I drove right under the core of this thing going home. I could actually see a tornado being made and I checked all the weather and News outlets and there was nothing, except that NOAA decided to throw a Severe Thunderstorm Warning 10 minutes up AFTER IT PASSED...

It was so crazy to see a tornadic supercell in West Valley City (Salty Lake City, for most Sifters). It was following 2700 West for a bit and then I-215 (nearing the airport) was moving super fast to the NNE, straight to Washington Terrace and Riverdale. The winds were wild and the cloud formations were awesome, they were moving fast enough that I thought a partial nub might be visible where I was at, but I never did see it.

All that I saw was the main vortex with the amazing sight of all the cold air being sucked into the vortex at the SSW corner of the leading edge. Which was twisting more than fast enough to be a "horizontal twister". It was rotating so fast it was amazing; since you could see that sight you knew all it needed was a bit of air to push against it from underneath and stand up some of those vortices around the central core and then, walla, you'd get the tornado (I actually did believe that Ogden or Bountiful would get one since that was where it was heading).

All it needed was to get a little closer to the mountains and you'd have the right ingredients.

Thus, this is what you see happen right here in this video. North of my house, out in the middle of the Great Salt Lake, sits Antelope Island. It got hit by the raining part of this tornadic system but look at this wonderful storm video from it:

https://twitter.com/AntelopeSP/status/779078436568518656

It even had some golf ball hail in it.

I was hoping it was a troll-meme, because i've seen a prevalence of people believing this shit lately.

Ask them how a sundial works. It's one of those things that's simple to think about or even draw. Get them to tell you how the sun rises and sets, and then ask about sundials - and why do 2 sundials separated by a significant distance read how they do.

If you make them 1000 ft tall sundials, you can use the horizon line of sight argument on them too.

Wait ... no pik-a-nik basket in sight? Yogi would be ... disappoint

Wow, a roadworks that gets done in one day. That is a sight we'll never see again.

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.

i am just going to add to the opinions and perspectives that @MilkmanDan ,@ChaosEngine ,@dannym3141 and especially @newtboy who i agree with so clearly that i swear we are related.

since many dynamics have already been covered, i.e:police culture,racism,incompetence etc etc.

i shall offer a historical perspective in the ways of the power dynamic.

while this is a power vs powerlessness dynamic dealing with agents of the state,it helps to understand just how we got to this point,and it is NOT the first time we have been here.

see:labor movement of the 30's and the labor strikes,and the response from not only the business community but our own government.

see: the civil rights movement and segregation,and how demagouges used political power to divide by way of racism,and then used police to intimidate,beat and imprison.

there are many MANY examples here in america where the police have been used to suppress and oppress a people or community for less than altruistic reasons,and most certainly not aligning with the ideology we were taught in school the function of police.nevermind the syrupy sweet,idealized picture shoved down our throats since an early age.

so we see on our facebooks,our twitters and/or whatever social media you prefer,that black lives matter...and the counter point,that NO..ALL lives matter.

now this would make sense in a world that never took history into account,or a growing cultural norm of violence and oppression that had been slowly seeping into poor communities (mainly black and latino).

oh wait..
that's right.
social media pundits NEVER fucking consider any of those factors,because just like bill o'reilly,those are pesky nuances and context conflict with their own narrow narrative.

but let us consider them and how they may possibly be a major driving factor in americas current climate.

let us take ferguson as an example,that is a good place to start.
and let us go back to 2008,where we can see the boiling begin to take place in this extremely impoverished community which was already struggling.

the population is a black majority,poor to working poor.home ownership is low,food stamp recipients are high and the future is pretty bleak.

in 2008 ferguson received approximately 18% of it's total fiscal revenue from misdemeanor infractions i.e:traffic,parking,moving violations.small time stuff.basic fines for small infractions.in 2008 that number jumped to 66%.

why?
what happened?
what changed?

well the comptroller of ferguson (and greater st louis),along with HUNDREDS of other smaller municipalities across the country,had bought the rotten fish that wall street was selling in the form of bullshit derivatives.

now wall street and the big banks got their tax payer bailout,but towns like ferguson did not.they lost millions,sometimes billions.this meant pensions were either reduced or outright denied,because there was NO money!

but a town still has to pay police.
fire fighters and school teachers,
clerks and judges,
keep the roads paved and the street lights working.

so what is a local government to do?
can't tax the working class who own homes.you already jacked their property tax to the roof.
can't tax the local business,you already squeeze them as well.
how about those non-property owning people in ferguson?
they need to pay up as well,and let's use the police force to relinquish them of the paltry money they don't have.

to the tune of 66% of all of fergusons revenue.
that is insanity.

so what if you live in ferguson?
chances are you are black,and either poor or working poor.

you make,if you are lucky,20 grand a year and by one man's testimony he paid over 2,000 in traffic tickets in one year.the majority of americans dont see those kind of numbers their entire lifetime.

and what if you began to realize that it was not just you.that almost every person you know or talked to had similar stories.

would you begin to feel a tad bit targeted?

what if the city of ferguson started to become very creative with not only their rules but how they enforced those rules?

what if every year the fines went up?
not remained the same,but actually UP? every year.

what if,as a community people began to actually fear the police? to experience anxiety just by the sight of a patrol car,even though they were not engaging in anything illegal? and who knows...maybe there is some new ordinance on the books that you are unaware of?

would you become paranoid and suspicious of law enforcement?

and then..what if....you started losing friends to cops.people you grew up with being shot in the street,and every time the mayor comes out and calls it a "justifiable killing".

would that make you feel any better?
any less paranoid or anxious?

there was ONE police shooting in ten years and then..as if by magic ..(which is how the media seems to always portray this..shocking news..at 11)..you lose 5 friends in a year.all to cops..all "justifiable".

would you begin to think there was a conspiracy?
targeting you and your neighbors?

i BET you would.
i know i would.

now lets look at the cops.

they are just a tool.
an instrument for the state to uphold the law and write citations for infractions.they dont MAKE the laws,nor the infractions,not even the fines.

they just do what they are told.

and they are told to go into these poor and working poor neighborhoods and write tickets,a LOT of tickets.

do you really think they are unaware of the growing hostility towards them? the looks of disgust,fear and apprehension?

but...this is their job,and they do what they are told.

they see.
they know.
they are aware of the growing hatred towards them,and this makes them anxious..and defensive..and in some horrible,tragic cases...trigger happy.

a natural and normal response to heightened stimuli in the face of great uncertainty.

so they react impulsively and out of fear in a way that ten years ago would have been unheard of.

they think themselves good cops.
they do a good job.
they do what they are told.
and the people hate them for it.
so they respond instinctively and with poor judgement.

we..as citizens,respond with disgust and indignation when a cop abuses his/her authority.we see this as a major moral breach in the citizen/cop relationship,because we feel as agents of the law they should be held to a higher standard than the rest of us...and rightly so,but when you put a human being in a tense and dangerous situation,not of their making,they will fail at some point to react correctly and with sound judgement.

they SHOULD be held accountable,but so should the city council members and the mayor and all the local representatives who created this toxic climate in the first place.

the lesson to be learned here is that nothing is a binary situation when people are concerned.

so when black lives matter protestors address people to make them aware of the situation,this is what they are talking about.the police killing are only a last stage manifestation of a situation that began in 2008 on wall street.

and we need to be aware,because right now it is the predominantly black communities,but soon coming to a neighborhood near YOU.

the poor and working poor have become expendable.no longer relevant to the system.which is why police shootings are being handled the way they are.our value is ever increasingly being judged on how well we can feed the system.

until this disparity is addressed there will continue to be police shootings.people will die and there will be no indictments.

because police do what they are told.

it is up to us to make policy makers accountable for their actions,and in doing so address a toxic climate that both the poor,working poor and cops alike have to swim in.

stop forcing cops to write tickets to fund a city that lost it's savings due to fuckhead bankers.

this blood..all of it..is on those bankers hands.

While I love it when developers have the courage and funding to do something bold and different artistically, I imagine I wouldn't feel better after playing that.

I get the appeal of more typical horror; being afraid is thrilling and can feel liberating when you know you're actually safe. But the feeling I get from this is not that it's scary but more along the lines of "wow, look at those suffering freaks suffer with no end in sight". It's like spending a few hours looking at the most disturbing pictures of birth defects and leprosy you can find, without the possible benefit of empathizing with a real experience that other people could have.

I'm not trying to denigrate people who like it, I'm just baffled. Can anyone explain the appeal to me?

Watch some 'formula drift'. They're powerful enough that they don't need to use the front brakes to spin the tires, even at speed. It's possible the same thing applies to the bike, that it's just overpowering the rear wheel and not using the brake, but since he doesn't accelerate out of sight, he probably is braking.

You can. That's actually the right way to do it. In the strictest sense, the only legal way to enact gun control.

(Although, IMO, a short sighted change... given millennia of repeating human history to show us what the future eventually holds.)

-scheherazade

Look... let's all agree on this...

The american founding fathers did some really great stuff. Wonderful.

But they're fucking human, and the 2nd amendment was unbelievably short-sighted.

The constitution is not something to mess with willy-nilly, but it CAN and it SHOULD be updated from time to time.

@lawdeelaw, my main problem with libertarians is two fold.

First, they're a fucking disaster for the environment. Did you hear that moron on climate change? "If it exists, the government should stay out of it"
Really?? I cannot even begin to comprehend the stupidity of such an argument.

Second, they're zealots. They ignore the fact that some things actually work in government because it doesn't suit their ideology. Did you actually watch the video? They wanted people to be able to drive on roads without a licence....that's just fucking nuts. Never mind things like public healthcare, social services, etc; all of which work perfectly well in plenty of countries around the world.

I agree with a lot of libertarian policy, but it how they arrived at that policy.

Fundamentally, they're children. They're selfish, short-sighted and convinced they're right.

I don't trust anyone who thinks they have a simple answer to the worlds problems. The world is complex and sometimes it needs complex solutions. Sometimes, it's private industry (look at how Tesla is slowly fixing transport emissions) and sometimes it's government based (look at the absolute disaster that is privately run prisons).

Bernie or bust.


25 things I trust more than Hillary Clinton:
• Mexican tap water
• A wolverine with a ‘pet me’ sign
• A mixed drink served by Bill Cosby
• A straight shave from Jodi Arias
• An elevator ride with Ray Rice
• Browns going to the Super Bowl
• Brian Williams memory
• Pete Carroll coaching decisions
• Loch Ness monster sightings
• Pinocchio
• The Boy that cried Wolf
• A snapping turtle in a mud bath
• A Nigerian inheritance email
• A pilot alone in the cockpit
• A factory packed parachute
• A test fart in bed with the flu
• Tying Anthony Weiner’s shoes
• Harry Reid’s exercise equipment
• A kiss from Judas
• An Afghan wearing a backpack
• A Dana White apology
• Keeping my healthcare plan
• A North Korean trial
• A BIC pen that won’t leak
• A tuna fish sandwich left on a city bus

@Zawash -- all true. And yet, just because Calvin and Hobbes and Bill Watterson are/were awesome, it doesn't make IP and copyright rules any more sensible.

My opinion: those respectful and well-done parodies and homages (say, Pants are Overrated's Hobbes and Bacon) are fair use. The person/people that drew Calvin peeing on things? Fair use also. There is a big difference between "tasteless" and "should be illegal".

Selling car decals with those images is different, because then you're treading all over the "not for profit" element of fair use. However, tracking down tons of small-scale infringers on that, or even worse, average people who simply buy the decals/shirts/whatever and likely don't know or care to know about IP and copyright laws is ... a losing battle at best, and punitive towards *fans* of the IP at worst.

There are many many examples of going to idiotic (IMO) lengths to protect IP. Disney suing local bakeries for drawing some character in icing on top of a kids birthday cake. Metallica suing Napster, University internet hosts, and even individual downloaders of their music. Teachers being sued for playing a clip of a TV show, movie, or song as part of their lessons. Etc. etc.

At some level, copyright is a good thing. Or at least a necessary evil. But the litigious zeal with which IP and copyright are "protected" these days seems like we've lost sight of the "art before commerce" element that is a huge part of why Calvin and Hobbes was so awesome. And why IP is something worth protecting (within sensible limits).

Who said that? One more straw man to disguise Clinton's inadequacies?

EDIT: Or did you miss-read. I do not say a Clinton PRESIDENCY is the same as a Trump presidency, I say a Clinton candidacy will lead to a Trump presidency. I do think she would probably (not definitely, they are both too random to predict at all) be better as president....but I don't think she can win, she's too hated and has too much heavy baggage.

Fortunately, most people have more sense than to fall for that straw man.

Politics is dirty. Do you like it? 'No.' Are you surprised by it? 'No.' Are you hurt by it? Absolutely, we all are. That's why when you are presented with a 'clean' candidate, it's astonishing to me that anyone would continue to support dirty ones.

Are you talking about Clinton supporters, who are the ones willing to let the world burn just to be able to put [force] a (admittedly terrible, widely hated, dishonest, divisive, and losing) woman up as a candidate?
Again, Clinton is BEHIND Trump in all national polls now, and while his numbers are rising, hers are falling. Sanders wins VS Trump by a landslide, and always has in national polls. Standing for Clinton is standing for Trump, but yeah, you would rather let it all burn so a (short sighted) segment of the voters (and the DNC) can get exactly what they want....good strategy.

Comment hidden because you are ignoring dag. (show it anyway)

For me it's not so much the substance of what she says, it's the incredulous derisive reaction. We're all short-sighted idiots, me included.