CMahaff

@CMahaff@lemmy.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨lemm.ee is shutting down at the end of this month⁩ ⁨⁨3⁩ ⁨days⁩ ago⁩:

  Yeah, every time there is a post on the topic, moderators say that the tools they have are insufficient.

  It’d be great to have some community focus on that going forward, whether through direct Lemmy changes or creating better bot mod tools. I’m not in a position to contribute right now but maybe in a few months.

  There is a subset of Lemmy that absolutely hates any idea of automod tools because it reminds them too much of issues they had with Reddit. But as Lemmy grows (and given it’s volunteer nature) it feels inescapable at some point.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Just discovered Mini Metro, a puzzle game where you have to create metro lines. Very addictive, but also chill, and currently 50% off on Steam⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Doesn’t look like it’s on sale, at least in the US

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Has the USA turned into an oligarchy?⁩ ⁨⁨5⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Well in 2015 Jimmy Carter said that the United States is "just an oligarchy, with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or to elect the president. And the same thing applies to governors and U.S. senators and congress members. "

  That same year The Economist’s Democracy Index downgraded the United States to a “flawed democracy” and it has continued to trend downwards since then.

  If you’re looking for something more recent, Bernie Sanders is saying the same thing: “We are moving rapidly into an oligarchic form of society. Never before in American history have so few billionaires, so few people, have so much wealth and so much power”.

  So between the massive (and growing) income inequality in the country, and rulings like Citizen’s United it’s hard not to believe it’s not at least on the trajectory towards an oligarchy. Now throw in the blatantly corrupt picks of the Trump administration, where cabinet positions are favors to rich friends, or being given to billionaires with a direct interest in killing the government agency they are running - not to mention all the things he’s routinely done / will do to enrich himself / friends with tax payer dollars and it certainly seems like an oligarchy to me.

  And just on a personal vibes level, living here, it feels like legislation to help normal people or solve normal people’s problems is almost non-existent. And when it does happen, it also conveniently throws a ton of money at the rich at the same time (see recent tax cuts, pandemic relief funds, etc.). Even something like the Affordable Care Act, which did a ton of net good things for this country, enriched a whole lot of private healthcare companies along the way rather than creating an actual public option with negotiated prices to keep government costs down.