Washedupcynic

The point is that this form of taxation is regressive and potentially hurts poor people more than it does the wealthy.

I grew up with great public transit, and having access to a bicycle, (NYC.) In my 20s I realized that attempting to own and maintain a car would be so expensive that I would not be able to save money for the future. I ride my bike everywhere. If I want to go somewhere more than 50 miles away, or where transit doesn't go, I rent a car. I rent a car maybe 2x a year tops. Depending on how long I'm renting the car I probably spend $400 a year on rentals + insurance. My last bike I had for 20 years. Cost me $1400 brand new, spread that cost out over 20 years, owning the bike cost me $70 a year. It was easy to repair myself, and the tools to repair it were inexpensive to purchase. Fuck cars indeed.

I'm 45. Am I old enough to be an old ass liberal? I love AOC and I hope she succeeds.

My best guess is that you are from Iran? If memory serves, this got kicked off via the Anglo-Persian oil company, 51% owned by the Brits. (They go by BP now.) The company was a private entity that was treating the Iranian workforce poorly in terms of qualify of life and profit sharing with workers. The ruler in Iran was tired of their country and land being used to generate profits for foreign entities. The profit sharing with the company was renegotiated in the somewhere in the 1930s. (my memory is a bit spotty on the exact date.) In Narrator voice: The company did not abide by that agreement. During world war 2, the allied forces basically occupied Iran to secure the oil fields to keep supply chains intact during the war; so this would have been happening in the 1940s. This created a push for nationalizing the company and supply of oil, leading up to the 1950s and in 1951 is when Iran nationalized it under prime minister Mossadegh. There was lots of back and forth between the Brits and Iran, and threats of going to international court. The Shah was a bit more friendly to how business was being done between Iran and the Birts. This led to an attempt by the Shah to replace Mossadegh in 1952, and led to riots against the Shah and perceived foreign intervention. This failed. Mossadegh was pissed and eventually Mossadegh expelled the British embassy in October 1952. The brits cried to the USA, which led to the CIA to depose Mossadegh via the Shah, using underhanded bribery and corruption type shenanigans. This led to another 2 decades of Iran getting fucked by the brits and the USA, which eventually was a factor in the hostage crisis in 1979. Yeah, America was pissed about that. I was born in 1979 and have very early memories of Reagan saying shit like we won't negotiate with terrorists. When Iraq went to war with Iran, the US was on the books as supporting Iraq. There was an embargo preventing the US from selling weapons to Iran. That didn't stop the USA. They funneled weapons and training to contras in Nicaragua who would then supply Iran, simply because the USA didn't want Iran to be influenced by the Russia and communism. This is not taught in American public schools at all. American history curriculum usually ends with the civil rights movement. This was all stuff I had to learn on my own after hearing about it first hand from my best friend who lived through the Iraq/Iran war in the 80s. Yes, we are the baddies.

I don't disagree with any of that.

Germany was economically crippled by reparations imposed after World War I. Read up on the Treaty of Versailles. The treaty, signed in 1919, demanded Germany pay 50 billion gold marks (approximately $220 billion in today's money) to cover civilian damage. This debt, along with other harsh terms of the treaty, contributed to hyperinflation, economic instability, and resentment that helped the Nazi party come to power in Germany.

He wants reduced interest rates so the uber rich can get cheap loans to buy up even more while the economy is crashing.

The Rs would celebrate the Ds getting detained in El Salvadore. Everyone going together would be risky as F. If they all get detained, there are no Ds to push back against this shit.

JD should have done more to self abort while he was still a fetus.

hús-brenna is the practice of setting someone's house on fire and refusing to let them leave the burning structure.

Classic leopards ate my face. May they have the lives they voted for.

The whistleblower’s disclosure was accompanied by a cover letter from his attorney, Andrew Bakaj of Whistleblower Aid, which said that, after he raised concerns internally about DOGE’s inroads into the agency, he received a physically taped threat on his door containing personal information and overhead photos of him walking his dog. They also attempted to intimidate him.