BruceVC

Thats a simplification of what impresses me But a lavish event like this at a 1000 year old castle does impress me Its not about Trump, its the effort and outcome of the banquet that I admire The decorum and dress code as well This is what was on the menu, interestingly the menu was in French Hampshire Watercress Panna Cotta with Parmesan shortbread and quail egg salad Organic Norfolk chicken ballotine wrapped in courgettes with a thyme and savoury infused jus Vanilla ice cream bombe with Kentish raspberry sorbet interior with lightly poached Victoria plums And then expensive wine was served for those quests that drink Wiston Estate, Cuvée, 2016 Domaine Bonneau de Martray, Corton-Charlemagne, Grand Cru, 2018 Ridge Vineyards, Monte Bello, 2000 Pol Roger, Extra Cuvée de Réserve, 1998

Sounds like a great life, nice one GD I cant imagine not being connected to news but it clearly can be done and it sounds very healthy

What is your definition of fascism and can you give some examples of how the US is currently a fascist state? Or are you saying its becoming a fascist state but examples would still be interesting And do you think this is permanent if the US is a fascist state, so for example if the Dems win the next election will the US continue to be fascist? Or do you mean its only a fascist state if Trump is president? Sorry for the questions but I want to get clarity on what you believe

For those that didnt watch it here is Trumps speech from the Windsor banquet last night, he was very cordial and complimentary around how he had been received Its only 6 minutes long and worth watching just to see how smart everyone is dressed and how lavish the banquet was. As I mentioned the British are the masters of pomp and pageantry

I think whatever it is its a small price compared to the trade and economic benefits. You know how it goes, every world leader rolls out the red carpet for Trump when he visits because of his hubris Today is the fun and tomorrow they talk trade and politics Microsoft and other IT companies will be investing $40 billion in AI in the UK and this type of theater just helps ensure the WH under Trump is onboard https://www.cnbc.com/2025/09/16/tech-giants-to-pour-billions-into-uk-ai-heres-what-we-know-so-far.html

Here are some highlights, watch from minute 5 to see the air display from the Red Arrows the official aerobatic team of the Royal Air Force

https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cx2q200d2vnt Trumps on an unprecedented second visit to the UK and its going really well The British are the undisputed masters of pomp and pageantry and as usual they have delivered There have been musical bands and military processions and Trump was shown the Royal Collection of art at Windsor Castle which he appreciated He also laid a wreath at the tomb of Queen Elizabeth II at St Georges Cathedral

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt28013708/ I watched the first episode of a new HBO series called Task and I can already tell its going to be epic Its a crime drama about a FBI Task Team hunting down a criminal gang but it has this incredible complexity and nuance with all the characters and the broader narrative I cannot recommend enough how excellent this series is and its definitely an immediate " BruceVC must watch series "

I wouldnt put much relevance into words inscribed into his bullets as an ideological motive for why he killed Kirk, he also had anti-fascist and Internet memes on his bullets. It has just created even more misinformation and people making assumptions on SM around his reasons But we have much more information now but nothing 100% confirmed CNN and other media houses have a good summary of who he was and what is political views were and how they changed before the shooting https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cp8wl2y66p9o His family are GOP\Conservatives and he use to be but he clearly changed over the last few years. Everyone who knew him was and is very surprised he killed Kirk and there is no evidence he was linked in anyway to any white supremacist group He seemed to have specific issues with Kirk and he thought he peddled " hate " speech and he decided to act on that I will stick to my original prediction around his motives, a mentally unstable person who was influenced by radical left ideology\left-wing extremism and decided to kill Kirk because of what he use to debate and how he encouraged debate on certain topics Its very common and normalized to refer to left or right wing extremism\ideology as a reason for any mass shooting I doubt that is going to make any difference to the current views and anxiety in the US at the moment around Kirks death But many people do want to why someone did what they did and you often find extremist ideology as a reason

https://www.bbc.com/news/live/c206zm81z4gt It looks like they could have the killer of Kirk Im going to guess about why he did it and of course I could be wrong because I gave 5-6 different ideological motives in a previous post He will be mentally unstable and influenced by radical left ideology and he believed Kirk was destroying\dividing the US with his debates and views and had to be stopped

Most people and the general EU\NATO is much more concerned with provocative Russian actions, like sending drones into Poland, that could lead to war with Russia than conflicts in the ME like the Palestinian vs Israeli conflict Sorry to disappoint you, its just the reality of the consequences and its regional EU impact. Its not personal

Did you watch the video I posted earlier? You might personally think he was a bad debater but thats clearly not what the young people who use to debate him thought The young lady in the video says after about 8 minutes " Im having so much fun in this debate " I would assume the people who spent time debating Kirk who be the best ones to judge if he was a good debater?

Yes, it seems like a professional hit. Probably ex-military and he got away cleanly But Kirk had a certain way he engaged, he would debate in the open and outside at Universities in many cases So automatic doors wouldnt have helped in this case

Sure but thats the point Im trying to explain He didnt " own the Libs ", thats just the silly reference that people use on SM and thats part of the problem with the nature of this type of debate. People want to align with one side or another and not listen to what the other person is saying or how they make there points If you want to see how he interacted with young people and why they enjoyed engaging with him watch the video, the young women is a liberal and believes in women's rights\feminism in a very normal way and she asks excellent questions and makes good points and clearly is well informed Its only 15 minutes but it will give you a better understanding of Charlie Kirk and why he was popular amongst young people on both sides of the aisle

I dont know if they are stupid because he provided a platform and medium where students could engage on issues I cant recall many people shouting in the videos, people disagreed with him and then they debated certain points. The ones I watched were almost always the same, students asked him questions on his views and he clarified why he believed what he believed He was always calm and he use to listen but he generally made the same counter arguments on the issues that were raised Here is just one example, like I said I didnt watch hundreds of his debates but this is a good example of the nature of how he engaged and his belief in freedom of speech . Its only 15 minutes, the female student he is engaging is really well informed, disagrees with him and yet really enjoys the debate. This is the type of debate Kirk created and its lacking in most of our societies. Its not about who " won " or " lost ", both of them made good points (and again ignore the YT title, the actual debate is much more nuanced than that )

Yet dozens of students use to come out to debate him? I think its much better to encourage debate like this than to shut it down The YT titles are often sensationalized and stupid, " Kirk OWNS\Destroys Liberal\Woke student " but I use to ignore that and just listen to the debate He never use to "destroy " anyone, he made his points and then the students use to agree or disagree

Yes he did believe that, its not as insensitive as you suggesting and he clarified this on several occasions and he had ideas around how to reduce gun violence But he fundamentally believed in the 2nd Amendment Millions of Americans do and its unfortunate we conflate the rampant gun violence and its causes in the US with the right to bear arms

The Charlie Kirk killing is really unfortunate and sad , he had 2 young kids and its yet another example of the rampant gun violence in the US and how some extremists on the left and right believe the best solution if you disagree with someone politically is to kill them I watched several of his Campus debates and as usual with this type of commentator I agreed and disagreed with him on different topics But he was very good at engaging with young people and lots of young people on both sides of the political aisle use to debate him It will interesting to see who shot him when he is caught because it could be an extremist from any one of several groups because Kirk would have angered several different groups of people that could include anti-Israel group pro-Palestinian group BLM group Radical Left group Neo-Nazi group Mentally unbalanced person

Nothing surprises me around Russia's warmongering and provocations anymore but they denying it ...which is the normal response from Russia

Yes, this type of greed is not a good start to this game At the very least include all the clans in the vanilla game Charge for DLC once the game is out and confirmed to be worthwhile considering its tumultuous development history

I enjoyed Hogwarts, I dont remember any of that political ideology\commentary being significant in the overall narrative I never read the books but I watched all the movies and I thought they did an excellent job at creating the Hogwarts world with its lore It had lots of fun side activities like exploring Hogwarts, Merlin Trials, breeding animals and broom races and it provides a massive open-world to explore Spells make combat interesting and varied and I like the crafting where you do end up looking for ingredients And the Companion side quests are nuanced and interesting, like Sebastian's sister quest The enemies became monotonous, you can only kill so many poachers and Ashwinders but that wasnt enough to detract from the fun factor of the game

Im about 45 hours into Fallout 4 and my Life in Ruins mod collection and Im still loving it Outside of all the improvements this mod collection makes its hard to beat the fun of an open world and sandbox game that Bethesda ultimately excels in This mod collection makes the game harder around survival mechanics and especially the economy as I mentioned I have also added some new mods using MO2 and I have had mixed results. Some of them work and some dont but Im reluctant to start troubleshooting too much because I dont want to break the mod collection experience where everything works together in the list. Thats why you not suppose to add mods to a large mod collection So Im just leaving it, its not serious mods anyway. It was just some Romance and extra companion mods

@melkathi Melkie my stepmom is leaving tomorrow for a 30 day overseas holiday, 7 days in London and 3 weeks in Greece at Paxos and Corfu Have you been to these islands, anything you can recommend outside of the normal advertised tourist things?

I wish international waters were respected but its often not the case The Houthis have been targeting ships for 2 years now in international waters and you will find people who justify this criminality and support it

"Petroganda "