Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
from the whatcha-sayin' dept
We've got a double first place winner this week, with one comment hitting the top of both the insightful and funny leaderboards. It's an anonymous comment on our post about the judge who ignored the First Amendment and misread a town law in ordering a resident to remove "Fuck Biden" signs from their lawn — and it's a simple callback to another recent First Amendment ruling:
Fuck cheer
In second place on the insightful side, we've got PaulT responding to a pair of incorrect assertions about net neutrality:
"Industry leaders fear net neutrality rules will pave the way for the government to set broadband prices"
If you don't know what net neutrality is or what it does, I suppose it makes sense.
"Net neutrality has become an expensive, time-wasting exercise that has little real world effect,"
Weird, it's the default setting outside of the US, and we have cheaper, better internet access than you do.
As with healthcare debates, I'm sure someone will be along soon to explain why better service at cheaper prices with more freedom to move around and less hidden charges is awful for me.
For editor's choice on the insightful side, we start out with a comment from That One Guy about the "Fuck Biden" signs, and specifically the complaint that a six-year-old might see it and need to have the word explained to them:
It's four letters, not a literally magic word
Ooh, I've got some bad news for you if your kids are going to be interacting with society at all...
Either you'll explain it or someone else will because 'little TImmy/Suzy never hearing the word 'fuck''' is not a viable option for anyone who isn't insanely sheltered from birth to death.
Next, it's an anonymous comment about the latest of the recurring fights between newspaper publishers and Google, and the claim that the latter needs to better account for the value provided by the former:
The newspapers could prove that value by using robots.txt, or Google could prove the value of being listed by de-listing those papers. I know which option would cause much wailing and screaming for government aid, and its not the use of robots.txt.
Over on the funny side, we've already had our first place winner above, so it's straight on to second place with wshuff and another comment about net neutrality:
Look, clearly net neutrality is a horrible thing that should not be allowed. I mean, just look at all the dead people who submitted comments against it, trying to save us from beyond the grave.
For editor's choice on the funny side, we start out with another comment about the "Fuck Biden" signs, this time from Stephen T. Stone in response to the claim that "an argument can be made that free speech is not infringed by requiring the Letters UCK be covered up":
It’d be a terrible argument, sure, but it could be made.
Finally, we head to our post about the shifty "MAGA Freedom Phone" where an anonymous commenter responded to the assertion that "this is precisely why Trump got elected. There is huge demand for this kind of product":
An obsolete, barely functional shitbox, embedded with foreign government spy(ware), that actively promotes its flaws as advantages, and tows an entire fleet of low class grifters and con artists, is pretty on brand for Trump.
That's all for this week, folks!
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Speaking of stupid
More Re-Trump-lican shenanigans, reported from across the pond, https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-26/trump-us-elections-republicans-arizona-audit/100313184
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Working backwards from the assumed conclusion
It would be laughable if the results weren't so damn dangerous both personally and institutionally how desperate so many people are to believe that multiple audits that all came to the same conclusion, 'the election numbers are accurate, there is no sign of fraud never mind on an election-shifting level' simply have to be fraudulent themselves, and if they just check the numbers one more time, this time with a heavily biased group then the real numbers will be exposed and their Dear Leader can regain his throne and start punishing The Others for being so mean to them and having the audacity to exist.
As this point I can but hope that the disillusionment and distrust that the republican party has fostered towards the entire election process blows up in their face spectacularly as those that would have voted for them don't even bother since clearly the system is rigged against them anyway, because as the insurrection showed 'people just not voting' is very much on the tame end of possible outcomes from that mindset.
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Re: Working backwards from the assumed conclusion
Surely at this point, any Democrat can claim election fraud as well if they fail to be elected? Can we get unending recounts and audits in Blue states if a Republican wins there?
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'You said you had awesome evidence so where is it?'
You could I suppose, it would be fairly easy to take the 'the election system is completely rigged and can't be trusted' narrative the republicans are running and turn it on them for any elections they win but that wouldn't really be a good idea as it would aggravate the problem and make their claims seems like they might actually be credible since both sides were claiming it.
Better to just hit them with a [Citation Needed] and refuse to let them wiggle out when they pull that stunt, pointing out that they either refuse to answer or when they do they have nothing to show for it that could even begin to withstand legal scrutiny where lying actually carries a penalty and the other side is allowed to check your work.
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Re: 'You said you had awesome evidence so where is it?'
Conspiracy Theory - if you cast enough doubt on this election, then you implicitly create doubt in the next election, such that a party wishing to take more permanent power (say, for example, one that has power in state legislatures) simply has to declare the vote counts invalid and select their "winner," and it will be welcomed by their supporters.
Wait, weren't we seeing some state legislatures proposing laws to empower them to do just that?
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That’s also what Trump all but begged Pence to do on the 6th of January: declare the vote counts for the “battleground” states invalid and hand Trump a second term for no valid reason.
Trumpist Republicans have embraced fascism. God help everyone.
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Re:
"Trumpist Republicans have embraced fascism. God help everyone."
The GOP fully embraced fascism under GWB, when in the days following 9/11 the neocons brought out every well fermented wet dream they'd had about a "strong man at the helm" and threw that sloppy wad of man-child power fantasies at a shell-shocked congress.
Everything since has just been the facade gradually slipping off until the Trump era sand-blasted the last pieces of the window-dressing off. Leaving the naked reality exposed to everyone; more than a quarter of the US citizenry so addicted to grievance the only thing they want out of politics is someone who sounds tough and can tell them who to hate and why.
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Re: Re: Working backwards from the assumed conclusion
They could, but they really shouldn't. The Republicans diving deeper into the crazy is a great opportunity for the Democrats to present themselves as the party of common sense for the normal people who just want things to work.
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Re: Re: Re: Working backwards from the assumed conclusion
"The Republicans diving deeper into the crazy is a great opportunity for the Democrats..."
If only. I think the division of votes right now is as good as it gets.
In most other countries if a politician stands up and proposes one act of rank lunacy alongside a window dressing's worth of templated talking points they don't intend to follow through on most voters will stay leery and not vote for that guy.
American voters, otoh, go for it over the talking points because that one act of rank lunacy won't affect them personally and fuck whoever it'll concern.
The "Fuck you, got mine" mentality is pretty common, not just among republicans, but swing voters who can't bring themselves to vote for the "all included" buffé which is the current democrat tent.
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Re: Re: Working backwards from the assumed conclusion
Well, that certainly would have saved the US a lot of trouble had the democrats insisted on this back then when George Bush junior was being so damn sure he'd win the election.
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Re: Working backwards from the assumed conclusion
Just give us one more chance to come up with a way to perpetrate a fraud. Then there will be fraud. See? Fraud.
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