Walsingham
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Everything posted by Walsingham
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kgambit's taken the forthright I'd normally take, so I have the luxury of a more nuanced approach. 1a) I'm really not clear how you think that having to reorient China's entire energy infrastructure to the Northwest/West is an acceptable solution to embargo. It takes a _long time_ and a lot of skilled workers to do that sort of thing. I'm even sure there's any kind of precedent. the British North Sea oil rush might be analogous. 1b) Russia has an established startegy of stamping on energry supplies to achieve foreign policy aims. Much more so than the USA. Transferring the vulnerability would seem to me to be an appalling miscalculation. 1c) Not to mention what happens to the existing infrastructure? 2) China is just not food self-sufficient. You can't just spin up agriproduction when you feel like it. Look at Britain in both World Wars. ~ Ultimately, as kgambit says, the point is that China is lashing out and trying to 'secure' her vital sea corridors. But if in so doing she precipitates a crisis then she's made matters far worse. All she can achieve is a renewed sense of unity amongst her neighbours, and potentially the end of non-militarisation in Japan. This would be utterly disastrous for China.
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Don't even BEGIN to question frosted pop tarts.
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I don't deny it has some connection to thinsg like alienation. What I am trying to say, perhaps poorly, is that I think it is misleading and dangerous to say that if we change our foreign policy then radicals will stop appearing. I don't think they will. It's important to understand that you don't need very many terrorists to run the kind of campaign that will wreck whole cities. The IRA at the height of its bombing campaign numbered barely over 100!
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Too true. All notions, and no plot.
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My back injury is... 3 years old now? Herniated disk, permanent bef***ing of the upper vertebrae also. Too late to worry about it going wrong. MOre of an iddiotcy wound, than a war wound. But same intention. This is just me over-working it yesterday. It happens.
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Sounds a wee bit simplistic to me, Ros. Hate to say. I don't think it's to do with national issues at all. Very many British citizens, subject to none of the points you make, become militant islamists. But how many people of any nation become terrorists without being either bonkers or brainwashed? I don't believe you can macro-engineer away the threat of islamism, any more than you can macro-engineer out the desire to take drugs. The only sensible approach is high-end weeding.
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Dialogue System?
Walsingham replied to Agelastos's topic in South Park: The Stick of Truth: General Discussion
While I'd be horrified if Eternity had no player 'voice', I don't much mind with South Park. Isn't the humour, and interest of the television power bound up with how it gives voice via the existing characters, and when it does so? I don't want the option of telling Cartmann he's a dumbass. I rely on someone else doing it for me. Like Hitler. -
No, you made the controversial claim, you better back it up. The point is that our cultist colleague has identified the only drawback to the banning system - that it permits those subject to bans the opportunity to adopt revolutionary chic. Maybe this is the reason why Fio is so reluctant to actually ban anyone. Cultist's cries of martyred integrity become a little less heart-rending when you understand he could quite easily say what's on his mind. He just knows that ban or not he would be shredded like fresh lettuce. Not by the mods, but by the ordinary members.
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You know, this picture never gets any less scary.
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My thanks to kgambit for furnishing what I couldn't be bothered to. He is a better man. Sorry, Azarkon, but there's no economic way you could move crude oil by land, even if the tanker capacity existed on that scale, which it doesn't. Besides, all the refineries are at the ports at the opposite end of the country. You can't just get across the border and declare yourself a winner. The entire setup would be all wrong. Just look at Iran. Surrounded by sodding oil, but had a petrol crisis that nearly sparked a revolution. Your point about land reform is specious, if less obviously wrong. Just because the central planning committee decide to transform farmers into urbn workers doesn't mean that they should. Central planning committees routinely make decisions on ideological, not practical grounds. China has had famines in living memory, for God's sake!
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I'm not sure much can be done about the crime rate for two reasons: 1) Vast unemployment and no safety net. The latter is unaffordable. The former can't be tackled so long as the unions dominate unskilled labour. Although I'd concede that cracking the unions might just destroy the unskilled jobs that ARE hanging on. 2) The South African Police were the primary mechanism of apartheid. And they were all volunteers. It meant that on the end of apartheid most senior ranks were purged. Many of the more, shall we say 'enthusiastic' junior ranks left on their own volition. Deprived of leadership, and still deeply mistrusted, the police became a cypher. Subsequent attempts to form elite units and seed improvements have fallen foul of corruption in the political class. At least, that's my outsider's view. Bruce?
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US spy agency takes sinister space octopus as mascot. http://rt.com/usa/nro-satellite-octopus-emblem-854/
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Dredd is collected now in massive volumes. They are pretty good value for money, and let you read in sequence.
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Back no longer in crisis. But by God it hurt. So easy to get blase about the damage that happened. DO NOT F*** UP YOUR SPINES, GENTLEMEN.
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Sorry to stamp down on you. But I am almost 100% sure both of these points is wrong. 1) In order to transport the quantities of oil you're talking about you need serious oil pipelines. And I men on an enormous scale. It takes years to get something like that in place. Even assuming it could run effectively. Oil moves by supertanker for a very simple reason: economics. 2) China's arable land is maxed out. Worse, there are many reports that it is being overused and actually diminishing. Just take a look at the vast country on a satellite image. All the arable land is along the coasts and in the southeast. Having said that I'd want to look again at the figures. But That's what I know.
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Something ...awry with my back. I haven't been in this much pain with it as long as I can recall. Couldn't sleep last night. Had to take painkillers and have a hot bath to relax the muscles. Just awful. Work today. NOt sure how the **** this is going to happen. But I'm getting ready now. Very very carefully.
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Tanzania (German east africa, which reminds me...), Namibia, Samoa, Papua and Togo. Nowhere near France or the UK or even the Netherlands, but quite significant. Not so sure, Zor. China can cut off manufacture and 'investment'. The USA can cut off oil and food. Doesn't sound liek an even outcome to me.
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Managed to graunch my spine at work somehow. I'm in quite a lot of pain just now.
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I think it's a damned interesting question. I'd agree that many Americans - or Britons - would be annoyed about paying more. But then equally my instinct says that we'd be better able to sustain that effort than the Chinese state. Not precisely sure why. But I guess it's to do with how we'd justify it. Thoughts?
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Lamb's kidneys slow-fried in a mix of olive oil, seal salt, thyme, and rosemary. Served wth boiled potatoes and carrots. Mustard and chutney on the side. Stout.
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You went to school? "Geography is the best subject ever. LULUZ"
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I don't understand those tough mudder things at all. I 'got' pushing yourself when I was training for the Army. It's important, and you have to test yourself to the limits, because you might need them. But if you're an office manager at Kinko, then frankly feth off.
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Sure, why not?
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In the top picture I think the turbine baldes are asymmetrical. I've been going nuts trying to work out if there are any mechanical bonuses to it. Increased turbulence of flow, maybe?
