Traveller, Aftermath (post-apocalyptic), Top Secret (spies and terrorists), and Villains & Vigilantes (super heroes) are all lost in the sands of time for me, but I really loved them all.

If you get a circular rash around a tick bite, you might want to get it looked at.

How’s the Chinese election looking? Who are the major candidates and who is in the lead?

Yeah, I recognize that it’s a deplorable thing and I am very much in favor of allowing for far more open immigration.

I also know that there’s an old Jewish joke about Germany and Russia about the difference between an optimist and a pessimist. The pessimists lived.

If that means spending $600k on a house in Portugal in order to get a resident visa, I’m going to do that if I need to in order to protect myself and my loved ones. I worry that people don’t realize how quickly things can get bad, or how bad they can get, and the answer isn’t “buy a gun.” I’ve been shot at and I didn’t like it. I’d rather move to someplace on the Mediterranean and drink cocktails. I will never stop working for civil rights, including the rights of migration, but if this is the only way to GTFO, I’m going to do it if I need to.

I get the bit about people parking money overseas using these programs, but humanitarian immigration is being eroded year after year. We need to fix that, but until we can, I need to make sure I’m considering all of my options.

I very much agree but have two points of clarification for more general audiences.

First, this is the job of these ships. They shoot down missiles. The countries that deploy these ships have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on sophisticated electronics and weapons platforms so that these ships can protect other ships. The weapons platforms being deployed against them don’t represent a major threat - I mean, never say never - but there was a point in the Falklands war where navies really internalized the risks presented by land based anti-ship missiles and things started to get taken very seriously.

The only other thing I’d say is that the loitering drones are probably going to be getting more use than traditional counter battery fire. The shoot and scoot systems - as opposed to in place systems - are less vulnerable to counterattack, but can and are being attacked by simply parking some flying bombs that just continue to fly in circles until they find something that someone wants to make a hole in.

Honestly, my partner and I are actively looking into golden visa programs. We are like a United Colors of Benetton ad of sexual, ethnic, and racial minorities, and the worse things are getting in the US, the more attractive emigration becomes.

That said, I would not even entertain the idea of moving to Australia. Maybe it’s just an outsider’s perception, but they don’t look like they’re heading in a particularly good direction either.

My cat yells when

1. She’s taken a shit and wants it cleaned up
2. It’s time for food and she hasn’t been fed yet
3. It’s time for food and she’s being fed
4. She wants to walk around
5. She’s tired of walking around and wants to go to bed

We were told about a year and a half ago that she had about a week to live. She’s still going. I’ll take every yell she makes, even if it means waking up at 3am because her bed fell over and she doesn’t like it.

One of my favorite observations was when I looked at an ASPCA website and they had separate sections:

1. Dog Training - how to get your dog to do what you want
2. Cat Behavior - what you can expect cats to do

Your cat is just doing a typical cat thing. Some cats meow constantly. Some cats yell (you can win internet points with these). Some cats barely purr, others sound like a Harley Davidson. Some cats will love it when you rub their bellies, others will lure you in and then scratch the living crap out of you leaving scars that make it look like you tried to commit suicide.

I apologize if this seems plain spoken, but you really have two choices - love your derp cat for who they are and what they do, or give the baby away to someone who can do so and think about getting a fish tank or maybe a fern or something. If you really, really want a cat with particular behavioral characteristics, you can do some research on breeds and behaviors, but you can expect to pay a fairly significant amount for most specialized breeds. I don’t know of any cat breeds that don’t meow because I’ve never looked for one, but many purebred cat breeds like Bengals will be sold for thousands of dollars. You’d have to do some research.

This article is bullshit.

The War Powers Resolution requires the president to notify Congress within 48 hours of committing armed forces to military action and forbids armed forces from remaining for more than 60 days, with a further 30-day withdrawal period, without congressional authorization for use of military force (AUMF) or a declaration of war by the United States.

The president can engage in airstrikes or in naval or ground warfare as long as they notify Congress after the fact within two days, and then can carry on operations for three months without congressional approval. It is used all the time.

US armed forces came under attack by Houthi forces on multiple occasions. Biden is well within the law in committing military forces to action, and could do anything up to and including a ground invasion of Yemen with a hundred thousand marines (although he won’t - this is going to be bombs and drones).

You can argue that Congress should not have abdicated its responsibility to declare war back in 1973 (I think it was a stupid idea and has been ripe for abuse), but this is what every president has used since it was passed.

Gamora, her arms wide.

Thank you for posting this. It’s a fantastic article.

This is coming to the US.

Don’t bother. It’s just that site that backs hate sites like Truth Social and other far right media. The article itself is blowing all of the world government dog whistles they’ve been sounding since the John Birch Society was in business.

That’s a good point. China has construction capacity like no place else on earth.

I also wonder if the technology involved would make this more deployable in the global south due to fewer infrastructure dependencies.

In our view, Hungary fulfills all the qualities of the rule of law

We self-certify our compliance and reject any review. Just give us money please.

I very badly want this to be true, but I simply cannot imagine it. I think my company might have more SREs than Twitter has employees, but I cannot see how they could do global ops like that. Or even just California ops.

People with money tend to trust people with money because their ego tells them how smart they are because of their own success, and they project that onto others.

Elon is also a brilliant con man, exactly like Donald Trump. They’re so close, it’s uncanny. Elon apparently got $13B in loans from major banks by telling them that his businesses never lose money.

We will have to see if reality is finally catching up with them.

I know a number of companies that have introduced exercise programs. In every case it’s clearly done on the employee’s own time, is made accommodating, and the reward for completing your 4000 steps per day or whatever is a tee shirt or something. It’s not that these things can’t be done.

Plus companies do stupid things that get them sued all the time. Look at Elon.

Thanks for saving me the search.

Also, there was the one where they were testing their sprinting speed with the radar sign, and Michael claimed he was running at 30 mph because a car drove by while he was going.

I also can’t see how this doesn’t open them up to lawsuits for any injuries incurred from a sprained ankle to a blown out knee or a heart attack. I’m a manager in a large company, and I got a bit nervous at some of the offsite activities, and those were mild things like dunk tanks. Plus I bet the entertainment company or venue carries that insurance. This is literally making the run part of the job, and it’s a relatively dangerous activity.