Well stranger, it doesn’t get more removed from personal connection than to talk over the Internet like this. I’ve heard your sincere viewpoint and have felt no sense of impatience or ingratitude.

This wasn’t the easiest weekend of my life, going home. And you’re right that sharing with strangers opens you to a world of potential negativity. I appreciate your patience with me and hope that I represented myself with a similar level of authenticity.

Not from the south are ya? It’s a true stereotype. People being nice and talking to strangers

I’ve been told I have a voice that people listen to. So, I use it when given the chance. This was a neighborhood brewery in the deep south. People here are polite and will engage. I feel it’s important to at least register my existence as someone passibly literate and semi- informed

I don’t agree with this. He asked for a definition of a term. I spoke in words he didn’t understand and he asked for a definition. My answer would have been more flawed and incomplete and frankly I was interested in exploring the topic and had not the time.

Yea really.

No time to explain, had Gemini do it. Forgive me, but this is important to understand. Glad you asked.

Institutional capture occurs when interest groups systematically gain control over public, regulatory, or legal institutions—such as the judiciary, regulatory agencies, civil service, and public media—and direct their authority away from original mandates toward political or ideological agendas. In the context of right-wing political ascendancy, institutional capture operates through specific, interconnected strategies:

• Judicial Realignment: Packing courts with originalist or conservative judges to rewrite constitutional norms, weaken regulatory powers, roll back social protections, and shield right-wing legislation from legal challenges.
• Administrative Deconstruction & Bureaucratic Control: Installing loyalists in non-partisan civil service positions, purging administrative personnel, or systematically starving key regulatory bodies (like environmental or labor agencies) to prevent enforcement against preferred business interests or ideological allies.
• Electoral Engineering: Weaponizing state administrative power to alter election mechanics via redistricting, targeted voting restrictions, or reshaping electoral boards to secure a permanent structural advantage regardless of popular vote margins.
• Media & Information Hegemony: Using state leverage, regulatory threats, or aligned private capital to acquire or influence independent news outlets and public broadcasters, transforming them into channels for populist narrative control.
• Capture of Civil & Educational Spheres: Defunding or asserting political control over public universities, accreditation bodies, and public libraries to restrict curricula, censor research, and align public education with partisan cultural goals. By shifting these institutions from neutral arbiters to instruments of state power, right-wing movements entrench their authority, erect high barriers against political opposition, and sustain power even through shifts in popular voting trends.

Agree or disagree, I don’t think this is the most apt Musk observation

Can’t discount the capture of institutions, consolidation of media, and trans-border collaboration. There’s also overt and covert acts of war against liberal democracies by far right governments. We’re due for another oopsies in Europe real soon.

That was genuinely an embarrassment for him, and probably hurt cyber truck sales. More like, sharing his vile racist tweets or video of him performing a Nazi salute

Can’t really avoid taking to him, ya know? And if you’re asking why I didn’t keep my mouth shut, recall the topic is a papered-over genocide.

If you think I even graced those bozos with so much as a glance, you’re sorely mistaken, stranger. I was speaking to my bartender.

I flew home to see the family this weekend, down in the deep south. My brother picked me up from the airport and took me to a local pub for a burger and beer. I went for my second glass and two regulars at the bar were chatting with the bartender.

“Just don’t make it political. Keep politics out of it”, said one of the men to the bartender. “Fuck Robert Kraft”, I loudly replied. The bartender cocked a half smile before mentioning that they were just discussing how Kanye was able to tour again. “Some things in this world are forgivable like, apparently, ‘heil Hitler’”, I opined for the whole bar to hear.

Aghast, the avowedly apolitical regulars could only stare back at me. They seemed reluctant to defend a billionaire known for his bad behavior, and also recently for his collusion with his other rich pals to cancel a music act from playing at two stadiums overlapping Kanye’s recent tours.

“But, save the children? Well, that really depends on exactly which children”. I took my 6% ABV lager back to my table to resume half-hearted interest in my brother’s WoW guild and hype over the re-re-release of vanilla, or whatever.

Yea the reason sony is doing this now is because it’s the dead zone of this generation cycle. Console sales are falling, people are cancelling PS Plus subscriptions, and they’re taking the hits deliberately now so it’s ancient history by the time they announce PS6.

Boycotting now means very little. There’s already an natural boycott happening as people have lost interest in console gaming. It’s just a reaction to being upset, rather than a real sacrifice targeted to inflict the pain necessary for Sony to consider changing.