Truly. I didn't know a song could make me cry until I listened to Billy Austin, a song Earle wrote about the death penalty.

I appreciate that you gave it a listen! Hopefully you appreciated it

Thanks, I respect your take too. I fully understand that I'm an optimist, and will desperately cling to any shred of hope we have. Not a position everyone holds, and I don't hold it against anyone to not have hope for humanity's future, as much as it conflicts with my own thoughts. In any case, I hope you have a good one! Thanks for a good discussion.

That's a non sequitur at best.

True, but imagine if we gave everyone an automatic weapon and told people they need to be responsible for what they choose to shoot. True, but we probably shouldn't have given out so many weapons.

It's a terrible metaphor, but there's an intersection between personal, collective, corporate, and technological responsibility that we need to consider, and it's hard to articulate in a few sentences. IMHO we're all in an ouroboros of thought and action, internally and externally.

It's a slow start, but it's worth the investment IMHO. Have a good one!

Reminds me of a conversation in the Wire between Carcetti and Bunny, about "Old Man Stryker": https://youtu.be/MTrvAnP5U18?si=UvjiXno_gbefGCuG

I've got some student loans....

I don't see it as delusion, but being realistic.

What you and I do today is meaningless in the grand scale of the universe, and likely has a tiny effect on what happens to someone living a hundred years from now.

That doesn't mean that what we do doesn't have a more immediate impact.

Make your neighbor's day better, because while it won't matter in a million years, it matters now. So who cares if it costs you a few extra minutes of your life, it makes theirs better, and nothing means anything in the long run anyway, right? So why not make it easier for everyone else here, now? Making other people feel better feels good, so everyone wins, and we can better enjoy what time we have.

Government intervention in the economy doesn't mean it's not Capitalism IMHO: I see that as an unnecessarily restrictive definition. I think of capitalism in more broad terms as being for-profit private ownership of trade/industry.

I can agree that there's some theoretical upper limit at which Crony Capitalism turns into an outright Corporate State, but I don't think we're quite there yet, and hopefully we can avoid it (as much as we seem to be headed that way, unfortunately).

Facade isn't accurate IMHO. Capitalist Oligarchy is fine though. Maybe a subtle distinction, but I think it's important.

Good guess, but doesn't look like it: July is when the Earth is at its furthest point from the sun.

There's a great They Might Be Giants song about exactly this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSbEOZY7k20