Bartimaeus

Thought it was lumpia at first, until I realized that it was all meat, .

What you said is exactly why he's my preferred candidate. I am not near knowledgeable (or probably smart) enough to know whether his exact plans would work, but Bernie consistently hits on the issues that I think are important, and he does it with obvious passion and conviction - you know these issues are obviously important to him, he's not saying stuff just because he thinks it'll be popular with the particular crowd he has at any given moment*. I think being the type of candidate that talks about those things, and talks directly about them is probably the more important bit of motivating the other powers that be to actually do something about it, even if it's not in the exact way that the candidate envisioned (see: Obamacare). Considering the candidacy of someone like Buttigieg makes me want to shoot myself in comparison: the man is completely devoid of passion and speaks in endless generalities and empty platitudes - when he decides to address anything in particular at all, that is. Bernie might not have the details ironed out, and it's quite possible that for some things he won't ever, but at least his mind is obviously occupied by the important matters and exactly where he'd like to see them go. *The closest he's gotten to this is probably gun control, which he is notably weaker on than other Democratic candidates, which you'd think is especially odd for a self-described "socialist". I consider that a feature, though, not a bug, since his approach to guns is more nuanced than other candidates, and I am not really totally for gun control to begin with. He has tried to straddle the line there as best as he can.

https://earthsky.org/space/new-natural-temporary-moon-for-earth-2020-cd3 Earth has a new mini-moon or "moonlet", a small asteroid that was captured into the Earth's orbit 3 years ago. (...Note: it's really, really, tiny, but since it is a natural body and has apparently been captured by the Earth, it technically qualifies as a moon, as there isn't really a size minimum for a moon).

Virtually none of his grand domestic policies would pass even a 51-49-controlled Democratic Congress anyways, so does it really matter? Has any president's pre-election plans mattered in recent history? Obama got Obamacare, Trump got his tax breaks...that's about all I can think of. There's probably more, but honestly, I'm really not that concerned. Well, I am concerned about the deficit's growth on a long-term basis, but no president will ever willingly deal with it because it'd be too unpopular to do so...so everyone will go on ignoring it.

Nope, no good in New Zealand. How silly. Don't have a server for India, so I can't say for that. (e): Doesn't work in Australia, either. What's going on down there, guys?

Virtually every cooked meal I have has some kind of spicy element in it, so I can't disagree with the general thought there, .

Haha, yeah, I wouldn't buy something like this. I like spicy food and eat peppers every day (mostly jalapenos as well, simply because they have my favorite flavor and they're cheap and plentiful), but I'm not out there eating ghost peppers or reapers or anything like that normally. This was solidly hot, but I wasn't like dying or anything.

https://www.amazon.com/Creeping-Ghost-Carolina-Reaper-Jerky/dp/B07CX97KZY/ I was gifted and ate a bag of this today. Pretty good flavor actually, though not as hot as I expected - which other people mentioned in the reviews as well.

^lmao

If it came down to Trump and Bloomberg, I would so, so very reluctantly vote for Bloomberg, and I'd hate myself doing it. I won't be happy with most of the Democratic field, but I would gladly vote for all of them with the exception for Bloomberg. At that point, I guess I'd have to accept that our democracy is fundamentally broken and that nothing really matters, but I might as well vote for the candidate that might ensure a small measure of balance in the Supreme Court because there's smaller and smaller chance RBG will make it another 4 years.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/02/16/nevada-avoid-iowa-caucus-mess-115437 Nevada caucus volunteers fear another Iowa disaster, possibly worse, due to rushed preparations, lack of security, and...attempting to have everyone input all the results via iPads to a Google spreadsheet all at once. Have caucuses always been this been and we just didn't know about it due to lack of transparency (the Sanders campaign pushed heavily for caucus transparency after multiple debacles back in 2016, especially IIRC after Nevada changed how it awarded delegates after everyone had voted in order to make Hillary the winner), or is this a recent trend?

I watched like...the first season and a half of BCS? Enjoyed it, but never picked it back up again. My attention span for dark, serious dramas is pretty low, and I was initially under the impression the show was going to be more fun and silly than Breaking Bad, which is why I stuck with it longer than I did Breaking Bad. I remember thinking Kim was my favorite character, though.

-Every Star Trek fan the last decade, . "Creator / executive producer Alex Kurtzman is in the firing line." I know he's an infamously terrible writer, but yikes, we're still doing the firing squads thing? Really? ...Well, maybe it's for the best after all - can't ruin anything else that way, .

Yeah, it sounds fun, but having actually administrated forums before, it's usually pretty easy to find out when someone's doing that through a couple different measures (although I'm unsure if this forum software provides any more than the more basic and unclear one, which is by IP). The other one I like to check can be spoofed/changed, too, but it's not typically something anybody would know about to do.

everyone's gonna be awfully upset with me when I reveal that I've been arguing with and belittling my own alts all along for shoots and googles oops did I say that out loud

I do, but people unfortunately keep responding to and quoting you...as if you're people. Hopefully that changes with time, as my browser script is unfortunately not equipped to void such occurrences. No doubt, but some of us have noticed that the exact same kind of poster, with the same exact mannerisms, somehow keeps popping up with a new account every time the last one mysteriously goes MIA. It's getting old...and again, it doesn't really matter whether one's an alt or not - if you have a bunch of different posters all going "yep, they're that garbage tier alt again alright", and that person actually ISN'T an alt, they should probably heed the warning and maybe reflect upon and modify their posting a little. Predictably with such people or characters, no such luck here.

The alternative is that there are multiple people who act like utter lunatics, constantly contradicting themselves while frequently making absurd assertions like "I am a hardcore leftist [...] that hates leftists [...] that loves Russia." Gee, I can't imagine why people aren't treating you seriously. Really, it doesn't really matter if you're not called a troll/alt, because you'll be treated just as seriously when people think of you as a complete nutjob. So pick your poison, as it were...or, if you're an actual person instead of some guy wasting all our collective times playing a character, put a little effort into making a lick of sense.

You are correct - I had to actually go look up the stupid controversy on Wikipedia because apparently I had forgotten. Edited the post.

That's like the Twilight Zone version of my grandparents disagreeing over something. If it were them, there'd have been lots of name-calling, "I don't want to get into it"s, "I didn't say"s, and "I told you so"s. They've been together for sixty years, and from what I can tell, they've been fighting for every minute of it. Glad to hear your marriage is a little more happy, .

Disgraced lawyer Michael Avenatti found guilty in Nike extortion trial Anybody remember when this piece of crap was mulling a presidential run off of the good publicity of Trump's prostitution affair scandal? (e): fixed 'cos of what KaineParker said below

If nothing else, it's such an obvious and pathetically desperate attempt at distortion that it makes it obvious to everyone in here what Sharp_One really is, .

An administration, whether this one or the last, imposing its will in ways that are unpopular with >=60% of the population should receive a serious civil response - but a combination of cheering for one's own team, being used to and apathetic to or overwhelmed by it, being afraid of potential consequences, or being too busy to do anything about it has apparently robbed most of us of our voices. We are indeed getting the kakistocracy we deserve. It's not any one person's fault as to how we got to this point, but ultimately we collectively did vote these jokers in.

It looks like we're headed straight for a brokered convention, between these random rises and falls and Bernie unable to strengthen his coalition leading to no-one (important) wanting to drop out. Still early, so something could change, but it's not looking good.

Seems like it has both good critic and audience scores (80s for both), so that might actually be kind of a shame (although not necessarily or probably even likely related to sexism).