But the reality I see is that they are very easily manipulated by unregulated media like TikTok and would vote for the same extreme right wing party as old people. Surveys here in Germany are a bit disturbing…

The same argument can be made for people of any age.

Can’t we instead take away voting rights from old people? Also kinda wrong.

The same can also be applied to younger people.

Personally, I prefer to err on the side of including them. It’s unjust that we can take advantage of them in so many ways as a teen but they can’t participate in the political system that decides how they can be taken advantage of (work, school, taxes, military, etc.) I know I hated it at that age and as a general rule, I’ve tried not to repeat the same things the adults in my life did that pissed me off when I was a kid. It’s not a perfect approach, but it’s been the correct approach to avoid the problems it caused when I was growing up from being repeated more often than not.

The only way to do right by them is to give them the right. If you are worried about them being manipulated too easily, education is a good fix.

And as a conflicting anecdote, my 16 year old is very interested in politics and very much wants to have a say in their own life, just like I did at that age. Are they the most informed individual? Hell no. Are they more informed than some adults? Hell yes.

Younger people may be susceptible to their lack of experience, but they are also more likely to bring new ideas to the table because they are less invested in the status quo. If they have the capacity to make informed decisions, they should have the right to self determination and participation in our political systems.

What you say about your kid doesn’t sound like an inability to process these concepts, just a lack of interest. Do you talk to your kid about politics and if so, how? I’ve found I’ve made a lot of progress by talking to teens about current events and asking them what they think. They won’t care about every topic, but I guarantee there is something that will peak their interest and typically topics related to adults imposing their beliefs on kids will get teens to talk, even if it’s just related to school. It’s important that you get them talking about their beliefs, not just telling them yours, because they won’t want to talk to you unless they feel like you will treat them as a peer.

You don’t need to agree with their beliefs, just listen and not talk down to them. Ask follow-up questions that can turn into wider conversations. Help try to explain what is going on and the context surrounding it if needed. You can absolutely share your views, but it’s usually best to talk about what’s going on/being discussed, asking their thoughts, and then following with yours. If you talk down to a kid, they will shut down or fight back (and also shut down). They need the same respect adults crave. They’ll also eventually disagree with you just like adults.

It varies by person, but I’ve found kids tend to start getting interested around 13-14 if you take this approach and then will really come into their own in terms of beliefs by 16. Kids have a LOT they are concerned about in the world today even without this. It causes many of them significant anxiety because they feel powerless. If you have success getting them interested, 16 (or after a few years of observing and talking about current events, history, and politics) is a good age to talk about analyzing the events.

If you’re into Marxism, it’s a great time to start teaching and practicing dialectical materialism so they can figure out for themselves why the world is the way it is on their own.

I know there can be differences with ASD, but I have a few cousins who are 15-20 years younger than me with ASD and have found the same applied for them. Details of the conversation, finding something that gets them invested in the topics, and explanations you give them may vary, but the basic approach doesn’t change and this varies by person regardless of any condition.

This is just a random reply, but if it’s something you want to be able to talk to her about, I hope this helps you be able to do that in a way that expands your relationship as they grow older. I know I wish I could have talked to my parents about politics and the world the same way I do with my kids when I was a kid.

And the skewed power dynamic.

I’ll trade you the communal toothbrush for this joke.

my former manager who wanted projects estimated in minutes.

That wasn’t a manager, that was a demon.

Despite calling Bernie out for at least some of his shit, I do think he has generally been one of the better Democrat senators in terms of progressive domestic policies. I wonder now if anyone actually can climb to that political level without being corrupted or rejected and black-listed by the system.

I used to support the Democrats and him in particular. It was demoralizing to see how he supported the DNC after his 2016 and 2020 campaigns, but I think there are lessons we can learn from his career. For me, he represents a good example of how operating in good faith within the existing US political system as a path to major reform is not a viable strategy (Jill Stein as well), but that you need to build organizations outside of this structure to seize political power and force the change that the system resists. Unions and other community organizations. The attempt at a general strike led by the UAW in 2028 for example.

I don’t believe this will fundamentally change any systems within the US, nothing short of revolution would achieve this, but I think it is an opportunity to improve lives. It’s a chance to show people not only that they have power, but how to build the power to fight for themselves.

Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m tired of putting my faith in these people when, you’re right, it feels like they’ve given up all pretense and dropped the bar on the floor. All they’ve ever done is disappoint me. Working and learning from socialist and labor organizations has given me hope again that there is a path to change.

Bernie has been nothing but consistent. Selling out to the neolibs and supporting imperialism is nothing new for him. Don’t forget how he shilled for Clinton and Biden when he “lost” the nomination to the establishment candidates. He praised the police after George Floyd’s murder and praising the ghoul, Jeff Bezos, for raising the wages of Amazon and Whole Foods workers to $15/hour in 2018, only 6 years after the “Fight for $15” began (while they were investing heavily in automation, never improved their labor practices, and indications were that they had always raised wages during similar economic conditions so they could meet their seasonal employment needs, surely Bernie fostered a change in Bezos’ empty heart).

Here’s a disorganized list of some of Bernie’s votes ranging from the early 1990s to the 2020s:

• Voted in favor of H.R. Res. 64 Authorization for Use of Military Force in 2001, giving Bush Jr. carte blanche to use military force against those the US found responsible for 9/11. He continues to support “The War on Terror” by voting in favor of the authorization of additional funds for US military actions in 2002, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, and 2008. In March 2003, he voted in favor of a resolution expressing unequivocal support of Bush Jr and the Armed forces for their actions regarding Operation Iraqi freedom. This is an odd choice considering he voted against the authorization of military action in Iraq in 2003, something he like to brag about when in the media spotlight. What good is voting against a war if you are going to repeatedly vote to fund it for years afterwards?

• Voted in favor of the Iraq Liberation Act in 1998. This included economic sanctions that killed up to 500,000 children. This same resolution allowed for direct military action in Iraq (Operation Desert Fox). He had previously voted against the Invasion of Iraq in 1991.

• Voted in favor of the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act in 1996. Then voted to extend these in 2001. This was meant to cripple the ability of each country to develop their own petroleum industries.

• Voted in favor of bombing Kosovo in 1999. This decision led to him quite publicly losing staffers and long-time friends as well as an anti-war protest in his office. I wonder why?

• Voted in favor of sending military hardware and funding to Israel in 1997, 1994, and 2004. In 2006, he voted in favor of economic sanctions against Palestine after Hamas won an elections in order to remove them from power. His support of the Israeli military also extended to their actions in Lebanon in 2006 and Gaza in 2014, but surely that was the end of his support, right?

• Remember that racist, dumpster fire of a movie “Black Hawk Down” which inaccurately portrayed the events that led to the US pulling out of the conflict in Somalia? Bernie voted for that military intervention.

• Supported providing $1 billion in military aid and training to Ukraine in December of 2014. I’m sure all of this was used in defense and none of it contributed to the conflicts that killed civilians from 2015 to today. I’m also sure that Bernie would never again vote to send funding to continue or escalate this war and the suffering it’s caused.

• Refused to end the drone program while running for president in 2016 and 2020 as he thinks it’s useful and promised that he would use it responsibly if elected.

• Supported military action in Libya, Lebanon, Bosnia, Yemen, Syria, Congo, Haiti, Liberia, and Sudan.

I’m tired of describing how his actions have spoken and I haven’t even gotten into his economics and how far removed he is from a socialist on the front too. There’s plenty to criticize even if you aren’t a socialist or don’t expect him to do a socialism.

The point is that any integrity Bernie Sanders had as a revolutionary or leftist was lost decades ago. His radical stances and actions are romanticized now. The only way Sanders is relevant to progressives and socialists these days is how he acted as a catalyst for driving many people in the US further left.

“A different damned drink.”

I agree with the term enshitification for this thing normally, but this is just a “bait and switch” at this point.

Any chance you’d be willing to provide answers to any of my questions based on what you saw?

Good points. It’s difficult to find a clear answer to how important lend-lease was to the Soviet war effort. During the war, the USSR and US obviously had good things to say about the program, but the start of the Cold War soured this discussion, leading to the US overstating and the USSR understating the impact. Here’s an excerpt from a paper by a British scholar exploring the topic. Emphasis is the author’s:

It is neither possible nor fruitful to try and put a precise measure on the material value of allied aid to the Soviet war economy, if only because of the unavailability of many Soviet production data. Whatever the value of western aid, the Soviet war effort was measured in human life and suffering incomparable with material aid from outside. Further, the Soviet economy became much more of a war economy than other combatant nations. Nonetheless, it seems that the contribution made by deliveries from the USA and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Canada, played an important part at crucial times and in crucial areas. First, and above all, was a vital margin of food supplies, second was the provision of specialist or deficit products such as aluminium and copper, specialized tools, high quality steels. In this respect lend-lease supplies overcame bottlenecks. However, it must be stressed that the major impact came after the Soviet counterattack and the beginning of German retreat. Such aid directly and indirectly helped defeat the German forces, and was in such a way a substitute for a second front, but it did little to defend the USSR from the initial onslaught. Third, some of the raw materials and more especially machinery and transport equipment was of positive value to the Soviet economy after the war. For this, the tyre plant is the best but not the only example.

It is nonsense to repeat the figure of four per cent of Soviet wartime production and disingenuous to disparage western aid - a feature evident in Soviet literature and one criticized even by Khrushchev. It is nonetheless true (and this is a point repeated in some Soviet works) that Britain and the Empire received far more than the USSR from the United States. Lend-lease, in this respect, may be seen as a temporary substitute for foreign trade. Britain was a major trading nation, highly dependent on imports, especially for food and raw materials. The USSR, on the other hand, was an economy with little trade dependence whose foreign trade turnover had fallen steadily during the 1930s…

The part left off at the end compares repayment of aid sent to the British vs the Soviets. A fairly short read that will give some more context to the conclusions I shared above.

One of the main points the author makes is that lend-lease was used by the US as a stand-in for entering the war and opening a new front in 1942 as the allies (and Stalin in particular) were requesting. In this context, lend-lease was a replacement for reopening the Western front in 1942, an action that could have been far more impactful. The US provided material aid in lieu of entering the war, shifting the human burden of the war onto the other Allied forces and particularly the USSR from 1942 to least at 1944 (note that lend-lease aid extended wider and was provided from 1941-1945).

Overall, the impression I’ve gotten from sifting through academic writings on the subject is that while lend-lease certainly helped take some of the pressure off of the USSR (mainly in the form of producing food, trucks, and raw materials), it’s most likely that the result would have been the same. That said, wondering over historical what-ifs, while fun, should really be constrained to recreational musing and shouldn’t be taken seriously.

I will, but this is an 8 hour series.

For real, the US committed a coup in Australia with Whitlam. They don’t constrain the CIA to just poor countries.

If the US was to take an isolationist policy 100 years ago, then there is a good chance that WW2 would have been won by the Axis. The Allied forces likely would have put up a good fight, but I’m not sure they would have emerged victorious against the combined Axis forces. The war in the Pacific would have raged on much longer, and without nuclear weapons, there would have been an extreme loss of life invading Japan. At the very least, WW2 would have lasted much much longer than it did. Depending on the outcome, plenty of countries might currently be speaking German and debating if they should tear down 80-year-old statues of Hitler.

The only people who believe this drivel are those who have only learned about WWII via Hollywood and YT videos. Go listen to an actual historian and you will not hear this fantasy. They will tell you that Germany had one foot in the grave by the time the US joined the Western front. The only ounce of truth in this statement is that the Pacific theatre would have gone on longer.

Edit: I didn’t touch on this but should have…the whole idea that a nuclear attack on Japan was necessary or even justified in any way is not only incorrect but is a racist, genocidal excuse for not one, but TWO of the most horrific acts in our entire history. You should be ashamed for propagating this tired lie.

Lol, only if you learned history from Hollywood.

Did they also go into mass atrocities committed and initiated by the US? If you go around lighting fires and then come back around to put them out after donning an official uniform, should others consider you a fire fighter or an arsonist?

Is there a single instance covered that wasn’t a situation the US directly and purposely had a hand in creating?

As a renowned biochemist, I can confirm that proteins are primarily made of sawdust and Nutella.

LOL, the only people who would say this to Yogthos are those speaking from ignorance. The dude is like a machine when it comes to reading and sharing articles from all over the place. I’ve never seen anyone else read the news so widely.

If it makes you feel any better about it, I’ve had the LR4 for almost 2 years without issues. Easily the best quality of life improvement for both my cats and me. Even unpowered (extended power outage), I found it more convenient because I could scoop and put it directly into the waste drawer.

It felt ridiculous when I bought it, but I’d do it again in a heartbeat if needed because of the benefits.

Yes, breaking larger goals into smaller goals makes it much easier to move bigger changes or projects forward.

Don’t forget the methane and other gases that are even worse than CO2!