Zoraptor

So, the US tested a land launched tomahawk missile on Tuesday after withdrawing from the INF Treaty which previously prohibited them and launchers capable of firing them. Not really news as such, except they used the same Mark 41 launcher for the test they insisted was INF compliant in Aegis Ashore. Nice of them to provide the proof they'd been abrogating the treaty for years, though one suspects the avalanche of media admitting Russia was right on the issue will be a trickle, if that. Not something that can be blamed on Trump either this time, Aegis Ashore was to all practical purposes Obama's child (albeit it was GWB's baby) so the practical collapse of this treaty can be put at Obama's feet even if Trump did the actual withdrawal.

But was there a countdown to the announcement of the trailer's trailer? If not, then the PR people simply weren't doing their job.

Yeah, IIRC they used/ the Israeli firm provided a BIOS resetter to allow more than 3 PIN attempts on the Florida (?) terrorist attacker's iPhone. The FBI then brute forced his PIN over a couple of days, which must have been a fun job for the most junior task force members. If Apple had complied with their demand or their encryption was broken the FBI could have reset the BIOS and given the phone a new PIN, getting instant access. It's essentially an intrinsic weakness that was exploited since Apple or whoever has to have a way to reset locked devices and that provides the point of attack. Indeed, the usual point of attack for any 'encryption break'- assuming it's actual secure encryption and hasn't been gimped by the NSA/ GCHQ etc and reasonable precaution like hashing and salting have been taken- is not the encryption itself but the end point where it's decrypted; via gaining access to the user's device by other means. The same Israeli firm provides software to various states to give them access to people's phones via forced installs pre sale or out and out trojans, generally for circumventing something like WhatsApp's encryption. Allegedly at least one of their products has been reverse engineered and is now used in out and out malware. Well, if you don't count helping Saudi Arabia find excuses to execute and torture dissenters as being malware in the first place.

That is more or less what Hillary tried to do last time- when she was running for nomination she aimed for the centre of the Democrat party to get the nomination and was more left than many of her previously established political positions; when running as the nominee she aimed more for the centre of the electorate (and to the right end of the D party spectrum), or at least the part of the electorate that would at least consider voting for her. That is historically what most candidates do in Presidential races in the US or elsewhere, the main exceptions tend to be the 'inspirational' candidates- Reagan, Obama, Trump recently in the US. It also has something to do with how the 'analysts' function, and how social media functions. It may be surprising given the weight their opinions are given but most analysts aren't experts, and their analysis tends to be extraordinarily simplistic. Someone who doesn't support western orthodoxy on Syria gets flagged as a 'Russian Bot', then if they support Gabbard because of her stance on Syria (and hence follow/ retweet/ like her on social media) it's support from bots, not support from actual people who agree with her stance on Syria. Because why would anyone disagree with with the highly successful western orthodoxy in the ME, except if they were being paid... And of course being social media you tend to get the web effect of people with similar views being exposed to her by other people with similar views; who then get flagged as 'russian bots' by 'analysts' for holding those views and having/ following 'bot' friends, and the number of Gabbard supporting 'bots' increases too. It's a circularised self supporting argument that collapses if you remove the one strut it rests on. Since that 'analysis' suits the media and the D establishment and self proclaimed analysts can be used to say pretty much whatever is wanted in any given situation- and because few analysts will disclose their actual methods- no one looks deeper. She certainly gets exposure from RT and the like because they like her stance on Syria, but the number of americans willing to be influenced by russian state media is unlikely to be high. And frankly, she does well in trends and the like after debates in part because she stands out, hasn't had the exposure and is pretty (the other thing that analysts say, though for obvious reasons they do so from behind their hands most of the time). Bernie would probably be the Russians actual choice from the D field since Gabbard is realistically a VP pick (not likely) or cabinet rather than nominee.

Can't say I care either so long as it's consistent. I imagined them being a bit more 'Meditteranean' than the castings but so long as Rand looks noticeably different from the rest of the Two Rivers folks- which the guy does- I don't see any reason for complaint. I have to admit than I am kind of hoping Billy Zane gets to be Ishamael again, he was certainly good for a giggle in the pilot.

I'm about 90% sure there was a 'resolve attack' or rest to a specific time type button on PC where you'd wait until the attack happened. The Keep management part of the game wasn't great but I didn't find it actively annoying and I certainly would have found it annoying if it was as described. (Worst aspect for me- apart from the main game being over long and a bit of a chore- was hitting the level cap with about 25% of the game to go. Hitting the cap in the endgame is marginally annoying but overall fine, but I hit the cap about half way (?) through the first part of the expansion...)

Bismark took advantage of a pop up event so he didn't need a CB. The tanker getting released was near inevitable in the circumstances because, having induced the seizure in the first place when Britain wanted help protecting their tankers the US told then to FOAD and that they wouldn't get reciprocal help (without most likely refuting the JCPOA and formally joining the anti Iran coalition). Perhaps the funniest part is that the 'agreement' for the Grace I not to go to Syria will get end run by simple expedient of... changing ownership and renaming the ship to something other than Grace I. Geopolitically the most interesting part was the Brits mentioning but otherwise ignoring the US request to hand it over to them (probably as 'reparations' for Iran's- non existent- role in 9/11), which suggests more than a little resentment over how the situation played out and the lack of US support.

Yeah but to be fair all Dead Island 2's initial announcement hype got totally drowned out by World War 2 breaking out a couple of weeks later so they kind of had to reannounce it. And for something different; King's Bounty 2 has been officially announced. The announcement trailer is kind of generic (OK, it's about as generic as you could get if you set out to be generic) so I won't bother posting it, but I did enjoy the previous games even when the concept was being run into the ground post Armoured Princess. If my eyes didn't deceive me there will be console versions (and GOG) too, I'd think its style would go down pretty well with some console fans.

Have they even started shooting the Avatar sequels yet? I'm halfway convinced the whole thing is a scam so Jim Cameron could buy a house next to Sir Peter Jackson and visit Weta Workshop whenever he wants.

Well, unless they get to be too much trouble like Mr Epstein was, I guess. Who knows, maybe he genuinely did kill himself but it could hardly look more suspicious if it were done deliberately. Nothing to do with any party affiliation though, he got a patsy deal from one of Trump's appointees and while there does genuinely seem to have been a break between Trump and Epstein a fair while ago Trump certainly ain't the only R associated with him. (The conspiracy theories are a bit Americocentric anyway; obviously Phil the Greek's crack assassination squad is cleaning house for Prince Andrew like he did earlier for Charles with Diana. Tywin Lannister has nothing on Prince Philip)

So yeah, the master storytellers Friedman and Weiss, 'creators' of Game of Thrones have landed at Netflix, rather than Amazon as rumoured. So LOTR is 100% safe from their input. OTOH Netflix is probably a good fit given the (lack of) quality of most Netflix Originals recently. (Lol at 'GoT creators' in the headline though. They adapted it and pretty well initially, but ironically given that headline it was when they had to actually 'create' that they totally screwed the pooch. OTOH, they'd probably have done a decent job with The Witcher since that would have been an adaptation)

That fake Democrat would do anything for attention, fancy using military service to boost your profile. Shameless. Then again she's only running because she wants a cabinet or VP position and has no actual chance so why bother voting for her. Did you know she also didn't like gays 20 years ago, or is a big fan of gAssad and wants him to run Israel? Plus she only gets attention due to Russian bots or because she's pretty and she hasn't guaranteed she won't do a 3rd party run and support Hillary Joe when he inevitably wins the nomination because she's so awesome. No no no, I haven't joined Shareblue and am not running through an obvious sponsored list of talking points with no regard to context or the person I'm replying to- only Russians run influence campaigns and the only shills and bots on the internet are people who disagree with me. (Think I hit every note for the typical reply every time Gabbard is mentioned on reddit/ FB/ Twitter- including the self contradictory ones like running as a 3rd party candidate and only running to get a cabinet position- except for the enormous 'spontaneous' and totally not potted list of links illustrating her badthink)

I doubt even the talking heads blaming video games on TV really believe it's to blame for gun violence. It's just that the more obvious factors aren't palatable for them to blame.

Hmm, US bar size is the same in each graph so since there is a clear 1:1 correlation between game revenue and gun deaths reducing one bar will reduce the other- that's just basic logic. (Next step: GDP to gaming revenue vs violent gun deaths in the Americas to get Colombia/ Honduras/ Venezuela/ El Salvador in there and all the pesky Euros and Asians out...)

It's referred to as a shining example because politics. If you believe in gun control it was a great success because... it has to be; otherwise other countries won't do it, and it got guns off the street even if the people handing them in were never actually going to go Martin Bryant anyway. OTOH if you're pro gun it was an abject failure because it only punished law abiding people and criminals got to keep their guns. In truth like most such things it was a partial success though not really at what its stated aim was, but people championing it as wonderful results in others making the same mistakes because they dismiss the problems it had as propaganda. The 20% figure for Australia was total banned firearms, they got about half of that. Whether that's an objective success or failure is a bit of an open question to say the least. Exact same thing with the buyback here, which is unsurprising since it's based on the Australian model. If you watch/ read/ listen to most media it too is a shining success. But, if you're expecting the 150-200k banned guns to be handed in within 6 months 200ish at a 2 day event is not actually a great start whatever the media say; it actually suggests you're going to get maybe half of what you expect to*. They also released figures including accessories like magazines (if you read the small print) as if they are guns to inflate the figures. So the actual numbers are well below- well, well below- what they should be. Still, not as bad as the pro gun media make it out to be either, with their 'only 700 guns handed in' headlines based on a figure for before the buyback even started and using 1.5 million (ie total firearms in the country) as the number expected to be handed in. *or 'expect to', officially they expect the 150-200k figure, but the budget is set for a lot less than that. If there's one thing that is annoying otherwise perfectly reasonable people it's that the government is 100% bullmanuring on the issue. Something Has To Be Done though, and a buyback is Something.

The Australian buyback scheme involved ~650000 guns. I don't know it for a fact but I'd be extremely surprised if that was 20% of Australia's firearms, 10% would be far more realistic. The expectation here is that about 10% of guns will be handed in as well in our buy back scheme, though that's based on the Australian experience no doubt. Couldn't see any buy back working well in the US, it didn't work all that well in Australia and isn't working that well here and guns as part of our 'culture' is a lot weaker in both places than in the US. Doesn't help that buy backs always set up to appeal to those who would not be a threat anyway- people concerned with following the law in the first place aren't going to be rampage killing except in very unusual circumstances- rather than people who would be a more significant threat.

I don't need to read any more at all. The Polish Government- paleoconservative as it is- is running interference for a bunch of kiddie fiddlers because it's less damaging to them to covertly support paedophiles than to criticise and punish the source of their ideological power. Mostly though, you as a Pole have no ground to stand on criticising other countries for their treatment of children when your institutions have failed spectacularly for decades to protect them. The Polish Government is terrified of a Ireland like situation where after their scandal all the pillars of paleoconservative catholic values have crumbled in a decade. Hence the interference campaign insinuating criticism of the RCC is the work of commies, degenerates (oh irony) and Sorosian outside agencies. The Polish people, on the other hand, include many who aren't exactly happy with cosying up to molesters, and includes those who have worked hard to expose and stop the abuse- and some who'd happily sweep it under the rug and hope it goes away. (FTR, there's plenty to criticise about New Zealand's record in protection of children as well. Everyone has bad child protection practices. Fundamentally if child protection is involved the situation has no good resolution most of the time and it's just minimising the bad)

Wow, a Pole lecturing Norway on children's rights. Not like Poland's current government is running interference for the biggest child molestation conspiracy in the world over literal centuries- the Catholic Church. Any child protection agency is going to make mistakes as the situation is fundamentally one where, frequently, there is no good answer. The Catholic Church on the other hand has made a whole lot of deliberates and apparently the only defence available is that it's all a commie/ Soros plot to discredit the pillars of Polish society. And in other news, the US has formally announced their withdrawal from the INF Treaty. Unsurprising, and not really much effect after the US abrogated it years ago with Aegis Ashore- not that you'd know that from media coverage as I haven't seen a single source mention it- and the Russians have (probably, at least theirs isn't proven unlike Aegis Ashore) done the same. Joins the growing list of international agreements the US has withdrawn from, though at least this time there's an argument it isn't a unilateral withdrawal. And, of course, a reminder that "China isn't bound by it" is a load of bollocks as an excuse too, since the only US territory the Chinese could hit would be Guam, and maybe the Aleuts.

It's there, it's just obscure. I wouldn't take anything coming from the politics subreddit as being true even if I wanted it to be. It's completely captured by Shareblue bots and has been for literally years. Trump does rather take the "under fire at Sarajevo airport" type self insertions and embellishments to a whole new level though.

Baltimore was certainly an 'interesting' experience when I went there. Had a day there, the waterfront was nice enough if pretty typical for a medium sized city, so we went for a walk and seemingly about two blocks back from it you could have been in real life The Wire. Or more accurately, since it was while ago, real life Homicide: Life on the Streets. Quite an eye opener for a teenaged NZer.

Smells like a contract negotiation leak to get someone to up their offer. LOTR series already has all its major creative/ admin side roles filled, iirc, and is starting to release cast information. It's too far along for Friedman and Weiss to be parachuted in.

"in brightest day or darkest night lens flare shall offend our sight logic's fans should fear a lot Abrams power: haphazard plot" Though to be fair to JJ, he could scarcely do worse than the last Green Lantern movie.

I'd suspect that's the contamination they'd be worried about too. It's been pretty difficult to prove any practical effects of leachate- even the effects of something prominent like BPA/ bisphenol A is controversial- but it's a stupid risk to take without very good reason. UV, heat and plastic is potentially a nasty combination.

The ultimate problem with US debt is human nature and its tendency, when offered a good scenario and a bad one, to pick the good scenario no matter how unlikely it is or what the evidence is for the bad one. I'm 100% sure that most US politicians know that their debt is a problem, and a big one; but solving it will be unpopular, other politicians will insist that the problem isn't that bad and they'll be the ones getting elected because "everything's fine, no need to make sacrifices, in fact we can spend more on stuff you like" is a lot more marketable than "we're in trouble, we need to minimise the trouble as quickly as possible and that means cut backs". And no doubt there's a lot of too big to fail hubris as well. The US definitely has a fair way to go until it's literally overdebted though. I'd probably say in practical terms the US could fairly readily service twice the debt it has now so long as the overall economic situation is more or less comparable to today. End of the day a constant debt load will inflate away slowly and becomes more manageable so long as the economy is growing and so long as it is a constant overall debt. The big but though is the Confidence issue, and the probability of a rival trying to spike the US if she looks vulnerable. (I'd be pretty surprised if a lot of US politicians didn't have plans to 'take advantage of' any economic chaos though, at least in the abstract sense. The 2008 bail outs went largely to vested interests deeply connected to multiple politicians, and in many cases rather than punishing them for stupidity or irresponsibility effectively rewarded them as smaller and less connected rivals went or were allowed to go bankrupt, or were bought up by their larger rivals on the cheap)

There was some talk of it being let go if they guaranteed it wasn't going to go to Syria but it didn't amount to anything. Probably the most salient fact about the whole incident is that there isn't actually an EU oil embargo on Syria- yes, seriously. Closest is jet fuel exports, and imports of Syrian oil to the EU. There's zero mention of exports of oil to Syria being banned though (eg, UK.gov).