I've been exercising and dieting again and so far I've lost 10 pounds, hoping to lose 10 more by new years - I'm gonna be down for 2 weeks in november for a tonsillectomy but it is what it is i screwed up the meniscus in my right knee when i was 16 and it's been giving me a little grief lately, but I'm just ignoring it for now and keeping at exercising and stretching until it starts interfering with anything important. i figure it'll be with me for the rest of my life and I'll be damned if i have surgery on it until I'm old and grey, so the only way out is through
Not much to report this week. A board game I played as a kid and still play versions of that's been out of print for a long time has, as of yesterday, been re-released and heavily updated. Decided to get it since the old version is at my parents house and then we can have it out here too -- https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/mrbgames/empire-builder-europe Otherwise, just anxious about the election but nothing new. If you didn't see it, this is worth a short watch
Well, first things first. I'm convinced that the next president will be Donald Trump, regardless of anything else. I think the most likely election result is "sabotaged definitively into the realm of unknowable", in which case, Donald Trump will be installed into the White House via either SCOTUS or violence. I find this quite upsetting, actually. So for the first time since 2020, I splurged. I've ordered about $600 in exotic lighting in the last 24 hours. No need to describe, you will see in the coming months. Got lots of travel coming up. DC, Paris, and Princeton over the next few months. LA last month was fantastic, professionally, but Santa Monica pier was.. well, if you're a local, you're already laughing. It was quick! It was quick. Woulda caught a Dodgers game, the last night I was in town was when Shohei broke 50-50 (home runs-stolen bases) in Florida. Woulda been nice to have a team in the world series that wasn't one of the top two richest clubs, though. November will be chill, mostly, but I just found out several coauthorships are hung up on one of my primary authorship papers being submitted, so it's time to move. It's a good problem to have.
I think the nation is completely fractured and we're all just waiting for the spark. Ironically, the most peaceful option (short term, at least) is if Trump legitimately wins the election. And we'll know if it's a legitimate win or not. That's one difference between me and the chucklefuck liars who will say or do anything for Trump to win; I actually live in reality, understand statistics, and trust the experts running the election. They'll tell us if it's been sabotaged beyond a knowable result. I'm just worried that's where we're headed, particularly in Pennsylvania. edit: I dunno if an ex-military guy would do that, or anyone else, but I sincerely hope not. Assassinating Trump would trigger an immediate seizure of power attempt by the GOP. Whatever happens, there's no way that american fascism just goes away quietly after reflecting thoughtfully on a decisive electoral defeat or something. I'm sorry, that's not happening. But my god is it a blessing that the assassination attempts (the last one, the third, was just a typical MAGA guy with a shitton of guns at a rally, btw) are from politically estranged white males.
necrop... has previously remarked that bongino is pretty representative of SS. That made me feel bad. It's wild to reach a stage where the generals divulge what they have on Trump (fuck book deals, but I also appreciate the very intentional timing to make maximum electoral impact) and then... nobody's mind measurably changed. Polls even suggest modest Trump gains since. Seems like it's later in the game than a lot of people thought.
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on what "sabotaged definitively into the realm of the unknowable" might look like. I assume there are bipartisan observers and scrutineers at all ballot counting locations. "sabotaged definitively into the realm of the unknowable" is the sort of claim I'd expect the Republicans to make in the event of it becoming apparent that they've lost.
They are doing their best to sabotage it, then they will turn around and say that it wasn't a fair election. Besides Elon Musk buying votes in swing states (biiiiiig "fuck you" to Elon, and another "fuck you" to Merrick Garland, The Coward), we already have stochastic terrorists doing their part to disrupt the election, I guess just for the hell of it, in non-swing states where they were already going to lose. Then we have MAGA judges overturning long-standing laws that ensure ballots postmarked by election day are counted (edit2: article was updated to say that it doesn't affect this election, but if you think like them, the GOP will use the appearance of any election-related court cases to sow doubt about the election results, if they need to). Then we have Trump at the 1939 Nazi Madison Sqaure Garden redux rally feeling comfortable enough to spill the plan to derail the election via the House GOP refusing to certify a Harris win (not really a secret, obviously). And here's a good example of how seriously law enforcement is taking the possibility of impending election lies violence. I could go on and on, surely to no one's surprise, but I'll spare you. Chaos benefits the GOP. They will escalate the chaos between now and January 20th. Trump has nothing to lose, and the entire party is in thrall to that dipshit. Everything has to go right for Harris to take the white house. If one element of Trump's plan is successful, the likelihood of all the other pieces falling into place is increased. And if he legit wins? Obviously that's it. No one will be organizing en masse to prevent a Trump certification. It's asymmetrical warfare. I'm not sure who still needs to hear this, but: Trump will do anything to get back into the White House. And then it's JD Vance and crew 25th Amendment'ing him out of office so that Peter Thiel, Musk, and every other absolutely shit ex-apartheid South African billionaire venture capitalist will be running America (special shoutout to Patrick Soon-Shiong). Btw, Elon Musk is a fucking Nazi. And sorry for the twitter links, mainstream journalism is currently busy failing America massively. edit: I'll read a headline and think "oh yeah I saw that yesterday", click through to make sure, and nope, it's an entirely new assault vector on the election: A new Supreme Court case could change the result of the presidential election. It is all coming down to Pennsylvania, and maybe Michigan. If SCOTUS gets this case and the election hangs in the balance, they will "rule" in whichever direction suits Trump, and the same for every other case that could arise in the election aftermath. Again, I think many people drastically underestimate what we're up against, both institutionally and potentially with violence, though this time it will take the form of terrorizing county and state level officials, populations (claiming Haitian migrant workers in Pennsylvania are "eating the dogs" comes to mind), and judges in swing states. Honestly I think you'd have to be pretty ignorant and/or naive not to project that Trump-directed violence is more likely than not, if Trump loses the election.