Straggler

3 minutes ago, a m ole said:

How many lives and quality of lives has the halo saved now?

So freaking true. 

It is Russell's fault, but I'm not sure he deserves much of a penalty if any for it. Unfortunate rather than carelessness.

And he seems ok.

14 minutes ago, CVByrne said:

Max has been brilliant since he joined F1. He has an edge to him and lots of raw talent. I think he's great. 

I agree that Max is super talented, I just don't like him. He is an even better driver this season than he was last. He is calmer, more calculated. It is the worst thing that could have happened for his opponents because his risk taking could be reckless and was his greatest flaw. Maybe he would take more risks in a tighter fight, but he seems to have learned the long game and it is to his credit. I have to admire his talent as he passed all my checklist of what makes a great driver, watching him perform in changeable conditions as they were today is one of them.

For me though it is a personality thing. I think he is a dick.

2 minutes ago, Lichfield Dean said:

This is going to be mayhem

Love it!

6 hours ago, maqroll said:

He probably wants the state legislature to pass the law and trigger an immediate lawsuit that the Supreme Court could rule on. 

While it's a basic right to privacy issue, this Supreme Court is so extreme, they could fund a way to justify it somehow.

Roe v Wade was about the privacy bit of the constitution. Without it, states can legislate against what 2 consenting adults do in their own home. Unsurprisingly for a document written hundreds of years ago, privacy is not well defined in the document. RVW established that the loose wording should apply to a person's own body, therefore protecting abortion.  

Take away the RVW ruling and anything a state fancies legislating against you doing with your own body is on the table. The scotus have pretty much already challenged that there is a constitutional right to privacy.

That utter word removed Clarence Thomas has already suggested they go after other established freedoms like LGBTQ rights next. Gay marriage for example is almost certain to go, and tbh sodomy as a crime is likely to come back too.

Dems really need to step up here.  I don't expect them to, but they need to expand the SCOTUS, end the filibuster, and bang out a few laws guaranteeing access to safe and legal abortions US wide (Federal land could be used for this).  I don't know if any existing rules allow, but I'm 90% sure that the last 2 SCOTUS judges appointed both lied under oath about protecting Roe v Wade.  What is the point of the hearing if you can just BS your way through them?  Recall/impeach those 2.  So much that is wrong with America goes back to the rich and powerful being utterly consequence free.

27 minutes ago, StefanAVFC said:

Great post. 
 

@Arj Guy clearly finds it hilarious though. 

I could have made it even funnier. Belle could have had a pregnancy that threatens her life to bring to term. The local Dr refuses to abort for fear of going to jail and she dies, both baby and mother don't make it. Jock can hold a 2 for the price of 1 funeral. 

Or Jocks brother visits and rapes Belle. Jock and Belle then have to raise his brothers rape baby.

So many punch lines for this joke of a decision.

The Conservatives that I know are still saying that Labour would have been worse/they are all the same anyway. They can't justify it in any logical way, they just trot it out like it's the truth. I tend to stop talking about it at that point as I don't want to fall out with them.

44 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

Anyone watching ms marvel? 

I found myself about 15 mins in to the 2nd episode realising that it was on but i wasn't actually watching 

Just not clicking for me

I didn't even turn on the second episode. I just think I'm too old for it now / not the target audience. It gives me vibes of Sabrina the teenage witch. This does not mean it is bad TV I just remember watching stuff like this after school as a kid and it's not what I want to watch now. 

I also think I'm a little jaded by the number of times I have seen a hero discover their powers. The process is so well worn now that it has all the impact and wonder of flipping over the next card in a top trumps pack. 

It's a fricking amendment.  It can and should be amended to take into context the availability of modern military equipment and it's daily use against the civilian population by the civilian population.  Slavishly following the words written hundreds of years ago, no matter how well-meaning those words are, is so self-defeating.  Even the framers of the constitution wrote it to evolve over time as society changes.  It was never intended as anything other than a broad framework of principles that were to endure, with specifics that could change over time. The process to change the constitution is written into the constitution. To treat it more like a religious document, one immutable truth that can and will be adhered to at all times despite the consequences, is in itself against the constitution.

That said, regardless of the intentions of those that wrote the constitution, it seems to me that if the framework that a country is built on has resulted in a society that has hundreds of school shootings a year then it is incumbent upon the political class of the time to make a break with the chains of the past that are preventing positive change now.  I don't really care how one person or another interprets the constitution.  Today's problems need today's legislation.  The USA would still be a colony if the founding fathers had been timid little bitches like the current generation of politicians.

2 minutes ago, Brumerican said:

Universe ?

You mean the one sandy planet where 90% of this saga plays out ?

A good point well made. 

14 minutes ago, Brumerican said:

It took 5 episodes of mediocrity  to get to episode 6 though . You'd expect better than  a 1 in 6 hit rate from a company such as Disney. 

I think you are very kind calling it 5 episodes of mediocrity. It was genuinely poor TV despite the universe it was set in.

Im dyslexic with a known bad short term sequential memory. Happy to do the test but don't want to muck it up if you only want boring normal people.

10 minutes ago, Genie said:

My example was based on a sole trader, £10 for a BJ next to the bins at the back of Argos.

Honestly surprised anything is going up there given the circumstances.

I've had a bunch of glitches.  I had Jackie stood up in the car next to me as we were driving around, I've seen AI drivers trying to do a 3 point turn in a wide open space like Austin Powers in a golf buggy, I've had NPC's start strobing so much that the screen became unbearable to look at (and then eventually crashed the game). Not just a single NPC, but most of them.  I thought the enemy teleporting around the screen might have been a skill for a specific enemy type rather than a glitch, but with this game who knows?  That's it for me so far and I found most of the glitches funny rather than annoying.  Nothing that has stopped me from coming back.

This Jan 6th panel seems frustratingly like gun laws in the States.  Loads of compelling evidence, all the great and the good saying what a terrible thing it was, and no one seeming to actually do anything about it.  Without a prosecution, all they have done is make a sequel to White House Down.  Whilst there are details and evidence being presented now that are new, the overall story of how Jan 6th came to be was known on the same day it happened, because most of what happened the perpetrators were not trying to hide. 

FFS, we know Trump was at the heart of it, is anyone surprised Giuliani was there pissed up? Most of the people at the heart of the coup are still at the heart of politics now, and Trump has managed to go this long without even giving evidence.  As things stand now, he is more than likely to run for President again and has a damn good chance of winning (even if he doesn't win).  I've seen tweets from Hillary going all "I told you he was trouble" and I look at it and think, we know, do something about it!  All she can think about is how she should have been Pres and what she wants.  Anyone who is anyone in the Dems are saying that the Republican party right now present a clear threat to democracy in the USA then when asked what to do about it they all sorta shrug and say it's down to the Justice Department.  The same Justice Department which seems to not even have started it's own investigation, instead they are waiting for this committee to finish to make a decision.

The Dems are holding these 2 positions

1 - Trump and his gangsters were within a hairs breadth of ending American democracy and continue to be a threat to this day.

2 - We can't do anything about it because it may be seen as partisan.

Defending American democracy by fainting with the vapours and waiting for someone else to rescue them.  It's a level of pathetic that can only be rivalled by Ted Cruz.

54 minutes ago, bickster said:

Not sure Putin can hear him in a coma 

Colour me interested?  What is this rumour, I love to hear about bad things happening to bad people.

Just now, Ingram85 said:

Tell you what England need to do, pass it around the back 4 a bit more. 

NAA, Bowen needs more of the ball, it's so funny. I'm out the other side now and enjoying this like an episode of Faulty Towers.

Ok this is all the fault of you guys in here, but I went and got this game on the basis of your enjoyment. This is despite the fact that I am physically incapable of playing FPS games. I can't aim you see. My cursor flicks from one side of the screen to the other like a metronome, only briefly scanning over my intended target. Bullets fly like every target is an agent in the matrix, entire clips are emptied with all the impact of an sclub 7 lyric. 

Despite this I'm still enjoying myself. I stuck all my points in becoming a cyber samurai. I just have to fill my screen with my opponent and spam the hit button.  I'm an FPS badass. I've had one crash that made me very glad I'm not epileptic, but other than that it's a real fun world to role play in so long as the answer to the question is turning everything into squishy lumps of flesh with blades.

I know I'm watching significantly less football than I used to, but how did I get to the point that I have no idea who an English starting player is? Marc Guehi? Never heard of the chap. No idea who he plays for, what position he plays, nope not a thing. I know more about the Kardashians and that is only because of, errrr adult movies.

25 minutes ago, markavfc40 said:

Those who want to leave the Union will believe they'll be better off financially so I'd imagine they'll believe they'll be better able to handle the cost of living crisis if they can govern themselves.

I don't know if them being better off out of the Union would be the case in fairness. What I do know is that had Scotland, along with the rest of the UK stayed in the EU, then they along with the rest of us would be better off. I guess it grieves them more as they voted overwhelmingly to remain in the EU. They were never likely to be duped by self serving right wing chancers like Johnson/Farage though were they.

There is no doubt that Brexit/a Johnson led Tory government will have strengthened those who want independence belief that they would be much better off away from England. An England that has taken to self harm.

If Scotland do go independent I will seriously consider moving there. England under Tory rule is screwed and the system is rigged to make that the most likely outcome. 

It's not that Scotland's chances are great as an individual nation, it's more that England has lost touch with reality. We cheer on a past that never existed at the expense of a future we are wrecking. I'm happy to peel off the I'm with stupid three lions shirt.

13 hours ago, magnkarl said:

Possibly. But there’s a reason why he hasn’t mobilised and his May 9th speech was so flat. He’d need to row back over 100 days of statements about this not being a war, not needing to conscript, not having any trouble at all in Ukraine. It’s a massive loss of face and admitting that he was wrong/lying for 100 days straight. 

This is the brave new world of doublespeak though.  He can simply say that they have always been at war with the Ukraine and NATO, that conscription was inevitable and the size of the NATO fuelled opposition shows how right he was to react to the Nazi Ukrainian aggression in the first place. He can spout any old crap he wants, so long as the media repeat it.