leicsmac

Yep, and prices should be preset, in no way dynamic, and touts/scalpers should be punished in the strongest way possible. Parasites.

I'll be honest, I wish I had faith in all, most or even a decent proportion of the people who didn't see Covid as any kind of big thing to do this. For me it's much more likely that they would dismiss the thing as a threat/conspiracy/something not directly affecting them personally ala Don't Look Up until the only thing that could be done would be to burn and count the dead. Of course, I hope I'm wrong about mentality and outcome there.

Difficult to tell, considering it's an unrepeatable experiment. As an object lesson in demonstrating our capability to work together as a species against a global threat, however, it's a reasonable working hypothesis to say that we failed. And while the failure in this instance may be viewed as "not too costly" overall ( try telling the relatives of the dead and those suffering with long Covid that) I wonder how those who hold those self-interested sentiments that led to that failure will view the next test that comes our way with equal ambivalence. Because it will, in all likelihood, be bigger.

Implying that having a continual grudge against someone like Kane is childish is an insult to the juvenile population imo.

Yeah, fears are often irrational, that doesn't mean they're not legit.

...or more people will have to be shown clearly suffering and dying, perhaps. Hopefully not.

What is observing something through empiricism and seeing it didn't happen (thus either satisfying or not satisfying a hypothesis) if not an "iterative application of the scientific process"? That's one of the most fundamental ones, even though the examples mentioned here weren't exactly carried out under controlled conditions. And what proves these people wrong? Further advances in the scientific process, nothing else. I have sympathy for people who have this viewpoint, though the post I cited goes into immense detail as to why such thought is misguided. I cannot, however, speak for those who will (BIU for extreme emphasis, it is practically a mathematical certainty) suffer and die because of the above mindset and the resultant lack of action through political policy resulting from it, and those people may be much less sympathetic than I. They may seek to hold such people accountable in an extreme manner, should the worst come to the worst because of ignorance of the scientific process. And that, through a variety of possibilities alone or combined (climate change just being one of them), is a distinct probability. Bluntly, the laws of science won't suffer ignorance forever, and neither likely will those who end up in terrible conditions because of that ignorance.

One of the best analyses of a fallacy I see so often. Particularly the last few paragraphs.

I mean, the first six words are spot on, just a shame about the rest of it.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0jwp3ppp6xo A firefighter died during a flood rescue in Austria and one person drowned in Poland, as torrential rain caused by Storm Boris continued to wreak havoc across Central and Eastern Europe. In Romania, five people have died, while several remain unaccounted for in the Czech Republic. The Austrian province surrounding Vienna has been declared a disaster area, with its leaders speaking of "an unprecedented extreme situation". Poland's prime minister Donald Tusk declared a state of natural disaster. ...Following extreme flooding in 2021, the World Weather Attribution Network concluded that the warming climate meant the likelihood and intensity of such events in Europe was increasing. That's pretty awful.

Yeah, agreed. And isn't it rather a judgement on the system as a whole and that public that PR and perception are valued so heavily over actual policy consequences, especially when that perception clearly varies from party to party, often media driven.

Exactly.

I'm not sure about that, a little under 10% of all US presidents left office that way, which is a reasonably significant proportion imo.

And they're having one even if they do. Like Attlee, of course he can't win with the press and I'm not sure how much effort he should expend trying.

Yeah, come on guys, match the wine with the meat in terms of colour, please.

Andrew Forde on YT does some fantastic compilations: Naturally, the Hand of Back is near the top - still remains the finest piece of shithousery I've seen at a critical moment in a rugby match.

And now..

Yep, it's masochists-only in there and has been for a while.

I think that the (relatively) laissez-faire tax rate in the US contributes rather clearly contributes to the systemic inequality issues there that have become so much more prevalent since Reagan, but then it's more complex than that and it's not the only reason.

By itself? No. As a part of an overall tax structure that's supposed to help the most vulnerable in society? Yes. Mind you, as above, I don't suppose it matters much given the state of such "help" Stateside anyway, so this measure probably won't make much difference. I know it's just the way things work over there.

And quite apart from the above, public services that might actually benefit those worse off can clearly go hang. Not that public services in the US apart from those that involve shooting or blowing people up (sorry, "defense" and "serve and protect") are in any kind of shape anyway.

It's a hope, rather than an expectation, for me. The expectation is that there will be violence, as there was post-2020 election.

A general observation on this topic: I wonder how many in the press and their readership decrying this act of cruelty towards pensioners were a couple of years ago totally OK with the idea of little to few restrictions regarding controlling the spread of a virus that was rather deadly to the same demographic? I'm thinking perhaps that's rather a lot of hypocrisy to swallow from them.

Is there any suggestion at all that he, or more pointedly his supporter base, will do this?

Given the events of 2020 where a pretty conclusive victory led to serious unrest anyway, I think that's going to happen this time round again regardless of the margin of victory for Harris (should she win). The cult of personality surrounding Trump will simply not accept him losing. WRT the future, long term policy decisions had an effect during his last four years and they likely would have still more of an effect were he to win again. And ask Heather Heyer just how ugly the actions were last time round.