Nerm

I am pretty skeptical of the idea of terraforming any planet in our solar system. It is such a large scale project that I have trouble thinking that better options will not exist that can be implemented with less cost/effort. I think there is some potential for building very large enclosed colonies in lava tubes, which recent studies suggest can be massive on Mars.

My "feeling old" moment came a few years ago, when I was informed that Ralph Macchio had become older than Pat Morita was when the Karate Kid was filmed. However, I have since been able to convince myself that this fact doesn't make me old. After all, Ralph Macchio looked way younger than he really was, and Pat Morita looked much older than he was. So I'm not actually getting old yet... right?

I have used both the Roku and the Amazon Firestick. I have been really happy with both. I also have the commercial free version of Hulu, but not the more expensive Hulu live tv option. The Handmaids Tale on hulu is very good. Other than that, I watch some FX shows through hulu that I also enjoy. I personally don't see a lot of differences between Roku or Firestick. I slightly prefer the Roku. I don't know much about hulu live tv, but I watch almost nothing on my direct tv subscription. Since game of thrones ended, I have pretty much only watched netflix, amazon prime, and hulu.

I don't know why, but I started watching Perfect Strangers on Hulu. For the youngsters, it is a sitcom that was popular in the late 80s. I am enjoying it more than I thought I would. There is something about watching Balki Bartokomous do "the dance of joy" that brings me back to a simpler time in life.

I feel like that would be a good title for a parody of the AC/DC song Thunderstruck.

Since we are all guessing about the article, anyone have any guesses on what the actual headline is going to be? I would think that "The culture is damn good" would be my top guess.

The "insanely rich" part is the key. Bezos maybe made a one dollar bet with Giants owner John Mara that he could take Dan Snyder's team from him. Watch the movie Trading Places. This is how the insanely rich amuse themselves.

Me either. This whole thing is so strange. Never seen so much buildup without any real sense of what the general topic of the story will relate to.

I like some musicals, depends on the songs. Rocky Horror Picture Show is probably my favourite. I would love to watch Hamilton, but I don't have Disney + currently. Will that performance be on that platform over the long term, or is it temporary?

His channel is awesome for learning about so many aspects of spaceflight, and particularly in potential solutions to problems that limit us currently. I found it ironic that in his early videos he would always include apologies for his speech impediment making it difficult for people to understand him, when he was able to communicate complicated subjects more clearly than just about anyone I have ever come across.

That was so cool. I'm pretty excited about SpaceX. I have always been interested in space flight, particularly in manned missions and exploration. I feel like today was a big step towards making it much more possible for the masses to have a chance to actually experience space flight in the foreseeable future. I always found it ironic that so many kids would say they want to be an astronaut when they grow up, and were told it can happen for them if they work hard in school. If a 10 year old boy says he has a goal of becoming an NFL quarterback, they are told that is very unlikely because there are so few people that can actually achieve that goal. Well, so far, the average ten year old (male) would have had a much better chance of becoming an NFL QB than they have had of becoming an astronaut that actually goes to space. I think today may have changed that.

I don't pay a lot of attention to state politics in South Dakota (where I live) but my perception was that the Governor was taking things fairly seriously. She seemed to shut down schools quickly at least. Also, I feel like this is a bit of a misleading headline. I don't know what other states are doing with their large food processing plants, but I have assumed that maintaining a food supply is something that is considered essential, even for states where stay at home orders are in effect. My guess is that this business would have been exempted in any state with stay at home orders, so I don't think the first sentence of the headline has anything to do with what happened at that food processing plant. Of course, I could be wrong.

I agree that almost nobody would endorse the goal of "punishing the rich" as a primary reason for progressive policies. But, that is how a lot of conservatives view it. It shows a fundamental lack of understanding of beliefs of progressives. The tendency to distort the reasoning of people who disagree with us politically into a unreasonable strawman argument is one of the core issues that fuels political divisions. In my opinion. On a side note, I have met one person who seems like they might fit into the "punish the rich at all costs" stereotype. When I was an undergrad in the mid 90s, my intro to philosophy teacher was pretty extreme. I remember there were wildfires that swept through part of California where some of the most expensive neighborhoods in the state were. The philosophy professor went on and on about how happy he was that these people had to face adversity. It genuinely brought him joy to think about these people he had never met loosing their possessions and being in distress.

I don't think I have ever met someone who thinks like that. There are a number of assumptions being made in that analysis that show a fundamental difference in beliefs about what helps or hurts people. There are a lot of people out there that feel that taking money from other people, against their will, and giving it to someone else is wrong... even if they would come out ahead personally. Others may feel that such programs should come from the state and local levels instead of the federal level. Some feel that giving money to people will "trap" people into perpetual dependence. You are making the assumption that these voters really believe that welfare is a good thing that helps people. That is not a universally accepted truth. For people who think that welfare is a trap, they view progressive voters as the ones who are willing to sacrifice their wellbeing as long as someone who is successful has to sacrifice more. Please note, I do not have any interest in defending the validity or reasoning behind various beliefs people have. But, as the theme of this thread is about not understanding Trump voters, I think you have to start with the premise that they don't secretly think the policies they oppose are actually good for the people of the country. One of the fundamental skills in being able to "understand" the other side in politics is to be able articulate their reasons for supporting a position, or person, in a way that they would agree with, even if you don't think those reasons are valid. I don't know if you could find anyone who would say "welfare helps me, but I want it cut because someone else would be hurt by the cut more than I would."

Now that it has become clear that I will continue to have a lot of down time for at least the next month, I have decided to watch 24. It is a show I have never seen, despite it being so popular back in the day. So far, I have 4 episodes watched, a little more than 200 more to go!

Here is another early story on Covid. I did add some of the links I was referencing, but I can't really get things that have been deleted, like the Vox article. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/01/24/coronavirus-versus-flu-influenza-deadlier-than-wuhan-china-disease/4564133002/ I will bow out of this thread for a few days. I'm a little discouraged about how a fairly benign discussion of media coverage in the initial days of this is seen as some type of partisan defense of Trump. I see a lot of people piling on, arguing about Trump's history of horrible behavior, as if I said or believe that he isn't a horrible person. There is nothing that I said that defends Trump in any way. People are reading a lot into my comment that some reasonable people, having nothing to do with politics, also thought that the flu was more dangerous than Corona at the end of January. That in no way indicates that I think Trump did anything correctly in responding to the situation.

I'm not making the case that "the left" was reporting anything for political gain. I was saying that people shouldn't jump to the conclusion that you have to be some type of propaganda spreading minion of Trump for believing that the flu was a greater concern in late January. It wasn't a partisan issue at the time.

I am having an hard time linking the material. The Vox article linked below is not the one I was thinking of. It appears they deleted it and the tweets saying people should worry more about the flu than covid. The buzzfeed one has also been altered, and I don't have the original. https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/time-for-a-reality-check-america-the-flu-is-a-much-bigger-threat-than-coronavirus-for-now/2020/01/31/46a15166-4444-11ea-b5fc-eefa848cde99_story.html https://www.buzzfeednews.com/amphtml/danvergano/coronavirus-cases-deaths-flu?bftwnews=&utm_term=4ldqpgc&__twitter_impression=true https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2020/1/26/21082357/coronavirus-outbreak-us-confirmed-cases

I think there is too strong a tendency to attribute these types of things to deliberate attempts to misinform people for political gain. Left wing outlets like Vox, the Washington Post, and Buzzfeed were also running articles at that time saying that people should worry more about the flu than the Corona virus. Do we automatically attribute that to stupidity or evil intentions?

I am wondering about the context of those numbers. Are they saying that the DoD forces companies to manufacture something they wouldn't otherwise be making an average of more than 800 times per day over the course of 2018. I'm having trouble visualizing what it means to "use" the DPA more than 300,000 times in a year.

I watched Tiger King. At first, I kind of judged myself for watching the Jerry Springer type personalities involved. But I have to say, as an overall docuseries, I have never seen a show that has as much footage for events that went on over several years. They seemed to have actual footage of so many extreme events, when a lot of documentaries just do a voice over with recreated events. I really cringe at the behavior of the people, but the overall story was interesting to me. As for Ozark, I thought season three was outstanding. I hope there is not such a huge break before the next season.

Glad to hear that. I loved season one, and felt very underwhelmed by season 2. I may start season 3 today.

I don't think you have to wonder. There are videos of swamped waiting rooms with people dying from obvious Covid cases that continue to come in. From what I understand, doctors have been told that they will be held accountable (i.e. dissapeared) if they diagnose any new Covid cases.

Just to clarify my position: I strongly believe that testing needs to continue to expand, and I think the horribly slow development and distribution of tests in the US has made the situation here much worse. I was just making a mathematical point about how mass testing/screening of populations that have a low prevalence of cases will result in changing the data for death rates among people who test positive. On the flip side, if you only tested people who are hospitalized with severe symptoms consistent with Covid-19, the death rate for people with confirmed cases would skyrocket. I despise Trump, but I think there is a place for discussion of diminishing value in testing people who have no symptoms and no reason to think they have been exposed to it. That doesn't mean there is no value in it, and the point would be valid even if Trump never existed, or the right was demanding everyone be tested.