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[wierd]

More like, Their social circle associates "ability to accumulate wealth" with "Value as a person". 

So, people that dont accumulate hundreds of times more than the median yearly income, every single day, are just bad people that they would rather not associate with.  This of course, leads to very strange places.

[Max™]

I value no object which I have not literally made with my own hands, or at bare minimum fettled and improved upon as required and able.

[Karnewarrior]

Once you realize that everyone dies eventually and money, fame, and power have no lasting value, you actually get to start enjoying life itself.

I think one of the biggest problems in America is people who think they're going to have infinite time to spend their money, so they keep accumulating it. If you have more than (annual expenses * remaining years of life expectancy * safety factor (maybe 2?)), why keep accumulating wealth? And yet people do it.

To be fair, for many people "annual expenses" is a pretty large category. Elon Musk's taste for rocketry costs more than most people. But Trump doesn't seem to be enjoying his "wealth" such as it is. He'd be a tragic story of a life wasted if he wasn't a tragic story of systemic failure of the American political system.

There's also inheritance stuff. The more money you have, the more money you pass to your children when you die.

And Trump does his best to "enjoy" his wealth. The man uses exclusively golden toilets and is gaudy as hell in every possible way. The difference is that he spends his wealth on useless things, whereas Musk spends his silly moneys on things with demonstratable returns, or awesome megaprojects. Sure, both are stuck up douchebags, but Trump is a self-centered douchebag who doesn't think he needs to help other people, while Musk is at least a douchebag who's decided he's going to become the coolest and he's using his money as a ladder to somewhere where he can be justified in being a stuck up douchebag.

[Reelya]

There's also inheritance stuff. The more money you have, the more money you pass to your children when you die.

Yeah, while you can't take it with you, and while they don't necessarily give a shit about their own kids, consider this as an ego trip: you passed on enough wealth to make your descendants rich bastards for centuries, ensuring your name is always carried on.

[Kagus]

There's also inheritance stuff. The more money you have, the more money you pass to your children when you die.

Yeah, while you can't take it with you, and while they don't necessarily give a shit about their own kids, consider this as an ego trip: you passed on enough wealth to make your descendants rich bastards for centuries, ensuring your name is always carried on.

Preferably in the form of a reality TV series.

[RedKing]

There's also inheritance stuff. The more money you have, the more money you pass to your children when you die.

Yeah, while you can't take it with you, and while they don't necessarily give a shit about their own kids, consider this as an ego trip: you passed on enough wealth to make your descendants rich bastards for centuries, ensuring your name is always carried on.

What, as a byword for the shittiest thing possible? Cause decades after he's dead, people will be using Trump's name as an epithet.

[Folly]

Things are heating up at the Kavanaugh hearing.
Basically the D's are doing their best to stonewall the thing, pulling out every rule and regulation they can think of to dismiss or at least delay the whole affair. R's are simply saying 'Nope. We have the majority, so screw you guys, we'll do whatever we want'. And lots of people screaming things in the background before being escorted out of the room.

[smjjames]

Not sure if Kavanaugh managed to get his opening statement out yet. The Dems are definetly pulling out the stops to delay it.

Now they're doing opening statements from the Senators.

[EnigmaticHat]

Thx to this bullshit we can have a supreme court that doesn't represent the beliefs of our country for literally decades

With the Scallia year we might make it a nice even century.

[McTraveller]

Thx to this bullshit we can have a supreme court that doesn't represent the beliefs of our country for literally decades

With the Scallia year we might make it a nice even century.

When has the Supreme Court ever represented the "beliefs of our country"?

More specifically - how do you define what the beliefs of a country are in the first place? If you can define that in a way that doesn't alienate huge populations (1% of the country is 3 million people... huge population no matter how you look at it...), you could be on to something.

Suffice to say, the country is now so big that any SC decision will always be contrary to the beliefs, wishes, or preferences of a large absolute number of people.

[RedKing]

Thx to this bullshit we can have a supreme court that doesn't represent the beliefs of our country for literally decades

With the Scallia year we might make it a nice even century.

When has the Supreme Court ever represented the "beliefs of our country"?

More specifically - how do you define what the beliefs of a country are in the first place? If you can define that in a way that doesn't alienate huge populations (1% of the country is 3 million people... huge population no matter how you look at it...), you could be on to something.

Suffice to say, the country is now so big that any SC decision will always be contrary to the beliefs, wishes, or preferences of a large absolute number of people.

Further support for splitting the country up into smaller, easier-to-manage chunks, IMHO. We've become too big to be a sustainable democracy.

[Reelya]

There's also inheritance stuff. The more money you have, the more money you pass to your children when you die.

Yeah, while you can't take it with you, and while they don't necessarily give a shit about their own kids, consider this as an ego trip: you passed on enough wealth to make your descendants rich bastards for centuries, ensuring your name is always carried on.

What, as a byword for the shittiest thing possible? Cause decades after he's dead, people will be using Trump's name as an epithet.

But that's moving the goalposts. The original comment was about why people accumulate vast amounts of wealth, so they can make a dynasty and be remembered.

The reason people hate Trump is from unrelated causes. Without the president stuff, the "Trumps" would only be remembered for being filthy rich business / reality TV types. The unforeseen circumstance of him actually winning the election was a spanner in the works. If he'd merely run for president then he'd be better off.

[Gentlefish]

Quick, pack the court! Is nine even enough to handle all of the cases that are put before the supreme court? Why not 13? Ir heck, two teams of 13? 4-5 is such a bull split. Even a 5-6 would feel less dumb, much less, say, 10-11

[smjjames]

Thx to this bullshit we can have a supreme court that doesn't represent the beliefs of our country for literally decades

With the Scallia year we might make it a nice even century.

When has the Supreme Court ever represented the "beliefs of our country"?

More specifically - how do you define what the beliefs of a country are in the first place? If you can define that in a way that doesn't alienate huge populations (1% of the country is 3 million people... huge population no matter how you look at it...), you could be on to something.

Suffice to say, the country is now so big that any SC decision will always be contrary to the beliefs, wishes, or preferences of a large absolute number of people.

Further support for splitting the country up into smaller, easier-to-manage chunks, IMHO. We've become too big to be a sustainable democracy.

How exactly would you split it up though? I guess one might go with everything west of the Mississippi and then north/south of the Mason-Dixon line, but then you'd probably want to have a more even population distribution.

A more feasable (but about equally unlikely to happen in this political climate) solution would be to just reform the government in some radical way (short of outright revolution).

[Gentlefish]

Spoiler: Something like this? (click to show/hide)

Of course, there's also the Cascadia Independence Movement which I would love to be a part of but am 8 miles too far West to partake in.