Spyke

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decent

“Our nation is a nation of immigrants. More than any other country, our strength comes from our own immigrant heritage and our capacity to welcome those from other lands." -Ronald Reagan

It's ridiculous how far right the USA has moved when it comes to immigration. Reagan was a scumbag overall but was right about this. Frankly it pisses me off that even the Democrats are so far right on this.

usa

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Americans have no idea

Even as an American I don't understand why tourism hasn't dropped more than it has. I know it's down but I'm amazed people are still coming at all.

But, it's true that the mainstream media isn't really reporting on this, Trump's 'flood the zone' strategy works exceedingly well.

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I'm a trans man. I didn't realize how broken men are

Maybe it's because I live in a rural area, but no guy I know seems interested/comfortable with any kind of emotionally deep relationship with another guy. Definitely not throwing shade there, I feel the same way and completely unprepared on how to speak with anyone other than my wife emotionally.

The more seemingly well adjusted guys are all family guys with kids, so they basically have no time to do anything that doesn't involve the kids.

The ones without kids and the guys that never married or divorced all got into solitary hobbies like hunting or fishing. I like to trail run, so it's basically the same with me. I feel like it's basically impossible to make friends with another guy and I do try to!

Something I talk to a therapist about but otherwise have little idea what to do with is the fact that I literally have no actual guy friends, just coworkers and a few old college buddies that live hours away, so we only get together about one a year. I feel like the article was pretty good and it is very interesting that a trans man was able to capture the feeling so well.

world

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Welsh tourist in US chained 'like Hannibal Lecter'

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This is a better article but basically she was 'working' in the US by exchanging help around the house for a place to stay. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c80y3yx1jdyo

Apparently the Canadians were concerned she'd work while in Canada? This kind of housework for accommodation is super common in the backpacking, hostel, hitchhiking kind of space. It's ridiculous to treat tourists like this because of simply doing a little house work.

Another example with hikers going along the AT or PCT will frequently do housework like activities to payback hostels or shuttle drivers.

news

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*Permanently Deleted*

Even if Trump removes every tariff a recession is almost certainly coming. Short to longer term planning, hiring, building, etc will certainly slow down and that kind of things is widespread. People lose jobs, people don't get hired, people choose not to start a business or invest money in the USA, etc.

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China Just Turned Off U.S. Supplies Of Minerals Critical For Defense & Cleantech

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This is all just Japan from the 80s all over again. There are a bunch of movies from the period with Japan as the bogeyman. The peak probably being the backstory of Die Hard.

The key difference this time is the USA was paying for Japan's defense, had a massive military base, etc. China doesn't have that problem, so they can counter American demands with their own demands.

Interestingly, look at interviews with Trump from the 80s, he'll talk about Japan almost with the same language that he uses for China now. The most famous was probably an appearance of Trump on Oprah.

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Berlin Wall relic gets a 'second life' on US-Mexico border as Biden adds barriers

It's so annoying to hear certain folks acting like all the problems in America come from this Thunderdome type situation at the boarder with Mexico. And never do they have any recommendation that doesn't involve hurting people or invading Mexico out other ridiculous things. Just the other day I heard someone talking about all the Chinese people coming across the Mexico boarder and how they were actually spies for China. Fifteen years ago they were Muslims and terrorists.

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U.S. Secretary of Commerce says the ‘new model’ is factory jobs for life—for you, your kids, and your grandkids

You keep hearing some members of this administration talk about automation and robots for factory jobs, and also AI for office jobs. If the press were at all smart they would continually ask these morons to keep explaining this contradiction. But I would love hear what they think will happen if everyone in the country loses their job. It's not going to be good for the %.01 either.

Oh yeah, only right wing brown-nosers have White House press credentials anymore.

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The government doesn't use SQL

If SSN based fraud is the program then let's establish an actual federal identification number. Even the Social Services bureau tried to get everyone to not use it as the end all source of truth. They only created it for social security benefits, literally only that purpose.

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Why 150 years olds are still getting social security benefits

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It's because that explanation isn't correct. The real deal is you just have entries without a death date, so if you ran a query this get super old ages as a result.

Note that isn't a database of payments or even people eligible for them, just a listing of 'everyone' with a SSN. There is a separate master death index. In the old days, wild west kind of stuff people would disappear so the death date would never get entered. Modern days every morgue and funeral home has to legally notify SS when someone dies, there is a specific form and major hell to pay if you don't do it.

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*Permanently Deleted*

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It's important to remember social security numbers were created ONLY to track Social Security benefits. And the Social Security Bureau continually advised everyone to please not use them for a way to teach other things, but no one listened so here we are. The Bureau readily admits it's not designed to do anything else . https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19697506/#%3A%7E%3Atext=Abstract%2Cas+a+nearly+universal+identifier.