Wow, a hugely wealthy oligarchical capitalist facilitating the rise of fascism?
How completely unpredictable, with no historical precedent whatsoever!
Who could have possibly expected this?!
How much money do these fuckers need before they are content enough to not rat fuck American democracy so they can eek out a few percent more on their billions?
How much does a single round of ammunition cost these days?
7.62 x 51mm goes for around a dollar a round.
5.56 x 45mm is about 50 cents.
Jesus that’s a lot more than I would have expected.
I’m sure its Obama’s fault, somehow.
Well yeah, he had the audacity to be black, which scared bubba and jimbo so much they had to buy a year’s salary worth of bullets before ObAmA tAkEs ThEiR gUnS
Also, crickets when Trump said he’d take the guns and worry about the courts afterwards.
It was already teetering but Sandy Hook is what pretty much locked permanently high ammo prices
Not until they are the god king.
Capitalism eventually turns into feudalism.
No, capitalism is feudalism with loot boxes! Because I could win the lottery.
… The answer is infinity.
Capitalism requires constant growth, constant extraction, constant return in investment, constant tendency toward monopolies and wealth disparity until you end up with a neo feudalistic caste society.
You can either attempt to restrain and regulate the system, which we are currently doing a rather poor job of, overthrow the system, which is nigh impossible given the precarity of the average prole, or you can just watch as we head closer and closer to… some kind of hybrid of the handmaids tale and elysium.
… Or, maybe, escape to a slightly less insane foreign country, but you’re gonna need a lot of money or a very lucrative skill set as an employee to do that as anything other than an illegal immigrant.
You know, I always wondered where the professionals ended up in Elysium. Like there are the medical professionals taking care of the earthlings, but the life saving machines are in Elysium so they aren’t needed up there.
But like, what about the software folks? Like there’s an epic shit ton of software going on in that movie that just kind of gets handwaved.
Passification is handled by robots and crazy humans. Other than the one executive who comes down, where are his direct reports? There is no way he was interested in the factory management, that would be a middle management job. And then what about accountants? Researchers designing the tech on Elysium?
It never really made a whole lot of sense that Elysium was just the rich. They can’t just “get” everything they want up there, it had to come from earth.
The motto of the Post is literally “Democracy dies in Darkness”, and it was adopted immediately after Trump was elected. It is deliberately positioned as pro-Democrat and anti Trump. I didn’t have a high esteem of Bezos, but I am still disappointed.
Nobody else finds this ominous? Besos was not exactly Trumps friend. Why is he being a bitch now? What does he know what’s changed
Money is stronger than any ethics or morals billionaires pretend to have
I don’t know about you, but I get this feeling there is a massive coordinated campaign between the monied interests behind the scenes. The Republican party is unpopular, by a lot. Voters are super pissed off about abortion, and it’s consistently been a losing issue for the GOP that they can’t help but double down on. Donald Trump is a criminal that a not-insignificant portion of the population think should be in prison. SCOTUS is openly corrupt, Kamala pulled in over a billion dollars last quarter, while Trump’s small-dollar donations have all but dried up.
Yes, the wealthy typically support the GOP, but like… why this election are they going so hard for Trump? If Kamala appoints a competent AG, there’s a very real chance Musk gets hit with election interference charges. Bezos had to know that this was going to lose WaPo subs, because the right doesn’t trust WaPo thanks to years of distrust sown by Trump so there was no way this wasn’t going to cause a financial hit. Ditto for the LA Times. So just… why? The whole vibe of the thing just feels off.
Edit: also not to mention the praising Hitler thing, the number of his former staff who are endorsing Harris, the number of former and current members of the GOP who are endorsing Harris, the fact that he’s been adjudicated as a rapist, his obvious sundowning, his “enemies within” remarks, wanting to send the military after his perceived enemies, his desire to see Israel completely obliterate what’s left of Palestine…
Almost makes you think they’re throwing it to the criminal so the rest of them can continue being criminals, doesn’t it?
If trump actually…shudder…wins, he could do as he’s said and bring down the fascist military hammer on any type of dissidents. These billionaire ghouls don’t care what happens to the country or world, they just care about their hoard.
Certainly not Prescott Bush!
And definitely not Woodrow Wilson!
Man… that’s one of the things that seems like a conspiracy theory to a great many people, but just actually is true.
Dude literally got caught doing massive amounts of money laundering for literal Nazis during WW2 and by all rights should have been convicted of treason.
Its like how most people don’t know that IBM machines enabled the Germans to tabulate and keep track of the holocaust, that their machines spit out the UIDs that were tattooed onto the victims at the death camps…
… I think that ‘War is a Racket’ by Smedley Butler really needs to be added to the basic K-12 curriculum alongside 1984 and Brave New World…
But oh oops, the Republicans already destroyed our education systems, nevermind.
The world is full of surprises, my friend.
Some real bald-headed behavior right here.
The guy that “gifted” millions to political commentators from CNN tries to influence politics? No way!
for years tech bros has been framed as liberal/leftist/team blue supporter. but after years of musk shitposting bullshit and almost not even single one called him out, more and more i have a feeling that they ALL are just magas hiding in the closets, they are not allies at all.
They’re mostly self-styled “libertarians”, which means they haven’t thought anything through, think they know better than all the country’s institutions, and just want to be allowed to do whatever they want without consequences. This makes them natural allies of the MAGAs, even if they don’t realize it.
Also, cancel your prime subscriptions you cowards!
Anyone who’s still using Amazon and wants to keep democracy is drowning in cognitive dissonance. Amazon is a bigger threat to decent lives for non-millionaires than any single politician, even granting that Trump is a nightmare.
Laaaaaaazyyyyyyyy
But just think of the juicy government contracts
I certainly much hope he has to justify that decision to a jury and later a deity
Bezos has tons of federal government contracts. When Trump was president last time he went after Amazon and others he disliked to get their contracts cancelled. Bezos is concerned that if Trump wins, Trump could fuck with his contracts.
That’s the reason. It’s fucked up and more evidence of why news media shouldn’t be owned by fuckhead billionaires. Shameful day in WaPos history. Cowardice. Grovelling to placate Trump for the benefit of the paper 's owner.
Tin foil hat: I am somewhat concerned that our oligarch overlords seem to be hedging in a way that they think Trump might win.
I’m extremely concerned. LA times backing out too. There’s no reason not to, unless they’re afraid the psycho toddler dictator is going to be holding the reigns next year. Fucking traitorous cowards, money over country.
He is clearly just wants peace… For his money
CNBC - News Source Context (Click to view Full Report)
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https://www.cnbc.com/2024/10/25/jeff-bezos-killed-washington-post-endorsement-of-kamala-harris-.html
Subscription cancelled.
WaPo or Amazon?
WaPo for now. Audible, Prime Video ad-free, Amazon Photos, and Kindle Unlimited after dinner. I don’t use any of those subscriptions but they were on autopilot. Jeff’s cowardice made me look and now (shortly) they are gone.
What is wapo
Ask Cardi B.
Short for WAshington POst (a US newspaper/website)
Oligarchs dont care who wins since for them either one is W lol
Normies in shambles to finally figure out that elections are a clown exercise to provide owners puppets legitimacy.
Didnt LA times have a similar situation haha
>“Oligarchs don’t care who wins”
>Jeff Bezos provably and directly interfered with an endorsement of Kamala Harris.
You could not have picked a dumber time to comment this, could you have?
You have poor understanding of the situation lol
He is keeping his options open bc there is a real possibility that trump will win.
Yall aint coping well at all.
Again DNC botched it and yall too dim to appreciate this lol
Enjoy the fASCism 🤡
>“Oligarchs don’t care who wins.”
>“But wait, actually, if Trump wins and his newspaper endorses Harris, then that could actually be bad for him because who the POTUS is suddenly does affect oligarchs whenever it’s convenient for my bullshit rhetoric.”
Keep doing the mental gymnastics thats how yall got here in the first place lol
By the way, why the emphasis on ‘ASC’ in fascism? Did the American Society of Cinematographers go in a radically new direction recently?
You talk like a child.
🤡
oh I see why your name is granola bar
cuz any argument instantly crumbles the second someone touches it
tax them until they learn to mind their own business
Since he owns the Post, it is very strictly speaking “his business”.
On one hand, I’d love to see the Post endorse Harris, but on the other hand, I do feel that the owner of a company absolutely should have this level of control over their own company.
It might be different if he were compelling the paper to compromise on it’s integrity or something, but simply preventing his own paper from endorsing a political candidate is absolutely something that he should be able to do.
Please note that this isn’t a commentary on his immense wealth, or the role of the ultra wealthy in America…simply an observation on what a business owner should be able to do with their own company.
well he did it. why? looks like he’s trying to help by trumping the editors opinion. only they were bypassed because story’s out. pay site drama is not worth it. wsj and wp paywalls have always been not worth it. subs leaving in droves like TwX.
Wish Version Lex Luthor?
If only wish luthor would fight temu iron Man
I love how we all know exactly who you’re talking about.
I’m sad I missed the opportunity for Temu Stark, or The Incredible Bulk
He’s less like Iron man and more like the Tin man from the Wizard of Oz.
I thought we all agreed upon Phoney Stark? Were you not at that meeting?
deleted by creator
Austin powers dr evil
He even nailed the rocket he made, looks very phallic as well :)
90% wealth tax is needed
Maximum wealth law. Once you’re worth more than 100 million, 100% of any new income goes to a designated fund for social programs.
100 million is enough money that there is still no real limit to how pampered your life can be, so there’s no argument that the rule would hurt anyone.
There is a big accounting difference in use the term “wealth” and “income”, especially when the wealthy take out a loan from stock holdings and not pay income tax.
Anyone with over 10 million dollars in wealth should be legally classified as a dragon and anyone stealing from their hoard shall not be punishable under the law.
Not so fun fact: The absolute richest dragons in all of fantasy, excluding Smaug, only have a net worth of several hundred million dollars. A Red Elder Wyrm will have, on average, around 2.5-3 million gold pieces of wealth, with an absolute maximum of 5 million gold pieces. That means that the absolute greediest, and richest type of dragon, by far, only has between 100,000 to 500,000 oz worth of gold.
Smaug being the absolute outlier because he had somewhere between 5 to 10 billion dollars worth of gold.
Now if you are wondering why I’m making a big deal about this, it is because 500,000 oz of gold is only worth about 1.1 billion US dollars. But that is the absolute outlier of the greediest type of dragon that there is. Still only looking at Chaotic Evil Red Elder Wyrms, the average would only be about 3.5 million gold pieces, or a mere 350,000 oz of gold. That’s only about $850,000,000 and that is just the most average of the absolute greediest manefestations of greed that our limited minds could imagine. Most dragons would be absolutely fine with between $1,000,000 to $10,000,000. The literal manefestations of greed don’t need more than $10,000,000 according to every treasure table.
Those people that have more than 100 million dollars have already passed the greed alignment chart into Chaotic Evil. They are damn near caricatures of dragons at this point.
You need to read up on Shadowrun.
Yeah, it’s been pointed out before that Shadowrun has some ridiculously wealthy dragons. I think the point still stands since Shadowrun isn’t exactly high fantasy. More like science fantasy, similar to Star Wars.
My favorite is always the Egyptian god deciding to save the equivalent of $10,000 usd every day and never spend a single penny of it back in 10,000 BC and they still don’t have as much money as Jeff Bozos.
I believe that the normal person can imagine themselves as a dragonslayer far more easily than a godslayer. A dragonslayer just needs a sword, shield, set of armor, and an unbreakable will. A godslayer needs to be able to turn the entirety of their target, including the things that don’t exist on any Universe Plane, or Prime Material Plane, into a black hole.
These modern “unassailable” individuals that constitute global fifedoms in and of themselves are merely dragons. They absolutely can be defeated. They aren’t the invincible gods that they attempt to claim to be.
Edit: umm, what Egyptian god? They had a lot of them.
Sounds like a Set thing to do. Real prideful and blows up in his face.
Fair enough, I could see Ra or Anubis doing the same, based on your description of “real prideful and having the whole thing blow up in his face.” Certainly sounds like most of the exploits of all three of them.
Key pull quote from TFA:
Post chief executive Will Lewis, in an online explanation of the decision, wrote, “The Washington Post will not be making an endorsement of a presidential candidate in this election. Nor in any future presidential election.”
“We are returning to our roots of not endorsing presidential candidates,” Lewis wrote.
“We recognize that this will be read in a range of ways, including as a tacit endorsement of one candidate, or as a condemnation of another, or as an abdication of responsibility,” he wrote. “That is inevitable. We don’t see it that way. We see it as consistent with the values The Post has always stood for and what we hope for in a leader: character and courage in service to the American ethic, veneration for the rule of law, and respect for human freedom in all its aspects.”
That’s the corporate excuse statement, and only significant if you ignore all context.
The phrase I’ve seen bandied about for this is “world-class bullshit.” Very fitting.
What a fuckin hypocrite. I hope he stubs his toe really really hard, then steps on a lego.
Sigh.
Canceled my subscription.
Just spoke to my parents. Uninterrupted subscribers since '73.
I called them right after canceling my own subscription and they’d already canceled theirs.
I hope Bezos is happy losing 51-year patrons of his paper.
Look, that’s honestly quite sad and very telling of the way things are, but I audibly snorted at the idea of Jeff Bezos noticing his income slightly lower this week, panicking, scrambling to find The Borbendorfs’ payment. A single tear wells up, but he wipes it away frantically. Never let them see. Never let them know how it hurts.
Yes, and that’s exactly the point, isn’t it?
There are some areas of business that are still built on trust and personal relationships and people trying to right by each other so they can each support their families.
But that’s not the case in modern politics or tech. It doesn’t matter if you have a relationship dating back decades. It’s inconsequential to a billionaire who’s earning a margin on an all the goods - and increasing share of which are brazenly counterfeit - that he sells globally.
Bezos doesn’t care about you, or me, or my aged parents. It’s not only that he doesn’t care about us, but instead that the billionaire class in general doesn’t care about anything besides contingencies to maximize profits and mitigate losses, real-world consequences be damned.
He will never notice any of us. It will not meaningfully affect his paycheck. It is up to each of us, including you, to determine whether to construct meaning in a symbolic act of protest, if an effectual act of protest is no longer an option.
I know. I know. I’m already a converted vegetarian or “bad at it vegan”. I’m spending a fortune on an EV car payment. My electricity is from a wind farm. I’m off all the socials. I’ve been recycling properly for decades and they tell me it was pointless. I’m getting pretty tired of personal responsibility. Can we do the guillotines now? I can’t make the first move. I’ve got kids and a mortgage. Start rounding them up and I can do some small part there too.
