Sorry. I have to call bullshit on that.
Each one costs as much as 500 average teachers salaries, not including operating costs. ;-)

Why are they trying to make the Osprey 2.0 anyway? We already have better, more capable, cheaper, tested aircraft in our fleet. I think someone is just infatuated with Avatar...Someone who doesn't care about the national budget or military readiness but loves being the only kid with a new toy....now who could that be?

@newtboy,

"Ok, but don't discount the factual arguments because they are presented with passion. Ignore the emotion and focus on verifying or debunking the facts presented. Because someone on Fox presents their denial argument flatly and dispassionately doesn't make it more correct."

Obviously agreed, exactly what I was saying.

"if the facts are presented clearly and in totality, which she does better than most if not all professional scientific lecturers....sadly"

I think here you are selling scientific lecturers short, or at the least including folks I wouldn't consider scientific at all in the group.

When I think scientific lecturer, I think an actual scientific researcher giving a lecture related to their field of expertise. That even excludes scientific researchers giving lectures outside their field of expertise. I've seen how badly interdisciplinary study types can misjudge their own knowledge of a field. In the hard sciences they can get rooted out faster, but in softer sciences and humanities it's easier for them to keep finding a niche that hides their ignorance.

If you get the CERES team to give a talk on the global energy budget, they will give a lecture a thousand times more complete and accurate, than you, I or Greta ever could. They will confirm the planet is taking in more energy than is leaving. They will confirm their data is corroborated between satellite and ocean heat content measurements. They can say with authority how much energy is being gained, and can even confirm it largely corresponds to what we'd expect from the increased CO2 contributions. If you asked, they would even also admit that the uncertainties on the measured imbalance are larger than the imbalance itself.

Ask them about mating habits for European swallows and you, I or Gretta might well know better than them.

From what I have been told many of the smaller county's budgets are directly tied to arrest and conviction statistics.

This creates a multitude of problems.
Officers literally have to score X convictions or their buddy might "loose his job".
Similarily, the only way out of traffic duty up the career ladder might be a high conviction rate.
The sick thing is that this just the tip of the iceberg. AFAIK departments have been doctoring their statistics for so long it has widely become accepted that you literally go "fishing" once the next review period comes up (usually its more like speeding/broken tail lights, etc) and is widely viewed as common practice.
However after 9/11 a lot of departments have inflated their expenses with more equipment/personel (go look how many redneck county police deparments have their own Special Tactics Squads...) - combine that with poor budgeting and you can see where this goes...
Not all the blame can be put on the police though - a lot of it comes down to the way the review process works (i.e. convictions vs crimes prevented - go figure which is the easier statistic to use/present).
This problem really isn't new unfortunately.

Your video, The Matrix low budget version, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

"Yo guys, we still need a video for this shit up in here, how much you want the budget for that to be ?".

"Yes"

Tiny budget, 10mins to work with and it was better than Prometheus and Covenant even with the dodgy reaction scene in the control room.

Your video, After Mueller Report, Trump Lies About Budget Cuts, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

Bob.
Stop being stupidly catty. Many investigators are Republicans including Mueller.
<1/6 of the Clinton investigation over a legal real estate deal, which found zero, amounted to zero, and you want to reopen it and investigate a private citizen with another special council with no target or budget limits...but this investigation was over treason and a felon filled administration that's committed uncountable (and been convicted of uncountable) felonies since Trump was elected, run by Trump appointees he only called Democrats when they wouldn't illegally do his bidding, then ended by two Trump sycophants that said it should be quashed before being appointed.

And you still whine like a little bitch. WTF, man, grow up. Your children are more adult. I bet they don't whine and pout when they get what they want.

Trump underhandedly won a single legal round, out of how many? He's almost as exonerated as Jussie is, which is barely at all legally and only that because of special treatment, and not a bit factually.
The report said they found no proof of illegal "collusion" with Russia and Trump directly over the election interference his friend Putin undertook for Trump's sole benifit, but also said he committed obstruction, but Mueller was instructed he could not indict Trump himself, and his bosses who told him that they must be the one's to indict blatantly prejudged the investigation publicly long long ago, it's why they were chosen for the positions, so there never was jeopardy, yet Trump fought tooth and nail against it making it take 4 times longer, wasting far more than necessary because he simply can't ever testify without perjuring himself dozens of times, not even to clear himself. He simply cannot tell the truth, or even avoid lying for an entire sentence, so we had to investigate his actions, and will again.
Sad, very sad.

Now he's tossing another promise and going after pre-existing condition protections like he repeatedly specifically promised to never do....and you love it I'm sure. So very very sad.

Typo in title - Alien. I think they'd probably need a much heftier budget for the sequel.

200 Billion is nothing compared to the budget.

Also Once implemented government over time will ask for more and more and more Till 60+%

Perhaps you are ignorant of the fact that the vast majority cross where walls already exist. To answer your question, nearly all of them would still try. Do you really think a fence is deterrence when the alternative is go home and see your family raped to death before you're decapitated? Would you just say "oops, sorry, didn't mean to trigger you....let me just take my daughter back to the narcos for a life of sex slavery and just die then, so sorry."?

A better immigration policy that makes it easier to get a work visa or asylum at ports of entry instead of making illegal entry easier, simpler, cheaper, and faster would discourage people from taking the easier, but illegal path. We are moving the other direction, which is why illegal immigration is on the rise under Trump after falling steadily for decades.

This doesn't cost America except for fighting it, they make us money with cheap labor, taxation without representation or access to government assistance, and by lowering the per capita crime rates by being far less criminal on average than Americans. You want to deport a group that's well above average in criminality, that would be Republican politicians and or Trump associates...no one will miss a single one.

A $50 billion wall (Trump's never built anything that wasn't at least 100% over budget) that can be evaded with a ladder, shovel, car, truck, saw, torch, boat, plane, and in many many places, absolutely nothing (it's no longer a single solid wall from coast to gulf, it's now a fence in a few more places for your $50 billion.) is not just vastly more expensive, it's also uselessly wasting that money for almost zero return, the few places it might help will just see the migrant paths move a few miles over.

If we had a 40+ ft high, 20 ft deep, 4+ft thick reinforced concrete wall coast to coast that was somehow ladder proof, it still wouldn't stop most illegal immigration or drug trafficking, because the vast majority of both come through ports of entry. The wall is a useless solution to a non existent problem that's been solving itself for decades....side note: what do you think it was like in the good old days when America was "great"? Contrary to Chump's claims, operation wetback (that he wants to reimplement) was a failure....
https://www.cato.org/blog/enforcement-didnt-end-unlawful-immigration-1950s-more-visas-did

I agree....mostly.
My plan, for when I'm emperor, is one tax rate based on the budget that pays for everything in full (no deficit, and pay off the debt) and puts 2% in the bank yearly for future unforseen disasters, with a base deduction of whatever poverty level in your state is +100%, so people barely out of poverty pay nothing.
Whatever that number is should be applied across the board, no loopholes, no special tax rates for certain types of income, no extra exemptions, nothing.
Also, 100% tax on money hidden offshore to avoid taxation and use RICO on the church(s) to pay off most of the debt first.


Yes, there were many reasons why the job market was good in the 50's for white guys, most of which are unthinkable or impossible today. For instance, a single income household with one average salary could not only save, they could often have a continuously rising standard of living. There's no way today, even on two incomes most families are in debt and downwardly mobile.

It doesn't work because there is an intrinsic group think personality in the Nordic region. Most people in that region that were born and raised there are very sensitive to profit making and ostentatious displays.

Which means that people are glad to simply 'get by'. There is not a mass drive to be better than your neighbor or own more toys than them. Of course there are outliers, but the bulk of Scandinavians are very used to the accepted norm. They are more willing to accept massive tax rates because they know they will be taken care of by the government. They aren't necessarily concerned about 'getting rich'.

Contrast that to other areas, especially the USA, and you will find out that it would never work here because we are an individualistic nation. Even the bluest liberal wants to be rich here. It's more cutthroat, more selfish, than you will find in a Scandi nation.

Another huge reason it would never work is that they do not spend anywhere near the percentage of their budget on defense that we do. Denmark spends about 20 billion per year on defense. Norway, an oil rich Scandi nation that is considered one of our most important NATO allies, spends about 6 billion. Less than 1.2% of their GDP. This is one thing that Trump was actually right about. We spend around 700 Billion, roughly 3.5% of our current GDP.

"Half the alliance — 16 of the 29 countries — don’t even spend 1.5 percent (of gross domestic product) let alone 2 percent that we all agreed on four years ago (at a NATO summit) in Wales,” Michael Fallon, who served as secretary of state for defense from 2014 to 2017, said. In 2017, only the U.K., Greece, Poland and Estonia reached the 2 percent target.

Whether that level of spending is needed is another argument altogether. I personally think we overspend way too much on defense, but regardless it is a huge factor as to why we can't offer the same level of 'socialism' that the Nordic nations do. If we spent the same percentage as Norway, we would be saving close to 460 billion dollars a year that could be applied to other programs. Such as paying for college for qualified students or trade school for ones that are not college minded. Or providing benefits to new mothers that we currently don't.

The fact that the current state of the technology is not public knowledge, and the fact that it's development is a secret military program, likely without a publicly available budget in all 3 countries, makes me think it's secret. Just tests on models require a supersonic or hypersonic wind tunnel....you don't pick those up at home depot.
Nobody has seen one fly, so if it was even in the early testing phase, no one noticed. Since we're watching, I'm dubious it's past models and simulations anywhere.
I don't doubt they, like us, are working on it. I have doubts any nation has made exponentially more progress than we have, and I wouldn't trust China or Russia if they claimed to have them without seeing them demonstrated successfully, just as they shouldn't trust us if we make more unsubstantiated claims, we're proven liars.

That is the important point. Studio budget drives the quality of effects companies. Poor effects can be due to the limits of studio budgets.