MedicineDan

Recent posts seem to be about Trump's visit to India. It's a smart move for him and the United States. If India is truly suffering as much as Grom claims, and I agree, then it's to their benefit to court the United States and it's in our interest to work with them. I really just popped my head in really quick because I know a lot of Republicans who think Bernie simply can't win the general. My brother-in-law in particular is gleeful that Trump is pre-ordained to smite Bernie and his bros. I don't think that's true. I think Sanders has baggage, but I think he most certainly *can* win. In 2016, Clinton lost the election. Trump didn't win it. The demographics according to exit polling and, more importantly, the voting statistics don't support the idea that Trump brought out a huge number of extra voters. It supports that Hilary failed to do so. If Sanders can bring out new people, and the results are mixed in the small sample we have in this cycle, he could win this thing. I know this is a bad question for this crowd, many of whom are probably annoyed by my posts, but do mainstream Democrats want Sanders? Do you guys hate Trump so much you'd rather see Sanders in office? Trump didn't really change our politics. Tax cuts and immigration have been political footballs for decades. Other than his desire to tweet apparently every single hour, Trump has done nothing to bring lasting harm to the presidency. Even his comportment, which is sometimes downright funny but often abysmal, is a symptom of the ailments in our society that pre-existed his administration. Sanders is a true revolutionary. I don't think he could get his agenda through, but even winning the presidency would mean something far different than Trump winning. Trump didn't blow things up. Sanders will. FTIW I did read the response to my previous post, and I actually appreciate the give and take, but I can't always do justice to the arguments in a timely manner and I don't want to bring them up several days or more after the fact.

I've been revisiting Don't Starve. I think I have age of giants or some such. I love the game, but it's just too harsh. I've managed to live up to... 90 days? 100? Something like that. I stopped playing a few years ago when eyeplants took over my rather expansive camp after I'd gone hunting for resources elsewhere. Maybe I'll get a really good map and 'retry' if I die for once. I do appreciate the bleak aspect of the game, but the fact that it's *so* desperate I depressing.

The kingdom management started out fun in Kingmaker and then it just got to be a terrible chore. It's the reason I never finished the game. I hope, whatever they do, they tidy it up and streamline that aspect if it's included at all.

I love the Athenian democracy. Truly a standout time for literature and art. The speech that Thucydides attributes (made up, really) to Perikles is an annual read for me. It's beautiful either in translation or in Greek. However, you're entirely right. Athens proved how terrible democracy can be. The creative destruction of freedom is brilliant, but it throws out as much heat as it does light, and that heat typically ends up burning down the Democracy itself. The founders were extremely distrustful of unbridled direct democracy. So far, over our history, we've managed to put that creative destruction to great use. As an aside, it's always good to steal Marxist terms and put them to pro-capitalist use. HA! If I were not Catholic, democracy would be my religion and the Republic would be my church. I assume it will eat itself someday, but what a glorious thing until then!

I don't want to bogart a beautiful drinking thread with recipes and whatnot, but it does take some tweaking. I would start with beer before moving to mead. Beer is a lot harder to completely botch than mead. Also, try a kit. I've never used one for mead. I've just tinkered around the edges. But I've used them for beer and it really helps get a feel for how the process works. Anyhow, right now it's tea. Not Long Island Iced Tea. Just regular ol' English Breakfast. I have Advanced Pharmacology in a few hours. Brutal class. No getting sauced beforehand.

I typically drink my whiskey on ice. Sometimes straight up or with water. I really don't like mixed drinks all that much. Anyhow, I moved mead to secondary a couple nights ago. I typically drink the lees. Even after five weeks of fermenting, the stuff is still throwing out CO2. It needs to age, so it's raw, but the blueberry stuff was actually pretty good already. The stuff will just hammer you. I changed up my brew method with the fresh blueberries and it worked better for the end product, but it means I get less usable product, which means I end up with a lot more in the lees.

bwahahahaha

Whatever the vote is, Bernie lost Iowa. Seriously, even if Bernie wins the votes, he lost Iowa, which might end up fueling his base. They see he got screwed and they're going to make sure other people see it also. So, I guess I'm wrong. Maybe, at this point, Bernie wins Iowa no matter the final vote. The Democratic party is simply shooting itself in the foot. I think it was Carville who came out publicly saying he didn't want the Democrats to become the Labour Party of the United States. I'm genuinely surprised that so many Democrats think the impeachment was dandy. ImPEACHY Keen, to make a pun. It was a loser of an idea in the first place, but the House made a royal hash of it. I've always played it above board in my assessments. It's not about rooting for one side or the other. If the Republicans had done something so monumentally stupid, I would have said the same thing. The thing is, while it was a loser, the Dems certainly could have played it better. The cynical view is that the Democrats were trying to orchestrate something to hurt Republican senators or some such. The reality is that a large credulous segment of the Democrat base honestly thought they had a chance at removing the president. In either case, they failed. Look, the election is a ways out, and you can kill the messenger if you want, but the Democrats need to get some discipline and start doing something other than trying to smear mud on Trump. How the hell would you be able to tell if any of it stuck anyway? Finally, I pride myself on staying cool headed and I should not have made intemperate statements about Romney. He might or might not survive his vote, but, in a lot of ways, I feel sorry for the guy. He has a lot of personal animosity for Trump, and Trump has certainly earned it, but I take Romney at his word that his faith guided his decision. Hopefully, cooler tempers prevail today and we Republicans don't bring out the pitchforks and fiery brands. Heat of the moment decisions are almost always terrible.

I know it's a popular idea in these parts, but I seriously doubt history looks kindly on the impeachment. First of all, history judges failed attempts harshly. Second, impeachment is truly dire and history will likely think this attempt was unfortunate. More likely, we'll have other partisan impeachments and this impeachment (and to an even greater extent, the Clinton impeachment) will be cited as paving the road for trivial impeachments that will almost always impact the country negatively. Third, while people will have their views colored by their dislike of Trump, the attempt was simply shoddy. Regardless of the vote in the Senate, the case was just bad. It was not just bitterly partisan, it was incompetent. Hey, we can argue about what history will say, but there's probably no point. However, from a historical perspective, there's nothing good about this. Put it this way, if you hate Trump, you should resent the Democrats attempting it in the first place. If you really wanted to see any chance of removing Trump, you should resent the way in which they did it. I'm sure my view will be unpopular, but I'd wager my take on how this will play out in the books is spot on. I'll have to concede the floor at this point. I've been worrying about all this political crap today and I have a ton of stuff to finish before bed. However, if you give me a good thumping, which I *always* appreciate, I'll check in on it tomorrow. :rueful grin:

Well, I will own that you're right, Gromnir. Not about the basic assumption. My views of Romney started shifting prior to Trump announcing his run. In fact, I think Romney might have been one of the reasons we ended up with Trump. However, where I think you're right is that I need to take a step back. My post was out of anger, and I will not commit to anything in the heat of the moment. Here's the real hypocrisy on my part, though. I'm mad at Romney because I believe his motives were bad. If his motives weren't bad, then I can't 'convict' him. It goes back to the mixed motive idea where there might be more than one reason for an action and we should accept (even if we don't assume) any reasonable motive that would exonerate the other guy. In this case, although I'm still mad as hell at Romney, I have to concede that I shouldn't assume his motives. My personal views of Romney have been pinging around a lot from the time he ran for president until now, and those views don't give license to thoughtless action on anyone's part. That's about as fair an answer as I can give at the moment. I disagree with the idea that my views need to be straightjacketed. No one's should be. In fact, I'm quite forgiving when other people have an evolution of thought process. Typically, I care more about assessing these things than arguing them, but I'm just as prone to the heat of the moment as the next guy.

Romney will undoubtedly be celebrated by the same people who reviled him in 2012. I concede that he believes he did the difficult and right thing, but that's because he fooled himself. I firmly believe his decision was driven by personal animus and (somewhat rightful) resentment of Trump. After all, Trump has ill-treated Romney for years now. I'm not much of a bomb thrower, but I will join with a lot of Republicans to destroy Romney's political career. I don't know if that simply means contributing to a recall effort (which I don't think they even have in Utah) or his primary opponents. If he lived in my state, I would actively campaign, and that's saying something since going door to door is time consuming and I don't have that kind of time. The president is an awful braggart and bully, but this impeachment was absolute folly and I do not believe a right-minded person would have voted to convict. The impeachment did far more lasting harm to the country than anything Trump has done hitherto. ...And I was against the Clinton impeachment also, so my voice came out of the same side of my mouth twenty years ago. Some have suggested that Romney did this for the adoration of the press, which he'll undoubtedly get because everything is good as long as it's against the president right now. I don't think he did it for that reason. I believe he did it to look good in the eyes of history. People who look at the demographics of the past several decades and think that it shows the so called arc of history haven't paid any attention to the last few millennia. To people who believe this will be a fatal wound to Trump... I'm not going to argue. I'll let time make my argument for me.

Ah, yeah, that's really too bad, ShadySands. I'll pray for your Mother-in-law and the rest of your family. healthcare issues are scary enough for their effects on your body, let alone fearing for your finances. Also, good luck on your business venture, GD.

I laughed out loud. My wife has been a teacher for 32 years. I try not to get her started. :sly smile while polishing my halo:

The funny thing about all this fixation on the Democratic caucuses in Iowa is that it inevitably helps Trump. He's got a lock on the state. If he doesn't win Iowa, it will be a very early night. It could have helped candidates, but it wasn't really going to help Democrats. This probably helped Biden, since the numbers I've seen so far are surprisingly bad for the old codger. I swear, this cycle is going to be insane.

Many thanks!

Gotta own that I'm a Gorth fan, so that might be why I'm defending him even though I think he's ultimately wrong. He's right in that Donald Trump is remarkably predictable in terms of his personality quirks. He's got a pathological need to defend and his only defense is to attack. It's one of the things that gets under my skin. However, he's really tricky about that. It doesn't mean he'll always attack the way you think or the cascade of events will favor the side that goads him. If it were that easy, President Clinton would be irritating Speaker... Ryan? at the SotU tonight. Some Republican Speaker, at any rate. Nancy Pelosi would be hailed for bringing down Trump. Schumer would be toasting his fellow Democrats at the dawn of a successful Senate conviction. I'm actually somewhat convinced that Trump is a god of chaos. We're all going to wake up in a Warhammer universe fighting for our lives against the minions of Khorne.

I usually play it pretty conservative, but I think that approval rating will suffice to put Trump back in office. Usually, the conventional wisdom is that below water means you're in real danger. Trump weirdness changes things up a little.

Just killed off the Ender Dragon in Minecraft. Pain in the tuckus. I thought that end poem was really sweet, but could it have been a *little* shorter? Good Lord! Don't know what else to do in the game that this point. The charm of Minecraft is that you can play it for a very short period of time without having to think much.

So, a while back, I was a real dead ender. I'd pretty much thrown in the towel. Weighed 400 pounds. Rarely left the house. Was just a complete loser. I decided to do a few things. I've lost over a hundred pounds and kept my weight down. I decided that I needed to do something more for my community and entered an ELM program and became an RN. I just got my license at the end of December and sent out resumes a week ago. This morning, I got a phone call with a job offer. Luckily, my previous history of management really helped. What's best is that it's acute rehab. I literally got my first choice for a job offer. I might be a schmuck, but I interview well. I've only got a couple of years left for my MSN, and then I plan, if I have the stamina and smarts left, to get my DNP (I think that's probably more appropriate for my goals than a PhD). I know I'm just some random internet guy who apparently is off-putting to at least some of you glorious bastards, but I thought I'd share a milestone with you anyway. Huzzah!

I came here to gloat and instead I'm hit by a "Gromnir DESTROYS Eldar" youtube moment again. Actually, in all seriousness, I actually thought there were valid points, but I just can't take the time to do justice to them. I did kind of come here to gloat a little bit, but not really. More like joke, since I don't think it's good for the Republic to have the Democratic caucuses go so awry. It's *probably* good for Republicans, but anything that adds to the chaos is generally bad for everyone at this point because it further erodes trust in our institutions. At this point, it's kind of a mix of funny ha-ha humor and gallows humor. No matter who ends up winning, this is really going to cause some grief, angst, and antipathy (if not outright hatred) within the Democratic party.

It's really not as cut and dried as trump voter = ignorant and uneducated person. I'll point out that, since we still have the secret ballot until the Democrats institute the Ministry of Truth, these are extrapolations from polls. I imagine that Trump, being a coarse and crass braggart probably puts off a lot of people, particularly in states with a particularly high number of advanced degrees. That sentiment undoubtedly colors both the reported and, more importantly, actual voting statistics. Whatever. I'll point out that Trump has always been a sort of out of margins candidate. That aside, the only group that really matters to the Democrats is the black vote. The only large monolithic group for either side is black voters and particularly black females. That's simply statistically true. If Republicans get 15% of the black vote, life is tougher for the Democrats. If the Republicans get 20% of the black vote, Democrats are going to be rightfully frightened. If Republicans get over 20% of the black vote, the Democratic party ceases to exist as a national party. My point isn't to castigate black voters. I'm just saying that fixated on education levels, which vary considerably between racial groups, is far less impactful than the racial groups themselves. Trump has characteristics that are an affront to educated people everywhere, and I've been saying that since before he won the election. More importantly, what matters is the vote, not the fun of pillorying the voters. If you really want to win, you have to find out why people vote a certain way and then attack that particular mindset. I know that folks will think that this is just a disgruntled response to what is ultimately a misguided statement. That is to say, the statement could be factually true but still not help win a single vote and might, in fact, lose votes for a particular side. :shrug: Fair enough. I'm not invested enough to stick around in order to fight these things. I'm just saying that arguments that strike at the intelligence, motivation, and character of Trump voters is a double edged sword. The Democrats can't stop doing it because it's their most potent weapon, but every time they employ it to their ends it cuts them a little. https://www.businessinsider.com/exit-polls-who-voted-for-trump-clinton-2016-11

I just looked it up. Kind of has a Long Dark sort of look to it. I started a game of Disco Elysium but ran out of time. I might keep that on the back burner and try this KRZ game. Looks quirky.

Went to two job interviews. I think I was well received. I don't need bragging rights compensation, but I *do* need them to accommodate my school schedule. I'm cautiously optimistic. The Nurse Manager in one of my interviews said she looks forward to working with me. That *can't* be a bad sign. Late in life career choices are a pain.

I should really get into Disco Elysium. I've only been playing Minecraft because of a couple young people who like to share MC stories. What I'd really like is a strange suspenseful game. I keep looking around here because, in my experience, I usually get good ideas from this board.

the impeachment was always ill-advised. I was against Clinton's impeachment, and *that* contained criminal elements. At the time, I thought that he deserved impeachment, but I thought it would be bad for the country and not do the Republicans much good either. In retrospect, I think I take Rubio's view that, even with crimes attached, Clinton should not have been impeached. If it hurts the country, and I believe the Clinton impeachment did, and there's another remedy, which was Clinton leaving office that year, impeachment is bad. Literally, it should be reserved for only the most dire of circumstances. The effort to impeach Trump was simply ill advised (I would say foolish) from the beginning. I'm not saying it might not work out for Democrats in the long run. Too much turmoil to know and people who make bold predictions this far out don't know what the hell they're talking about, even if they end up right. I can claim I'll roll a D20 and get a crit. Even if I do, it's still a random roll. What I mean by foolish is that the upside wasn't worth the risk. It was a reckless move, even if they somehow manage to get a win. I'm telling you, don't let some of these polls fool you*, this is not a net gain for the Dems right now. It shouldn't have been done. The people who hate Trump and revile him might as well continue. It sucks as a plan, but the Dems have put themselves on rails. Their train only goes one direction now. Best hope sheer hatred wins the day because they have no other options. However, as I've said before, the hate mongering is, in my opinion, a net loser over time. Sure, you have to do it to keep your base humming, and that's the only chance for victory now, but don't mistakenly think it was a good idea. Like I said, it *can* carry the day, but I suspect it makes things harder for Democratic presidential candidates. Not sure about congress at this point, although I think the Dems have a House advantage right now. I think the Republicans can save the senate. Too early to commit. Of course, Trump could have shut his mouth (and twitter account) about 25% and he'd be winning running away with the House and Senate riding his coattails. It takes Trump to make the Democrat candidates viable in this election. We've got it better than in quite some time. The only reason some people don't admit that is because Trump is... well... Trump. *I'm not a poll denier. Even in the 2016 election, the polls weren't entirely wrong. They were a little wrong, usually in the margin of error nationally, all skewed the same direction. However, that tiny smidge and that single direction nudge makes a huge difference in making predictions, which is why some of us claimed Trump was viable until the end. At this point, there are people I know in real life who make better election predictions more reliably than most of the pundits I see on TV on either side.