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Yes, something I didn’t like about FiraXCOM was how pod activation was the most important mechanic on the game. You can go through a mission and not get a single shot aimed at you, or you can make last move in your turn, unveil one or two extra tiles and have a new pod or two take a shot at your squad.

Curtis Yarvin has been blogging about his dreams for almost twenty years, blogs called Unqualified Reservations and Gray Mirror, you can look them up if you want, and he calls it Dark Enlightenment (a name that teenagers could easily pick for their goth or black metal band). Companies existing as their own little kingdoms with their own laws, and them as kings. Cities run as companies, competing for citizens. The final Cyberpunk form of Guard Dog's beloved libertarianism. He blogged about how to turn the US into an autocracy and has inspired the neo-reactioary movement. He's a nutjob who has gone from defining castes of people in the US, arguing that South American immigrants are part of a caste where men are criminals and women on welfare, to giving them names from Tolkien's Lord of the Rings (elves are the liberal ruling elite, hobbits are the middle class and dwarves the workers) and wants to replace the elves with dark elves (i.e. him and his ilk). Friends with J. D. Vance (who has publicly quoted the "works" of Yarvin and referenced Yarvin's idea of the Cathedral in speeches), even though he's been trying to distance himself from him, and backed by Peter Thiel. The same Peter Thiel who runs companies like Mithril and Palantir, because referencing Tolkien's body of work is fun. A nutjob who was invited to the inaugural gala of Mango Mussolini because by now he's an influencial figure among the alt-right / neo-reactionaries. You know, someone who wants to turn the United States into a monarchy, with ties to the vice president, in an administration where the president has posted and talked about himself as being the king on more than one occasion. Who said that voting for him would be the last time people need to vote. With people like Bruce still believing he's joking. The tech bros are, as Gromnir put it, vying for control. Absolute control. I mean, what can you do when you're so rich that you and your familiy will never want for anything for any forseeable future? Well, why not become king?

am agreeing the US is embracing fascism with disappointing vigor and speed, but am simply noting that all too often people use "fascist" and "authoritarian" interchangeable... save that fascist feels worse, so is more pejorative? most o' us rolled our eyes when vol identified every group or action he disagreed with as nazi. all too often, people do something similar with the fascit label. dunno. regardless, am agreeing that the US is pretty deep into fascism at the moment. the following is kinda silly, but also illustrative valhalla? the commander in chief dodged the draft for chrissakes, but somehow we got this weird quasi-comic warrior culture being perpetuated by pete hegseth and... kash patel, the trump administration's living embodiment o' peter pettigrew. serious? add contempt/fear o' science, demonization o' trans people and minority groups, a s'posed "invasion" at the southern border, exploitation of outrage and grievance, as well as the deep state nonsense. etc. but again, is not difficult to make a fascist argument for almost any government organization or action... if you don't like 'em. am simply pointing out that identifying generic authoritarian behaviors and practices by a government doesn't genuine push the needle toward a result of fascism in any meaningful way. as for tech company's following the lure o' profit, we agree... mostly. during the biden years the tech companies were doing extreme well. profits were historic good. the US economy were the "envy of the world" and all that. sure, ordinary americans had struggles with inflation and cost of living concerns, but the tech bros were unaffected by such minutiae. one reason why bernie sanders and elizabeth warren were always outraged during the biden term is 'cause never had so few made so much money in such a short a period o' time, and those tech bro billionaires were paying proportional less in taxes than rich people had been required to pay for +80 years. converse, trump is an ignorant buffoon who doesn't care what happens to the economy as long as he personal gets rich. the tech guys knew before the election that tariffs were problematic and trump's current assault on the fed is not helping with investor confidence. mass deportations is necessarily gonna result in further inflation as well as a shrinking of the consumer and tax-paying base as well as creating severe impacts on specific industries such as agriculture and construction. the tech guys know that if the economy tanks, they will also suffer, but they nevertheless supported (and continue to support) erratic and ignorant as 'posed to the status quo, a status quo which were making them all fabulously rich. so, if profits were your most pressing concern, which bet made more sense, harris or trump? am gonna suggest that even more than profit, the tech guys is blinded by their need for control. there is a belief amongst the tech bros that if they have control, they will keep making money no matter what, so control and profit is necessarily intertwined, but if if they gotta make a choice 'tween the two, control wins. biden frequently cut the tech oligarchs outta the decision making 'round government regulation of ai and lina khan was kinda their nightmares given flesh. converse, the tech guys can get trump to respond to their phone calls and a shiny bauble and a performative genuflection is, they believe, gonna get them the results they desire. kleptorcacy and oligarchy ain't the same thing, but the tech oligarchs is betting that they are able to convince trump to enrich them too even if the recent conflict 'tween elon musk and donald trump should prove that they don't have legit control. regardless, if profits were genuine your most pressing concern, why would you f with the status quo o' the previous administration? HA! Good Fun! ps our biggest concern regarding the endemic misunderstanding o' fascism is that the only reason most maga folks, not to mention a considerable % o' the remaining general population, reflexive balk at being called fascist is 'cause they don't know what is fascism. w/o mention o' fascism, describe the kinda vague ideology being promoted by tucker carlson, bennie johnson and yeah, charlie kirk using the framework o' umberto eco's fourteen features. describe in glowing terms how tucker, unlike the mainstream media, recognizes the threat of trans people and immigrants, or how bennie johnson embraces a return o' masculinity. without mention o' fascism, use the fourteen features to describe the increasingly typical right-wing pundit and then see how many americans see such as problematic v. positive. when the el paso walmart shooting happened, we read the shooter's manifesto. in 2009, the manifesto woulda' sounded like the ranting o' a lunatic. in 2019, the manifesto's main points were familiar to anybody who followed tucker carlson. @Pidescois no doubt certain that fascism is unhealthy for a society, and history supports that conclusion, but am increasing of the opinion that fascism is only seen as pejorative by most maga types because they don't know what fascism is. pps am also gonna observe how most o' the media companies, law firms and universities who has capitulated were similar going mask off in the name of profits. as noted, the law firms who rolled over for tump were the firms who has big merger and acquisition portfolios. the current kerfuffle regarding jimmy kimmel happened 'cause the head o' the fcc intimated that he would kill a prospective merger deal 'tween sinclair and nexstar. earlier when cbs and abc caved to trump whims, it were also likely due to the fact they got big deals in the works which require fed approval to happen. universities caved as soon as trump went after their grants. etc. this trump administration has had difficulty avoiding tripping over their own feet even as the rough beast, its hour come at last, slouches toward bethlehem. even so, you gotta hand it to the project 2025 folks as they appeared to bet that all the big talk from lawyers, universities and others regarding rights and justice was just so much air and that if tested, people with the power to make a difference would choose their third vacation house as 'posed to remaining true to their espoused convictions. trump, is a psycopath, but am s'posing that is the source o' much o' his success. trump can smell weakness?

I suppose the next logical step is to explain the power structure underneath. this is where you slip the kids some Noam Chompsky on the dl. edit: I meant to quote Hurlshot as well, but it doesn’t wanna do it on my ipad

Oh yeah, it is pretty annoying to me as well. I still have "brain-muscle memory" from the old Microprose game for tactics used to clear landing/terror sites, and keep forgetting, about this mechanic, which leads to a lot of reloads 😛

you are describing authoritarianism more than fascism, but such confusion ain't your fault as the definition o' fascism is a gestalt o' somewhat related qualities and factors which exist to greater or lesser degrees in various real world examples of fascism. given the admitted fuzzy descriptor o' fascism, you end up with kinda a dual problem as 1) almost nobody genuine knows what fascism means, and 2) it is not difficult to legitimize pounding any square peg you don't like into the fascist round hole. if you don't like cops, the catholic church or no-smoking areas, then is all too common you will see those entities, organizations and regulations as fascist. authoritarian + more-than-just-bad = fascist? am not suggesting @Pidescois doing such, but am sure you have noticed such behavior. that said, the current US embrace of authoritarianism is bordering on axiomatic. for crying out loud, even the trump campaign distanced itself from project 2025 during the run up to the election in part because even the folks at fox recognized the proposed blueprint was overtly embracing authoritarian methodology to achieve extreme goals... were a franco christmas list for chrissakes. the pushback against project 2025 complaints from the right was not that project 2025 were a legit approach to government reform but rather that libs were using the mad scribblings o' a fringe group to unjust paint trump as a wannabee dictator. we are eight months into this Presidency and something like 47% o' project 2025 goals has been implemented. fascism? if you were attempting to plot where the US is on a fascist graph or spectrum, am willing to concede that due to the challenging nature o' the fascist definition, there is uncertainty in definitive identifying nascent fascist regimes sans equivocation. nevertheless, 2025 US has gotta be worse than 1930s and charles lindbergh, yes? ... am disappointed by the tech companies, media organizations and even universities as they capitulate at the first sign o' trump displeasure. few law firms have fought back against trump, although every one who has done so won in court. those firms with any kinda mergers and acquisitions portfolio has too often displayed humiliating, if predictable, cowardice. am not at all shocked by the craven servility o' Congressional republicans. also, we fully anticipated that +1/3 o' the country would cheer on trump as he indulged his most salient personality attributes: greed, vanity, pettiness, ignorance, cruelty. most o' this freaking mess is what we has warned 'bout all too often, although am gonna admit we were genuine dumbfounded by the blatant grift of the proposed tik tok deal... and cecot caught us complete off guard. is september 2025 and we keep waiting for some kinda pushback from ordinary americans. trump loyalists will stick with the President no matter what, but the majority o' americans ain't hardcore maga. there is some encouraging signs that the mass deportations and ending protected status for venezuelan asylum seekers is having an impact on those admitted diverse latino voters who flipped from democrat to republican in the recent election, but the problem is that while they no longer trust trump, am doubtful they are more enamored with "godless" democrats in 2025 than they was in 2024. still, if all those latinos just don't vote, it would help democrats in the midterms. will it take some unspecific level o' inflation/stagflation to finally motivate americans to protest en masse, 'cause masked ice agents mistaken brutalizing american citizens hasn't. sending the national guard to american cities? meh. trump and elon's colossal failed promise of $2 trillion in dodge savings? tax cuts for billionaires leading to rural hospital shutdowns? trump's sh!t coin shennanigans? the epstein files? what? joe manchin is doing a book tour. kamala harris also released a book. what we learned via reporting o' the books (is no way in hell we read either offering) is that the only thing democrats and republicans can agree on in 2025 is that democrats suck. anywho, we bring up manchin specific 'cause we saw him recent on a podcast (to sell his book) and among other topics, he explained why west virginians keep voting republican in spite o' the fact republicans has now controlled the state for years and the economic situation in west virginia has gotten noticeable worse-- what would it take for a demcorat to win in west virgina? manchin conceded that the democrat brand is too toxic in west virginia for any democrat to win, regardless o' economic policies or promises. is tribal/social/community which has west virginians reject democrats, and it ain't so much democrat economic policies which is the problem. the people of west virginia won't vote democrat 'cause they see democrats as habitual "mainstreaming" behaviors west virginains don't approve. democrat values is repugnant, so west virginians will vote against democrats regardless o' economic interests. let that sink in when trying to predict future election outcomes. HA! Good Fun!

So the garden patches are fairly useless as they are. I know people have suggested adding the ability to grow things like dandelions which would be good but they're still too slow to use. I'd suggest both a higher yield and the ability to re plant and or harvest in one input as I for one don't bother with them because you need to chop, collect, open menu, add crop, and fertilizer for each one which is slow enough that I'd rather just gather resources normally.

What we need is a fresh water and salt water garden for the seaweed, pond moss, and other water flora.