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Cake day: July 3rd, 2023

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  • Part of me blames the collective memory loss of the COVID years and a complete lack of understanding of cause and effect.

    It’s like everyone forgot there was this massive global pandemic which absolutely killed entire industries. And even though the important parts were propped up during the lean times by government support, that support ended eventually, with the economy still a mess that couldn’t just be put back together like nothing happened.

    I mean, people at that time didn’t even have a concept of what was going on. They have no idea how much money was spent keeping the lights on. People lost their shit over the billions it would cost to forgive student loans, but had no idea how many more billions were already spent on—and abused by—businesses whose pandemic loans were forgiven by the government.

    Everyone forgot the pandemic was only as bad as it was in the US because it was so completely mishandled by the Trump administration. We could have had everything back to normal a lot sooner if there was even a little bit of national preparedness, not to mention if we didn’t have all the misinformation spread by his own administration.

    So when the economy went to shit in 2021-2022 during the Biden administration, people shrugged their shoulders and put the blame on the old man in the white house, despite the fact that it’s been on a recovery trend during this last year. And so Trump’s first year is going to start with stronger markets, he’ll get the credit, and then things will get worse just in time for someone else to take the blame for it.













  • I am morbidly curious to see what happens over the next generation or two. The innate anti-intellectualism that seems to be a required component of right-wing policy will heavily affect red states, but blue states are still prioritizing their school systems. Is the “states’ rights” party going to sic the fed on state-controlled school systems in blue states to prevent the spread of thoughtcrime?

    If it’s only blue states that continue funding education, what does that do long-term in a nation that has shifted away from being a manufacturing superpower to now primarily making its capital on knowledge industries? It is already the case that college applicants from states like Massachusetts and Connecticut get inherent bonus points in their transcripts just by virtue of where they graduated high school, because earning an A in Boston means more than earning an A in Baton Rouge. We’ve got a brain drain of doctors and nurses, and teachers and college professors, all leaving red states because the laws there are getting too oppressive for them to work. Most of the finance and technology sectors remains in the (blue) northeast and west coast states as well.

    What is the long-term plan for the Republican party to empower their own constituents in these red-state strongholds when their old industries are gone, never to return, and they refuse to invest in the education and welfare of their citizens?