but all this rhetoric about increasing wages because the owner is billionaire is ridiculous. Up to what level should cleaners, security guards, farmhands or labourers should be paid? Leadership roles are also administrative in nature which requires a lot of effort than most people realise. You have to organise, manage people and logistics, do meetings, conduct finances, problem-solving, do legal work, ensure compliance, and if you have a family that is already another work on its own, etc. Having done various jobs in my career, I would argue that administrative roles are harder than manual labour. This is not to diminish the importance of blue collar and labour workers, but the human brain alone consumes 20% of energy that an individual takes from food. A lot of mental work will get someone tired easily in just two hours at least. That is why college-educated folks are paid more because of the intellect required for the job. Again, this is not to undermine the role of blue collar workers, but being operator or a janitor doesn’t require as much work. I know because I have worked as blue collar and labourer. I certainly don’t expect to be paid a lot for those jobs. The pay among the low, middle and high earners should be proportional, which is why it’s important to look at the ratio of CEO pay versus the lowest

Duty Free is a private company, so the owner decides how much of the profit goes to paying the workers more. But if a person wants more equal pay regardless, there are co-operatives to work in. Everyone basically gets equal income in co-ops. I’m a supporter of co-ops but I am aware of its limitations. It may be democratically run with one vote per one person, but co-ops are known to always elect increasing their wages which could affect the net earnings and may not be able to cover the operating costs.

The article and author is very layman shall we say, and has obvious libertarian bias, but it has a point:

According to Forbes, this nefarious tycoon “has aggressively tried to avoid taxes at every stage in his career– from setting up his early business in Liechtenstein, incorporating his holding company in Bermuda. . .”

Feeney transferred his business interests to his charitable organization in 1984. And for the last 30+ years he’s given away nearly $ 8 BILLION through the foundation.

While the US government has been using your tax dollars to bomb children’s hospitals by remote control, Feeney has been building them.

He has endowed entire universities, funded cancer research, invested hundreds of millions in AIDS benefit to Africa, built a $ 300 million medical center in California, and developed a new technology hub on New York City’s Roosevelt Island.

These aren’t the actions of a narcissistic robber baron.

Th**e entire concept of taxation is grounded in the idea that some politician knows how to spend money better than you do. ** But Feeney opted for a different path: taking completely LEGAL steps to stay in control of his savings and make a huge difference in people’s lives.

I’m not trying to fanboy Chuck Feeney. If it had been proven that he was very exploitative of human lives and dignity to amass billions, I will change my opinion of him. However, the results speak for itself.

I would also add that the article has a point about it. In my home country, there is tax for citizens leaving the country. I was appalled not because I will lose money, but I know that my taxes will go to the then president and his family’s fortune who unabashedly orders extrajudicial killing.