polka_haunts_us (u/polka_haunts_us)

polka_haunts_us commented on Nick Clegg: If the people who ran FB were monsters, I wouldn't have worked there theguardian.com/politics/... · Posted by u/donsupreme

blibble · 4 months ago

that strategy worked great for the Tories

polka_haunts_us · 4 months ago

The Tories were notably not a EU maximalist party and the only reason they added support for an in-out referendum was due to pressure from the side of the party who wanted "out".

The Tories are in fact not the same party as the Lib Dems, whose leader at the time, Nick Clegg, this thread is about. I'm not really sure why you're bringing them up.

polka_haunts_us commented on Nick Clegg: If the people who ran FB were monsters, I wouldn't have worked there theguardian.com/politics/... · Posted by u/donsupreme

blibble · 4 months ago

he directly supported an in-out referendum, at the point he thought it would get him into power

https://www.libdemvoice.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Clegg...

(the leaflet is complete gold, he even criticises the tories for not offering a proper one)

there was also this amazing speech by him: https://youtu.be/cDcR_6x7GgI?t=812

which is exactly what he then did after he lost the referendum, just like his japanese soldiers

the man is a total hypocrite of the highest order

polka_haunts_us · 4 months ago

The whole point of the Lib Dems supporting an in-out referendum was that in the event they were actually elected to power and therefore able to enact their platform, the UK would be in a state where they would obviously support "in" because the only people who would ever vote for the Lib Dems were people who were EU maximalists.

polka_haunts_us commented on Poll: Should submissions about Elon Musk's political actions be allowed on HN? · Posted by u/minimaxir

polka_haunts_us · a year ago

I vouched this dead submission and voted yes as a support of the status quo, because you can trivially put "Elon" into search bar and find that they aren't a shortage of Elon political submissions.

Look, my highest rated comment on this site is asking Dang to unflag a certain thread on Jan 6, 2021. You need to understand there are plenty of people on this site who will flag anything political regardless of the content, because frankly that's not what this site is for. I understand that perspective, I don't get my news from here I actually go to news sites and read there. Hacker news is an entirely different compartment of my life and I assume I'm not the only one.

On the other hand, people flagging Elon isn't some new phenmoenon. People have spammed every single time he's been in the news for years. Like Taylor Swift, the guy is a bonafide superstar. Millions of people who both love him and hate him for years have hung on his every word and action.

Speaking for myself, I decided Elon was a piece of garbage when he called the submarine guy a Pedo, but I was still happy to get some Tesla stock when I thought it was a good deal. My real life friends of 10+ years, apropos of nothing, were taunting me in a more mean spirited than joking way in December 2022 that the value of the stock had fallen, boy aren't you sad you lost those thousands of dollars. Then at least a couple times a month since they want my opinion on the Elon outrage of the week, most of which aren't real outrages but shitty celebrity gossip they found out about because they spent all their curiousity about the world on r/all, where thousands of Elon haters were doing the same thing. This has been the temperature from a certain segment of the population for years.

I'm legitimately concerned about some of the stuff going on, but I do honestly think there quite a large component of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf", even if there is also a component of "Don't Look Up". The fact of the matter is if you honestly believe there is an in-progress fascist takeover of the US Government, there are 50,000 better things you could be doing about it than debating the Hacker News current events flagging policy.

polka_haunts_us commented on Google Pixel 4a's old firmware is gone, trapping users on buggy battery update androidcentral.com/phones... · Posted by u/bmaupin

slavik81 · a year ago

My Pixel 4a won't turn on. I wonder if this might fix that problem. I guess it's worth a shot.

polka_haunts_us · a year ago

My dad and I both bought a 4a (5G) at the same time, ours both died within a week of each other. With mine at least I know the issue was that it just stopped charging entirely, no cable plugged in would fix it.

Unfortunately, the 5G variation doesn't appear to be part of this program.

polka_haunts_us commented on r/Duolingo Will No Longer Be Duolingo’s Unpaid Customer Support or Data Mine old.reddit.com/r/duolingo... · Posted by u/Lammy

polka_haunts_us · a year ago

I guess it's been over a year since the reddit blackouts, we were due for more ludicrous drama and laughably inflated moderator egos. I wouldn't be surprised to see similar posts in other subreddits, at least until Reddit swoops in at someone's behest and threatens to take their toys away.

Duolingo only has themselves to blame though, I'm struggling to name another non-social media app who has cultivated a fanbase with such a weird parasocial relationship with it.

polka_haunts_us commented on Ursula von der Leyen wins second term as European Commission president politico.eu/article/ursul... · Posted by u/aa_is_op

atlasunshrugged · a year ago

Particularly interesting is that she was elected again with a higher number of votes than her initial election, despite concerns over serious headwinds from the far-right. Not sure what this portends, but interesting.

polka_haunts_us · a year ago

Previously she was elected by a coalition of the center-left, center, and center-right. Due to major losses by the center, she made concessions to get the greens on board as well, which is why the vote count is up.

It's part of a broader trend in Europe where in most countries, since the share of the far-right grows and the share of everyone else shrinks, the absolute refusal to work with the far right is leading the remaining parties to attempt increasingly complex and discordant coalitions.

My take is doing this means that people who vote far-right never get any evidence that they should change their vote and people who are dissatisifed with what they vote for are left with increasingly few alternatives since the majority coalition sucks up more and more parties.

I think it will be interesting in a few years to compare the likes of France and Germany who are all in on the blockade, vs the Netherlands or Sweden where the far right is part of a governing coalition they don't have full control over.

polka_haunts_us commented on Lower mortality, hospital readmission rates if treated by female physicians thenationalnews.com/healt... · Posted by u/wjb3

throwawaysleep · 2 years ago

Anecdotally, women care more about strangers than men do. Men also go along with my amoral schemes much more than women do.

polka_haunts_us · 2 years ago

Any amoral schemes you care to share with the class?

polka_haunts_us commented on Ask HN: Who Wants to Be Fired? · Posted by u/codingclaws

polka_haunts_us · 2 years ago

I definitely feel a bit drained about my job lately, but then last night I was looking through my linkedin connections and basically everyone who left in the last 6+ months doesn't have a new job title, at least not one they care to share on linkedin.

No harm in keeping the resume up to date, but I'm not getting my hopes up at all.

polka_haunts_us commented on · Posted by u/lando2319

polka_haunts_us · 2 years ago

We have this nonsense in Washington too, I made an effort last time I went to pick up takeout to bring one of my reusable bags with me to avoid the 8 cent bag fee, they had already bagged my order in a new one, the restaurant was like "Oh you have your own? We'll just take that one off your hands." Well, it wasn't one of the restaurants it was just a random grocery store one I had laying around, what are they going to do with it?

I wonder how many people even know those heavy bags ARE supposed to be reusable. I only know because I was bored and read my shopping bag.

We also have some kind of ban on fastfood giving you plastics without you asking for them first that as far as I can tell literally no one, except for a singular KFC near my house, actually abides by. It's all just ridiculous theater.

polka_haunts_us commented on Enthusiasts struggle to keep model railway industry on track theguardian.com/lifeandst... · Posted by u/austinallegro

polka_haunts_us · 2 years ago

Funny to see this now. A couple days ago I was on vacation in San Diego and visited the San Diego Model Railroad Museum in Balboa Park and a lot of the traffic flowing through my head about it are all points addressed in the above article:

"Almost everyone working here is quite old"

"The amount of space this takes up is incredible, I wonder how people get into this hobby, I've never lived anywhere where I'd have enough space to set up a model railway long term"

It's kind of a shame too, it was the first time I think I've ever really appreciated the large scale model train installations. When I was younger I'd see them at random historical museums and mostly just think "yeah choo-choo sure does go in a circle haha". I think the San Diego museum did a good job of conveying that it isn't really just about the trains as much as it's about modeling the landscapes and towns the trains actually go through. Viewing it from the perspective of a massive scale diorama of some region really raised my overall appreciation for the whole endeavour.