This is literally the difference between Europeans and Americans:

Europeans: Tell an uncomfortable truth and work from that.
Americans: Tell an outright fucking lie and then act like it's the truth. When the bill for that crap comes due, pretend you did and said the exact opposite of what actually happened and scream down whoever calls bullshit on you.

It's a sad thing that many Americans' first introduction to Europe is Charles de Gaulle airport, which serves the same purpose in European transportation as Hell does in Christian theology. CDG is how France punishes Americans for telling World War 2 jokes.

When you're landing at CDG, the pilot says "We are now arriving at Charles de Gaulle Airport. Please prepare to weep tears of blood and rage." That's when you realize the scenes below of people running in circles and screaming in panic is just the line for passport control. It gets worse from there and differs from Dante's Inferno only in that Dante' got out within a single human lifetime.

(Story: I got lost in that place once -- and by 'once', I mean 'every single fucking time' -- and couldn't figure out how to get to the taxi stand. Since no one will give you help at CDG like no one will give you ice water in Hell, I approached this French military guy toting what looked a lot like a MP-5.

"Bonjour, Monsieur," I began, "je ne parle pas français; parlez-vous Anglais?" and I'm trying to scrape together enough of the infantile French I know into some semblance of "how the fuck do I get out of this failure of architectural design and vacancy of God's mercy to get a taxi?", which came out as "Taxi, S'il vous plaît?", probably much to my advantage.

The dude with the MP-5 gives me the Gallic stink-eye, shakes his head slowly, and then points directly up.

"Taxi -->" said the giant sign directly above his head.

"Ah, merci!" I said brightly while he, my mortified wife and pretty much the entire nation of France rolled their eyes.

I so fucking love France!)

Actually, it's an interesting but inefficient way to fund their rescue services that save stupid Americans who go hiking where they don't belong and get stuck.

For years, they couldn't get on SKYTV, the European ESPN. They would film events and send them to SKYTV, never getting a reply. An organizer eventually called to find out why, and SKYTV told them they weren't interested in RC cars....Only to fall out of their seats when it was explained those are full size cars with drivers. At least that's what our host told me when we were in Iceland to see it live.

1. No -- unless they advance battery technology to either the point where you're getting 1,000+ miles on a single charge or can charge the entire battery in less than 2 minutes, electric is a novelty and hydrogen is the future.

2. Tesla is going to be eaten alive by the Chinese, Indians and Europeans.

3. TSLA? You mean the stock with a 1000+ P/E? BAAHAAHAHAHAAH!! At least with tulip bulbs, you got a pretty flower out of the deal.

W-wait... how the fuck did you find that? Are you some kinda wizard or something?! That shit's in JAPAN and you still found it! The Europeans didn't find Japan until 1957! I mean, seriously, can you imagine driving around Belgium in a Citron and suddenly BAM!! IT'S FUCKING JAPAN OUTTA NOWHERE! And that's when you realize you're floating in a canal in the center of Ghent because you've been fuck-all pissed on Avec Les Bons Voeux for the last week and a half. That shit happens to me at least twice a week and I'm fucking tired of it. Can't they just move Japan out of the way or something?

Even if Joe himself were currently crack addicted, probably the next claim, he would still be leaps and bounds ahead of Trump in the "fit for office" category.

No one cares how you whine about Biden or what nonsense you come up with, people are voting AGAINST the biggest pile of shit to ever enter politics, we would vote for Ashy Larry if it was against Trump.

Side note, according to your ilk, Hunter Biden is such a business genius that he's made billions off foreign countries while high on crack. Wow, we could really use someone like him in the administration instead of losers like Jarred and America's biggest loser, Trump.
Also, according to you, he managed to do that without ever getting caught breaking the law or going bankrupt repeatedly, again in stark contrast with Trump. Hunter sounds pretty on the ball by your description. Incredibly above average, miles above Trump's lackeys and worthless children.
Also, according to you, Joe managed to do his job so well during the stress of a close family member having a problem while another had brain cancer that no one had a clue. Trump has done so poorly it wouldn't surprise anyone if it turns out he's been smoking crack every single day in office, it would actually explain a lot of his inexplicable behavior, and HE has been photographed with drawers FULL of European Sudafed in his office.

And let's not forget, Donald is a certified long term racist and rapist. True story.

More bullshit from this YouTube moron who has Trump's c*ck so deep up his ass he's drooling syphilitic discharge.

Ripping up a speech is the worst thing ever in political history? Derp.

The travel ban from China was xenophobic and racist, it only stopped Chinese from coming from China, not Americans, not people from other countries.

The quarantine rule was only for those entering from one province, and was not enforced.

Cuomo was following CDC and Whitehouse guidelines to send the elderly back to their nursing homes after being discharged from hospitals....Derp.
Trump killed 170000 Americans and counting....statistics say he's likely also disabled 500000 for life too.

NYC had the most infected enter through their ports of entry....Trump didn't shutdown travel from Italy or other European countries while they were out of control with new infections. Wonder why?

It's not difficult, this guy and those that repeat his utter bullshit are exponentially more disgusting, cynical, and dishonest than Quomo. Period.

Trump's response was to deny it's a problem for months, dumbfuck.

The field hospitals wouldn't take patients, neither would hospital ships.
Um, you fucking moron again, "elderly patients had covid but were not sick enough to be admitted" doesn't mean "they were too sick to be admitted" you fuckwit.
The CDC guidelines stated clearly they should be sent back to their nursing homes, that was Trump's plan and directive, not Quomo's.

Trump created a complete mess by infecting people in nursing homes while insisting there's no problem, the virus isn't dangerous, and sometimes the virus is a pure hoax. This led to thousands of people dying a day.
The protests didn't start a second wave, the anti mask protests and anti maskers refusing to social distance, having covid parties and gathering indoors exacerbated wave one, we haven't started a second wave yet.
So much erroneous, stupid, blatantly false, self contradictory, hyper partisan, utter bullshit. *lies is right, there wasn't anything else, but this moron has never had facts, only his own uninformed opinion.

Newt,

This is in response to your comment on my statement about Biden needing to lose in '20.

I recently wrote this as a reply to one of my readers (I write under a number of different names in other places).:

Dear <name>,

>I took some time to absorb what you wrote. It's a lot to juggle. The Atlantic has an article in the July-August issue on the worst and best case scenario in CLO defaults. I'll read more.

I read the article you mentioned, and while it's certainly good, it also misses a very important point that explains the mess we're in: the collapse of Lehman and Bear-Stearns, while catastrophic in their own ways, were not the nightmare that caused the Fed to freak out in 2008 -- AIG was. Had AIG gone under and the counterparty default contracts triggered, we'd be on the barter system right now. We came within hours of not having an economy in the western world. The $700b ($.7t) the Fed coughed up to stop this from happening calmed the panic, but did nothing to resolve the underlying issues. These issues continued to compound during the 2011-2020 stock run-up and now we're at the point where the Fed is throwing trillions of dollars at every piece of bad debt they can find just to keep the whole thing from imploding into an economic black hole. It is important to note that in September '19, the credit markets started freezing because of the debt that was already on the books then, -before- CV-19 started rolling, and it took $3t just to get them unlocked again. Absolutely nothing has gotten better since then, and I would argue things have gotten dangerously worse.

In an odd coincidence, the NYT ran an article today about the looming bankruptcy crisis. They're calling for 30-60 days before things start imploding, but I'll stick to my estimate of ~90 days. There's some talk about extending the $600 benefits (we'll see) and chatter about another stimulus check, but that's kicking the can as well as telegraphing how bad things really are. When the Republicans are getting behind free money, you know we're in some uncharted territory. For all intents and purposes, Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) -- the reason the Fed is backstopping debt and printing money like crazy -- is the hill the US economy will live or die on. Should the US dollar come unpegged as the world's de facto currency or should inflation begin (and there's already worrying signs this is happening), that's game over.

Please don't take anything I say as the Word of God; please do your own research and come to your own conclusions. Everything I've said is an opinion based on my education, experience and way of thinking. Your mileage may vary.

Here is the article I mentioned: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/18/business/corporate-bankruptcy-coronavirus.html -- might be paywalled, but clear your cookies for the NYT and you should be able to read it.


>Frankly, it's the physical danger in my area of the States that concerns me. There are the guns and bullying. During some BLM demonstrations in the Midwest, locals were standing around with semi-automatics. I drive a Prius for the fuel efficiency. Pick up trucks enjoy tailgating, trying to intimidate me. This behavior isn't going to change with a change of President but will get worse is we don't change. This ideological push to takeover the country instead of ruling by compromise started around the same time we came to the US in 1981, Reagan's first year. I was so shocked when I heard talk radio for the first time; this wasn't the country I had left in the 1970s.


And now we come to the giant pile of sweaty dynamite that's just waiting for the right shock to set it off. I could give you a prolonged lecture about how this all started in 1978 with California's Proposition 13, or how David Stockman's tragically prescient warnings were blatantly ignored, but Haynes Johnson does a far better job at this than I ever could in his 1991 book "Sleepwalking Through History", as does Kevin Phillips in 2006's "American Theocracy". Honestly, at this point, the prelude is academic. The reality of the situation is that a large swath of adult Americans are appalling ill-educated, innumerate and devoid of even the most basic critical-thinking skills. These people are now locked out of the Information Economy. They lack the most basic skills required to compete in the 21st century job market and thus will watch their standard of living sink into the abyss. These people are not blind to this fact because they're living with the reality of their situation every single day. They're totally without hope, cut off from all avenues of control over their own lives and they feel utterly abandoned by the very people who're supposed to be helping them. The reason you're seeing bullying and behavior like that is because these same people are totally removed from any avenues of recourse and the only people they can take their anger out on are people like you and me. Their anger is being stoked on a daily basis. FOX News and the GOP are experts at this and have a host of boogeymen to keep the anger from being pointed their way: ANTIFA, BLM (black Americans have always made a perfect target), "coastal elites" and, of course, Liberals.

Trump's election was a warning, not an outlier. Trump was the primal scream of these people and Liberals and the Democrats as a whole chose not to listen because they found the sound so abhorrent. The rage will only get worse and the number of people enveloped by this rage will only grow as economic conditions worsen. At this point, it no longer matters who wins in '20. Winning the election will be like winning the deed to the World Trade Center one second after the first jet hit. The damage has already been done and no steps are being taken to repair it; if anything, people are actively making it worse either through ideological blindness, deliberate malfeasance or outright stupidity. It took almost 50 years to get to this point and the endemic issues will not be undone in a single generation, much less a single election. Until the people who voted for Trump feel a sense of real hope, a sense of control over their lives and a genuine expectation of recourse for their grievances, they will keep right on voting for Trump, or people like him.

My unfortunate suspicion is that this country will rip itself to shreds long before those reforms are enacted.

Side note: the fundamental difference between the United States and Europe is that European history has forced the nations of Europe to live with the consequences of their actions. Not so the United States. Europe has suffered for her sins. Not so the United States. The two bloodiest wars in human history were fought on European soil. Not so the United States. The United States has never faced true suffering, nor has it ever had to live with the ramifications of its own actions. Both these facts are about to change and a nation whose character is built on a mythology of individual action and violence is going to have to face reality. The people of this nation are not prepared for this and they will not like it.

Second side note: many people are erroneously comparing the current situation to the Wiemar Republic. This is a lack of historical understanding. A more apt comparison would be to Spain in late 1935.


>As for re-opening, we could have gotten some control if the "leader" had simply donned a mask and used realistic thinking. People could go back to work more safely, wash hands, stay a certain distance. But his hubris led the way, so now we'll have a roller coaster for months and years that will affect the economy even more. France is a good comparison because they were unprepared also, having slashed the public healthcare budget for the last twenty years. But when they laid down the rules, troops patrolled the streets to be sure they were followed. So far, they've flattened the curve (for now), and used different economic incentives, such as paying part of employees' salaries to keep them employed.

At this point, the pace of re-opening is a difference between very bad and much worse. Had $3t been used to pay the yearly salary of every American, we could have saved lives and the economy, but we didn't. The history of 2020 will be littered with "what-ifs". However, the first thing you learn when studying history is that what-ifs are useless because things are what they are and you can't change that. It's already obvious we're going into a second wave. If previous pandemics are any indication of what's to come, this second wave will be many times worse than the first. The wait for a vaccine is indeterminate, but if we're going for herd immunity, ~70% of Americans will need to catch the virus. To date, ~1.5% have. If the US population is ~330 million, ~230 million will need to catch the virus. Call the mortality rate 2%, that means ~4.6 million Americans will die. That's a lot of dead Americans and grieving families.

Take care,

(my actual name)

It's not really about the ramp. He's an old rickety man, naturally he has trouble.

The problem is that he forces doctors to lie about his health, then things like this make the truth obvious.

Then he compounds lies upon lies. His skin is so thin he just can't let it go, he rambles for 10 minutes about how unfair everything is.

Remember, this is a guy born to incredible wealth, never worked a day in his life, thinks that knowing a fucking rhinoceros from a drawing is an impressive achievement, is cruel and demeaning whenever he has a chance, treats the world, and women's genitalia as his own personal playground with few repercussions, no matter how egregiously he's broken the law, rips off investors, contractors, the very country he now pretends to serve, lost billions of dollars in personal wealth while bragging about how good he is with money, had to turn to Russian lenders because US and European banks wouldn't touch him anymore, yet somehow fell ass backwards into the presidency of the US. Now he uses that position to line his own pockets, without the slightest care for those he hurts or kills in the process.

And yet... he finds life doesn't treat him fairly. He whines and complains.

You know the only time he's seemed truly sad and upset while President?

Was it when 100,000 Americans died while he made things worse?

No.

Was it when police started ramming innocent protestors and media with their vehicles, tear gassing, beating, and maiming with rubber bullets?

No.

What about when mass shootings happened on his watch, or school shootings, like Obama?

No.

He got truly publicly upset for the first time in his presidency when a disappointing number of adoring fans came to a rally.

He is so pathetic and useless, so self-serving and evil that pain, death, suffering on a scale that really hasn't been seen in the US in a very long time means nothing.

The only thing that matters is him.

Now, what were you saying about Biden?

Do you still want to do that side-by-side comparison?

Do you really think this is about a ramp?

The key point here is that the Emancipation Proclamation, although widely celebrated, had no real legal effect. It did not apply to states that had not seceded, and for states that had seceded US federal government proclamations didn't mean much. The real effect of the Emancipation Proclamation was diplomatic, it made it more difficult for European governments, particularly the UK, to support the Confederacy, as was in their economic best interest.

So was murder, and rape, so I'm coming over to murder you, put your children into slavery, and your wife too if she survives my whole tribe raping her. What, can't get over the past? It's the norm since Jesus, until the 1800's at least...but you just gave me permission to ignore any civil progression. Thanks, I can use some white slaves and a whore.
Dumbass, the constitution allowed slavery, and actually so did Lincoln, he offered to allow states to decide themselves if they just paid their taxes.
South said no dice, and went with treason. They much preferred being traitors to admitting blacks were human beings.

When you start with nothing (not the >$400000000 "nothing" Trump was handed), are denied opportunities, loans, housing (by Trump and pops in many cases) businesses, and in places where you're successful anyway like Tulsa, you get massacred, you're left with little chance for personal or cultural financial progress. Derp.
When you then, having scratched out a living despite the dozen daily roadblocks whites don't have, must compete with those who were handed $400000000 but claim to be self made and also don't have roadblocks like loan refusal, rental refusal, job refusal, purchasing refusal, near daily delays and attacks by racist police, business burnings, etc, that's not the past holding you back, it's the present.

The countries where it's local have mostly white police forces that are also racist against black and brown people, and even so are mostly protesting America's massive systemic racism, holding George Floyd signs and slogans. You know that, you aren't 3....or are you?

Never heard of colonialism I guess. Well, that's not surprising. See, white Europeans took over most brown or black countries, racistly claiming they couldn't govern themselves because they weren't fully human. That was a global racist endeavor.

You are such a stupid, racist tool. You should be forced to live in rural S Africa and learn what racism is before opening your ignorant mouth and spouting stupidity. You really have no clue what you're talking about, as usual.

You make me so sad and worried for humanity if we have your ilk dragging us down and backwards.

You don't have anything because you haven't tried to get over the past.

Slavery was the norm since Jesus.
The Constitution gave a path to end it.

When you have a chip that big on your shoulder.
When you don't have a father in your family.
When you blame others for your blight.
You are left with little chance of personal financial progress.



What I find odd is that the BLM movement is Global. Since this is indeed Global then this is not an White racist America problem, nor European racist issue. The whole white globe can't be at fault for the blight of the black. So the true question is What is the Black doing to better themselves? Or are they just screaming poor little ole me? Or is the truth really is that blacks are fucked over just as much as everyone else but used as political pawns. Since a black can achieve / become whatever they want in life, I think the latter is the correct answer.

Great news...the Japanese Giant Hornet has recently established itself in Washington state.

Giant hornets are bee predators. They can decimate a hive in hours. Japanese honey bees have a defense against them...they can vibrate their bodies generating enough heat to kill the hornets but not enough to kill themselves. Italian and other European bee species don't have that defense. If giant hornets spread, they could be a death nail in the already struggling American bee/honey industries.
Also worth noting, they kill up to 50 people a year in Japan, but far more in China. They could be worse than killer bees in multiple ways. For instance, they can sting through a bee suit, each one can sting multiple times, and they can thrive in cold that killer bees can't survive.

*quality masochism

Wow.
Three thoughts:
1) European liability laws and releases of liability are really different from the US!
2) No helmet, not even goggles against swirling dust in an open topped car
3) Did anyone else hear the sound track of Gran Turismo in their head lol?

Nice video.

Timeline as far as I know it...There seems to be...a disproportionate amount of golf...


1/3 Trump learns about coronavirus outbreak in China from intelligence officials.
1/3 Trump holds Miami, FL rally.
1/4 Trump plays golf.
1/5 Trump plays golf.
1/ 8 CDC issues warning about coronavirus.
1/9 Trump holds rally in Toledo, OH.
1/14 Trump holds Milwaukee, WI rally.
1/18 Trump plays golf.
1/19 Trump plays golf.
1/20 1st US case confirmed.
1/22 Trump "...we have it totally under control. It is going to be just fine".
1/23 Hubei, China goes on lockdown
1/24 Global cases over 1,000
1/27 Trump holds Wildwood, NJ rally
1/27 Global deaths over 100
1/30 Trump holds Des Moines, IA rally.
1/31 Global cases over 10,000
1/31 Trump enacts China travel ban
2/1 Trump plays golf.
2/2 Trump "We pretty much shut it down coming in from China."
2/2 Trump plays golf.
2/5 End of impeachment
2/10 Trump holds Manchester, NH rally.
2/10 Global deaths over 1,000
2/13 Senators Richard Burr (R., N.C.) and Kelly Loeffler (R., Ga.) sold off millions of dollars in public stock following a closed-door briefing on the coronavirus
2/15 Trump plays golf.
2/19 Trump holds Phoenix, AZ rally.
2/20 Trump holds Colorado Springs, CO rally.
2/21 The first Italian cities go on lockdown
2/21 Trump hold Las Vegas, NV rally.
2/25 Trump "...we are down to 15 cases, will be zero soon."
2/27 Trump "One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
2/28 Trump holds Charleston, SC rally and says worries about the virus is the new "hoax".
2/29 1st American dies from coronavirus.
3/2 Trump holds Charlotte, NC rally.
3/6 Global cases over 100,000
3/6 Trump “Anybody that needs a test, gets a test. We—they’re there. They have the tests. And the tests are beautiful.”
3/7 Trump plays golf.
3/7 Trump says "No I'm not concerned at all. We've done a great job".
3/8 Trump plays golf.
3/9 The whole country of Italy goes on lockdown
3/11 ~~CDC~~ WHO declares SARS-CoV-2 a pandemic
3/13 Trump declares a national emergency.
3/13 Trump "No, I don't take responsibility at all".
3/17 Trump "I’ve always known this is a real—this is a pandemic. I felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic … I’ve always viewed it as very serious.”
3/19 Trump enacts travel ban on European countries.


3/27 Trump signs Covid-19 relief Bill
3/28 U.S. deaths surpass 1000
4/1 U.S deaths surpass 5000.
4/3 Trump fires intelligence community inspector general who flagged Ukraine whistleblower complaint that lead [self sic] to his impeachment.
4/4 "The models show hundreds of thousands of people are going to die...I want to come way under the models. The professionals did the models. I was never involved in a model. But – at least this kind of a model.”