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@null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com
- Comment on [deleted] 3 hours ago:
You might be thinking about debt from a personal finance angle - it’s costly, and borrowing money to buy a car isn’t ideal because you end up paying a lot more to own the car. In this context we’re taught that borrowing should be avoided, and if we really have to borrow we should pay it off as quickly as possible.
In business it doesn’t really work that way. Often there’s no expectation that you will repay the money you borrow within any specific period of time. Banks are in the business of lending you money after all.
Suppose you have $1m. Maybe you borrow $4m and buy a $5m farm. Things go well and in a few years your profit (after paying interest on that loan) is another $1m which you still have in the bank. You could pay down your debt, but then your profits would be more or less the same. Or… you could double your profits by borrowing more and buying another farm.
Of course it’s not that simple and there’s lots of good reasons to pay down debt but I’m just trying to illustrate that paying it off is not always the objective.
- Comment on [deleted] 3 days ago:
Designating a country as “uncivilised” is gravely offensive, and immensely arrogant. No country would refer to itself as uncivilised. There are a few which may be lawless, or ungovernable, but uncivilised has connotations that just don’t apply.
- Comment on Nationals leaving Coalition as David Littleproud announces split with Liberal party after election defeat 3 days ago:
Not really. If the solar on people’s roofs is part of the network. The network needs to be able to manage peaks and troughs in demand no matter how the power is produced.
- Comment on Nationals leaving Coalition as David Littleproud announces split with Liberal party after election defeat 4 days ago:
Aren’t the issues it causes mostly because the grid was designed to deliver power from plants?
I mean, aren’t they solvable problems?
- Comment on Nationals leaving Coalition as David Littleproud announces split with Liberal party after election defeat 5 days ago:
They’re completely incapable of changing direction.
No one wants nuclear. Transmission distance is too far in Australia. It’s just a license to keep burning coal for another 30 years.
- Comment on Nationals leaving Coalition as David Littleproud announces split with Liberal party after election defeat 5 days ago:
Has renewable energy really lost its social license?
Farmers don’t like wind because all their neighbours are putting up noisy turbines.
Meanwhile every house in my street has solar because it’s a no-brainer.
- Comment on 7 for me 6 days ago:
I’ve been 20 for most of my 43 years.
However, we had twins recently. They’re 18 months old and we all co-sleep. I don’t want to be a prudish family where kids aren’t allowed to see a bum or whatever, but I also don’t want to feel weird about snuggling up together.
So… I’ve been wearing pyjamas just to avoid any awkwardness.
- Comment on When you see danger coming 1 week ago:
Is this a false equivalence?
Is the rate at which wood rots indicative of how quickly plastic would rot?
Also plastic tends to be very thin. Like if bacteria can denature 0.1mm per year that’s lots of years for a timber beam but a few months for plastic packaging.
- Comment on who are you? 1 week ago:
Yeah this is me.
If it’s on or after the last day I need to leave it in the fridge for several weeks until I’m in the mood to acknowledge that it’s dead.
My partner does believe in use-by dates but she has very poor situational awareness and is just oblivious to the concept. Recently she tried drinking a flavoured milk that had been in the fridge for a few months.
- Comment on How are roundabouts made? 1 week ago:
Firstly, roundabouts aren’t perfectly round.
The city I live in is relatively small but has dozens of roundabouts. They might look round as you drive through them, but if you look from a satellite image most are just “mostly” round, and some that seem round on the ground are plain oblong.
With that in mind, you’re dealing with curves, not a perfect circle.
Different points are defined with a range of methods like survey, measuring, and just plain eyeballing.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 1 week ago:
The vote was only 29 to 25 in favour of Ley, and 2 of her biggest supporters are senators who are about to finish up
That’s pretty much what I said.
It’s just denying reality to pretend that this is evidence of them accepting a shift to the centre
That’s the opposite of what Karvellas said.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 1 week ago:
Your comments are contrary to most other commentary.
Karvellas asserted the inverse just this morning: Ley represents a significant shift to the centre.
You’re right in that she will probably get knifed in the coming months. “See, we tried centrism and it didn’t work”.
However, even the liberals recognising that there’s a need to demonstrate that they tried centrism is significant.
I’m happy to acknowledge that your opinion is unchanged. For my own part I think everything that has transpired over the last week demonstrates a change of trajectory.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 1 week ago:
Perhaps I’m just unnecessarily anxious, but I feel like the constant culture war nattering makes it be a thing.
For example, my parents are in their 80s. The struggles of trans people just aren’t relevant to them in any way. The chances they would ever interact with a trans person in any meaningful way are infinitesimal.
However, if the leader of the liberal party is on TV every day complaining about how a trans person might use a public toilet for whatever gender, it will make my parents believe that it’s a problem.
These politicians stoke the culture war to fire up and engage their base.
Locally we’ve had some conservative nutters complain about library books discussing sex and gender issues. It’s just another manufactured outrage.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 1 week ago:
Just thought I’d check in with you after the Liberals voted for Ley as their new moderate leader.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 1 week ago:
Left enough ? They’re about middle right.
You realise this is a matter of perspective?
Policies that feel “middle right” to you might feel “radical left” to someone else.
Regardless, my question isn’t “how left are we” but “are we moving towards the left right now”.
Given that the Liberals just voted for a moderate as their new leader I’d say that we are.
- Comment on How do children address a non-binary parent? 2 weeks ago:
I don’t think that’s really true.
Dad is a title, bestowed by anyone for any reason.
“Biological dad” may have a specific meaning, but “dad” does not.
- Comment on Labor’s landslide victory obscures a disturbing trend for the major parties 2 weeks ago:
Isn’t the thesis of this article that we’re headed towards minority governments ?
Through recent decades votes are tending more towards independents.
I think it’s great too, does it mean we’re trending away from polarisation? That’s nice, honestly.
Maybe it’s a feature of today’s ease of communication. In the past you really needed parties in order to communicate brands and policies. In the information age that’s less critical.
- Comment on Labor’s landslide victory obscures a disturbing trend for the major parties 2 weeks ago:
IMO the LNP is facing an existential threat.
I’m not saying they’re going to disband tomorrow, but depending on what happens over the coming months it may not be possible for them to ever return to their former glory.
- Comment on Cloudflare CEO warns AI and zero-click internet are killing the web's business model 2 weeks ago:
I don’t think we will like the new model though.
I mean IDK what it will be, but it will be implemented by tech bros working for tech giants.
- Comment on Cloudflare CEO warns AI and zero-click internet are killing the web's business model 2 weeks ago:
I call it the side web.
It feels like sneaking along on the shoulder of the information super highway.
- Comment on Gina Rinehart urges Liberal party to stick with Trump-like policies in the wake of election loss 2 weeks ago:
Let’s not confuse wealth with merit. She gets a vote like everyone else.
Her comments aren’t based on research or analysis, she just vibes with trumpism.
Her interests do not align with those of Australians, why would her political views have any credibility.
- Comment on Price defection slammed as Taylor and Ley confirm plans to run 2 weeks ago:
It’s kinda crazy how quickly she’s filled the void of my most-disliked-politician left by Dutton.
She just seems so willing to throw anything and everything under the bus for personal advancement.
The Liberals and Nationals love her because she’s an Aboriginal person who sane-washes their racist positions. She’s undermining decades of progress towards equality and equity for her people. Does she honestly believe her advancement is based on merit?
This defection is clearly self serving as well. Switching parties seems kinda antithetical to representing your constituents when you’ve spent the last 6 weeks standing on policies which you’ve now discarded. Did she have a mandate from her constituents to join the Liberals? Hardly.
- Comment on Jacinta Nampijinpa Price joins Liberal Party as leadership race heats up 2 weeks ago:
What is up with her?
You’re on the wrong side honey. Trump would happily exterminate all First Australians just on principle.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 2 weeks ago:
Decimate means a 10% reduction… to put to death one soldier from each squad of 10.
Last night on ABC’s party room Fran Kelly quoted a sitting liberal member saying the party faces an existential threat, although Fran did note that sounded like hyperbole.
Of course I acknowledge that the liberal party can return to strength before the next election but will they need more centrist policies to do so?
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 2 weeks ago:
I can’t read the whole article but even the prt before the pay wall says party moderates aren’t happy with the move. It remains to be seen whether Taylor will get the leadership.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 2 weeks ago:
Biden didn’t decimate the republicans.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 2 weeks ago:
Is there any truth to the claim that Greens block legislation on idealistic grounds?
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 2 weeks ago:
I was reading the first part of your comment thinking that anything left of the greens is too nutty for me, but then I would absolutely vote for any of those three policies.
You’re right in that they’re non-starters politically, but certainly part of an idealist utopia.
- Comment on [deleted] 2 weeks ago:
I suspect these parents actually want to hear that their daughter is no longer a virgin. They obviously think she’s not and now just want “proof”.
- Comment on Is Australia's Overton Window Shifting? 2 weeks ago:
Ok mate, we will see what happens.