I’d generally agree, definitely consider XY completely forgettable. That said, I think Rush of Blood is a great album as an album. Parachutes is a better collection of songs but Rush feels more comprehensive to me. Even clocks, in the context of the album, works. The only other album I enjoy is viva la vida, because while it’s not perfect, I like what they were attempting with that one. I’d like other bands to experiment with those kinds of concepts so even if I don’t think they exactly hit the mark, I appreciate the attempt

I would say at the time they were solid good. They weren’t technically very complex but who cares - half the bands at that time barely even played instruments, just banged out power chords and yelled into a mic. As far as pop music goes those albums were great in my opinion. Wouldn’t talk about them in a music theory class, but we were lucky to have such solid albums getting radio play.

People are upset cause you’re 'both sides’ing it whether you mean to or not.

It’s like that in my city too when people decide to drive on the streets designated as greenways. You want bikers out of your way? Give them another place to go and they’ll gladly use it to get away from you. It sounds like you’re describing a place where there is only car infrastructure so bikers are forced into traffic situations built for cars. That means every one of them interprets what they are supposed to be doing (either for safety or to follow the law) differently.

Think about it this way. Someone parked in the bike lane? I’m swerving into traffic. Person doesn’t see me and starts merging at me? I’m swerving into another lane. Someone intentionally decides to ride my ass? I’m getting out of their way before they get violent, possibly putting me in front of you.

Tired of bikers in your ‘car lanes’? Give them their own lane. A person in a car does not have any more value or rights than a person on a bike. And their infrastructure costs tons more.

If there were 100x less games but they all had the passion of stardew behind them I think we’d come out ahead

Crazy inefficiencies is why not. If you’ve ever worked a large infrastructure or construction project you’d see why this doesn’t work. There are advantages of scale. A single company being able to handle the land acquisition, and all engineering alone for a large project is going to be like 10000 people, and that’s without construction. If I had to work with 15 other companies to get a thing built I’ll tell you right now that things never gonna get built. Big companies aren’t the problem, small ownership is the problem. Employee owned (socialist) companies are the solution. It’s not about not scaling, it’s about ensuring that the workers own the means of production. If you want renewable energy, high speed rail, and sustainable district engineering we need to leverage economies of scale. It’s just that we need to set up economic systems that distribute the profits to those doing the work.

I don’t like the idea of limiting company size - there are a lot of advantages of scale. Instead let’s say any company over 1000 employees must be fully employee owned

Every interaction I’ve ever had with police I’ve been the one attempting to de escalate. Literally 100%. What’s frustrating is you speaking calmly and clearly pisses them off even more because they feel like you’re speaking down to them. They feel like they are supposed to be the reasonable ones and you’re making them look bad. Which of course you are, because they’re not.

I recognize you’re doing some form or devils advocate and I appreciate that. I grew up in the ruins of one of those cities and it really helped define my political beliefs. I think it’s important to not suddenly frame NAFTA as this wonderful thing just because trump opposes it. There is a real reckoning we need to have as a country when it comes to rebuilding our industrial base. Are tariffs the answer? Almost certainly not, but that doesn’t mean that the people asking for them are completely delusional. Trump is capitalizing on a real pain that people are feeling, and have felt for a generation now. I wish we had a proper progressive to reframe the debate. It’s not about us vs Canada, it’s about the disgustingly wealthy vs everyone else. You don’t want people to support tariffs? Then we need real left wing populist arguments.

I know it’s stupid. Being right should be good enough. But it’s not. We need to be convincing. And not ‘republican lite’ convincing - more like teddy Roosevelt f’ing come at me unabashed progressivism convincing.