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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:39:24 GMT -8
For chemists, alcohol is not a problem, it's a solution You Should See the One That Got AwayNow here's something you don't see at the fair - a man using two hands to lift a goldfish nearly as big as he is. Worcestershire angler Andy Hackett landed the orange beast while on a trip to France, in a region worthy of toasting such success - Champagne. The giant, known as The Carrot, was introduced to Bluewater Lakes there 20 years ago, proving elusive since.  But then came along Mr Hackett and rod; using, you might say, a Carrot and stick approach. The fish, he explained, was a hybrid of a leather carp and a koi carp and after a 25-minute battle, it was all over. The goldfish that had been a white whale to many was in Mr Hackett's net. "You're gonna need a bigger bowl," was everyone's first thought, quickly followed by whether there were scales large enough to weigh scaly Carrot. But a weigh-in was achieved, with this beauty's (Beauty?> That's an ugly fish.) vital statistic being a whopping 30kg (67 pounds). And yet there was no need for a mountain of potatoes for chips - The Carrot was released back from whence he came to leave another angler with a chance of a fishy tale. |
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:41:18 GMT -8
He Should Know All About Sanctions
Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel describes sanctions against Russia as “unfair” during a trip to Moscow, where he and President Vladimir Putin unveiled a statue of Fidel Castro.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:43:11 GMT -8
Perhaps This is Why He Announced
Trump walkied into Trump Tower in New York City with his son Eric Trump last week to sign a reported $4 billion deal with a Saudi Arabian real estate company to build a mammoth project in Oman.
This particular deal puts him directly into murky waters. According to The New York Times, the project isn’t just some random real estate deal—it’s a deal with the government of Oman itself. Conflict of interest much?
Kathleen Clark, a law professor at Washington University in St. Louis, tells the Times, “This is yet another example of Trump getting a personal financial benefit in exchange for past or future political power. … The Saudis and Oman government may believe that giving Trump this licensing deal will benefit them in the future, should Trump become president again. This deal could be a way to ensure that they will be in Trump’s good graces.”
The behemoth AIDA project is led by the Saudi-based Dar-Al Arkan and is in conjunction with the government of Oman, which the Times reports owns the land. The concept includes 3,500 high-end villas, two hotels with around 450 rooms, a golf course (of course), and retail shops and restaurants.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:45:22 GMT -8
Will the QOP Have the Nerve to Change to Proportional Awarding of Delegates?
Since Trump still has many, many supporters in the grass roots of the G.O.P., the only way for non-maga Republicans to consign him to history is for them to unite against him, perhaps subordinating their individual interests and ambitions. As the event in Las Vegas demonstrated, that’s a tricky proposition—especially with Trump already running.
In theory, the 2024 primaries could serve as a moment when the Party would line up behind someone other than Trump. But the 2016 primary had the opposite effect: a scrambled field of more than a dozen candidates helped Trump to steamroller everyone else. Will that happen again? Quite possibly. One of the keys to Trump’s victory in 2016 was that many states used a winner-takes-all system, or something roughly equivalent, which enabled Trump to rack up delegates in the early states with a plurality of the vote. In South Carolina, he received all fifty delegates despite getting just 32.5 per cent of the vote. Marco Rubio, who attracted 22.5 per cent, got no delegates.
The QOP and Courage? Nah!
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:47:40 GMT -8
What is the Only US Court With No Ethics Rules?
The most striking detail in the recent investigation by The New York Times into another potential Supreme Court breach is not the evidence that Justice Samuel Alito or his wife may have leaked information to conservative friends in 2014 about the outcome of Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, which extended “religious liberty” to the actions of family-owned corporations.
No, the most striking detail is the extent to which a number of Republican justices, Alito included, appear to have been the targets of a sophisticated and well-funded influence operation designed to notch as many legal and constitutional victories for moneyed and conservative interests as the justices were willing to give.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:52:12 GMT -8
The Most Dangerous Person in the World is ... WHO?
In an interview with Semafor, Mike Pompeo, who is thought to be eyeing a potential 2024 White House bid, said that
education is one of the central issues that Republicans should focus on, noting his criticism of Weingarten and the current teaching curriculum in U.S. school systems.
“I tell the story often — I get asked ‘Who’s the most dangerous person in the world? Is it Chairman Kim, is it Xi Jinping?’ The most dangerous person in the world is Randi Weingarten,” Pompeo said.
“It’s not a close call. If you ask, ‘Who’s the most likely to take this republic down?’ It would be the teacher’s unions, and the filth that they’re teaching our kids, and the fact that they don’t know math and reading or writing,” the former top U.S. diplomat added.
“These are the things that candidates should speak to in a way that says, ‘Here’s the problem. Here’s a proposal for how to solve it. And if given the opportunity, these are the things I will go work on to try and deliver that outcome that fixes that problem,'” Pompeo concluded. “Pretty straightforward stuff.”
Clearly, If Your Party is Based on Ignorant People, Education is the Biggest Threat
Another MAGA Republican just put a bullseye on the back of an innocent American citizen; this time, it is Randi Weingarten, the President of the American Federation of Teachers. Mike Pompeo, the former Secretary of State under Donald Trump, accused the teacher of being more dangerous than Kim Il Jong, XI, and even Putin, who is actively committing genocide in Ukraine and threatening nuclear warheads to be used in Europe.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:53:56 GMT -8
We Have a Poll! We Have a Poll!
In the first poll of the Georgia runoff on December 6, Democrat incumbent Raphael Warnock is up 51-47, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports:
The poll, commissioned by the AARP, pegged Warnock at 51% and Walker at 47% — within the margin of error of 4.4 percentage points.
Conducted by the bipartisan team of Fabrizio Ward & Impact Research, it’s the first major public poll since the Nov. 8 election ended with neither rival securing the majority vote needed for an outright victory.
Is Warnock in the Lead or Is It a Statistical Dead Heat, Because It is Within the Margin of Error?
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:55:12 GMT -8
85 Things Russia Got Wrong
Electing Putin to begin with
No emphasis on NCOs for expertise
No empowerment of junior officers and NCOs to make decisions
Viewing competent officers as a threat to be eliminated
Abusive treatment of soldiers
Culture of grift in the military
Allowing Oligarchs to not deliver purchased equipment
Not performing proper maintenance on stored equipment (all the Tanks they were supposed to have)
Unwillingness to equip soldiers with expensive equipment (night vision, etc) due to grift
Poor and insufficient training
Expected Ukrainian Leadership to fold quickly
Expected the Ukrainian people to welcome the Russian invasion
Believed pre-war bribes to be working (they only seemed to work in Kherson and a few other places)
Did not ready proper 3:1 troop ratio for a successful offensive
Did not ready nearly enough soldiers to occupy a hostile nation
Only planned for immediate Ukrainian surrender or 3 day campaign
Attacked in too many directions at once
Overly reliant upon rail supply
Did not secure critical rail junctions early (such as Kharkiv)
Did not properly secure supply lines
Grossly overextended supply lines in Northern Ukraine
Dug into the ground and other stupid activities around Chernobyl
Failed to properly scout out all Ukrainian air defense
Failed to target enough of Ukrainian air defense
Fail to persist with targeting Ukrainian air defense until it was suppressed.
Did not properly support paratrooper or air-mobile assault.
And then repeated the same poor paratrooper or air-mobile assaults again and again and again.
No effective combined arms.
Tanks used without infantry cover.
No training of proper response to an ambush
Use of long columns of vehicles in areas of likely enemy activity
Large concentrations of vehicles in the open making a target rich environment
Poor accuracy artillery
Targeting of civilian targets instead of military targets. (both artillery and missiles) [Peter Olandt] [Firefoot]
Poor scouting (reports of Russian “recon” using loud groups of 20-30 soldiers)
Poor perimeter defense
Unable to coordinate a large number of forces at once
Persist with small ineffective attacks
Many targets of attacks have no obvious strategic value
Smoking
No (or little) use of pallets and forklifts
Improperly equipping soldiers
Not providing food for soldiers
Waiting way too long to mobilize
No training at all for recently mobilized troops
Designed communication system that needed cell towers
Destroyed Ukrainian cell towers their system needed
Did not retreat from Kherson when it was clear supply lines could be cut
Instead, they sent more troops into Kherson to further strain supplies
Continue to hold out in Crimea and southern Ukraine even though supply routes are poor
Failure to plan defense in depth resulting in sudden collapse of lines near Kharkiv
Persisted in keeping large amounts of troops in Izyum despite no progress there
Repeatedly tried to cross a river at the same exact spot even after suffering massive losses on previous attempts
Prioritizing looting instead of retreating with military equipment
Attempting to hold Snake Island when it’s within artillery range of the Mainland
Not having a unified military command structure in the theater of war [highonthehill]
Openly giving preference to private mercenaries over own military [highonthehill]
Failing to provide winter uniforms to mobiks being send the war in the winter [highonthehill]
Picking a crony with no military experience as Defense Minister in charge of the war (Shoygu) [highonthehill]
“General” Putin overruling the military command on strategic and tactical decisions [highonthehill]
Piss poor design of the Moscova’s anti-missile system which apparently can only track one thing at a time.
Committing atrocities to inflame civilians [stratocruiser] [Firefoot]
Committing atrocities to keep opposing alliance together [stratocruiser]
Using unencrypted comms [savethewails]
Destroying rail stations instead of rail bridges [savethewails]
Failure to target Ukrainian logistics on a sufficient scale
Starting the war in the first place [MadScientist]
Never trying to learn from the enemy, or from their own mistakes [CMYukon]
Threatening nuclear attacks, only to have China, India, and other remaining clients distance themselves from Russia’s innuendo and actions [BasharH]
Disguising Russian troops as civilians in order to escape collapsing pockets, only to leave any and all military equipment behind [BasharH]
No combined forces training or exercises [Cecil c D Serpent]
Failure to anticipate NATO response and support for Ukraine [paulex]
Underestimating severity of sanctions [paulex] [OzPerspective]
Underestimating Joe Biden [paulex]
Just prior to war start, ignoring how much information US intelligence had been able to gather
Poor maintenance of active military hardware (bad tires etc) [Ilywrch]
Forgetting Trump never received the popular vote [Mathy Kathy]
Failure to understand the EU resilience to their energy blackmail [OzPerspective]
Overestimating their supposed (but really only in prototype phase) "wonder weapons" [OzPerspective]
committing all kind of deliberate, cruel war crimes against domesticated and wild animals [DutchLemming]
Not allowing women into combat roles [pholkiefred]
Conscripting “soldiers” they never intended to pay [pholkiefred]
Driving most of the talented youth of the country to seek employment/lives elsewhere [pholkiefred]
Russia’s delusional belief that they are a great empire [Jas Popeye]
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 8:59:06 GMT -8
How Favre Was Brett Willing to Go?
Four years ago, Hall of Fame quarterback Brett Favre joined forces with a Florida neuroscientist to promote an experimental drug — a nasal spray designed to quickly treat brain injuries from a concussion.
Favre, a major investor in the company, touted the substance on podcasts, radio interviews and national television, including on NBC. And he did more than evangelize, court records show — he successfully lobbied Mississippi state officials who granted the company $2.1 million in federal welfare money that was intended to help poor families.
The payment was illegal, state officials allege in a lawsuit — part of a huge Mississippi welfare misspending scandal that has tarnished Favre’s reputation.
But beyond that, experts say, it was a bad investment by the nation’s poorest state. Concussions are a huge problem in youth, college and professional sports, but as of today there is no evidence the experimental drug Favre promoted does anything to treat them in humans, according to a review of claims by the company.
The company that is now trying to bring the drug to market, Odyssey Health, appears to be on shaky financial ground, according to public filings. Experts in neuroscience and drug development say its promise to conduct human trials of the drug in Mississippi — supposedly an economic development benefit — appears unlikely to ever be fulfilled.
“You’re better off buying a lottery ticket,” said David Maris, a New Jersey-based financial analyst who specializes in pharmaceuticals and who examined financial statements for NBC News. “It’s destined to be a zero.”
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 9:01:38 GMT -8
This Bud's Not For You
Budweiser will throw a celebration for whichever country wins the FIFA World Cup with the company's massive stockpile of beer Qatar restricted it from selling inside stadiums at the soccer championship.
Qatar, which is hosting the soccer tournament, last week reversed its policy surrounding the sale of alcohol at the games. Budweiser initially planned to sell the drinks at fan zones as well as at stadiums during the tournament.
But Qatar said last week that alcohol sales for most fans would be banned at stadiums.
The move has been met with scorn from fans—some of whom traveled from around the world to Qatar, where alcohol is generally restricted, to watch the championship—as well as from the beer company, which has a $76 million sponsorship deal with FIFA.
As the company is left with a large stockpile of beer unable to be sold during the tournament, it is now set to offer whichever country wins the soccer tournament a "celebration" with the leftover product.
"Where there is a celebration, there is always a Budweiser. In that spirit, Budweiser wants to bring this celebration from the FIFA World Cup stadiums to the winning country's fans," a Budweiser spokesperson wrote in a statement to Newsweek.
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 9:04:36 GMT -8
Get Ready For TucKKKer to Lose It. The Special Counsel is Married to a Sane Person, Which Is More Than You Can Say For Clarence Thomas
Newly appointed Special Counsel Jack Smith is married to a documentary filmmaker who worked on a 2020 film about former first lady Michelle Obama and donated to President Joe Biden's 2020 campaign.
Katy Chevigny worked as a producer on Becoming, according to IMDb, while publicly available records from the Federal Election Commission (FEC) show her previous campaign donations.
Chevigny and Smith were married in 2011 and their wedding was reported in the "Class Notes" section of the winter 2012 Harvard Law Bulletin. Smith received his J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1994.
The New York Times also noted on November 19 that Smith was married to "a documentary filmmaker" and that they have a daughter.
Smith is a career prosecutor who has been appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland to weigh potential criminal charges against former President Donald Trump.
The documentary Becoming focused on the former first lady's 2019 tour promoting her book of the same name. It was described as "an intimate documentary looking at her life, hopes and connection with others."
One of the production companies that worked on Becoming was Big Mouth Productions, where Chevigny works as a director and producer.
FEC filings also show that Chevigny donated in support of President's Biden campaign twice in the 2020 election cycle.
She donated $1,000 to Biden for president on September 20, 2020, and another $1,000 to the Biden Victory Fund on the same day. In both cases, her employer was listed as Big Mouth Productions.
Continue reading
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Post by mhbruin on Nov 22, 2022 9:07:00 GMT -8
The State of the QOP in One Tweet. He's a Crook, But I Might Vote for Him.
A Pedophile or a Wife Beater or Someone Who Committed Treason is Better than a Democrat
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