As long as some don’t want to see nudity in public, most, out of consideration, will also avoid it. Even if nudity was universally accepted, people would wear something to carry their phones, money, and keys. They’d want to advertise their social status. And clothes provide protection. Would you want to sit in a recently vacated seat on the subway if the last person was naked? Or imagine parking your nude bottom on a bench that’s been in the sun for a while.

When putting away money for retirement, consider inflation-resistant investments. The past 3 years really fucked some of my friends who didn’t heed that advice.

The 14th Amendment, Section 3, was written to prohibit anyone who participated on the losing side of the Civil War from holding office. None of those prohibited were convicted of insurrection. This is very much like the age requirement for the President. It’s a qualification - must not have committed insurrection or given comfort to those who did. You might argue that Trump himself did not directly participate, but he’s certainly given plenty of comfort to those who did, with promises of a Presidential pardon.

As a qualification, it requires no judicial intervention unless challenged. Trump is free to challenge the grounds on which he is disqualified from the ballot, but being convicted for insurrection is not a requirement. These were things discussed during the ratification of the 14th, as was whether the amendment applied to the President (it does). I guess we’ll see just how principled the “originalist” conservative judges are.

You can turn off the LEDs. I actually prefer them in a dim warm white color which makes them easy to read in low light without being annoying.

I’ve been to a funeral where the guests wrote their farewells on slips of paper, which were then anonymously read by an officiant before being placed in a large ceramic pot with a small fire. It was much better than the traditional “Would anyone like to say something” followed by uncomfortable silence. People were much more willing to write down their thoughts for someone else to read.

Prop 13 locked property tax to the sale price of the home. It’s since been partly repealed, with a grandfathering of those who owned their homes while it was in effect.

The way it affects housing is that people would normally move when the appraised value of their home causes their tax to exceed their budget. But Prop 13 keeps that from happening. If they do move, they lose their grandfathering and have to pay the prevailing tax rate. That’s huge. If you are paying $1.6k on an $80k Prop 13 valuation, sell, and buy a smaller home for $650k, your tax goes up to $13k. So it makes more financial sense to live in your big house until you die.

Fully repealing Prop 13 would essentially evict a lot of fixed-income seniors, or force them to take out reverse mortgages to pay their property tax, which could jump to 20k-30k in many metropolitan areas. The political fallout would be disastrous for whatever politicians supported the repeal. Seniors are the block of people most likely to vote. That’s why Prop 13 will endure until those grandfathered have passed on.

You can subscribe to Easynews. It’s Usenet turned into a website. There’s a built in search engine (supports regular expressions), retention going back to 2008, spam and malware filtering, and multiple servers located in the US and Europe. You choose whether to use the web or a Usenet client. Probably the easiest way to use this neglected corner of the Internet.

Even Usenet gets censored, but there a window of a couple days between posting and takedown where the file is available. We see this a lot with major studios who pay investigators to identify infringing material. To get around this, some uploaders are encrypting their content, and you’ll need the description key.

Why TF is the server so slow?

She’s telling you, “No Anal”

Bom-bom-bomb, bom-bom-Iran.

The transporter is a death machine. They established that in the episode with the two Rikers created by some interaction between the transporter and the field around the planet, leaving one stranded. Normally it kills you and creates a duplicate. You’re actually dead while your doppelganger takes your place.

Charcoal is wood that has been heated above combustion temperature without oxygen. That does drive off water, but it also chemically decomposes the lignin and other organics into primarily carbon while creating a volatile mixture of gasses known as woodgas.

Source: Have a woodgas generator. Byproduct is charcoal.

I haven’t reached the point yet where I’m personally dumpster diving, but I have a friend who has an inside connection at a major grocery store. They call when it’s time to take out the garbage, set it outside the compactor, and my friend swings by to snag it. It’s incredible how much gets thrown out. He preserves what can’t be used immediately and gives it away to those who don’t have a problem with the source. I’ve benefited from a 5 lb bag of jerky and a box full of dried fruits, veggies, and other items.

Otherwise, I’m always on the lookout for sales and deals. When I find one I stock up, like the one going on now at Amazon for Sweet Sue canned chicken that worked out to 78 cents for a 5oz can.

I’m fortunate enough to have a few acres and access to water at agricultural rates, so I grow enough produce to supply myself and a few other families that subscribe to my farm-to-home service. It’s enough to pay the costs and buy the grandkids some nice presents, but I ain’t getting rich off it.

A non-amicably seceded Texas is doomed as a country. No food, drugs, or medical supplies from the rest of the country. No parts to repair their oil wells or vehicles (made by businesses in other states). Companies like John Deere would be forced to brick all equipment in Texas. Then the US government imposes sanctions on any country doing business with Texas, and businesses outside Texas are restricted from doing business in Texas. Nobody comes to their rescue when the power grid fails in an ice storm or a hurricane blows through the state.

Face it. States are too interdependent to cut ties with the rest of the country.

You don’t even need drones. Insurgents aren’t particularly technical, and tend to use unsecured communications that are easily pinpointed for a precision HIMARS or smart artillery strike. Ask the Russians how it went for them. They lost thousands in Ukraine because soldiers used cellphones to call home to Mama - calls processed through Ukrainian cellular towers.

Lose? Nah. If he doesn’t win the election, we’ll get Insurrection 2.0. Then he’s either imprisoned, dead, or we get to live in a dictatorship.

I understand the danger of revealing trans status. I also understand that it can be even more dangerous to be discovered as trans after a relationship develops with a partner who is violently transphobic. Back in the 80’s I was in the Navy. One of the guys on my ship was arrested for attempted murder. The woman he was dating didn’t reveal she was trans and he found out when they became intimate. He threw her off a second story balcony after beating her.

My question is why anyone would want to initiate a relationship with another person unless their prospective partner was accepting of them? I’d at least bring up the subject in an indirect manner to judge their response.

Actually, the court got $5.5 million. It’s being held until the appeal process is completed. Then Carroll will get that plus interest.

Carroll may not be paid for years if Trump strings out the appeals. But to appeal, he has to either pay the entire award to the court first, or he can use an appeal bond - assuming any financial institution will give him one. His credit rating is questionable with all these trials hanging over his head. $83 million here, maybe $370 million there, unknown amounts in the documents and vote tampering cases. And nobody is actually sure how much he’s worth. The Trump brand is damaged goods.

He’s under a financial microscope at the moment. He can’t reassign any assets until the two civil trials are completed and paid. Whether Carroll sees the entire award depends on the NY fraud outcome and what Trump’s assets are really worth. Maybe his cracker jack attorney will miss the 2 week appeal deadline, allowing Carroll to seize his liquid assets and put liens on Trump’s real estate holdings.

It takes a lot fewer licks now than when this commercial came out (shrinkflation).