Caineach's page

The Mad Comrade wrote:

We're heading arse-over-teakettle into a universal stipend society. Or a dystopian society. Or a bastard love child of both.

My hope is that instead of a stipend we eventually implement some form of guaranteed minimum employment. That is, if you want to work you are guaranteed to be able to do so for at least a minimum wage and some minimum number of hours per week... which together provide enough funds for basic necessities.

The obvious questions are what would all those people do and how would we pay for it. However, I don't think either is all that insurmountable. A lot of the funding would come from eliminating unemployment assistance, that would no longer be needed, and the increased revenue generated by increased economic activity from near universal employment and societal benefits from the work actually performed. The remainder would have to come from less imbalanced wealth distribution mechanisms than we have currently... which means the GOP and many of the wealthy would fight it to the death, but ultimately fixing that income imbalance is going to be the cornerstone of ANY solution to our long term finances.

As to what work all those people could do... everything which currently doesn't get done because there just aren't enough bodies to do so. Police get asked all the time why they don't prevent more crimes or vigorously investigate the theft of every wallet and cell phone... and the answer is because they do not have enough people to do so. Problem solved. Put an unarmed part time auxiliary police officer on every street with body cams to record everything going on around them and just have them 'observe suspicious activity'. If a crime is later reported in that area then the police have video of everyone who was around at the time... and then you can have as many people as you need to go through the videos to identify possible suspects... and as many as you need to file paperwork for warrants and do research on the suspects (e.g. financial...

Sorry, but I think you are off by orders of magnitude if you think current unemployment assistance would even dent the money required to implement your idea.

Blerg. Must keep current on RWBY, not binge watch until 1:30 on a work night.

Sadly, this season seems slow to me, what with them splitting the party and introducing so much more of the world.

Can't bring myself to watch this show again. Unsure what else can be done to pique my interest again. Plot moves too slowly. Not enough is explained. It's just a touchy feely kinda ride that you must cringe through. Like anything past Season 1 of Lost... This is the first time I ever wished that midi-chlorians were mentioned in a show. It's that bad IMO.

I love how your reason for not wanting to pick the show back up are some of my reasons for loving the show.

CBDunkerson wrote:

We all agree that Antarctica is melting more quickly than expected even 20 years ago. Only you have suggested that Antarctic ice will be significantly destroyed in 14 years.

But the problem with the way you put it is that you ignore (misunderstand?) that the rate of melt has been increasing non-linearly. It's been increasing at an increasing rate.

Additionally, you seem to be ignoring the fact that those ice shelves that "we all agree" are soon to be gone, hold back a far greater amount of land-based glacial and ice field material. AGW doesn't have to melt the ice directly via a warmer atmosphere to cause significant destruction over the next couple of decades. The mechanism is not theoretical, it's been shown to be underway for the West Antarctic Ice. Elsewhere too certainly, if anyone were to take the time to study those areas as well as we have the West Antarctic Ice.

I'm thinking you (among others) haven't actually read/watched the links I provided.

Coriat wrote:

On the other hand, I'm fairly pessimistic about the ability of the incoming administration to derail progress."

Trump's Secretary of Energy is Rick Perry - a green energy advocate presently and for three terms while he was governor of Texas.

Don't believe me? Check out this link here, Special Interests Worried Rick Perry's DOE Might Focus On Creating Sustainable U.S. Energy Policy

Forbes wrote:

During Governor Perry's tenure as governor, Texas's wind energy production soared from almost nothing when he entered office to more than 35 million MW-hrs in 2014, his last full year in office. If Texas was a country, its wind energy production would rank 5th in the world.

Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:

Do you have anything new to add to your essentially "We're terminally screwed, so we shouldn't even bother." position, or have you

...

Anyone who thinks Rick Perry will be friendly to renewables hasn't looked at his stated energy policies.

Caineach wrote:

Natural Gas is at least used for more non-electricity related purposes like heating, so at least the decline in electricity production wont kill quite as hard. I see regulations on fracking hurting it a lot in the future, now that the EPA has confirmed that it contaminates drinking water.

Ha ha ha ha. What regulations? What EPA, for that matter.

I didn't say it wouldn't get worse before it gets better.

Thomas Seitz wrote:

I'm glad you're hopeful about that. I dunno because I live in a state has pretty much defined itself by coal and by extension, natural gas. But if it comes a day when solar and wind power provide 200% more energy and also efficiency than both those combined...I'll be happy. The rest of my state? Maybe not so much.

Yeah, I'm afraid the coal states have bought in to a lie.

Coal jobs and usage have both been in decline for decades now. Peabody Energy, Arch Coal, Alpha Natural Resources, and Patriot Coal all filed for bankruptcy last year after having borrowed massively to ramp up production in hopes of selling coal to China... just as China began cutting its coal use.

That has nothing to do with global warming, the supposed 'war on coal', the EPA, individual politicians, et cetera... and everything to do with the fact that coal can no longer compete economically. Wind and solar now cost HALF as much as coal does for most of the planet.

Coal states should have been lobbying hard to become centers of wind and solar manufacturing. Instead, they've bought in to a seemingly endless series of myths about how coal would be soaring except for 'insert villain of the week here' and thus continued to chase after a dying industry rather than listening to (or voting for) anyone that could actually help them. The result has been a slowly withering fossil fuel economy... which is now headed to complete collapse.

Natural gas is going to be the same story... just playing out later and over ~40 years instead of ~150. States with a strong natural gas economy still have about a decade to save themselves. After that they'll be in the same (sinking) boat as coal.

Natural Gas is at least used for more non-electricity related purposes like heating, so at least the decline in electricity production wont kill quite as hard. I see regulations on fracking hurting it a lot in the future, now that the EPA has confirmed that it contaminates drinking water.

Hopefully you're not snow-miserable for too long. :)

I want to crawl through my monitor to slap you right now.

Ouch. Santachus seem to be fairly common. Given the limited timespan to get them, it seems that this should be a relatively easy way to farm up Pikachu candy until the 29th. Hopefully a nearby park will have a steady spawn rate for you?

Lol. There are no pokemon in any park near my house. Suburbia has no pokemon. And wandering more than a few blocks in this weather prevents you from actually being able to throw a pokeball.

I have only seen 1 santachu and the game errored out catching it because I was at the edge of my building wifi.

Being able to transfer multiple pokemon at the same time is quite handy.

Thank you for saying this. I never would have looked for it. 167 pokemon sent to the candy factory.

XMas is shaping up to be really, really lame. :/

Pikachu wearing a santa hat does not appear nearly enough to be a decent Christmas gift.

Considering HYDRA was keeping an eye on Strange as of Winter Soldier... yeah, not sure the timeline untangles easily.

Unless, of course, it wasn't War Machine, but Justin Hammer's botched efforts from Iron Man 2...

Yes, but he was also a famous doctor at that time, so he still had reason to be on their list of influential people. That wasn't a list of superheros.

Browman wrote:

Speaking as a guy who has never read a comic book but likes well made super hero movies, Marvel's larger movies are getting to unwieldy with characters. The first Avengers movie was awesome partially because it had a decent but not huge team. As much as I liked civil war there were too many major characters. The nonsense that the infinity war movies could have 60-70 major characters would be completely unworkable.

60-70 major characters?

Who are we expecting to see in it? How many more are going to be introduced before then?

Similarly, I would consider Civil War to have 4-5 major characters heroes (Cap, Tony, WS, BP, and possibly BW). Everyone else is in it as side characters. Just because named characters exist and have their own story doesn't mean they are major in a crossover. Spiderman and Antman, for instance, were basically minor cameos.

Jeff,

Because I also want the Phoenix Force and it's hard to get without mutants.

Wow, 2 things I absolutely hope don't make it into the MCU.

Thomas Seitz wrote:

Delightful,

Nova is in a weird spot since the Nova Corps don't have Nova Force...yet.

And most likely never will since MCU is setting them up to be space cops, not super heroes. Nova isn't exactly a character who can carry a movie these days.

A lot of people think that with the Nova Corps getting the infinity stone it will be the source of their Nova Force.

A title sequence flashback will do the necessary telling, leaving the 90-odd necessary minutes to tell the main story for that film.

Now I'm thinking of an Up styled origin story.

Alzrius wrote:

A question to everyone: with the new cour about to start, what were some of the best anime of the cour that just concluded?

I like to wait until a series is completely done before I start it, so that I can watch it at my own pace. Given that, what among the recently-concluded shows should I turn my attention to?

(Bearing in mind that I only have Crunchyroll, and already watched Re:Zero and Grimgar of Ash and Fantasy.)

The Anime News Network critics pretty consistently picked both Re:Zero which you've already watched and Mob Pyscho 100 as the top shows of the Summer season. I wasn't a big fan of One Punch Man but I thought Mob was terrific mainly because of the premise of the main character who has tremendous psychic power but just wants to be "normal" like everyone else.

Two others that are very good which conclude today are the Prohibition-era, mafia drama 91 Days and the pseudo-fantasy war drama Aldermin of the Sky. Give the latter a couple of episodes because what seems like at first glance is going to be another run of the mill, haremy teens with powers show, actually gets quite serious and introspective as the show progresses. Definitely a show which consistently got better as it went along.

And all are available on Crunchyroll.

I recently watched Aldermin of the sky. It was amazing and I want more.

Thanks Caineach and BigDTBone.

You guys are right that I did not realize the Prius was first out in 1997 (2000 for the USA)! Looks like there were other earlier ones in California of various makes/models but were each only selling in the 100's final total after 2-3 years. Not a good start.

Still, my larger point was this:

Let's say everyone is as diligent as CB is in regards to his carbon footprint. As I said up thread everyone wants to be like us - they want modern convenience, even when that convenience isn't convenient. People! I know! <eyeroll> But until they get what they later realize they don't want, they'll be hankering for it something powerful.

When you multiple CB's diligently "small" CO2 load on the atmosphere by the the 7.5 billion that are out there, what do you get?

While I can't give you an exact number, I'll bet my favorite set of dice that the CO2 load would exceed the current level by an order of magnitude or more.

Assuming AGW causes even half the bad things scientists say it will, there is no good way forward this side of nuclear fusion. We as a species will take what we want, call our greed "Not much, just what I got come'n... it's only fair", and burn our house down while sleeping in it all at the same time.

Other countries have the ability to intelligently plan to get to our standards. The US stumbled through stage 1 with massive development and existing investments that make stage 2 harder to do. Developing countries will skip most of stage 1 and go straight to stage 2. They get to reap the benefits of our being the head of the pack. Kinda like how Boston's roads are an eldritch abomination while new cities make sense. As for China, they have decided the US wasn't making up smog, having discovered it for themselves, and now they want to do something about it.

Quark Blast wrote:

Hybrids are good but if you are on your 3rd may I ask if you really need to drive that much?

I don't drive much... ~325 miles per week.

I got the original Prius when it first came out and drove it until it died. Next car got totaled (while parked). Have had the third for a few years now... considered going EV instead, but they were new and either poor range or super expensive.

I don't think people realize that Hybrids have been out long enough for them to die of old age at the same time as every other car their age. Hell, by this point it wouldn't be hard to kill 2 to mileage.

Caineach wrote:

Plausible Pseudonym wrote:

This article by a sort of liberal-ish libertarian, extremely pro-LGBT, decidedly anti-Trump psychiatrist who has patients expressing Trump-related suicidal ideations, is a very long but very, very good antidote to a lot of Trump fear, for those of you who might benefit from it.

The man chose white supremacists for top positions in his government. No, people are not crying wolf.

They aren't white supremacists, any more than 90% of Japanese are Japanese supremacists or most Israelis are Jewish supremacists. (Or maybe they all are!) If anything, Bannon, like most of these guys, is an Asian supremacist. (I'm referring here to his CEO comments.)

When Glenn Beck calls someone racist I'm pretty confident in calling them one.

Wei Ji the Learner wrote:

To get back to the Republic:

The most important question is 'HOW do we fix this admittedly broken system?' not 'WHO is at fault for the broken system?'

Bring back jobs, first and foremost.

Seriously, that right there will probably fix most of it. Get incomes growing and people employed. I don't care about race, sexual preference, gender, or anything like that. Just get them working.

As long as people have no hope, as long as they have no reason to feel represented or that things can improve, they're not going to vote or they're going to protest vote. At least some of the people who voted for Trump did so purely on a "take everyone with me" basis.

Once the people are working again, then focus on other things. You can even focus on it entirely from the focus of improving productivity, as I will now demonstrate.

Do they need healthcare? Great! National healthcare system would work wonders and solve all of the problems with the ACA. And have it run by the feds, not the states. If people want to opt out, let them. If they have the money to afford it, no reason to stop them.

People want to marry the same sex? Shouldn't that create jobs in the marriage industries? Let them! Letting them be happy is less stress on the mental health side of the healthcare system. Lower costs.

People are trans? Well, solving problems they have will mean lower medical costs in the long term. So, solve away!

Women having trouble? There's at least half our workforce with a problem. Solve it! Easy access to abortions and birth control also means they will have less stress about potential pregnancies, which in turn helps them be happy. Easy access to abortions and birth control also means they will have less stress about potential pregnancies, which in turn helps them be happy. Happier workers are more productive workers.

Men having trouble? That's at least half our workforce with a problem. Solve it! Curing the insanely high rate of depression among men alone would be...

So your proposal for solutions is to put in power the party that did everything they could to fight all the things you want?

It's as much hyperbole as the doomsday cries about Obama the last 2 cycles and Bush the 2 before that.

No. There is a difference.

BigNorseWolf wrote:

Democrats: lets fund this healthcare thing out of the general fund.

Republicans: no, lets fund people that don't have health insurance by making people who do have it pay more

Democrats: well if thats the best deal we can get then it's the bes

Republicans: YOUR RATES ARE GOING UP! YOU"RE GOING TO HAVE TO PAY MORE! GET THEM! STOP THEM!

And either way I'm screwed since I couldn't afford it at old prices and now get taxed for not being able to afford it.

because Republicans pushed the Supreme Court to say they don't have to give it to you for free, most likely.

CBDunkerson wrote:

CrusaderWolf wrote:

Just a Clinton win = Four more years of gridlock.

Two years. A third of the Senate and all of the House are up for election in 2018.

Republicans will likely retake the Senate in 2018. House wont change until districts are redrawn.

CrusaderWolf wrote:

Even going to wake up at 3am so I don't miss anything :)

Honestly, don't bother. This election is close enough that we probably won't know who won for at least a few days, if not weeks.

Florida is not capable of competently holding an election, and they are basically going to decided this thing. Everyone knows what happened in 2000, but FL has been a total mess in other elections as well.

We are in for a long, crappy slog.

EDIT: Based on past and current trends, I'm going to make a prediction that Trump wins Florida.
wipes vomit from corners of mouth
May god have mercy on our souls.

Using 538's numbers, if Clinton takes every state they give her +3%, plus NH (2.9%) she wins. Florida and North Carolina wont mater.

edit: If either of those states can be called for Clinton at a reasonable time, the election will be set and you wont have to stay up for the west coast.

At best, that was Obama making a very nebulous statement. Combined with CNN leaking debate questions to Hilary, the "mirror dimension" is the one where liberals don't have to bend over backwards trying to ignore the corruption running through their midst.

How was he saying anything nebulous?

Fergie wrote:

I think that Clinton can be viewed and critiqued based on what she (and Bill, due to Hillary's past support of his policies) have done, while it seems that others require a comparison to Trump or Sanders.

Please put me down as one of those others; in fact, i think that to treat this in any other way is the mark of an irrevocable fool, to put it bluntly.

Barring an act literally unprecedented in the history of the United States, the next president will be either Ms. Clinton or Mr. Trump. I don't expect, for example, a military coup and for General Dunford to announce that he's taking over the country to preserve the smooth-running order of the United States. But neither do I expect a revolution by the Sanders Liberation Front or a sudden restoration of the Hanovrian dynasty. Even less do I expect a meteor strike to eliminate the city of DC,... and the possibility of a third party victory comes in even behind the meteor strike.

So I don't know what good it does to complain about how Clinton is a lousy candidate, since, unless your preferred candidate is Mr. Trump, your preferred candidate is not even in the race.

Given the very real possibility that the real candidate you find even worse might win, voting for an imaginary candidate like Frodo Baggins, Jill Stein, or Bernie Sanders is at best foolish and at worst grossly negligent. Even staying home is irresponsible.

You don't complain to influence this election. You complain to influence future elections.

CBDunkerson wrote:

Should we allow casinos in two more counties

Why not?

I can't comment on CBD's specific circumstances but there are a few things I can think of.

I can see a case for it either way. On the one hand, it is a blue law where a lot of the motivation for creating it has gone away.

On the other hand, removing it opens up the existing monopolies to competition and may very well sink them, as is happening in to Atlantic City. Since they tend to support the local economies, there is a vested interest in making sure not only that existing casinos remain healthy but that the tourism industry around those casinos stays strong. Expanding casinos really hurts that tourism industry as there is no longer a need to travel to do it.

Back to the case for expansion, neighboring states are likely looking at expansion and you don't want to be the one left out. You want to be importing tourists, not exporting them.

Started the new season of RWBY and, wow, they really stepped up their game with the quality this time around.

I haven't decided if I like it more yet. I find it drifts closer to uncanny valley for me, where the things that are off seem more pronounced. I heard it takes them something like 40 minutes per frame to render.

CrystalSeas wrote:

Jaçinto wrote:

The thing with Hillary is setting precedent I guess so hopefully they are both punished for their actions.

No, Colin Powell set the precedent when he was Secretary of State. She did not do anything that her predecessors hadn't already done.

Last I checked, Colin Powell NEVER PUT CLASSIFIED information on his private server.

Clinton did.

That was NOT a precedence Powell set...EVER, as far as I know.

That is solely on Clinton's ignorance.

Just to clarify, if putting classified information on a private server was a precedence that Powell set, Clinton could NOT CLAIM IGNORANCE nor INNOCENCE of intent...as she would have had the intent to do as he had done with precedence.

However...that was obviously NOT what came up. Therefore, as per the idea of intent, she never intentionally put classified on her emails (as per what she claims) in that light, which is where the issue of her innocence lies (if one believes that intent is required or even matters...this is the first time I've ever heard of someone getting off based on whether they intended to disclose classified or not in all honesty). I don't think Powell ever instructed her about classified information and this is how she utilized it on the private server. If she had done that with the intent that she was copying that idea...that would have been included in regards to her Intent.

Last I checked, the REASON it was stated that Clinton was not charged was because she did not have INTENT...which was what was necessary if they were going to charge her with infractions of placing classified on an uncleared server. It is her IGNORANCE of the fact or her claim of such that meant that she would not be charged.

We have no idea if Powell had classified emails because they were never combed in excruciating detail by a 3rd party. It took experts ridiculous man hours to search through Hillary's emails, and in the end all they found a handful of things inappropriately classified before getting to her and some things that were later classified after the fact. In fact, in the FBI director's testimony, he admits that, because of the way things sent to her were labeled, an expert on the classification system would have no reason to believe any of the emails were classified without additional knowledge of the specific programs being discussed. Combine that with a formal disagreement between the State Department and FBI about what level of detail constitutes classified information (Drone program FBI says all emails are classified and State Department says general plan emails are not, IIRC), which accounts for many of the after the fact reclassifications, and there would be no case.

Not only can you not make the case that she knowingly intended to remove classified information, you can't even make the case that she knew she had removed classified information in the first place. That's not even including the perfectly valid arguments she can make about not understanding the technology well enough.

Caineach wrote:

BigDTBone wrote:

Donna Brazile used her position as a CNN correspondent to leak primary debate questions to Clinton camp.

I wonder how many people will click through to realize it was during the primary and no one will care.

Or how many people will blow over the fact that I put "primary" in my link description and not care...

Honestly, in the context, I interpreted "primary" to be main when reading your post and forgot about it by the time I responded.

Donna Brazile used her position as a CNN correspondent to leak primary debate questions to Clinton camp.

I wonder how many people will click through to realize it was during the primary and no one will care.

Ah, I figured out how they came to 3.3. The calculated the average monthly mortgage and monthly rent, and compared that, rather than using average years broken down by county. That gives a very different result.

In addition, they seem to only be including mortgage and not including taxes, which in many areas could be as much as the mortgage and drastically change this calculation.

Caineach wrote:

I don't know anyone looking to buy a house that is spending less than 5 years in it.

Limited sample size. Especially since most people aren't planning on buying a house and retrofitting it with solar immediately. The question isn't whether it would have made sense four years ago to retrofit my current house with solar, unless you've a TARDIS in your garage you're willing to lend me.

Quote:

If you are, generally the economics say you should rent instead because on resale you wont recoup the closing costs. That is unless you plan on flipping the house, which only works in very limited housing markets.

Or if you're in one of the markets where renting is a lot more expensive than owning, which right now is most of them. Right now, the average breakeven point is 3.3 years for renting vs owning.

Ok, sure. My friends are admittedly abnormalities because they look at solar potential as a selling point of the house (google now has a convenient calculator).

A quick google search tells me that average time for owning a home is 13 years, and has been growing since the housing collapse. I'm guessing that data has some distinct breakdowns though, and is in no way a bell curve, with a large group of people owning homes for 30+ years and a huge cluster at <3. Age and regional demographics probably play a huge role.

I'm really curious that site's methodology for calculating an average of 3.3 years, since almost no county buying is better in at 3 years and only a handful are better at 3.5. I would buy it if they told me 3.8. Renting is still better on the west coast at 5 years.

And this is ignoring the fact that solar is a capital investment that increases the value of the home. That is of course if you are buying the panels yourself instead of renting them.

Wrath wrote:

Don't know. My panels have a 30 year warranty on them. They'll have paid for themselves by 2020 at this rate. That gives me 20 years of energy profit before warranty runs out.

I really think you need to look at things more deeply Quark.

Battery systems are already here. They are expensive now. 5 years from now that won't be true. Look at every piece of technology for households,that's ever gone to market. TVs, computers gaming console etc.

They all,start super expensive and then get very cheap very fast as the technology advances and people begin to consume.

My prediction, 5 years till self sufficiency for many homes.

Assuming we don't have a fricken nuclear war in that time.

Agree whole heatedly with the bold part.

Problem for most people is they don't plan on living in the same home for 5 years, let alone 30.

We'll see where the tech is at in 5 years.

I think another limited nuclear war is inevitable and that should be the last one (assuming it doesn't escalate and we as a species survive).

Word from Amnesty International around Mosul is that there are already revenge killings by Shia on Suni locals (excluding members of ISIS). So we push ISIS out of Iraq and the Russians/Assad push them out of Syria, what happens when they take over Pakistan?

I don't know anyone looking to buy a house that is spending less than 5 years in it. If you are, generally the economics say you should rent instead because on resale you wont recoup the closing costs. That is unless you plan on flipping the house, which only works in very limitted housing markets.

I will also point out in a previous post you were looking for solar to be installed in Texas. Last I heard, Texas actually penalizes people for installing solar by requiring them to be connected to the grid but refusing to pay them back for energy produced.

I'm in NY, and one of the biggest things holding solar installation back is lack of trained installers. The companies that do it are booked months in advance.

From the Trump Gets the Skynet Vote Dept:

The AI System MogIA which takes in 20 million data points from Google, Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube posits Trump as the winner of the Presidential election, and more popular than Barrack Obama was in 2008.

I think a lot of people retweating Trump's insanity is throwing off their algorithm.

4%? In a presidential? Assuming 200 million registered voters (a benchmark I believe we just reached a week ago) that would be a mere 8 million votes cast. 2012 saw almost 127 million votes cast for President.

I assume you mistyped, but I'm not sure what you meant to say.

EDIT: Unless you meant that 4% of voters are swing votes, in which case my bad for misunderstanding.

I think he was referring to people in swing states, but he wasn't particularly clear

Huh. While I wasn't looking the New Hampshire Green Party went and changed tomorrow's protest outside the Dem's Clinton/Kennedy dinner (changed earlier this autumn from the "Jefferson/Jackson dinner") from a Jill Stein demo into a Solidarity with Standing Rock demo.

Got to go with what is more important.

I think you lost me here on your logic.

I discussed how I like Tim Kaine and his overall reasonability. You then talk about pre-emptive surrender.

The closest I came to was talking about how I think Kaine may be able to build the bridges that have been burned in the past few years and make it so we have something that resembles a working congress rather than the shambles we have now where they won't even get a Justice selected to the SC.

I'm not sure how that is interpreted as automatic preemptive surrender.

Working together and cooperating is FAR different than surrender. It's that type of mindset that one is surrendering if they work with others is exactly the type of vitriol that has caused the caustic situation in the US government in the first place.

Because all the bridges were burned by Republicans, so any overture by Democrats to build new bridges is giving in to the Republican tantrum.

article on renewables surpassing coal worldwide
Interesting to note is almost half of China's new energy production is renewables, and the US and Europe are adding renewables faster than increasing energy demand.

Caineach wrote:

Drahliana Moonrunner wrote:

Pillbug Toenibbler wrote:

CrusaderWolf wrote:

NPC Dave wrote:

I was then informed that gays are under threat from “gay conservative therapy”. Again, I said that was nonsense. I pointed out it was nonsense because if that were really true, all gays would be against it (or at least all gays who want to be gay).

Um...so your argument is "I can find a handful who agree with me, therefore the vast majority that doesn't is invalidated?" It might be better for you to use an argument that doesn't rely on pointing to an extreme minority of gay men for your support, because I bet that I can find a whole lot more than you who loathe gay conversion therapy. Again, the term for what you're doing is "tokenism". Also would be interested in your source for "20% of gays support Trump".

So, other than the cherry-picked trio, does the rest of the actual LGBTQ Republicans' say count? The Log Cabin Republicans took out an ad rightfully complaining that the 2016 RNC Platform was "the most anti-LGBT platform in the party’s 162-year history."

And if you're curious, the LCR later refused to endorse Trump/Pence 2016.

About bloody time they stood up for themselves.. Only took about a quarter century.

Of course right after voting to not endorse Trump they praised him as being the most LBGTQ friendly candidate in history. No idea how they manage to parse that cognitive dissonance.

Actually, compared to the other Republicans in the Primary Clown Car, with the exception of Munchies Kaisch, he is. The party itself, remains downright hostile

They were including Democrats.

Pillbug Toenibbler wrote:

CrusaderWolf wrote:

NPC Dave wrote:

I was then informed that gays are under threat from “gay conservative therapy”. Again, I said that was nonsense. I pointed out it was nonsense because if that were really true, all gays would be against it (or at least all gays who want to be gay).

Um...so your argument is "I can find a handful who agree with me, therefore the vast majority that doesn't is invalidated?" It might be better for you to use an argument that doesn't rely on pointing to an extreme minority of gay men for your support, because I bet that I can find a whole lot more than you who loathe gay conversion therapy. Again, the term for what you're doing is "tokenism". Also would be interested in your source for "20% of gays support Trump".

So, other than the cherry-picked trio, does the rest of the actual LGBTQ Republicans' say count? The Log Cabin Republicans took out an ad rightfully complaining that the 2016 RNC Platform was "the most anti-LGBT platform in the party’s 162-year history."

And if you're curious, the LCR later refused to endorse Trump/Pence 2016.

About bloody time they stood up for themselves.. Only took about a quarter century.

Of course right after voting to not endorse Trump they praised him as being the most LBGTQ friendly candidate in history. No idea how they manage to parse that cognitive dissonance.

538 has Clinton ahead in Ohio, giving her a 60% chance of victory. That being said, she can lose every state closer than Pennsylvania, where they give her an 87% chance and polls show her up a minimum of 5 points, and she would still win electoral college victory. Pennsylvania is stronger for Clinton than Texas is for Trump.

Fukishima survived the earthquake and had its failsafes activating properly. It did not survive the Tsunami, which took out backup power. Most of the world doesn't have to deal with those.

Cottonmouth wasn't cartoonish enough, while Diamondback was enjoyably so. Shades was kind of dull.

We must agree to disagree. Diamondback was a huge letdown for me, and a huge part of that was his cartoonish insanity.

Sat down and watch the series this week.

Overall I liked it. I think JJ was much better constructed, but this was better than either season of DD.

It did suffer from the same problem as DD though, the main character was the weakest one in the series. The "strong, silent type" is very cliched and kind of stale. It's hard to pull of well or interestingly these days, it can be done, but there are big hurdles to overcome. When Luke was passionate and vocal, the character was interesting. His brooding silence though was boring and dull.

Also, the show engaged in a rhetorical argument against it's own existence several times and that annoys the crap out of me. The main character wants to just leave and doesn't see why he should be involved. If he doesn't care about the story, it starts to make me wonder why I should care.

I did appreciate that they didn't do a lot of drawn out action sequences. Especially in the first half of the season when there's little to no tension in the scenes. Short and sweet scenes to the point.

Missick and Rossi were both very fun to watch as Det. Knight and Shades respectively. Knight was predictable within the genre, but had enough twists and depths to keep her interesting and engaging. Shades was the most interesting villain to watch IMO, seemed like he actually wanted to survive and thrive. The actor did a good job of adding layers to his emotions that really indicated that the wheels were turning inside his head.

I thought the references to current events in the real world were a nice touch.

I really loved the way Shades didn't just want to survive and thrive, but he wanted those around him to as well. He actually cared about the other villains.

GreyWolfLord wrote:

Kirth Gersen wrote:

It seems to me the Tea Party and the Sanders/OWS people actually have a lot in common on some issues; the party would be looking to capitalize on that. Republicans - 1/3 of the voters + the independents/superleft Democrats = possible win, if you sold it well.

I'd say the Tea Party and OWS do, not so certain about Sanders supporters.

I see the same thing in many ways. The both see that there is a lack of well paying jobs for those who are not upper middle class to upper class.

They both want to have meaningful wages and jobs BACK in the US rather than in other nations.

They both want the Wall Street Types to keep their companies (and hence jobs) in the US rather than exporting them to other nations and manufacturing things there.

They both think the upper echelons are corrupt.

I was surprised that we didn't see a strange alliance between the two when the OWS movement was particularly large and the cops were trying to disband them.

Ironically, instead, we saw a lot of the Tea Party encouraging the cops...rather than seeing that there was a LOT in common between the two.

I'm not surprised at all. As I said above, that anger at corporate elites is the only thing the Tea Party and OWS have in common. And in the Tea Party, it's largely been co-opted by anger at government.

The solutions they want are vastly different. OWS was for government support in many cases, safety net, WS regulation and breakup, housing market, etc. TP is against all that - wants the government out, let the banks fail etc.

And of course the Tea Party is largely rural and white, while OWS is urban and colored. Two different worlds. Anger driven by many of the same sources, but completely different responses.

I think if early Tea Party met OWS they would have gotten along decently well. There was definitely a point before the crazy dominated the tea party that they could have at least realized they could be friends. A lot of people I know who supported the Tea Party early and fled also supported OWS.

Caineach wrote:

Kirth Gersen wrote:

It surprises me there isn't a "Hard Work Party." They could tap into the bootstrap myth but appeal to a broader base. They'd have a platform that looked something like this:

Job creation

Reduce "entitlement" programs

Eliminate large corporate subsidies & loopholes; tax breaks for small businesses only

Less overseas adventurism to focus on internal infrastructure

Non-career politicians claiming to present "common-sense" bills that "make sense" as opposed to making back-room political deals with other "insiders."

Renewable energy recast as job creation for American know-how, sidestepping the whole anthropogenic climate change vs. denialist issue.

Hot-button religious topics like abortion and evolution/creationism left to lower courts as a means of conspicuously avoiding having a stance.

Claims of being in favor of "small government"

You could tap into the disaffected jobless base that Trump is relying on, but without the overt racism. You'd also appeal to the Sanders people/OWS contingent.

Isn't this pretty much the Libertarian party minus the crazy?

Not really, no. The whole point of the Libertarian party is that the government should have no role in anything. For example, the government should not be in the business of "job creation" generally, and specifically shouldn't be in the business of selecting sectors (such as renewable energy or "small businesses"). The government should not be leaving hot-button issues like abortion alone; it should instead make it clear that the government at any level has no business whatsoever restricting abortion, or use of heroin, or personal possession and use of antitank artillery, et cetera.

Even bills that "make sense" are usually overstepping their bounds.

Like I said, minus the crazy. Most self-identified Libertarians I know take it no where near the extreme you are describing.

It surprises me there isn't a "Hard Work Party." They could tap into the bootstrap myth but appeal to a broader base. They'd have a platform that looked something like this:

Job creation

Reduce "entitlement" programs

Eliminate large corporate subsidies & loopholes; tax breaks for small businesses only

Less overseas adventurism to focus on internal infrastructure

Non-career politicians claiming to present "common-sense" bills that "make sense" as opposed to making back-room political deals with other "insiders."

Renewable energy recast as job creation for American know-how, sidestepping the whole anthropogenic climate change vs. denialist issue.

Hot-button religious topics like abortion and evolution/creationism left to lower courts as a means of conspicuously avoiding having a stance.

Claims of being in favor of "small government"

You could tap into the disaffected jobless base that Trump is relying on, but without the overt racism. You'd also appeal to the Sanders people/OWS contingent.

Isn't this pretty much the Libertarian party minus the crazy?

Guy Humual wrote:

You shouldn't assume that if Nader hadn't been in the race that those votes would have gone to Gore, it seems intuitive, but when people were polled on just Bore Gore and Bush, Bush won. Nader might have stolen more votes from Bush.

Here's the problem with that assumption. Republicans to a man HATED Nader. They still do. They even did when they were funneling campaign money to him. If you took a position survey on the bulk of Nader's supporters, you'd find that their positions on Nader's key issue all sided with Democratic candidates, on matter such as environment, election reform, consumer protection, and corporate accountability. They used Nader as a tool to hurt the Democrats just as they used all the other tools in their arsenal, being smart enough to take all the advantages they could muster.

It'd be absurd to claim that Nader's votes had a neutral effect on the total Bush vs. Gore tally.

I voted for Nader on both elections that he ran in, the safe blue state of New Jersey which went for Gore in 2000. I probably would not have done so if I was voting in Florida. And Nader should have pulled back from that state, and concentrated on getting his 15 percent from elsewhere. (in the end he only got 3 percent of the total vote.)

Pretty much everything I have seen showed Nader pulling roughly evenly from Bush than from Gore.