Amentep

Rippanamusuko?

Artist interpretation of what Neolithic life was like:

*puts away ban button*

You say that like its a bad thing. I still remember how Harmony Gold, because of the success of Robotech, took the 70s Queen Millennia and Space Pirate Captain Harlock animes and merged them into a single show called Captain Harlock and the Queen of a Thousand Years to meet syndication requirements for number of episodes. That said, I love Leiji Matsumoto's stuff, and I wish more of it was translated here. (cue someone telling me about official manga releases that I missed over the years). Theme song with lyrics allegedly by Stan Lee himself. ♫ Defenders of the Earth (De-fennn-dersssss!) ♬ I think that US production companies or the network/syndication heads tended to think of teenagers as less accepting of complex storytelling in cartoons than happened in Japan, which for many years made action series somewhat dumbed down versions of live action TV shows (which also, for many years, were done-in-one-episode types of storytelling).

I'm currently re-watching DEFENDERS OF THE EARTH which is similarly a US show animated in Japan (and later Korea). In this case the writers and character designers/storyboarders from Marvel Productions animation (previously DePatie-Freleng, who did the Pink Panther titles and theatrical shorts) and Toei (later Daewon and Sei Young). Like a lot of US television animation, its aimed for, at best, a teen audience and the writing shows. I've enjoyed it for what it is, not expecting it to be a particularly nuanced show as it was a few years too early to benefit from the BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES breakthrough in television adventure cartoons*. I think that's one of the big differences from this kind of show and, say, Tom & Jerry which was pulling from a theatrical model that appealed to families (ie it was multilayered with gags for adults and kids) even after they moved to television (at least for awhile). *Yes, it does come post Robotech, but Robotech severely altered the source material to make it suitable for a teen audience and ultimately didn't lead to the breakthrough that many thought it would of more serious TV animation. And anyway, the model for DOTE seems to be GI Joe: A Real American Hero.

It is, but I think it has more to do with time investment (US football game is now as long as a baseball game on tv; my memory may be cheating me but I don't recall that being the case back a few decades ago) and the fact that football is more similar to basketball which is probably as popular as its ever been.

Good question, I believe it is actually state laws that codify this. But I'm not certain without doing more research.

That's why I said it is in the eye of the beholder; obviously one who lives in a small town and 90% of the jobs are tied to a single employer will not feel like they really have a choice not to comply. But rightly, or wrongly, that's the way the laws are set up.

In the US a number of vaccines are required* for enrollment in elementary and high schools and college (college is almost entirely for encephalitis). Most of these are for major diseases (mumps, rubella, etc). So that by the time the person is employed, they're already inoculated against a number of things. TB vaccine isn't recommended in the US, no vaccine for colds. That really just leaves the seasonal flu as the only thing they could require**, but its probably considered more trouble than worth in a benefit analysis. *but with exemptions for religious belief and such **Actually some jobs which work in places bacteria or virus may be fostered might have inoculations required to protect the person from the environment they'll be working in, but these would be unique to those jobs and something not even on the radar of other employers

"Land of the Free" typically would apply to freedom from governmental or religious compulsion to do/not do things, not necessarily that one would have no restrictions whatsoever; the idea would be any restriction you have is one you voluntarily agreed to place upon yourself. With the caveat, of course, that voluntary may be in the eye of the beholder. This is an important distinction because the relevant laws in the US around medical information (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act aka HIPAA) is that your medical provider needs your consent to disclose your information, not that your employer cannot ask you to provide medical information (putting the choice on the employee as to whether the benefits of employment are worth the loss of privacy inherent in the terms of the employment). Note that in all of the cases I'm aware (which is a very limiting caveat), things like drug tests are *not* conducted by the employer, they're *required* by the employer. Typically a third party administrator (picked by the company or allowed to be the choice of the employer) would work with the company to perform a drug test, and you would have to sign a legal document allowing the third party provider to release the results to your employer. These results would route through Human Resources and be handled by Human Resources with confidentiality, much as background checks would be done when hiring an employee. Hilariously, though, since your HR record isn't legally private, any medical records contained within your HR record wouldn't be covered by HIPAA's privacy rules. The only instance I know of personally involving an intoxicated employee didn't need a breathalyzer as the person also had a bottle of alcohol on them which wasn't allowed on site, so was an automatic dismissal without needing to prove intoxication. However, I'm not sure the employer could have legally required a breathalyzer, though, as there'd be questions regarding whether the intoxicated employee could consent to release the results (and, AFAIK, the police would decline involvement unless there was evidence an actual law was being broken, like DUI/DWI). All that said, not every business is big enough for an HR department, and also unionization adds an extra layer to everything, so everything can end up being different depending on where you work. Heck, just working in a right to work state where you can't be required join a union as a point of employment is a different experience from working in one where you could be. Anyhow, if you're interested here is a couple of links regarding HIPAA for the US that might help understand the distinctions the US makes regarding medical record privacy: https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-individuals/employers-health-information-workplace/index.html https://www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-individuals/faq/index.html

TNG - Aquiel Apparently no one in the production had seen THE THING. Also, when quarantining people, the crew forgot that they needed to quarantine the dog (and possibly should have done the same for Riker and LaForge even though take over was unlikely in Riker's case as he'd never really been alone on the station).

I liked Suicide Squad 2 (nice call-out to rec.arts.comics Shady, whether intentional or not). But then I liked the first one even if it was a narrative mess. My issue with the film?

Seems possibly apocryphal; she was supposedly suggested to Edward Pickering by his wife as having skills being wasted as a maid (she'd briefly been a teacher in Scotland). He employed her to do some part time work and proving adept at that, Pickering taught her how to do observations and had her lead a team of (human) computers observing the skies. Her work - and that of the other computers - is currently being preserved so that scholars can actually study their observations directly after being rediscover in about 20 boxes.

I guess we know why everyone went authoritarian all of a sudden...

Yeah, you can get a lot of that guy:

Yikes. Puritan is a group term; it covers the protestants who felt the Church of England was too closely tied in form and function to the Roman Catholic church and should be reformed (or, literally, purified of the Catholic influence). The Mayflower pilgrims were Brownists (aka separatist Puritans) who initially wanted to move to Newfoundland, but eventually moved to Amsterdam in 1607 when Cromwell was 8. Their motivation for leaving was the execution of Henry Barrow and John Greenwood (who'd founded the Brownest movement after the teachings of Robert Browne). The movement, like all puritan groups, wanted to to reform the church and in particular have repealed he Act of Uniformity (1559) that made it illegal to miss church functions. They became prosecuted after the Act Against Puritans (1593) which made it so that not attending the functions of the Church of England could ultimately lead to execution The Brownists actually had three going churches in Amsterdam, a protestant stronghold in Europe at the time, but had problems with supporting themselves and a desire to conduct missionary work and an internal split; part became the early Baptist church, with the others splitting between leaders with two groups ultimately leaving for the Americas ~1620, one to what is now Virginia, and one to Massachusetts. Cromwell, meanwhile, didn't officially become associated with Puritanism until 1630, 10 years after the Brownists hit America. For his part, Cromwell was considered part of a radical Puritan bent that arose after the persecution in England and was markedly anti-Catholic and anti-Quaker. That's not to say the Brownists were 'good' or 'bad', but their ties with Cromwell seem to be rather tenuous (as I recall, and a quick search didn't indicate they were part of the Puritan reverse migration with Cromwell came to power).

I've moved the topic to the Grounded forum, as it probably won't be seen by anyone who could answer the question for Obsidian there. If you haven't already, you might want to send something to support@obsidian.net as well; I believe for Pillars they had guidelines for fan use of IP, but I don't see one for Grounded.

RIP Bobby Eaton. The Midnight Express (Eaton and Condry, Eaton and Lane; I don't think I saw the earlier pre-Eaton version but may have) were one of those tag teams that regardless which territory I saw them in, you knew they were headed to the top to feud with the best. By all accounts I've heard, Bobby was a good guy, someone who I don't think I've heard anyone in the wrestling business say anything bad about and who fans have only had positive things to say about their interactions with him. And with wrestlers that pretty rarified country because usually someone held a grudge somewhere, but not with Bobby from what I've heard.