As a non-American I sum it up as this: For the last 50 years (that I am old enough to know about) Democrats don’t have the answer so they are bad. Republicans don’t have the answer but will lie to us every minute of the day to keep us happy so they are good. Then Americans wonder why their country is about to implode.

I really hope that many companies, not American ones of course, decide that the 100% tariff is fine for Americans to pay, and create all their chips in any other country in the world for the rest of the world to use.

I’m none of those however I believe they are right to view it negatively. The rest of us should be just a wary.

Skill to do a job is important. However it seems that many younger people do not believe that interpersonal skills are a necessary skill because they haven’t learned them. Some have much more difficulty learning them or are completely unable to learn them due to neuro differences. They have a choice to either learn interpersonal skills or find work that is isolated where others don’t have to interact with them directly in order to do their jobs. Workplace accommodations can only go so far in helping if other people must interact with them in order to do their jobs. People in the workplace have always had to figure out how to work effectively with others. If they cannot, they have had to find other types of work that don’t require working directly with people. What’s new is expecting others to conform to individual needs instead of individuals conforming to the groups needs. Could you take a socializing class to learn the basics and get out of your current comfort zone? Your coworkers don’t need you to become their best friend but they do need to feel that they are not working with a robot. (I say this as someone who had to figure it out pre-internet. I was labelled Officious & Cold in one of my first employment reviews.)

I had friends 40 years ago in their early 20s that were adamant that they never wanted kids. Some of them stayed that way and are going into retirement childless and most of them are happy with their decision. A few aren’t but can’t do anything about it. The others discovered, that with with right person, they did want kids and are just as happy. Hard to say which you will be. I know a few young women banking eggs in case they change their mind 10+ years from now and want to have biological children. Can you bank sperm to hedge your bet?

Trump has been “sinking” trade negotiations with Canada every week with whatever excuse he makes up at that moment. He isn’t negotiating. He’s trying to force us to join his awful country. Why have an agreement anyway? The last one, that he negotiated and said was the best ever, he blithely ignored as soon as he wanted to. I expect he will honor all the new agreements in exactly the same way. There is a long line of contractors in the US that can attest to the fact that he never honours his agreements.

It isn’t too late now. Apparently AI is a good target - eating a world’s supply of electricity to further enrich the billionaires while continuing to muddy the science of climate change. Wish people were as upset about that as they are about their porn being restricted.

We did manage to change some things for the better - acid rain, ozone depletion, lead in everything. However with conflicting information and some corporations doing everything they can to muddy the consensus, it is hard to do the right thing. It is especially difficult if for years you think you’ve been doing the right thing and find out it was all fake - recycling.

Personally I believe the world was a better place before the Internet existed. It was more personal, more local. The billionaire tech class was created by the Internet and are actively damaging the world for their own personal gain. Good mental health is almost non-existent for those who are always online - and that is a purposeful construct so that they will be online more and create even more revenue for the tech billionaires. The initial romantic notion that the internet would provide education and information and connection has been dwarfed by the damage it has caused. The most ‘internet raised generation - Gen Z’ is notoriously disconnected and isolated compared to previous generations. In short, if the Internet ceased to exist tomorrow, a decade from now the world would probably be a better place.

I really wish I knew that when I was in my teens and 20s holding down 2 jobs to barely make ends meet with 40% of my income going to my share of a shitty illegal basement suite’s rent and another 25% going to students loan payments at 12% & 15%, that I was a “have”. Eventually things started to pay off in my 30s and at 60 I might be able to retire at 65. It has felt like 45 years of continuous slog so it feels really off that some kid is complaining that after going to their ‘dream university’ and ‘travelling the world on cheap flights’, and ‘door dashing every meal’ with a ‘continuous supply of Amazon or Temu’ being delivered, is the hard done by one. Or maybe, not everyone in every generation is in the same predicament. I know plenty of people older and younger who have done exceptionally well and plenty who have scraped by their whole lives. If you buy into everyone older than me had it easy, you will never be happy in life. Every generation has it’s own struggles. Every generation has people who never struggled.

Why would he admit it? The MAGA base loves the lies. Why tell the truth if that would cause MAGAs to get mad and possibly not vote for you?

His kids and grandkids first. In fact, if there aren’t enough necessary workers, maybe “news” hosts should be forced into labour.

Anyone even remotely surprised?

What if…Trump says he isn’t a pedophile because being with any of these girls would make him a hebephile. While there are people who go after young pre-pubescent children, pedophiles, men like Trump, like them pubescent. Yes, everyone likes to use the word pedo because then they don’t have to remember which word means what, but that is also the kind of loophole that Trump and his ilk use to claim their innocence. They aren’t pedos. They are Hebes. Semantics but that’s what criminals like to use to hide their illegal activity.

While I still like most of the music I did at age 14, I continue to find new music I like. I don’t discard much. If I liked it at one point I usually still like it.

Everyone slows down to watch the car wreck.

It took me a few years to convince my partner that sleeping separately would be a good idea. He snores and I am a very light sleeper. It has improved our relationship to sleep apart. Since I talk to my friends about it, I know that many of them also sleep apart and credit it for being able to stay happily married instead of being sleep deprived and always mad at their partner. On vacation, we often go back to sharing a bed.

Just a guess but maybe if they aren’t government backed scholarships, Ireland has no way of verifying them. What happens if Ireland helps the students get to Ireland and it turns out there isn’t any real money? Now Ireland has to deport the students, which they won’t be able to, so they will then have to cover the full amount of the bogus scholarships to pay for the students who otherwise can’t afford to be there.

Most women learn from a very young age that the real definition of slut is 1) you used to have sex with me and not longer do so you’re a slut; 2) I want to have sex with you but you don’t notice me therefore you’re a slut; and 3) my boyfriend, husband, guy I like thinks you’re hot so you’re a slut. Doesn’t have anything to do with what sex the “slut” may or may not be having. Many women were labelled sluts while they were still virgins.

If any Trump voter was honest, they’d say “I didn’t vote for this…to happen to me, my family, my friends.” They damn well voted for it, with the expectation that it would only shit on “others”.