Charlie Kirk, a key Trump ally who joined Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., on a trip to Greenland this week, argued on his podcast Wednesday that it was imperative for the U.S. to control Greenland … “It is the resurrection of masculine American energy. It is the return of Manifest Destiny,” said Kirk (Source)

These fucking people. It’s really men like this, with their idiotic ideas of masculinity, who make the world as miserable as it is.

Apart from the whole being part of the USA thing. That’s insane. I just hope Canada’s right wing are not so craven as to want to sell out their country, but I don’t trust them.

“I’ve talked to so many governors and congresspeople and senators and never once did they say Canada is the problem,” Ford told CNN. He emphasized that a bilateral deal between Canada and the U.S. would be a better solution than imposing tariffs on Canadian goods.

I’m no fan of Doug Ford, but he’s right here. I guess Trump’s plan is to drive Canada into the ground economically through tariffs then invade or otherwise annex Canada when it’s too poor and desperate to resist. But why? It would be more profitable to both the USA and Canada simply not to do any of this. There are only two explanations I can think of:

1. Belligerence is the only thing Trump understands, even when it works to his own disadvantage, because actual diplomacy is too complicated for him and soft power contains the word “soft”, and/or
2. Trump isn’t working for the interests of the USA, but rather for those who want to see NATO and other Western alliances destroyed.

I don’t think Canadians would have a problem with taking on Minnesota.

They just keep voting for him, or not voting against him. Get it together Ontario!

Society invests in the education of its people, and the return is a general benefit to society from its people being more educated. It is not necessary for every single individual to give something tangible and obvious back in order for society to benefit from an educated populace. If you apply the criterion that every individual must give something back, it always turns into a requirement that they give back something tangible, usually money or labour, and the next step is to abolish education in philosophy, the arts, and possibly the more theoretical or exploratory parts of science. The result of this is an impoverished society, not an enriched one.

For it to be a good deal for society to pay for education there only needs to be on balance a benefit to society. That leaves room for the arts and all kinds of human curiosity and creativity that doesn’t yield an immediate tangible benefit. We contribute together, not individually, and some contributions are very indirect. Still, societies benefit from the arts, philosophy, and people with curiosity. And this system can tolerate some people not contributing anything much at all. The investment is in quality of life for the society as a whole.

The clue is in the term “Human Resources”. I can’t believe people just accept the existence of this phrase.

Yes, it wouldn’t have occurred to me until I saw this sign.

Republicans have only threatened to invade Mexico, Canada and the UK so far, with a few days to go yet until they take power. They’re basically pacifists.

Edit: Oh, and Panama.

Is Fetterman still left-leaning? I heard he had gone Trumpy.

Maybe what I’m doing right now? I mean, it could be.

Up you go, and soon it will.

Agreed and proboosted.

The difference between taxes and fees is really just that the first is cheaper and goes to people who aren’t incentivized to pocket the money while providing the worst service they can get away with. If you push a libertarian to explain their story in detail, there always comes a point where they introduce government and taxes but try to call it something else.

They don’t have any idea how cost-effective taxes are, compared to paying private companies individually for every single shared resource. It’s the same for healthcare, education, etc.: to pay the government for a decent nonprofit service is always better value.