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Foosters

Certifiably Surly
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Posts posted by Foosters

  1. 1 minute ago, Beantown Express 2.0 said:

    It is interesting that a state that is basically 51% R and 49% D gets its congressional seats to be split in a 20 to 8 ratio for R's.  The D's won't win a lawsuit over this because the Supreme Court which is packed with R appointees will say "states' rights" and allow it to happen.  I wonder how many other states have this kind of disproportionate look when it comes to number of R's/D's versus actual representation in congress.  The Senate is just as bad if you look at actual population in each state.  

    Wisconsin

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  2. 24 minutes ago, mdmost said:

    Disney isn't leaving Florida. From what I've seen Disney can challenge this in court pretty easily. The actual effective date in June 2023 which is plenty of time for court cases to render it moot. I've also seen that the residents of the area would have to agree to remove the designation, which forces them to pay higher property taxes and to forgive 2 billion in debt. I highly doubt an area full of Disney employees and Disney fans (people who move to those expensive neighborhoods near the parks) are going to vote to repeal the designation and cost themselves tons of money. Disney also gets a vote as the majority land owner. So it's ultimately up to them and the residents and not Desantis. 

    Lifted from Reddit:

    Quote

    I don't think a lot of people understand what Reedy Creek is or why its a controversy so here's a simple explanation from a long time Florida resident. When Disney first looked at breaking ground in Central Florida for a new theme park in the 1960s, the area was virtually uninhabited with the exception of some small rural farming communities, of which Reedy Creek was one. The counties of Orange and Osceola did not have the resources to provide all the infrastructure and services that Walt Disney World would need. So Disney offered to provide all those services under the provision that they be the sole administrator over them since neither county that Walt Disney World sprawls into had the resources to do so. So the Florida Legislature came up with the Reedy Creek Improvement District which functions as a semi-independent municipality under the administration of the Walt Disney Corporation.

    There are legal provisions in the law that specify the scope of this district, how this district is managed and how it may be dissolved; all of which Governor DeSantis and the Florida Legislature just violated with the bill they proposed and passed. Disney knows this, the Florida Legislature knows this, odds are this will be fought in court and won by Disney and thrown out as unconstitutional because the state just violated their own law. Plus, Reedy Creek is a municipality with Florida citizens residing in it and any change to their district would have to be approved by those voters, approval the State of Florida did not get or even ask for.

    Additionally, the biggest benefit to Walt Disney Corp is that managing their own municipality allowed them to bypass red tape in typical county zoning and permitting. However, at this point Walt Disney basically owns both Orange and Osceola county and should they be forced to take over administration of Reedy Creek odds are they will create special provisions for Walt Disney Corp. However, both Orange and Osceola would have to absorb any debts the Reedy Creek Improvement District currently holds, which is about 2 billion dollars in bond debt which will have to be immediately reimbursed to the bond holds if the district is dissolved. That, along with the infrastructure costs to maintaining Reedy Creek which would also be passed along to the counties which amount to a tax assessment being levied against every resident in Orange county by about 4000 per year. If Osceola assumes the debt, it would be even higher because that county has a smaller population. The 2 counties will have to sort out who is responsible for what since Walt Disney World sprawls across both counties.

    Disney would face a higher tax liability, however, the Florida Legislature passed a law several years ago that limits the amount that counties could raise their property taxes to no more than 10% per year. That would not be enough to cover Reedy Creek's bond debt even with Disney included. Basically Florida would be taking over 2 billion in debt off Disney's books and dropping it on to the Florida taxpayers in central Florida. Disney would also have the added benefit of no longer need to pay for the expense of maintaining the district (fire services, police, medical, sewage, roads, etc) which will also fall onto the Florida taxpayer. All of these savings disney stands to gain more than offsets whatever small tax increase they would pay due to the cap.

    Basically this entire stunt is doomed to fail. Its a political game that will go nowhere.

     

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  3. Just now, 52-80 said:

    On month #0 since the WHO declared a Pandemic. 

    On month #21 we had someone else predicted a "winter of severe illness and death", too.  

    Both of these are very relevant to twitter's acquisition.

    Huh? We're discussing the tendency to overrate Musk's acumen in all fields because he has shown success in others. The fact that many took his covid tweet as reliable - despite no medical background whatsoever - highlights that fact. I'm not trying to rehash the entire covid debate here.

  4. 32 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

    You've got the timing wrong on that, the allegations that he was a fascist started in the run up to the Iraq war. But more importantly, that's not what I was responding to, which was your claim that GWB tried to play nice with Dems. Karl Rove's ratfucking of Max Cleland was as disgusting and dirty as anything the modern GOP has done. Bush and Rove's swiftboating of Kerry was complete bullshit and was almost as disgusting. His presidency was just as threatening for gays as today's GOP. There's fucking hundreds of examples of Bush, his administration, and his campaigns saying and doing shit just as disgusting as most of what Trump is reviled for.

    That's not even getting into what the GOP congress did.  When the GOP controlled Congress during Bush's presidency, they literally held hidden committee meetings they didn't even tell Democratic members about. When Dems dared to speak out a tiny bit against the idea of invading Iraq, child-fucker Dennis Hastert accused them of giving aid to the enemy. And of course there was the social environment post-9/11, when opposition actually got cancelled. The Dixie Chicks and Phil Donahue are the obvious examples, but the fear of speaking out against the invasion of Iraq was everywhere. 

    And you want to pretend those were the days when the GOP was playing nice? Fuck you and your bullshit revisionist history.

    Johnny is frantically searching for a bar graph with x and y axis "nice" and "time"

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  5. 4 minutes ago, Johnny Sack said:

    The man has an uncanny ability for picking fights that he 1) knows the other side will refuse to bow out of and 2) knows that he will win in a knockout. He has the entire Democratic party throwing a national shit-fit defending teaching transgenderism to kindergartners. It's phenomenal.

    That's not what's happening, but honesty has never really been your thing . . . 

    Did you celebrate when the new Texas approach circumvented the legislature and resulted in state agents investigating parents and threatening to remove their children for being trans? is that the kind of limited governemnt you can get behind?

    Quote

    On February 23, 2022,

    following the issuance of the Paxton Opinion and the Abbott Letter, Jane communicated with her supervisor at DFPS to seek clarification of how the Abbott Letter would affect DFPS policy. Such clarification was important for her family as well as to her ability to perform her job at DFPS.

    81. That same day, and just mere hours later, Jane Doe was placed on leave from her employment because she has a transgender daughter with a medical need for treatment of gender dysphoria.

    82. The next day, on the afternoon of February 24, 2022, Plaintiff Jane Doe was informed that her family would be investigated in accordance with Governor Abbott’s letter to determine if Jane Doe and John Doe had committed abuse by affirming their transgender daughter’ s identity and obtaining the medically necessary health care that she needs.

    83. On February 25, 2022, a DFPS Child Protective Services (CPS) investigator visited the Doe family’s home to interview Jane Doe, John Doe, and Mary Doe. The CPS investigator interviewed Jane Doe and John Doe, who were accompanied by counsel, together, while he interviewed Mary Doe, who was accompanied by different counsel, apart from her parents. Aside from interviewing the Doe family, the CPS investigator sought access through releases to Mary Doe’s medical records, which the Doe Plaintiffs refused to sign.

    84. The CPS investigator disclosed that the sole allegation against Jane Doe and John Doe is that they have a transgender daughter and that their daughter may have been provided with medically necessary gender affirming health care and is “currently transitioning from male to female.”

    85. The issuance of the Paxton Opinion and the Abbott Letter, along with DFPS’s implementation of these, has terrorized the Doe family and inflicted ongoing and irreparable harm.

    86.

    As a result of DFPS’s implementation and the subsequent investigation of the Doe family, Jane Doe has been placed on leave from her employment. Should DFPS incorrectly find that Jane Doe and John Doe have committed “abuse” based on Governor Abbott’s and Attorney General Paxton’s erroneous and misguided missives and understanding of medical treatment for gender dysphoria, Jane Doe could face termination, which would result not only in the loss of income for the family but also their health care coverage

    But we know you don't actually care. Your limited government principles exist only to enrich you and inflict pain on others. As long as government can be weaponized to eliminate what you don't like, then its all good. God forbid you ever have a child struggling with gender identify. These kids kill themselves at a much higher rate, and you sit on the sidelines cheering their persecution. 

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  6. https://apnews.com/article/tampa-florida-ilhan-omar-congress-3c7fd71fcc581ad69dd7186040047123

    Quote

    According to prosecutors, Hannon sent an email to Omar threatening to kill her in July 2019 following a televised news conference held by the Minnesota representative and three other congresswomen.

    In an email with the subject line “(You’re) dead, you radical Muslim,” Hannon referred to Omar and the other congresswomen of color as “radical rats” and asked Omar if she was prepared “to die for Islam.” Investigators said the email further stated that Hannon was going to shoot Omar in the head.

     

  7. 5 minutes ago, immamac said:

    I know everyone wants to talk about all the robinhood stuff and whatnot. That's not the real issue, the real issue is that my taxes for a house I bought in 2010 are now more than the mortgage, interest and insurance. 

    ~2000/mo in taxes

    ~1650/mo mortage+insurance

    This is the issue. Housing is becoming unaffordable for those who already own a home. It's absolutely absurd to pay more than your mortgage to the local and state government to live in the house, even if it's paid off. There is nothing that can make that make sense, it's a problem and it's one that will destroy the city. 

    Wages have become stagnant and employers are not adjusting for inflation, even in high paying jobs. It's completely unsustainable, there isn't a place for normal people to live in this city anymore - soon we'll have friends buying houses together and just being roommates forever. I don't know how much of this problem is attributed to "boomers" for living too long and staying in their houses, but something is extremely fucky about how this is going down and not just for those who don't already own homes (making it near impossible for them to own one) 

    I mean who is going to fund the bump in rents that is going to happen across the board when the rental market adjusts to this complete assfucking by the city? I don't see companies shelling out the extra compensation required to live here - so what happens then? Where are all the service industry folks going to live? Austin isn't cool enough to live like a ski bum with 5 people to a 2 bedroom and the houses overall are much too nice to even allow for a setup like that generally speaking. 

    I just don't see how this doesn't lead to some major reform once we get a normal government back in Texas instead of raping everyone for the 1% or better, which is what is happening all across the state. 

    This is happening in cities/states all over the country. Along with rises in crime, wealth inequality, healthcare costs, homelessness, and stagnant wages. Regardless of whether jurisdiction has high taxes, low taxes, progressive DAs, conservative DAs, liberal or conservative leadership.

    It's almost like something is fundamentally broken with our system.

  8. 3 minutes ago, immamac said:

    I know everyone wants to talk about all the robinhood stuff and whatnot. That's not the real issue, the real issue is that my taxes for a house I bought in 2010 are now more than the mortgage, interest and insurance. 

    ~2000/mo in taxes

    ~1650/mo mortage+insurance

    This is the issue. Housing is becoming unaffordable for those who already own a home. It's absolutely absurd to pay more than your mortgage to the local and state government to live in the house, even if it's paid off. There is nothing that can make that make sense, it's a problem and it's one that will destroy the city. 

    Wages have become stagnant and employers are not adjusting for inflation, even in high paying jobs. It's completely unsustainable, there isn't a place for normal people to live in this city anymore - soon we'll have friends buying houses together and just being roommates forever. I don't know how much of this problem is attributed to "boomers" for living too long and staying in their houses, but something is extremely fucky about how this is going down and not just for those who don't already own homes (making it near impossible for them to own one) 

    I mean who is going to fund the bump in rents that is going to happen across the board when the rental market adjusts to this complete assfucking by the city? I don't see companies shelling out the extra compensation required to live here - so what happens then? Where are all the service industry folks going to live? Austin isn't cool enough to live like a ski bum with 5 people to a 2 bedroom and the houses overall are much too nice to even allow for a setup like that generally speaking. 

    I just don't see how this doesn't lead to some major reform once we get a normal government back in Texas instead of raping everyone for the 1% or better, which is what is happening all across the state. 

    This is happening in cities/states all over the country. Along with rises in crime, wealth inequality, healthcare costs, homelessness, and stagnant wages. Regardless of whether jurisdiction has high taxes, low taxes, progressive DAs, conservative DAs, liberal or conservative leadership.

    It's almost like something is fundamentally broken with our system.

  9. 2 minutes ago, Ghost of LL said:

    I mean, if the Republicans manage to nominate J.D. Vance, Herschel Walker, and Dr. Fucking Oz, we're really going to have to stop talking about the Democrats being incompetent at politics for a while.

    Not after they're elected to the Senate, we're not.

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  10. Just now, Longhorn_Fan68 said:

    well, you finally got your way, so maybe you'll quit crying about it

    That depends on what's more important to them: being mask free or having federal judges stick to textualism.

    Can't have both here.

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  11. 11 minutes ago, Immaculate Vibes said:

    My sense was it’s very flight attendant dependent. If Penelope or LHFan 68 are on your flight you can bet your ass they’re many little Braydon mask the fuck up. Especially between bites and sips. 
     

    Anyway. 
     

     

    Rated "not qualified" by the ABA when she was up for appointment. 

    Unsure how someone opposed to activist judges could read that opinion and not be furious.

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