Drop the passive aggressive tone. It's not intellectual dishonesty to recognise that not all situations are the same.

Texas doesn't have a right to secede. There is no legal framework for it to do so under US law. That has nothing to do with my opinion, that is reality.

Scotland, OTOH, did have a right to secede based on the Edinburgh Agreement.

Whether they should secede is a different argument, and one of sufficient complexity that I don't feel a blanket yes or no could cover all cases.

I see no reason for Texas to secede, so I don't believe it's warranted.

I sorta wanted Scotland to secede, partly out of interest, partly because of my aforementioned dislike for monarchy, but even then I wasn't sure it was in Scotlands best interests. Since I don't live there, my interest really didn't go much beyond Groundskeeper Willie and John Oliver.


As for whether the US can learn lessons from monarchical governments, of course it can. Just because you shouldn't adopt their system of a head of state, doesn't mean there aren't aspects of their government/society that aren't vastly superior to your own (arguably broken) democracy.

To claim otherwise would be hubris.

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The difference being this one was done by Willie Nelson. IMO the card trick itself is shit. When you set the decks order with no shuffle at the beginning and then reset the deck order after each cut of the deck, it's not much of a trick.

Scottish Independence - Groundskeeper Willie has been added as a related post - related requested by ChaosEngine on that post.

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Be free, my *celtic brethren! Throw off the yoke of sasnach oppression.


anyone else think Willies voice sounded different?

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This is fun. Looking at the reflection, and knowing pretty intimately how reflective surfaces work, it still seems questionably-real. At 0:43-0:44, the reflective angle shows a large strip of earth-tone well above the horizon line, and also above the reflective bend of the door-handle curvature meaning it's not an artifact of the surface angle. The large strip of earth-colored element that's splitting the mans reflection up the middle in the same frame very well could be an angular reflective artifact, or just the reflection of a low-angle shot between his legs. (just to cut off any naysayers along those lines).
It is as clear a sky as glass despite the 'willy willy', and that seems supported by the reflection. I actually think this might be legitimate. If it's not... Well fucking-A, I'll go back to school if it's not.

The willy willy looks just like that recent one from a garden in Japan. I'll add it as a related tag later if I can find it.

[spoiler]It's certainly quite well done, particularly the first half. If you want to know for sure though, check out the reflection in the door handle around the 44s mark, and also the shadows on the ground just prior to that.[/spoiler]

Ocker

I couldn't catch which station he claimed he was at either, but here's the transcript of the rest:

00:01: All right, I've just parked? out at ?? station, and I've just been watching this willy willy forming
00:08 (laughs) Check that out, that's one of the bigest ones I've seen in a few years
00:12 That is absolute dare-devil status right there
00:18 Far out, that is grouse
00:21 F#?'n run into this thing
00:24 Woo hoo, Jesus Christ, That is huge!
00:30 That is absolutely huge
00:40 #?$?#?
01:06 Oh my god

If it were done as a single nerve in a direct route, it would be subject to damage from a jerking head motion

That doesn;t make much sense as all nerves start as large bundles and get smaller as they subdivide. In humans the course of the left recurrent nerve is a minor curiosity but when you make the vertebra that much taller and add another 6 feet of nerves going back up the neck then it supports the idea that giraffes and ourselves are from a common mammalian or even more distant species. Clearly the existence of the recurrent laryngeal nerve doesn't seem to cause a discernible weakness that's susceptible to being selected against, however it is ODD because if there are any arguments for supporting the course of the nerve for structural reasons then you would have to ask why are none of the other important structure of the neck supplied recurrently.

As someone who has done plenty of human dissection. I've seen enormous variation in structure. The anatomy books are a general map but by no means applicable to individuals. The coronary arteries of the heart and the cerebral arterial flow of the circle of willis are examples of anatomy that's well illustrated in idealised form but seldom matches up to the textbook on an angiogram.

imperfection is the norm but a lot of it won't cause disease. The idea that you can pick and choose which part of biology a designer intervenes baffles me.

I've had nightmares where I'm driving along, and suddenly the car goes out of control. Mainly because I've suddenly found myself in the back seat, and I'm scrambling to get behind the wheel.

Usually, those videos where the person's car hasn't been properly put in park and takes off without them makes me flash back to those nightmares.

This video gives me the willies.

Palestinians fire rockets willy nilly in an attempt to kill any Jew. Jews fire rockets in attempt to kill terrorists firing rockets. Big difference. If Palestinians don't want rockets fired their way, stop firing your rockets.

Also, Turks hate Jews.

That's Bruce Willis for ya!

It's probably not as economical and convenient as white phosphorous.

My father was a physicist, and he told me a story (mind you, a great deal of his stories were apocryphal and he died before they could be sorted out--which is why I feel justified in claiming my great grandmother was Irish royalty and my great grandfather was an armless gypsy horse acrobat... but I digress). Anyways, he claimed that for a time in Spain there was a company marketing cigarette lighters that used white phosphorous so that you could merely flip the lid open, exposing a small amount to the air igniting it, and very suavely light a ladies cigarette for her. Unfortunately, sometimes the seals would fail while in a man's trouser pocket, which is where the slang "willy peter" comes from.