ABigGuy4U
13d ago
I think a nuclear war between the United States/NATO and Russia is still the most likely existential crisis facing this planet. It doesn’t get nearly as much as attention as it should, here or elsewhere, because it’s now old fashioned and unstylish. And because younger people haven’t read about the likely scenarios for how it would happen, so the don’t realize the immense time pressure involved. The leadership on both sides would have about a ten minute window to make the decision whether to torch the planet. I find it worrying how cavalier everyone is about this, all the way from Reddit to the high political leadership.
ABigGuy4U
16d ago
The end of a revolution is usually only visible in hindsight. This might be it but it’s too soon to say.
ABigGuy4U
16d ago
America is locked in a constant cycle of “regret war now get excited for the next war”. Vietnam was a tragic and pointless waste of life, but the Global War on Terror is an existential necessity, because Saddam has nukes and the Taliban hate us for our freedom. The Global War on Terror was born out of lies and hysteria, but the Ukraine War is an unambiguously righteous cause that justifies unlimited escalation.
My favorite is the one where you have to click through a full page disclaimer of tiny text about how looking at the screen is dangerous in order to actually get to the necessary functions that the screen provides.
ABigGuy4U
17d ago
A few years ago 4000 was the maximum daily dose but the FDA has recently revised the recommendation down to 2000 mg because of evidence that acetaminophen is more hepatotoxic that previously realized. And to reduce the risks of accidental overdose from multiple medications, and because of the synergistic damaging effects with alcohol.
ABigGuy4U
17d ago
As opposed to:
-The least popular candidate of the last 40 years who was selected entirely due intra-party backstabbing and seniority
-A terminally senile old man who only narrowly won due to a once in century pandemic, and then mentally flamed out so bad he had to drop out of the race
-An incoherent alcoholic apparatchik who somehow manages to be more unpopular than the 2016 candidate, who never won a primary or even placed in the top three, who only has a political career because they are good at giving head.
Gosh, it’s a good thing the Democrats didn’t get Bernie, or their reputation over these last few years might have taken quite a hit!
ABigGuy4U
17d ago
They were using a mass coordinated media smear campaign against him just like they did with Trump later. And they weaponized the already questionable superdelegate system against him.
ABigGuy4U
17d ago
I would suggest trying to gradually cut back to a significant amount before you go cold turky. It will ease the shock.
ABigGuy4U
17d ago
3000 milligrams of acetaminophen in one dose is dangerous to your liver. That’s one third higher than the recommended maximum dose for a entire day. 4000 would be double the maximum allowed daily dose. Especially if you regularly drink any alcohol at all. Can you ask your doctor to put some lidocaine on your face before he starts? Or use an injected numbing agent?
ABigGuy4U
18d ago
What the Dems could have done about it is held their nose and refrained from ratfucking Bernie out of the nomination. But they just couldn’t stand his lukewarm populist vibes so he had to go.
ABigGuy4U
19d ago
Buster Scruggs is a bit weird, if you end up not liking it don’t let it put you off the rest of their output. I would suggest trying Fargo and the Big Lebowski. Those are kind of their two most iconic movies and it gives you a pretty good idea of the kinds of movies they make. No Country for Old Men is very good, but it’s pretty different from anything else they ever made. It’s more of a Cormac McCarthy movie than a Coen Brothers movie.
ABigGuy4U
19d ago
Israel has begin bombing targets in Tehran. No word yet on the specific sites or casualties.
ABigGuy4U
19d ago
They cry and scream about it all the time when China imports Han Chinese into Xianjang to displace the local minorities there. Or when Israel does it in the West Bank.
The problem is that the United States and NATO armies are in shambles already, and wouldn’t be able to credibly threaten that kind of conventional war. Hell, I doubt the US has the ability to do a 2003-style thunder run against a country like Iraq anymore. Ashton Carter absolutely gutted the military under his watch. He got high on Francis Fukuyama and assumed that the United States was the one remaining superpower and would only be doing goat herder wars for the next fifty years. So he got rid of all the programs that would allow the United States to fight conflicts against peers and went all in on COIN stuff. A NATO expeditionary force in Europe would have enough shells to last for about three days. And modern air defenses are outpacing offensive air capabilities, so the Air Force probably wouldn’t be able to get level of air superiority that NATO combat methods require. Which would mean Ukraine war style meat wave offensives with insufficient artillery support. How are the American people going to react to taking 19,000 casualties in two weeks? Because that’s what the the Army War College is estimating. How is the army going to replace one fifth of it’s combat troops in that time frame? What happens when China and North Korea take the opportunity to go for it the second America is tied down elsewhere?
NATO is even worse. Poland ran the numbers, and their war games estimate that the nation would last about 48 hours in the event of a war with Russia, which is why their bellicose rhetoric suddenly got real quite about a year ago. Britain would have serious problems getting even a single combat deployable division ready, and that would probably take months.
Well, the dodge that seems to be pretty universally used in both secular and Christian circles is that most of the people burned as witches were not in fact actual practitioners of black magic knowingly and intentionally in league with Satan. They were just innocent randoms convicted on sketchy evidence. This allows Christians to avoid thinking about whether burning people alive for heresy is justified, and it allows secularists to avoid having to support people who are engaging in human sacrifice in an attempt to hex and curse innocent third parties.
Arguably, Kamala has been so noncommittal about policy that there is nothing there to endorse. She could walk up to the podium on Inauguration Day, pull off a lifelike rubber mask to reveal that she was actually Donald Trump in disguise all along, and she still wouldn’t technically be violating any of her stated campaign promises.
ABigGuy4U
21d ago
I think you’re right about being used a distraction away from class issues. But it has still turned into an obstacle in the way of power, and will be swiftly discarded as a result.
ABigGuy4U
21d ago
I think Democrats are realizing trans issues are the albatross tied around their neck. It alienates suburban whites, it alienates minority and immigrant voters, it alienates women, including a large part of feminists. They can’t keep bending over backwards to pander to a segment of the coalition that’s 0.3 percent of the voter base.
ABigGuy4U
21d ago
I think part of it is future shock at how fast this became an issue. Six years ago AI could barely generate a paragraph of coherent text and now it’s producing photorealistic images and competing with professional artists. It took mechanical automation 150 years before it started to replace manual factory laborers at that level. Also science fiction and technological prognosticators never expected knowledge workers to be the first ones on the computer’s chopping block so we have no frame of reference for it.
ABigGuy4U
23d ago
American politics is still more civil than a lot of places. There are plenty of countries that aren’t currently at civil war where it’s still commonplace for all major parties to have officially organized armed wings.
ABigGuy4U
25d ago
The Martyrmade podcast, the “Fear and Loathing in the New Jerusalem” episodes, and the “War All the Time” follow up episode.
Normally I would agree. In this situation though I think it’s irresponsible for either of them to be doing that since it’s a nuclear power and an imminent nuclear power. That’s how you get millions of people killed over personal defense interests of the leadership.
Will we be having an Election Day Mega-thread on November 5? Or do election post just go in the culture war thread?
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