BruceVC

No, not in the way I mean by life altering experience Trump becoming president just became an extension of his personality and provided the greatest stage for him to do what he enjoys doing. He loves attention, he loves people listening to him Think of The Apprentice and how Trump thrives on his rallies. Thats not the same as the life changing experience that many people go through when they nearly die. Sometimes its a health reason like a heart attack, sometimes they can have an NDE ( near death experience ) or they can avoid being killed in combat or a criminal act like an attempted car hijacking and after that it can put things in perspective and they can literally change because they realize the brevity of life GD basically retired and stopped following politics after his health scare because his priorities changed Thats what Im hoping with Trump after the attempted assassination. But yes lets wait for the speech

But he didnt have a life changing experience in 2016. If the bullet had been a few inches to the right Trump would be dead and that would be a much worse outcome because then he becomes a martyr and that would have radicalized and militarized more of his base and supporters There are lots of examples of people nearly dying and that experience changes there lives in a positive way. But I want to hear his speech before I give him real credit for " changing " because there are lots of understandable skeptics around Trump doing anything different

Well his public response around the assassination will go a long way to reducing the level of toxicity and general discord that exists in the USA around politics He could rampant up tensions and mistrust and feed the " deep state" conspiracy theories or he could reduce these views. He has lots of influence on his base And Im sure we all want the same thing, a more united USA and less political tension Malc lets wait and see what he says, lets try to be positive. This attempt on his life could be a positive influence on Trumps grandstanding?

It looks like Trump is not going to give the same speech he was going to give at the RNC convention before the attempted assassination, good on him and its the right thing to do. America needs to be more united and less divisive around politics https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cljy6yz1j6gt " Former President Donald Trump has given one of his first interviews since the attempt on his life on Saturday night, saying he has completely rewritten his convention speech to focus on a message of "unity" instead of criticising Joe Biden. "The speech I was going to give on Thursday was going to be a humdinger,” he told the Washington Examiner. “Had this not happened, this would’ve been one of the most incredible speeches,” he also said, adding that it would have been aimed mostly at the President Biden's policies. “Honestly, it’s going to be a whole different speech now. It is a chance to bring the country together. I was given that chance.” Trump also said that the "reality" of what happened on Saturday "is just setting in," and described the moment he looked up at the crowd after realising he had been shot. “The energy coming from the people there in that moment, they just stood there; it’s hard to describe what that felt like, but I knew the world was looking. I knew that history would judge this, and I knew I had to let them know we are OK,” he told the Examiner. The former president touched down in Milwaukee just hours ago, where he'll attend the Repulican National Covention this week and be formally nominated as the party's candidate. He's also expected to reveal who will be his running mate in the election.

We dont want to trivialize this attempted assassination but one of my brothers said " Bruce you can tell the shooter was a Democrat. The shot was far too left " The memes and jokes are inevitable

The predicable and expected conspiracy theories are rife around this assassination attempt But IMO there are 4 main contributing factors to this shooting current US political culture is both toxic and divisive. People on both sides have contributed towards this there are some people on both sides who literally think the other side wants to destroy the US and Democracy there are extremist and mentally unbalanced people on both sides who are prepared to act on the point above the US has a culture of mass shootings and gun violence sometimes manifests itself in how people act out

Im glad Trump is okay, its the last thing you need in the US is the potential presidential candidate to be assassinated by a delusional and mentally unbalanced person who cant separate reality from exaggeration and then decides to act on it And yes US gun culture and mass shootings culture is an aspect of this but that doesnt change the severity of this egregious development

Malc do you think Biden should step down in the interests of Dems having a better chance of winning? I have mentioned this before but if the Dems really believe that " Trump represents the greatest threat to Democracy the US has ever faced" then he should go immediately No debate whatsoever considering the view that the future of US Democracy is on the line

I was going to invest in PC game pass because of the good deals and just the Bethesda games are worth the monthly cost but apparently you cant use script extenders so that means you cant mod effectively So there is no point if I cant mod Bethesda games

Some are, look at the general lack of support for LGBT rights Its not great in Africa or many African American communities It doesnt apply to everyone but its not uncommon

Yes I did read it but if you dont mind try to be more specific about what you think my view is or how a link doesn't support what Im saying My view has not changed in any of the posts I have made, Im saying that the view that Trump\GOP is "racist\fascist " is an opinion and its not shared by all people of colour who vote for GOP around there voting decisions They are voting for the GOP for reasons and policies that resonate with them . Here is the original link I posted and it goes into more details about this https://theconversation.com/what-early-2024-polls-are-revealing-about-voters-of-color-and-the-gop-and-its-not-all-about-donald-trump-227534 " Two explanations have emerged to explain Trump’s growth in support among voters of color.The first is based on the faulty assumption, made by some Democratic strategists that the increasing racial and ethnic diversity of the U.S. electorate would automatically benefit Democratic candidates. This assumption rests on the idea that voters of color are inherently progressive on issues such as education, social services, health care and criminal justice reform. According to this line of thinking, Trump’s polling numbers are mostly the result of poor messaging by the Democrats – a failure to remind voters of color that their interests align with Joe Biden, not Trump.The second explanation is that voters of color are inherently conservative, particularly working-class Black and Latino men, who identify more closely with the political right on issues such as immigration, law and order and cultural conservativism."

And yet despite all this "evidence " of Trump\GOP being racist you are ignoring the reality of how people of colour are increasingly voting for the GOP Why would they do that if they believed the GOP was racist. Why dont you rather understand this reality instead of posting reasons around what you think are reasons people of colour wont or shouldnt vote for the GOP? No need to play the race card when there are numerous studies and analysis done on the question " why black people vote for the GOP " or something similar Here is another link that provides answers, read it to understand this question and I would encourage you to do your own research and post a link that answers the same type of question https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/3/18/why-are-black-voters-backing-donald-trump-in-record-numbers Im not saying you wrong about some of the issues you have with Trump. Some of these are legitimate Im saying its not accurate to have a generalized or selective view of " Trump is racist " so people wont\shouldnt vote for him because thats not how many Americans and people of colour see the GOP or a Trump vote

Or you could argue much of the media is now being honest about the concerns and reality of Bidens mental acumen which was largely ignored or handwaved by the Dems This is not about " Biden speaking one wrong word" and several EU leaders are equally to blame for not insisting on making there experiences with Biden more public and known https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/foreign-leaders-worry-about-bidens-health-decline-1235053927/ I mentioned this before but the Dems had an opportunity to find a new candidate after the midterms. The Dems overall strategy has backfired on them and this was because of overconfidence And now its too late, Biden might still win. The undecided voters could swing it for the Dems

I base my views on politics around the policies of parties and outcomes, I dont subscribe to identity politics or personality politics So when someone says " dont vote for Trump because he is a racist or fascist " thats not a very convincing reason for me But if that is a point we want to discuss then the evidence around voting choices people of colour make in the USA doesnt support that The GOP has steadily seen an increase in the votes from people of colour and this election will be the same https://theconversation.com/what-early-2024-polls-are-revealing-about-voters-of-color-and-the-gop-and-its-not-all-about-donald-trump-227534 And there are various reasons for this but end of the day a black or Hispanic person is not going to vote for a party they genuinely thought was " racist" So support for Trump\GOP in this election is much more complex and nuanced than that

Yes that would be ideal but unfortunately I cant see Biden winning especially with the state of his mental acumen Its prudent we prepare ourselves for another 4 years of Trump

This list has some of the most ridiculous things I have ever heard... " ban books on Slavery " I absolutely reject that, I demand my reparations and redress from the slavery inflicted on my Saxon ancestors by the Romans and the Vikings. We must never forget the cruel injustices of the past

Trump has lots of advisors as Im sure you will remember, he had Bannon as one advisor and he didnt do everything Bannon wanted or suggested and thats always how Trump operates. He surrounds himself with people to get advice but he makes the final decisions based on how he thinks. He is capricious and unpredictable. But things around the border and illegals being deported will be implemented because he has stated that many times And then if you go through the list from the Heritage Foundation you can see already that Trump wont agree to certain points like the complete ban on abortion, he has already said leave it up to the states. What I am saying is we should be concerned with the Heritage Foundation but it doesnt mean that Trump is going to implement what they say. Lets rather wait and see instead of jumping the gun

One of the greatest losses in gaming development PB was an iconic and prestigious studio and they created some of the best games I have ever played, Im sad

Sounds like a plan, count me in. Hopefully we get to read your blog and gaming journey as a contribution Good to hear you still around

Im about 15-18 hours into F:NV and its been the incredible and predicted positive experience that I knew it was going to be The mods I loaded from Viva NV and other additional mods seem to have created the ideal wasteland experience for me And as usual I must talk about MO2 and how it helped with troubleshooting because you typically experience most mods conflicts in the first 2-4 hours and once you fix them the problem is resolved Firstly I noticed immediately that Doc Mitchell had the pink mesh problems around his character and that was related to the Fallout Character Overhaul https://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/54460 So I did some troubleshooting from the mod Nexus page and everything seemed fine but then I realized I had made a mistake with this mod and I had installed a hotfix with the " Replace" option and not the " Merge" or " Rename " Merge should always be used for hotfixes because it just replaces similar files which is what you want, Replace deletes all assets and just uses the new ones and that meant my mod obviously wasn't installed properly because you need the original mod files with the hotfix. I then rechecked about 3-4 other mods and reinstalled them with the " Merge" That fixed my pink mesh problem. I then noticed I had a problem with circles in the sky and thats a known problem around Desert Natural Weathers and conflicts with other weather mods. But I was confused because the Desert Natural Weathers was the last ESM in right of MO2 but then I noticed that Realistic Wasteland Lighting was conflicting around meshes in the left side of MO2 so I just changed the order of Desert Natural Weathers on the left so it was lower than Realistic Wasteland Lighting and the problem was solved And then Im using mods like World of Pain which adds lots of new and fun quests like Vault 40 and the Harder Barter Faster Stronger which makes the overall economy and resources much more difficult and Im spending lots of time finding resources and being selective about what I can sell. It adds to the overall survival element of the game when money is always a factor The only thing Im " unhappy " about are my companions and how they too powerful and unbalance the dangers of combat. I loaded a mod that allows Companions to die in combat but I will keep the autoheal for companions after combat because I can live with that convenience and Stimpacks are in short supply anyway with the mod settings I use But great experience so far and modding has really improved the vanilla game

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Faraway_Tree There are a whole series of fantasy books based on the Faraway Tree theme and these books were written from 1939-1951, I had forgotten how much they had influenced my love of fantasy because I had assumed it had started with the Steve Jackson books but when I was thinking about the blog and my journey I realized it had started much earlier. I didnt read these books myself so that was what had created my original love of fantasy And that red box D&D image, I will never forget it

Interesting French election outcome, the general global media got these predictions wrong where they made assumptions that RN would win the second round The bogey man of the " French far right " ruling France is subdued again Here is a good interview with Le Pen where she explains somethings to Christiane Amanpour about the RN and what they stand for and how they not the same as US " far right "

Yes but again, the Heritage Foundation does not define what Trump can and will implement. Project 2025 is there blueprint and most of these ideas are far too extreme for Trump to want to implement Its different if Trump said " my presidency is going to be about Project 2025 '' then we should be very concerned. But at the moment there is no need for fearmongering

Yes, it was a predicted loss for the Conservatives It will be interesting to see what fundamental, if any, changes Labour makes But Democracy is the winner, if you not happy with leadership you can use the ballet box to make your unhappiness realized

Yes I have heard lots of things Trump says, that doesnt mean he is going to do these things which is why I asked you what concerns you the most? And I had never heard of Project 2025 but I looked it up now https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c977njnvq2do Some outrageous suggestions including " Under the proposals, pornography would be banned, and tech and telecoms companies that facilitate access to such content would be shut down " How dare they consider banning porn