Block it? Limpet.

#7 | Posted by Doc_Sarvis

Why not Phuket?

To what degree do you think the Iranian leadership's religious belief that Allah is on their side contributes to their determination?
#76

I think leadership's determination is based on their own goals to gain, maintain, and expand power. I think leadership's calling upon religious authority is a justification to their own people. Not limited to Iranian leadership, ours does the same.

#72 | Posted by truthhurts

- the problem is OUR leaders have no clue what they are doing. THEY do not understand Iran's perspective, not because Iran's worldview is not understandable from a western perspective, it is due to a lack of empathy and willful ignorance of the magat leadership.

That's essentially what I was trying to say, perhaps I didn't state it effectively. Our leadership seems to think we can simply use escalating force to cow Iran into capitulation. Short of complete annihilation that is just not going to work. We're not destroying anything they can't rebuild, including the population in another generation. They have no reason to trust any statements or agreements coming from this administration. Why would they commit to any long-term agreements with an untrustworthy negotiator, who will be out of office or dead in another couple of years? And the unintended (to us) consequence of this conflict is the demonstration to the world of Iran's ability to control the Strait of Hormuz. Iran is an old civilization, they take the long view on their relationship to the rest of the world. They can wait the Trump admin out and be stronger in the end.

As this conflict drags on with eye-rolling waffling updates as to its success, I'm reminded of the Powell Doctrine which got us into and successfully out of 2 military actions in Panama and Kuwait/Iraq. Got us off to a decent start in Afghanistan until that went off the rails. Say what you will about how he ended his career for GWB, Powell's doctrine was designed specifically to avoid becoming embroiled in military quagmires, using the lessons of Vietnam and even the USSR's experiences with Afghanistan.
1-Is a vital national security interest threatened? - Maybe, several reasons have been given for beginning this conflict. Difficult to assess the truth from this administration.
2-Do we have a clear attainable objective? - Unknown - again, several objectives have been stated since the conflict began. Also again, difficult to assess the truth.
3-Have the risks and costs been fully and frankly analyzed? Clearly not
4-Have all other non-violent policy means been fully exhausted? Clearly not
5-Is there a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglement? Clearly not
6-Have the consequences of our action been fully considered? Clearly not
7-Is the action supported by the American people? Clearly not
8-Do we have genuine broad international support? Clearly not

Just for the hell of it, I'll answer Bill's questions to the best of my knowledge.
Does Iran have a superior military, or are its leaders simply smarter than ours? Their military is clearly not superior in strength and capability. Their leaders are certainly making ours look ridiculous.
Or is it something else? See the Powell Doctrine, above. This conflict was clearly entered into with no clear plan of objectives, no understanding of the potential consequences, no substantive risk/benefit analysis, no significant support, and clearly no effective exit strategy.
Is the US politically incapable of forcing Iran to yield? Yes. We're making the same mistakes we made in Afghanistan and Iraq-thinking we can predict or influence the behavior of people whose worldview we simply don't understand.
Is the rest of the world simply going to have to accept Iran's control over shipping through the Strait of Hormuz? Yes. We've given them the platform to demonstrate that control to the world. It's a huge advantage to Iran, why would they give it up?

Envy is not a virtue.

#31

Nor is the abject stupidity to continue not only supporting, but worshipping the lifelong conman who is rolling in the money he has fleeced from all of you useful idiots.

His net worth has grown about $3 billion since first taking office in 2016. Dipped a bit while he was out of office but rocketed right back up in 2025-2026. It's nearly tripled in the last two years.

Criminals don't want to be tracked.

#3

Certainly not. But it doesn't mean the rest of us should be tracked either. I'm not giving the government carte blanche to my data because they don't want to do the work to obtain sufficient probable cause for a warrant.

Um, we did get migrants from Norway. In the mid-1800's Norwegians and Swedes immigrated to the U.S. in droves, as did Irish, and Scots, following the potato famine. The Norwegians and Swedes settled in the upper midwest, areas very similar in climate to what they were used to and low in population, with lots of available land for farming. The Finns followed later and targeted the Great Lakes region - mining, logging, and water transportation. Those who remained in Sweden, Norway, and Finland turned those three countries into some of the most successful and happiest places to live in the world. Why the hell would they want to immigrate here now? If she would retrieve her head from the far-right's collective ass, Megyn is smart enough to answer this question herself, and even ask why we can't be more like those countries.

Universal coverage is such a massive undertaking that only 38 of the top 39 nations have mastered it.

#23 | Posted by Nixon

And how many of those 38 nations have a massive insurance industry generating $1,700,000,000,000 in annual revenue, netting $71,000,000,000 in annual profit, and spending $180,000,000 per year on federal lobbying? Or religious groups controlling nearly a quarter of the nation's medical facilities? The insurance industry's annual revenue, for comparison purposes, is about the size the annual budget deficit.

#117 | Posted by dutch46

In which case Charon will refuse the fare and we'll have another bloated rotten corpse stinking up the reflecting pool. I wonder if even his family wants anything to do with his carcass once he's no longer of use or benefit to them.

Effete;

He's translating your posts into Russian. For example, Sitz's 86 is your 85, in Russian.

Muscovy ducks, despite the name, are native to the America's. More Central and South America, but they are native to southern North America as well, mostly Mexico and south Texas. They're non-migratory, so they do cause problems when transplanted to northern and eastern U.S. ecosystems because they stay all year. They're popular with private ponds because they look cool and, again, don't fly away for the winter. USFWS prohibits release of Muscovy ducks into the wild outside their native range.

The photos of ducks in the reflecting pool that I've seen, live or dead, look like mallards. Doesn't mean there aren't any Muscovy's, they're pretty distinctive in color and head shape so should stand out.

"God is a sound people make when they're too tired to think anymore."
--Edward Abbey

#215

There's a quote I haven't seen before. Thank you, I'll begin using it regularly.

It must have been a terrorist act by AlgaeFa

#8 | Posted by Hughmass

My VA doctor told me she is part of a preliminary study of veterans with multiple deployments, specifically who've received multiple gamma globulin shots, and any correlation with lessened COVID incidence. Sounded interesting. I've had the GG twice, and either never caught COVID or was asymptomatic. Granted I get the vaccine every time I'm due, but I also work in an occupation where I'm in direct contact with a lot of people, even during the height of COVID. Be interesting if that awful peanut butter shot provided an extended immune system boost.

#35 | Posted by visitor_
Flag: Has no idea how solar works and is just spouting BS.
FLAG: Shot his mouth off without thinking

Solar is also more efficient when it is cold because there is less voltage drop in colder temperatures than in hotter ones. This is due to the fact that as temperatures drop, so does the resistance of the wire and as a result more power can be transmitted.

Here are a few sources of facts you can use instead of parroting right-wing talking points.

I worked straight nights for about 10 years. Worked out pretty well when my kids were little. Usual shift was 10p-6a. Got home in the morning and saw them for a little bit before they went off to school, napped during the day, got up in the afternoon and spent time with them after school, had dinner together and I took another nap before going to work. Coached soccer, little league, youth football, and was their Cub and Boy Scout leader. Worked out pretty well. I preferred the permanent overnight schedule to rotating shifts, that just tore me up physically and mentally.

#28 | Posted by sitzkrieg

Pretty sure that rifle is T.R.'s Holland & Holland double in .500/450 Nitro Express, nicknamed the Big Stick, which was a premier elephant gun at that time. Fired a 480gr bullet at about 4200 fps, just over 5,000 ft/lb of energy. He also carried a 1895 Winchester in .405 and a Springfield .30-03 on that hunt. He preferred the .405 for large and dangerous game, like lions and cape buffalo, but for elephants and rhinos used the H&H. Apparently inspired by Karamojo Bell, a professional hunter who took over 1,000 elephants with small-bores, primarily a .275 Rigby (7x57 Mauser), T.R. took at least one elephant with the .30-03. You can read about the expedition in T.R.'s book, African Game Trails. It's been reprinted many times and is still commercially available.

#17

"It was a complete obliteration," Trump said of the Saturday strike in Iran. Trump, flanked by NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, said that Iran's nuclear ambitions were set back "decades."

"I don't think they'll ever do it again. ... I think they've had it," Trump said. "I mean, they just went through hell. I think they've had it. The last thing they want to do is enrich.

#10

Brent crude was over $100 per barrel for March and April. $103 average for March, $117 average for April.

Who's worried about 36% interest rates on revolving debt equal to half your annual income? Trump's gonna cut medical costs by 2,000%. Gas will be under $2. Eggs will be practically free. Trump just ran the national debt up higher than our GDP, do you think these people give a rat's @$$ about credit card debt? This ridiculous war is driving up prices globally, wrecking the supply chains that have only recently recovered from COVID, and pissing off every other country. But former economics professor Hassett's only take is "Yay, they're buying everything on credit!" Only the best and the brightest...

I'll let you know how many doxxed ICE agents are attacked or killed because of this.
not that you'll give a rats ---- but because it will prove my point.

#7 | Posted by shrimptacodan

I was a law enforcement officer for 28 years, including 16 with the U.S. Border Patrol on the Mexican Border. 5 of those commanding the Tucson Sector Narcotics Interdiction Team from 2000-2005 if you're familiar with any of the events of that time frame. I've had death threats. I've been shot at, and been hit. Never did I wear a mask to hide my identity. Nor did anyone else I worked with. The bad guys wear masks, not the good guys. When the cops start hiding themselves from who they're policing they lose their moral and ethical standing, which is what separates them from the dirtbags. This is what's become a problem in American policing, is this change to an Us vs. Them mentality. Do cops need to take reasonable actions to protect themselves from credible threats? Of course they do. Do they need to look at every man, woman, and child as a deadly force encounter? That's beyond stupid.

Judge Alito: Roe v. Wade is an important precedent of the Supreme Court. It was decided in
1973, so it has been on the books for a long time. It has been challenged on a number of
occasions, and I discussed those yesterday, and the Supreme Court has reaffirmed the decision,
sometimes on the merits, sometimes in Casey based on stare decisis, and I think that when a
decision is challenged and it is reaffirmed that strengthens its value as stare decisis for at least
two reasons.
Judge Thomas: Senator, I think that the Supreme Court has made clear that the issue of marital
privacy is protected, that the State cannot infringe on that without a compelling interest, and the
Supreme Court, of course, in the case of Roe v. Wade has found an interest in the woman's right
to"as a fundamental interest a woman's right to terminate a pregnancy.
Judge Gorsuch: Senator, again, I would tell you that Roe v. Wade, decided in 1973, is a precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court. It has been reaffirmed. The reliance interest considerations are important there, and all of the other factors that go into analyzing precedent have to be considered. It is a precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court. It was reaffirmed in Casey in 1992 and in several other cases. So a good judge will consider it as precedent of the U.S. Supreme Court worthy as treatment of precedent like any other.
Judge Kavanaugh: Senator, I said that it is settled as a precedent of the Supreme Court, entitled the respect under principles of stare decisis. And one of the important things to keep in mind about Roe v. Wade is that it has been reaffirmed many times over the past 45 years, as you know, and most prominently, most importantly, reaffirmed in Planned Parenthood v. Casey in 1992.
Judge Coney Barrett: I will follow the law of stare decisis, applying it as the court is articulating it, applying all the factors, reliance, workability, being undermined by later facts in law, just all the standard factors. And I promise to do that for any issue that comes up, abortion or anything else. I'll follow the law.

The Supreme Court stopped being a respected institution bringing solemnity, dignity, and legitimacy to the government when over half the sitting justices were revealed to be just another pack of lying, conniving, grifting political players.

@#4

"He can't tell the difference between truth and falsehood," said John Bolton... "A lie is knowing something is not true and saying it anyway. For Trump, it's sort of what he wants it to be, and he just makes up the rest."

The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines the term as to "refuse to serve (a customer)", or to "get rid of" or "throw out" someone or something. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) says it may be used as a noun or verb. As a noun, "In restaurants and bars, an expression indicating that the supply of an item is exhausted, or that a customer is not to be served; also, a customer to be refused service. Also transferred." As a transitive verb derived from the noun, it means "to eject or debar (a person) from premises; to reject or abandon". The OED gives examples of usage from 1933 to 1981; for example, in the 1972 film The Candidate, a media adviser says to Robert Redford's character, "OK, now, for starters, we got to cut your hair and eighty-six the sideburns".

86 47. Is anyone making T-shirts and hats yet?

#62

We have by far the greatest military spending in the world. Countries 2 through 10 combined barely add up to ours. But Iran, who doesn't even crack the top ten, has us stymied. Is it the amount of available force, or the wisdom of where, when, and how to use it?