If you don’t like driving in “traffic”, why don’t YOU use mass transit?
“Congestion pricing” is an elitist scheme to PRICE RATION the use of our public roads.
In effect, it lets the rich pay $$ that THEY can easily afford—to buy their way out of sharing the road with us peons.

https://twitter.com/kfcbarstool/status/1892302631684493561

It’s a REgressive tax that hits working and middle class people hardest.
And yes, most of us DO have to drive—especially busy adults with work and family responsibilities to juggle on tight schedules.
How did people who call themselves “progressive” ever buy into this crap?

“Now President-elect Donald Trump has tasked the Tesla and SpaceX CEO with eliminating waste from the federal government. In the new role, Musk will help direct policies on a wide range of issues and government bodies, including those that regulate his many business interests.”

https://twitter.com/mutant187/status/1888821479816765673

“His companies have received ‘only’ tens of billions from government contracts and programs.
But in other ways, virtually all of his net worth can be pinned to government help. Tesla and SpaceX got started—and survived their early days—

WHO DIES, WHO PROFITS FROM TRUMP JACKING UP THE PRICE OF INSULIN? 🧵

From $35/month under Biden to $5,917 under Trump!

“Trump recently signed an executive order rescinding 78 of Biden’s presidential actions, including 3 executive orders aimed at lowering prescription costs and enabling access to affordable health coverage... Biden order imposed a $35 monthly cap on insulin, which normally costs $5,917 a year."

Trump’s rollback of Biden’s healthcare protections—like the $35 insulin cap—exposes a chilling truth:
the working class is not just ignored

YIMBY HOUSING LIES—AND THE TRUTH
(In CA—& Elsewhere) 🧵

LIE #1
Flooding the market with market rate and luxury units lowers housing costs for everyone.

REALITY
Sacramento’s agenda is gentrification on steroids. It’s already worsening the housing affordability crisis statewide.

https://twitter.com/mutant187/status/1871127760799985943

LIE #3
Local governments block needed housing.

REALITY
Local officials care most about their communities’ growth, prosperity, and affordability. They know their neighborhoods’ needs better than distant bureaucrats and profit-driven corporations.

@leahfrombklyn @gtjco ACTORS—& other showbiz types who perform onstage or on camera—may not need degrees to get living-wage work. Especially the already-established—&/or well connected. EG Melissa.
But for most desirable fields—INCLUDING off-camera jobs in entertainment/media—degrees are “preferred”. @leahfrombklyn @gtjco Which basically means “required”.

And “the professions” definitely require degrees.
Even “midlist” fields that we don’t consider particularly aspirational—like teaching or “office work” or “middle management”—require degrees.

The answer is NOT to say “you don’t need a degree”—

IF YOU LEAVE—please put your new address/alt ID/linktree in your bio and pinned post here.
And LEAVE YOUR ACCOUNT OPEN.
Otherwise, those who happened to miss the info may never find you!
(And maybe log in here occasionally—or your account could be deleted against your will.) Oh—and wherever you go, consider putting your former handle and bio from HERE in your new bio/pinned post THERE.
(In search-friendly text form, not just photos.)
The more clues we leave, the more easily we can reconnect!
Nice network we’ve built—it would be a shame to lose it.

@HananyaNaftali 10/7/23 may have happened on Biden’s watch, but Trump’s actions—including the Abraham Accords and moving the embassy to Jerusalem—may have contributed. How? By causing Palestinians to despair that there will ever be a peaceful solution that they would consider fair to themselves. @HananyaNaftali When people see (what they would consider) a just outcome growing less and less likely by the year—and events moving more and more in the opposite direction—they sometimes decide they have nothing to lose by waging an all-out war.

Yes, even if victory seems unlikely.

SEE: ➡️

Hey, California legislators?
You might want to back down from this REUSABLE plastic bag ban you’re pushing!
Or at least table it until next year?
Working people need, use, and reuse those bags—and you don’t want to piss off VOTERS by taking the bags away during an ELECTION YEAR! ATTENTION CALIFORNIA POLITICIANS:
Neither CA, California Democrats running for re-election, nor the Democratic Party in general needs any further reputation for unnecessary draconian laws that make life harder for regular people!
@casendems @AsmDems
@CAgovernor @Cal_OES @CA_Dem

@skuterzysta @criticalurban @AmericanFietser It’s already started.
That’s what all these anti-car measures are about!
Each claims some other purpose—“reducing congestion”, “raising money”, “road safety”, “more housing” (without parking)—but a major motive behind each is to bully us out of owning, driving, and parking CARS. @skuterzysta @criticalurban @AmericanFietser It’s no secret—the extremists say it in their own words.
In 2010, one saw that EVEN IN CITIES WITH ROBUST TRANSIT, most people still choose to drive.
Recommendation?
We’ll have to COERCE people out of driving, by making parking scarcer and more expensive!
la.streetsblog.org/2010/12/13/den…

@asymmetricinfo NO! The best gauge of learning is how well the student can APPLY what is studied—in reasoned, well written essays.
Also, some students are great at that—and will be great at their future jobs—but NOT great at memorizing and regurgitating material in closed book or timed exams. ⬇️ @asymmetricinfo Just make writing quality—aka “style”—part of the grade! (We can all spot AI-speak on sight.)
Or have students show their work/notes via multiple drafts, research outlines, check-in chats with profs, etc.
Or AT LEAST: have students do some of the work in a supervised environment—

@tampatude @LCyrocki AND it will hamper—not help—economic development.
It reduces available parking (all of which really IS needed, at peak times). It removes parts of driving/parking lanes for “bulb outs”—to slightly shorten street crossing distance. (For pedestrians who don’t REALLY want to walk?) @tampatude @LCyrocki Overall, schemes like these reduce access for most residents and visitors—who get around by driving our cars—and even for the non-negligible minority who get around by bus.
All to promote the cycling hobby, which is suitable or preferred transportation for only a tiny minority.

@girlziplocked Higher education USED TO BE more or less tuition free at state colleges, and financial aid—to attend any school—USED TO BE mostly scholarships, not loans!
So WTF HAPPENED—and WHY?
Here’s a clue:
hipcrimevocab.com/2016/10/05/why… @girlziplocked “According to Powell, Communist firebrands were…brainwashing America’s youth to overthrow the free enterprise system….
College campuses were…an injection system for radical ideas into the body politic…and…needed to be stopped, or else the free enterprise system was doomed!”

@Boenau @NHTSAgov I’ve looked at “senior” apartments for a relative. And many were a half mile to mile+ from a transit stop!
Those who don’t drive but still go out—even to work—need curb to curb bus service, not a long difficult/impossible walk!
We can better address issues like this—WITHOUT
⬇️ @Boenau @NHTSAgov the draconian anti-car road sabotage schemes, and regressive “taxes” on driving and parking, that a few activists are pushing.
These measures hurt most people, who NEED to drive—working families, and some with disabilities—without even fixing the “problems” they pretend to “fix”.

VOTE WISELY!
Some people who THINK they’re “progressive” have mistakenly jumped on this bandwagon of regressive congestion taxes, and other draconian measures, that hit working and many disabled people hardest—and won’t even “save the planet”.
What do REAL progressives think? 👇 Green Austerity and the Climate Culture War

“Capitalist politicians are increasingly wrapping-up austerity measures in ‘green’ packaging – provoking a backlash amongst ordinary people….”

marxist.com/green-austerit…

@bidenaintlyin @7Veritas4 @radiostatic74 @nytimes Cool. We’re exploring other platforms, and that’s great. One may yet emerge as the near-universal gathering place THIS has been.
But unless and until that happens, it might be wise to at least maintain a presence here—where the most people still check in at least occasionally. @bidenaintlyin @7Veritas4 @radiostatic74 @nytimes Remember a few years ago when some conservatives thought this place was too “leftist”-oriented?
Some went to other new (right wing) platforms—but most also stuck around here, to keep their voices in the mainstream debate.

I think it’s the left and center’s turn to do likewise.

@bidenaintlyin @7Veritas4 @radiostatic74 But many “poo flinging monkeys” are in a position to drop $8—or $16 or more—every month without thinking about it; while many rational activists, entrepreneurs, and “citizen journalists”—and political dissidents worldwide—are not!
I want to hear from EVERYONE, not just the rich. @bidenaintlyin @7Veritas4 @radiostatic74 And I want the option of reaching and interacting with everyone—from other peons who might be interested in joining a union or whatever, to the credentialed pundits you seem to like—who checks into the “Town Square” now and then.
WITHOUT another monthly bill that I can’t afford.

@LauraMiers Blocking Blue buyers may not be a good idea. But many of us consider this new system itself to be elitist and siloing, because Blue buyers get features the rest of us don’t—most importantly, you get “boosted”. Which means the rest of us are DEboosted. It’s “PAY-for-full-reach”! @LauraMiers This system bifurcates Twitter into two tiers—those who can easily spare “a few dollars a month”, and those who can’t. The “haves” will rarely even see the tweets of the “have nots”.
We grassroots activists and entrepreneurs will now find it even harder to “reach” the “haves”.

NO MORE REGRESSIVE TAXES!

We should support transit—through our PROGRESSIVE taxes, as well as through fares.
AND we should support the roads and parking that transit AND bikes AND cars AND pedestrians AND (work) trucks ALL USE—
and NOT privilege any one form of transportation.

https://twitter.com/AFineBlogger/status/1636695192412495882

Some say we’ve “privileged” car use—and accomodations for cars—over transit and other transportation.
That’s debatable; we all use roads and all that arrives by means of them.
In any case, to now “OVERCORRECT” by favoring transit is wrong.
#DifferentFolksDifferentNeeds
#ProChoice

@jenny_schuetz NO—it’s YIMBYs who don’t represent the people.
Especially when they push these draconian anti-car policies, like abolishing parking minimums for “affordable housing” and other development.
Working people want and need cars to “get it all done”; and we need PARKING for our cars! @jenny_schuetz To add so called “affordable housing”—or “middle housing”—without parking minimums is just a cruel tease.
“You want a place you can afford to live? Okay—but YOU CAN’T BRING YOUR CAR!”
And the same goes for business construction without ample parking for workers and customers.

@J_lem21 @criticalurban @BradWagon @BFryback @MotoristRights @NoBikeLanes @infopobn @NoMoreBikeLanes @PoundstoneWill @ZEROVISIONPHIlL @hgigante @savehopkins @MikeFromWoburn @DriveBikeWalk Transit and biking aren’t free either.
And don’t forget the cost difference between being a captive customer of the pricey “convenience store” near home, vs driving a little to load up the car at the big box discount stores.
And HEALTH?
Can you say “stranded in a food desert”? @J_lem21 @criticalurban @BradWagon @BFryback @MotoristRights @NoBikeLanes @infopobn @NoMoreBikeLanes @PoundstoneWill @ZEROVISIONPHIlL @hgigante @savehopkins @MikeFromWoburn @DriveBikeWalk And FITNESS?
For many, “just get more exercise—THEN you’ll be fully able bodied (again), and able to walk to bus stops or ride a bike” is NOT a thing.
Neither is “get more exercise—then you’ll be ‘fit’ enough to outfight/outrun any predator you might meet on the street at night”.

@Llib7 @Kachowsterxd @PoundstoneWill Want to fund public transit?
Add public $$ for expansion—a bus everywhere every 5 minutes 24/7.
Then, SOMEWHAT more people will ride—and pay fares.
But these transit nuts should stop trying to bully us all out of driving cars. Even the “ideal” transit won’t work for everyone. @Llib7 @Kachowsterxd @PoundstoneWill Transit would win more public support if these transit nuts would STOP framing cars and car use as the enemy, and STOP claiming that we can’t support ALL transportation options being available, feasible, and affordable—so we can EACH get around in whatever way works best for US.