Hardly. Bill Gates came from a wealthy family, attended a private school, and through it had thousands of hours of computer programming time several years before even the Altair 8800 came out. He had a personal connection to IBM through his mother, which is how Microsoft got the DOS deal. His circumstances were unique, and his success the result of a hefty dose of luck.

Sure, lady, explain that again when they want to put Ivanka in the Oval Office after her old man croaks.

Hot take: The euphemsism “flipping burgers” is so dismissive of the physical and emotional labor of working at a fast-food place that anybody using it unironically needs a punch on the nose.

Just so ya know, the centi- prefix in the metric system denotes 1/100 of a quantity, so a centimillionaire would have $10,000. The prefix for 100x a quantity is hecto-. S’pose we could also call them a decibillionaire. But you probably caught the allusion to wealth inequality faster than I did.

Aye, that is the one silver lining of this fascist take-over: Miller et al. have attached themselves to a demagogue who has a looming expiration date, so they are speed-running the creation of the fourth reich. Our best hope is that they’re doing it too quickly to really take root. (And that they can’t find another demagogue to step in when the orange one bites it.)

True, but like that famous saying goes, we do not negotiate with terrorists.

Rich people and islands, name a more iconic duo.

Are there still people out there moaning that “Americans won’t vote for a woman,” despite, y’know, Hillary Clinton winning the popular vote in 2016?

I’d like to point out feckless Democrats that while Citizens United is bad… money ain’t everything.

I started the day with the news that Dick Cheney is dead. Now I’m ending it with news that Zohran Mamdani is mayor. It’s been the best day in a long, long time.

Interesting that it’s turning out so similarly, then.

No, they just believe that they are God’s chosen people. Totally different.

Ah geez, I meant that the Constitution is irreparably broken, and that the nation it created is gone, but yeah, you’re right. I hadn’t even thought about him trying to rename the nation that we have now, but it makes total sense.

Don’t they get it yet? The United States is over. That country doesn’t exist anymore.

I’m forced by the government to give up a bunch of money so that people can feel important rolling around in their $50,000 toys with heated seats and entertainment systems, while simultaneously destroying the planet.

Claiming the rich will flee is such a dumbass take, just on the face of it. They’re rich. And they want to live in NYC, which (*checks notes*) ain’t exactly cheap to begin with. They can afford to live wherever the fuck they want, money is no object. So if it costs a bit more to live in NYC, what difference does it make? Allegedly the whole point of even being rich is to be able to afford the things you want.

But if it makes folks feel better, maybe call it New York Platinum Edition™?

They all should have been on a plane to Gitmo before the sun set on inauguration day.

Nah, worse than that. The root of the conservative pathology is self-hatred. They fear that they are worthless, shit people. A person who believes that they are better than everybody else can sit smugly in the corner and be superior in peace. Conservatives need near-constant reassurance that other people are worse than themselves, hence the performative cruelty they crave.

I make my guess that there are two factors:

1. The Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon (or frequency illusion If somebody has a chip on their shoulder about rude Linux users, the rude Linux users they see will be highly memorable.

2. People tend to get back the same energy that they project to other people.

My instance has a very laissez-faire policy, so it’s federated with almost everybody. My experience is the same; I’ve only ever seen self-aware mocking of the Linux-user attitude.

It’s no use. Resistance is futile.

Signed,

Someone Who Raged Against the Destruction of “FUD” Back in the Day