Azal

Pretty much this. Like I said about my Focus, I've straight up driven with 2x4s that wouldn't fit in coworkers trucks because the 4 foot bed is useless for that and I could fold seats down.

Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuugh if we were allowed to have the Toyota Hilux here I'd buy one immediately. Fucking closest to a truck I "like" is a Ford Maverick because it's a "smaller truck"...

But they ONLY come in crew cab. For fucks sake I want a standard cab full size small pickup truck about the size of a HIlux or a ranger from the 90s. And frankly if they made one a hybrid I'd have a dream car, but hell I'd take a 4 cylinder. But nope. Around here they're the shortest fucking bed for the biggest fucking motor that's effectively an SUV that is somehow MORE useless because the wall between the bed and the cab means I can't lay seats down. A fucking mini-van is a better truck in the US.

I apologize... this is an angry angry rant I have to do like once every other week...

Same from Arkansas, Missouri, Oklahoma...

Yet they think they understand how the world works better than anyone.

Modern pickups are bad. Old pickups were fantastic for "I need to pile a bunch of (insert thing here) in the back."

But now every pickup is a massive motor for a tiny truckbed that my ford focus wagon has better hauling capacity.

There's a weird moment where it's "Fuck, here we go aga... wait... it's not our fault this time?"

Pretty much.

I mean... there's a good side. We don't have the manufacturing for heavy equipment and we're pissing off the world so it might take a couple years before we actually have the heavy equipment to strip mine our national parks.

I live in a red state. We have a method of voting individual bills into our constitution as a majority process.

We have voted in a reform to get big money out of our politics. The Republican majority in the state forced another vote with the most obfuscated language to get the state to overturn it. We have voted time and time again against Right to Work which is an anti-union bill. The Republicans have constantly tried to get it to happen. St Louis managed to get its police out from under State control, leaving Kansas City the only state in the nation with the state controlling the cities police... until the Republican ran state forced St. Louis back under its control.

We voted in a higher minimum wage and guarantees for sick leave. We also voted in protections for abortions overturning the harshest ban in the state. These were overwhelming majorities. We as a state also overwhelmingly voted Republicans in, who have just overturned the min wage and sick leave bill, and are trying to figure out how to overturn the abortion protections.

So if we had a COMPLETELY free and fair election. I guarantee you, at least the portion of the country I'm in, would still vote for anything with an (R) next to their name.

and you’re lucky to have the NPS to make all of it so accessible.

Give it a couple years...

I will not be going back there until shit calms down.

Don't expect it for a long time. You talk about the Erasmus to teach people they're just like everyone else to prevent an internal war.

Here in the states, I honest to god cannot see how our two sides can come to a peaceful resolution and that terrifies me.

Instead, the anger will be pointed at minorities.

For a time. How long until "Democrats" are the ones that are taking their jobs and food.

And I don't mean the politicians.