Comment by doodlebugging | Hacker News Reader

Comment by doodlebugging | Hacker News Reader

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Probably a sign that it is past time to tightly regulate all AI-aligned companies and their products to set up guard rails to prevent this level of corruption. I am a person who lives in a state where it is totally legal for lobbyists to walk the floor of the state legislature handing out envelopes of cash to any representative who will line up behind their proposed legislation. Bribery buys state laws here and it buys pretty much anything else that those with deep pockets desire.

One day people in this state will wake up and burn it all down by electing representatives who serve the people, not the corporate entities that desire a low drag place to do business. There are active anti-AI and data center groups now in the state. Once they get enough traction this bullshit will end.

Anyone at any of these AI companies that attempts to influence elections should be held accountable and should suffer the harshest consequences including confiscation of all personal assets. Multi-generational enforced poverty should be their reward.

Just my two cents.

Hahaha... regulation lol. That aint happening in the US. If you do see regulation it will be so crippled as to be meaningless but it'll give something politicians can talk about as "for the people". All regulations are written by industry insiders.

Regulation is not possible with today's politics. But it can become possible as soon as January 2027 politics, which is largely determined by the 2026 November election.

Nothing of substance will change in 2026. That goose is cooked already after all the gerry mandering

Gerrymandering only affects House and the House is overwhelmingly looking like a Democrat victory.

Senate is statewide so it's innately immune to Gerrymandering. Like.... Do you even know what that word means?

Democrats aren't winning the Senate. They are not lock ins for the House either.

I dont know what is so difficult about this for you.

Are you proposing a different solution? Or are you content to be a cynic that does nothing?

The goal should be to run up the score of the popular vote as much as possible even in the face of anti-democratic shenanigans like gerrymandering or statistical voter suppression, e.g. how the SAVE act would make it harder for women (who lean Democratic) to exercise their right to vote (because it will require more documents for people who have changed their last name to prove their identities).

Manipulating the election and perpetuating minority rule rather than responding to popular will has its limitations. We need to be prepared for a second civil rights movement.

Democrats have a disadvantage in this years Senate race yes. But polls have become so anti Trump these days that today, Senate races are looking 50/50 odds. Which is a huge benefit to Democrats when this years Senate race should be a Republican blowout (a lot of Texas, Georgia, Alaska kinda states up for Senate this year so Republicans should be winning. The fact that it's 50/50 in these states is down right crazy and shows how crap the Republican support is right now).

The House is a hilarious mix of terrible Gerrymandering (ex: Florida assuming that Latinos will vote Republican) or defeated Gerrymandering (Texas gerrymandering effect being defeated in court).

All in all, it's a hilarious self own where Republicans couldn't even be trusted to Gerrymander correctly and may have made the House a worse situation for themselves. So if anything, the Gerrymandering is seemingly leading to Democrat advantage because of how incompetent Republicans have been.

So as I said before: we are looking at House blowout for Democrats and even a surprise 50/50 odds for Senate. That is a huge change of that happens.

Your invocation of corruption/Gerrymandering doesn't mean anything if you actually look at what has happened. It only matters if Republicans Gerrymandered correctly.

For decades people have proclaimed that we can fix things in the next election...but that has never happened in all of my existence and do not expected to happen in my life time. It's pure carrot chasing

> For decades people have proclaimed that we can fix things in the next election

The secret of modern democracy is figuring out 2/4 years is how long it takes for people to forget the electoral promises that weren’t delivered upon.

But hey, next time my party is going to fix the economy, housing and corruption! Just remember to vote!

I still wonder how many elections does it take for one to see the farce of it.

But we were fixing things under Biden. The frozen potato cartel was defeated in court and Google was defeated in court as an illegal monopoly.

Then the Trump Administration came in (likely after donations from Google, and other tech bros) and suddenly that Google case was dropped.

Regulating against awful behaviors was happening under Biden, and no longer is happening under Trump. It's about as simple as night and day if you are paying attention.

What changes now is that historically, tech firms were largely apolitical. Today they are hard right support, so Democrats weren't used to memes or lack of free viral marketing (etc etc.)

Today, Democrats are finally waking up to the fact that they are being suppressed by both national media and tech media (Twitter and Facebook) and have begun gaining alternative means of getting their messaging out.

Things have gotten worse, but that causes the strategies to shift and the overall political fight to grow stronger.

And who will do the regulating? The same politicians taking these bribes?

I am very curious- what state?

Texas

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