What do trees have to do with computers?

Senators in the US senate serve 6 year terms and there are only 2 per state. This means that there is always an even number of senators and they have a lot of time in office before needing to focus on campaigning for re-election. Compare this to the House of Representatives where the terms are 2 years and states get allocated different amounts of representatives based on population.

Other things to note about senators is that there are certain procedural elements in government that only originate or happen in the senate: approving presidential appointees, judges, generals and admirals, authorizing treaties. The senate also has various committees that advise or manage various aspects of governance. Bills, including the budget, must pass both houses of Congress; in the case of the budget, it originates in the House of Representatives but must be approved by the Senate. The Senate has a lot of power to kill/block legislation because legislation requires both houses of Congress to pass it.

Historically, the Senate was the states’ representative in the federal government and, in fact, state legislatures used to select senators. Although senators are now voted for by the populations of each state, they still have a legacy of being “more prestigious” than the House of Representatives and often vote more conservatively (read as deliberate or less reactively).

Candidly speaking, senators are known to become legacies often staying in office for more than 20 years and it is not uncommon frontje children of senators to also become senators. I mention this, because socially senators are often perceived as being part of a supposedly “non-existent” US aristocracy.

Oh, I’m with you. I was just diving really deep into how absurd the 51st rhetoric is on our side.

It is clear that there is no intention of treating Canada fairly and, as you rightly pointed out, annexation would be violent and justifiably so.

If Canada entered collectively as a single state (pure nonsense, but hear me out), they’d get two senators and 1 representative to the house. The apportionments for US representatives would need to be raised to account for 40 million new people, which my guess wouldn’t happen, so instead California and Canada (who have almost equal populations) would just trade off allocations of representatives alternating with New York and Texas. Canada would end up with a lot of representatives in the House this way but wouldn’t be nearly as powerful as adding 20 senators if the provinces entered as individual states.

All said, not all of these seats would go democrat, but the GOP definitely wouldn’t be able to guarantee majorities or stalemates in both houses like they have been for the past 20-30 years. Even if the Trump admin pulled this con off and annexed Canada as a US territory, the GOP would just block entry as a state since I can’t imagine this Congress passing a joint resolution to allow it. Furthermore, Congress doesn’t even have to consider adding a new state even if the population of that territory keep petitioning for it (see ongoing D.C. and Puerto Rico statehood petitions).

Shit would get really complicated when the US has to handle the dissolution of parliament, withdrawal from the Commonwealth, and Quebec.

The honest answer is this: Salami (sliced salami), pepperoni (sliced spicy salami), and sausage (pre-cooked fennel-flavored uncased/crumbled pork sausage).

In the US, “sausage” tends to generically refer to uncured, fresh, or raw sausages, often really meaning “ground meat mixed with herbs and spices sometimes in a tube or casing (but not always).”

I have a smart deadbolt that is keypad operated. It’s awful.

Never used the smart features, and there isn’t a bypass to unlock the door when the batteries die — which happens a lot, especially in the winter. I tried using rechargeable batteries in it, but they last less than half the time of normal batteries.

There is nothing more frustrating than punching in the key code and hearing the death of HAL9000 voice before the deadbolt fully unlocks. Luckily I have a back door that isn’t smart.

I’m replacing the lockset soon and this won’t be a problem anymore, but holy shit is it frustrating and wasteful.

Doge.js is required to audit imports across interpreters.

May I interest you in renting this fine pineapple?

Intellectually I know that all currency systems are constructs and are volatile. That said, what bothers me so much about crypto is how it’s either an obvious scam or it appears to behave like company scrip requiring various exchanges or participating vendors, etc. It’s annoying enough using credit cards or systems like PayPal cash app, and crypto reads like a more annoying PayPal with all of the instability of a stock.

I rarely place much value on authority, but I trust a central bank or national treasury much more than three dudes at a startup promising to disrupt how we think of money.

“It was back it the early 2000s, around 2013 or so….”

The “2000s” also has no meaning for defining a specific time period. It should mean 2001-2010, but I’ve also never heard anyone seriously refer to 2011-2020 as the “teens” and 2021-2025 as the “twenties.” Those words are already associated with decades that we still culturally reference.

We’re a quarter of a century in and I still don’t know how to precisely refer to a 21st-century decade.

The New Colossus was released during Trump’s first term and it was really cathartic to play during the shit storm. The game even pissed off the “alt-right.” The New Order and The Old Blood are much better at “endless destruction of Nazis” though.

Might be time to reinstall and play through them again.

And the ‘it’s just a flu!’ people pissed me the fuck off.

I think many people haven’t actually had the flu or have had it after a vaccination or a during mild year.

That shit is awful, and it can and has killed. Hell, 100 years before COVID there was the 1918 Flu Epidemic which killed nearly three times as many people as COVID. So when some chucklefuck prattles on about “it’s just the flu,” my response is always, “that doesn’t make it safer.”

I’ve experienced the language skills of Nederlanders first hand! What I found to be most striking was hearing people having trilingual conversations especially in restaurants where the waitstaff were actively communicating individually with dozens of people in two to three languages.

I’ve tried to keep up with language skills but starting a language in high school or college just didn’t work for me. Especially since the application of those skills prioritizes written communication. I always end up with an understanding of pronunciation, some grammar, and a handful of vocabulary that I can’t actively use.

I don’t think any Americans are judging you too harshly for UK spellings. I think keeping track of all the slang and colloquialisms would be the greater challenge. I was taught “grey” and “colour” as a kid and the only problem I have is with spellcheck. 😂

That’s one way to do it!

I had problems with TSA before because my real ID confused them and they didn’t believe it was a valid US ID. Granted, this was at a regional airport, but it’s literally the ID that complies with requirements set by Homeland Security for the specific purpose of use in airports by TSA.

Edit: and my ID isn’t even from New Mexico!

Your English is also better than people in my family whose ancestors were 18th-century British colonists.

I once had a heated argument with a coworker about where the capital of the US is located. He was of the opinion that Washington state was the capital and Washington, DC was a US city located in Colombia (he also had difficulty understanding that Colombia and Columbia were spelled differently). He wasn’t trolling; when I finally got to a map (pre-smart phone days) and showed him where DC is located, he got really mad.

Yeah, I’ve noticed that a lot of sites are starting to disallow aliasing with email addresses. So annoying.