The DOJ is not an independent branch though. It’s part of the executive branch.

Structurally, no. In spirit it is. That’s why 75% of the DOJ left over 2025, because they do not want to deal with the eventual fallout of how Trump is managing this DOJ. It’s not a case they are confident they will get out of cleanly (with their license to practice law).

To me this is one of the biggest flaws of the constitution

Yes, the constitution was kept small on purpose and a lot was left to the honor system. Under the logic that a truly tyrannous leadership could tear it down no matter how many loopholes it tries to close. Was that the right call? I can’t really say.

These can be interpreted as contradictory statements.

Sure, if you never worked at a large structure. They are professionals who talk. They are not intimate nor buddy-buddy with each other.

And they’re the same branch. That’s the point.

The same way Congress has various agencies it delegates powers to, yes. You are very technically correct.

Like those agencies, the DOJ is a non-partisan part of the otherwise partisan executive branch whose job is to represent the US in its court cases. It is not the president’s personal law firm.

but I was speaking to the specific statement.

I’m speaking generally. Becsuse this specific situation is so sleazy and utterly corrupt that it’s barely even worth analysis. But for those who don’t know: no, this is not normal, business as usual.

Part of that is the power of government subsidized high fructose corn syrup, yeah. It’s in a lot of American food and makes a huge difference in pricing healthy vs highly processed foods.

Your lack of conviction disgusts me

. I would expect if a President had a legitimate concern that they would voice that concern to the AG to investigate

Yes. The branches communicate with each other, but ultimately work independently except for very specific sync points. Or if one branch needs to check and balance another.

That is very different from meeting up with an AG for a private meeting. Let alone the conflict of Interest of being the president’s personal lawyer. This isn’t normal.

promising not to ever do it would just get them in hot water later down the road.

Yes, I’m sure it will for Todd. Much later than I wish, but later down the road indeed.

Wish I could do that for the Switch. Or hell my dang TV remote. I never press that Netflix button on purpose. Hell, it seems manufactured to press those streaming buttons whenever I drop the remote.

I think you jumped the gun when you tried to compare this to losing elections. You kinda lost your ground to be sarcastic about how you’re responding to some dude making a hot take.

https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Relative-Privation

If we only drink soda, 45 gallons sounds disastrously small. Since we’re supposed to drink at least 64 Oz of water a day (or a gallon). We can’t possibly be that dehydrated.

Ehh, it’s still liquid at the end of the day. We going to call beef a luxury because chicken or tofu has more nutritional value (I do not know if this is true. This is just a random theoretical).

You’re not wrong. But by that logic water based products would be cheaper. Which it sadly isn’t. Often the contrary.

The US very rarely uses price to incentivize good practices and vice versa.

For a 12 oz/300ml? Yeah, that gets into crazy territory.

But we’re in crazy land right now. My local Walmart? 8.50 for a 12 pack. 70 cents a can, so not full loony. But a far cry from this picture a decade ago with under 20 cents a can.

Bro. The kids are alright. Not pristine perfect beings who will being about a new era of prosperity.

Besides, why you putting it on “the kids discovered vaping”? That sounds like something a billionaire would say to deflect from the huge lobbying campaign they made to distinguish vapes from cigarettes.

with about as much irrational hate as the people they despise, like Trump.

Thanks for outing yourself. Makes it easy to just skip the conversation and not bother trying to open up a conversation made in bad faith.

I don’t think this is an argument. OP has a personal vendetta with a high pfofile figure and telling him to “calm down we need him” doesn’t remove that betrayal. He wasn’t even disagreeing with the reply. Just asserting what we all already know in that Jeffries does not have the people’s priorities in mind.

Him not being as bad as a literal nazi isn’t a high bar to meet.

For those who do not know history; it was once a huge scandal for Clinton to be seen talking with the AG. 16 years after he was president. Those so concerned about “her emails” would know this well.

And that’s not even going into “Nannygate” if you want a small rabbit hole to go down. A very tame controversy that would be cast off as a “nothing burger” today as I’m sure Trump’s cabinet have had controversies every other day at this point.

This is all to say that: no, this is not normal. It is not normal for the DoJ to be so closely affiliated with the executive branch. And watch the hypocrisy when the US magically rememberes this after Trump leaves.

You don’t see the contradiction in those two concepts?

No, not really.

I was hoping you’d take a look and figure it out but let me explain, and hope you get it.

Why would I when you didn’t give me the same grace? from what I said upstream

I just want to make sure we make distinctions between general ideas and why we actually hate the concept in the modern day.

Well here we are arguing definitions and ideas and not the reasons within these modern ads are oppressive. Not talking about the algorithmic nature of mass surveillance and privacy breaches needed to power modern ads, but “no this ad is different” surface level thinking. But if you want to talk about it, so be it.

‘Telling someone to come to your house’ specifies someONE to whom you are directing the invitation

Okay. make it a group you’re at. Throw a flyer on a telephone pole. Same deal. We had ads before the interet.

You are trying to combine two contradictory levels of specificity.

I don’t think the levels change the intent and definition of an ad. You want to tell people about a thing, you use something to tell them thing.

You can’t prove it was scrapped, and you can’t stop it.

That’s literally why Cara exists. Makes it easier to prove it was scraped and harder for AI to profit off the data it scapes.

The friction is the key.

Yeah, and for most people they won’t be bolting their windows and investing in bulletproof glass. A lock is enough detterent. I see sites like Cara as a lock in your metaphor and you’re worried it’s not good enough.

I was thinking in a different dimension and thinking more about community and control. That isn’t something feasible to replicate in the physical world, and its not something we inevitably have to reliquish to billionaire corporations. Community is something you build and cultivate, not something that needs a million dollar investment.

I think the fallacy is artists believe they need an gigantic amalgamation of online people exposed to their art, a large fraciton of the internet.

If you’re a professional, you do. more exposure is more leverage for deals that will pay you. more views correlates with more funding for your paid works, or crowdfunding, or commissions, etc. That’s just how stiff competition is. There’s an old school rule of getting 1000 “true fans” to pay you 100 dollars a year in order to make a good living. Well, we’re in an age where even 10 million impressions may not convert into 1000 true fans. That’s why reach is so important.

Its always been rough being an artist. The kind of rough simply evolved overtime.

Can’t have one’s cake and eat it.

Sure we can. You don’t need to either use Instagram or never use the net. That’s precisely what Cara is for. Promote open source tooling and use friendly communities that don’t promise to scrape your life’s work.

Now how we deal with mass scrapers downloading images; that’s a legal issue. One that even physical venues isn’t immune to (it just adds a lot of friction).

You either post online, where people can and will do stuff you don’t like with your content, or you keep it private.

I think there’s a difference between “this person took a few images and edited them” and “I scraped an entire website to use for training AI slop”.