English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

tchrist

00:00

> If a nomination was not submitted within 150 days of the vacancy, however ... to the President, the acting officer may continue to serve for no more than 210 days.

Cerberus

@tchrist OK I meant "still there" as in, after having been fired.

tchrist

@Cerberus Yes, he can for the most part fire at will. They serve at his pleasure.

> > S. 2176 provides that upon the death, resignation, or inability to serve
of an officer of an executive agency (including the Executive Office of
the President), the first assistant to the officer becomes the acting
officer, subject to the bills time limits. If the President so directs,
a person who has already received Senate confirmation can be made the
acting officer in lieu of the first assistant. The bill also requires
that a first assistant who has not received Senate confirmation, but

Cerberus

Oh so Trump can't decide who will act for the officer after the latter has been fired.

alphabet

This part's important:

> If the President so directs,
a person who has already received Senate confirmation can be made the acting officer in lieu of the first assistant.

tchrist

When Trump fired FBI Directon James Comey, his "first assistant" Andrew McCabe automatically became Acting FBI Director. But because McGabe had been previously confirmed by the Senate, this isn't quite the same.

alphabet

00:05

There tend to be a fair number of crazies who the Senate confirms for low-level, unimportant offices without much debate or scrutiny. So they become the acting appointees.

tchrist

@Cerberus He isn't supposed to be able to. He was, however, being a pain in that regard before.

Over the last two decades, presidents of both parties have increasingly exploited a loophole in the Vacancies Act to turn temporary acting officers into de facto permanent officers.

And yes, I know it's from the Cato Institute. Sorry.

Cerberus

@alphabet Hmm would the senate approve someone like Gaetz as an assistant?

tchrist

> Congress has created a procedure for temporarily filling vacancies without Senate consent. This procedure has been implemented via a series of statutes known as Vacancies Acts, the first of which was enacted in 1792 and the most recent in 1998.3

Although these acts have varied in significant ways, they have mostly shared two key similarities. The first is a limitation on the length of time a person may serve as an unconfirmed acting officer.4 The second is a limitation on the pool of people who may be selected to serve as acting officers.5

alphabet

@Cerberus If they don't approve him as AG, I doubt Trump'll try to give him some other office, but who knows.

Cerberus

I mean that as a general question, since you said the senate confirms lower officials without much scrutiny.

tchrist

00:11

@Cerberus Justice has a lot of Senate-approved jobs.

Cerberus

So I wondered, how much.

tchrist

> The positions in the U.S. Department of Justice that require Senate confirmation include: Attorney General, Deputy Attorney General, Associate Attorney General, Solicitor General, and heads of major divisions such as Assistant Attorneys General for Antitrust, Civil Rights, Criminal Division, Environment and Natural Resources, and Tax Division.

And of course all the U.S. Attorneys, too.

FBI Director.

FBI Deputy Director.

CIA Director

> Office of the Director of National Intelligence
Director of National Intelligence
Principal Deputy Director
Director, National Counterterrorism Center
Director, National Counterintelligence & Security Center
General Counsel
Inspector General of the Intelligence Community

That's not under Justice the way the FBI is.

> Central Intelligence Agency
Director
General Counsel
Inspector General

Ditto.

FBI Director is a ten-year appointment. That's why Wray is still there under Biden after Trump put him there after Comey.

It is NOT supposed to be partisan!!

My Lord! Look at all these presidential appointments needing Senate confirmation under Justice!!

> Department of Justice
Attorney General
Solicitor General
Deputy Attorney General
Associate Attorney General
Assistant Attorney General - Antitrust Division
Assistant Attorney General – Office of Justice Programs
Assistant Attorney General – Office of Legal Counsel
Assistant Attorney General – Office of Legal Policy
Assistant Attorney General – Office of Legislative Affairs
Assistant Attorney General – Civil Division
Assistant Attorney General – Civil Rights Division
Assistant Attorney General – Criminal Division

List of positions filled by presidential appointment with Senate confirmation

This is a list of positions filled by presidential appointment with Senate confirmation. Under the Appointments Clause of the United States Constitution and law of the United States, certain federal positions appointed by the president of the United States require confirmation (advice and consent) of the United States Senate. These "PAS" (Presidential Appointment needing Senate confirmation) positions, as well as other types of federal government positions, are published in the United States Government Policy and Supporting Positions (Plum Book), which is released after each United States ...

new vacancies act: everycrsreport.com/reports/98-892.html

Remember that "white house staff" like Chief of Staff, Communications Directory, Press Secretary, National Security Advisor, White House Counsel, and many many more are not Senate-approved. But Trump still burned through many people in each of most of those offices.

Cerberus

That may explain why Trump wants to appoint without the senate, because it would take ages to get so many people confirmed.

@tchrist Here I think zero officials are politically appointed.

Just ministers and their personal assistants and secretaries of state.

tchrist

00:26

Like how retired Lt Gen Flynn served just 22 days as National Security Advisor. Chief of Staff is also high turnover.

Cerberus

Ministers occasionally replace high officials, but I have not heard of this happening for partisan reasons.

tchrist

Cerberus

Cabinet also appoint politicians from opposition parties as mayors. Like the mayoress of Amsterdam, who is from the Green Party, who have I think never been in government.

tchrist

@Cerberus No: not if they're good people. It is normal for the Senate to approve all the big important ones on Day Zero.

Cerberus

@tchrist All the ones in the list you posted here?

tchrist

00:29

@Cerberus No, the ones in immediate succession to the presidency after the VP and Speaker. State, Defence, that sort of thing.

I think Biden may have only gotten 5 at first.

Cerberus

I do see 11 there for Trump?

tchrist

yes, but that's more than a fortnight out

Cerberus

I read that Democrats delayed appointments for him.

tchrist

> Fifteen days into President Joe Biden’s administration, the Senate has confirmed just five of his 15 statutory Cabinet secretary nominees. At a comparable time, the Senate had confirmed 90% of the Cabinet secretaries for Presidents Clinton, Bush and Obama combined.

> Fifteen days into Joe Biden’s presidency, the Senate has confirmed only
five of 15 Cabinet secretary nominees. At a comparable time, President
Bill Clinton had 13 nominees confirmed, President George W. Bush had
14 and President Barack Obama had 11. The official Cabinet consisted
of 14 positions until 2002 when the Department of Homeland Security
was established, and the Cabinet expanded to 15. Each president has
the option to expand their Cabinet with additional members, but those
positions are not part of the Cabinet as established by legislation. The

> The delays are not due to the lack of speed of Biden’s
announcements. The official beginning of Biden’s transition was hampered
by the delay in ascertainment – the formal decision made by the General
Services Administration which triggers the government’s official
preparation for a handover of power. However, Biden still announced
nominations quickly. He publicly named 12 of his Cabinet choices by
the end of 2020 and all 15 by Jan. 7, 2021 – about two weeks prior
to his inauguration. In fact, Biden announced more nominations for

This is going to be a problem for Trump. He won't sign anything.

So he's going to be very far behind on Day 1. His people won't have had access to anything.

There are contingencies for brief holdovers or "acting" positions so that the nation is not caught blind, but it's still a bad thing.

Cerberus

He is a bad thing.

tchrist

00:38

> The Senate delays began even before Biden was sworn in. The Senate can
hold hearings for nominees prior to the president taking office to speed
up the confirmation process. All of Clinton’s Cabinet secretary nominees
had a preliminary hearing prior to Inauguration Day. The same was true for
all but one of Bush’s nominees and 11 of Obama’s 14. By contrast, only
five hearings were held for Biden’s picks prior to his inauguration,
all of which took place the day before Biden was sworn in as president.

Robusto

@Cerberus Positive litotes. Well played.

Cerberus

I didn't know that was a thing!

tchrist

So ALL THAT is because of Mitch McConnell, who refused to surrender to Chuck Schumer.

quotes are from: presidentialtransition.org/…

Cerberus

Hmm.

Oh, well, the old ministers can just stay in place until the new ones are sworn in?

tchrist

SOMETHING like that. But these are secretaries not ministers. They were never elected.

Just like how the Foreign Secretary in Britain does not have to be a parliamentary "minister".

Cerberus

00:43

Our ministers aren't elected either.

They could not be, because of the separation of powers.

tchrist

Hm, they aren't MPs?

Cerberus

But the old ministers just stay on until the new cabinet has been fully approved.

tchrist

> In the countries utilising the Westminster system, such as the United Kingdom or Australia, cabinet ministers must be appointed from among sitting members of the parliament (MP). In the UK, it can be from either the House of Commons or the House of Lords.

Cerberus

@tchrist That would be against the constitution, I believe. I think there is an exception when it goes the other way around.

tchrist

But secretaries are different.

Cerberus

00:44

@tchrist Yeah that is not the case here.

In practice, quite a few ministers will be members of parliament, but they must give up their seats.

tchrist

> A minister is an MP selected for his position by the Prime Minister: the Cabinet Secretary is a civil servant and is, therefore, non-political.

Cerberus

Our current Prime Minister was never even a politician, I think.

tchrist

Then how did he get elected?

Cerberus

He was a high official at the Ministry of Justice, had worked well with ministers, so parties liked him enough.

He was in fact until 2021 a member of a party that is now in the opposition.

But he was no politician.

tchrist

"high official" but civil service?

Cerberus

00:50

Yes.

tchrist

I see.

Cerberus

Everyone except the ministers, secretaries of state, and their personal assistants would be considered civil servants, I suppose?

tchrist

In theory, members of the civil service cannot be fired at will. That's what Trump is trying to change. He wants them all out.

Cerberus

I mean everyone who works in the executive branch outside the King and his personal cabinet (unimportant and distinct from the cabinet of ministers).

@tchrist Can he change that?

tchrist

He thinks of them as thousands of Permanent Under Secretaries getting in his way.

@Cerberus He's trying. That's what Schedule F is all about. I think Musk is helping him. barrons.com/articles/…

npr.org/2024/11/13/nx-s1-5188566/…

> At the tail end of his first term, Trump issued an executive order that created a new category of political appointees, called Schedule F. His plan was to move an unknown number of career civil servants into this category, making it easier to fire them and replace them with loyalists.

> Trump also tried to move the EPA's regional office overseeing the Great Lakes from Chicago to Kansas City, hundreds of miles from any of the lakes. The idea was dropped after an outcry, including from members of Congress.

Cerberus

00:54

Can he do that?

tchrist

You keep asking these strange questions.

Cerberus

I am strange.

tchrist

He is a GOD don't you know! He has ABSOLUTE POWER! He told you this. Did you not listen?

Cerberus

I find his speech insufferable.

tchrist

Of course. He's a deteriorating megalomaniac.

Try to skim the NPR article on the Schedule F thing.

Trump Says He’ll Move Thousands of Federal Workers Out of Washington. Here’s What Happened the First Time He Tried.

Cerberus

00:59

Ah OK, I was still busy getting the other article archived so that I might read it through my adblocker.

tchrist

> The Bureau of Land Management’s headquarters moved from the capital to Colorado in 2020, causing an exodus of leadership. If elected, Trump plans to use the same tactic across more of the federal government.

He doesn't even need to fire them. He can just move them out of Washington to I dunno Wyoming.

And he moved them to Grand Junction, not to Denver or Boulder!!!

Cerberus

That is a mean trick. Don't courts see through it?

tchrist

How could they stop him?

He is their leader.

They're a federal bureau.

> The Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, the 900-plus page blueprint for a potential second Trump term, recommends sending the BLM headquarters back to Colorado and relocating other agencies, ranging from the Environmental Protection Agency’s regional offices to the Air Traffic Organization and the American Indian Environmental Office.

> Separate from Project 2025, Trump has doubled down on his plan to take aim at the federal bureaucracy as part of Agenda47, his campaign’s outline for a second term. “Just as I moved the Bureau of Land Management to Colorado,” he said in March 2023, “as many as 100,000 government positions can be moved out, and I mean immediately, of Washington to places filled with patriots who love America, and they really do love America.”

It's just more ethnic cleansing, you know.

Forced deportations from the center of power.

> “They ran the career people out,” said Steve Ellis, who spent nearly 40 years working for the federal government, rising to the level of BLM’s deputy director during the Obama administration. “This business about politicizing the civil service, that’s a problem. It’s something that should concern all Americans.”

But it won't. Most Americans could not care a tiny bit less. They have no awareness of any of this.

> Project 2025 advocates reinstituting the so-called Schedule F classification for federal employees that Trump created via a 2020 executive order to remove job protections and make such workers easier to fire. As part of Project 2025, backers created a database of potential replacement hires who share Trump’s mission.

> Indeed, an exodus followed from the roughly 500-person headquarters, with numerous employees taking jobs elsewhere in the federal government to avoid leaving the Washington area, where they had put down roots. Vacancies in the office jumped to 326 from 121, according to the GAO.

The administration imposed hiring restrictions, including a freeze on filling certain senior positions to gauge whether they were necessary.

Notice he hasn't "fired" anybody.

This is the kind of bullshit that Musk will be helping him with.

> Pendley, the man selected to oversee the agency at the time of its relocation, is a self-avowed “sagebrush rebel,” part of the anti-federal government movement that wants public lands handed to states or sold off. (While functioning as the agency head, Pendley only officially held the title of deputy director for policy and programs and was never confirmed by the Senate. A court eventually ordered him to step aside, finding he had served unlawfully for more than a year.)

See, that shows that Trump doesn't care about the law. His good old "actings" don't leave even when it's illegal for them to work.

Cerberus

I hope moving an agency just in order to get people to leave would be stopped by a court.

tchrist

01:22

They have to have a legal principle to apply.

Because it's a federal agency and he's in charge of all federal agencies, he can do anything he pleases with any of them. It's terrible.

They have a huge list of agencies they wish to abolish or gut.

Mostly because these get in their way of raping the land.

Or otherwise harming it and its people.

Moneyed interests, not public interests, are all that matter to the would-be oligarchs.

Cerberus

If one only does something in order to do something else that one isn't allowed to do, a court here would normally stop one.

tchrist

He gave them the chance to keep their jobs. They just had to go to a very very very backwater dusty tiny little town to do so.

Cerberus

@tchrist Perhaps if he does damage to the functioning of the state, Republican voters will notice at last?

tchrist

With a four-hour to the nearest major airport.

Cerberus

Yeah you would need to give good reasons for that here as an employer, normally.

tchrist

01:28

@Cerberus Not so long as their minds are a wholly owned subsidiary of the right-wing media machine ranging from Fox to Newsmax to AON. They will never know.

They will simply never know about it.

Cerberus

Perhaps when their insurance is removed and they lose other things the state provided them with.

tchrist

These are not people who are moved by careful analysis. No amount of facts can be shown them. Their minds are made up. It's all about allegiance to what they feel.

Think how much of Russia believes Putin's every word.

Cerberus

I believe Republican politicians were afraid to repeal Obamacare because it would make them unpopular.

alphabet

@Cerberus Those people don't think that the agencies in question contribute much of value.

tchrist

01:45

@Cerberus They may try again, now that they have the Senate again.

@Cerberus But yes, I've heard that, too.

Cerberus

@alphabet They may once they stop receiving the benefits.

@tchrist They may fear similar effects when other agencies are made ineffective.

tchrist

He certainly plans to try to do away with the Education Department and the Environmental Protection Agency if he can figure out how to get away with it, and that's just the tip of the iceberg, as Project 2025 has detailed demolition plans for many, many more than that.

The Veterans Affairs Department, Health and Human Services Department, the Internal Revenue Service, the Interior Department, even the Justice Department and the State Department would see extreme downsizing. Anything that gets in an oligarch's way.

Now, he tried some of this early on, even in 2017 by proposing doing away with 19 agencies. Congress didn't let him.

Things established by Congress are much harder for him to eliminate by simple imperial fiat on his part. So he's finding other nasty ways of gutting them.

> Project 2025 envisions sweeping changes to economic and social policies and the federal government and its agencies. The plan proposes taking partisan control of the Department of Justice (DOJ), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Department of Commerce (DOC), Federal Communications Commission (FCC), and Federal Trade Commission (FTC), dismantling the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and abolishing the Department of Education (ED), whose programs would be transferred or terminated.

And that's just Wikipedia.

> While some proposals might require the support of Republicans in both houses of Congress[17] or favorable rulings from the conservative Supreme Court,[127] much relies on executive power.

And that's the problem. Mere executive power suffices in many cases.

HippoSawrUs

02:06

Am I in the Twilight Zone? This 💩 asked for a name for a "particular" 💩 and I knew it of the top of my FN head because I've seen a TV before... I know, I hate to admit it, but I actually sat down and watched one before...and here's a secret: You can Google dictionaries online now. Merriam-Webster and Oxford... WTF? I know, I couldn't believe it either... 💩 But I feel better now. Relieved.

s/b off the top

Cerberus

@tchrist The courts could decide to block anything if they wanted to.

CowperKettle

Spanish of the day: güevedoce

tchrist

@Cerberus "if they wanted to"

Cerberus

02:25

If he tries something they think is outrageous and clearly against the (spirit of the) law.

tchrist

@CowperKettle Pronounced /ɣweβeˈðose/ in the Dominican Republic and /ɣweβeˈðoθe/ in most of Spain. Hey at least the vowels are easy. :) Those three voiced fricatives all are actually quite lightly articulated, technically mere approximants, and often hard for native English speakers to "hear" as a clear consonant.

@Cerberus Which he is now above, criminally.

Cerberus

They cannot oust him but they can prevent him from doing things.

tchrist

O silver-lined cloud, you are an infinite font of unrelentingly positive plausible outcomes of every dark future we see on the horizon. Would that it were so.

Güevedoce

In the Dominican Republic, güevedoces (from Spanish: güevedoce, from Dominican Spanish güevos a los doce "testicles at twelve") are children with a specific intersex variation. Güevedoces are classified as girls when they are born but, around the age of 12, they start developing male genitalia. This is due to a deficiency in the production of 5α-reductase, an enzyme involved in the metabolism of testosterone to dihydrotestosterone. The phenomenon also reportedly occurs in Turkey and in Papua New Guinea, where it is called kwolu-aatmwol (literally 'a female thing changing into a male thing') by...

güevos being how they say huevos there, < ovum/ovi.

Cerberus

Just offering possibilities.

Hope.

tchrist

I figure he'll lose a few but given how the Heritage House has packed the Supreme Court, not enough. They have clearly laid down their guardianship with the presidential immunity ruling, not to mention so many others of lesser immediate impact.

Cerberus

02:35

I suppose it depends on what he might do.

tchrist

> What cannot be known hollows the mind. Fill it not with guesswork.

Cerberus

No, indeed.

alphabet

0

Q: What is the difference between a phrasal verb, a prepositional verb and a phrasal prepositional verb?

My pupils find it hard to find out if a verb is a phrasal verb, a prepositional verb or a phrasal prepositional verb.

Ugh. The close voters must be stopped.

No seriously, closing this is unacceptable. The comments are asking for examples and clarity. If the asker had that, she wouldn't've needed to ask the question!

Seriously somebody needs to talk to these three people--Greybeard, KillingTime, Chenmunka--and tell them to stop closing obviously on-topic questions.

2

They are not helping.

Anyway, I apologize for going on a long rant, but I will absolutely not apologize for making it personal, because it is.

Cerberus

Ranting is allowed here.

alphabet

02:52

It's these three people, all among the worst offenders. They are a big part of one of this site's worst problems and they should either change their habits or leave.

Cerberus

Only Greybeard posted a comment; did you see the others in the votes to close or something?

alphabet

They were the three close voters--look at the post history. Two of our community's more upstanding members did us the favor of reopening it.

Cerberus

Ah, OK.

When I saw it, it was already open again.

HippoSawrUs

I decided to go out on a "low" note... 😂🤣😂 Get it? Nvm. But I think I mentioned it before: Women ain't taking jack 💩 no mo. Unless their redneck husbands say so.

HippoSawrUs

03:18

I'm taking a break. Remodeling our house for my son.Hey, I should get him one of those particular things you see under wall-mounted TVs sometimes...Is it a bench you're not supposed to sit on or or a Stonehenge thing that fell over or WTF!? Oh, my son managed a Dish office and installs fiber whatever now. Let me call him... He didn't answer 🙁 but 3-y/o Cari says it's a TV whatever, so let's go with that. 😄😂 I crack myself up...

Thanks for helping me find my lost words. They were not on the tip of my tongue. They were here...all along. 🥹

alphabet

Matt Gaetz quit Congress two days before ‘highly damaging’ ethics report was to be released, report says

HippoSawrUs

I'll be back to pick them up when I loose them again. 🤟🏼🧡✌🏼

alphabet

Oh that's how Trump earned his loyalty. Gave him an excuse to leave Congress just before the truth came out.

Right, he was the guy with the statutory rape and sex trafficking allegations.

Of course Trump loves him. Now he "owes" Trump, who I assume will pressure him into using his powers as AG for evil. If he gets confirmed.

Cerberus

Will the report still come out?

alphabet

No, it sounds like. The ethics complaint against him is closed since he isn't a member anymore. But I wouldn't be too surprised if it got leaked anyway.

Cerberus

03:26

I'm sure it will.

If I were any Republic who disliked him, and I knew anyone involved in the report, I would have it leaked.

alphabet

Anyway, yes, Trump's choices are still batshit, and this one seems quite sinister.

Cerberus

Perhaps Biden can have the FBI help Republicans who oppose Gaentz in some way.

tchrist

@Cerberus That info be in the timeline.

Cerberus

Yes, I saw it.

Just hadn't looked when I asked because I didn't have the tab open any more.

tchrist

I looked carefully at the the top 20 close reviewers, and discovered some minor surprises.

Because I can see close votes, I can tell you that that CV review queue line up does not in fact end up reflecting the close vote ranking. Sometimes it is in the ballpark or similar, but other times it is certainly not.

Cerberus

03:32

Hmm.

tchrist

People at the bottom can have many more actual CVs than people at the top of that ranking.

Cerberus

Is that because it is all time and not, say, per month?

Oh, huh?

tchrist

No, it's because people close things without using the review queues to do so.

Mitch

@Robusto and auto spell from typos

alphabet

Who better to serve as our nation's top prosecutor than a guy who allegedly had orgies with underage prostitutes?

Cerberus

03:33

Ahh OK.

alphabet

Somehow I'd forgotten about that story. It kinda died down in the news.

tchrist

But there is another factor, which is overall longevity and days visited.

Cerberus

Yes, of course: most votes to close will be simply when the question is new and on the main page.

Whereas votes to reopen are almost all from the queue, probably.

tchrist

Number 1 on the CVRQ ranking is not number 1 or even number 2 on the CV ranking.

alphabet

How generous of him to provide much-needed money to disadvantaged youths.

tchrist

03:35

I cannot reveal particulars except in a singular regard: I can tell you who the top-rank CVer is.

By which statement I have in fact done so.

Cerberus

As long as they are over the legal age...

Mitch

@Cerberus yes I remember that, but we never spelled out what it means to be Puritanical.

Cerberus

@tchrist I am not surprised.

alphabet

> Evidence including mobile payment receipts reportedly suggesting Gaetz had illegally exchanged money for sex, such as May 2018 Venmo transaction records showing Gaetz sending $900 (with a memo referring to a woman) to Greenberg, who then relayed the money (with the memos "tuition" and "school") to three women, one of whom was 18.

Cerberus

@Mitch I think the AI said it well enough: it knows because this is extremely widely known stuff.

tchrist

03:36

@Cerberus No, but I'm also by far the site's main voter as well.

Cerberus

Yeah.

tchrist

Also, note that one of the three CVers on that question is not in the top 20 of the CVRQ ranking.

Mitch

@Cerberus then yes totally agreed, in comparison to the rich western European countries, the US is more prudish than them, and there are some minor features that might be traced to the early 17th c Puritan sect (though it is my opinion that that is way over low in importance).

Maybe Ireland is about as prudish as the US. Or maybe Japan? (Lots of dimensions to compare in)

Cerberus

@Mitch To the latter, that may be so. Puritanical without a capital is just a generic word to me; I don't mean the sect specifically in this case.

alphabet

@Cerberus I don't think the law determines whether his actions were right or not.

Mitch

03:42

@Cerberus I am very aware that that is the opinion of many people, especially Europeans.

Cerberus

Remember that it was not someone from Europe who said this.

Mitch

@Cerberus then maybe prudish is what is actually meant?

@Cerberus I don't remember.who said it?

Cerberus

I kind of used the words interchangeably. The difference may be that prudish suggests you don't want to show yourself; puritanical suggests you also don't tolerate it when others do so.

@Mitch Our Persian friend.

Though I'm sure Russians would say the same thing.

tchrist

Aryan is as Aryan does.

Cerberus

Quite.

alphabet

03:46

Of course, I think we can safely say that the Netherlands is also an outlier in this regard, much moreso than the US. I don't think many countries have a "legalize sex in public parks" lobby.

Cerberus

Not really relevant.

Germans are far more into nudism than we are.

Mitch

@Cerberus like I mentioned before, despite some small things like public nudity or swearing, the US seems way past any kind of trying to cover up any personal shame. That is quite the opposite of prudishness or small p puritanical.

Cerberus

Brits dress more scantily.

And Italians more tightly.

Mitch

@Cerberus I did find that source surprising

Cerberus

4 hours ago, by Cerberus

@Mitch It is not!

It is how everyone views American culture.

4 hours ago, by Cerberus

Mitch

03:49

@Cerberus again, everyone in Europe. India, China, the Muslim world are much more prudish.

For every single one of those points you linked.

Cerberus

@Mitch That was about the importance of money, not puritanism.

Outside greater Europe and the Americas, the Unites States is not viewed as puritanical so much, I suspect. Perhaps in some countries.

alphabet

ChatGPT, that most reliable of sources.

Mitch

@Cerberus as I said before, with respect to money glorification, much of the world also glorified it, the US is just famous for it.

alphabet

@Cerberus Yes, I think you're right, and especially compared to your country in particular, which at least to Americans has something of a reputation in that respect.

Cerberus

@Mitch I also meant that in comparison to other countries in the aforementioned European sphere, although in fact I'm sure most of the world has that idea about American society/culture.

GPT doesn't come up with these things out of thin air. It is what the entire Internet says.

It is extremely common knowledge.

tchrist

03:54

"knowledge"

Cerberus

So that is why I said I was surprised the first time Americans didn't seem aware of these two things.

alphabet

You know the charts I linked earlier have actual data about this.

Mitch

@Cerberus yes I agree that most people in the world view the US in that way, that the US is some kind of pinnacle in glorification of money. I suppose I'm being some kind of outlier in claiming that that -view- is wrong that the US is not the only culture at the top. People -say- that the US is the worst, and I'm not saying that they don't glorify wealth, just that most cultures around the world glorify wealth just as much if not more (excluding of course Europe)

alphabet

My two favorite sources are "common knowledge" and "what the entire Internet says," because you can't fact-check me on that!

Cerberus

@Mitch Well I am comparing it to similar cultures, not to vastly different cultures which it is hard to compare with anyway. Even so, I think it is wide than that.

alphabet

03:58

@Mitch I'd also be willing to believe that they glorify wealth a lot more in the environs of Silicon Valley and Hollywood than they do here, and that the former probably have more of an effect on how Americans get viewed abroad.

Mitch

@Cerberus I agree with you that it is common knowledge and that ChatGPT is reporting that common view accurately. I'm saying they're all wrong (or rather that other cultures are just as bad if not moreso)

alphabet

But again: I gave you literal data on this and among no demographic do a majority of Americans think that the existence of billionaires is a positive good for society.

Cerberus

I mean people in China or Australia will no doubt be shocked when they hear you need to pay a fortune to get an ambulance, those kinds of stories.

@alphabet What does that show?

tchrist

@Cerberus I think that's a very different thing going on.

Mitch

@Cerberus sure there are problems here like there are everywhere

Cerberus

04:00

@Mitch Well, that wasn't exactly my point (though I suspect I disagree with that too).

@tchrist It makes money very important in a society, when that is one's reality.

Well, anyway, I don't really think this is worth discussing so much.

tchrist

Try to remember that broadcast-vs-cable-vs-streaming TV all have to play by radically different rules.

@Cerberus It's really only about how disastrously demented the US "health" care system is.

Mitch

@Cerberus yes I understand that you are saying that you believe the US to 'glorify wealth' (my shorthand) and you've given evidence that I agree with that many people including ChatGPT also report that they believe this. I don't dispute the popularity of that opinion.

tchrist

Does your broadcast TV have things on it that we couldn't show on cable?

Cerberus

I have no idea?

Mitch

I also don't dispute that the US does glorify wealth much more than the west European countries.

tchrist

04:04

Understandable.

Cerberus

I don't watch our television, let alone yours.

tchrist

Same.

Cerberus

And what is "broadcast TV"?

tchrist

Airwaves.

They operate under a different licensing arrangement.

EM spectrum.

Mitch

'not cable or internet'

Cerberus

04:05

I don't think we have airwaves any more.

I mean there is cable, Internet, and satellite: I suppose satellite is waves.

tchrist

> Television is also broadcast on electromagnetic waves. Since the waves must carry a great deal of visual as well as audio information, each channel requires a larger range of frequencies than simple radio transmission. TV channels utilize frequencies in the range of 54 to 88 MHz and 174 to 222 MHz.

Cerberus

But it's all the same channels.

Jan 18, 2022 at 22:25, by Cerberus

Gewoon Bloot is a television programme in which ordinary, fully naked adults take place on a stage, and children are the audience. They ask questions about people's bodies and stuff.

Remember we had the same discussion earlier?

tchrist

You never have to pay to use an antenna here.

alphabet

@Cerberus I don't think that the kind of wealth people glorify is "the ability to afford an ambulance."

Cerberus

It is all part of the same issue.

But anyway.

alphabet

04:08

Those seem unrelated to me.

tchrist

Broadcast TV is by definition free of charge and available to everyone.

Cerberus

@alphabet A fish can't see the water?

tchrist

I don't understand what you are talking about.

I was trying to explain why there are different content regulations for different media.

Cerberus

@tchrist Most of this wasn't directed at you.

tchrist

ok

Cerberus

04:09

Are you really sure you need the Ignore function?

Or have things cooled down enough that you don't care any more and could turn it off?

I mean, it's just random strangers on the Internet, is what we are.

alphabet

I promise that I will never bring up the incest thing again.

Cerberus

I have no idea.

Probably don't need to.

alphabet

04:25

I am still too "woke" for his preferences, unfortunately.

Cerberus

Ignoring someone in whatever way is always allowed, I should say.

alphabet

Indeed. Nobody's obligated to listen to me.

Cerberus

Odysseus chose to listen, his comrades did not.

Who was better off, one wonders.

And what to think of the sirens' fate.

alphabet

That's what I am, an island temptress wooing passers-by to their deaths.

Sadly, some humans will never truly listen to us raccoons, no matter how loud we growl and screech.

Cerberus

Maybe you, too, can grow a woman's head onto an animal body.

alphabet

04:43

> You and me, baby, ain't nothin' but mammals.

Laurel

@alphabet I mean, that's not what the issue was…

But it's kinda late now

alphabet

I forget, whose fault was this?

Cerberus

Perhaps the matter is best laid to rest. Or kept at.

alphabet

05:01

Let's murder it and send it to that crematory where they just leave bodies in stacks outside and ship you an urn full of cement dust that they claim is ashes.

CowperKettle

10:57

Canadian of the day: tuque - Inherited from Middle French toque, tocque (“toque", also "a type of hairstyle”), in some senses from Spanish toca (“headdress”) and in other senses from Italian tocca, from Lombard toh, from Lombardic *tuoh, from Proto-West Germanic *dōk (“cloth”).

SmokeDetector

11:07

[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Manually reported answer (93): Which is better, "Information and Communication Technology (ICT) discipline" or "the discipline of Information and Communication Technology (ICT)"?‭ by Kaniz Fatema‭ on english.SE

tchrist

12:37

Related questions, including probable duplicates: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8. This list is not meant to be exhaustive; others exist. — tchrist ♦ 1 min ago

Closed again before I could hit return.

M.A.R.

13:06

@alphabet he gaetz it

HippoSawrUs

13:17

@alphabet - Oh, that explains everything... Very white people are publicly freaky-deaky. The windows...I should've guessed. My bad.

D G

Which one is the correct one?
a. Determine which triplets can construct a triangle.
b. Determine which triplets can construct triangles.

Note: a single valid triplet can only construct a unique triangle.

D G

13:33

Or should it be ?
c. Determine which triplets each can construct a triangle.

Robusto

#travle #701 +0 (Perfect)
✅✅✅
https://travle.earth

@DG The first is what I'd use.

D G

@Robusto Thank you. ChatGPT also said that. :-)

Mitch

14:05

@tchrist do you think it should be reopened? You've given multiple reasons for closing as duplicate.

I personally prefer things open even if duplicate, but if you think it should stay closed I won't vote to reopen.

GratefulDisciple

@DG But can ChatGPT offer the reason?

I have a premonition that in a few years I will have to defend my judgment against people who replied "but that's not what ChatGPT said".

alphabet

14:21

@DG I think both are correct, but (a) does seem more idiomatic.

GratefulDisciple

Not to mention how conspiracy theories have influenced so many Americans' view of reality. Gotta be a humanity-prepper of the coming "doom" of reality so much distorted by those theories and by the likes of ChatGPT.

tchrist

@Mitch I'm indecisive about the optimal outcome in this instance. It's a little frustrating that the asker hasn't returned to engage. I imagine it "should" probably be closed as a duplicate of something. I'd much rather she came to support that decision on her own following inspection of the links, instead of having it ramrodded through.

MetaEd

Wordle 1,244 4/6

🟨⬛⬛⬛⬛
🟨🟨⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Robusto

#WhenTaken #261 (14.11.2024)

I scored 737/1000🎗️

1️⃣📍114 km - 🗓️5 yrs - 🥇190/200
2️⃣📍203 km - 🗓️44 yrs - 🥉92/200
3️⃣📍3.8K km - 🗓️6 yrs - 🥈125/200
4️⃣📍2.7 km - 🗓️1 yrs - 🥇199/200
5️⃣📍3.8K km - 🗓️1 yrs - 🥈131/200

https://whentaken.com

Wordle 1,244 4/6

⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
🟨⬛⬛⬛⬛
🟨🟨⬛⬛⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Daily Octordle #1025
9️⃣4️⃣
6️⃣5️⃣
8️⃣7️⃣
🔟🕛
Score: 61

Daily Sequence Octordle #1025
4️⃣6️⃣
8️⃣9️⃣
🔟🕚
🕛🕐
Score: 73

Tightrope, a daily trivia game | Britannica

Nov. 14, 2024

T I G H T R O P E
💔 ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ ✅ 🎉

My Score: 1820

Mitch

15:55

@tchrist understood

jlliagre

16:43

#travle #701 +0 (Perfect)
✅✅✅
https://travle.earth

Conrado

17:08

Alright, I don't know prompt engineering, so I had to do it myself with GIMP:

"Ministry of transport: Gone!"

á la Milei

Robusto

@Conrado That's more time than I'd want to spend with GiMP

Conrado

Will they do anything about the conflict of interest when someone who owns a bunch of businesses that might be regulated is appointed to oversee the regulating bodies' spending?

Robusto

@Conrado They? Who's "they"? You mean the Republican Senate, or the Republican House, or the Republican Supreme Court?

Conrado

I don't know... Someone!

Robusto

Superman? Wonder Woman?

Conrado

17:19

Or maybe this is such a crazy situation that no check was foreseen to be necessary, and thus no balance was even considered?

jlliagre

#WhenTaken #261 (14.11.2024)

I scored 728/1000🎗️

1️⃣📍306 km - 🗓️7 yrs - 🥇181/200
2️⃣📍1.5K km - 🗓️13 yrs - 🥈137/200
3️⃣📍1.9K km - 🗓️16 yrs - 🥉119/200
4️⃣📍219 m - 🗓️2 yrs - 🥇198/200
5️⃣📍18.2K km - 🗓️6 yrs - 🥉93/200

https://whentaken.com

tchrist

19:47

> Senator Lisa Murkowski, Republican of Alaska, said Mr. Gaetz is “not a serious candidate” and compared him to the disgraced fabulist who was expelled from the House last year, saying, “If I wanted to make a joke, maybe I would say now I’m waiting for George Santos to be named.”

STOP GIVING HIM IDEAS!

2

Robusto

> How can you tell Donald Trump’s plan to improve “government efficiency” is off to a promising start? Because his first step was appointing two people to do the same job.

Trump’s great government purge begins

> The Musk-Ramaswamy Ministry of Silly Walks will probably get the biggest headlines, even though it sounds largely performative. (Based on the scant details released so far, it sounds like a toothless advisory board.) More potent (and more toxic) are the planned large-scale purges of government employees who fail to demonstrate fealty to Trump.

tchrist

Maybe he'll make them show their eternal loyalty by getting a facial tattoo or tongue piercing.

Robusto

20:11

@tchrist Or to mark their fealty by offering up one-half of the koyubi to the man in charge.

Mitch

@tchrist That is a very tough choice.

tchrist

@Robusto Ceremonial circumcision.

Mitch

One hurts terribly for a short time (and then you have this weird stud in your mouth you constantly fidget with)...

tchrist

@Mitch Why not both?

Robusto

@Mitch How would you know?

Mitch

20:13

or you have a conversation starter... for the rest of your goddam life.

OK I'd choose face tattoo, and get an image of that part of my face put there.

Hah!

And then the devil would say fine here you go then chop of one of my fingers.

and not the pinkie.

that would be too easy.

@Robusto I can only imagine they hurt terribly to be given one, from the screams of all those who I've given them too.

Robusto

@Mitch Worse than a tongue lashing, I'd imagine.

Mitch

@Robusto I always wondered if it was the tongue doing it or getting it.

Mitch

20:29

Cripes. "... given them to."

CowperKettle

20:44

Семен Слепаков - P. Diddy

►

A humorous song in which Putin relates the story of P. Diddy

The refrain is "sidite i ne P.Diddy", which sounds like "sidite i ne pizdite" - "sit still and don't run your f-ing mouth" (meaning keep low and don't talk too much, don't criticize the authorities)

Putin in the song says that you can freely criticize P.Diddy and other vices of the West, because we have freedom of speech in Russia, but if you want to go beyond the vices of the West, you should "sidite i ne P.Diddy"

alphabet

22:12

Ok, back to complete insanity

> Trump Wants Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to Be Health Secretary

Yikes.

Conrado

22:56

@alphabet That's why I asked about the fluorine in the drinking water...

Incidentally, I asked a pharmacist for whom I was installing a water pump on Monday about fluoridated water, and he seemed to have the impression that, while there is not an argument about the dental health benefit, fluoridation also increases risk of certain metabolism-related disorders in the consumers.

While the 1950s USA conspiracy theory talked (as well as I could understand what I read online) about a communist agenda to poison the unsuspecting Free American Public, my acquaintance here was of the opinion rather that the capitalists (pharmaceutical companies) were responsible for the studies focusing on dental health rather than (and at the cost of) all round general health.

CowperKettle

23:26

Why I dress as a Regency gentleman... everyday of my life - BBC News

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