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I am Ram

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Everything posted by I am Ram

  1. https://www.reuters.com/world/biden-says-three-us-service-members-killed-drone-attack-us-forces-jordan-2024-01-28/ RIP to the fallen. :( Biden will have no choice than to strike Iranian targets.
  2. Hanging is a particularly tricky method too. It CAN be done "safely", but the head tends to come off. Not pretty.
  3. I hate, hate, hate the introduction of commercials in streaming services. This is how it started with cable. Not doing it. We've cut down on the number of services we subscribe to. It's not for me, but I understand everyone who just uses "free" streaming services. Especially given the quality they deliver these days.
  4. Because of we want the deed done, but we don't have the stones to do it. As Halfman said on the first page, we want things sanitized. Even the firing squad involves a chair, blindfold, and probably a bunch of blanks. I'm not some kind of macho romantic, but let people stand and look their executioners in the eye, for God's sake. Decapitation? Inconceivable.
  5. The guy's face! At least he'll have a good story to tell.
  6. Or.. we're just more likely to hear about those cases. :(
  7. Which cultural celebrations have been obliterated?
  8. It's quite possible. Satellites and navigation equipment in general are frequent victims of disruption by solar flares.
  9. Wait, let me get this straight: You're saying Biden did not, in fact, read this thread and order his Kamala to go and drill for oil?
  10. Yeah, it's a bit sus. Texas has a much lower fuel tax than most other states, but that doesn't explain the huge difference. Not sure I completely buy the whole "distance from refinery" argument. I mean, cheese isn't half the price in Wisconsin or Vermont as in other places.
  11. I'm just trying to learn from you, Convert. :( A good teacher should be able to explain things in a way even slow students understand.
  12. Woah, @Nevada Convert! Looks like Brandon is reading this board, look:
  13. So, your plan is for Biden to create a drilling-friendly environment so that huge amounts of oil immediately become available, which will make Russia too poor to launch nukes?
  14. Look, the problem starts with this kind of reflexive digging in on both sides. Of course the sheer number of guns in this country are a problem. They make heat-of-the-moment violence easier. They make suicides easier. And they make terrible accidents more likely to happen. If we somehow got rid of most guns in the country, we'd see far fewer deaths, easy as that. On the other hand, guns aren't THE problem. As you and others have pointed out, mental health and life stress are probably our single biggest societal issue. If we fixed that, we'd also see a huge drop in death and violence. Most Americans understand this and that our best solution would be a some-of-everything approach. But leaders on both sides have little incentive to take that approach. It's much easier to cater to the passionate minorities, knowing that the more moderate voters will fall in line. If in doubt, conservatives will support the loud pro-gun people, and progressives will support the loud anti-gun people. Doesn't matter that most conservatives support reasonable gun restrictions, and that most progressives don't support draconian restrictions. And pretty much everyone agrees America needs more (mental) healthcare and better work-life balance. Yet, nothing happens because to many, if the other side supports it, it must be bad.
  15. Yeah, that's not inflation, that's your DIL getting robbed. Wiper blades cost pretty much what they always cost in recent year. Lemme guess - she went to the dealership?
  16. So, here is the thing about gas prices: Let's take the median price of the glory days of the GW Bush days, say $2.30. Now add the 2% inflation rate most experts consider desirable, which takes us to an expected inflation-adjusted gallon price of about $3. So yes, a median current price of gasoline at $3.50 tracks above what's expected, but let's look at fuel consumption: If you drive a reasonably modern car of the kind 90% of Americans need (i.e. a car or unibody SUV), it's likely that the portion of your budget that goes to fuel has actually gone down compared to the early 2000s because cars and car-based SUVs have become dramatically more fuel efficient. The notable exception: the pickup trucks everyone seems to "need" these days. BUT MY SUPER DUTY ONLY GETS 18 MPG! I NEED MY SUPER DUTY! GAS NEEDS TO BE CHEAPER! You're an accountant in suburban Lake Oswego, OR, and you go to Home Depot twice a year. BUT MY FAMILY IS A TRUCK FAMILY! MY GRANDPA HAD A TRUCK! MY DAD HAD A TRUCK! Your grandpa had a farm vehicle. Your dad had a utilitarian work vehicle. YOU have a luxury car that happens to also be a pickup truck. GAS IS TOO EXPENSIVE! Don't get me wrong, I'm not hating on modern trucks here. If you have one because it's cool (which is a valid reason in my book), go for it. But then don't complain about paying a bit more for gas. The car industry has given you a million ways not to overspend on gas.
  17. Wait, you're being serious about this? Okay, first of all, they weren't paying people to take it off their hands. Crude prices were in the negatives for a little while because there was no market and no storage capacity. That doesn't mean retail customers could pull up in their F-150s and get paid 30 bucks for each barrel of crude they'd pick up. I'm too lazy to look it up, but I'm pretty sure upstream producers don't even sell crude like that. Assuming you don't happen to own a refinery, a storage facility, AND major transportation infrastructure, that oil - if someone sold it to you - would have been a massive liability. And that's only the purchase and owning part. You can't just pull up at a refinery and sell them 56 barrels of slightly aged WTI. And even if you found any takers, they certainly wouldn't pay market rate for the tiny amounts you could realistically sell them. But here's the main thing. Even if, by some miracle, you would have been able to purchase, store, transport, and sell a bunch of crude at a spread of $90/barrel: At the same time with the same money, you could have bought, say Royal Caribbean stock. At their lowest, they traded at around 20 bucks per share. A few months later, they traded at almost four times that price. That's a MUCH better deal - and one that doesn't require explaining to your family why there are 15,000 gallons of crude in your backyard swimming pool.
  18. Yeah, transport, storage, and permits would have eaten every single cent of your profits. Invest in Lego sets if you want to put storage space to good use!
  19. Tbf, we're counting from the time of the 9/11 crash to the height of the housing bubble.
  20. Ha! 10 years or so ago, I went to the Blue Lagoon in Reykjavik. Thy have mandatory naked showering before you enter, and they have people enforcing it. When we were in line, I was sure the Americans around us would hate it. But to my surprise, everyone put a brave face on. There was an Italian group that got really upset, though. Now I know they probably all had shrink wank.
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