briar patch

[ken_sylvania]

Gas isn't cheap, guys. Conserve a bit or we will have to add a fuel surcharge to your subscription fee.

You know people generally place a higher value things and services that they have to pay for....

I’ll charge $5,000 per month so you REALLY value it.

Maybe that would help me be more careful with my words.

[ohio jones]

Maybe that would help me be more careful with my words.

I hope a bit of cash isn't a greater incentive than Matthew 12:37.

[Szdfan]

Soon AI and Tesla robots will take over teaching.

I don't think AI will take over teaching (at least not soon), but it will transform teaching.

[Robert]

Soon AI and Tesla robots will take over teaching.

I don't think AI will take over teaching (at least not soon), but it will transform teaching.

You are missing the bigger picture with Elon's plans.

In 10-20 years, people will only need one income, this allows one parent to stay home and raise their children using AI to educate them. They will also have a personal robot to assist with things around the house, and child care and education will be a part of that.

[Szdfan]

That he is an accused rapist, serial adulterer, and raging alcoholic only underscores his unsuitability for the job.

You can have your opinions, but watch the accusations.

For clarification, which forum rule did Ken violate? He didn't make any accusations against any participants on this forum. Participants post allegations against politicians and public figures here all the time.

[Robert]

That he is an accused rapist, serial adulterer, and raging alcoholic only underscores his unsuitability for the job.

You can have your opinions, but watch the accusations.

For clarification, which forum rule did Ken violate? He didn't make any accusations against any participants on this forum. Participants post allegations against politicians and public figures here all the time.

Do not argue with Mods.

[Szdfan]

You can have your opinions, but watch the accusations.

For clarification, which forum rule did Ken violate? He didn't make any accusations against any participants on this forum. Participants post allegations against politicians and public figures here all the time.

Do not argue with Mods.

I'm sorry if I'm coming off as arguing. That's not my intention. I'm asking for clarification regarding forum rules.

[JohnH]

I think it’s completely inappropriate to insinuate that I’m secretly a Nazi or sympathetic to these ideologies because I raise these concerns. It’s hurtful and unfounded, and I ask that you don't do it again.

I don't think it's inappropriate at all. you bring up nazi stuff, a lot, and repeatedly compared trump to hitler or nazi ideologies. now you're comparing elon musk to a nazi. it's ridiculous, and if you don't want people to think you're obsessed with nazis, the best thing to do would be to stop talking about them. naziism is long in the past and hitler has been dead a very long time, perhaps you should find other things to worry about.

[ohio jones]

I think it’s completely inappropriate to insinuate that I’m secretly a Nazi or sympathetic to these ideologies because I raise these concerns. It’s hurtful and unfounded, and I ask that you don't do it again.

I don't think it's inappropriate at all. you bring up nazi stuff, a lot, and repeatedly compared trump to hitler or nazi ideologies. now you're comparing elon musk to a nazi. it's ridiculous, and if you don't want people to think you're obsessed with nazis, the best thing to do would be to stop talking about them. naziism is long in the past and hitler has been dead a very long time, perhaps you should find other things to worry about.

Please have the decency to respect the request.

[Ken]

Then maybe stop accusing many of us of racism. I think it shows poor character to do so.

Get a grip. No one accused you of anything. They accused the president of racism not you. Unless you consider yourself to be part of the online mob of Trump apologists dedicated to whitewashing everything he does. And it isn't just people here making that observation. Plenty of people close to the president or whose job it is to study such things have made the same observations: https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/03/us/p ... =url-share

As Navy divers searched the Potomac River for bodies from the worst air crash in the United States in 20 years, President Trump zeroed in on what he saw as the cause: hiring programs that promote diversity.

The meaning behind his words was clear, that diversity equals incompetence. And for many historians, civil rights leaders, scholars and citizens, it was an unmistakable message of racism in plain sight at the highest levels of American government.

“His attacks on diversity, equity and inclusion aren’t about a particular program or some acronym — they’re just a sanitized substitute for the racist comments that can no longer be spoken openly,” Margaret Huang, the Southern Poverty Law Center’s president and chief executive, said during a call with civil rights leaders after Mr. Trump’s remarks. “But the message is the same, that women, ​Black and brown communities are inherently less capable, and if they hold positions of power or authority in government or business, it must be because the standards were lowered.​”

and

In his actions, Mr. Trump has aligned himself with those who are brandishing the term D.E.I. as a catchall for discrimination against white people, and using it as a pejorative to attack nonwhite and female leaders as unqualified for their positions. After some of Mr. Trump’s allies in Congress disparagingly referred to Vice President Kamala Harris as a “D.E.I. hire” during the 2024 campaign, Mr. Trump refused to disavow the remarks.

and

“It’s the latest term that serves as a proxy for race, and it’s used as a politically expedient slur, as a way to stoke white grievances and to give a convenient scapegoat to whatever ails our nation,” said Timothy Welbeck, the director of Temple University’s Center for Anti-Racism.

and

In Mr. Trump’s remarks last week on the plane crash, he cited no evidence that diversity programs had anything to do with the fatal accident. When asked how he could say that diversity hiring was to blame, he said, “I have common sense.”

In a misleading claim, Mr. Trump insinuated that the administration of President Barack Obama — the first Black president — had stocked the Federal Aviation Administration with people who could not do their jobs.

and

But in the F.A.A. and elsewhere, officials say, the programs follow the same aptitude, medical and security standards for all hires.

Melik Abdul, a Republican strategist who was a part of the group Black Americans for Trump during the 2024 campaign, said the president’s stated commitment to merit was contradicted by some of his actions. He noted that Mr. Trump’s cabinet, which is predominantly white and male, is packed with loyalists.

“If it was all about merit, then we wouldn’t have Pete Hegseth,” said Mr. Abdul, referring to Mr. Trump’s defense secretary. Mr. Hegseth, a veteran and former Fox News host, took over the job of overseeing the Defense Department and its three million employees with little management experience beyond running veterans groups that he was accused of mismanaging.

“You can’t argue merit and say that is our most merit-based hire,” said Mr. Abdul, who has not broken with the president over the D.E.I. issue but says he is frustrated by Mr. Trump’s “obsession” with it.

For many, Mr. Trump’s attacks on D.E.I. point to his long history of inflaming racial tensions using dog whistles — from a campaign dating back to the 1980s against five Black men who were wrongfully convicted and ultimately exonerated of assaulting and raping a white woman, to his attempt to paint the first Black president as a noncitizen.

But now, they say, the dog whistle is a bullhorn.