On paper there's plenty that could. The Supreme Court could have stepped in to stop a lot of this. Executive orders only stand in places where a full fledged law from congress doesn't cover the issue. The military is theoretically as obligated to disobey an unlawful order as they are to obey a lawful one and states are theoretically pretty insulated from federal interference except in a few explicit areas.

But, we don't live on paper and none of those protections exist unless there are people out there who are ready, willing, and able, to act on them. What happens if the Supreme Court somehow manages to rule against the administration and they just flagrantly disregard the order? What happens if Trump orders the military to start attacking US citizens openly or starts an illegal war without congressional approval? What happens if Trump runs for president again in 2028? Or just says he's president for life and we're not doing elections anymore?

The answer is nothing, unless people stand up against him. And... so far... we haven't seen much of that. Not from people in government at any rate. We've seen a bit from normal folks on the ground in places like LA, but our government's been working to neuter the power of popular protest since the civil rights protests, perhaps even earlier. So reasonable people can disagree on the efficacy of that.

I really don't want to echo the doomer line I've seen written here a lot, but yeah, we're probably fucked. Like maybe if something was done like... a decade ago? Two? Maybe we wouldn't be in this situation. But... as things stand? I don't even know if the damage from the first Trump presidency can ever truly be repaired and more damage is being done on a weekly, almost a daily basis. Personally? I think it's only a matter of time before this man breaks the global economy irreparably. In a way that simply can't be swept under the rug again. Domestically? Who the fuck knows at this point? I have to resist the urge to laugh out loud whenever people ask where I see myself in five years because at this point I've got no idea what the next two weeks are gonna hold.

So... yeah. Fun times in the ol US of A.

I mean, we kinda already ended up there with the Ashley Madison hack in 2015. Problems with that site aside, I feel like it's kinda the blueprint for everything wrong with companies that retain personally identifable info on folks. If a company collects details like your driver's license, it's not a question of if it gets out but when. There's just no way to collect that sort of data and truly keep it safe.

But, it seems like we've kinda forgotten how to learn lessons in the modern day, so I'm sure this was an isolated issue and we'll never see it's like again.

(/s on that last part, just in case that wasn't blindingly obvious.)

Every day we get closer to teaching the robots how to feel pain.

I'm gonna be honest, I did not think this was staged when I first read it...

...Because why on earth would that be what you want to stage? Like sure, they say in the article it was to "prove Putin isn't hiding behind others" or some such shit. The message it sends to me is "our air defense is so shit we can't even lock it down when the guy in charge comes to visit". What a bizarre choice of propaganda.

"Lettuce Speak".

It's... better in the sense that you don't have right wing weirdos all over the place. But technically? Organizationally? Feels like we're on track to replay the same exact shit over again. It feels like people just aren't learning the lessons they should from the Twitter takeover.

To be fair, considering the right wing hellscape our (US) Overton window overlooks the bias bot might actually have a point.

I'm not against nuclear power, but could they have concocted a worse set of motivations? Restarting Three Mile Island to power Microsoft's AI ambitions? Shit reads like something a super villan would cook up.

While the other cable news networks stuck with live special coverage for the rest of the evening, Fox News decided that its audience needed a break from the deflating electoral results for conservatives. After Hannity signed off at 10 p.m., Fox aired its regularly scheduled broadcast of “comedy” show Gutfeld!, which was pre-taped and didn’t make any mention of the elections.

Gutfeld acting as a conservative american "swan lake" might be the saddest thing I've heard all day.

This is why they're losing advertisers left ~~right~~ and center.

Fixed that for you.

I kinda don't get these articles. "Giuliani expected to surrender" the fuck else is he gonna do? Flee to Russia? Make a run for it? Cover himself in his own melting hair dye like Arnold Schwarzenegger trying to escape from the predator? I'd fucking love to see him try. But really the fuck else could he have even done?

That's what I don't get. These are expectations that I've had for years. The indie space has kinda proven that creativity will take a game a hell of a lot farther than cash ever will. With few exceptions I simply don't buy AAA games anymore because honestly I just don't expect the same level of effort will be put into making them.