I’m a simple man, I see “Kandinsky”, I upvote.

That’s the other reason it’s a great analogy, Chef Mike is pretty central in a lot of kitchens.

This is a good analogy because microwaves are useful tools and are frequently found in restaurant kitchens. They obviously don’t replace the whole kitchen, but they absolutely provide value so long as you don’t overuse them.

At home, I generally heat leftovers most of the way in the microwave and then finish them in the air fryer or in a pan. It’s much faster than any other method and the quality is fine, just remember to stir periodically and use the right power level to ensure even heating.

I think LLMs can likewise be productively used as part of a process to get most of the way there, granted you finish it up manually. The problem comes when you try to make it the entire value stream. That’s like nuking something for 5 minutes and eating it immediately; you’ll have hot and cold spots and no texture.

Eh, A cups on a Pixar mom are better than the best breasts in the world on a stick figure. They’re just kinda… there? Sure they look nice, but they don’t really summon a force in me.

As soon as people start having kids, you’re back to square one

Secondly, 360° doesn’t really make sense, probably they meant 180°.

It makes sense if you consider birds to be a mid-360° position of dinosaur evolution. They started at “classic” dinosaurs, pivoted to the avian variety, and will continue to pivot until they return to their classic form.

Schlep

These are all set in walkable cities, it makes sense to have a favorite cafe near where you all live.

I’m unironically glad, I hope they replace the entire staff. When the company inevitably implodes, it will serve as a warning.

I’m sorry for the children in the US and the immigrants/indigenous, the rest of y’all have had plenty of time to straighten things out

That’s the thing though. The MIC hawks that do all the evil shit will be just fine, they’ve got money and connections. Most of their supporters will be fine for a good while, they’re the right color. The collateral damage is primarily going to be the children, the working class, the immigrants getting sent off to camps.

The people most responsible for the evil done by this country will be the last ones to suffer, if they’re not long dead by the time “find out” comes home to roost. The bulk of the suffering will be the people who hate it as much as you.

Winning a primary doesn’t mean much if the party crushes you in the general.

He’s beating every other candidate combined in the polls.

Democratic and Republican primaries are completely controlled by these two private organizations not some house always wins.*

Then what winning strategy do you recommend, and can it be implemented before midterms?

I don’t know what the ‘correct’ approach is

This is the crux of it. I’m advocating imperfect but immediately implementable actions, and you’re fighting that to remain pure for “Perhaps some actual grassroots organizations” doing something at some point in the future.

You can do both. A bandage doesn’t heal a wound, but it keeps you from bleeding out long enough to get to the hospital. We’re a long long way from the hospital, and you’re refusing first aid.

We see the truth being cast aside or drowned in a bunch of noise.

And you see truth coming out and spreading like wildfire. Social media is a tool. You can leverage it with money, or you can leverage it with numbers. We’ve got them beat on the numbers.

How are these people “the best option” in hindsight when we know for a fact that they lost the election?

Because the options are Democrat, Republican, or third party. A perfect third party with no chance of success is a bad option. Policy doesn’t mean anything if you stand no chance of winning. So it’s really a binary choice, and whichever one is less bad is by definition the best.

I legitimately cannot understand how someone like yourself can agree that we have terrible options while simultaneously arguing that we need to support the people determining said options.

Because we’re bleeding out. A dirty t-shirt as a makeshift tourniquet is a terrible medical option, but it sure as hell beats bleeding out. Stop focusing on historical-scale problems, since the ones in front of you RIGHT NOW. The best hospital in the world is useless to you if you bleed out before it’s built.

The incinerator is your vote and what you decide to do with it.

And when you’re a smattering of third party voters, that “incinerator” is a matchbook.

The environment we exist in isn’t limited to these two private parties. That’s just what they want you to believe.

Functionally it is. That’s what the math proves. This has been extensively studied. Parties can change, but as long as the mechanics of the election stay the same, it will always be a choice between the two biggest parties.

You think if the Dems can just win this next election they’ll turn things around

I do not. I think that building a grassroots coalition takes years, even decades. I think that the Republicans are an immediate existential threat to that kind of coalition, and do-nothing Democrats aren’t. I think it’s a lot easier to plan a revolution when your vanguard hasn’t been abducted by the gestapo.

And regardless of which party wins any given election, we’ve been steadily approaching that reality with each passing day.

What? No we haven’t. We approached that reality like a rocket after inauguration day. This is a dramatic, breakneck acceleration, directly tied to one party. It’s ridiculous to suggest otherwise. This is not a serious statement, I can’t have a discussion with someone that divorced from reality.

Seems like a great wakeup call that some actual change is needed, no?

Yeah, just like the last couple dozen wakeup calls over the last century. Until you’ve got the army to back up your plans, maybe let people address immediate threats in peace, and help them out while you build the resources and influence to IMPLEMENT your big plan. You’re no different than the worker voting red because when they’re a billionaire they’ll want tax cuts for their private jet.

Oof. That way lies quite a bit of collateral damage.

Do you have a plan for that or…?

Is red better for the global south or…?

He won a primary but has yet to win the election.

My whole point was about primaries, but even still he’s polling well in the lead. If he wins will you admit that it can be done?

Because people have been beaten down with the same club for so long that they’ve given up. I can say with almost certainty that a majority of people these days are just voting against the other candidate rather than voting for someone, so how do you build a coalition of people behind someone in an environment like that?

Okay, what’s your point? That the same population that’s too apathetic to vote in a primary are going to what, pick up arms and take to the streets? Organize behind and promote a minority party? How do you plan to build a coalition behind an objectively more difficult and unlikely strategy? You don’t.

You’re asking for a machine to produce a product that isn’t wanted by the people actually running the machine.

Mamdani, and several other leftist candidates have been running exceptionally successful grassroots campaigns through social media and hitting the streets. We live in the information age, viral community-driven campaigns have the potential to reach more people than legacy media. And again, what alternative do you propose that will face less corporate opposition? You think the DNC is going to stay silent on third party candidates competing for their votes? You think corporate media is going to stay silent on any attempt at actual revolution? If the machine is so powerful, what action are you suggesting that can actually overcome it?

they act like said loser candidate was “the best option” in hindsight despite the fact that they lost yet again.

So long as elections in this country are FPTP, and leftists don’t show up to primaries, and Republicans keep pushing Christo-fascism, then they are correct that it is the best option. Splitting the anti-Republican vote just helps the Republicans, and by extension the Heritage Foundation and Federalist Society. Personally, I’d rather have a Neo-Liberal government than a Christian Nationalist one, and there aren’t any other options right now.

At this point I’d be perfectly happy to throw the Democratic party in the incinerator alongside the Republican party and just starting over from scratch.

No disagreement here, but where’s the incinerator and the power to throw them in it? If I had a magic wand that I could wave to erase both parties, I would. But I don’t have that kind of magic wand, and neither do you. We have to operate in the environment we actually exist in. Idealism doesn’t get us any closer to material change. Voting against the worst option is the best choice we have at the polls, until we can get seriously organized. Serious organization takes a lot of time and effort. Ignoring the material present for a vague idealist future is a massive strategic blunder.

It’s a lot harder to organize as a political prisoner in a concentration camp.

Because no one else has the popularity to win at the moment?

Why do you think those are mutually exclusive? Can you not walk and chew gum at the same time? Wouldn’t doing all that you can do involve both laying the groundwork for revolution AND strategically voting against worse in the meantime? Voting doesn’t prevent me from democratizing my workplace, organizing with other leftists, educating non-leftists, or anything else that furthers direct action.

Why do you think it’s an either/or choice?

A thumb on the scale wouldn’t really matter if we were united. They put their thumb on the scale with Mamdani and he won anyway.

Why else do you think we keep getting the same handful of candidates?

Because primary turnout is something like 15% of eligible voters, who are disproportionately old and “centrist”.

Do you not see the pattern here? They want a dynasty in control not the people with the best ideas.

I’m not saying that this is false, I’m just saying it wouldn’t matter if we quit the infighting, rallied behind a good prospect, and actually showed up to vote for them as the Democratic candidate.

No, but we don’t have the popularity and support to elect good candidates yet, so right now it’s a choice between bad and worse. We should be doing what we can to avoid worse.

It assumes infighting is the reason why we can’t coalesce around a single candidate but the real reason why that isn’t happening is because the DNC keeps backing right wing candidates who don’t represent any of us.

That wouldn’t really matter if we coalesced behind the candidates we want in the primary.