Depending on the design of its memory, a device with a full drive will literally weigh slightly more or slightly less than one with an empty drive. Charging the battery in all cases causes it to weigh more.

Because collecting only one type of taxes would cause massive economic distortion and would inevitably burden people unequally. Different taxes have different properties. Some hit certain groups harder than others. Some hit certain types of businesses harder than others. Far better to have a whole series of modest taxes than one form of ruinous taxation. Do some countries not have property taxes? Yes, but they’re small tax havens that aren’t really a good model for the vast majority of nations.

But as far as optimization, consider some examples.

Property taxes also work best at the local level because the spending needs of municipalities don’t swing heavily with economic conditions. The federal government has spending needs that vary wildly with the economic cycle. During a recession, the federal government needs to massively ramp up its spending. But at a local level, a recession doesn’t mean you suddenly need twice the number of firefighters. Property taxes are pretty steady over time, so they’re a good match for the needs of local government. The federal government’s income tax revenue goes down during a recession, but that’s ultimately fine, as the federal government controls the currency. They can afford to sustain massive deficits during bad years and make it up with surpluses in the good years. (Well, if the federal government was functioning as designed.)

Income taxes also make more sense for government entities whose jurisdictions are difficult to avoid. If you fund your city entirely with income tax and no property taxes, you may find your community completely overrun by retirees who want services like anyone else, but don’t actually earn much taxable income to pay for them. If you fund your city entirely through a large sales tax, people can just drive and shop outside of city limits. It’s much harder for people to avoid federal income tax simply by moving house. Unless you’re leaving the country entirely, you’re not avoiding the reach of federal income taxes. (And sometimes even that doesn’t cut it!)

But property taxes? The only way to avoid those is to not live in the city at all. Which, from the city’s perspective, is fine. If you don’t live in the city, then you’re not putting much burden on the city’s infrastructure and services. But if you want to live in the city and enjoy all the benefits that come with living in a city, you have to pay the city’s property taxes.

In short, different taxes have different properties, different benefits and drawbacks. Funding a society through a diverse arrangement of taxes allows much more efficient optimization of these taxes. It’s a much more intelligent system than just trying to fund it all with one big dumb tax of a single type. That’s more the way of Medieval head taxes, not modern nation states. We used to have simple tax systems. We stopped using them because we realized there were better ways to do it.

This Boomer homeowner is why those Gen Z families can’t find homes. If your single family home is worth $4 million, that is the market telling you that that single family home should not exist. The land is too in demand, too close to jobs, too close to amenities etc. to have that lot hoarded by a single selfish person. You want to live in a single family home on a quarter acre lot? Fine. Do it on the edge of the city where the land is cheap. This women’s lost could provide homes for a dozen families, at prices that would be affordable to Gen Z families. Instead people like her vote to prevent such redevelopment.

The solution is to demolish the home and build multi-family housing there. Low density single family zoning has no place in an area where the land values are that expensive. Keep that kind of development on the urban fringe where it belongs.

If the land your single family home is sitting on is suddenly worth four million dollars, that’s a sure sign that that plot of land should NOT be used for single family zoning. It’s doubtlessly some of the most valuable land in the city, close to job centers and lots of community resources. That kind of land should be used for multi family housing. Quit hoarding it so you can live your Leave it to Beaver fantasy in the middle of a built up urban area.

Not quoting you specifically here but the general vibe of this owner:

“But I want to live as a rancher in the middle of Manhattan. I demand we warp the tax laws to enable it.”

Get the fuck out of here, you entitled fuck.

Taxes are the price of civilization. You pay taxes on your land, because if you don’t, a gang of armed thugs will come and steal it from you and bury you under it.

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That article lacks some really important context. Kalyn Free, a losing candidate, argued to have the results of the election struck down. But what is the context of this? Why was a combined ballot election held in the first place? Who’s choice was it to run the election like that? How long has the DNC been running elections like this? Why was it never challenged before, why is it only when Hogg is involved that this rule was challenged? No one ever had a problem with it until Hogg won.

And most importantly, why is the DNC even entertaining a challenge from a sore loser here? We’re not talking about a challenge involving how ballots were counted after the election. We’re talking about a question of the fundamental structure of the election. The time to make such challenges is BEFORE the vote takes place. Cancelling election results is such a nuclear option that it should almost never be done.

Katlyn Free assumedly knew that this was going to be a combined-ballot election. She never objected before the vote. She never tried to change it then. It was only after she lost that she chose to challenge it.

This is ridiculous and an insult to everyone’s intelligence. The time for this type of challenges is before a vote takes place.

To me, it sounds like Democrats have been running elections like this for years, possibly decades. Yes, there’s some old rule on the books that technically prevented it, but no one really gave a damn and they just rolled with it. But as soon as Hogg starts making waves? Then this long-ignored rule is summoned from the grave, conveniently just in time to hurt the party’s chief iconoclast.

Yes, it’s certainly possible that Hogg’s election technically violated some rule. But that doesn’t make annulling the election results anything less than a disgraceful and electorally suicidal exercise in corporate Dem control.

In fact, it’s possible they’ve left this rule in place precisely for this situation. How convenient would that be? Make it so every chair and vice chair is violating some minor rule in their election. Ignore those violations for years or decades. Then, if anyone who the DNC establishment doesn’t like manages to win an important post? Use that zombie rule to annul their election. In the reelection, apply extraordinary pressure and throw out any pretense of impartiality in order to ensure that the thorn in the side of the DNC establishment is removed from the picture.

This situation effectively gives the DNC establishment the ability to get rid of anyone they don’t like. It’s classic selective enforcement. Make sure everyone is technically violating some rule, but only enforce the rules against people you disagree with ideologically.

And yes, this means that Kenyatta also will have to run again. But the DNC will bend over backwards to make sure he wins; he will be rewarded handsomely for his participation. They’ll pull out all the stops and twist every arm to make sure Hogg loses the revote. But Kenyatta will be allowed to sail through without any such opposition applied.

Democrats are going to lose in 2028. The existing Clintonian/Corporate Dem leadership is 0-3 at running elections against MAGA, the modern Republican party. They managed to eek out a win in 2020 due to Covid, but without Covid, Trump would have easily been reelected in 2020.

DNC leaders do not know how to run a modern presidential campaign. They’re a bunch of old corrupt dinosaurs that still think it’s 1995. They are utterly incapable of winning nationwide elections. They don’t respect their own base. They don’t respect people’s intelligence. They stick to proven fatally wrong campaign methods like TV-first ad campaigns, pandering to Republicans, and running artificial, robotic, inhuman, inauthentic candidates whose every utterance is dictated by corporate donors and focus groups.

They are going to lose in 2028. They can’t change. They don’t want to change.

They ran on “we’re not Trump” in 2016.

They ran on “we’re not Trump” in 2020.

They ran on “we’re not Trump” in 2024.

They will run on “we’re not Trump” in 2028.

They don’t believe in anything. They don’t stand for anything. They won’t fight for anything. They’re only good for one thing and one thing alone - losing.

AOC might have a shot at beating MAGA in 2028, but there is not a snowball’s chance in Hell they’ll allow her to gain the nomination. They’ll rearrange the entire primary schedule to prevent her from being nominated. They’ll get a half dozen other nominally progressive candidates to run, dividing the progressive vote, while ensuring there is only one corporate centrist running. They’ll manipulate the entire process to ensure that their preferred corporate whore wins the nomination.

Republicans are going to win the 2028 presidential election. And that’s making the big assumption that there will be a free and fair election in 2028. But truthfully, even without Republican cheating, Democrats are going to lose in 2028. They will have no one to blame but themselves.

This entire thread was started by a blue MAGAT stirring up shit.

And again. You’re blinded by partisanship. You’re no different than MAGA worshiping their God king. You see any criticism of your team, and you immediately bring out the pitchforks and start accusing people of supporting Trump.

Trump got elected because “blue no matter who” has lead the Democrats into Hell. Democrats are going to lose again in 2028, because they lack the self-reflection necessary to actually ask why they lost. Any criticism means you support Trump. We have to accept the perfection of the blue team, and any criticism means you want Trump to win.

In reality, those who want to reform the Democratic party want Trump to lose far more than people like yourself. The actions of people like you are precisely why Trump is now in office. You are responsible for Trump. MAGA is going to win again in 2028 because of people like you.

You ever wonder how the British could have been so comically evil as to go to war with China to force them to except opium imports? You ever feel that surely no country could be so comically villainous today? Well, you can drop such illusions. Nothing has changed at all.

Kids these days with their cuneiform on clay. Too lazy to use a proper chisel.

I mean, that was a literally true statement. She sacrificed her chance at the presidency because she cared more about enabling genocide than any other issue. It was what she cared more about than all other things. It was her highest campaign ambition. Everything else was secondary.

The issue on Gaza really wasn’t whether one side was better than the other. The Gaza policy of Biden, Kamala, and Trump is completely identical - 100% total support for Netanyahu.

Yes, Trump is a lot ruder about it. He’ll openly state he wants to ethnically cleanse Gaza. But Biden pushed for the same damn thing. He was just a lot quieter about it. The Biden administration supported the ethnic cleansing of Gaza.

Anyone who thought Kamala would be better than Trump on Gaza was simply delusional. There was no option other than “100% support for whatever Israel wants” on the ballot in 2024.

Look. History shows that you don’t fight authoritarian right wing parties by returning the center-left party to power that enabled the fascists in the first place. It never works. You either have to burn the center-left party to the ground entirely, or reform it so deeply that it has little resemblance to the old order. The Democratic Party right now is fundamentally incapable of stopping Trumpism. It literally cannot win an election against MAGA.

You might as well be put your hopes in the Green Party. Centrist corporate Dems are three-time losers against MAGA. Only covid allowed Biden to win in 2020.

The definition of insanity is trying the same thing again and again while expecting something different. You are insane.

I mean, it’s true. Biden signed off on the ethnic cleansing plan and tried to facilitate it himself. And, by raw numbers, a lot more Gazans have died under Biden’s watch than Trump’s.

In practice, the Palestine policy of Biden, Kamala, and Trump is completely identical - 100% support of Netanyahu. No exceptions.

The only reason you think Trump is worse is because of vibes. He’s just a lot ruder about it.

Classic whataboutism. Kamala had a choice:

1. Give up genocide.

2. Protect abortion rights.

She chose option 1.

<Hands you chisel and stone tablet.>