Octopus Overlords

malchior wrote: Fri Sep 17, 2021 8:09 pm

Holman wrote: Fri Sep 17, 2021 5:16 pm It also could be a good long term move. We seem to be slowly backing away from the old NATO alliance and possibly cozying up with the Japanese, India, Australia, and UK to confront China.

I think this might actually turn out to be pretty savvy. My understanding is that without oil, Russia has no real economy, and will pretty quickly be in trouble. It feels like we're near a tipping point where the world has to move away from all fossil fuels pretty quickly, pushing the Chinese ascendancy more to the forefront. I've also begun wondering about the next president, and what Biden thinks his odds are of getting another 4 years. If the calculus is that it won't be him (Kamala, or whoever), then he can make all the unpopular choices and take the hit, leaving someone else the possibility of having 8 years with those decisions as legacy policy.

stessier wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 9:57 am Wasn't sure where this should go - has anyone read Peril from Bob Woodward? I kind of feel a duty to read it - hoping the library has a copy.

El Guapo wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 10:18 am

stessier wrote: Wed Sep 22, 2021 9:57 am Wasn't sure where this should go - has anyone read Peril from Bob Woodward? I kind of feel a duty to read it - hoping the library has a copy.

I don't know if I'm going to read it. Woodward's books are in many ways a warning about the perils of access journalism - he'll often just let bad people tell stories that flatter them without much context or pushback.

https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/14 ... 14?lang=en

dbt1949 wrote: Wed Sep 29, 2021 8:01 am I saw this video from India where some protestor decided to run at police waving a large stick around and the police gunned him down. After shooting him they ran over to him and started kicking and beating his body. This photographer got caught up in it all and ran over and started kicking and beating the dead body too.
Quite a disturbing video.
This has caught major news now and I was thinking...............as bad as these cops were (not to mention the photographer) what was this protestor thinking? "I'm going to run at those armed police and wave my stick around and pretend like I'm going to beat them. Yes, this will work out great!"
I see this kind of stupidity all the time in the news. The protestors can get away with it here in the West but those countries in the East and Africa don't put up with that kind of thing too well.
They might as well be wearing signs that say "Please shoot me. I'm stupid." And they do.
By the way the photographer was arrested later on. Not at the time tho.
Anyrate, my thoughts for this morning.

El Guapo wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 10:00 am https://twitter.com/SpecialPuppy1/statu ... 5559007235

This is fascinating to me - such an enormous swing. Is it just that Trump appealed to their 'whiteness' so much more directly than Romney or other prior Republicans? It's not like the GOP of 2012 was that much different in terms of policies.

El Guapo wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 10:00 am https://twitter.com/SpecialPuppy1/statu ... 5559007235

This is fascinating to me - such an enormous swing. Is it just that Trump appealed to their 'whiteness' so much more directly than Romney or other prior Republicans? It's not like the GOP of 2012 was that much different in terms of policies.

Skinypupy wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 12:10 pm
As soon as Trump came along with his faux-macho, faux-rich, faux-everyman act, they immediately jumped on board. Romney was completely unable to tap into that.

Skinypupy wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 12:10 pm This seems like more of an indicator of how much they disliked Romney.

As soon as Trump came along with his faux-macho, faux-rich, faux-everyman act, they immediately jumped on board. Romney was completely unable to tap into that.

LordMortis wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:30 pm

Skinypupy wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 12:10 pm This seems like more of an indicator of how much they disliked Romney.

As soon as Trump came along with his faux-macho, faux-rich, faux-everyman act, they immediately jumped on board. Romney was completely unable to tap into that.

I didn't see that. I just saw him appealing to angry white, we're losing our culture and our nation to otherness. Romney didn't try and McCain actively discouraged this. McCain (and Palin and the Tea Party) was the real clue to the rise of Trumpism. One that I could hear coming like a train but completely underestimated how big and strong it was.

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:34 pm McCain? How so?

LordMortis wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:40 pm

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:34 pm McCain? How so?

He had multiple large televised appearances where hateful WASPish rants were spouted and he'd stop and try to discourage seeing otherness in Americans. He actively stated many time the he Obama both loved the US but just had different visions towards what makes the US great and what steering to success looked like.

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:44 pm

LordMortis wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:40 pm

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:34 pm McCain? How so?

He had multiple large televised appearances where hateful WASPish rants were spouted and he'd stop and try to discourage seeing otherness in Americans. He actively stated many time the he Obama both loved the US but just had different visions towards what makes the US great and what steering to success looked like.

Oh, that's what confused me. When you mentioned McCain being the clue, I guess I read that as "partly to blame" as opposed to his actively trying to shush the nastier elements that showed up to his rallies (which is how I was thinking of him in this particular context).

Defiant wrote: Thu Sep 30, 2021 1:58 pm One thing McCain *did* do, for which he does get blame, is putting Palin on the ballot.

malchior wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:43 pm The AT&T mask reveal scene earlier today was pretty insane.

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 9:29 am

malchior wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:43 pm The AT&T mask reveal scene earlier today was pretty insane.

??

ImLawBoy wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 9:57 am Cross-posting from the other thread:

I have a feeling my thoughts on this will be disregarded as blindly supporting my employer,

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:26 am Also, do we not have a "poke" emoji for Clem Fandango's sake?!?

ImLawBoy wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:42 am That's all fair. For what it's worth, I certainly don't agree with everything AT&T does or positions we take. For a variety of reasons, when I'm in that position I usually just don't comment on it. (Note that this doesn't mean I disagree with AT&T on any related topic where I don't post - sometimes I'm just not interested in contributing.) I don't know where this particular issue is going to end up, and there may be a time where I follow through with my threats not to discuss it anymore, but at this point it seems to me that some folks are jumping to worst case scenario judgments when the case against AT&T has some rather large (IMO) holes and not all facts are out. That said, I would expect people to view my comments with the knowledge that I work for AT&T and am likely to have bias, both conscious and unconscious.

Isgrimnur wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:44 am

Carpet_pissr wrote: Thu Oct 07, 2021 11:26 am Also, do we not have a "poke" emoji for Clem Fandango's sake?!?

Page 9

some people have been celebrating christopher columbus day all year by spreading disease

Smoove_B wrote: Mon Oct 11, 2021 2:58 pm I'm assuming Blue Lives Matter flags will be going up near the statue before year's end and after the election, I'm fully expecting the overall tone to get much, much worse as we head into 2022.