I doubt Ashton and Mila apologized because they actually regret writing those letters; this is just damage control because they got caught defending a rapist. Also, Scientology isn't a religion, it's a criminal organization, and it ought to be treated as such.

I was disappointed to hear that Kurtwood Smith wrote a letter in support of Masterson too. I really liked him in RoboCop... but I guess there's a reason why he was so good at acting like a total bastard.

I think it's interesting how Trump cultists have been screaming for months that the DoJ should leave their guy alone, and look into Hunter Biden instead.

Turns out, they have been looking into him, and Hunter's going to enter a guilty plea. Because the DoJ can conduct multiple investigations simultaneously.

Sooo... Trump supporters should be happy now, right? Everyone can shut up about the Trump investigations being witch hunts?

Re-Logic (Terraria's developers) have already gone on record saying, "even if Unity were to recant their policy and statements, the destruction of trust is not so easily repaired.” That's the stance I think every developer should be taking. Unless you have a Unity game that can be released by the end of the year, all devs need to seriously consider switching engines.

As the article points out, the original lyric from American Idiot is, "I'm not a part of a redneck agenda." They changed it to, "I'm not a part of a MAGA agenda."

...Can this even be considered a significant change? It's more like a modernization of the original language. Whose agenda did they think Green Day was previously referring-- oh, right. They probably didn't do any research, did they? It's just manufactured outrage, so they can pretend that the left is just as vile as they are.

Looks interesting, but I gotta be honest: when I click on the Steam page and the first thing I see is a cash shop to buy "Epoch Points" for this early access game? That's an instant turn-off for me. I'm sure it's not as predatory as what Blizzard did with D4's monetization, but I don't want it in my games, period.

And her reasoning was, of all things, that the appointment of Special Counsel Jack Smith was illegal. I would have expected her to say that relocating the classified docs to Mar-a-Lago was an official act, done while Trump was still President, but no. She based this idiotic decision on even shakier legal ground. Doesn't this mean that the appointment of Special Counsel David Weiss was illegal too? Shouldn't Hunter Biden's conviction be expunged, based on Judge Cannon's logic here?

I don't expect impartiality from an outlet like Bloomberg, but it's important to point out that this isn't new relief, just a further step toward fixing a fundamentally broken program that was supposed to provide this relief years ago. Personally, I have nearly sixteen years of qualifying employment but still haven't had my loans forgiven due to mishandling by the companies, and deliberate sabotage of the program by Betsy DeVos.

I've been seeing a lot of low-effort content lately, and I suspect it's coming from users who want their Reddit alternative, and they want it now. So, they see that Beehaw has a large community, and decide it's a perfect place to start content-barfing.

I think the admins have been clear that they're not trying to create a replacement for Reddit here, though. Everything under the sun does not have to be re-posted, just content that you actually want to discuss with this community specifically. When I see five posts created by one user in under a minute, I can't help but think that the intent there is not to spark discussion. And, of course, the volume is problematic for the mods when they don't have the tools they need to manage it.

This was the right decision in 2023. Making it now, a month before the DNC, means they have completely circumvented the primary elections and robbed voters of their chance to select the nominee. We've gone from millions of people having a voice in the nomination process, to a group of less than ten thousand, and that is disenfranchisement on a massive scale.

Don't get me wrong, I would vote for a dead raccoon before I'd vote for Trump. But we deserve better than to have Trump's opponent hand-picked on our behalf like this. I'll vote for whoever that is, but we should absolutely give the Democrats hell once this is all over. The duopoly in our elections needs to end, if they can't be trusted to honor the basic fundamentals of the system.

As someone who has held a security clearance with the U.S. Federal government and has handled classified material as part of my official duties, I am reasonably confident in stating that the presence of golf shirts in a container holding classified documents is not sufficient to declassify said documents.

It's Florida, in the United States. The article is from a local news station, which is probably why they don't mention their own state. Sorry for the confusion!

It’s insane that Thomas is still a Supreme Court justice

Absolutely zero argument with you there.

You run the risk of being ostracized by a conservative social group if you share any opinion that contradicts the teachings of the church school. I'm straight, but the hicks I went to high school with shouted every homophobic slur they knew at me anyway, because my opinions sounded "gay" to them.

That being said, you could tell her that the church has held opinions in the past, which they decided to change when we learned more about the world. The church persecuted Galileo for suggesting that the Earth revolves around the Sun. They called Leonardo da Vinci a necromancer for studying human anatomy. And 98 years ago, Christians wanted to hang John Scopes for teaching evolution in Tennessee.

Basically, if you can't tell her directly, you can at least suggest that the church is not infallible when it comes to certain topics. Again though, people will consider you subversive even if all you're doing is relaying pure, historical facts. There's no safe way to contradict a zealot.

Andromeda is fine as long as you don't compare it to the core Mass Effect trilogy. Ryder is no Shepard, and none of your squadmates are as memorable as Garrus, Tali, Mordin and the rest. But take the game as its own thing, and it's a pretty good time.

My wife is a music nerd, so I asked her this question. Her answer: Summer Nights from "Grease". The entire song is perfect for what it is, except for the very last word. John Travolta switches to his falsetto range to sing the word "nights" in a style that reminds me of the Bee Gees, and it just doesn't fit with all the vocals that came before it. It's literally a sour note to end what's otherwise a perfectly good song.

There's no question in my mind that the oligarchs in the U.S. want to encourage racism and culture wars, in order to keep lower-class Americans at each others' throats rather than united against the bourgeoisie. It's also true that populist dictators have leveraged, and continue to leverage, anti-immigrant and other racist viewpoints in order win support and push their twisted ideologies on their entire country. Trump is, without question, an example of a would-be dictator who's in the pocket of billionaires and is appealing to Christofascists in hopes of going back to the White House in lieu of jail.

That being said, articles like these which insinuate that Trump's campaign is primarily about racism is a repetition one of the key, fatal mistakes that Hillary Clinton's campaign made in 2016. It's also not a good way of fixing the "us vs. them" environment that allows the oligarchs to keep thriving.

While it's hard for us to understand their motivations for doing so, some voters in the black, Latino and Asian communities still support him. It's irresponsible and short-sighted to pretend these voters don't exist, so it becomes necessary to concede that while many of Trump's supporters are indeed racist, there are still some legitimate ideological reasons why certain people continue to embrace conservatism. And if you actually want long-lasting change in this country, you have to engage with those people and not dismiss them as being just as deplorable as the rabid Trump cultists.

Granted, it's getting harder with each passing week to justify supporting Trump for non-racist reasons, as seen by the fact that some conservative influencers have started walking back support for him. That being said, there remains a perception (no matter how invalid) that Kamala Harris is an insider, a cog in an inherently corrupt political machine, while Trump is the guy who's going to drain the swamp. I know perfectly well that Trump is way more corrupt than Harris, but the 'drain the swamp' narrative sticks because some Democrats have been just as subservient to the oligarchs as Republicans. Even when they controlled the White House and Congress, they didn't undo the Reagan-era tax cuts for the wealthy, or cut the billions of dollars in spending on defense contractors, or pass any reforms that would make our government more accessible to non-elites (like term limits or ranked choice voting).

The status quo isn't working out too well for the majority of Americans, and the Democrats represent a continuation of that status quo. A lot of these disaffected Americans just want to see the system "shaken up" in hopes of seeing an improvement. The "vote them all out" sentiment is popular for a reason. Hopefully, those people realize we already gave Trump a chance in 2016, he didn't fix a damned thing, and it's not going to be any better for them if he gets a second term. However, Democrats in the U.S. (just like Labour in the U.K.) are going to have to deliver some significant improvements in the quality of life for the common folk instead of serving the oligarchs first and foremost. Otherwise, we're just going back to conservative leadership in a few years, and the next would-be dictator might be less incompetent than Trump was in staging a coup.

That reminds me of how my conservative uncle got really angry once, when I showed him one of my college papers. Started ranting about how it's a bunch of liberal indoctrination.

In fairness, the paper was left-aligned.

I only have a small amount of experience with generating images using AI models, but I have found this to be true. It's like making a photocopy of a photocopy. The results can be unintentionally hilarious though.

If Southern Baptists could ban male and female pastors, I would be so happy.

Interpol's legal team will take one look at Malaysia's request, laugh, and then respectfully decline to assist. They won't be wasting any of their resources on this.

Malaysia has no power to actually do anything about this, so I think they're just trying to use strong rhetoric to have a chilling effect on anyone who's thinking about making similar jokes.

Her seat is not in danger, but there's infighting over who will replace her. If Feinstein resigns, California's governor gets to appoint her replacement, and Gavin Newsom is likely to appoint a black woman if given the opportunity. Rumor has it that Nancy Pelosi wants Adam Schiff to replace Feinstein though, so she is pushing for the 90 year old Senator to finish her term.

Feinstein's caretaker also happens to be Pelosi's daughter. That's not a conflict of interest at all.

Thanks for all the info! It's especially helpful to know that naloxone/narcan is still recommended even if the fentanyl has been mixed with xylazine.

Russia could only find one tank for their World War II Victory Day parade, and Prigozhin is openly rebelling because they couldn't find enough ammo to supply the Wagner Group. The shortages have been obvious for a while now.

Nikki Haley's parents were Sikh immigrants, originally from Punjab. And she's calling for an increase in deportations. I don't get it, either.

Considering how well the Super Mario movie worked out for Illumination, I'm expecting to hear something about a new movie or short TV series. Maybe more Mario, maybe Legend of Zelda. In any case, there's no way Nintendo won't be going hard in that direction now that they see what a gold mine it is.

I refuse to believe this decision was influenced, in any way, by any actual consideration of the U.S. Constitution. There's no reasonable interpretation of that document which would provide sufficient justification to rule the relief plan unconstitutional. This was a political decision, pure and simple, by a government body that is supposed to be apolitical. Just like every other branch of government, the judiciary has become corrupted by billionaire donors and turned into a polarized mockery of its original intent. No wonder public opinion of the Supreme Court is in the toilet. They're no better than Congress these days.

I'll have to check that out. It can be hard enough to bring someone back from a fentanyl OD even with Narcan, so it's definitely concerning to think that xylazine could make it even harder.

Nothing wrong with that answer! Skyrim can even be played in 3rd person, and there are mods to make 3rd person combat more satisfying if you get it on PC.

I don't think there is a specific process for that outlined in NATO's treaty. However, Article 60 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties suggests a member country could commit a material breach of the treaty, if that nation that violated the principles of the treaty in a systematic and egregious manner. The decision to suspend or expel that nation would have to be a unanimous decision made by all other existing members.

There have been calls to suspend Turkey from NATO in the past, but there's no precedent for suspending a NATO member, and that's probably part of the reason why the member countries have been hesitant to do so. The U.S. in particular might not back the idea, since this would be very damaging to our diplomatic relations with Turkey in general. However, Hungary has been so pro-Russia lately that there may be a strong case for suspending them from NATO, and I don't believe they're seen as important as Turkey from a diplomatic standpoint, either. So, that's a possibility if they continue to block Sweden from joining.

There's a lot to unpack here, but I have similar concerns. If Lemmy becomes a refuge for people fleeing Reddit, how do we ensure that the toxic mods from Reddit don't simply bring the toxicity over here?

I won't name usernames, but I can think of a few specific ones that showed up on almost every sub's list of moderators who can just... fade away, along with Reddit itself. I'd be interested to know if there's a strategy in place to ensure there are no super moderators on Lemmy. Or at least, not on Beehaw.

The base game has improved considerably since launch, though it still lacks some promised content and performance will vary depending on your hardware. I have a PC with a Ryzen 7 and a RTX 2070, which can run the game well enough, but have not tried it on a machine with an AMD video card.

I think the base game might still be on sale and now might be a good time to pick it up for 50% off. Major updates will still be coming to the base game even if you don't buy Phantom Liberty... including vehicle combat, I believe.

The United States has very similar problems. The oppressed are encouraged to work within the system if they want things to change. They go to the system, and find it broken. So they protest, and the moment the protests turn violent-- or appear to turn violent-- the oppressed are labeled as being impatient or perhaps even deserving of being marginalized. Cries for freedom are willfully misinterpreted as the howling of barbarians, and used as populist propaganda.

Like you, I don't know what it's like to be treated like a second-class citizen in my own country, but I do know that racism doesn't go away simply because the government declares that it won't be tolerated. It's hard to come up with any specific solution to this particular problem though, when it's a conflict that humans have struggled with for their entire existence. Back in 2020, people were just trying to get the message out that black lives matter. Even when taken as a plea for solidarity with no specific policy demands, somehow that statement proved controversial.

I hadn't heard about those changes, but that's quite a relief. I hated traveling to individual ripperdoc clinics to snag all the best upgrades. Especially because the best cyberware for your frontal cortex can only be bought from a VDB ripper in Pacifica, and I didn't want to give those assholes any of my eddies.

Modding Skyrim is a rabbit hole that leads straight into the Mines of Moria. And the Balrog has opened an adult bookstore.

I wonder why the WP bothered to call it "New England floods" when the article only talks about one state in New England. New York is not part of New England, but half the article focuses on that state.

Okay, I think we're on the same page; we're just saying it two different ways. Trump and his core/inner circle are racist? Yes, agreed. There are low-income people who are voting against their best interests, and gutting education makes it even worse? Yes, also agreed.

The key point I'm trying to make is: it's not inherently the fault of these lower-income people that conservatives have actively tried to keep them stupid. Lumping these unlucky rubes in with the actual malefactors isn't helpful, it's just kicking them when they're already down.

Yep, Live Another Life is usually in my list too. I inevitably wind up downloading a mod that breaks the wagon scene, so it's a life saver.

I agree, BioWare does not need to be devoting its resources to SW:TOR at this point. It's been out for a good, long while and the fact is, MMORPGs are not big money-makers these days. There was a huge wave of them in the wake of WoW's success but none of them were able to achieve the kind of market success, player base or staying power of WoW. That ship has sailed, and it's only appropriate to let the BioWare devs get back to doing what they do best.

I don't have high hopes for the next Dragon Age game, but would love to be pleasantly surprised. They've changed directions so many times during the development of that game, so I'm expecting the end result to be a mess. Mass Effect gives me slightly more hope as a possible return to form for BioWare though, if they learn from Andromeda's missteps and focus on what made the original trilogy (particularly the first two games) great.

Thanks for the reply! I think limiting the number of communities that a given user can moderate is a great policy.

True, and they wanted to keep religion out of government because they had just won independence from the monarchy that established the "Church of England". They knew how problematic it was when the head of state is also the head of the church. Separation of church and state protects both entities; mixing them de-legitimizes both. Modern evangelicals seem to have forgotten that.