#political ish

[ml-image]

politic ish, cont.

from, with apologies

what percent of cost should be profit?

Does a dollar amount of profit mean anything... i stole $50 or i made it from my organic farm... i made $50?

The US isn't capitalist, it corporatist. rarely has it been "las a faire" /free for all capitalism so demonized.

Are corporations and capitalism bad or grotesquely misshapen by constants? Who is voting those in? My congress person clearly isn't the problem... right

Listening to counter augments and explaining to yourself why they're wrong is the best thing you can do to strengthen your own :

Thomas Sowell on the Myths of Economic Inequality

more independent thinking, Harris econ talk @ 11min+

[sanyu-thewitch05]

Called it back on January 14th!

And to the 100 people on the poll, from the way things are going, it looks like you might’ve chosen correctly.

Link to the poll even though you can’t vote. But just as proof.

[dietmimo]

The Ex.

Contrary to popular belief, they still get along well.

[finleyforevermore]

Listening to the 1993 proshot version of the finale from Cabaret while on the bus ride to school.

Right as Emcee says, "Where are your troubles now?", I saw a house with a Trump flag in front of it.

Where are my troubles? Right in front of my fucking face and all around me.

[atopvisenyashill]

Thoughts on the Alysanne is Maegor's daughter AU? I feel like it has some interesting potential, and it vastly recontextualizes different parts of Jaehaehae (I do not like him sjsjsjs) and Alysanne's relationship (such as Jaehaehae's treatment of their daughters) but I wanna hear what you think about it!

I’ve touched on this a bit before but since you actually want to hear my thoughts, allow me to present to you my Jaehaerys Is The Goddamn Worst, And Alysanne Annoys Me Too: An Essay lmao but my answer is basically “yeah all of what you just said.”

I think it makes Alysanne much more palatable (to me) as a character because as she stands, she just fixates on forcing her daughters through these fucked up marriages at too young an age bc it traumatized her to be married and pregnant at 15 too but she’d never admit that being a willing participant in her own kidnapping by her brother-husband was the single worst thing that ever happened to her, and because Alysanne doesn’t want to admit it (and Jaehaerys would never see it as wrong or a mistake) F&B really shies away from delving into the fact that Alysanne is as deranged of a mother as Cersei is. So as she stands, she’s very flat to me because she’s presented very flatly and inconsistently. She’s so in love with Jaehaerys, she’s maritally raped by Jaehaerys, she’s a loving and doting mother, she forces her daughters into marriages when they’re the same too young age she was, she accuses her teenage girls of being scheming whores then gets angry when her husband accuses their teenage girls of being scheming whores, and worst of all we are just told “Maegelle tells them to make up so they do” so we don’t know why Alysanne gets over all of this. What is the point of riding a dragon when you never use that dragon to protect your daughters from unwanted teen marriages? We’re just not given a good enough justification for why her behavior is so weird and frustrating towards her daughters.

Make her Maegor’s daughter though…most of her behavior as an adult makes more sense. Like a worse version of Rhaenyra’s childhood almost - a father desperate for a son, but lowkey obsessed with his daughter, who makes all his hang ups about his parents the problems of every woman around him, except Maegor is out here blood sacrificing and torturing and starting wars and forcing babies on wives he discards quickly and brutally. Then here comes Jaehaerys on a white horse green dragon to save her from the horror her life has become, and he loves her so much he runs away with her even though Alyssa says they shouldn’t marry because people won’t like it. And they have beautiful children, and a beautiful marriage, and build a beautiful kingdom.

Then her pregnancies start getting dangerous. Gaemon, then Valerion, die. Alysanne thinks of the shriveled up mutants she called brothers, if Maegor’s taint has passed to her. Her perfect husband ignores her no, and forces Gael on her. Alysanne remembers that he said nothing to Rogar when Alyssa died, merely wept. Then her daughters start to die. Daella, Alyssa, Viserra, all within a few years. Then Jaehaerys makes Saera watch as he murders her boyfriend, calls her a whore, and says Alysanne cannot follow Saera to Lys. Alysanne thinks of Maegor torturing the Harroways over Alys’ presumed infidelity. Jaehaerys says he’s sorry, and her daughter badgers her into forgiving him, and she remembers how she helped Jaehaerys badger Alyssa into forgiving Rogar. Not two years later, Jaehaerys passes over Rhaenys. Alysanne thinks of how she was never enough for her father, how she felt so superior to Rhaena banished to Dragonstone and resented by Aerea, yet there she is dragging Gael away from court because she can’t stand to be with Jaehaerys. How her father was surrounded by dead women and dead babies and how Jaehaerys is surrounded by his own dead daughters, but surely she did the right thing, surely Maegor was worse, surely the realm is better off? Is he right to pass over Rhaenys? Is she enabling a man just as monstrous as her father? She will never decide, because Maegelle will guilt her about keeping Gael isolated at Dragonstone, and Alysanne will do as she’s told, just like Rhaena, and Alyssa, and Jeyne, Elinor, Ceryse, Alys, and Tyanna, just like every one of her daughters.

I do get why Alysanne is Alyssa & Aenys’ and not Maegor’s. The weird Targ babies, the line not descending from Visenya, Jaehaerys and Alysanne being held up as the perfect Targaryen couple specifically because they are brother and sister and dragon riders. I do even think canon Alysanne is likely traumatized by her time as a hostage on Dragonstone, and the ensuing war, and the trauma bond that caused with Jaehaerys, and it makes her idolize Jaehaerys, and then he isolates her at Dragonstone so he can swiftly and safely marry, groom, and knock her up. It’s not like,,,, a fun time, and it’s enough to make anyone crazy and weird about their daughters, but I think having her father be Maegor makes Alysanne herself much deeper because it gives her, as the most beloved Targaryen queen, a blood tie to the most hated Targaryen king, and a marriage to the most beloved Targaryen king. It fits better with a lot of the themes of the main series (again, imo) - forcing the spotlight on the outsiders to see how the affect the story from behind the scenes. The fall of Aegon’s sons, and The Long Reign, not told from the PoV or to serve the PoV of any of the kings or princes, but of the queen that tied them all together.

[ruby-red-inky-blue]

Post hoc ergo propter hoc

A con of being friends with the White House Press Secretary, Jyn finds, is that the good-natured hazing in front of the rest of the press room goes on for far too long. Another is that Leia will absolutely not take no for an answer on the “mandatory tour”, even though she clearly doesn’t have time for it, going by the four aides that immediately besiege her as soon as they step out of the press room.

Jyn is sure there will be pros as well, but she hasn’t found any so far.

“Leia, Draven wants you in his office in half an hour about the HUD thing,” says the last of the aides, jogging to keep up with them.

“Thank you, Kate,” Leia says without stopping, her arm still firmly linked with Jyn’s. “I’m just going to finish the tour for Miss Erso here. She’s my latest charge, she took over for Hal.”

“Oh!” The aide smiles brightly and shakes her hand. “Congratulations, ma’am,” she says and disappears down a corridor.

“Four people have called me ma’am today.”

“Get used to it. This is the White House, it’s like a reflex.”  Leia stops to delegate some more important press secretary business in the next office over – Jyn gathers it’s the Communications Office – then returns to scoop her up again and drag her down another hallway.

“You haven’t shown me a thing, Leia.”

“Well, that was Kleya Marki’s office, and down there’s the mess, that’s always important –“

Jyn has a sudden realization followed by a horrible, sinking feeling. “Leia, please tell me we’re not –“

Too late. Leia has spotted her prey at the end of the corridor, and pulls her towards him, smiling brightly and heels unmistakably loud on the polished floor.

“Cassian!”

Oh God. “Leia, come on, he’s busy. It’s my first day, he can –“

“Nonsense, he just looks busy. He always looks busy.” She grabs Jyn by the sleeve and drags her further down the hall. “Cassian, meet the new Post correspondent!”

Jyn stumbles along, feeling like an absolute fool for falling for Leia’s whole spiel and letting herself be dazzled by the West Wing of it all – and for knowing the guy she was stupidly, wildly in love with in college and then left without a word now worked in this building, and still putting off preparing what the fuck she would do when she actually met him again until, well… right now.

The man who has stopped at the end of the hall is in a fairly rumpled suit, carrying a stack of files and looks achingly familiar even from afar. For half a breath, she’s standing in some Yale hallway and is about to run to catch up with him and probably do something silly like try and tackle the papers out of his hands – and then she’s back in the West Wing and they’re all ten years older and successful, serious people again. And she’s back to wondering if he still knows her name. Or if he hates her. And which would be worse.

After a beat, he turns around and walks towards them, with a spooked look on his face like he, too, briefly tripped over ten years of baggage – or, of course, like he’s trying to place someone who looks vaguely familiar. Then something, probably the lawyer in him, takes over, and he fixes an easy, warm smile on his face. She always liked his smile. He looks older, and even more tired than he used to – naturally, he’s Deputy Chief of Staff to the president – but still, he looks good. His hair looks as soft as she remembers, which is a deeply unhelpful thought.

“Jyn.”

She feels stupidly relieved. “You do remember me.”

An offended frown pulls at his eyes. She always did like those, too. They’re such a nice brown, it doesn’t translate on pictures.

“Of course I remember you.”

(To be fair, it probably is insulting to assume he’d forget a girlfriend he had for seven months, but still. He’s busy, and at least it would mean he couldn't hate her for disappearing overnight and never picking up the phone again.) Jyn opens her mouth, closes it again, feels herself blush.

“He keeps your Baba O’Reily piece on his bookshelf, you know,” Leia says with a grin, still holding on to Jyn’s jacket like she’s scared she’ll try and make a run for it. The thought has occurred to her.

“Very funny, Leia,” Cassian says curtly and makes a vague gesture down the hallway. “I… I’d love to – I have the Secretary of Labor waiting, so –“

“It’s fine, I know you’re –”

“We should catch up, though,” he says absent-mindedly, sorting through his stack of files before adding, with a quick look up at her: “Off the record.”

“Right.”

“Maybe just come by my office before you leave, if you’re free,” he says, fiddling with the files that are starting to slip. “I’ll be here, and uh, marginally less busy.”

“Okay, yeah. Sure.”

“Great. Um - congratulations, Jyn, on the – I have to go.”

“Yeah.”

Leia watches him dart off, smirking. “So, you two are really over that whole thing, huh?”

[keep reading on Ao3!]

[princesssarcastia]

i really hate reading them 99% of the time because they're so hard to do well. and because everyone else usually focuses on the things i find least interesting about it.

but it's sooooo fun to imagine what your favorite characters would do as feudal lords. it's a fascinating question: what would this character do with unlimited executive and probably military power over an area of land and its people? people who depended on them? would they be a good ruler? a bad one? would they take it seriously? do their inherent qualities make them better suited to that role than the modern era? or are they truly a product of the time and place they come from?

because I'm me, this thought exercise is a chance to daydream about "what if I held a gun to this character's head and forced them to get involved in politics?", really.

on one end of the scale you have anakin skywalker, who would....not....have done well as emperor, or frankly as any kind of feudal lord. maybe don't give him more power over life and death, or taxes, or food supplies. maybe don't.

on the other end of the scale, you have jed bartlet, who i truly believe would have been more comfortable with unilateral authority and a divine mandate. somebody make that man a king. let his staff profess their undying devotion to him on their knees, the way they so desperately, secretly wish they could in canon. i feel like it would Fix Them. Leo McGarry wants soooooo badly to swear his sword to Jed. you know it in your heart to be true.

[rtc-obsessed-gworlie]

I might loose followers for this, but if Trump wins this election, I might not live to see 14.

[lazyveran]

Heyyyy how is it going? I had a question about the political marriage au.

You talked about how jealous katara is of tylee, is it because tylee is azula’s ex (or even someone azula had intimate relationship with)? Or cause tylee is a tease and clingy to azula but azula is oblivious cause it’s tylee she had always been like this.

How is the relationship between tylee and azula in your au?

Thanksss for this amazing au I can’t wait to read the fic.

SO. i have many thoughts on this. my personal fun time hc characterisation for ty lee is that she's kind of (insanely incredibly) toxic when it comes to attention seeking and personal relationships. my idea of ty lee is that she endlessly chases attention - any attention, good or bad - and drops anything and everything once she thinks she's not getting enough/losing/getting bored of said attention. however she IS locked in for life to her childhood friendships with azula, mai and zuko because they afford her the only stability she's ever really had. essentially, shes co-dependant on the group and a toxic, flaky attention-seeker. i LOVE her and her insane brain.

NOW. the way that relates to the azutara au is that ty lee is highkey annoyed azula now has a wife that's taking up her time and emotional investment. very rude. she's grown up with azula and has this possessive attachment to her and to the INTENSE devotion and attention azula gives ty lee (yipeee emotional issues!!). azula is pretty much used to ty lee being like this, it's just one of her normal quirks like auras and whatnot, so she doesnt bat an eye at it. oh ty lee is hanging off her arm directly in front of her wife? that ty lee, she's so silly!

i think im leaning more on the idea they had this really super intense friendship as children (in love with each other and never realised it/said anything) and that kind of carried on/morphed into this strange, a-little-too-close-for-best-friends situation as adults.

katara has to watch in excrutiation as ty lee teases and goads (poking to get attention) while azula defends the damn woman because "this is just how ty lee is" as in she's EMOTIONALLY DUMB and can't see the very obvious weird ass dynamic they have. katara gains a fun new sixth sense called *detect when ty lee is being weirdly intimate with azula* as a result. its very effective

[klavierpanda]

I've seen a few people complaining that the UK politics tag is full of jokes and I just... Have you never heard of satire? That comic of the people in a train station is satire about the closure of ticket halls in the UK.

Also maybe people don't want to be serious all the time, maybe they want to post satirical shit because they're mad that the government is full of clowns who are so out of touch from the people that it's unreal.

And I don't see any complaints about all the memes made from Trump's mugshot coming from the same people. Are they not also joking about something that is serious?

[ml-image]

Politic ish, Apologies

from, with apologies

deeper than the question

[kitausuret]

There's something interesting I've realized about the concept of a "living wage" in the US that has only really occurred to me since I got a better job that.. you know, pays a living wage. (Just for the sake of what I mean, I earn over $20 USD/hr, I work full time, and I live in Nebraska. My partner is the same as far as wages.)

This fall, my partner and I got our first house. It's 3 bedrooms, 2 bath, small but finished basement. It took a lot of negotiation and stress but with the help of an A+ realtor and loan expert, we got it. Yay!

Now, we were used to paying rent, but paying a mortgage was going to be almost double. This was fine, we could afford it. While we recover financially from some things we had to do (replace a deck, fix a cracked pipe, you know the usual) we have been a little more careful about our spending. Even with that though, we're still able to get groceries and eat at a restaurant once a week and buy holiday gifts for our friends and families. It might be a couple years until we can shell out for a little vacation, but that's okay.

My point here though is that... this is what it should be like for everyone. A two-income household should be able to get a decent little house and have a few fun luxuries and still have enough in savings if you need an emergency car or home repair or veterinarian bill or the like. A living wage needs to be more than just a roof over your head and food on your table. You should be able to invest in things that make you happy (like a nice bike or video game console) and things that make life easier (like a toaster oven or snowblower).

We both work desk jobs. It's stressful but we can work from home and that also saves money. But for everyone in every kind of job, or even if you can't work, you should still be able to live. And that's why it's important to support higher wages, better disability support, and universal basic income. Everyone deserves the opportunity to be happy and feel safe and secure.

So when you see local petitions out to raise the minimum wage, when you see workers striking for an income they can actually live on, and when you see measures that will help people on the ballot, remember that when you support them, things DO change for the better.

[elegantmarigold]

The conversation between Gwen and Sam at the end of the episode is going to haunt my nightmares. Like, WHAT IS THIS CONVERSATION?? Somehow this is the exchange that sticks with me possibly the most so far because the vibes are so discordant, that's the only way I can describe it. These are two people who are being miserable near each other and against each other but not at each other. They are sliding past each other, both separately having a *very* bad time and neither stopping to communicate at all about it.

[technicolor-swarm-of-bees]

can confirm that Kigali has a bopping queer scene, although it's still a bit sketchy to be publicly out and even more iffy in rural areas. according to Kagame,

"[the LGBT community] hasn’t been our problem. And we don’t intend to make it our problem.”

(citation is the first link I found bc I remembered the quote but not the source. there are more reliable sources than the RT in general)

(requisite disclaimer that I'm not expressing any kind of support for PK in general, bc as people are noticing now and as we've seen for decades, the man is definitely not the all around peace- and democracy-loving leader he's been made out as, but I will say that it's better to be queer there than in any of the immediately surrounding countries)

Same-sex laws in Africa.

Legal status of consensual same-sex activity

[dewvorce-flowers]

Have seen it on twitter but not here. Reminder to cancel your Oilers+ subscription, if you have one and send a mail to their support team at support@oilersplus.com why you cancelled.

[kindred-spirit-93]

THIS IS EPIC: Polyphemus

dangit im 13 seconds in and look what the winions made me do:

sorry for the bad quality lol. humor is how i cope with impending doom :')