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I admire your persistence but I don't think it'll pay off. That Newsweek article about Russia not doing all it can to destroy Ukraine is true: Russia is not in the process of nuking Ukraine, for example, nor has it committed to wholesale Dresden-style bombing. However, given what happened in Bucha and the fact that Putin gave awards / medals to precisely those troops responsible for the Bucha atrocities makes this point moot. Russia's policy is rape, pillage and destruction, these things will be awarded and there is no regard or respect for anything. Russian soldiers, with their faces covered, are gang-raping Ukrainian girls and women and forcing their families and relatives to witness it. This is what is happening right now, and this same country is committing airspace violation crimes against sovereign countries pursuing their own defensive interests, insisting that other countries' business is also its own business. This same country has established phone numbers and email addresses(*) in some of its embassies and encouraged its citizens to report commentary and behaviour that can be regarded as antagonistic to Russia's interests, which, to anyone who has looked at very recent history, looks like building ground for future military operations in ostensibly hostile countries. This same country is currently reporting on my country in a manner which would look amusing in a comedy show but which looks unbelievably stupid and childish in reality. This same country started a war, and once this action received condemnation, it went on and labelled dozens of countries as hostile to Russia, which has to be some kind of record in being both stupid and puerile. Calling all this pure and absolute madness is, in my view, completely justified, not in a mental health sense but in the sense where actions cruel enough or out of proportion enough are generally described as madness. Russia's comments on Jews, Swedish nazis etc. also qualify as madness in this sense. And many of these comments don't come from any old Russian, they come from on high, from people like Lavrov. The claim that Russia is not going all in is true. But when you go to Bucha and see someone who has been both raped and murdered, you don't say "Well at least the perpetrator didn't jump up and down on her ribcage, as it's perfectly intact", even if it is true. (*) This was not an intelligent move. According to the reports I have read, these email addresses received more input than they could handle. Well, I suppose anyone should have seen that, and I find it hard to believe that anyone could disagree.

Yes definitely one of the better options. And Isreal has now lifted its earlier block on Baltic states and other NATO states transferring Israeli military hardware to Ukraine, which is what prompted the latest crazy out of Lavrov that Israel was helping neo-nazis in Ukraine. I'm still holding out hope that the US will transfer Patriot to Ukraine. It's been the Administration's pattern thus far to initially wring their hands and whine about something but then eventually cave to pressure and change their mind.

Mamie are you sure the Ukrainians are not using black magic, shouldnt we wait for confirmation before we proceed

Also, back to speaking about Russia getting insane... Question to everyone... If official Russian government media mouthpieces are spreading information like this, how can you consider them not completely out of touch with reality, and how would you negotiate with these people?

That's not irrelevant, just inconvenient for your "Russia is not aggressor here" stance. Also, while you're at Minsk docs, do they include booting out Moscow puppet "governments" along with their little green men out of of "disputed territories"? Maybe it would be good to stop flipping arguments like pancakes so that they always land in a way that supports your opinion? Because I vaguely remember someone regularly whatabouting the US getting involved in affairs that are not exactly geopolitical. Also, EU's territorial integrity is not the same as France and Germany's territorial integrity. Where did I say that you said there is no war? Stop extrapolating. Better yet, stop getting all huffy when I do the same to you. Well then how fortunate it is that internet forums do not make important decisions in foreign politics, don't you think? I'm sure that people who do are pragmatic enough and know better than use suchlike rhetoric in negotiations; meanwhile, on our here niche internet forum I am going to insult the poor man's Hitler and his Darkspawn as much as I please. 🖕 Also, it's such a convenient thing to fuse two rather different statements, namely "Russia never stopped being the Soviet Union and always aimed to take over" with "the reason for this is that they are stupid and insane", because then whenever someone tries to point out signs of revanchistic Sovietistan nostalgia rising as soon as tiny dictator plopped its scrawny arse on the metaphorical throne, you can smugly dismiss everything by countering that second part about "stupid/insane", which is considerably easier to do, yes I know I am extrapolating. No it isn't, there is this thing called "stalling", also, it's always useful to try and sniff out your enemy's plans, ideas etc. even if you are not planning to seriously negotiate, and I'm not singling out Russia here, both sides are doing that or at least they should. Anyway, scuttlebutt is that Mordor is planning "referendums" in "contested territories" and Kherson in mid-May so lets wait and see how that ends, shall we. No argument here? Flattering as it is for you to say that denizens of assorted internet hangouts such as reddit or this very forum have the power to infect decision-making people with exercises in frivolous name-calling, I'm afraid you are slightly overestimating their influence.

German federal states do not have a belligerent, aggressive, militarily stronger neighbour trying to use them as a foothold to further mess with Germany. And I have a suspicion that special protected status for Basque, I suppose, language comes from either Spain or some sort of agreement between Catalonia and Spain and not from, say, France with an implication of "Or else!" Because there are certain other members of NATO that might sway the alliance towards standing up to the bully? No, it's just me stating that war, in fact, was started. And now I do not understand where were you going with this: Because sense or no sense, war is happening. Tanks are rolling, people are dying. It's there. And again, I do not get your point here. "See, Poutine isn't as comic book villain levels evil as he could be?" ...okay?

The fire traps in the fire naga temple do not disappear after they are triggered and can be triggered repeatedly. If you send Ishiza to fly over the traps and bait the enemy into them, they will kill themselves upon the traps.

Even in a sorta post-apocalypse where most stay underground, there are rubber duckies in random surface ponds, because of course there are.

I'll keep that in mind. One of the worst experiences I've had was getting into a show then running out of subs and quitting because the dubs I could find was such low quality in terms of both audio and visual. Excuse you, I'm bringing freedom and democracy to those licensed goods.

If it at all possible, try to make sure whatever you watch comes from the Japanese region DVD - apparently, the non-Japanese ones have a problem with crushed blacks that makes it hard to see what's going on in certain scenes, and not in a good way.

I guess I'm lucky in that I look less for genre (as much as shoujo can be considered a drama, because stuff made for teen and pre-teen girls is a pretty big grouping) and more for an interesting experience when I watch stuff. Oh, and a general distaste for cgi animation because it usually looks like ****. I'm going to try Texhnolyze out for sure, but I'm having trouble finding it.

Details of the current versions are of course classified but the US feels comfortable it remains superior to Russia's S-400 and even S-500 systems. The main issues in the context of this war are that (a) it has long range, enough to target Russian aircraft well within Russian airspace, and (b) is reasonably resistent to Russian jamming.

Yeah this is the true goal of Russia's strategy and policy in Europe: to try and push the US out of Europe. Everything else is merely an extension of this, including this war. Putin's powerplays in the months before his invasion were all about trying to drive a wedge between Europe and the US, and only when all of that failed did he feel forced to carry out his invasion because the only other alternative was to look foolish and weak and to lose face. What Putin truly hoped for with his invasion threat was to have Europe break from the US and cut some sort of separate deal with him that left out the US and aligned Europe with Russia, even if only symbolically at first. And given the extensive pro-Russia ties that already existed between Germany and Russia (and ditto for Italy), Macron's ego-fueled desire to be viewed as some great European statesman, and Britain--the only major European power refusing to play footsie with Russia--now out of the EU and politically isolated in Europe, Putin can't be blamed for believing the time was finally right to make his powerplay to push the US out of Europe. The US presence in Europe is the only real obstacle to Russia (in its perception) dominating Europe. And so, if not for the US presence in Europe, even Ukraine wouldn't matter to Russia (other than in the whole cultural and sociological sphere of "the Ukrainians are not their own separate people from Russians" nonsense).

There's been, for years, a libertarian part of the Republican party that seem to want to demonize any federal or state government agency (Post office, schools), presumably in the hope that they can completely privatize these functions so that they are done by magical loving corporations who will lovingly provide loving services to all people regardless of financial bottom lines and costs out of the kindness of their heart and everything will be flowers and love.

It's in Russia's interest to separate the US from the other members of NATO, so there is probably an element of psyops in the communications.

Hmm, if the Russian media is really talking about black magic, then it appears to have gone back to the middle ages, or something. Does it expect people inside Russia to take this stuff seriously? Well, of course the answer must be "Yes". 😬

FYI, here's another example of Russia's barking-mad rhetoric: Maria Zakharova (so not just any Russian but a proper spokeswoman from on high) once again warns Sweden and Finland against joining NATO. Her claims are untrue to a hilarious extent, as she proposes that this is all a US / Brussels ploy that these two poor countries are falling for, not decisions made by these two countries themselves. This, incidentally, is one reason why negotiations appear almost entirely futile now: the lies(*) are so outrageous that there is no shared reality. https://tass.com/world/1440259 (*) "We have not attacked Ukraine", etc.

In Putin's case, the potential mental problems caused by the isolation are exacerbated by the fact that given the kind of leader he is and the kind of country he's leading, he has every real reason to be apprehensive to the point of being paranoid (about other people, about food, etc.). Over two years of almost total isolation in an apprehensive state of mind won't do anyone any good. Putin's overlong reign is also unlikely to have done him any good. There are many political reasons why term limits are a good thing, as are limits on power. But there are also psychological reasons. Putin has had very few limits and an overlong tenure, which is a bad combination in all sorts of ways. However, from this it doesn't necessarily follow that he has become seriously unhinged. This would have to be determined by more direct means, and that is obviously not going to be very probable. This is almost certainly the reason why the US, for instance, has refrained from making official statements about his state of mind (in a medical sense). Also, statements such as that wouldn't do any good, even if they were based on proper medical consultation.

Yes you are correct, there is a lot of Swamp and as I've mentioned, Russian are making best advancements around this area, but as I've said with situation around Kharkiv, it might help with disrupting at least some of the Russian opperation. And it has already happened after Ukraine seized back Staryi Saltiv. Also there are already emerging reports, that killing off general Semionov at Izyum might have sown some chaos into command line of the Russian forces at the area of Izyum. And almost all of the gains in Kharkiv area have taken place after the alleged general's demise as well. Yesterday report from ISW: Ukrainian forces continued to threaten Russian ground lines of communication to Izyum along the E40 highway, destroying a Russian supply convoy in Vesele on May 3. Answer to both of you, there are rumours about Israel willing to offer Ukraine their Iron Dome, especially now after Lavrov went full anti-semitic. I have absolutely no clue how that might be plausible, so I am just posting it here as one of the theoretical options here. Two general's deaths is being disputed now, as they allegedly shown themselves on Russian TV after the alleged hit. But knowing Russian propaganda, this might be a prerecorded footage to deny Ukrainian claims. And of course this could be also Ukrainian propaganda to boost little bit their soldier's morale... And There are also two unnamed generals, who allegedly died during bombing of command outpost in Kherson area, with pretty high number of lower ranking officers dead as well. This attack has not yet been verified by independent parties though. So the number of dead generals is currently between 8-12. Putin was not in the previous 20 years hidden without contact to other people. Since the start of COVID, he spent almost entire 2 and half years completely isolated with very few people able to contact him. Even the strongest people might get mental health problems when isolated for such a prolonged time. Also speaking about the Russian negotiations, well, their tactics since Syria is to pretend, that they want to negotiate with you, just to divert your attention to somewhere else, so they can stab you in the back at the first possible moment. But it looks like, that the West have learned hard lesson from Syria. Any negotiating efforts from Russia could not be taken seriously. Especially with all the gas and ores around Crimea and Donbas... Negotiations is just another means of waging their war. In Syria Russia offered deescalation in one of four areas of control in Syria, for the start of "negotiations" and while west was busy and happy about that one area, Russia snatched three others and obliterated them. And in the meanwhile, they were having "negotiations" with UN as well, which ended up with UN not having any significant reaction to Russian onslaught of civilians and civil infrastructure. The excerpt from one of many articles on how Russia is misusing "negotiations" to deceive the other side: "Negotiate As If There Were No War and Bomb As If There Were No Negotiations In 2015 Russia decided to take advantage of the vacuum left by Western actors and engaged in Syria on three levels simultaneously: militarily, diplomatically and politically. One of the common features of the wars in Syria and Ukraine is the Russian strategy of negotiating as if there were no war and bombing as if there were no negotiations. On all three levels, Russians have outdone their Western counterparts. Highly capable Russian diplomats have upheld political dialogue and, at the same time, kept the military option open. Both reinforced each other. Sitting at the table opens options in case they are needed. During the talks a peaceful narrative could be fed to the media, reducing international outrage and allowing a regrouping of forces." Full article: https://blogs.prio.org/2022/05/putins-blood-trail-from-syria-to-the-ukraine-western-failures-in-the-face-of-power-play-propaganda-and-de-humanization/ Note, that the same strategy was deployed during Phase 1 of Russian invasion of Ukraine, but thankfully, they failed this time to spark the international outrage against bad west trying to sabotage the peace talks...

Out of twenty Russian generals who initially took part in the war, ten have now died. Not entirely certain given that one side has an interest in skewing the numbers one way and the other the other, but that appears to be approximately the size of it. Humiliating, in any case, like that fallen match that produced that fire on Moskva.

two quick points. first, our problem with the J. alito opinion is the history & tradition approach taken. a genuine textualist approach considers history but only in the context o' revealing the plain meaning o' the words o' legislation or laws as written at the time they were authored. a history and tradition analysis to legitimize conservative favoured substantive due process claims is therefore suspect from a textualist pov. which history means more anyways? previous to roe, there were indeed considerable history which would show a tendency to criminalize abortion. however, the s'posed justification for roe itself were the changing values o' american society as a whole which had shifted in favour o' a recognition o' a woman's right to self determination in matters o' medical treatments. since roe, the weight o' traditions has clear shifted even further such that today most polls show support o' some kinda abortion protection anywhere between seventy and eighty percent in favour o' maintaining roe. we now got fifty years o' tradition and history which appear to show a trend towards support o' a right to abortion. J. Gorsuch authored the recent obergefell v. hodges case... which we criticized. J. Gorsuch in obergefell observed the shift in societal values and opinions regarding same-sex marriage as validation for the granting o' a fundamental right to same-sex marriage. we observed how such an analysis were far too touchy-feely for The Court and that such an analysis were in fact the kinda policy choice Congress were meant to indulge. furthermore, support for same-sex marriage, even post obergefell, is 'ccording to most polls less pronounced than is the support for a pregnant woman seeking an abortion. regardless, the so-not-a-textualist-approach taken by J. Gorsuch in obergefell were criticized by J. alito as a violation o' textualist principles. says alito, “The Court’s opinion is like a pirate ship. it sails under a textualist flag, but what it actually represents is a theory of statutory interpretation that Justice Scalia excoriated—the theory that courts should ‘update’ old statutes so that they better reflect the current value of society.” 'course the alito draft opinion similar undermines a textualist approach but instead replaces modern societal values with history and tradition as the guide. as such alito's criticism o' obergefell, while valid, is more than a little hypocritical. whatever. obergefell and the alito draft opinion, along with the first amendment cross case we mentioned earlier, reveal a new trend in the Court away from textualism as J. Scalia woulda' described in favour o' a highly subjective interpretations o' law. the so-called conservatives o' The Court has since the death o' J. Scalia become reactionary activists, a most disturbing trend as judicial restraint were previous considered the purview o' the conservatives. even if you didn't like conservative values, a so-called conservative Justice were less dangerous 'cause he/she would be less likely to make law as 'posed to limiting their efforts to interpretation o' law. unfortunate, if the alito draft opinion stands as has been leaked, then it might be time to give textualism a viking funeral. second, individuals receiving Presidential nomination to SCOTUS observing roe is settled law is meaningless. plessy v. ferguson were indeed settled law... up until brown v. board of education. is many examples o' The Court overturning precedent and in each case the Justices is rejecting established jurisprudence in favour o' a new rule o' law. am having no idea what were stated by SCOTUS nominees in private meetings with Congressmen, but am unable to recall any hearings in which Gorsuch, Kavanaugh or ACB stated unequivocal that they saw roe precedent as inviolable. and speaking o' precedent, am gonna observe how one year removed from the leak o' the alito draft, we observed how justice thomas were telegraphing his willingness to overturn roe, and alito had done similar laying o' groundwork if a bit less overt. ... well, not so quick points after all, but what were you expecting from a Gromnir response, eh? HA! Good Fun!

Considering the torture stories I've read today, they sure as hell don't want to be taken as POWs.

The Ukrainians have apparently turned the underground bunkers into a militarized area Its going to be very costly for the Russian army especially because the Ukrainians know its likely if they captured alive they will get killed anyway I would think like that if I was one of those Ukrainian soldiers...rather die in battle than be executed or abused as a prisoner. And we know their are several cases of captured Ukraine soldiers being executed so its very likely

Russian soldiers have apparently entered that Steel factory in Mariupol. I imagine the Ukrainian soldiers left will make a final stand, I admire their bravery and sacrifice in the face of tyranny for the freedom of their country

Good news everyone! NFT sales ‘have declined 92% since their peak’

AFAIK, the Kherson region is currently at stalemate as well, the biggest gains for Russia are currently around Izyum area, but these are limited as well. And the Kharkiv counter-offensive is there to weaken the Russian advancements at this specific front. Also, the gains around Kharkiv should not be dismissed so lightly, because especially in the village of Ruska Lozova, the Russians put hell of a fight, and Ukrainians had significant loses. Also, Ukraine is as of today in possession of 80 out of 90 US provided howitzers, and 90000 out of 144000 rounds for them, which if placed at some strategically significant points, could turn the table even more to the Ukrainian side, because AFAIK, these howitzers have longer range, than Russian artillery. All of this will of course help only if they will be able to save them from Russian air bombardment. Also you are right about the Russian artillery, because Russian are still tightly defending the area NorthEast of the Kharkiv. Which could be possibly taken care of in the short/mid-term if Ukraine will be successful at encircling them from the newly acquired Stariy Saltiv area. Yup, that's why I have written, why you should take it with a grain of salt, although the whole accusation is plausible for me. Also this "wishful thinking" is kind of in line, with the leaked article from the start of the invasion, which one Russian news site (sorry but don't remember the name anymore) released by mistake, and very swiftly took down.

I'm personally down for them to add ALL of this. The more creatures, craftable items, and resources the better in my opinion. Fallout New Vegas had SO much crafting, and I'd love this game to reach that height.

This one? I wonder if anyone posted them at some point. Hmm. Not sure if it's all of them, but them's all I gots.

Iirc, Oswalt was in Blade: Trinity, the one where Snipes felt writer/director Goyer has ruined the movie bringing in the other characters like Hannibal King. Allegedly this led to blows on the set.

I suppose I just do not find them interesting. Once done once, I feel no need to do them again. They have minimal gameplay, and offer little or no reward. As I said, without doing much I have over 1000k at all times. Camp got fully upgrated within first or second camp, and weapons are few, they are cheap, and honestly all feel the same to use so outside. Also have an elite horse, that everyone complements me on (and don't feel much improvement from my good, old Whiskey). I am not familiar with typical Rockstar games - I am just disappointed how little there is to it as their games are hailed as "sandbox" - it's just a lot of pretty window dressing. EDIT: Googled Zero Punctuation as I was curious what Yahtzee thought. 100% on point as usual. Also slaps me on the wrist for still not playing Obra Dim. Why didn't I play it yet? It's made by a guy whose previous game I adored, all reviewers I follow loved it, and I had a strong recommendation from a trusty colleague. I am the problem.

To my school's credit, you needed permission top opt out so by default the kiddo was enrolled. But then again we have reasonably unified school system across our province which I've heard makes us Communist. (Our current government is working on helping break down our school system though, so cool cool cool) I do remember one of our teachers (a new teacher) got in trouble because he gave a factual description of what a blow job was when a student asked during a sex ed course. That said this one was in Grade 6 where most of the sex ed stuff at that point was very anatomical, but still... IMO it's silly panic and some parent getting upset with answering the question of a curious student is silly. It's because of something like that, though, that I see stuff that is going on in Florida and 100% assume it's going to be as close to worst case situation where a kid asking a teach what it means to be gay is 100% going to get any teacher that answers that in trouble.

Its really good, in my wife and I opinion.

Snipes should have worked with Seagal. Because then Seagal would be dead, and the world a better place.

I'd guess Snipes has mellowed with age and a prison stint.

They were simply the friendlies civilians that I ever encountered overseas. Most US ports of call are set up specifically for pleasure and separating us from the almighty Dollar (seriously, the exchange rate at that time was ludicrously in our favor.) Chile was different in that a US naval vessel hadnt been there in YEARS so the locals were excited to see us. They were lining the docks and cheering for every liberty boat that pulled up, when they noticed us struggling with Spanish they would go out of their way to translate for us, the women couldnt wait to approach us at the clubs. Its the one and only country that I took a tour while I was there. We hiked up some mountain (Andes?) and then white water rafted down. Good times. @Amentep Do you have the crying meme from BIS?

Thanks, I suspected this was the case but wasn't sure. As for soul power, you're right, it wasn't implemented. I forgot that I downloaded a mod that implements this for main characters too. Also, regarding food, I wonder if Hylea's Bounty might be ideal for martial multi classes like this? The extra defense, skill points and health would all be great, and this doesn't seem like a build that requires empowering attacks.

Unfortunately there's a big belief in some areas of the country that teaching sex ed (including condom distribution) is going to make kids have sex the first time or have more sex (as opposed to making the sex they're already having safer). We not only had to have our parents consent, it was actually done as a field trip (sex ed was explained at a local science center rather than in the class; I guess so no one who hadn't had a parent sign off could come and sneak a peak). Pardon me while I steal this response from KP...

omg man, NATO is not state nor manufacturer of weapons so they even can't supply any weapons, its members are doing it in coordination of NATO again you are just nitpicking

Nah. IMO sports fandoms get a little *too* intense. I think part of that is by overly investing in ways that maybe aren't that good? I was like this with the Bulls in the late 90s (though they were winning) but as an NHL Oilers fans, man is the fandom super toxic. Just so so so aggressive and hostile. After a decade of losing I actually found myself nicely situation in "I'm fine if the team loses, but happy for them when they win." I will get upset at bad calls or cheap shots during game etc (always against my team of course!) but at the final whistle I move on. I follow sports to relax and have fun, and some of the high intensity some people have is just not worth it. After Jordan retired my interest in NBA fluctuated, but I did gravitate towards players I liked. Nash was the one that got me back into it. But I don't really have a team any more (mostly Bucks, then Dallas, as I love to watch Giannis and Luka play) but I find it quite nice to not have any real investment in any particular team winning and it lets me really appreciate fantastic plays at all parts of the game. I'm getting old and whatnot but I definitely prefer it this way.

This will be a bloodbath... TBH I think some mad Russian officer decided that they have to get the steelworks before May 9th at all costs... Azovstal was build in USSR time as an Anti-Nuclear cover... I am unable to imagine how this could end well for the Russian soldiers...

Never mind that a lot of consequences of nukes don't care about things like borders!

For the quirky interest: The Spaceshipper - "A Star Wars Story: The making of Jedi Outcast"

we first saw this bit o' alt-right pith attributed to gaetz and considering his legal issues which allege the congressman's inappropriate involvement with millennial women, we thought the supposed tweet couldn't be legit, but we went to gaetz's twitter and sure enough it is bona-fide florida man. HA! Good Fun!

Would love to be able to give a dozen 'hearts' for this post.

Majestic's spider would not bother me at all, even in the house. The one Gorth posted would not bother me at all and I would find it quite interesting ... but from over there. If I saw one in the house it'd be broom swept into a giant glass jar and tossed outside with a stern warning to never come back inside. >.>

That was you and I talking and Im still waiting for you to PM me the numbers. For real though, Calax won a forum contest and as reward a character of him was modeled into FO:NV.