Rates can be less than 1. So you’d take the number of people killed by minneapolis police in, say, a decade and then divide by 10.

So 52/x (we’ll say 0.5 just to estimate) would give you 104* more killing. (Or 10,000%)

Which is a lot, yes, but not infinite.

It’s less of a revolution than it seems to be. Both parties have been doing awful things for a long time, Trump is just louder about it and more flagrant in his defiance of the other branches of government.

But it’s not “Trump is a fascist, unlike any president before him.” Trump is a fascist, but there have plenty of fascistic elements in the US goverment all along, and there have been other presidents like Trump in US history.

The system really is working exactly as intended.

If it was truly a democratic proces then we wouldn’t even be able to have this conversation, because Adams would have been removed from office as soon as he was found to be corrupt. (Which is a prime example of how the “rules” only apply to the poor - why should we follow them blindly when those in power don’t!?) But the system isn’t working and hasn’t been for decades (If indeed it ever did) and to cling to it now as though the government will save us is foolish.

I care about the rules, this whole conversation started because I said I didn’t like the idea of blanket rescinding of executive orders. It sets a bad precedent. But we can’t cling to “the Rules” as though they are a self-enforcing mandate from some deity.

There are no gods here to save us. Politicians will not save us. The system will not save us.

WE will save us.

We will use the system and the rules when we can and abandon it where we must. But no matter what, we must not put blind faith in anyone or anything, because power corrupts and those in power cannot truly represent our interests because they are not one of us. And that distrust must always also extend to the rules they have written and force us to follow at gunpoint, because they add exceptions for themselves and catch-22s for us.

Of course I don’t want one mayor deciding things. But I also sure as entropy don’t want him sitting on his hands because of some stupid rule like the filibuster or whatever when he has a mandate from the people to represent their interests.

I’m sure he’ll turn out just as spineless as any other politician, but let’s not handcuff him just yet. He might just prove us wrong.

You assume those processes were ever democratic to begin with. The truth is that they’ve been rigged against the common people since they were first written.

I’m all for following the rules, but we can’t ever put the rules before people’s lives and wellbeing. If the law is unjust, you have a duty to disobey it. This includes legislative gridlock engineered to stifle progress and thwart the will of the people.

In theory I 100% agree. But right now our legislatures are typically in gridlock and executive orders are the only way things get done.

Sometimes, yes. Depends on the tactic - obviously we shouldn’t be kidnapping people based on their skin color - but yeah, we can’t afford to be too cautious right now. The very notion of democracy sits on a knife’s edge.

It feels good to see a politician who actually shows attention to detail and cares about the people they’re supposed to represent. That’s definitely not the norm.

Oh, symbolically it’s very powerful. He’s (rightfully) pointing out that Adams should have been removed from office, and that therefore his official acts since are null and void.

But you can run into problems when you blanket reverse orders. Perhaps some of them were normal, necessary, or benign - and you won’t know which is which until you read them. I would honestly rather Mamdani say he’s reversing all of Adams’s orders, but then actually sit down and read all of them and reissue/leave alone any that would cause problems if reversed.

I don’t love the idea of executives blanketly rescinding their predecessors’ actions. That said, since the fascists started it, I won’t complain too much about Mamdani using it.

Believing that someone engaged in some malicious compliance here would restore a tiny sliver of my faith in humanity… which means it was probably just incompetence.