August 2019 Current Events Thread: It's Hot and Everything Sucks

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Internet VFW > August 2019 Current Events Thread: It's Hot and Everything Sucks

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Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Vasudus posted:

My new office has a collection of rotating O5s/O6s that do like 45 days at a time or something. They're just used for hey-you action officer stuff because they're only there for such a short time.

Our reservists all needed accounts and certifications that lapsed in the year they spent between IDTs and couldn�t be reactivated before they were done with their next set. Literally worthless - they couldn�t even access email.

# ¿ Aug 1, 2019 23:54

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# ¿ May 17, 2024 20:07

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Major Payne is clearly the best

# ¿ Aug 2, 2019 01:15

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Vasudus posted:

anything that puts your total payments or value into the hands of the free market is a scam

Better deal than taking literally nothing if you get out before 20

# ¿ Aug 2, 2019 18:57

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Milo and POTUS posted:

I imagine it's a difficult problem to suss out and there almost certainly isn't a single reason why climate change denial is so popular but IIRC the level of higher education doesn't matter. Like, at all. It's about worldview and whether the individual considers themselves a part of something greater or whether they believe that rugged individualist claptrap. I doubt I could find that study and in any case a single study probably isn't a smoking gun on something so complicated

Many of my science denying coworkers are highly educated, well-off, and have spent decades working with space systems. It�s definitely an issue of propaganda meshing with some broken personal ideology.

# ¿ Aug 3, 2019 18:22

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

sharknado slashfic posted:

Most of the ones I run into are of the "First we were all gonna die from acid rain, then we were all gonna die from the hole in the ozone layer, then we were all gonna die from Y2K, it'll go away" mindset.

People wore masks when walking around in LA within the living memory of boomers yet somehow they still deny that people can have an impact on both the cause and solution. What�s really sad is seeing this mindset in 20-30-somethings.

# ¿ Aug 3, 2019 18:42

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Investing in resilient, distributed sources of energy ought to be appealing to rugged individualists. Creating massive new industries around renewables ought to make investors salivate. Instead we let the liches in charge of a tiny fraction of our industry dominate us.

# ¿ Aug 3, 2019 18:59

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Oh cool I wonder how many of my classmates and professors are dead now

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 15:37

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

facialimpediment posted:

FYI - This is all you're going to get.

https://twitter.com/existentialfish/status/1158018462125572102?s=19

Give Trump a few hours to get back from the golf course and he'll parrot it too.

That�s maybe the only thing Fox News could say that might actually get young right wingers to lash back.

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 15:52

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Bored As gently caress posted:

Here's the problem - it's not going to work. Banning so called assault weapons is not going to work because "assault weapons" are really just semi automatic rifles with certain scart features like a pistol grip, or a collapsible stock, or a barrel shroud, or a muzzle brake, or a flash suppressor, or a super scary bayonet lug. Look at California's increasingly restrictive gun laws and you'll see that simple assault weapon bans aren't enough, and that when they fail to work, every single law after that gets more and more restrictive, yet still fails to do what the legislators want them to do. First they grandfathered in preban magazines. Then they got rid of that. The when people followed the letter of the law with the bullet button, they banned that, too.

The generous interpretation is to say that the legislators want to end gun violence. The more cynical interpretation is that the legislators want to pass a bill that looks like they are being tough on the NRA and looks like they're tough on gun violence, while also doing nothing to end the root causes of gun violence in general because that is etremely expensive, complicated, multi-faceted, and requires a reworking of our health care system, our mental health care system, our education system, and our criminal justice system. So passing a bill that further restricts what guns people can have is just a hell of a lot easier for them to do.

I honestly can't really blame them, because people, like voters, like simple answers. They don't like complicated solutions because you can't put that in a sound bite. That's the same exact reason why people love what Trump says about immigrants. "The immigrants are taking your jobs, the immigrants are dangerous, it's the immigrants fault why you aren't rich. Building the wall will solve this!" It's a really simple answer, and it's completely wrong. But people love being told what they already think is true, and if you have a simple solution to a problem that reinforces what people already think is true, then you're gonna get votes.

The 1st problem with passing more gun laws Is that fascists, right wing militias, and white supremacists aren't going to turn theirs in, and I'll be dammed if it's only the Rpublicans that have firearms after a ban. The 2nd problem is that of implementation. The 1994 AWB only passed the house and senate because of the sunset clause. A bill without the sunset clause will have a much harder time of being passed. Then there's the issue of grandfathering the firearms that exist now. If you don't grandfather the so called assault weapons that are legally owned now, and instead go the route of a mandatory buy-up, you've just made felons of millions of Americans instantly, because even non racist otherwise law abiding citizens aren't going to hand them in. Then, how are you going to pay for all of the ones that are turned in? That'll be spending tens of billions of dollars taking previously legally owned firearms out of the hands of law abiding citizens, when those billions would've been better spent on improving access to healthcare, universal pre-K, or expanding the free school lunch problem.

The other problem with passing more restrictive gun laws is that it's not going to address any root causes for gun violence in general, or the rise of mass shootings in particular. Trump's rise to power and his racist rhetoric emboldens other racists. Hate crimes have gone up significantly since hes been president. Racists love him. White supremacists love him. The anti immigrant, Anti-Muslim narrative has caused so many lone wolf terrorist attacks. El Paso was a terrorist attack. Full stop. Yet the DOJ and FBI aren't going hard after right-wing white supremacist terrorista groups, at least publicly. Why would they when their boss is a racist himself?

The FBI has purview over those types of assholes, and I'm sure they've got undercover guys working on infiltrating white supremacist groups, but here you run into the same problems that they run into with violent Islamist extremist groups - most of these terrorists are self-radicalized. Most of them have few outside social contacts or friends, or if they do, they hide their extremist views (or at least their intensions to commit an attack) from everyone except their online friends (whether it be Stormfront or 8chan, or jihadist websites) or a small group of people who they're going to commit the act with. There's not a lot of chances for law enforcement to intervene because these fucks largely fly under the radar. You can't just arrest people in a white supremacist group just because the views they espouse are abhorrent, just like you can't lock up Muslims who post jihadi videos online and say that it's great when Americans get blown up overseas. It's free speech, and thank gently caress we still have that right somewhat intact.

So these people fly under the radar either because 1) they self radicalize completely, or 2) they incubate in these echo chambers of hate until they are ready to commit the act. Unless a family member or friend alerts the FBI or local police, no one's gonna know until they commit the act.

And even when the person is known and has an interaction with FBI or police, we don't have Minority Report style pre-cogs who can know what they're doing in a week, so unless they've already done something illegal, it's not easy to charge them with anything. And it's not like we have unlimited resources in equipment, man-hours, and manpower to watch every possible bad guy, or even every guy that's on a watchlist - nor should we.* If we did, we'd live in a no-poo poo dystopian dictatorship. *(There have been so many terror attacks committed by home grown terrorists in Europe where the attackers have been known to police or intelligence agencies, But they were never charged with anything because they didn't commit crimes yet. Some people think that if someone is known to police or intelligence as a potential terrorist (for instance, if they fought for ISIS in Syria and then came back to France or Belgium), that the authorities have 24 hour surveillance on a guy with a 12 man team of agents and surveillance specialists with multiple cars and phone taps. That poo poo isn't reality. There's far too many potential bad guys, and not nearly enough resources to watch them all).

In short, gun laws aren't going to solve the issue. What we need to do is to look at the problem holistically, and come up with science and fact based solutions that doesn't give the government more power and doesn't further infringe on people's rights to adequate self defense.

In summary, ban and confiscate all weapons after a buy-back grace period. That is the science and fact-based solution practiced worldwide. Right wing extremism should also be dealt with but what's going on right now is that people have both motive and means, and taking away their means is part of fixing the problem.

Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 17:43 on Aug 4, 2019

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 17:41

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

not caring here posted:

Won't have to worry about gun violence when these loving chuds learn it's safer for them to lay out EFPs and set buildings on fire and poison water supplies or taint food sources.

They want it to be personal.

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 17:54

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Law enforcement is already collecting information on right wing terrorists and refusing to do anything with it so addressing that does seem like a good step

Throwing your hands up and saying the concept of preventing domestic terrorism is inherently intolerable does not seem like a good step

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 18:13

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

bulletsponge13 posted:

I'll admit, I have a mental block to bans, because it is incredibly easy to build a gun with poo poo from ACE hardware without raising an eye brow. It's not 100% logically, and I get that, it's just I know what I would do as a bad guy, and I have issues getting past that mental hurdle.

For one, your pvc zip gun would barely be capable of getting one shot off much less mow down 30+ people.

3D printers and home metal fabrication seem like the greater threat and I don�t know how you�d begin dealing with that without just banning the concept of workshops. In ten years we probably will get to the point where you can make your own reliable automatics.

Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 18:18 on Aug 4, 2019

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 18:16

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Bored As gently caress posted:

Use your strawman arguments somewhere else.

My interpretation of what you said may not be what you meant but that doesn�t mean I�m straw manning you. There used to be methods for addressing domestic terrorism and white supremacy specifically and the reason those got rolled back was because they were hurting the Republican base, not because the intelligence collecting methods were too invasive. I think you�re right to be concerned about the current administration but the intelligence community and federal law enforcement has so far managed to stay on the level, DHS and CBP aside.

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 22:24

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

FAUXTON posted:

Wasn't there someone who shot someone in a theater over talking too much or eating their popcorn too loudly?

A retired cop shot a guy after complaining about his texting. He tried to say he was defending himself after escalating the situation into a fight.

https://www.cnn.com/2017/03/10/us/stand-your-ground-movie-trial/index.html

# ¿ Aug 4, 2019 22:47

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

BigDave posted:

A gun buyback program and banning semi-auto firearms is probably not feasible, mostly because the NRA made firearm ownership a part of identity politics. Owning a gun went from target shooting and hunting to owning the libs and being a man at the same time.

People might be right that arming blacks and gays is the way through this.

# ¿ Aug 5, 2019 02:08

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

CommieGIR posted:

It already is, he's using a man shooting at people of Spanish decent as fodder to push anti-immigration bills.

Can�t target them if they�re not here!

# ¿ Aug 5, 2019 13:33

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

bird food bathtub posted:

NPR was going over the Rod Blagoya-whatever thing on the way home. Turns out his wife was on Fox multiple times saying, word for word, how unfairly he was treated and how he's the real victim for just doing some light ~~treason~~ corruption.

The leader of the country is an oatmeal brained dotard and a propaganda channel dictates his actions to him because he's outsourced his loss of mental faculties to the television.

We already saw this work with the sailor who was caught photographing equipment on a nuclear submarine and claimed he wanted to show them to his infant daughter. It�s a good strategy.

Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 23:25 on Aug 8, 2019

# ¿ Aug 8, 2019 23:22

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Sue Gordon, the deputy DNI, is resigning. She was insanely well respected by the IC and a fantastic speaker. I saw her talk in person about how hopeful she was for the future and for the future of her grandkids. Lmao.

# ¿ Aug 8, 2019 23:36

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Internet Wizard posted:

CNN said it was cardiac arrest, which seems like a difficult way to commit suicide.

Especially since he was already on watch after he was found with marks on his neck

Guess what gets arrested when you get choked with a noose

Your...your cardiac

# ¿ Aug 10, 2019 16:41

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

LtCol J. Krusinski posted:

I watch every new episode when it airs.

I�ve been watching for 30 years.

This Epstein stuff is loving... well Wasabi The J said it best.

I catch one every once in a while and the newer ones seem pretty solid. There was probably like a solid 15 year rough patch though.

# ¿ Aug 10, 2019 21:36

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

UP THE BUM NO BABY posted:

https://twitter.com/mhanham/status/1161045881220554753?s=19

What an unbelievably stupid loving thing to put on Twitter gently caress me what the gently caress

# ¿ Aug 13, 2019 00:00

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

These things are all great examples to pull up when somebody claims that you can't criticize large companies for making these decisions because they're working with more information and smarter support than you have.

Back when they were first talking about banning porn every Cletus on the internet knew it would be ruinous.

# ¿ Aug 13, 2019 00:41

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Vincent Van Goatse posted:

Better than being a penguin-sized man.

# ¿ Aug 15, 2019 03:34

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Vasudus posted:

The stock market is both the least important and the most important thing depending on where you are in your life.

I have to calm my mom down on a regular basis when her portfolio takes a hit because it's all she has and the total value of her portfolio determines how much money she can spend per month. She's terrified of running out of money before she dies and having to depend on me to support her. Considering she's 71 and in excellent health and my grandma is 96 and still kickin' it's a valid concern. It's all money from my dad's life insurance payout + her selling her house and downsizing so it's nowhere near enough to do things like hedging.

In the meantime I haven't even glanced at my 401k since I got one almost 5 years ago. It doesn't matter to me right now and managing it doesn't change anything in a significant enough way. I probably have a lot in there just considering the raw percent of my salary + employer match, I don't know and I don't care.

Aren�t olds always advised to take their money out of stocks and put them into more stable investments?

# ¿ Aug 15, 2019 17:27

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Vasudus posted:

It's almost entirely in low-risk, stable things like index funds and such rather than individual stocks. But if the whole market takes a poo poo then it gets hit enough to radically alter her spending.

They usually mean stuff like CDs when they talk about low risk investments, not index funds. That�s assuming you make it to retirement age with a comfortable amount to cash out on, though, and aren�t dependent on an 8%+ return to stay alive.

Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 17:58 on Aug 15, 2019

# ¿ Aug 15, 2019 17:55

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Vasudus posted:

Yeah I don't know what her portfolio breakdown is proper. I should look next time I'm over there. She does have an asset manager so I'm assuming they're not total morons.

In my casual perusing of financial advice stuff over the years the prevailing opinion seems to be that asset managers are sharks and rarely worth their fee. It might be worth shopping around for a new one that isn�t going to leave her in a state where her quality of life is tied so directly to the market.

# ¿ Aug 15, 2019 18:07

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

My CCW class in Virginia was taught by a 400-pounder wearing BDUs who spent most of it ranting about Obama and wishing he could use castle doctrine to justify killing "looters"

The other instructors acted visibly pissed whenever they had to show students how to load the range's busted-rear end assortment of handguns.

# ¿ Aug 15, 2019 23:58

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Bored As gently caress posted:

According to most gun banners, yes, because Person 2 committed the sin of owning guns in the first place and LOL PRIVATE OWNERSHIP OF A GUN IS A HUGE PUBLIC RISK AUTOMATICALLY ONCE YOU TAKE OWNERSHIP OF ONE

This but unironically.

# ¿ Aug 16, 2019 01:31

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Bored As gently caress posted:

The natural end of that argument is that any ownership of any firearm, even if it's a safe queen that never sees the light of day, or gets shot 15 times at the beginning of hunting season, automatically increases the danger to the public in the area.

Statistically it literally does.

# ¿ Aug 16, 2019 01:48

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

not caring here posted:

Re credit scores. My credit scores are all above 800 now and the way you get treated is loving amazing.

Bought my wife a new car, went in to sign the paperwork, and it got confused that I wanted financing. But I was just gonna pay with wire transfer.

So I say that I'll just come back when the wire transfer clears, no biggie. But they ran my credit score and basically sent me off with the car under a gentleman's agreement to pay. Also offered me the Mazda financing rate of 1.99% or whatever it is.

I was legitimately shocked. Didn't put a cent down walked out with a new car. Having a good score is dope.

Hah, I bought a car a few months ago and the dealership tried to scam me on the financing. They said their only options were 5%+ for an 800+ score. I applied for USAA loan right in front of them and got 3%, after which the finance guy visibly soured and said he magically found a list of companies offering 3.5%.

# ¿ Aug 18, 2019 15:25

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Mr. Nice! posted:

That is done, once again, for the dealer reserve. Their banks were offering 3% (or less) for an 800 score. This is part of why cash purchases do not have as much negotiating power as financed ones.

This can be used to your advantage if you have the cash to pay off the loan immediately (or refinance) because the dealership gets their reserve regardless.

Yeah I realize the point is to earn the dealer more money but instead of offering me a deal they just copped a lovely attitude over my shopping around.

Still better than the Toyota salesman who approached me in the parking lot, talked me up, and then abruptly canceled my test drive when I compared prices to other dealers.

Maybe salesman actually try to negotiate in other markets. Here it seems so busy that if you don�t act like a mark they just tell you to gently caress off and wait for somebody else to come along.

Tiny Timbs fucked around with this message at 18:36 on Aug 18, 2019

# ¿ Aug 18, 2019 18:33

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

hobbesmaster posted:

rm -rf / folder/you/were/trying/to/delete

AGH

# ¿ Aug 20, 2019 03:51

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

You�re a real piece of poo poo Margaret

# ¿ Aug 20, 2019 23:35

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Did anybody come up with "Donald's Folly" yet

# ¿ Aug 21, 2019 01:31

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Plastic_Gargoyle posted:

https://www.10tv.com/article/florida-man-charged-after-botched-castration-home-2019-aug

This has been your reminder that Florida Man exists.

People are full of poo poo when they say Florida only seems crazy because of its crime reporting laws.

# ¿ Aug 21, 2019 04:08

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Lol is he really doing the Antichrist thing

Lol

# ¿ Aug 21, 2019 13:35

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

Milo and POTUS posted:

my imbecilic cousin who last i saw him was bitching about Sansa stark not wanting to work in georgia because of their stupid abortion bullshit yet she was willing to work in northern ireland asked me post election 2008 if I thought Obama was the antichrist

Yeah I remember the crazy stories about Obama but this time the president is actually, literally doing the Antichrist thing and that is just blowing my mind

# ¿ Aug 21, 2019 23:54

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

BigDave posted:

The way things keep going, this might actually happen.

I'm at the point where I read stuff like that and feel like it already happened

# ¿ Aug 22, 2019 23:41

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

orange juche posted:

https://twitter.com/Ferric242/status/1164869840802373638

lmao

"human being" is a hell of a stretch for a hive of interdimensional wasps in a skin suit

E: this is also why trump will get re-elected in 2020 because there are people who can look at the current state of things and go "both sides"

This man who was actively working to kill my family and the planet deserves our love and respect

# ¿ Aug 23, 2019 14:31

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# ¿ May 17, 2024 20:07

Tiny Timbs: Sep 6, 2008

The Expanse show is way better than the books and I hope they have the freedom to keep rewriting plot lines.

# ¿ Aug 24, 2019 23:28

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Internet VFW > August 2019 Current Events Thread: It's Hot and Everything Sucks

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