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Everything posted by BruceVC
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I know very few credible experts who have predicted Putin's political demise because he is an autocrat and there are no free and fair elections in Russia and he controls the courts so he has ensured his control is insurmountable? The only way he could be removed is through some sort of military coup like the Wagner insurrection but thats unlikely. No dictators or autocrats ever step down. They rule for decades until they die or are forced to be removed. But the US is a Democracy and you see leadership change all the time and politicians can be charged in courts if there is evidence, so Trumps demise would be ending up in jail? But I doubt that is going to happen before the 2024 election
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But dont you think if you admittedly don't know much about a part of history you shouldn't make comparisons or statements until you have educated yourself about that history? I appreciate your honesty but it also highlights one of main reasons for this modern day reality of inconsistent and selective outrage around a range of topics and opinions. Many people who have an opinion dont understand their own argument or they dont understand the real history of that opinion. And yet the history is well documented and available for anyone with a interest For example take some of the outrage around slavery, there are many people who think only Europeans committed African slavery. They literally aren't aware that Arabs and numerous black tribes were involved in the slave trade and white people were also enslaved throughout history. In fact its hard to think of a single ancient civilisations that wasn't part of the slave trade And this truth about slavery is well documented. And what does this tell us? It tells us that for many people the facts and truth about history is not as important as the ideological or political views that people have and the bias around these views
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I loved that game, I thought the way the RNG was designed was great fun I remember going on these long voyages and desperate to get back to a port with cargo and Im on my last health and food and having to resort to cannibalism to survive And the absolute adulation of sailing into a port ..and surviving
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Its early days for my first POE experience, I am about 3 hours into the game and its fun so far Its taking time because the ruleset is different to what Im use to with D&D but Im learning it and enjoying the lore and how the narrative is presented. But of course I dont know anything about the lore so that will take time to understand the history of the game universe Its unusual but expected to play a game outside of the Forgotten Realms with all this new IP but I want to understand it so I'm reading and absorbing everything because it also makes sense for future games
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That is a valid question, what do countries do about persistent illegal immigration? It depends on the type of illegal immigration. If people are fleeing active wars then you can create refugee camps funded by the UN. Thats common in Africa and the ME. Sometimes people live in them for years and they absolutely not considered concentration camps https://www.unrefugees.org/news/refugee-camps-explained/ If they economic refugees you can deport them which is fairly common, SA has started doing that. But its not a great reality to deal with. The long-term solution is finding ways that governments are stable and people dont want to leave but this applies to economic refugees And then you look at each country on a per case basis to understand why the governments are failing and who takes responsibility for that. I just know the solution cant be " countries must just accept all illegal immigrants " ...thats not sustainable and eventually leads to massive pushback from most citizens
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It is an interesting question but it would be almost possible to get accurate polling information on the question " which percentage of Russians seriously regard NATO as a threat or the enemy " but its obviously peddled by the Russian state media But here is probably the best answer to that question and its another Daniil Orain video where he asks a similar question and the answers are more honest because its a neutral question and wont get you arrested
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https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67504272 So Wilders has won in the Netherlands, I remember when he was arrested and charged for inciting hatred back in 2011, I would have never predicted in 13 years he would make a comeback Another victory for a right-wing politician and its mostly about the unpopular and failed Dutch immigration policies? I have said this before and I will say it again, when are liberals and the left going to learn? When people have valid and understandable concerns about illegal or uncontrolled immigration to ignore this and call them " racist, fascist or Nazi" doesnt help The greatest friend to the far-right in the EU is ineffective immigration policies and ignoring the public sentiment around this @HoonDing Anything you want to add?
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I am considering playing POE as my next game, I helped fund it but never played it. I dont know the ruleset and I was wondering the following is the DE worth getting Whats a good class to start with? I dont know the game mechanics at all and I want to avoid playing for 10 hours only to find I "chose " the wrong party which puts you at disadvantage in combat In party based RPG like IE games I normally select 2 x tanks. 1x healer\fighter like a cleric. 2 x magic users and one hybrid thief Do you need a thief in POE and what would be a good overall party recommendation based on how the game defines classes which I see is not like D&D games?
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I completed Kotor 2 after 40 hours and I thought it was an overall better game than Kotor 1. It gets a 72/100 on the globally popular " BruceVC game rating system " I enjoyed the narrative and was surprised how the " good " Jedi were actually my enemies at the end. I did have to use heal cheats in one or two combats when my main character wasnt fighting because the combat was almost impossible But I ended up saving my party members at the end, staying true to the light side,supporting the Republic and trying to Romance Visas which was disappointingly just a platonic Romance and sharing some sort of spiritual force bonding ..boring But good game overall, my character was deadly at the end with dual wielding lightsabers and using speed and quick heal to win most battles..oh and my trusty Verpine Prototype shield was invaluable
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Great video as usual but of there is another side to the inefficiencies and corruption with having lots of smaller parties that end up with some sort of small representation in parliament. They can also get captured by special interest groups, banal political views or radical policies that dont benefit the country We seeing this in SA, this is the registration process in SA for a new party An application for registration (Annexure 1 of the Regulations), fully completed; The name (not more than sixty (60) letters) of the party; The abbreviated name, if any, (not more than eight (8) letters) of the party; A High resolution party logo or symbol in colour, this can be submitted separately as a .PNG or .JPG file; A copy of the party's constitution; A Deed of Foundation signed by 1 000 registered voters who support the founding of the party (see Annexure 6 of the Regulations); R5 000 registration fee; and A hard copy of the Government Gazette in which your notice appears (see Annexure 2 of the Regulations). So this created this absurd reality where in our last national election we had over 50 parties contesting the last election, 90% of them didnt get the required 40K-50k votes for a single seat (you need 0.25% of the total votes to get a seat in parliament ) https://businesstech.co.za/news/government/315570/this-is-how-many-votes-a-party-needs-for-a-single-member-to-grab-a-r92000-per-month-salary/ But we still ended up with about 7-8 new parties that dont offer or provide anything new and they don't do anything to change peoples lives So the solution to current unhappiness with established parties is not necessarily new parties
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I really enjoyed it, I preferred it to Dying Light 2 I thought the narrative was compelling and the factions believable and interesting and clearing Hordes made for some fun around strategizing I also liked the main protagonist...and I didnt expect that surprising NERO end. Effective way to create a narrative for a sequel
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Gaza - conflict, war, land, water rights, bad colonional legacies...
BruceVC replied to BruceVC's topic in Way Off-Topic
I didnt realize that, interesting. But the military offensive against Gaza was a direct consequence of 7 October, Im not sure who could argue thats not true? But you can argue 7 October was because of the Israeli occupation and the reality of the hopelessness of Palestinians but that doesnt mean 7 October is not the direct reason of the Israeli offensive on Gaza. Two things can be true at the same time -
Gaza - conflict, war, land, water rights, bad colonional legacies...
BruceVC replied to BruceVC's topic in Way Off-Topic
Well its more nuanced than believing a peace deal is unlikely because Israel has the Palestinians at a resource advantage, Israel does have the support of the US and it has an obvious advantage of being an established country with a well trained military Those arent reasons there can't be peace, and these include the following the US believes in a 2 state solution and is has for decades tried to broker peace there have been times where peace was nearly achieved like with the Oslo Accords, take 5 minutes to read this link to see how close they came and how it fell apart https://www.britannica.com/topic/Oslo-Accords The main problem is leadership. Netanyahu has demonstrated he has been terrible for sustainable peace and once hes gone, which is almost a given once this current war is over, we will hopefully see a new PM who is serious about negotiations Also there are lots of Israelis who want peace and so do large parts of the Jewish diaspora, like the US Jewish community, who mostly also believe in a 2 state solution But then on the Palestinian side we need one official and recognized authority. And groups like Hamas wont be part of that and then the Palestinians need to recognize Israel has a right to exist and be prepared to compromise Its not insurmountable, if SA could do it after 45 years of Apartheid then I do believe the Palestinians and Israelis can do it? -
Gaza - conflict, war, land, water rights, bad colonional legacies...
BruceVC replied to BruceVC's topic in Way Off-Topic
I know you want to but please dont quit your job to become a ME negotiator I hate to destroy people's dreams but think of it like those people who cant sing and there friends and family never tell them they cant sing.....sometimes the truth is better -
Gaza - conflict, war, land, water rights, bad colonional legacies...
BruceVC replied to BruceVC's topic in Way Off-Topic
My favorite comedian of all time is Sacha Cohen, here he is with his gay character Bruno in the ME and trying to find a solution to the Palestinian vs Israeli conflict. Watch from the beginning -
Gaza - conflict, war, land, water rights, bad colonional legacies...
BruceVC replied to BruceVC's topic in Way Off-Topic
What do you think is the best solution for sustainable peace between the Palestinians and Israel? Lets say you were the chief negotiator and you had to come up realistic points that both sides would need to compromise on I know its a tough question but thats why I have immense sympathy for the dozens of people who have tried to find or propose various peace plans for decades and yet both sides have dismissed these proposals for different reasons