Seems likely. The most rigid materially known, (or at least theorized) is nuclear pasta.. Nuclear pasta only forms inside neutron stars, stellar objects that are the last stage of matter before matter gives up entirely and collapses into a black hole.

It would work, but only in the impossible world where you have a perfectly rigid unbreakable stick. But such an object cannot exist in this universe.

Pick up a solid rigid object near you. Anything will do, a coffee cup, a comb, a water bottle, anything. Pick it up from the top and lift it vertically. Observe it.

It seems as though the whole object moves instantaneously, does it not? It seems that the bottom of the object starts moving at the exact same instant as the top. But it is actually not the case. Every material has a certain elasticity to it. Everything deforms slightly under the tiniest of forces. Even a solid titanium rod deforms a little bit from the weight of a feather placed upon it. And this lack of perfect rigidity means that there is a very, very slight delay from when you start lifting the top of the object to when the bottom of it starts moving.

For small objects that you can manipulate with your hands, this delay is imperceptible to your senses. But if you observed an object being lifted with very precise scientific equipment, you could actually measure this delay. Motion can only transfer through objects at a finite speed. Specifically, it can only move at the speed of sound through the material. Your perfectly rigid object would have an infinite speed of sound within it. So yes, it would instantly transfer that motion. But with any real material, the delay wouldn’t just be noticeable, but comically large.

Imagine this stick were made of steel. The speed of sound in steel is about 5120 m/s. The distance to the Moon is about 400,000 km. Converting and dividing shows that it would actually take about 22 hours for a pulse like that to travel through a steel pole that long. (Ignoring how the steel pole would be supported.)

So in fact, you are both right and wrong. You are correct for the object you describe. A perfectly rigid object would be usable as a tool of FTL communication. But such an object simply cannot exist in this universe.

You will end up paying the share of taxes to your state government that you currently do to the federal government. If the federal government collapses, all 50 states are now de facto independent. Those states can now start forming a new country or new collection of countries as they will.

Even better, add emotions!

Season with salt until it tastes angry.

I prefer milligallons myself.

Microacres^(3/2)

Because it’s clearly being banned, not because of privacy violations, not because of the nefarious impact of a foreign government, but because of the content that is shared on it. It is the only major social media platform with a strong pro-Palestinian viewpoint on it. And the people in Congress have been caught on camera explicitly stating this is why they want to ban it.

I hate Tiktok. I don’t use it. Never have. But I still don’t want to see the US turn its internet into the Great Firewall of China 2.0.

The leaders in Congress cannot stand the idea of there being a social media platform that is popular in the US that isn’t hosted in the US. Why? The answer is simple - control. All the US social media platforms are heavily influenced by the US government. Hell, most of them openly contract with the NSA. Facebook is an NSA contractor. These platforms get a ton of money from the US government. And despite what conservatives bitch at in regards to “being censored,” the real censorship is against anything that doesn’t advance US power and influence. Outside of Tiktok, the major platforms heavily censor pro-Palestinian messages and stories. Go to r/worldnews and post anything other than “Palestinians deserve to be vaporized,” and you’ll be banned within 5 minutes. It’s literally that bad. Even when outright bans aren’t in place, the platforms will severely down shift any pro-Palestinian content and keep it out of peoples’ feeds.

“Beware of he would would deny you access to information, for in his heart, he dreams himself your master.”

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New Trump conspiracy just dropped:

It turns out Trump actually does have a superpower. He can Groundhog Day himself at will. He can create a save state of reality and load it at will. Or he can set up time loop of up to say, 6 months in length. He won the election because he literally ran that campaign hundreds, perhaps thousands or tens thouands of times before finally getting it right. He’s save scumming reality. Though, this is also the reason he talks so oddly and is all screwed up. Thousands of subjective years giving political speeches just fries your brain.

A third term really isn’t that much of a stretch. The 22nd Amendment was poorly drafted. Or perhaps more specifically, poorly drafted for our political era.

In order to approve a Trump third term, SCOTUS really wouldn’t need to come to an incredibly stretched conclusion. According to the letter of the Constitution, the requirements to be president such as term limits only apply to being elected president. Read from a strict literalist perspective, these requirements don’t apply to achieving the powers of Acting President through the line of succession.

So Trump could get a third term through being appointed Acting President through the line of presidential succession. He would have two flunkies run for President and Vice President. They run promising to immediately resign after being sworn in. MAGA arranges to have Trump appointed Speaker of the House. When the two flunkies resign, Trump would immediately become Acting President and serve the remainder of the flunky president’s term. In terms of actual powers, there is virtually no difference between being President or Acting President.

Again, it really wouldn’t require a super stretched interpretation of the Constitution for SCOTUS to rule this as a valid method. The writers of the 22nd Amendment wrote the amendment to say, “No person shall be elected to the office of the President…” They should have written it, “No person shall be elected to or hold the powers of the office of the President…” They didn’t consider that someone could try to deliberately become president in a way that doesn’t involve being elected president.

There’s never been case law on this, because no one has ever been vain enough to try and use this loophole to get a third term. But according to a strict reading of the Constitution, someone can absolutely serve a third term this way. Hell, this would also be a path for someone like Elon Musk, who is not a native-born citizen, to become president.

Get a bidet.

Yeah, but there’s something a lot more gross about spraying yourself with a bottle than just turning a knob and letting the plumbing do it.

We just finished a big holiday trip, 2 weeks visiting both sides of the family. Stayed with one family and then the other. After that…yeah…seriously considering getting everyone bidets next year for Christmas…

Yes, a true classic!

Eh, just do your best, and accept imperfection. You’re Hercules, not God. Try to do what good you can, when you can. Trying to perfectly optimize things simply leads to madness.

I mean, even Hercules is allowed to take a break. In fact, self-care is a vital part of the work of any true hero! You can’t be effectively battling evil if you’re unhealthy, depressed, or sleep deprived. Take care of yourself, superfam!

Nah, I’m just saying that if you’re a health insurance CEO, you deserve to be tied to a boulder and thrown into the Sea.

There’s no shortage of rocks at our disposal. If it’s the labor costs you’re worried about, I suppose we could force the CEOs to quarry and carry their own rock.

Bring justice to the wicked AND get swole? Sounds like positives all around. You’ll basically be Hercules at that point!