#the council of daves

[kawoid]

~~(8:>

[gretchenzellerbarnes]

"anakin would've never turned to the dark side had qui gon lived." utter. bullshit. not only is this particular hot take an insult to obi-wan it completely robs anakin of his agency, because at the end of the day it was anakin's decision to pledge his loyalty to palpatine and to destroy everything that the people he loved held dear. that's what makes anakin skywalker such a compelling character, and as darth vader a tragic and iconic villian... because he did this to himself.

[incorrect-hs-quotes]

DAVE: what do we want? 

DAVE: time travel

DAVE: when do we want it? 

DAVE: doesnt matter does it

[kanansdume]

In all of the discussions about Ahsoka being called a "former Jedi Knight" in the opening crawl, I am remembering that Felony recently did that interview where he claimed that Luke Skywalker was not TECHNICALLY a Knight because no one ever officially knighted him, and uh.

Hm. The hypocrisy is just... so pungent.

[vivalaems]

I don't see enough rebels memes anymore 🥲

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Guy Parsons

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

October 17, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Oct 18, 2024

In a new rule released yesterday, the Federal Trade Commission requires sellers to make it as easy to cancel a subscription to a gym or a service as it is to sign up for one. In a statement, FTC chair Lina Khan explained the reasoning behind the “click-to-cancel” rule: “Too often, businesses make people jump through endless hoops just to cancel a subscription,” she said. “Nobody should be stuck paying for a service they no longer want.” Although most of the new requirements won’t take effect for about six months, David Dayen of The American Prospect noted that the stock price of Planet Fitness fell 8% after the announcement. 

When he took office in January 2021, with democracy under siege from autocratic governments abroad and an authoritarian movement at home, President Joe Biden set out to prove that democracy could deliver for the ordinary people who had lost faith in it. The click-to-cancel rule is an illustration of an obvious and long-overdue protection, but it is only one of many ways—$35 insulin, new bridges, loan forgiveness, higher wages, good jobs—in which policies designed to benefit ordinary people have demonstrated that a democratic government can improve lives.

When Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen spoke to the Council on Foreign Relations yesterday, she noted that the administration “has driven a historic economic recovery” with strong growth, very low unemployment rates, and inflation returning to normal. Now it is focused on lowering costs for families and expanding the economy while reducing inequality. That strong economy at home is helping to power the global economy, Yellen noted, and the U.S. has been working to strengthen that economy by reinforcing global policies, investments, and institutions that reinforce economic stability. 

“Over the past four years, the world has been through a lot,” Yellen said, “from a once-in-a-century pandemic, to the largest land war in Europe since World War II, to increasingly frequent and severe climate disasters. This has only underlined that we are all in it together. America’s economic well-being depends on the world’s, and America’s economic leadership is key to global prosperity and security.” She warned against isolationism that would undermine such prosperity both at home and abroad.

The numbers behind the proven experience that government protection of ordinary people is good for economic growth got the blessing of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences on Monday, when it awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences to Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson, both of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and to James Robinson of the University of Chicago. Their research explains why “[s]ocieties with a poor rule of law and institutions that exploit the population do not generate growth or change for the better,” while democracies do.   

Although democracy has been delivering for Americans, Donald Trump and MAGAs rose to power by convincing those left behind by 40 years of supply-side economics that their problem was not the people in charge of the government, but rather the government itself. 

Trump wants to get rid of the current government so that he can enrich himself, do whatever he wants to his enemies, and avoid answering to the law. The Christian nationalists who wrote Project 2025 want to destroy the federal government so they can put in place an authoritarian who will force Americans to live under religious rule. Tech elites like Elon Musk and Peter Thiel want to get rid of the federal government so they can control the future without having to worry about regulations. 

In place of what they insist is a democratic system that has failed, they are offering a strongman who, they claim, will take care of people more efficiently than a democratic government can. The focus on masculinity and portrayals of Trump as a muscled hero‚ much as Russian president Vladimir Putin portrays himself, fit the mold of an authoritarian leader.

But the argument that Americans need a strongman depends on the argument that democracy does not work. In the last three-and-a-half years, Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and the Democrats have proved that it can, so long as it operates with the best interests of ordinary people in mind. Trump and Vance’s outlandish lies about the federal response to Hurricane Helene are designed to override the reality of a competent administration addressing a crisis with all the tools it has. In its place, the lies provide a false narrative of federal officials ignoring people and trying to steal their property.  

Their attack on democracy has another problem, as well. In addition to the reality that democracy has been delivering for Americans for more than three years now—and pretty dramatically—Trump is no longer a strongman. Vice President Kamala Harris is outperforming  him in the theater of political dominance. And as she does so, his image is crumbling.

In an article in US News and World Report yesterday, NBC’s former chief marketer John D. Miller apologized to America for helping to “create a monster.” Miller led the team that marketed The Apprentice, the reality TV show that made Trump a household name. “To sell the show,” Miller wrote, “we created the narrative that Trump was a super-successful businessman who lived like royalty.” But the truth was that he declared bankruptcy six times, and “[t]he imposing board room where he famously fired contestants was a set, because his real boardroom was too old and shabby for TV,” Miller wrote. While Trump loved the attention the show provided, “more successful CEOs were too busy to get involved in reality TV.” 

Miller says they “promoted the show relentlessly,” blanketing the country with a “highly exaggerated” image of Trump as a successful businessman “like a heavy snowstorm.” “[W]e…did irreparable harm by creating the false image of Trump as a successful leader,” Miller wrote. “I deeply regret that. And I regret that it has taken me so long to go public.” 

Speaking as a “born-and-bred Republican,” Miller warned: “If you believe that Trump will be better for you or better for the country, that is an illusion, much like The Apprentice was.” He strongly urged people to vote for Kamala Harris. “The country will be better off and so will you.” 

A new video shown last night on Jimmy Kimmel Live even more powerfully illustrated the collapse of Trump’s tough guy image. Written by Jesse Joyce of Comedy Central, the two-minute video featured actor and retired professional wrestler Dave Bautista dominating his sparring partner in a boxing ring and then telling those who think Trump is “some sort of tough guy” that “he’s not.” 

Working out in a gym, Bautista insults Trump’s heavy makeup, out-of-shape body, draft dodging, and physical weakness, and notes that “he sells imaginary baseball cards pretending to be a cowboy fireman” when “he’s barely strong enough to hold an umbrella.” Bautista says Trump’s two-handed method of drinking water looks “like a little pink chickadee,” and goes on to make a raunchy observation about Trump’s stage dancing. “He’s moody, he pouts, he throws tantrums,” Bautista goes on. “He’s cattier on social media than a middle-school mean girl.”

Bautista ends by listing Trump’s fears of rain, dogs, windmills…and being laughed at.” “And mostly,” Bautista concludes, “he’s terrified that real, red-blooded American men will find out that he’s a weak, tubby toddler.” Calling Trump a “whiny b*tch,” Bautista walks away from the camera. 

The sketch was billed as comedy, but it was deadly serious in its takedown of the key element of Trump’s political power.

And he seems vulnerable. Forbes and Newsweek have recently questioned his mental health; yesterday the Boston Globe ran an op-ed saying, “Trump’s decline is too dangerous to ignore. We can see the decline in the former president’s ability to hold a train of thought, speak coherently, or demonstrate a command of the English language, to say nothing of policy.” 

Trump’s Fox News Channel town hall yesterday got 2.9 million viewers; Harris’s interview got 7.1 million. Today, Trump canceled yet another appearance, this one with the National Rifle Association in Savannah, Georgia, scheduled for October 22, where he was supposed to be the keynote speaker.

Meanwhile, Vice President Harris today held rallies in Milwaukee, Green Bay, and La Crosse, Wisconsin. In La Crosse, MAGA hecklers tried to interrupt her while she was speaking about the centrality of the three Trump-appointed Supreme Court justices to the overturning of the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that recognized the constitutional right to abortion. 

“Oh, you guys are at the wrong rally,” Harris called to them with a smile and a wave. As the crowd roared with approval, she added: “No, I think you meant to go to the smaller one down the street.” 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[rebekadjarin]

Going to the jedi council:

Anakin: This is an important meeting, Ahsoka. Remember, be mindful and speak only when spoken to.

Ahsoka: Don't I always?

Anakin: (¬_¬) side eye

[starzaraezx]

I was originally going to have Doll recognize Decay before he got arrested, but it didn't make sense. Decay was imprisoned for 6 years and Doll is only 3. (and a half, at least.)

Oh, and the reason for Decay's imprisonment?

Unauthorized singing to orphans. (I'm sorry it doesn't really fit Dave's personality even if Decay is the anxiety part)

[tomorrowusa]

Dave Chappelle, who has issues of his own, somehow thought it would be a great idea to have Elon Musk appear with him at a show at the Chase Center in San Francisco.

“Ladies and gentlemen, make some noise for the richest man in the world,” Chappelle said near the end of his set at the Chase Center.

They certainly made noise. 😅

The crowd erupted into a mixture of cheers and boos, before the boos clearly won out, according to footage posted on Twitter. [Update, 6:40 a.m. ET: The footage appears to have been deleted from Twitter for some reason, but you can still watch it below.] The booing got louder as Musk wandered around onstage with a microphone in hand. Musk started pacing and waving, clearly unsure what to do about such a negative reaction.

“Cheers and boos, I see. Elon...” Chappelle said.

“Hey Dave,” Musk responded, prompting another wave of boos from the crowd.

Any time Musk opened his mouth the booing re-erupted.

Chappelle tried to salvage the encounter, according to a second video posted to Twitter, joking, “his whole business model is fuck Earth, I’m leaving anyway.” [Update: You can watch it here.]

“What kind of pussy they got up there? That’s what we’ll be doing,” Chappelle said, according to the video.

After Chappelle’s jokes about “titty bars” in space, the crowd seemed to be properly won over and Musk started to speak again.

“Thanks for having me up on stage,” Musk said awkwardly to more boos.

“The first comedy club on Mars....” Chappelle said, as Musk stood by awkwardly just saying “yeah.”

As the laughs for Chappelle’s jokes would get drowned out by boos anytime Musk tried to talk, the comedian said that people could boo all they want, because Musk had given him a jetpack last Christmas.

But every single time Musk began to speak, the crowd started booing again, much to the frustration of Musk.

If you act like garbage, people will treat you like garbage. Even the sound crew had it in for Musk.

One of the men onstage is asked by Chappelle to shout the catchphrase from his 2000s sketch show, “I’m rich, bitch,” into the mic. The man dutifully complies, then says, “wait, wait,” while handing the microphone to Musk, clearly wanting him to say the same thing. Musk does, in the most awkward tone you could imagine. The crowd again erupts into boos, only drowned out by someone in the stadium’s sound department honking a horn of some sort.

What did Elon Musk expect? He treats his workers like used toilet paper, sets about destroying a once useful platform, and turns into a far right conspiracy bullhorn.

Musk, who used to have a rather bipartisan appeal in the U.S., has outed himself as an entitled right-wing prick in the short span that he’s owned Twitter. Musk bought Twitter, along with a number of investors, for $44 billion at the end of October when he almost immediately instigated brutal layoffs.

Musk has also been trying to court some of the worst people on the internet lately, tweeting over the weekend that his “pronouns” are “Prosecute/Fauci.” The tweet is apparently both a “joke” about people who are trans, and a reference to the far-right belief that Anthony Fauci, the country’s leading infectious disease expert, was somehow responsible for the covid-19 pandemic that struck the entire world.

Elon Musk is additional proof that having huge amounts of money doesn’t mean you’re very smart.

Musk’s ugly attack on Fauci shows how right-wing info warfare works

Over the weekend, Elon Musk called for the prosecution of Anthony S. Fauci, the leading infectious-disease expert in the Biden administration. “My pronouns are Prosecute/Fauci,” Musk tweeted, mocking transgender people for good measure. Musk then endorsed a complicated right-wing conspiracy theory about Fauci’s role in the covid-19 pandemic.

Democrats and other Musk critics reacted with an explosion of outrage. One Democratic senator pleaded with Musk to “leave a good man alone.” Another member of Congress seethed: “Shame on you.” Former CIA director John Brennan scolded Musk: “You have no class.”

[ ... ]

In his attack, Musk flatly validated a big right-wing obsession: The idea that Fauci was involved in U.S. government funding of controversial early research into covid, and lied to Congress about it. As The Post’s Glenn Kessler demonstrated, this is a highly complex dispute, but there are zero grounds for concluding anything remotely like that happened.

Musk seems to have bought Twitter just so he could spread his personal brand of disinformation. And to make sure that there would be no internal roadblocks, he abolished Twitter’s Trust and Safety Council.

Musk's Twitter has dissolved its Trust and Safety Council

Elon Musk's Twitter has dissolved its Trust and Safety Council, the advisory group of around 100 independent civil, human rights and other organizations that the company formed in 2016 to address hate speech, child exploitation, suicide, self-harm and other problems on the platform.

Musk may have been eager to distract from the news stories about him getting loudly booed in person. So he decides to take action that proclaims he’s in favor of hate speech, child exploitation, and self-harm. 

 —--—— —--—— —--—— —--—— —--—— —--——

If you absolutely must use Twitter, use it with an ad blocker. I don’t know how difficult that may be with the Twitter app but it works beautifully with the web version. Starve the beast.

Somebody needs to invent a replacement for Twitter which makes it easy to migrate to. Through posts, petitions, and site comments, let developers know that you’re interested in such a replacement platform.

[lettersfrombeyondthegrave]

the only two constants in the universe is cats being named luna and star wars movie/tv shows having at least one unique robot as an untold mascotte

[kawoid]

DEFALT & THE COUNCIL OF DAVES

New speedpaint! with some troubleshooting i finally uploaded this speedpaint on yt, enjoy!

i'll be happy if you interact with this video, because it's a new channel aaaand you know it will be cool if you like it *giggling* share it *blushing* and subscribe to my channel u know *twirling my hair*

[dumbass-duo-showdown]

BEST DAD BATTLE: BAPELSIN BRACKET

ROUND 1 GROUP 2 PART 1

[incorrect-hs-quotes]

Dave: who kicked your ass

Dave: was it the yelly guy over there?

Dave: no, dave was mostly preoccupied with his own… shenanigans.

Dave: the yelling is deceptive. he's a rather private person.

Dave: dave, however.

Dave: he really is quite an extravagant bitch

[alonsolobotomy]

nothing i love more than conversing with a group of people who all have the same weird old man as their pfp. like yeah. the council will decide your fate

[the-useless-wizard-council]

Announcement:

There is a gecko in the council lean-to. His name is Dave and will join us in being useless.

[jojotier]

the thing missing from the witch hat au is just the fact that Jade is Also these kids' professor, which is great bc while Dave can teach the fundamentals and practicals of magic he's absolute Dogshit at creating any items based on magic or maintaining magic tools in any longterm way. like his one contribution is a glyph that makes nauseating neon abstract jpeg artifacts irl in a world where there's no computers or tvs. what's he supposed to do with that.

meanwhile Jade sits the alpha kids down and says 'alright children who wants to learn how to make robots come to life!' to rousing cheers (and one(1) quiet 'woohoo' from Dirk)