Current EV batteries are

And just like that you’ve shown that gravity batteries aren’t feasible.

Storage is going to be a big part of the solution going forward. But it’s going to be chemical batteries and thermal batteries, not gravity batteries.

Middle class generally means people whose incomes are in the middle half (ranging from 40th to 60th percentile to the 20th to 80th).

If you want to pull out your own new definition based on whether their income comes from work or from return on investments, then I’d still point out there’s a large number of people who do both, especially when compared across the entire life cycle including retirement. So if you insist on this alternative definition, you still have to account for the big chunk of the population who do both.

Are they working alone, or do you envision groups who can stop, collaborate, and listen?

Dammit for the last time you can’t wear an NBA jersey and shorts here, this is a doctor’s office.

If you work for your money, you’re part of the struggle. If you own for your money, you’re part of the problem.

But the middle class is those who are able to leverage working for their money to accumulate capital to where they can live off of the proceeds of that owned capital. If you’re able to retire, you eventually become part of the ownership class.

There is a shrinking middle class but the actual people in it are those who split their adult lives into eventually retiring on their wealth, accumulated through working.

I agree. Stated another way, imagine the trolley is headed towards 5 people, and you have the power to pull the lever to divert it to a path where there are no people. Even if someone tied those 5 to the tracks with the intent to kill, your failure to save their lives (at no additional cost to others) is widely regarded by most systems of ethics/morality as a moral failing. Yes, the person who tied the tracks bears blame, but so does the person who could’ve easily saved them but chose to let them die.

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Unions are legal in all occupations.

One caveat: the legal protections of the right to unionize apply to non-supervisors. If you have people who report to you, your power to unionize is pretty limited.

There are also some specialized jobs that aren’t allowed to unionize by either federal or state law: actual soldiers in the Army, certain political jobs, etc.

But for the most part, if you are employed, you’re probably allowed to unionize (and protected against retaliation even in an unsuccessful union drive).

More specifically, the more recent studies analyze non-drinkers in two categories: those who just choose not to drink (generally healthier than even light drinkers), and those who don’t drink because they have serious health conditions incompatible with drinking or people recovering from substance/alcohol abuse issues who (generally much less healthy than light drinkers). By separating those who don’t drink versus those who can’t drink, the studies reverse earlier findings that non-drinkers are less healthy than light drinkers.

What in the name of waluigi is this

I didn’t know until this thread that this character is from Overwatch or that there is apparently a lot of porn of her. I only knew it as a random meme format.

We know it exists because it does interact with gravity.

More accurately, we believe with high probability that it exists because our observations show that the rotation of stars in galaxies don’t behave consistently with the amount of visible matter we can see, assuming that we’ve correctly calculated the universal gravitational constant (from observations of the solar system), that it’s actually a universal constant, and that general relativity is correct.

Maybe there’s another explanation. But dark matter fits really, really well with the rest of our observations, without breaking everything else we believe we know.

Who wants a bland white wall?

Hang some shit on that wall. Paintings. Photographs. Random yard sale taxidermy.

Modern styles can still have plenty of personality. Yes, one of the modern trends is minimalism, but that’s not the only modern trend, and there are plenty of ways to explore your own sense of style within a modern sensibility.

I like having a house with really, really good insulation, with good plumbing and electrical up to 21st century fire/safety standards. I like having ducts for my central heat pump and air conditioning.

I can fill in the appearance and style stuff after that on my own.

Oh and Best Buy owes its survival to investing heavily into cell phone plans and contracts. They would’ve folded without it.

Radio Shack limped along for maybe a decade after their core business stopped making sense, because of their cell phone deals. This Onion article from 2007 captures the cultural place that RadioShack operated in at the time, and they didn’t file bankruptcy until 2015 (and then reorganized and filed bankruptcy again in 2017).

It feels so real in how disappointing the experience becomes for the straight characters.

This hits the nail on the head. It’s funny because of the point of view of the actual participants.

The funny thing about this thread is that there are so many comments essentially agreeing with the central premise of the sketch, that it’s relatable and disorienting when you stumble onto some kind of established fandom and can’t seem to keep up with why it’s popular or what is or isn’t “part of it.” The popularity is confusing in itself, and the need to dissect the lore (as OP is doing, perhaps even unintentionally following the sketch itself) distracts from the original purpose of going there to be entertained.

In other words, the sketch is funny and relatable exactly for the same reasons why much of the audience doesn’t find it funny and relatable.

If Republicans are that scared of turnout, they could legislatively overturn their own abortion ban.

The filibuster makes a big difference when the president, the speaker of the house, a majority of the House, and between 50-59 senators all support something.

If you don’t have all of those others lined up, the filibuster isn’t the only hurdle.

For example, Biden hasn’t been president during a Democratic-controlled House, so everything he’s accomplished legislatively has been with the support of either Kevin McCarthy or Mike Johnson, who have been the critical veto point while he has been president.

Plus with only 51 Senators in the Democratic caucus (and 50 in the last Congress), getting 50 votes through Manchin and Sinema has been a challenge sometimes, too.

The last time the filibuster has mattered for a Democratic president in actual legislation was the 111th Congress, when Democrats last held a trifecta. The Democrats did abolish the filibuster for presidential appointments, which don’t go through the House, during the 113th Congress, when they controlled the White House and the Senate.

I think it’s pretty obvious that the filibuster is gone the next time it matters, the next time there’s same party control of all 3. It’s just that it’s better if it’s Democrats in control.

Yeah, you can think of it as a simple transaction fee for debit transactions, and a full blown credit and risk shifting system for credit transactions. The banks charge high fees for credit transactions because they’re actually lending money and bearing some credit risk for them, whereas the debit transactions are just moving money from one account to another.

This stuff takes a while to get going.

The FTC sued to stop Microsoft from acquiring Activision in December 2022, but lost.

DOJ sued Google in January 2023, and won their trial last month.

The FTC and DOJ started rulemaking on new merger disclosure and review requirements in June 2023.

The FTC sued Amazon in September 2023.

DOJ sued Ticketmaster/Live Nation in May 2024.

The last two years have shown aggressive antitrust enforcement for the first time in about 50 years, when Robert Bork basically convinced the Supreme Court and all Republicans to impose almost impossible standards for antitrust regulations.

Elmo is beloved and doesn’t hurt anyone. Put some respect on his name.