That's the thing, I think they probably are.

I saw a quote the other day that said if Trump wins, "it won't be a great time to be mexican or black or a woman in America, but other than that things will be pretty much the same".

It's 2016. Writing off huge demographics like that shouldn't be an option.

@newtboy, I don't know what you do to affect change in the US. Your political system is awful, your voting system is borderline insane and your judicial apparatus is compounding the problem with some unbelievably short-sighted decision (i.e. Citizens United).

But I do know the answer isn't Trump.

If your house has rot, you don't burn it down. You have to do the hard work of finding the problem areas, scaffolding them to protect the rest of the house, ripping out the problems, replacing them and then insulating so you don't get the problem again.

Funny, my dad used to say the same thing.
He worked for his dad's insulation company and was blown up in a chemical fire at around 18 while hanging off the side of a chemical hauling truck that exploded.

Well, they aren't loud enough about it to be heard outside their insulated circle. Usually something like that would make national news and/or have commercials deriding it and protests against it sprout up any place it's an issue. That I haven't heard about it makes me believe it's as I described and not JUST about financial insolvency, but is about true mental incapacity. EDIT: If you have an instance where pure financial issues caused someone to have their firearms removed that you can point me to, I'll certainly read it.

Proper training would certainly eliminate people shooting themselves with an 'unloaded' gun, because proper training teaches you to consider ANY gun loaded at all times.

I eliminated the possibility of my kids getting hold of my guns by not having any. Problem solved! As long as my doors are locked (which they nearly always are), my firearms are under lock and key. ;-)

/sigh

He has the right to be offended. He does not have the right to be insulated from offense by forcing everyone around him to remove themselves from his vicinity (which is what you are suggesting).

eg. Hey, I'm offended by you, mebbe you should go write your posts down on a piece of paper and chuck it in the bin instead of posting here. You know, to protect my delicate sensibilities?

Bitch please... \X D

Sure - here in Norway it's quite common to have windows like that. Triple-pane, really well insulated

Um, I don't think that was Bob's or Milkman's point. And the point is all that matters because the fact that America is fucked up is irrelevant. Just as saying country A is okay so all government will not fall into the trap.

Fact is EVERY government since the start of mankind has fallen into this trap. Some take longer than others, and there are insulating features (such as nations that are sheltered by natural terrian, those with rich resources, those with low populations, and those that have never had a TRULY meaningful impact on the world but just kinda get by.)

America's problems are myriad but I think it's because they won too much in the last century and are about to fall, as any great boxer has.

Edit added later:

And no, most other governments are not. Russia, China, North Korea, many South American nations, Mexico, the Middle East, all those examples are not minor. Now you could say "many" governments.

But there's no insulator between the cells. Why wouldn't the electricity just flow freely between the pins through the interior of the lemon?

I don't think you can increase the voltage of an AA battery by creating extra terminals, which is essentially what he's doing here...

I could be wrong, but the internal panels are usually just sound and heat insulation.

Unless the outer shell had also ruptured (instant pressure drop & instrument warning), this probably posed little to no risk to anyone.

That said, if I was the captain I'd probably land soon as just in case too.

@newtboy

Oh, absolutely, the video is poorly titled. I'll give you that.

But everything else you wrote is, for lack of a better term, uninformed.

Certainly commercial meat suppliers in first world countries like the U.S. have bowed to the "politically correct" demands of PETA to "humanely" kill animals. Poultry are knocked unconscious (with electric shocks) before having their throats slit while larger animals like cows are killed with a single shot to the head. Concern with how "humanely" the animals are killed is rather comical given the conditions under which most commercial animals are bred and raised, but that's an issue for another thread.

Now, if you think stuff like this video doesn't happen in places like the U.S. I'm gonna guess you don't realize what happens on typical farms where people raise livestock for their dinner table as opposed to commercial sale. People kill animals exactly in this and similar ways--slitting their throats, beheading them with axes, grabbing poultry by the head and breaking their necks, etc. Don't believe me? Check out this thread on how to kill a chicken. What happens in this video happens across first world countries, including the U.S., on a daily basis. Your shock comes from the fact that modern society has insulated you from the killing by hiding it from you.

Now, the people in this video are probably not living in a first world country, and we've already established that even if they were the animal would likely be butchered in a similar way if it is being prepared for personal use as opposed to commercial sale. They're most likely doing it the way it's been done there for hundreds if not thousands of years using the tools available to them to get the job done. Slashing the carotid artery is the fastest and most painless way (compared to other methods) to kill the camel. I can't think of a faster or more painless way other than shooting it in the head (which still risks ricochets and assumes personal gun ownership is legal in the country where this is happening).

Calling them idiots? This coming from a person not understanding the job they are performing. The two on the roof are relieving pressure in the building as well as creating ingress and egress points, ingress for the water and egress for the fire pressure.

Building fires create a serious amount of pressure due to the expanding air in a very confined, and pretty well insulated, environment. This is the same actions you see firefighters breaking out windows to expel a large portion of said pressure. It also allows a fire to expand in a more controlled and less volatile way (see: explosive backdrafts).

The guy using the 'poker' is looking for structural weakness, both for the safety of the crew on the roof, as well as the 'cutter' to have the most direct access to the higher 'heat areas'.

I was unfortunately surprised to learn that my butcher block home workbench, or more likely the varnish (looks like polyurethane to me) in many spots has a very low resistance (<0.5 ohm/in as I measure). Fried a PCB I was working on, which I took a lot of shit for, everyone assuming I'd just done something stupid. Anyways, the moral is don't assume your wooden bench is actually an insulator.

Oh, and I also don't recommend playing with a a transformer out of a microwave unless you really know what you're doing. Though it's probably safe enough, 2kV will arc pretty far through air, so you don't even have to actually touch it to have a bad day.

The problem with white culture is.. @lantern53, @newtboy & @AllWhitePeople

White Privilege insulated you from the reality of your advantages and the true suffering of others who aren't white

Hell, white people include if poor uneducated.

(I asked a white friend.
He said that white people just see other white people as strangers.
Makes sense now I guess)

You live in this White Privilege Bubble where "everyone's equal cause this is AMERICA!"

Everyone in your bubble has bootstraps. A safety net.
Reliable job opportunites and call-backs.
No fear of being harassed and/or murdered by police.
The general unconditional trust of society



In the bubble of impoverished black culture, however.. having a chance at leaving that poverty is a pipe-dream.

I know, because I live in Atlanta.
A place notorious for lots of poor black communities.

My girlfriend was born and raised in it.

Her parents were addicted to crack.
(Funny how crack possession carries a harsher sentence than cocaine possession, considering their the exact same drug.)

She saw a dead body in the street when she was 6.
(Gang violence is present when decent jobs and summer camps aren't)

She had Police SWAT invade her home & hold a gun to her head around the same age.
(Because busting potential drug dealers is more important that entering the correct house.)

Her cousin, who was probably a prostitute since 12 or 13, is currently very happy that her new "boyfriend" doesn't beat her.
(She feels like that's a win. Hell, my girlfriend was herself convinced that she'd "grow up to be a prostitute."
You know, the norm.)

For the last 5 months, my girlfriend has lived with a 21 year old prostitute (started at 14 when homeless) and her much older "boyfriend"/pimp because that was the only "affordable" housing near her work.

(She mentioned that earlier this month, there was a new girl there some mornings who was definitely probably 13 or 14.
She literally just moved out today and happened to spot her ex-roommate working her corner near West End Mall. )

So yeah, white people assume - No, righteously assert - all black people are just a equal as white people.

Because you all think:

"I've got bootstraps & dignity & great opportunites & everlasting hope.
Stop whining and take personal responsibility."

The reality is starkly different.

Black people are reminded of that difference LITERALLY EVERYDAY.

We're remind everytime an unarmed black youth is murder, just for "looking threatening".

Even with civil rights laws, even with a brown president.

You'll never know what it's truly like to be non-white..

Because White Privilege prevents you from even having to acknowledge these issue.

Just call it all even and blame the rest on personal responsibility.

Adrenaline rushes aren't dangerous if they're done properly. Personally I'm going to make sure my little boy is exposed to plenty of 'scary' things as he grows up so he can learn about risk and how to assess/handle it properly.

I saw a great documentary about this with Danny MacAskill called Daredevils: Life On The Edge. It looked at adrenaline junkies and investigated why they do what they do. At the end of the program there's a really nice choreographed sequence with MacAskill and various others performing tricks as they descend down the step into an underground station in London, and through the station itself.

The sequence was directed by a hollywood stunt specialist who has worked with all the top guys in big blockbuster movies and he said that the stuntmen and women, far from what most people think, are the least likely people in the world to do something risky. There are two parts to this. Firstly they've learned how to be very good at assessing risk. They understand extremely well what makes something safe or risky. They've had a lot of experience and have learned from it.

Secondly they are very highly skilled. What would be very risky for us to do isn't for them because they have the training to perform safely. We only think what they're doing is dangerous because we ourselves would be very likely to be hurt doing it.

If you insulate a kid from risky experiences you deny them the chance to learn in a controlled environment. It's like teaching a kid to cook. If you look after them really well and provide everything they need and cook them fantastic nutritious meals every day until they leave home they'll love you immensely for it. Then they'll move out, try to look after themselves and end up burning the house down with a pan fire or cut the end of their finger off with a knife or shave the skin off their hand with a grater.

Teach a kid how to use a sharp knife safely and how to sharpen it and keep it keen and they'll be safe for the rest of their life. Kids should be able to use sharp knives, under strict supervision of course, to learn the safe way of doing it. They should be doing 'dangerous' things to learn to do them safely. Part of the learning process is probably going to hurt. They may well get a few cuts before they get their knife skills up to scratch, but if they're in a controlled environment these should be small compared to the injuries that happen when someone with no idea about knives forces a blunt one through something tough.

As for adrenaline sports, the more they fall over the better they learn to balance. If this kid goes on a bit of a bigger slide and gets thrown off in the corners it's going to hurt, but it's not going to kill him. He'll find his limits and respect them more.

I'd rather my kid makes his mistakes while I'm still around to clear up the mess

Agree, you can clearly see their ceramic wire insulators at 1:45.

As to what caused it, looks like melt water caused lubrication between an extended slanted field of topsoil and a clay base. I live near a beach with a eighty-foot cliff that's quite similar, and in the earliest spring, large chunks of it slide down along that wet clay to pool at the bottom. In this case, the hills are so distant that the pressure became huge enough to completely bulldoze everything in front of it.

I dub it a "slowvalanche".

If you have money then it can snow and snow and snow and your perfectly fine. Basically running warm water under the cement and also keeping an insulation area on your roof around 40 degrees or so... Of course this stuff isn't exactly available to your Average Joe...so...

Also, I don't think the piped water (though there is electric versions as well, but then you have to worry about extreme electric bills too, if I remember right) would work at all when you start to reach a certain sub-zero temperature unless you can REALLY turn the temperature up on them (and then these start to cost money via gas...).

Every so often you run into people that are super rich (or just make good use of their money and resources) and actually have this stuff installed (not just ski resorts or certain areas)... I forget how much it costs, but you can get it if you really, really get a lot every year and you're getting afraid about your house or something else getting ruined...