Video: A Shutdown Wouldn’t Halt Trump’s Trials, So Republicans Seek to Rein in His Prosecutors

Law • Views: 15,591

The extreme corruption of the Republican Party of 2023 is absolutely horrifying. Now they’re trying to force a government shutdown and use funding legislation to sabotage the prosecutions of their Dear Leader.

Federal criminal proceedings are exempt from shutdowns. But GOP House members want to use a must-pass funding bill to defund or limit law enforcement from investigating Trump. NBC News’ Sahil Kapur reports.

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119 comments
1
Thanos  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:04:19am

Brought forward from previous thread, how Trump and Heritage plan to resurrect schedule F.

Mastodon

2
Eclectic Cyborg  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:06:37am

Another day, another CEO throwing a big middle finger to the employees who make him rich:

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy seems to have run out of patience with remote workers refusing to come back to the office.

The return to office issue has been a problem plaguing some of the biggest businesses in America, with companies from Meta to Disney and Starbucks all wrestling with workers who want to hold onto their pandemic-era flexibility.

Unfortunately for Amazon’s executives, summoning staff back to the office has been particularly controversial.

And after being hit with everything from criticism to staff petitions, it seems the Amazon boss has reached the end of his tether.

In a “fishbowl” meeting earlier this month—a company name for a fireside chat—Jassy reportedly threw down the gauntlet, implying that if staff refused to come back to their desks they would not have a spot on the payroll.

”It’s past the time to disagree and commit,” Jassy said in a recording obtained by Insider. “And if you can’t disagree and commit, I also understand that, but it’s probably not going to work out for you at Amazon because we are going back to the office at least three days a week, and it’s not right for all of our teammates to be in three days a week and for people to refuse to do so.”

God forbid the master doesn’t have his subjects close by to lord over.

On a related note, corporate “fireside chats” are getting seriously overdone IMO.

3
Decatur Deb  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:11:56am

The plan to delay his trial is going to go wobbly as soon as he talks his way into bail revocation. And he will.

4
lawhawk  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:16:29am

re: #2 Eclectic Cyborg

Most companies that have gone remote have found that it hasn’t hurt their bottom lines, and a bunch of companies have reduced real estate footprint, saving them even more money.

There’s little reason for someone to return to an office - it’s more costly for them in time/commute, and companies aren’t really pushing for a full or part time return to office as a result. The bosses that want butts in the seats are those who need headcounts - like for tax credit purposes - or because they’re micromanagers. Or both.

5
lawhawk  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:17:17am

re: #1 Thanos

6
🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:17:46am

re: #1 Thanos

Brought forward from previous thread, how Trump and Heritage plan to resurrect schedule F.

[Embedded content]

Fascists. There’s nothing conservative about destroying the nation to please a narcissistic sociopath.

7
lawhawk  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:18:07am
8
Anymouse 🌹🏡😷  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:21:07am

re: #6 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

Fascists. There’s nothing conservative about destroying the nation to please a narcissistic sociopath.

Fascism is a logical outgrowth of conservatism. Conservatism is about gaining and maintaining power. That’s it.

Conservatives frequently destroy nations when they gain total control. They don’t care. They have power, and you don’t.

9
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:22:34am

re: #4 lawhawk

Most companies that have gone remote have found that it hasn’t hurt their bottom lines, and a bunch of companies have reduced real estate footprint, saving them even more money.

There’s little reason for someone to return to an office - it’s more costly for them in time/commute, and companies aren’t really pushing for a full or part time return to office as a result. The bosses that want butts in the seats are those who need headcounts - like for tax credit purposes - or because they’re micromanagers. Or both.

Also, office space, whether owned or rented, are things that effect the companies’ accounting. As would be equipment and such.

But I’m at the point where I think they want butts in seats precisely because they know it’s inconvenient and has a cost for the worker. A person who has to burn time doing compliance—whether that’s in-person meetings or the drive time each day—is held at a higher degree of precarity than someone working from home. If work-from-home became common, then workers would to a limited degree own the means of prodution—their home office, their computers and peripherals—and thus could more effectively negotiate the terms for their labor, even creating competition between employers for workers that might increase compensation.

10
FFL (GOP Delenda Est)  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:23:57am

re: #1 Thanos

Brought forward from previous thread, how Trump and Heritage plan to resurrect schedule F.

[Embedded content]

Brown pants and ketchup-colored shirts seem more appropriate for Trump Toadies.

11
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:24:02am

From downstairs.

re: #325 ericblair

[Embedded content]

Biden continues to turn the US into a socialist hellhole by, uh, negotiating prices for goods and services. Commie.

I am on two of the ten and lower prices would be great. I’m out a lot of pocket on each.

12
jaunte  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:25:39am

Two words impinging more frequently on my perception lately, from:

Ghost of a Flea: Precarity
TV Lawyers: Colorable

13
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:26:32am

re: #6 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

Fascists. There’s nothing conservative about destroying the nation to please a narcissistic sociopath.

But they’re not pleasing him.

They’re pleasing themselves.

That’s the entire thing with fascism: the signers-on aren’t magically duped by one guy: they are the kind of rubes who are really excited to get disproportionately rewarded, but they’re also the kind of assholes that think they’re owed everything *and* the kind of assholes that specifically like the idea that when they steal it’s just and moral.

14
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:26:36am

re: #9 The Ghost of a Flea

Also, office space, whether owned or rented, are things that effect the companies’ accounting. As would be equipment and such.

But I’m at the point where I think they want butts in seats precisely because they know it’s inconvenient and has a cost for the worker. A person who has to burn time doing compliance—whether that’s in-person meetings or the drive time each day—is held at a higher degree of precarity than someone working from home. If work-from-home became common, then workers would to a limited degree own the means of prodution—their home office, their computers and peripherals—and thus could more effectively negotiate the terms for their labor, even creating competition between employers for workers that might increase compensation.

There was an interesting poll done a few months ago asking workers about job satisfaction from WFH. Employees loved it. Mots saw their productivity go up. Managers were the only group that hated WGH, likely because they no longer had a clear mandate for their own jobs. Which, of course, reveals why productivity went down after people returned to work. Those middle managers were really not producing as much as the company said for their bottom line.

15
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:28:03am

re: #14 silverdolphin

There was an interesting poll done a few months ago asking workers about job satisfaction from WFH. Employees loved it. Mots saw their productivity go up. Managers were the only group that hated WGH, likely because they no longer had a clear mandate for their own jobs. Which, of course, reveals why productivity went down after people returned to work. Those middle managers were really not producing as much as the company said for their bottom line.

Bismillah I have bad news about upper management.

16
FFL (GOP Delenda Est)  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:29:29am

re: #14 silverdolphin

There was an interesting poll done a few months ago asking workers about job satisfaction from WFH. Employees loved it. Mots saw their productivity go up. Managers were the only group that hated WGH, likely because they no longer had a clear mandate for their own jobs. Which, of course, reveals why productivity went down after people returned to work. Those middle managers were really not producing as much as the company said for their bottom line.

A lot of this sounds familiar. Like all the managerial whining when clock-punching started going away. Or a department started allowing employee flex time for their working hours.

And the loss of productivity caused by a casual dress Friday.
//

17
jaunte  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:29:38am

Amanda Marcotte @amandamarcotte.bsky.social

The first thing any Republican who takes the White House will do is shut down the price negotiation program on drug prices. Something I hope gets highlighted in like every campaign ad.

Because far too many voters, especially elderly white people, justify voting Republican by telling themselves a story about how they won’t take away stuff the Democrats gave them. But they absolutely will in this case.

18
Thanos  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:31:21am

re: #5 lawhawk

It’s like Weyrich is still directing things from the grave.

19
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:33:57am

re: #14 silverdolphin

There was an interesting poll done a few months ago asking workers about job satisfaction from WFH. Employees loved it. Mots saw their productivity go up. Managers were the only group that hated WGH, likely because they no longer had a clear mandate for their own jobs. Which, of course, reveals why productivity went down after people returned to work. Those middle managers were really not producing as much as the company said for their bottom line.

Given a choice between greater efficiency and greater control, capital always chooses the latter.

Sometimes that’s neglecting a factory until it sprays phosgene over an Indian city, sometimes that’s just refusing to cede the petty manipulations and coercions that middle management apply as Skinnerian conditioning. Happy more productive workers is less important that pliable ones.

Have you ever read Graeber’s essay “Bullshit Jobs”?

20
Thanos  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:34:14am

re: #2 Eclectic Cyborg

It’s not a surprise that Amazon would want all of their workers back commuting. There’s a cost for commuting, and that cost feeds back into their business model.

From more clothes sold so workers look right, to more lunches, more coffees, more wear and tear on cars, more need for convenience meals and fast food, more need to order because you don’t have time to shop anymore… it all feeds back to Amazon.

21
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:40:00am

re: #20 Thanos

It’s not a surprise that Amazon would want all of their workers back commuting. There’s a cost for commuting, and that cost feeds back into their business model.

From more clothes sold so workers look right, to more lunches, more coffees, more wear and tear on cars, more need for convenience meals and fast food, more need to order because you don’t have time to shop anymore… it all feeds back to Amazon.

excellent point

22
Decatur Deb  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:40:09am

The first thunderstorm that is probably one of Idalia’s outer bands has started. It still seems to have shifted a good bit to the East.

23
PhillyPretzel ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:44:31am

re: #22 Decatur Deb

From the NWS/Mt Holly:
weather.gov

scroll down to Idaila

24
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 11:56:42am

Secret phone call reveals Christian Right plan to ‘take down the education system as we know it’

Read the rest of the article and click through to the WP piece, but I want to highlight one bit:

The ultimate goal is to get the Supreme Court to mandate the state pay for private religious schools despite the First Amendment preventing the “respecting an establishment of religion.”

Pay attention to this, because you need to remember that the full spectrum of the right…from conservatives to libertarians to fascists…may abhor the state as an abstraction, but this never actually translates into praxis to abolish the state because their interest is retention of power.

The will abolish the state, but only where that power can be redistributed to figures and instutions they prefer, and only when capture of the state seems unfeasible.

What we’re watching is more and more moments of naked power-hunger as the right feels like it’s time to start making bolder, more openly undemocratic swings, but in we look the past the pattern has been there all along: Republicans never strip out government power they could use to advance their ends, and the things they do undermine are accountability structures that land on the kind of capital-holders that vote Republican.

25
retired cynic  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:01:04pm

‘Abandoned Theatres’ Spotlights the Remains of Small-Town Midwestern Cinemas
thisiscolossal.com

26
darthstar  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:01:06pm

re: #3 Decatur Deb

The plan to delay his trial is going to go wobbly as soon as he talks his way into bail revocation. And he will.

Revoke his bail and he’ll ask for a speedy trial in a second

27
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:03:16pm

Productivity, Real Value added and Hours Worked

I love this graph. It shows the obvious drop in hours worked and in the real-value added per employee due to COVID. But Hours worked dropped faster than real value-added, so productivity went up to levels not ever seen.

When people returned to work, productivity went down.

28
CleverToad  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:04:24pm

From downstairs because I’m still catching up, as usual

re: #399 FFL (GOP Delenda Est)

I saw that in the Pittsburgh area when I moved here when using apartment search software like Zillow. You could punch in a set of criteria based on apartment size, certain ammenities, etc. etc. And get a list of locations.

Click the “pet friendly” box and 90% of the list would evaporate.

This conversation resonates with me just now!

I’ve just been through the My First Apartment search with our almost-25-year-old son and his 22-year-old girlfriend — services like apartments.com and apartment list.com were worth signing up for. They’ve been living with their respective parents due to the rent levels; working part time retail while taking part time college classes. Our son got a full-time job with a small engineering firm in July, thirty miles away (still well within the Denver metroplex). Great job, but killer commute — two hours each way on the light rail, an hour if driving.

He moved into the new nest last week; his girlfriend will be joining him at the end of September. She has a cat; she doesn’t drive so will need a new job in walking or transit distance. Two MAJOR factors in the search criteria. We got a minor miracle with a complex less than two miles from son’s job, right by a light rail station with a lot of nearby retail and restaurants. A bargain on rent for the first 13-month lease, which will probably jump at least $150 up when they have to renew.

Her sweet little cat is costing them a $300 non-refundable deposit and $50 a month. The complex does accept dogs — with a long list of the breed and mixes they won’t consider — but says all animals have to be six months or older. No kittens or puppies!

I don’t know if 90% of the choices went away with ‘cats’ checked, but it definitely cut the size of the ‘potentials’ list. Dogs would probably have narrowed it further. (At least I didn’t have to check how many would bar other interesting critters, like the boa constrictor my first husband had when we rented our first apartment…)

29
Joe Bacon ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:05:00pm

He’s so shocked that Republicans oppose gay rights!

Former Ambassador Richard Grenell was shocked to learn that the Republican Party doesn’t support LGBTQ+ people, the site LGBTQ Nation reported.

lgbtqnation.com

30
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:06:02pm

re: #24 The Ghost of a Flea

This is what lies at the core of “state’s rights” and “sovereign sheriff” notions floating around the American right: it’s not that these devolutions remove a level of state power, it’s that state power is now concentrated in positions that conservative see as bending to their needs. Now they seen the chance to flip the whole administrative state and they’re going to take it.

Trumpism could be understand as a choice to more nakedly pursue by all conservative parties: forget the fan dances with justification or building intellectual shells to make the hypocrisy hard to see, just roll forward…the biggest lies, the most obvious grasping move…because truth emerges from power, and after you win you can enforce any narrative you want.

31
JC1  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:06:25pm

re: #2 Eclectic Cyborg

Another day, another CEO throwing a big middle finger to the employees who make him rich:

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy seems to have run out of patience with remote workers refusing to come back to the office.

The return to office issue has been a problem plaguing some of the biggest businesses in America, with companies from Meta to Disney and Starbucks all wrestling with workers who want to hold onto their pandemic-era flexibility.

Unfortunately for Amazon’s executives, summoning staff back to the office has been particularly controversial.

And after being hit with everything from criticism to staff petitions, it seems the Amazon boss has reached the end of his tether.

In a “fishbowl” meeting earlier this month—a company name for a fireside chat—Jassy reportedly threw down the gauntlet, implying that if staff refused to come back to their desks they would not have a spot on the payroll.

”It’s past the time to disagree and commit,” Jassy said in a recording obtained by Insider. “And if you can’t disagree and commit, I also understand that, but it’s probably not going to work out for you at Amazon because we are going back to the office at least three days a week, and it’s not right for all of our teammates to be in three days a week and for people to refuse to do so.”

God forbid the master doesn’t have his subjects close by to lord over.

On a related note, corporate “fireside chats” are getting seriously overdone IMO.

He seems to think that unemployment is 8% and not 3.5%. Just absurd.

32
Teddy's Person  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:07:29pm

re: #28 CleverToad

From downstairs because I’m still catching up, as usual

This conversation resonates with me just now!

I’ve just been through the My First Apartment search with our almost-25-year-old son and his 22-year-old girlfriend — services like apartments.com and apartment list.com were worth signing up for. They’ve been living with their respective parents due to the rent levels; working part time retail while taking part time college classes. Our son got a full-time job with a small engineering firm in July, thirty miles away (still well within the Denver metroplex). Great job, but killer commute — two hours each way on the light rail, an hour if driving.

He moved into the new nest last week; his girlfriend will be joining him at the end of September. She has a cat; she doesn’t drive so will need a new job in walking or transit distance. Two MAJOR factors in the search criteria. We got a minor miracle with a complex less than two miles from son’s job, right by a light rail station with a lot of nearby retail and restaurants. A bargain on rent for the first 13-month lease, which will probably jump at least $150 up when they have to renew.

Her sweet little cat is costing them a $300 non-refundable deposit and $50 a month. The complex does accept dogs — with a long list of the breed and mixes they won’t consider — but says all animals have to be six months or older. No kittens or puppies!

I don’t know if 90% of the choices went away with ‘cats’ checked, but it definitely cut the size of the ‘potentials’ list. Dogs would probably have narrowed it further. (At least I didn’t have to check how many would bar other interesting critters, like the boa constrictor my first husband had when we rented our first apartment…)

Not sure what the law is in Colorado. I live in Washington. I registered Teddy as an emotional support animal ($90 one time fee) to eliminate the monthly pet rent.

33
jaunte  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:07:56pm

re: #30 The Ghost of a Flea

“Muscular” Christianity.

34
Teukka  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:08:01pm

35
JC1  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:10:14pm

re: #4 lawhawk

Most companies that have gone remote have found that it hasn’t hurt their bottom lines, and a bunch of companies have reduced real estate footprint, saving them even more money.

There’s little reason for someone to return to an office - it’s more costly for them in time/commute, and companies aren’t really pushing for a full or part time return to office as a result. The bosses that want butts in the seats are those who need headcounts - like for tax credit purposes - or because they’re micromanagers. Or both.

Only compelling argument I heard for being physically in the office is that it allows new hires to more readily network and absorb the culture. That makes some sense, especially for folks just out of college or with limited experience. But for experienced staff it just doesn’t make sense in most circumstances.
They’re not going to unring this bell. Firms more accommodating to work from home will get the best talent.

36
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:11:23pm

re: #31 JC1

He seems to think that unemployment is 8% and not 3.5%. Just absurd.

From people I know who worked there, Amazon is a real authoritarian company, with lots of administrative overhead. Lots of TPS reports and such. Everything is put into writing. So there are a lot of Office Space moments.

Office Space TPS Reports

37
Nojay UK  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:13:37pm

re: #2 Eclectic Cyborg

In a “fishbowl” meeting earlier this month—a company name for a fireside chat—Jassy reportedly threw down the gauntlet…

…and it’s not right for all of our teammates to be in three days a week and for people to refuse to do so.”

So “teammates” are different from “people”. Right.

38
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:14:51pm

re: #35 JC1

Only compelling argument I heard for being physically in the office is that it allows new hires to more readily network and absorb the culture. That makes some sense, especially for folks just out of college or with limited experience. But for experienced staff it just doesn’t make sense in most circumstances.
They’re not going to unring this bell. Firms more accommodating to work from home will get the best talent.

I know somebody who is supposed to be in the office 3 times a week. But the majority of the people they work/talk with are in a different state so most of their corporate interactions are via Zoom, which they could do at home.

Best corporate interactions they have are getting together with some of the others in the office at a brew pub. That is what they should be working for when they have company days - greater social interactions. Have a party with door prizes ;-)

39
lawhawk  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:14:58pm

re: #36 silverdolphin

You haven’t seen my home printer problems… or my solution

Office Space - Printer Scene (UNCENSORED)

40
PhillyPretzel ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:19:02pm

re: #39 lawhawk

Hmm. I forgot where I read it but Apple allows employees to destroy old and un repairable equipment. That sounds like a good release to me.

41
sagehen  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:19:36pm

re: #8 Anymouse 🌹🏡😷

Fascism is a logical outgrowth of conservatism. Conservatism is about gaining and maintaining power. That’s it.

Conservatives frequently destroy nations when they gain total control. They don’t care. They have power, and you don’t.

again, you are confusing “Right Wing” with “Conservative”. Which is THEIR framing, because the far right recruits from within conservative factions.

During the American Revolution, the abolitionist movement, the labor movement, women’s suffrage, civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights… the Conservative position has always been “Let’s not change a thing. Keep it all as is.”

Fascists find conservatives useful, but fascists are not conservative. Because fascists want to change EVERYTHING.

42
🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:23:54pm

re: #33 jaunte

“Muscular” Christianity.

Fascism.

43
Unabogie  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:25:18pm

I work at a Large Retail Company doing software engineering. We have gone fully remote for our team and my direct manager is leaving the state.

I absolutely LOVE working from my home office. No commute, wear what I want, walk the dogs, see my wife during the day, eat what I like, make my own espresso drinks.

There is zero reason for me to schlep to the campus to jump on Zoom meetings.

44
Teukka  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:25:54pm

re: #42 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

Fascism.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God.”

“Wurr nutt kidds heah!”

45
FFL (GOP Delenda Est)  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:27:16pm

re: #28 CleverToad

From downstairs because I’m still catching up, as usual

This conversation resonates with me just now!

I’ve just been through the My First Apartment search with our almost-25-year-old son and his 22-year-old girlfriend — services like apartments.com and apartment list.com were worth signing up for. They’ve been living with their respective parents due to the rent levels; working part time retail while taking part time college classes. Our son got a full-time job with a small engineering firm in July, thirty miles away (still well within the Denver metroplex). Great job, but killer commute — two hours each way on the light rail, an hour if driving.

He moved into the new nest last week; his girlfriend will be joining him at the end of September. She has a cat; she doesn’t drive so will need a new job in walking or transit distance. Two MAJOR factors in the search criteria. We got a minor miracle with a complex less than two miles from son’s job, right by a light rail station with a lot of nearby retail and restaurants. A bargain on rent for the first 13-month lease, which will probably jump at least $150 up when they have to renew.

Her sweet little cat is costing them a $300 non-refundable deposit and $50 a month. The complex does accept dogs — with a long list of the breed and mixes they won’t consider — but says all animals have to be six months or older. No kittens or puppies!

I don’t know if 90% of the choices went away with ‘cats’ checked, but it definitely cut the size of the ‘potentials’ list. Dogs would probably have narrowed it further. (At least I didn’t have to check how many would bar other interesting critters, like the boa constrictor my first husband had when we rented our first apartment…)

90% might have been an exaggeration, but it was a sizeable reduction.

Luckily my last two moves were made on my own schedule so that I had plenty of time to do searches, visit places, and assemble a list of what my criteria were. The townhouse in Paoli was a lucky find - the company’s regular apartments (which I had gone to look at) had a two cat limit - but the townhouses allowed three (and I had the full trio of Tuxedo Cat, Chat Noir, and Floof Cat at the time.)

And the Paoli location was almost ideal since a lot of things (post office, bar, cafe, train station [SEPTA and Amtrak], and library) were all in walking distance. A slightly longer walk for pharmacy and a grocery store. Wegman’s and Trader Joes both within a roughly 10-15 minute drive. And I could walk the local neighborhood streets and a nearby walking trail if I wanted. Though I tended to take the car and go farther afield for hiking. I also miss hearing the owls at night.

46
Nojay UK  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:29:56pm

re: #39 lawhawk

I read an article about a shooting range somewhere in the US mid-West. The rules were that you could bring your own targets but anything you shot at had to be dead before you started shooting, nothing that would explode sufficiently violently to damage the range was allowed and you had to take away all the debris afterwards.

One memorable group of visitors turned up with a trailer-load of computer documentation in three-ring binders. They rented a couple of belt-fed machine guns and bought the requisite ammo and they apparently had a whale of a time before, as required, trailering away the shredded and bullet-ridden binders.

47
Nerdy Fish  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:31:04pm

re: #43 Unabogie

I work at a Large Retail Company doing software engineering. We have gone fully remote for our team and my direct manager is leaving the state.

I absolutely LOVE working from my home office. No commute, wear what I want, walk the dogs, see my wife during the day, eat what I like, make my own espresso drinks.

There is zero reason for me to schlep to the campus to jump on Zoom meetings.

In a similar vein, my company recently announced that we were making permanent our pandemic-era work-from-home policies. I may stop in to the office every now and again, to get face time with the bosses or for important meetings, but I no longer have to. It was kind of a no-brainer for us, as we hired people in many widely distributed geographic locations during the pandemic, and forcing all those people to one of our much more limited physical locations would’ve been cost prohibitive.

48
🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:31:04pm

re: #43 Unabogie

I work at a Large Retail Company doing software engineering. We have gone fully remote for our team and my direct manager is leaving the state.

I absolutely LOVE working from my home office. No commute, wear what I want, walk the dogs, see my wife during the day, eat what I like, make my own espresso drinks.

There is zero reason for me to schlep to the campus to jump on Zoom meetings.

I’m 100% remote, and my director lives in another state. I have five high-resolution screens in front of me, one of them pretty big. At the office I had three little 1080p screens.

49
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:38:18pm

re: #43 Unabogie

I work at a Large Retail Company doing software engineering. We have gone fully remote for our team and my direct manager is leaving the state.

I absolutely LOVE working from my home office. No commute, wear what I want, walk the dogs, see my wife during the day, eat what I like, make my own espresso drinks.

There is zero reason for me to schlep to the campus to jump on Zoom meetings.

At a neighboorhood Friday beer bash, I found out that two of the women were 100% working from home, one in the insurance industry and the other in retail. Neither is a programmer or IT person. This is why I think WFH will change rural economies once they get high speed access.

The IT technology is being distributed throughout every company and some are recognizing the benefits of WFH (realizing that not everyone can do it). So some people will move to cheaper, rural areas to WFH. For example, parts of WV are within 90 minutes of Baltimore, DC, Pittsburg, etc.

Not only is the cost of living lower but there are lots of natural places to visit. Now communities in rural areas could have economies that are service oriented rather than extractive. Lots of people are moving from SF now. This will only accelerate as WFH spreads thoughout the entire US economy. IMHO.

50
FFL (GOP Delenda Est)  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:39:14pm

re: #48 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

I’m 100% remote, and my director lives in another state. I have five high-resolution screens in front of me, one of them pretty big. At the office I had three little 1080p screens.

And widespread better internet and better running meeting software and associated project tracking software makes a lot of this much more possible than it was pre-Covid or earlier.

It’s one reason one may expect/project more of a diaspora into rural regions as they get better internet networks and access.

51
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:40:33pm

re: #47 Nerdy Fish

In a similar vein, my company recently announced that we were making permanent our pandemic-era work-from-home policies. I may stop in to the office every now and again, to get face time with the bosses or for important meetings, but I no longer have to. It was kind of a no-brainer for us, as we hired people in many widely distributed geographic locations during the pandemic, and forcing all those people to one of our much more limited physical locations would’ve been cost prohibitive.

And you bring up a really great point. WFH companies can recruit from anywhere in the US or world, instead of locally as most companies do. It gives them an advantage more authoritarian companies cannot achieve.

52
rhuarc  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:40:51pm

re: #48 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

Same here with working remote. My immediate team is spread across the globe. I’m in the US, my manager is in Belgium (as well as the 2 managers above him), and my 2 co-engineers are in Romania. My expanded team (the operations part of the group) is in another state in the US as well as the Philippines.

There is a local office to me, but there is zero reason for me to ever visit the office as there is nothing there that is supported by my team.

From what I’ve heard through the grapevine my company started trying to pressure the front line employees back into the office, but they saw a lot of voluntary quitting as well as a lot of push back. From what I can see, management backed off that plan. Now offices are there if employees want to work there or if there are power outages due to weather related events the business side can make sure they’re covered by requiring those employees to come in.

I love working from home 100% of the time. I’m with Unabogie..being able to walk the dogs, go outside in my yard for a break, eat what I want, etc. is priceless.

53
jaunte  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:42:47pm

re: #50 FFL (GOP Delenda Est)

It’s going to flatten out real estate prices. I’ve been watching comparable prices in Brenham (nearest small town) and Houston, and the average home price is now 320k and 335k, respectively.

54
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:43:11pm

lol

55
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:44:30pm
56
Charles Johnson  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:47:53pm

CEOs have a monetary incentive to force workers back to the office, because large office buildings are very expensive to rent and maintain. But I’m pretty sure their real motivation is to restore the traditional power structure of bosses and workers.

One thing the pandemic has done is to show that most office work is unnecessary. But forcing workers to do it anyway is a demonstration of dominance.

57
PhillyPretzel ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:47:53pm

re: #54 Backwoods Sleuth

Booted. DT won’t be able to fix that one.

58
Decatur Deb  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:48:48pm

re: #55 Backwoods Sleuth

[Embedded content]

Special Agent Starling there, on the right.

59
sagehen  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:51:00pm

re: #52 rhuarc

Same here with working remote. My immediate team is spread across the globe. I’m in the US, my manager is in Belgium (as well as the 2 managers above him), and my 2 co-engineers are in Romania. My expanded team (the operations part of the group) is in another state in the US as well as the Philippines.

So… this is only going to accelerate the “everyone in the world must speak English” way of organizing international commerce.

With Spanish as the obvious 2nd language, since Central and South America are very large and have many people (all of whom are in US compatible time zones).

Remember when all the boffins suggested Mandarin would be a good thing for your kids to learn? HA! That idea vanished pretty quickly.

60
Unabogie  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:51:17pm

re: #51 silverdolphin

And you bring up a really great point. WFH companies can recruit from anywhere in the US or world, instead of locally as most companies do. It gives them an advantage more authoritarian companies cannot achieve.

Absolutely. I once interviewed for Lyft and they would no allow any remote work (pre-pandemic). I looked at rent in Palo Alto and decent apartments were going for $6k a month. I did the math and figured I needed to make a $300k base salary for a mediocre living situation compared to my current house in a wooded area that I love.

61
Unabogie  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:53:33pm

LinkedIn just pinged me to agree:

linkedin.com

62
Joe Bacon ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:54:57pm

re: #54 Backwoods Sleuth

lol

[Embedded content]

Proof that Mercury is in retrograde…

63
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:55:00pm

re: #53 jaunte

It’s going to flatten out real estate prices. I’ve been watching comparable prices in Brenham (nearest small town) and Houston, and the average home price is now 320k and 335k, respectively.

Yep. One of the interesting things that will be worked out is pay: should people be paid based on where they live or based on the jpb they do no matter where they live?

At the moment, the former is used more, but this also requires a far amount of overhead to keep track of where people are living (and making sure they are really living there or just set up a pseudo-address to get more money). Or pay people based on the value they are supposed to bring the company and let them live wherever they want. Much less overhead as the company just needs to make sure productivity is what is expected.

The latter is where we are going, I think. The compnaies that do this will find it much easier to recruit people (no moving or gaming COL pay) and will stimulate WFH. Making $80,000 in Seattle is tough. But in Yacima or Wala Walla it is great.

ANd eventually the market will start to equalize prices making things much more equal wrt housing. IMHO

64
sagehen  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:56:09pm

re: #58 Decatur Deb

Special Agent Starling there, on the right.

There’s a whole fanfic genre of Starling/Scully love stories. Maybe they were in the same training class at Quantico, or maybe they met later, but anybody who’s into F/F stories loves that pairing.

65
Decatur Deb  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:59:10pm

re: #64 sagehen

There’s a whole fanfic genre of Starling/Scully love stories. Maybe they were in the same training class at Quantico, or maybe they met later, but anybody who’s into F/F stories loves that pairing.

Sounds like a formula for world-class domestic violence.

66
CleverToad  Aug 29, 2023 • 12:59:35pm

re: #45 FFL (GOP Delenda Est)

90% might have been an exaggeration, but it was a sizeable reduction.

Luckily my last two moves were made on my own schedule so that I had plenty of time to do searches, visit places, and assemble a list of what my criteria were. The townhouse in Paoli was a lucky find - the company’s regular apartments (which I had gone to look at) had a two cat limit - but the townhouses allowed three (and I had the full trio of Tuxedo Cat, Chat Noir, and Floof Cat at the time.)

And the Paoli location was almost ideal since a lot of things (post office, bar, cafe, train station [SEPTA and Amtrak], and library) were all in walking distance. A slightly longer walk for pharmacy and a grocery store. Wegman’s and Trader Joes both within a roughly 10-15 minute drive. And I could walk the local neighborhood streets and a nearby walking trail if I wanted. Though I tended to take the car and go farther afield for hiking. I also miss hearing the owls at night.

Yes, that Paoli location sounds great! Lots of luck plays into it, but flexible timing sure helps. Nice to find a place that worked for your feline overlords.

67
Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:03:03pm

re: #30 The Ghost of a Flea

This is what lies at the core of “state’s rights” and “sovereign sheriff” notions floating around the American right: it’s not that these devolutions remove a level of state power, it’s that state power is now concentrated in positions that conservative see as bending to their needs. Now they seen the chance to flip the whole administrative state and they’re going to take it.

Trumpism could be understand as a choice to more nakedly pursue by all conservative parties: forget the fan dances with justification or building intellectual shells to make the hypocrisy hard to see, just roll forward…the biggest lies, the most obvious grasping move…because truth emerges from power, and after you win you can enforce any narrative you want.

tangentially, this is why i am adamant that natural rights are not ‘granted’ or ‘given’. we all have them. and they are the same for everyone.

civil rights weren’t new rights granted to black people by virtue of the CRA. these types of rights are intrinsic. the cra is a laundry list of what everyone else couldnt do any more.

because what happens is some people arent able to exercise their rights. their rights were repressed by powerful people and institutions supported by the backing of local, state and federal governments and law enforcement. ie try to vote, or buy a house or drink from a fountant, get a job or whatever.

freedom of movement and association being two of the big ones - you know what everyone except florida calls ‘slavery’.

hold, essentially imprison, people against their will using horrific threats because the powers that be all agreed it was ok to do that but only to those people

also true for lgbtq+++, gay marriage, trans; the right to be who you are.
and abortion - the right to manage your own body.
and the ERA

none of these are (imo) a fight for rights; gay rights, equal rights, marriage rights

they are a fight to stop the power structures from discriminating / not treating everybody consistently, fairly and the same way.

68
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:04:40pm

re: #56 Charles Johnson

CEOs have a monetary incentive to force workers back to the office, because large office buildings are very expensive to rent and maintain. But I’m pretty sure their real motivation is to restore the traditional power structure of bosses and workers.

One thing the pandemic has done is to show that most office work is unnecessary. But forcing workers to do it anyway is a demonstration of dominance.

If my gut is right, these authoritarian companies will not be as successful as they are putting money into things that no longer provide value. It would be ironic if things they did to game the system (ie tax beaks) now requires them to do things that actually lower value.

Apple is one of these, with the spaceship building being a great example of a white elephant today. Lots of tax breaks but only if enough people work there.Obviously the hardware people likely need to work there but Apple is having some real pushback on a 3 day in office week.

I do not think it will go the authoritarian route that Amazon does. Amazon does not care about its employees, which is why it does boom-bust employment strategies (hire lots in good times, fire them all in bad). But Apple has a history of not hiring during the boom and not firing during the bust, because it aleady has really great productivity so it can get more done with less. Iy uses slower times for training and working on side projects that might become big. But the upper management is generally worried about people quitting if they go too far by reducing WFH.

Apple does not like seeing good employees leave. Not only does Apple lose their work and experience but Apple’s competitors gain an advantage when they are hired.

It will be interesting to see what happens as time goes on.

69
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:08:47pm

good grief

70
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:14:40pm

re: #41 sagehen

again, you are confusing “Right Wing” with “Conservative”. Which is THEIR framing, because the far right recruits from within conservative factions.

During the American Revolution, the abolitionist movement, the labor movement, women’s suffrage, civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights… the Conservative position has always been “Let’s not change a thing. Keep it all as is.”

Fascists find conservatives useful, but fascists are not conservative. Because fascists want to change EVERYTHING.

Eh…this is a backdoor into “fascists want change and are therefore leftist.”

Academically, fascism is paligenetic ultranationalism—it wants to change society by reverting it to “purity,” with the standard of purity…and belonging within the nation…defined by conservative norms of class, gender, religion, etc. No two fascisms are the same because their platform is dependent on the precise cultural mix of how conservatism is expressed, but one could say that all them do the similar things in the same toolset: they exclude minorities and steal their shit under color of law, redistributing a thin portion to “real” members of the nation, and they do so by making existing conservative hierarchical norms have state power behind them.

So their playbook is conservative; the norms they enforce by “changing everything” are conservative. The new state is built on exclusion—the state is for the volk, and not for the stranger—and the standards of inclusion and exclusion are based on existing conservative distinctions of type.

Fascism is also conservative in it’s relationship to capital: there is little to no redistribution down—as a man hung from a lamppost once said, fascism can be called “corporatism”—but the cooperation between state and industry (the guys who own the means of production) is now filtered through a volkisch lens…the state picks winners and losers on the basis of inclusion/exclusion standards, industry is willing to accept the state’s power and bend their production towards inclusion/exclusion objectives held by the state (including war).

But all of the above treats ideology as as sound construct, and I’d argue that the core proposition of “change versus stasis” isn’t a very good one to apply because

(1) fascism is a bad faith construct because it’s basically a vibe with thin skin of college-freshman level analysis as justification, and routinely just makes shit up;
(2) conservatism is frequently a bad faith construct and regularly “changes” it’s ideas…in ways that invest more restrictions on individuals and invest more power an interpreter-elite that divines what “tradition” is;
(3) both are bad faith because their specific propositions are entrained to the core premise of retention of power by capital holders. In conservatism, the theft of other’s labor must happen because the ingroup are better kinds of people; in fascism, the theft of other’s labor must accelerate because the ingroup have been cheated of what they were owed;
(4) but so is centrism and center-leftness…the actual “ideology” of the status quo, which simply proposes that there’s no alternative to the current system of theft of labor but perhaps we could keep the theft at a 5 out of 10;

Really, the trick here is that “the same” it always a lie on a level that extends beyond politics into culture: nothing can be “the same” generation by generation because social learning always transforms the meaning of shared concepts, and material circumstances profoundly effect the direction of such transformation.

Conservative point to the general notion of Christianity as volk-accepted common religion, but have no ability to address the notion of “Christianity” as a plurality of interpretations of the same text, with almost-daily transformations of meaning by individuals and two centuries of America-distinct sectarian formations that mate Scripture—a dead text waiting to be quickened with interpretation—with the material concerns of people in radically different circumstances. If you need to understand that conservatives justify themselves by revering The Ship of Theseus, simply look at what they’ve done to God and Jesus, decade by decade, since the Southern Baptists invented a theology that let them own people.

Tradition is a shared fiction of what was, what is, and what’s the meaning of what was and is. Everybody’s doing tradition whether they intend to or not. When conservative say “tradition” they always mean “hierarchy” because conservative thinking starts as a defense of monarchy, but more diffusely they interpret the past (and divinity, and culture) as little more than vehicles for sorting people, and the stories they tell of the past amount to (1) the good people were in charge because the were in charge and therefore must be good, (2) authority is more important than individual dignity such that “tradition” that on it’s face harms people…by, for example, stealing their labor…must still be understood as moral (right) and just (right).

Fascism’s what happens after the above collapses: the hierarchy didn’t fail, the theft wasn’t actually theft…and therefore it’s neither the system nor the ideology that’s made things worse, it’s the presence of contaminants that must be solved with faster more aggressive theft and more vicious hierarchy.

71
Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:16:30pm

re: #49 silverdolphin

…This is why I think WFH will change rural economies once they get high speed access.

The IT technology is being distributed throughout every company and some are recognizing the benefits of WFH

… This will only accelerate as WFH spreads thoughout the entire US economy. IMHO.

covid happened at an opportune time
- internet interaction speeds were reasonable and accessible
- cost effective in the home, not just enterprise level
- skype, zoom etc didnt have to be developed from zero and adapted quickly to the demand
- people who had never zoomed caught on fast (say as opposed to mastadon that’s having difficulties attracting converts)
— and that’s more than just getting your face on a screen with 20 others
— it’s sharing desktops, doing full scale presentations with exhibits, etc
- a lot of travel has been recognized as not productive
— the cost of a face to face meeting has to add value

a covid epidemic 7-10 years would have been far more complicated

and that is essentially where rural america is now

72
Joe Bacon ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:16:43pm

Anti-abortion activists who blockaded DC clinic found guilty on all counts

A jury deliberated for a day-and-a-half before convicting activist Lauren Handy and four co-defendants.

A jury convicted five anti-abortion activists Tuesday of conspiring to blockade a D.C. clinic in 2020 in violation of federal law.

Jurors deliberated for a day and a half before returning their verdict, finding activists Lauren Handy, Heather Idoni, William Goodman, John Hinshaw and Herb Geraghty of two felony counts each of conspiracy against rights and violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances (FACE) Act.

Prosecutors described Lauren Handy as the organizer and leader of a plot to block patients from accessing care at the Washington Surgi-Clinic on F Street NW on Oct. 22, 2020. The day before, anti-abortion activists from around the country traveled to D.C. and gathered at a meeting where Handy, according to witness testimony, laid out the plan and also informed those who intended to physically obstruct the clinic they could face arrest. According to Caroline Davis, an activist who was at the meeting, Handy went as far as describing the specific statute, the FACE Act, under which individuals who blocked doors could be charged.

“This entire event, the invasion, the blockade, this case - it’s all because of her,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Sanjay Patel said Thursday.

On the day of the blockade, Handy and long-time anti-abortion activist Joan Bell - who will go to trial with a second group of defendants next month - waited outside the clinic door while other activists, including her co-defendants Herb Geraghty and William Goodman, hid in an emergency stairwell with a bag of locks and chains. Handy had made an appointment under the false name “Hazel Jenkins.” When a clinic employee opened the door, the activists rushed out of the stairwell and forced their way into the clinic in a chaotic struggle that sent a clinic employee to the hospital with an ankle injury. Surveillance video appears to show Handy giving directions to other activists, who then moved chairs in front of the door leading from the waiting room to the clinic. Two members of the group - Bell and Paulette Harlow - pulled chains out of a bag and affixed them to bike locks they had placed around their necks. They then sat in chairs in front of the door to form a physical blockade with other activists, including one of the defendants on trial, John Hinshaw. Others went back into the hallway, where some stood in front of the clinic’s employee entrance and others attempted to persuade clinic patients waiting for their appointments to leave.

73
Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:17:04pm

re: #50 FFL (GOP Delenda Est)

And widespread better internet and better running meeting software and associated project tracking software makes a lot of this much more possible than it was pre-Covid or earlier.

It’s one reason one may expect/project more of a diaspora into rural regions as they get better internet networks and access.

ok i just spent 10 minutes writing this using way more words

74
Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:18:15pm

re: #54 Backwoods Sleuth

lol

[Embedded content]

do you know who i am??!!!

75
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:18:46pm

re: #60 Unabogie

Absolutely. I once interviewed for Lyft and they would no allow any remote work (pre-pandemic). I looked at rent in Palo Alto and decent apartments were going for $6k a month. I did the math and figured I needed to make a $300k base salary for a mediocre living situation compared to my current house in a wooded area that I love.

One of the really interesting aspects of human social networks is that for many things dealing with creativity and innovation (ie patents issued, wages), every time the population doubles, these things go up by 2.2 or so.This is likely due to how efficient we are with moving inforation around, getting it to the right person at the right time, due to our social networks. A large city cam move around informaiton many times faster than a small city just due to the network effects of our social networks..

So, ove the last 10,000 years, we have had a selective drive towards larger and larger cities, where people are in close enough proximity for this advantage. Older technology required them to be very close physically. And new technologies, such as roads and cars, as well as skyscrapers, allow us to create huge megacities. Here a citiy of 1 million is more creative than10 cities of 100,000.

But we still needed to be in close physical space to make these networks be advantageous. Telephones, etc have helped more people away from each other as they work. We have global communications but they still mostly connect people in cities. It will be WFH that changes this basic principle. It connects peoiple who can work anywhere at anytime.

We have pretty much reached the pinnacle of this physical model and cities just cannot get much larger because of infrastructure problems. But now we have technology that allows us to move beyond a model where everyone in the corporate network must be in the same place, meeting at the same time in order to move information around and take advantage of the social networks. Now we have the possibility of creating a global “city” where it does not matter where people live in order to rapidly move information around to produce creative solutions.

WFH will actually make use more creative, innovative and resilient. IMHO

76
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:19:15pm

re: #67 Dangerman (sigh…only in America)

Yeah, simps for colonialism, like simps for slavery, invent some kind of bestowal of franchise:

“well, eventually the empire brought you limited rights, and didn’t you learn how to run a proper nation from us”

and it’s just skin-crawling. Very much “I had to do that, I had to discipline you.”

77
Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:19:40pm

re: #56 Charles Johnson

CEOs have a monetary incentive to force workers back to the office, because large office buildings are very expensive to rent and maintain. But I’m pretty sure their real motivation is to restore the traditional power structure of bosses and workers.

One thing the pandemic has done is to show that most office work is unnecessary. But forcing workers to do it anyway is a demonstration of dominance.

long term leases with no way out are a bitch

78
Captain Magic  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:20:27pm

re: #52 rhuarc

I work for a super regional bank, and my team is spread across 5 states. It works well for us.

79
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:21:11pm
80
silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:24:43pm

re: #71 Dangerman (sigh…only in America)

covid happened at an opportune time
- internet interaction speeds were reasonable and accessible
- cost effective in the home, not just enterprise level
- skype, zoom etc didnt have to be developed from zero and adapted quickly to the demand
- people who had never zoomed caught on fast (say as opposed to mastadon that’s having difficulties attracting converts)
— and that’s more than just getting your face on a screen with 20 others
— it’s sharing desktops, doing full scale presentations with exhibits, etc
- a lot of travel has been recognized as not productive
— the cost of a face to face meeting has to add value

a covid epidemic 7-10 years would have been far more complicated

and that is essentially where rural america is now

Yep. Yep. Yep. without Zoom things would have been tougher on the economy. I really think COVID will have moved us into a new economic era just as WW2 did or the Civil War.Unfortunately in all of them we only gained the advantages of change by the deaths of 10s of thousands.

81
The Ghost of a Flea  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:27:58pm

re: #70 The Ghost of a Flea

Sidebar:

Never, ever accept the proposal that the past was conservative, or that modern conservatives have some kind of special connection to the past such that they are it’s interpreters…even when it’s presented as a negative.

At any moment in time a bunch of political shit is happening and radicals with egalitarian designs, or just dudes willing to fuck up a landlord, were present.

If those people weren’t there, then conservatism would still be arguing for monarchy, instead of a kind of hybrid oligarchy that lashes together transnational money assholes and national small-town-aristocrats in the common goal of being small kings without getting guillotined.

82
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:29:54pm
83
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:31:30pm
84
Hecuba's daughter  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:33:22pm

re: #48 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

I’m 100% remote, and my director lives in another state. I have five high-resolution screens in front of me, one of them pretty big. At the office I had three little 1080p screens.

I’m the rare person here who preferred working from the office. There was a synergy that you don’t get from home. I loved the ability to drop by someone’s desk and spend the next hour working together with someone, maybe using a whiteboard to sketch out ideas or stare at a screen when discussing code. Of course, the last 30 years of my career I was always only 10-15 minutes from the campus.

85
Florida Panhandler  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:35:09pm

re: #79 Backwoods Sleuth

[Embedded content]

If Trump polling falls dramatically towards to trial date look for major turncoats to appear in this case eager to make a deal to put TFG behind bars. A large amount of resistance to cooperate with the DA is because they still hold out hope for a Trump election victory and full blanket Pardon.

America knows this and also knows this will be a fundamentally different country early into 2025. Trump will continue to fall in the polls …It’s not going to happen.

86
7-y (Expectation of Great Things in Due Course)  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:35:25pm

re: #48 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

I’m 100% remote, and my director lives in another state. I have five high-resolution screens in front of me, one of them pretty big. At the office I had three little 1080p screens.

I remember in the 1980s when people laughed at me for having two monitors.

87
HRH Stanley Sea  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:36:09pm

Maybe I should wait till after work more often

ajcwUnhZR0g4TFQyc0NWNEV3ODY1Z01UQ3M4TkNYbFVKN0VMQVJQV1hhWkVhQk5OOWFqTTRkTzVYUVBEV3I2V21yZ05jQ3luL1lTeTdNVkY1TndQSkJhQ1NFQVFqaVBpNkZXVVBCMktCODBxSDZZNEJwdnN2QzhkVjRnZGJ1MTM6OvNOs28jLx4GxULpOocDDpg=

88
🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:38:50pm

re: #84 Hecuba’s daughter

I’m the rare person here who preferred working from the office. There was a synergy that you don’t get from home. I loved the ability to drop by someone’s desk and spend the next hour working together with someone, maybe using a whiteboard to sketch out ideas or stare at a screen when discussing code. Of course, the last 30 years of my career I was always only 10-15 minutes from the campus.

I collaborate with my coworkers all the time. Instead of going to someone’s desk, which really did not fit 2 people well since they switched to microcubes, we share a screen while we talk.

89
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:40:59pm
90
🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:48:34pm

re: #89 Backwoods Sleuth

[Embedded content]

Funny that you posted that today minutes after I discovered that something is living in the wall adjacent to my patio. It pried the siding away from the wall, and left some food by the opening. Nice thing about living in an apartment is that it’s not my problem. I just had to report it.

91
Eclectic Cyborg  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:50:42pm

re: #48 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

I’m 100% remote, and my director lives in another state. I have five high-resolution screens in front of me, one of them pretty big.

92
Shiplord Kirel: From behind wingnut lines  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:52:58pm

This is kind of funny:
11 Turns Of Phrase Commonly Misused

My favorite in the list is “nip it in the BUTT,” which I have never actually heard but which might in fact be preferable to the original version.

Otoh, “could of” instead of “could have” is just illiterate and makes me cringe when I see it.
“Statue of limitations” is another other dumb one but “do a 360” could legitimately refer to someone trying to change positions but doing a complete turn and ending up back where they started.
As they note, “pawn off” instead of the original “palm off” might be an improvement or at least a little more vivid.

93
steve_davis  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:55:26pm

current listening pleasure: Carmine Appice crushing his fucking drum set on That’s what Makes a Man off the Renaissance album.

94
Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:56:40pm

quickie update on Klys

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Eclectic Cyborg  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:58:59pm

re: #94 Dangerman (sigh…only in America)

< Homer Simpson WOOHOO.gif >

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Eclectic Cyborg  Aug 29, 2023 • 1:59:19pm

re: #92 Shiplord Kirel: From behind wingnut lines

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PhillyPretzel ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:00:29pm

re: #96 Eclectic Cyborg

I like the bird.

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Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:01:17pm
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CleverToad  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:01:21pm

re: #94 Dangerman (sigh…only in America)

WEhGeis0YUczWDBubjYyWDJkL1NoS1RJdUJNczFHeEk2eTJoOFZjU3h4WT06OsIbZ3sTDRamwfjykRaMg1w=

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Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:01:45pm

did you notice i havent posted one word about linux, virtualbox, windows10, or tax software in a week.

that’s because everything works. all of it.
no surprises, hiccups, or unexplained behaviors or limitations.

it just works.
very impressive.

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GlutenFreeJesus  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:02:32pm
102
Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:03:08pm

re: #92 Shiplord Kirel: From behind wingnut lines

This is kind of funny:
11 Turns Of Phrase Commonly Misused

My favorite in the list is “nip it in the BUTT,” which I have never actually heard but which might in fact be preferable to the original version.

Otoh, “could of” instead of “could have” is just illiterate and makes me cringe when I see it.
“Statue of limitations” is another other dumb one but “do a 360” could legitimately refer to someone trying to change positions but doing a complete turn and ending up back where they started.
As they note, “pawn off” instead of the original “palm off” might be an improvement or at least a little more vivid.

‘for all intensive purposes’

103
William Lewis  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:05:26pm

re: #62 Joe Bacon ✅

Proof that Mercury is in retrograde…

Hah, more like reverse cowgirl… O_O

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Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:05:55pm
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Captain Magic  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:08:50pm

rawstory.com’s writers suck - a post they made listed Jennifer Rubin as Lisa Rubin.

Looks like they fixed it.

106
steve_davis  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:09:05pm

re: #28 CleverToad

From downstairs because I’m still catching up, as usual

This conversation resonates with me just now!

I’ve just been through the My First Apartment search with our almost-25-year-old son and his 22-year-old girlfriend — services like apartments.com and apartment list.com were worth signing up for. They’ve been living with their respective parents due to the rent levels; working part time retail while taking part time college classes. Our son got a full-time job with a small engineering firm in July, thirty miles away (still well within the Denver metroplex). Great job, but killer commute — two hours each way on the light rail, an hour if driving.

He moved into the new nest last week; his girlfriend will be joining him at the end of September. She has a cat; she doesn’t drive so will need a new job in walking or transit distance. Two MAJOR factors in the search criteria. We got a minor miracle with a complex less than two miles from son’s job, right by a light rail station with a lot of nearby retail and restaurants. A bargain on rent for the first 13-month lease, which will probably jump at least $150 up when they have to renew.

Her sweet little cat is costing them a $300 non-refundable deposit and $50 a month. The complex does accept dogs — with a long list of the breed and mixes they won’t consider — but says all animals have to be six months or older. No kittens or puppies!

I don’t know if 90% of the choices went away with ‘cats’ checked, but it definitely cut the size of the ‘potentials’ list. Dogs would probably have narrowed it further. (At least I didn’t have to check how many would bar other interesting critters, like the boa constrictor my first husband had when we rented our first apartment…)

as an apartment dweller, I can testify that neighbor cats are great. neighbor dogs are occasionally a pain in the ass.

107
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:09:05pm
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PhillyPretzel ✅  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:09:47pm

re: #104 Backwoods Sleuth

Grr. It would be nice if these idiots would shut up. I know it is not going to happen but it would be nice.

109
Backwoods Sleuth  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:14:13pm
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Dangerman (sigh...only in America)  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:14:18pm

re: #104 Backwoods Sleuth

[Embedded content]

i get why this is an R talking point

now cite some law or case law or something

111
William Lewis  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:17:14pm

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silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:21:19pm

re: #88 🐈 Crush White Nationalism 🐈

I collaborate with my coworkers all the time. Instead of going to someone’s desk, which really did not fit 2 people well since they switched to microcubes, we share a screen while we talk.

I’ve always found the best collaborations happen over a pint of beer. When I traveled to conventions, the best research was exchanged over a beer, some snacks and some napkins.

113
BadgerB  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:37:20pm

re: #2 Eclectic Cyborg

And after being hit with everything from criticism to staff petitions, it seems the Amazon boss has reached the end of his tether.

In a “fishbowl” meeting earlier this month—a company name for a fireside chat—Jassy reportedly threw down the gauntlet, implying that if staff refused to come back to their desks they would not have a spot on the payroll.

If Amazon wants to pay me to spend an hour a day (30 minutes each way) to drive to my seat in the office I’m OK with that but I’m not sure they will be getting the return on expense they think they will. If they expect me to drive an hour a day on MY time to do a job I can do at my desk, never mind eating the millage cost, I’m not sure we are on the same page about the definitions of professional vs personal time.

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Yeah Sure WhatEVs  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:42:29pm

re: #82 Backwoods Sleuth

OMG! That face! Sooooooo cute!!!!

115
Yeah Sure WhatEVs  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:46:19pm

re: #84 Hecuba’s daughter

I’m the rare person here who preferred working from the office. There was a synergy that you don’t get from home. I loved the ability to drop by someone’s desk and spend the next hour working together with someone, maybe using a whiteboard to sketch out ideas or stare at a screen when discussing code. Of course, the last 30 years of my career I was always only 10-15 minutes from the campus.

We do that from Teams. We talk to each other all the time. And this is the best team I’ve ever been a part of.

I’d never take a job again where I had to go into an office.

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FFL (GOP Delenda Est)  Aug 29, 2023 • 2:59:36pm

re: #59 sagehen

So… this is only going to accelerate the “everyone in the world must speak English” way of organizing international commerce.

With Spanish as the obvious 2nd language, since Central and South America are very large and have many people (all of whom are in US compatible time zones).

Remember when all the boffins suggested Mandarin would be a good thing for your kids to learn? HA! That idea vanished pretty quickly.

And software systems for such a company will also need to handle multiple languages. Last company I worked for had to support Portuguese, English, and Spanish due to plants in Brazil, USA, Germany, and Mexico. Since they hung the German plants off of the US HQ group they had an English requirement there.

It does raise issues when you try to push software from a development group and roll-out in one section over to another. I saw a very user/manager oriented security authorization system have a lot of issues when they tried to move it into the USA side of the systems from Brazil.

Part of it was some very bad Portuguese-to-English translations in the application’s texts and documentation.

A bigger issue had to due with how managers did things in the USA compared to Brazil in terms of wanting to learn and use the application along with the necessarily additional knowledge set it involved. Since the manager in order to assign and authorize security for a user had to know what they wanted to allow the user to do and also know how to identify those authorizations in the system. Which was a bit more work for a bunch of them then sending an email or request into the ticket system asking for “Please set up User A to have the same access as User B.”

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FFL (GOP Delenda Est)  Aug 29, 2023 • 3:05:15pm

re: #66 CleverToad

Yes, that Paoli location sounds great! Lots of luck plays into it, but flexible timing sure helps. Nice to find a place that worked for your feline overlords.

The Feline Overlords went from looking onto Philadelphia from 10+ stories up from wonderful sunny large windowsills to being in a quiet grassy nook with windows 6’ above grass and nearby trees. And lots of watching squirrels and chipmunks since they saw birds in Philadelphia as well.

Their exploration privileges went from excursions out into the hallway to watch the elevator and spy on people to some ability to wander about outside. (Which for two of the three eventually included encountering and avoiding the neighbor cats. The two of them would watch and follow, but never annoyed or confronted Chat Noir for some reason.)

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FFL (GOP Delenda Est)  Aug 29, 2023 • 3:16:36pm

re: #77 Dangerman (sigh…only in America)

long term leases with no way out are a bitch

And cities and office parks have an ongoing problem with getting tenants for their office buildings. It was around before Covid but it’s gotten a lost worse for them since Covid.

It will be interesting to see how corporations and cities react to these challenges. Switching use of a building might be expensive and still not offer much, especially for places where their existing retail and food outlets are very dependent on commuters spending money there.

Malls took a huge hit in the past decade as well. One north-northeast of Pittsburgh that opened like fifteen years ago is semi-abandoned. The what I remember as “huge mall” in the 1990s (Century III) is closed down, has a bunch of unpaid tax liabilities, and I half-expect to see it condemned and torn down within a year or two.

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silverdolphin  Aug 29, 2023 • 3:56:55pm

re: #118 FFL (GOP Delenda Est)

And cities and office parks have an ongoing problem with getting tenants for their office buildings. It was around before Covid but it’s gotten a lost worse for them since Covid.

It will be interesting to see how corporations and cities react to these challenges. Switching use of a building might be expensive and still not offer much, especially for places where their existing retail and food outlets are very dependent on commuters spending money there.

Malls took a huge hit in the past decade as well. One north-northeast of Pittsburgh that opened like fifteen years ago is semi-abandoned. The what I remember as “huge mall” in the 1990s (Century III) is closed down, has a bunch of unpaid tax liabilities, and I half-expect to see it condemned and torn down within a year or two.

All the malls here are shifting to Apartments with retail geared more for their occupants than for people driving in to shop. SOme restaurants, some food, a theater but maybe only one anchor store.


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