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Russia's huge manpower and the ability to mobilize very quickly was most certainly the reason the Soviet Union was able to keep on fighting after the Germans captured or killed more than four million Soviet soldiers in 1941, which all but destroyed the RKKA standing forces in the west by that point. But yeah, I guess manpower didn't really matter.

"Paraguay really was robbed"? What exactly are you referring to? The goal that was disallowed by Cardozo's offside? Seriously, what?

She only does that sporadically, afaik. Publicly, that is. Spain had the ref on their side, according to jackass manager Yup. Like, totally. Doesn't matter, anyway. Germany has been scary effective so far, and I don't see that changing against Spain.

Yep. The Spanish empire was pretty nefarious. It had some bright points (Lepanto) but mostly it was a reactionary blight. Your point? Only Uncle Joe's crimes don't end at the Purge. This is ridiculous and absurd. Prove that only Stalin's genocidal policies could have lead to a defeat of the Wehrmacht, or conversely that without these policies, Germany would have prevailed in the Eastern front. Russia had historically been a power and a very serious worry for European and especially German leaders (Bismarck: "The secret of politics? Make a good treaty with Russia."), so it's insane to suggest that Stalinism helped defeat Hitler, when it's actually most likely the opposite as Stalin's policies were fundamentally conceived to cement his own power, regardless of the cost. Early Soviet history is a contest between national socialists and international socialists to see who can kill the most Russians (and minorities).

That would be a misunderstanding on your part -- I (or that guy) can't be held responsible for your lack of a realistic picture of how things work outside America. Despite efforts (from within Europe, too) to portray Europe as a somewhat culturally homogeneous and politically unified entity, that's not really how things are. If you are suggesting that a Belgian politician expressing fringe historical views in Belgium somehow reflects badly on me as a Spaniard... then I can only assume that you haven't really done your homework.

Why? I'm pissed at neither. From the looks of it, both are just going for an obvious attention grab. I don't feel this guy represents me any more than, say, the heirs of the German American Bund do you. He just happens to live in the same continent as I do.

Proof, please. Also, **** the ref.

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, Maradona.

The rules should, ideally, make it a risk not *worth* taking, yes. I don't think so. If the idea was that offenses are to be punished so sternly that nobody would ever commit any willingly... they would be. The way the rules are set, tactical fouls are just another element of the game. Opinions to the contrary are, I think, holding the sport to an unrealistically romanticized standard. In fact, for truly unsportsmanlike acts (aggression, mostly), associations have committees deliberate and impose special sanctions on players, after the game. I'm not sure if any player has ever been perma-banned from playing, but the penalties imposed can be pretty harsh at times, regardless.

It could have meant either "some Europeans" or "the Europeans," as he included no article. People generally assume the latter, though. Yeah, technically, it should be "One European literally cannot... etc. as that's all this piece shows. I could go find a similar article about some cranky Stalin-loving lefty and make a similarly silly thread... and I would if this wasn't just the latest lolf troll-fail.

Err... not quite. The Maginot Line was meant to work in concert with the Belgian fort system, as there was an alliance in place when the system was built. Under this setup, the French army would have reinforced Belgian positions and theoretically a breakthrough would have been neither as easy nor as decisive. However Belgium, in a stroke of genius, broke their alliance with the French in 1936, which destroyed the principle around which the Line was built (present a homogeneous defense line to the German aggressor). Germany then outflanked France through "neutral" Belgium in 1940, after steamrolling them. It wasn't as much a military blunder as a political one... as per usual.

How exactly is that some sort of hypocrisy? Someone on death row has had a chance at life and has taken the lives of other's in, usually horrific means and would likely continue. I suppose those who oppose the death penalty yet are for abortions are ok with you. The argument usually goes like this: all life belongs to God, and therefore it's exclusively His prerogative to give and take it. If you accept that man can come up with exceptions to amend what is Divine judgment... well, all bets are off. Looking at it purely from a consistency perspective, it's not exactly the most tenable of positions. However, this is politics... <insert Chuck Norris reference>

Victoria is awesome. Market dynamics, internal politics, international relations, migrations and, of course, war in the advent of the industrial revolution. No tactical battles, though. "Suicide by micromanagement" for some (), Paradox's finest for others. And Vicky2 is coming out soon!

Dear Monte, I can't ever seem to get out of bed when I'm supposed to (!). Please help. Yours faithfully, elitenapper

That's being looked into, fyi. We can't have the rich becoming richer as the poor become poorer. Equal distribution of misery is a top priority atm. As for the quality of English footballers, I'm going to say that the team had, I think, sufficient quality to be world champions. The WC stakes just aren't high enough (individual awards can be earned without winning the championship, too), and they don't play as a team nearly long enough to be as compact as they are as part of their respective clubs. UEFACL/League tournaments are a much better representation of their ability... because they give a damn. The current setup means that competitions with the national team is something that pro footballers do on the side. Besides, nation-states are so pass

It is, unless it's Argentina.

Watched USA-Ghana, was great fun. I wish all teams had the same thirst for victory as these two -- Americans kept fighting till the bitter end, and this produced some awesome moments (goalie vs goalie head-to-head). Ghana's 2nd goal was pretty nice too. Overall I liked the way the US played better, with more discipline and less shenanigans, but I think Ghana deserved to win in the end, what with the lack of effectiveness of the American team and all. Then his close protection detail are doing a good job. But then again, regular people manage to sneak into a White House party uninvited, so...

Yeah. Then you find you can just arm everyone with bows and just have the guy with the boots of speed draw aggro while the mob in question gets pumped full of arrows. Then the feeling goes from frustration to a sense of vacuity and pointlessness. Numbersperson's Rule of Thumb: Good AI -> challenging games. Bad AI -> boring and/or frustrating games.

Uh-huh. I think it's pretty clear who has reading problems here. What, too many words in my post confused you? Maybe it's time for you to go back to something you are more accustomed to? Something with less words, more pictures and that is less likely to induce embarassing seizures in you? Here, this is some "semi-realistic military fiction" to get you on the right track. No need to thank me. edit: just spotted this gem as I reviewed the thread: Yeah, I'm an agent of the Man messing with your head! Time to up your meds, champ.

Second round? Hahaha, that's a good one! I'm looking forward to that game because it's the most interesting match-up so far, not because it'll decide who would be Spain's rival if we qualify. Funny about the US team, too. Just a few days before the tournament started I was talking with a friend about how they looked like they could give a few surprises to the "favourites".

Hahaha. I thought I was in your ignore list. Yeah, I kinda figured you couldn't stay away for long. No. Read the thread as many times as you need, if you can't keep track. You made an argument from ignorance (or speculated based on your lack of knowledge), and I offered counterarguments based on what I KNOW. For the nth time, WHICH point do you want to discuss in detail? The discussion cannot progress further until you refine your claims and make concrete points instead of vague suggestions. And also, please don't assume that just because your (lack of) knowledge comes from late nights with COD, everyone else is just letting their imagination fly. And, instead of researching the subject further, you just started imagining stuff and suggesting that the commandos had illegally executed a few activists, based on your assumption that they couldn't have scored headshots in the middle of a fistfight. And then you throw a fit when I dare question your intellectual rigour. My, I must really have hurt your ego. Get used to that feeling, and grow up already. Again, re-read the thread. I didn't say they were aiming for the head from the get go -- I was simply discussing this possibility, as it's an essential part of your "illegal execution" theory. I stated that hitting a person's head at a distance of less than 2 metres with a handgun is possible. No, this doesn't require a bit of proof, if you've ever fired a gun outside of a MW installment. I've seen a training drill for this, performed under high levels of induced stress. No, I don't have a YT link for you. Not everything is in YouTube. Shocking, I know. Um, so what? They tap the chest, then the forehead. That kinda works against your own discourse, btw, as it shows they are trained to go for the head. How does this relate to your other points anyway? Do you have any? Further, the instructor clearly says, "we're going live fire for the first time", and you can see their movements aren't that quick and automatic (one guy swept by another's head with a loaded, cоcked weapon; you'd know this is a VERY serious mistake, if you had ever had any actual tactical training), so they most likely aren't done training. Unless you are suggesting that the Israeli commandos were n00bs (proof plx), how is that video representative of an actual combat situation? Such as? My citing international law and how it relates to boarding rights under blockade conditions? My claims about 9mm Para being a common law enforcement caliber, and the relative lack of stopping power of jacketed bullets? My explaining the legitimate use of deadly force in self-defense? Those are all really easy to verify, even on the Internet, if you can use sources other than YouTube. I'm not going to do your homework, though. The other counterpoints cannot be made more specific until you concrete the statements those rebuttals were directed at. Get on it.

The biased ref'ing that people tear their shirts over almost every week somewhere in Europe, you mean. This was the same, but it attracted more attention because, well, it was a World Cup. The racism argument doesn't fly with me -- I think the outrage would have been similar regardless of who had been the host. Eagerly awating the Portugal-Brazil.

What's not to celebrate about being the janitor.. you get a swaggin jumpsuit. If you say so. I hear the hours and money aren't that great, though.

Oh yeah, and the argument that the game is an RPG could in turn lead to a discussion on ontological categories... awesome! But seriously, putting an arbitrary label on the box does not excuse bad gameplay. If anything, games define genres, not the other way around. There's no law that RPGs must have crap AI or clunky cover mechanics. Yeah, compare Blood Money's AI search/awareness routines with AP's, where a helicopter circling the area will alert everyone to your presence, despite the fact that you're behind cover. Compare the suspicion-o-meter with AP's "guard finds a corpse, gets mildly suspicious, forgets about the whole thing ten seconds later" system. Oh, and hey, I guess moving corpses out of sight and ****ing closing doors is way too much to ask in a game where stealth is supposed to be a valid way of beating most scenarios. Who cares about that anyway? You have The One Ring! But yeah, in AP enemies flank you and have unlimited grenades to drag you out of cover. I guess in that respect, AP is better. Dialogues and characterization are better too. A shame that all of that is irrelevant wrt the points I was discussing, don't you think?

Because he has opinions and expresses them? O-kay. I can understand where some of the complaints come from, at any rate. Hitman: Blood Money one-ups AP with regards to stealth, infiltration and AI without compromising gunplay should the player want (or need to) shoot his way through a mission, and without pulling stupid **** like invisibility magicks. And, um, it's a 2006 game. Once again, the gameplay of an Obsid game just isn't up to par.