Bez continues his tear with incredible pace and slots 2nd in qualifying.
Fermin Aldeguer tumbles from the heights of victory down to a third row start.
TWO Yamahas in the top three with Quartararo on pole and Miller in 3rd.
Raul Fernandez begins in 4th.
Acosta starts 5th.
In the sprint Quartararo faded off the line and Bez bolted to the front where he would put on a show with a wing and a prayer stuck in his front fairing. He struck a bird on the warm up lap, but this didn't affect his ride and he would go on to finish 3s ahead of 2nd place. Raul Fernandez gave Aprilia their first (I think) sprint 1-2 finish as the only rider who could nearly keep up with Bez. Pedro Acosta finished well behind but put up an incredible defense to keep Miller and Digiantonnio just behind him in order to complete the podium.
In the race proper Bezzecchi served a double long lap penalty and didn't manage to work his way through traffic for another victory. Instead, he would settle for 3rd after working his way through traffic. Raul Fernandez earned his first win in MotoGP and kept Aprilia as top dog this weekend. A well deserved win especially considering his soft rear tire gamble and uncertainty that it would go the distance. Martin made a similar gamble two years ago in Mandalika and went from a commanding lead to finishing off the podium. Fabio Digiantonnio displayed impressive race pace and finished 2nd.
Pecco Bagnaia continues to be plagued with inconsistency and he finished nearly last in the sprint and crashed out of the race late. He is out of second place in the championship with Bez now 8 points up on the struggling competitor.
Alex Marquez managed not to lose too many points to Bezzecchi and looks likely to hold on to 2nd place in the championship.
The best way is to pay for access on MotoGP.com. You get all the practice sessions, qualifying, and races for Moto3, Moto2, and MotoGP live or on demand. You can watch races all the way back to '92. Some decent interviews and documentary stuff, too.
It also lets you choose your cameras to view, and you can turn off the commentators if you like.
Unfortunately it's $150/yr, so you really have to want it.
It is expensive but there's 22 sprints and races per year + practice/quals + Moto2 and Moto3 and next year the baggers exhibitions (? I'm unsure of the details on that one).
I think it's a good value compared to MotoAmerica and particularly when the production values, live timing, website layout, and everything is considered as a package.
Remains to be seen what crew is used next year. I think the F1 TV subcription crew is not just used in the US. I thinks the quality of their talking heads has decreased over the last couple of years but still better than Sky (ESPN's crew). Apple could just go with one and not offer the other.
You’ll also be able to watch For All Mankind, Silo and Slow Horses (which is good but not as much as it’s hyped up to be). Apparently Severance is good as well but I haven’t watched that.
To say nothing of Severance, which has been outstanding. I agree regarding Slow Horses, but it's still far better than the average Disney dreck, and most of what's on Netflix.
YES! There is actually some decent stuff worthy of time on Apple Plus. It doesn't have that "netflix look" or Disney's "throw in a chick and make everyone gay" thing either. Not everything is for me and I'm not happy with the final season of Ted Lasso. However, their ability to stream is pretty well done.
I know people want to dump on Apple, but their baseball streams have been extremely well done for the most part. They also seemed to have learned their lesson from the MLS and other sports contracts that virtually no one wants to buy a secondary sub. This may end up as apple tv wearing the skin suit of F1 TV. It's also very likely more a tech and promotion move.
This is a move to capture more normies in the same way the F1 Movie helped to make it fun for someone like my wife... who now will sit and watch Max every week as well. You're never going to get a generation of American F1 drivers until you have kids with easy access to F1. Guess what, the majority of households have apple products and get at least a TRIAL of apple tv with it.
I think it's good news for a lot of reasons you outline above. The balkanization of streaming into ever smaller and smaller $10/mo. F1TV subs is not good for wider dissemination.
F1 is exploding in popularity for 3 reasons:
1) The Netflix series. Love it or hate it, it brought F1 into people's living room and gave them a reason to like (or dislike) teams and drivers.
2) The F1 movie, which was as good for racing as Ford vs Ferrari was. In 10 years, we've gone from nobody caring about endurance racing and F1 to everybody talking about it. It's glorious.
3) American races, street races especially, on the calendar. Putting Vegas and Miami on the schedule was brilliant, no matter how much they cost to attend (and I'm cheap enough that I'll never go).
Making F1 even more accessible by putting it on a platform lots and lots of people already pay for will be number 4 on that list.
This is a big deal, and very good for racing. Now lets see if the FIA can keep from screwing up the format even more than they already have.
So the F1TV pro subscription is about 85 USD per year. Apple TV is 13 per month with no yearly. Also supposedly the F1 that comes with Apple TV won’t have all the features as F1TV pro. To get those you have to pay for an extra on top of the 13 per month.
Maybe I misinterpreted the email F1TV sent out, but I thought we still got the practices, qualifying sessions, and sprints along with the races. Are you talking about the archives? Access to old races? F2/F3/F1 Academy?
Yeah you are right. You get the “equivalent” of F1Tv premium with the Apple TV subscription. I misread it as you got the races live with Apple TV and if you wanted Premium it was an add on.
I think it's good news for a lot of reasons pertaining to the growth of F1.
The balkanization of streaming into ever smaller and smaller $10/mo. specialty apps is not very good for wider dissemination, because justifying $85 to a non car-loving spouse often kills a thing in the crib. Nobody new is going to pay for an entire year of something just to try it out.
F1 is exploding in popularity for 3 reasons:
1) The Netflix series. Love it or hate it, it brought F1 into people's living room and gave them a reason to like (or dislike) teams and drivers.
2) The F1 movie, which was as good for racing as Ford vs Ferrari was. Yes, it strained credulity. Yes, it was wildly imperfect. But it was entertaining, and a LOT of non car-people loved it. In 10 years, we've gone from nobody caring about endurance racing and F1 to everybody talking about it. It's glorious.
3) American races, street races especially, on the calendar. Putting Vegas and Miami on the schedule was brilliant, no matter how much they cost to attend (and I'm cheap enough that I'll never go).
Making F1 even more accessible by putting it on a platform lots and lots of people already pay for will be number 4 on that list. Millennials ad Gen Z all use Apple almost exclusively, and all have Apple TV. Yeah, I know your future engineer has a flip-phone, but he's an outlier.
This is a big deal, and very good for racing (I think). Now lets see if the FIA can keep from screwing up the format even more than they already have.
WIndows should work with a Chromium based browser. Possibly FireFox also.
I am more concerned with DVR capability. If live or nothing or a day later probably a big NOPE from me. I rarely watch the grid walk pre race, so I come into the race a few minutes in. Considering there's a good chance of a pile up and red flag in the first couple of laps, coming in late lets me catch up and bypass the sitting in the pits. Also being 10-15 minutes behind isn't a big deal.
Oh, and I don't believe there's a Android App for Apple TV. Apple TV has an app I believe for Google TV. So, Android phone + tablet user are SOL. I'm SOL on those devices.
The media whores are regurgitating Apple/Liberty PR. "Well ESPN was paying 90 million and Apple will be paying 140 million a year". Ok, 90 was when ESPN signed. No mention of what ESPN offered to reup with or if they even did. The assumption is Liberty gets 50 million more a year. It could be far less than that.
This is the best news I've had all month (in fairness, it hasn't really been a great month). Apple TV is already kind of the high-water mark on streaming content among the big players (Netflix, Amazon, Disney, et al). Netflix hasn't had a breakout show in years, and Amazon has always frittered at the margins. We dropped Disney is was so pathetic.
I'm aware that Apple is losing their butts on the Apple TV side, but they're trying to buy their way into the upper echelon, and they're succeeding. I have no idea how long it'll last, but they've given me another reason to keep sending them $10/mo.
... and that's what it is, for all of you whiners. Ten lousy bucks, and you get a whole lot more than F1, but we will get the entire F1 package for that amount.
I hate to be the "Actually" guy but Netflix HAS had several breakout hits in the past year. The problem is, they aint for guys like us.
I mean, KPop Demon Hunters? Really?!?!
(Also, Apple Plus is now 12.99 for the majority of Americans but even then the quality beats the rest of the streaming services by a mile. Biggest issue is that some shows take forever to develop. Well, when you attempt to create 8 movies essentially, that'll happen.)
I can't wait to see what other camera angles we will have access to. The revised cams they used in the F1 movie were pretty decent.
I'm 68. KPDH is one of the best movies I've ever seen once you decide to buy into the really, really dumb premise. Those songs are completely on point for the movie. I've read that the song "Golden" was what the money people heard before deciding to go all with the movie.
The girls aren't your typical Girl Bosses either. Possibly because it is animation. The live actress GBs are usually angry with a scowl on their face every waking moment. Rae, Capt. Marvel, Black Widow, the Asian woman in the new Tron debacle. The characters are written angry and the actresses have a angry persona in real life. In this movie the only real angry is near the end in the scene with Rumi + Celine. And the angry is justified.
If you read the lyrics of the movie songs, there's a lot more going on than a kid's movie. Soda Pop is about idolatry and needing the adulation to survive. On the surface it's fluff. Your idol is more explicit. I picture Robert DiNero and "Stars" from Hollywood singing those songs.
The Golden song was written by the Rumi character's singer. She got into the KPop factory at 10 or 11 and at 21 was told she aged out. She writes for others now and wasn't supposed to even sing in this movie. The song can be said to be her personal redemption about the industry. One KPop hit she wrote which for some odd reason I have heard is Red Velvet's Psycho. Mostly in Korean.
If anything the movie has KPop in it's title, but to a large degree the movie isn't all that positive about the KPop industry. KPop is the reincarnation of MoTown.
While the movie was created by a Japanese company (Sony), all the voices and singers are of people that are Korean or of Korean heritage. Many of the behind the scenes people are Asian.
Oh my complaint isn't with the quality or whether it is well done. My problem is more with adult themes in something wrapped in a package for younger people. I mean, it's a cartoon. And yes, I understand the viewer dynamics now for adults watching anime and cartoons is that the majority do.
It's just... why are we largely not getting this attention put into adult shows? Pretty rare.
I am not a fan of animation, but I watched KPDH with my nephew and quite enjoyed it. Apparently the creatives fought the suits hard to keep the story specifically Korean instead of generic Asian. I also derive personal satisfaction from the high degree of Canadian content. Nowadays, animation is designed to work on two levels: adults and children.
Yes. Though I think it's Kimbap not sushi. Same/different and I believe it is served warm. I hope that went over a lot of kid's heads. Other's noticed the same thing.
Everybody was told to “cut the cord” when they got sick of $200/mo. cable TV bills.
Now you spend that much per month, except by a thousand cuts, for five different streaming services, along with Internet access with enough bandwidth to run those on multiple devices!
The drug situation makes the case for the harshest immigration policy and - perhaps some day? - a border to speak of, but not for stealing another country's oil and installing a puppet regime (likely hand-picked by USAID).
In the GWB era, we'd have made the argument that it's Venezuela's problem to fix but that failure to fix it would come with "Coalition Of The Willing" style penalties.
except almost all of the drugs in the US come from Columbia (cocaine) and Mexico (heroin, fentanyl, and the trade routes through which the cocaine flows in to the US)...
Yes, the bulk of the precursor chemicals needed to synthesize illicit fentanyl come from China. that said, I suspect those individual chemicals are used in a wide variety of products. it's not as if they are used _only_ to make fentanyl. there's also the fact most illicit production occurs in Mexico, so there's not a lot the US can do to ban production or importation.
Also, as Jack has noted elsewhere in the thread, fentanyl for legitimate medical use is manufactured in the US, and I'd wager they also use chemicals produced in China.
the bottom line, though, is the war on drugs has been, for the most part, an abject failure and the Trump administration bombing Venezeulan vessels in international waters and launching a covert war within the country will do little to nothing to address the problem.
the real aim of this is regime change in Venezuela.
I’ve was always disappointed that Mazda never made a hard top Miata coupe. I’m not counting the rare JDM model.
But you are on to something with the Cosmo comparison.
The original Cosmo was 9” longer than the Miata, but the wheelbase was 7” shorter. The Cosmo was a 2 seater, too, so a Miata based coupe with a Cosmo length and keeping it as a 2 seater would be pretty cool.
Looking at the Simpson Design Miata based designs shows that the possibilities for the Miata platform are endless. https://www.simpsondesign.net/
Major respect to Mr. Simpson for putting in the work and making his visions into realities! The Italia classic is my pick of those, but that being said I'm not sure I prefer it over a stock NB Miata. I appreciate his talent for body and paint work, that stuff is very hard; I just think the end result of any handmade retro body on a modern chassis is a bit... goofy. I assume the goal is to make it look like a real coach built 50s car, and no matter who does this, they always seem to miss the mark. That being said, I'm not going to pretend I could do any better myself, and I'm glad there are people who try
You'll have to venture to southern USA to find one that isn't about to fall in half, and you'll still have to pay 10k for it because I fear even those are becoming "collectable" thanks to 35 year old nepo babies.
very true but we do have the subie sanctuary company just outside of toronto which handles pretty in depth restoration of subarus (kinda have to given the locale) so at least ive got that as an option
I’ve always wanted just that a fun to drive convertible that could fit three kids in the back, might just settle for a NC and make the kids take turns riding…hey let’s go for ice cream 3 times. Can’t think of any 5 seaters except the wrangler but I’m not into collecting ducks waving at everyone and all that goes with the jeep thing
Yes but Sebrings fucking suck (I drove my friend's 4cyl Sebring convertible to Warped Tour one year, and it was only fun because it was packed with 4 other teenagers)
Mazda should build a n all wheel drive SUV version of the Miata, call it the “Miata SS” which stands for “Speed Special”. Sell it only in Canada, at a discount, concentrating the marketing around Speed’s hometown, so lots of them get sold there!!!
I’ve been thinking about the flaw in the get-customers-when they’re-young-and-keep-them-for-life model. It’s certainly possible but you have to ensure the aspirational vehicles don’t suck. Or the entry-level ones, for that matter.
Aston's lineup, like Ferrari's and McLaren's, has become confusing to anyone not deeply immersed into that particular brand. I entirely stopped caring a while ago (admittedly, design played a role, too).
Yes, when they Reichmaned the design of Aston’s a decade ago, the last reason for buying one disappeared. Now they make a stupid mans Jensen Interceptor, lacking both the cool name, and the inexpensive to run and dead reliable American V8. Ask your Mercedes parts department, what the unrepairable AMG v8 under the hood costs to replace.
Agreed. The various green paints they offer are some of the best I have ever seen. I would choose which green paint first, then which Aston car second.
If there are still any out there. Preferably with the 3800. (Was that only in the first two generations, dustbuster and folds-floorpan-around-shattering-foot-in-accident? I don’t remember if that made the third GM minivan generation.)
"Yet here we are with just thirty-four points between Oscar and Max."
i am so fuckin hyped for this season and that max will win in the end
"most races without a Grand Prix podium"
i wonder how his legacy would have looked had he not tried to pretend he could make it in another car that wasnt the all conquering mercedes and simply retired after the 7th (6th if that old f1 fiasco is solved) wdc so everyone wouldnt see how slow he actually is
"African-Americans are now most at risk. So this is also now an issue of racial justice."
if blacks werent dying but only whites in the midwest would anyone in power care? anyway more aim9s on drugboats please or maybe just gun down the drivers so the coke can be kept out of the ocean kthx
"The fact that Canada can’t find funding to make this pipe-dream stupidity happen is further proof that the EV wave has stalled on arrival"
its also proof that even though we are hemorrhaging money on purely retarded ideas we cant afford to do every bad idea that the liberals come up with which is the slightest silver lining
" consider asking “What do you believe to be true, in the greater sense, about this issue?” You might be surprised."
Michael Schumacher's first Ferrari was the legendarily awful F310. It broke in six of his first ten starts, and he podiumed the other four. That's the difference between true greatness and manipulated dominance.
With Max scoring how many of those Red Bull points? **Nearly all of them**
Just insane to look at two driver teams vs Red Bull. But when you have a driver that is so good, it's easy to see why you'd put all your focus on one guy.
That's why this season is going to cost McLaren unless something nutty happens. RedBull put there heads down and focused. Papaya rules were dumb and they should have given Lando a good pat on the head and told him Oscar was the captain now of that team with full support to extend the points total. Instead, they let too much ego take over. Lando is only in this spot BECAUSE he has a car worthy of a championship. Oscar seems to be driving not to lose now which has changed his style a bit. Not a good look.
In a launcher under my bumper! One flash of the headlights, and if you don’t get your self-righteous ass out of the way of me and the line of drivers behind me, you won’t know what hit ya!
We need to figure out whether we need fentanyl in the medical field or not. If we don't, let's have a border? If we do, let's also have a border and have proper protocol for distribution - and maybe make it ourselves instead of importing it? And let's not use the tragedy of drug addiction as a pretense for Soros-type globalist interventionism
Medical fentanyl is produced in the United States by multiple providers. The Actiq lollipop, which was Israeli, I believe to be discontinued at the request of the FDA.
I'm starting to think there is zero reason to have fentanyl. It's so much more powerful than other drugs. The fact that it gets laced into all sorts of grey market stuff is scary. Kind of shocked people will smoke other people's joints at this point. We cratered an entire tobacco-vape-zyn industry for less.
'I'm starting to think there is zero reason to have fentanyl. It's so much more powerful than other drugs'
There are medical reasons for it. More than you'd think. But I think possession of it outside a hospital should be grounds for execution, assuming reasonable standards of evidence are met, e.g. not "Oh, LOOK WHAT WE HAVE HERE!"
Do we trust this new generation that can't tell us what a woman is to actually dole out hard core medication properly and be the ONLY source of stuff like fentanyl?
I'm honestly not sure if that is fair or not. I just know the doctors around here don't seem to be very... uh... American. Lots of box checking going on.
I fibbed when I was being referred to a neurologist for trigeminal neuralgia that “I don’t do very well understanding accents, particularly if they could be discussing treatments involving invasive procedures; I want my entire brain engaged, and not have to expend any mental capacity trying to interpret someone’s gibberish-as-“English!”
I simply don’t trust Indians or Arabs. And a plurality of the doctors in most medical practices seem to have names from one or both of those ancestries. (Fortunately, the resident working with my neurologist is as American as apple pie and Honda!)
Anyone who has seen how easily drugs enter a prison--probably the most controlled piece of territory in the United States, outside certain secret government facilities--should realize that securing 6k miles of land border and another 12k miles of coastline is a pipe dream, and trying to affect the supply of something so easily concealed (e.g. in condoms in your stomach as you fly back from wherever) is far more difficult than affecting the demand....
(Or better yet, just sell it at the state store. People know how much they need to get high and don't really intend to waste it; the vast majority of opioid deaths are because you no longer know whether what you're shooting up is just the right amount or 10x as much. Plus you'd have one less reason for gangs to shoot at each other; Seagrams and Smirnoff are no longer knocking each other off on street corners the way they did during Prohibition.)
People do have more in common with each other politically than the online discourse would suggest. Remember that only about 7% of people vote in primaries, and since the districts are largely written to basically deliver a victory to one party or the other, it's only natural that the parties would increasingly look less like "all of us" and more like "the ones who care enough to show up," making the 1980's Democrats look like Nazis and the 1980's Republicans look like socialists....
BC is becoming an out of control shit show between all the cracked out hobos littering the streets in even the small out of the way towns, and the massive influx of people from the other side of the planet that have zero intention of ever integrating into the culture or society. I’ve been watching it as a frequent visitor for ten years now and it’s sad to see
Agree with the thoughts about legalization. We are already paying more and getting less out of healthcare than anyone so as much as I hate to say it some sort of formula for services and getting rid of the middle bureaucracy and costs seems to be a possibility. Some sort of minimum care for everyone to keep a population healthy then pay for more from there?
I dont have the answer but after working around and seeing drug addiction I don’t want legalization of hard stuff that only has medical applications.
Friction works, and publicly displaying a government blowing people up is essentially demoralization propaganda specifically designed to dissuade some people. Reducing the number of people willing to bring drugs to the US and reducing the number of drugs entering the US are better than doing nothing even if it is unfortunate that people are killed either way.
Legalization of something so mild as weed has had horrid knock on effects, and legalizing harder drugs a la Portland is outright disastrous: say no to legalizing.
It's almost as if they legalized pot and pretended to be the good guys just long enough to let nefarious groups populate and run their country... hmmm.
Even my wife has started to believe that perhaps women should have never been able to vote. I tell her it's fine... we need people over a certain age, with land, and kids... oh and they must be a citizen with ID. Kind of simple to have a proof of all those things. I hate a bunch of young renters making decisions for the local school district. It's dumb.
The few times i have partaked in pot i felt like a zombie and people smoke this shit all day everyday. At least i dont have a drink till 6pm. Except mimosa sundays
I hate it. I used to hate cigarette smoke but it's freaking Chanel #5 next to that reek. Commonly coming from a Kia parked in the fire lane in front of Dollar Tree. I've learned to hold my breath when I approach a likely double-parked clunker...
Notice how that magically, the phrase “second-hand smoke” has disappeared from the public lexicon now that it’s weed smoke and not tobacco.
I was in a Puma outlet store recently, and a young couple came in with their 2 young daughters and were trying on shoes next to me. They absolutely reeked of weed, like they had been smoking it seconds before.
They were a nice looking family, too. Driving to the outlet mall and getting high with 2 kids around the age of 5 is effed up, to say the least.
My buddy and I were discussion the job cuts at Coors in the news this week..and his response was yeah gen x is the last drinking generation and all the younger gen’s prefer weed…not my choice but pick your poison. Seems to be the trend these days ☹️
It’s disingenuous for the original poster (I will give Sir Morris the benefit of the doubt) to imply that this is somehow to be attributed to the CEO’s ethnicity.
(A quick survey of his Mr. Goyal’s LinkedIn shows him to be a nearly 25 year Coors veteran - so it’s not like he’s the new kid on the block suddenly keen to chop heads at a firm to which he has no loyalty).
Faced with missing revenue forecast, shrinking EBITDA, increase in COGS, and slowing consumer spending - this is par for the course for any CEO beholden to Wall Street and shareholder returns.
1) An insidious effect of the work visa policies is that today's entry level hire is tomorrow's senior IC, next week's manager, and next's month's executive. As CBS 60 Minutes was doing exposes on H-1b in 1993, i.e., 32 years ago, Mr. Goyal should have never been hired at Coors in the first place:
It’s not fun unless you’re already at least half-drunk.
Pro tip for the college-aged male: The best way to close girls at the bar is to bring up smoking after. Chances are, you’re going to end up at her house.
That said, I’m not going to take that literally all the time. Usually I’ll have one in the afternoon on the weekends if I’m not doing anything else. One beer weekdays when I get home from work, maybe a couple more on the weekends.
I can’t figure out why people smoke so damn much pot, especially since you go around smelling like a skunk 🦨!
There are lots of much more fun, interesting, non-addictive drugs to do than marijuana that won't make your clothes stink. May be a little more expensive and harder to find though.
I was on Norco for pain control as-needed during a kidney stone episode back in 2018. I was using as little as I possibly could because I’m scared shitless of opioids!
There was one time around the time the stone passed when I accidentally took one too close to the last dose, and as I was going to bed, I started to realize that when I got a little lightheaded and a little flushed. Of course I knew what was going on, and it was like “Oh Christ, how am I going to get to sleep?!” 🙄🙄 And “people literally kill themselves to feel like THIS??!! FUUUU-UUUCK NO!”
I don’t like it when I get over-revved from too much COFFEE, FFS!
I'm more of a decriminalization mindset than a legalization one.
The former limits some of justice system abuse while still maintaining the public and community posture that "x" is "bad."
I don't want some idiot non-violent teen to go to Rikers for a dime bag, but I DEFINITELY don't want a $200M weed startup backed by PE to be advertising on every interstate in my county.
I spent a month on a special drug enforcement grand jury in Manhattan in 2002. Every single case brought before us was a crack dealer with at least half a dozen priors, often so recent that they were clearly losing less of their liberty than I was by having to spend a month on a special drug enforcement grand jury. The idea that anyone was doing meaningful time for simple possession in NYC is either pure propaganda, or it is a manufactured result intended to motivate legalization so PE can cash in, and more people can have their lives ruined.
If you were on a GJ, you're self-evidently seeing people who have reached trial.
Rikers, like many jails, not only holds convicts serving time, but also holds people who have been arrested awaiting arraignment, or detention after arraignment if denied bail or couldn't make bail, depending on the plea.
It's true - very few people were doing long sentences for simple possession. But LOTS of people were doing weeks or months in Rikers because their arraignment took forever (even though the rule is 24hrs) or couldn't make $1k cash bail. And that's all it took to basically ruin a life.
"Anyone who has seen how easily drugs enter a prison"
That would be *me*, actually. In the Midwest they have a better handle on it than they do on the coasts.
'and trying to affect the supply of something so easily concealed (e.g. in condoms in your stomach as you fly back from wherever) is far more difficult than affecting the demand....'
Try getting drugs in Singapore, which is surrounded by a literal jungle. The difference is how they treat traffickers.
"Or better yet, just sell it at the state store. People know how much they need to get high and don't really intend to waste it;"
In my youth I firmly believed this. Seeing what legal weed has done to behavior on the road, and in the workplace, has removed a lot of my sanguinity on the subject. If we distributed fent the way we distribute weed, I think we would have a national collapse. The only thing that saves us WRT weed is that it's not physically addictive for most people.
"Remember that only about 7% of people vote in primaries,"
You can make it harder to get, which reduces the amount available. Cutting the supply by 10 percent would save thousands of lives.
Also, we are all perfectly aware of how to stop it. You have the death penalty for anyone carrying it, administered with minimal judicial overhead. Which is repugnant to anyone raised on traditional American principles of justice and due process... but in 40 years the percentage of people living here who were taught that stuff will be a decided minority, so who cares?
I know little about about how intertwined US intelligence dollars are in the upper echelons of trafficking... but the little I do know tells me there are reasons that, say, the top financiers and money managers in that space mysteriously travel very freely and have no sanctions.
TBH, the MAIN foreign policy reason I'd want to limit US car production in MX is because of the money laundering opps within being a sub or supplier.
Clearly, First Brands Group didn't hire the right bankers because the right MX tie up would've solved their capital calls right quick lol
I don’t pretend to understand the finances of Aston Martin, but it seems like they are propping up a brand that died precisely when they started using turbo AMG engines instead of N/A V-12s and V8s. They are still capable of producing a handsome coupe occasionally but I can’t get over the “slightly less negatively profitable than Ford’s Electric truck effort” business model.
All that said, the Valkyrie sounded like pure heaven at Petit LeMans.
I’d go back even further. To me, Aston died with the V550/V600. The Vanquish was a pretty terrible driving car, with that totally awful automated manual transmission.
The foreigners smuggling drugs into America KNOW Americans will die consuming their product, AND THEY DON'T CARE. That's depraved indifference, at the very least. Accomplice to mass murder, arguably. These are hostile foreigners, and The State and its military exist to protect the citizens from hostile foreigners.
We are absolutely justified in using our military to stop these people, using every method available, up to and including lethal force. We're absolutely well within our rights to lock down and militarize our southern border. No one goes in or out between San Diego and Brownsville. Turn the airspace over the eastern Pacific and the Gulf of Mexico into free-fire zones. Any moving object on radar not carrying a transponder is presumed to be hostile.
That's DEFENSE. If they don't get the message, we do OFFENSE.
I went to an Orthodox funeral service for an aunt, and it was the most primal religious experience I’ve ever had. It made the Catholic services I grew up with look like a flight attendant explaining how to use the seat belts and what to do in case of a water landing.
I genuinely thought during this ancient service that my aunt’s soul was going to heaven directly from this Orthodox Church while I was there.
The more I study what the Orthodox believe, the more I like what I learn. It’s amazing how much the Catholics changed over hundreds of years by adding things or ideas that are not in the Bible.
And don’t get me started on the Pope blessing the block of ice.
I grew up in a Polish Parish that was closer to an Eastern Rite Church than what would be considered a contemporary “Catholic” Church. Music only at Noon Mass, organ only. Heavy use of Latin. Weekly Mass in Polish. No Eucharistic Ministers. No altar girls. No female lectors. A Pastor who was a personal friend of JPII. I went to Mass at other Churches occasionally and those felt like a Baptist service in comparison.
The new Archbishop of Detroit took offense to this and did his best to kill that community. It’s been very difficult to find that again.
The Catholics have it out for the Latin rite masses. God forbid you try to make your church popular and bring in young families.
But the Catholics have always been bad at marketing. Add in some pedophile priests and you end up with empty churches. I just saw the other day that over 100 churches in the Chicago Archdiocese have been closed up.
JPII visited my boyhood Polish parish. There’s a statue of him outside the church.
What laws do other countries have concerning the flow of drugs entering and penalties for people using? BTW, not saying you are not correct.
The US has money to burn more than many countries. If you have a product and can make more money selling it in the USA as opposed to Luxemburg, why bother with Luxemburg?
"Most countries can't afford to get high." Forgive me, but this is bollocks. Any country (and its citizens) can afford to get high because the production cost is beans. Weed grows, er, like a weed. Fentanyl is tuppence a bag. Cocaine is lightly processed leaves. Supply is easy and the profit huge. Demand management, however, is hard; to be effective, it would need to blow up the Western idea of civil liberties, eg compulsory, random hair testing at the population level. I don't see that idea taking off!
In Bolivia, they chew coca nuts because the cost of extracting cocaine is beyond most people's income. Never underestimate how poor the world is as a whole. And illegal drugs are always expensive anywhere you go, because the cost of the trade is baked into the product. Weed grows for free but if you can be hanged for growing it, that changes the game.
The wealth disparity turbocharges the trade, for sure. But folk have been willing to pay to feel different since pre-history. "I feel so bad and wanna feel good" as Ry Cooder sings. Attempts to crush supply alone fail for this reason. I think it would require very aggressive measures to also curb demand to make an effective drugs policy and if a million dead from fentanyl hasn't done it I don't see it happening.
There are food deserts in the Akron-Canton area where low income folks can find it challenging to shop for groceries but cannabis dispensaries are readily available.
MotoGP at Philip Island, Australia:
Bez continues his tear with incredible pace and slots 2nd in qualifying.
Fermin Aldeguer tumbles from the heights of victory down to a third row start.
TWO Yamahas in the top three with Quartararo on pole and Miller in 3rd.
Raul Fernandez begins in 4th.
Acosta starts 5th.
In the sprint Quartararo faded off the line and Bez bolted to the front where he would put on a show with a wing and a prayer stuck in his front fairing. He struck a bird on the warm up lap, but this didn't affect his ride and he would go on to finish 3s ahead of 2nd place. Raul Fernandez gave Aprilia their first (I think) sprint 1-2 finish as the only rider who could nearly keep up with Bez. Pedro Acosta finished well behind but put up an incredible defense to keep Miller and Digiantonnio just behind him in order to complete the podium.
In the race proper Bezzecchi served a double long lap penalty and didn't manage to work his way through traffic for another victory. Instead, he would settle for 3rd after working his way through traffic. Raul Fernandez earned his first win in MotoGP and kept Aprilia as top dog this weekend. A well deserved win especially considering his soft rear tire gamble and uncertainty that it would go the distance. Martin made a similar gamble two years ago in Mandalika and went from a commanding lead to finishing off the podium. Fabio Digiantonnio displayed impressive race pace and finished 2nd.
Pecco Bagnaia continues to be plagued with inconsistency and he finished nearly last in the sprint and crashed out of the race late. He is out of second place in the championship with Bez now 8 points up on the struggling competitor.
Alex Marquez managed not to lose too many points to Bezzecchi and looks likely to hold on to 2nd place in the championship.
They race at Sepang in Malaysia this weekend.
Hey, I love these updates. I've caught the occasional MotoGP race on TV, and it's excellent racing...
What's the best way to follow MotoGP? I don't have cable TV, streaming services, or social media... so does that mean I'm out?
The best way is to pay for access on MotoGP.com. You get all the practice sessions, qualifying, and races for Moto3, Moto2, and MotoGP live or on demand. You can watch races all the way back to '92. Some decent interviews and documentary stuff, too.
It also lets you choose your cameras to view, and you can turn off the commentators if you like.
Unfortunately it's $150/yr, so you really have to want it.
Thank you!
What Morgan said.
It is expensive but there's 22 sprints and races per year + practice/quals + Moto2 and Moto3 and next year the baggers exhibitions (? I'm unsure of the details on that one).
I think it's a good value compared to MotoAmerica and particularly when the production values, live timing, website layout, and everything is considered as a package.
USGP adjacent. F1 in the US on Apple TV in 2026. For another discussion. Maybe the next one.
I didn't want to talk about it because it's so depressing.
a) I will have to get Apple TV to watch the races
b) there will be whores watching the races as well, and not the fun Monaco kind.
Is F1 Live not going to be an option? I have watched every GP broadcast in the US since I learned to program a VCR, but I truly despise Apple.
I don't know if my love of F1 is greater than that hate.
The F1TV subscription will supposedly be discontinued. I don't know what other options will persist.
On the positive side, you'll be able to see "The Morning Show!"
Its $10 a month or something. I watch on hulu live tv now which is all sorts of disney gay. And the espn broadcast is crap. So… meh
Remains to be seen what crew is used next year. I think the F1 TV subcription crew is not just used in the US. I thinks the quality of their talking heads has decreased over the last couple of years but still better than Sky (ESPN's crew). Apple could just go with one and not offer the other.
You’ll also be able to watch For All Mankind, Silo and Slow Horses (which is good but not as much as it’s hyped up to be). Apparently Severance is good as well but I haven’t watched that.
To say nothing of Severance, which has been outstanding. I agree regarding Slow Horses, but it's still far better than the average Disney dreck, and most of what's on Netflix.
As usual, with Slow Horses it is better to read the books. I like the show, but...
YES! There is actually some decent stuff worthy of time on Apple Plus. It doesn't have that "netflix look" or Disney's "throw in a chick and make everyone gay" thing either. Not everything is for me and I'm not happy with the final season of Ted Lasso. However, their ability to stream is pretty well done.
I know people want to dump on Apple, but their baseball streams have been extremely well done for the most part. They also seemed to have learned their lesson from the MLS and other sports contracts that virtually no one wants to buy a secondary sub. This may end up as apple tv wearing the skin suit of F1 TV. It's also very likely more a tech and promotion move.
This is a move to capture more normies in the same way the F1 Movie helped to make it fun for someone like my wife... who now will sit and watch Max every week as well. You're never going to get a generation of American F1 drivers until you have kids with easy access to F1. Guess what, the majority of households have apple products and get at least a TRIAL of apple tv with it.
You make a ton of excellent points, Josh.
I think it's good news for a lot of reasons you outline above. The balkanization of streaming into ever smaller and smaller $10/mo. F1TV subs is not good for wider dissemination.
F1 is exploding in popularity for 3 reasons:
1) The Netflix series. Love it or hate it, it brought F1 into people's living room and gave them a reason to like (or dislike) teams and drivers.
2) The F1 movie, which was as good for racing as Ford vs Ferrari was. In 10 years, we've gone from nobody caring about endurance racing and F1 to everybody talking about it. It's glorious.
3) American races, street races especially, on the calendar. Putting Vegas and Miami on the schedule was brilliant, no matter how much they cost to attend (and I'm cheap enough that I'll never go).
Making F1 even more accessible by putting it on a platform lots and lots of people already pay for will be number 4 on that list.
This is a big deal, and very good for racing. Now lets see if the FIA can keep from screwing up the format even more than they already have.
So the F1TV pro subscription is about 85 USD per year. Apple TV is 13 per month with no yearly. Also supposedly the F1 that comes with Apple TV won’t have all the features as F1TV pro. To get those you have to pay for an extra on top of the 13 per month.
Yeah, that's frustrating. I don't have any desire to support the programming on Apple TV or, in fact, any other streaming-slop service.
I’m sure F1 will be successful with Apple TV, unlike those losers like Major League Soccer, world surf league and the Pac-12 athletic conference.
Maybe I misinterpreted the email F1TV sent out, but I thought we still got the practices, qualifying sessions, and sprints along with the races. Are you talking about the archives? Access to old races? F2/F3/F1 Academy?
Yeah you are right. You get the “equivalent” of F1Tv premium with the Apple TV subscription. I misread it as you got the races live with Apple TV and if you wanted Premium it was an add on.
I think it's good news for a lot of reasons pertaining to the growth of F1.
The balkanization of streaming into ever smaller and smaller $10/mo. specialty apps is not very good for wider dissemination, because justifying $85 to a non car-loving spouse often kills a thing in the crib. Nobody new is going to pay for an entire year of something just to try it out.
F1 is exploding in popularity for 3 reasons:
1) The Netflix series. Love it or hate it, it brought F1 into people's living room and gave them a reason to like (or dislike) teams and drivers.
2) The F1 movie, which was as good for racing as Ford vs Ferrari was. Yes, it strained credulity. Yes, it was wildly imperfect. But it was entertaining, and a LOT of non car-people loved it. In 10 years, we've gone from nobody caring about endurance racing and F1 to everybody talking about it. It's glorious.
3) American races, street races especially, on the calendar. Putting Vegas and Miami on the schedule was brilliant, no matter how much they cost to attend (and I'm cheap enough that I'll never go).
Making F1 even more accessible by putting it on a platform lots and lots of people already pay for will be number 4 on that list. Millennials ad Gen Z all use Apple almost exclusively, and all have Apple TV. Yeah, I know your future engineer has a flip-phone, but he's an outlier.
This is a big deal, and very good for racing (I think). Now lets see if the FIA can keep from screwing up the format even more than they already have.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_private_network
I’m 58. For me, F1 is an unwatchable hot mess.
I cannot listen to these Brit broadcasters SCREAMING like everything is the apocalypse.
The racing is absolute crap. I’m sorry, but between DRS Zones and the rare lead changes, it’s just a boring boat race to me anymore.
It’s funny to me that as I age out of F1 fandom, the sport explodes in popularity.
It’s like Austin, Texas. The Gen Z population wants to live there, and I just say, “You should have been there in the 80’s.”
It all went to shit when Bob Varsha and the gang no longer announced.
“Bring back Biz” IYKYK
I liked how it seemed like David Hobbs had a couple of gin & tonics before the broadcast.
I OTOH, am ecstatic. I already subscribe to Apple TV, so it is like getting something very, very valuable to me for free.
I'm happy to NOT be charged for something I already spent my hard earned money on.
WIndows should work with a Chromium based browser. Possibly FireFox also.
I am more concerned with DVR capability. If live or nothing or a day later probably a big NOPE from me. I rarely watch the grid walk pre race, so I come into the race a few minutes in. Considering there's a good chance of a pile up and red flag in the first couple of laps, coming in late lets me catch up and bypass the sitting in the pits. Also being 10-15 minutes behind isn't a big deal.
Oh, and I don't believe there's a Android App for Apple TV. Apple TV has an app I believe for Google TV. So, Android phone + tablet user are SOL. I'm SOL on those devices.
The media whores are regurgitating Apple/Liberty PR. "Well ESPN was paying 90 million and Apple will be paying 140 million a year". Ok, 90 was when ESPN signed. No mention of what ESPN offered to reup with or if they even did. The assumption is Liberty gets 50 million more a year. It could be far less than that.
Do you not have a Roku enabled TV? Any smart TV will play any streaming app.
This is the best news I've had all month (in fairness, it hasn't really been a great month). Apple TV is already kind of the high-water mark on streaming content among the big players (Netflix, Amazon, Disney, et al). Netflix hasn't had a breakout show in years, and Amazon has always frittered at the margins. We dropped Disney is was so pathetic.
I'm aware that Apple is losing their butts on the Apple TV side, but they're trying to buy their way into the upper echelon, and they're succeeding. I have no idea how long it'll last, but they've given me another reason to keep sending them $10/mo.
... and that's what it is, for all of you whiners. Ten lousy bucks, and you get a whole lot more than F1, but we will get the entire F1 package for that amount.
It was a good day today.
I hate to be the "Actually" guy but Netflix HAS had several breakout hits in the past year. The problem is, they aint for guys like us.
I mean, KPop Demon Hunters? Really?!?!
(Also, Apple Plus is now 12.99 for the majority of Americans but even then the quality beats the rest of the streaming services by a mile. Biggest issue is that some shows take forever to develop. Well, when you attempt to create 8 movies essentially, that'll happen.)
I can't wait to see what other camera angles we will have access to. The revised cams they used in the F1 movie were pretty decent.
I'm 68. KPDH is one of the best movies I've ever seen once you decide to buy into the really, really dumb premise. Those songs are completely on point for the movie. I've read that the song "Golden" was what the money people heard before deciding to go all with the movie.
The girls aren't your typical Girl Bosses either. Possibly because it is animation. The live actress GBs are usually angry with a scowl on their face every waking moment. Rae, Capt. Marvel, Black Widow, the Asian woman in the new Tron debacle. The characters are written angry and the actresses have a angry persona in real life. In this movie the only real angry is near the end in the scene with Rumi + Celine. And the angry is justified.
If you read the lyrics of the movie songs, there's a lot more going on than a kid's movie. Soda Pop is about idolatry and needing the adulation to survive. On the surface it's fluff. Your idol is more explicit. I picture Robert DiNero and "Stars" from Hollywood singing those songs.
The Golden song was written by the Rumi character's singer. She got into the KPop factory at 10 or 11 and at 21 was told she aged out. She writes for others now and wasn't supposed to even sing in this movie. The song can be said to be her personal redemption about the industry. One KPop hit she wrote which for some odd reason I have heard is Red Velvet's Psycho. Mostly in Korean.
If anything the movie has KPop in it's title, but to a large degree the movie isn't all that positive about the KPop industry. KPop is the reincarnation of MoTown.
While the movie was created by a Japanese company (Sony), all the voices and singers are of people that are Korean or of Korean heritage. Many of the behind the scenes people are Asian.
Oh my complaint isn't with the quality or whether it is well done. My problem is more with adult themes in something wrapped in a package for younger people. I mean, it's a cartoon. And yes, I understand the viewer dynamics now for adults watching anime and cartoons is that the majority do.
It's just... why are we largely not getting this attention put into adult shows? Pretty rare.
I am not a fan of animation, but I watched KPDH with my nephew and quite enjoyed it. Apparently the creatives fought the suits hard to keep the story specifically Korean instead of generic Asian. I also derive personal satisfaction from the high degree of Canadian content. Nowadays, animation is designed to work on two levels: adults and children.
is the kpdh anime(?) the one where someone throats a roll of sushi
if so thats literally the only thing ive seen from it
Yes. Though I think it's Kimbap not sushi. Same/different and I believe it is served warm. I hope that went over a lot of kid's heads. Other's noticed the same thing.
All the songs with the animations are on Youtube. I was hooked with the movie 4 minutes in when this started up https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGsevnbItdU
Apple tv sucks but so do the rest. I have amazon at enertia at this point. I pay for hulu live tv to get the bears games. I dont pay for Netflix
Get an antenna. I've been watching the Bears on Fox since forever.
My kids keep pulling them down
Put it in your attic, friend! No fiddle farting around, man!
I dont know how that old ass technology works!
Everybody was told to “cut the cord” when they got sick of $200/mo. cable TV bills.
Now you spend that much per month, except by a thousand cuts, for five different streaming services, along with Internet access with enough bandwidth to run those on multiple devices!
Progress??!! 😂😂
man, fuck Apple TV. download the torrents from Racing For Me
Id rather pay $10 a month than deal with torrents again
The drug situation makes the case for the harshest immigration policy and - perhaps some day? - a border to speak of, but not for stealing another country's oil and installing a puppet regime (likely hand-picked by USAID).
In the GWB era, we'd have made the argument that it's Venezuela's problem to fix but that failure to fix it would come with "Coalition Of The Willing" style penalties.
except almost all of the drugs in the US come from Columbia (cocaine) and Mexico (heroin, fentanyl, and the trade routes through which the cocaine flows in to the US)...
My understanding is that if it weren't for China, fentanyl wouldn't be the problem it is.
Yes, the bulk of the precursor chemicals needed to synthesize illicit fentanyl come from China. that said, I suspect those individual chemicals are used in a wide variety of products. it's not as if they are used _only_ to make fentanyl. there's also the fact most illicit production occurs in Mexico, so there's not a lot the US can do to ban production or importation.
Also, as Jack has noted elsewhere in the thread, fentanyl for legitimate medical use is manufactured in the US, and I'd wager they also use chemicals produced in China.
the bottom line, though, is the war on drugs has been, for the most part, an abject failure and the Trump administration bombing Venezeulan vessels in international waters and launching a covert war within the country will do little to nothing to address the problem.
the real aim of this is regime change in Venezuela.
Pretty much agree on all counts.
What's USAID...?
the uniparty's slush fund for installing puppet regimes and subverting societies abroad
And at home.
It's 404 now lol... it was a joke!
For now. I think that hydra has a few more heads and others that may grow back if allowed.
"Jesus Frank, that's classified!"
If the “Frank” reference is to a certain detective in all those great spoof movies, mixed with another of his movies:
“What’s classified?”
“It’s a section of the paper that’s too small to read, but that’s not important right now!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1u8fcCICbdw
What about dirthammer?
er, what about them?
A hearty amen to the last 5 paragraphs of this tome.
"anyone who could sell an 11-second 2+2 for $29,999 in either country is gonna clean up"
hey GM, why don't you put a roadster body on the Bolt platform??? (oh and don't f' it up like you did with the Fiero and Solstice)
hey Ford, why don't you put a 2+2 coupe/roadster body on the Mach-E platform??? (though maybe that platform needs to go on a diet plan)
I seriously doubt it. Would you buy it? A sports car that's always on "Empty?" I'd rather drive a Plymouth Turismo.
Given sufficient garage space, yes would consider it.
One or two good pulls, to home, plug in, rinse, repeat?
No!
It would be a nostalgic experience for those of us who remember early RC cars...15 minutes of fun and 2-4 hours of battery charge time.
Too bad there is no second battery work around.
A PHEV Diet Bronco would make Ford's money machine go brrrrrrrr...
I wanted exactly that a few years ago. Ended up with a PHEV Jeep GC. Now with all the Ford "quality" issues I wouldn't consider a Ford.
PHEV Dodge Hornet to the rescue!
Not enough off road capability.
You can get Mike Musto to shill for that one too. New SEMA build incoming.
Oof the choice between Ford and 4XE Jeep for reliability cannot be a comfortable or easy one. God speed.
Easy button: Mazda stretches the Miata to include a rear seat, keeps a drop top on it, and ups it to a v6 (with SkyActivia) and 6 speed.
Hard button: GM takes the Bolt and puts the aging v8 alu block du jour and a manual transmission to make a "driver's car" for 30 large.
*I realize they need to crash validate and all that, but it's very easy for me to make pronouncements that will never come to pass...*
"Mazda stretches the Miata to include a rear seat"
NO
In addition to the 2 seater still being offered.
why not just call it something else like the cosmo or 626
Nameplate recognition and rage baiting "miata is the answer" Tylenol nerds.
how do you feel about the mustang mach e then
I’ve was always disappointed that Mazda never made a hard top Miata coupe. I’m not counting the rare JDM model.
But you are on to something with the Cosmo comparison.
The original Cosmo was 9” longer than the Miata, but the wheelbase was 7” shorter. The Cosmo was a 2 seater, too, so a Miata based coupe with a Cosmo length and keeping it as a 2 seater would be pretty cool.
Looking at the Simpson Design Miata based designs shows that the possibilities for the Miata platform are endless. https://www.simpsondesign.net/
Major respect to Mr. Simpson for putting in the work and making his visions into realities! The Italia classic is my pick of those, but that being said I'm not sure I prefer it over a stock NB Miata. I appreciate his talent for body and paint work, that stuff is very hard; I just think the end result of any handmade retro body on a modern chassis is a bit... goofy. I assume the goal is to make it look like a real coach built 50s car, and no matter who does this, they always seem to miss the mark. That being said, I'm not going to pretend I could do any better myself, and I'm glad there are people who try
Mazda did build an NB coupe. Japan only. Think only a couple hundred were built.
Or Chrysler Sebring.
oh come on, someday soon you will have kids and need room for car seats.
yeah
thats the point of getting a second car (probably a gc impreza)
I'm sure you know this but:
You'll have to venture to southern USA to find one that isn't about to fall in half, and you'll still have to pay 10k for it because I fear even those are becoming "collectable" thanks to 35 year old nepo babies.
very true but we do have the subie sanctuary company just outside of toronto which handles pretty in depth restoration of subarus (kinda have to given the locale) so at least ive got that as an option
the Miata is the excuse for leaving the kids with the grandparents or a sitter...
An 11 sec Rx8 that doesn’t suck? I think that’s what you were trying to say.
so yeah not a miata
i do kinda like rx8s though
The 3rd gen FD RX7 is the one that does it for me. But I never wanted a rotary even though the car was gorgeous.
rotaries are great and awful for different reasons but i still kinda want one even thought it wouldnt be painless
That'd work, but not angering the Miata bois is a missed opportunity.
I’ve always wanted just that a fun to drive convertible that could fit three kids in the back, might just settle for a NC and make the kids take turns riding…hey let’s go for ice cream 3 times. Can’t think of any 5 seaters except the wrangler but I’m not into collecting ducks waving at everyone and all that goes with the jeep thing
Mustang?
Only four passengers.
I think the 1st decision gate is manual or no-manual?
IIRC you can squeeze 3 into the back seat of some non-Porsche convertibles. But none have sticks anymore.
Good for getting ice cream ~and~ for working it off:
https://pics.imcdb.org/0is27/90414.6632.jpg
(although if you already have 3 kids, you might be better off just buying a car rather than adopting another child)
Did Sebrings fit 5?
Yes but Sebrings fucking suck (I drove my friend's 4cyl Sebring convertible to Warped Tour one year, and it was only fun because it was packed with 4 other teenagers)
That's one of a few ways to make them not suck.
I feel like this is the ONE non-edgelord reply I've ever seen from you lol
I can't recall... you have an NB or NC?
i like how you think the only non edgelord reply of mine is literally two letters lol
anyway i have a canadian market 1990 miata which is the lightest mass produced one. its red
Edgelord?
That guy from "Guardians of the Galaxy?"
The security guard at the Android device store. 😉
Wait until Toyota gets their hands on it.
Mazda should build a n all wheel drive SUV version of the Miata, call it the “Miata SS” which stands for “Speed Special”. Sell it only in Canada, at a discount, concentrating the marketing around Speed’s hometown, so lots of them get sold there!!!
Thankfully no Germans have been able to infiltrate Mazda.
Zis car! Vhy iz it not heavier and more complex?
Four vheel dreif, toorbo und four dorse!
Ja! And make twenty-four versionz of ze same car! Ve are on same page!
Und in fife different lengthsss!
If you are going to lose billions on EVs, why not make a Bolt roadster for $9,999 and sell one to every high school kid with a job?
Exactly. Lose money on each one but make up for it with volume.
Get 200k new customers for life every year.
I’ve been thinking about the flaw in the get-customers-when they’re-young-and-keep-them-for-life model. It’s certainly possible but you have to ensure the aspirational vehicles don’t suck. Or the entry-level ones, for that matter.
Alfred Sloan approves of this comment.
I don’t think anything could be considered bad at that price.
Aston's lineup, like Ferrari's and McLaren's, has become confusing to anyone not deeply immersed into that particular brand. I entirely stopped caring a while ago (admittedly, design played a role, too).
Yes, when they Reichmaned the design of Aston’s a decade ago, the last reason for buying one disappeared. Now they make a stupid mans Jensen Interceptor, lacking both the cool name, and the inexpensive to run and dead reliable American V8. Ask your Mercedes parts department, what the unrepairable AMG v8 under the hood costs to replace.
well put. They leave me ice cold.
I'm also not a fan, although if I had infinite money I could see driving one.
Agreed. The various green paints they offer are some of the best I have ever seen. I would choose which green paint first, then which Aston car second.
Maybe this one:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3RdK51Igeqc&pp=0gcJCR4Bo7VqN5tD
“[D]ead reliable American V8.”
Not as much lately.
Liked, but not liked if you see what I mean.
Understood. But two of the three are a little shaky of late.
And the other is owned by Stellantis?
I love the description "stupid man's Jenson Interceptor" but wonder what today would qualify as the thinking man's JI? Lexus LC500?
I would definitely take an LC500 over any Aston Martin.
Aren't those engines something like $40k?
re Aston, this abomination https://www.astonmartin.com/en-us/models/dbx707 should not exist.
yeah what the hell is that
why is that even
Seconded.
Yeah, I've driven one of those. They suck balls.
Gross.
the supercar of SUVs ~=~ the Cadillac of minivans
I would like a Cadillac van.
well then, my friend, what you need is an Oldsmobile Silhouette
Better to start with Astro, if not Express/Savanna platform-based.
Although the "Pontiac Trans Sport" was ahead of its time! Imagine Lia Thomas, etc., endorsing it.
https://nypost.com/2025/10/23/sports/transgender-swimmer-ana-caldas-banned-five-years-for-refusing-sex-test/
https://nypost.com/2023/03/30/male-powerlifter-enters-womens-event-breaks-record/
I think G Jetson was making a reference to the movie Get Shorty.
Thank you; that's one of thousands of films that I have not seen.
https://www.imcdb.org/vehicle_3337-Oldsmobile-Silhouette-GMT199-1994.html
If there are still any out there. Preferably with the 3800. (Was that only in the first two generations, dustbuster and folds-floorpan-around-shattering-foot-in-accident? I don’t remember if that made the third GM minivan generation.)
"Yet here we are with just thirty-four points between Oscar and Max."
i am so fuckin hyped for this season and that max will win in the end
"most races without a Grand Prix podium"
i wonder how his legacy would have looked had he not tried to pretend he could make it in another car that wasnt the all conquering mercedes and simply retired after the 7th (6th if that old f1 fiasco is solved) wdc so everyone wouldnt see how slow he actually is
"African-Americans are now most at risk. So this is also now an issue of racial justice."
if blacks werent dying but only whites in the midwest would anyone in power care? anyway more aim9s on drugboats please or maybe just gun down the drivers so the coke can be kept out of the ocean kthx
"The fact that Canada can’t find funding to make this pipe-dream stupidity happen is further proof that the EV wave has stalled on arrival"
its also proof that even though we are hemorrhaging money on purely retarded ideas we cant afford to do every bad idea that the liberals come up with which is the slightest silver lining
" consider asking “What do you believe to be true, in the greater sense, about this issue?” You might be surprised."
will do that then
go Max!
Michael Schumacher's first Ferrari was the legendarily awful F310. It broke in six of his first ten starts, and he podiumed the other four. That's the difference between true greatness and manipulated dominance.
Points scored over last 5 rounds
McLaren: 119
Verstappen: 119
==========
Points scored since Miami '24
McLaren: 1248
Ferrari: 835
Mercedes: 757
Red Bull: 725
With Max scoring how many of those Red Bull points? **Nearly all of them**
Just insane to look at two driver teams vs Red Bull. But when you have a driver that is so good, it's easy to see why you'd put all your focus on one guy.
That's why this season is going to cost McLaren unless something nutty happens. RedBull put there heads down and focused. Papaya rules were dumb and they should have given Lando a good pat on the head and told him Oscar was the captain now of that team with full support to extend the points total. Instead, they let too much ego take over. Lando is only in this spot BECAUSE he has a car worthy of a championship. Oscar seems to be driving not to lose now which has changed his style a bit. Not a good look.
re drug interdiction, maybe we should be sinking the Chinese cargo ships bringing the fentanyl precursor chemicals into Mexico.
How is that our problem? Oh wait, we don't have a border.
good plan
get it from the source
I'm been curious for some time as to what an ADCAP would do to a Panamax.
and if we're gonna attack countries in a military bid to stop the flow, actually attack the countries responsible? (ie Mexico and Colombia)
I lost one of my closest friends to Fentanyl; most of us at this point know someone who died of it. Drone ‘Em All
sidewinders for everybody
In a launcher under my bumper! One flash of the headlights, and if you don’t get your self-righteous ass out of the way of me and the line of drivers behind me, you won’t know what hit ya!
I thought I was the only one who fantasized about that!
you'd probably be friends with them if you knew them--and tease them about their awful driving!
I should’ve clarified further: left lane, at or under the speed limit!
We need to figure out whether we need fentanyl in the medical field or not. If we don't, let's have a border? If we do, let's also have a border and have proper protocol for distribution - and maybe make it ourselves instead of importing it? And let's not use the tragedy of drug addiction as a pretense for Soros-type globalist interventionism
Medical fentanyl is produced in the United States by multiple providers. The Actiq lollipop, which was Israeli, I believe to be discontinued at the request of the FDA.
For obvious reasons.
I'm starting to think there is zero reason to have fentanyl. It's so much more powerful than other drugs. The fact that it gets laced into all sorts of grey market stuff is scary. Kind of shocked people will smoke other people's joints at this point. We cratered an entire tobacco-vape-zyn industry for less.
'I'm starting to think there is zero reason to have fentanyl. It's so much more powerful than other drugs'
There are medical reasons for it. More than you'd think. But I think possession of it outside a hospital should be grounds for execution, assuming reasonable standards of evidence are met, e.g. not "Oh, LOOK WHAT WE HAVE HERE!"
Honest question:
Do we trust this new generation that can't tell us what a woman is to actually dole out hard core medication properly and be the ONLY source of stuff like fentanyl?
I'm honestly not sure if that is fair or not. I just know the doctors around here don't seem to be very... uh... American. Lots of box checking going on.
Nobody is more surprised about this than I am but it looks like the most deadly fentanyl doc around was… a German-ish dude! https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trial-set-open-ohio-doctor-accused-murdering-patients-fentanyl-rcna14963
I fibbed when I was being referred to a neurologist for trigeminal neuralgia that “I don’t do very well understanding accents, particularly if they could be discussing treatments involving invasive procedures; I want my entire brain engaged, and not have to expend any mental capacity trying to interpret someone’s gibberish-as-“English!”
I simply don’t trust Indians or Arabs. And a plurality of the doctors in most medical practices seem to have names from one or both of those ancestries. (Fortunately, the resident working with my neurologist is as American as apple pie and Honda!)
Same
And nice, fat bounties for drug dealers.
We could start with the Sacklers.
In any just society they would have been publicly executed.
That kind of thing would do a lot to "restore faith in the system."
Anyone who has seen how easily drugs enter a prison--probably the most controlled piece of territory in the United States, outside certain secret government facilities--should realize that securing 6k miles of land border and another 12k miles of coastline is a pipe dream, and trying to affect the supply of something so easily concealed (e.g. in condoms in your stomach as you fly back from wherever) is far more difficult than affecting the demand....
(Or better yet, just sell it at the state store. People know how much they need to get high and don't really intend to waste it; the vast majority of opioid deaths are because you no longer know whether what you're shooting up is just the right amount or 10x as much. Plus you'd have one less reason for gangs to shoot at each other; Seagrams and Smirnoff are no longer knocking each other off on street corners the way they did during Prohibition.)
People do have more in common with each other politically than the online discourse would suggest. Remember that only about 7% of people vote in primaries, and since the districts are largely written to basically deliver a victory to one party or the other, it's only natural that the parties would increasingly look less like "all of us" and more like "the ones who care enough to show up," making the 1980's Democrats look like Nazis and the 1980's Republicans look like socialists....
i get where youre coming from but shouldnt there still be a concerted effort to keep as much of it out of the country as possible?
The legalization of drugs has worked just great everywhere it’s been tried.
yeah just look at bc
BC is becoming an out of control shit show between all the cracked out hobos littering the streets in even the small out of the way towns, and the massive influx of people from the other side of the planet that have zero intention of ever integrating into the culture or society. I’ve been watching it as a frequent visitor for ten years now and it’s sad to see
Umm..https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/oregon-law-rolling-back-drug-decriminalization-takes-effect-making-possession-a-crime-again
Im 99% sure that’s sarcasm
But Reason Magazine told me that drug legalization wasn’t the cause of Oregon turning into a shithole.
Fine. Sure. As long as the taxpayers aren't on the hook for the inevitable medical bills.
Unfortunately you still get treated if you walk into an Emergency Department so there is no way around it.
High cost of coverage leads many to use the ED as primary care which increases costs.
No good way to deal with this problem, but I know legalization isn't the answer.
Agree with the thoughts about legalization. We are already paying more and getting less out of healthcare than anyone so as much as I hate to say it some sort of formula for services and getting rid of the middle bureaucracy and costs seems to be a possibility. Some sort of minimum care for everyone to keep a population healthy then pay for more from there?
I dont have the answer but after working around and seeing drug addiction I don’t want legalization of hard stuff that only has medical applications.
"hard stuff that only has medical applications..."
The "medical applications" aren't always clear-cut.
Friction works, and publicly displaying a government blowing people up is essentially demoralization propaganda specifically designed to dissuade some people. Reducing the number of people willing to bring drugs to the US and reducing the number of drugs entering the US are better than doing nothing even if it is unfortunate that people are killed either way.
Legalization of something so mild as weed has had horrid knock on effects, and legalizing harder drugs a la Portland is outright disastrous: say no to legalizing.
hell look at canada
legalizing pot was a horrible idea
Unless the goal was to pacify the masses who are funding their own dispossession 🤔 POSIWID
It's almost as if they legalized pot and pretended to be the good guys just long enough to let nefarious groups populate and run their country... hmmm.
retards and women voted for trudeau
that was the catalyst
Even my wife has started to believe that perhaps women should have never been able to vote. I tell her it's fine... we need people over a certain age, with land, and kids... oh and they must be a citizen with ID. Kind of simple to have a proof of all those things. I hate a bunch of young renters making decisions for the local school district. It's dumb.
keeping women and illegals from voting sounds like a pretty good idea
people with stakes ought to be the only ones making long term decisions assuming the votes even matter anyway
The few times i have partaked in pot i felt like a zombie and people smoke this shit all day everyday. At least i dont have a drink till 6pm. Except mimosa sundays
More people than you think light up as soon as they wake up and stay baked until they go to sleep.
I smell pot every day walking the oldest to school. At this point im convinced its almost all of them. At least i limit my day drinking to vacations
I hate it. I used to hate cigarette smoke but it's freaking Chanel #5 next to that reek. Commonly coming from a Kia parked in the fire lane in front of Dollar Tree. I've learned to hold my breath when I approach a likely double-parked clunker...
Notice how that magically, the phrase “second-hand smoke” has disappeared from the public lexicon now that it’s weed smoke and not tobacco.
I was in a Puma outlet store recently, and a young couple came in with their 2 young daughters and were trying on shoes next to me. They absolutely reeked of weed, like they had been smoking it seconds before.
They were a nice looking family, too. Driving to the outlet mall and getting high with 2 kids around the age of 5 is effed up, to say the least.
Around me it's coming from an Altima or G37
My buddy and I were discussion the job cuts at Coors in the news this week..and his response was yeah gen x is the last drinking generation and all the younger gen’s prefer weed…not my choice but pick your poison. Seems to be the trend these days ☹️
Millennials, at least the elder ones, drink
"job cuts at Coors":
https://xcancel.com/WokeCapital/status/1977200322750660621
Christ. Not again.
were hitting fatigue limits that shouldnt be possible
It’s disingenuous for the original poster (I will give Sir Morris the benefit of the doubt) to imply that this is somehow to be attributed to the CEO’s ethnicity.
(A quick survey of his Mr. Goyal’s LinkedIn shows him to be a nearly 25 year Coors veteran - so it’s not like he’s the new kid on the block suddenly keen to chop heads at a firm to which he has no loyalty).
Faced with missing revenue forecast, shrinking EBITDA, increase in COGS, and slowing consumer spending - this is par for the course for any CEO beholden to Wall Street and shareholder returns.
You are correct that revenues are down.
1) An insidious effect of the work visa policies is that today's entry level hire is tomorrow's senior IC, next week's manager, and next's month's executive. As CBS 60 Minutes was doing exposes on H-1b in 1993, i.e., 32 years ago, Mr. Goyal should have never been hired at Coors in the first place:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-h-1b-visas-have-been-abused-since-the-beginning/
2) In addition to layoffs, it is a virtual certainty that Mr. Goyal is working on terminating all non-Indians at the company, from executives on down, as is happening at FedEx (this is one of several examples: https://xcancel.com/WokeCapital/status/1977920141561090292) and as you see here celebrated at American Express: https://xcancel.com/WokeCapital/status/1975574798622179796, or at Honeywell, which has defense contracts: https://xcancel.com/WokeCapital/status/1977005662933524512
Growing pot is easier than brewing beer.
With the popularity of Minecraft, I think they long for the mines.
It’s not fun unless you’re already at least half-drunk.
Pro tip for the college-aged male: The best way to close girls at the bar is to bring up smoking after. Chances are, you’re going to end up at her house.
It seems that "social skills" is often an euphemism for "substance use"
You’re still going to end up in bed with a 10 at 2:00, and waking up at 10:00 with a 1.5!
It’s always 5:00 someplace.
That said, I’m not going to take that literally all the time. Usually I’ll have one in the afternoon on the weekends if I’m not doing anything else. One beer weekdays when I get home from work, maybe a couple more on the weekends.
I can’t figure out why people smoke so damn much pot, especially since you go around smelling like a skunk 🦨!
Like everything else, tolerance increases with exposure.
Sometimes familiarity breeds contempt!
Weed does kinda suck.
There are lots of much more fun, interesting, non-addictive drugs to do than marijuana that won't make your clothes stink. May be a little more expensive and harder to find though.
Allegedly.
Im waaaaay past that stage of my life
I was on Norco for pain control as-needed during a kidney stone episode back in 2018. I was using as little as I possibly could because I’m scared shitless of opioids!
There was one time around the time the stone passed when I accidentally took one too close to the last dose, and as I was going to bed, I started to realize that when I got a little lightheaded and a little flushed. Of course I knew what was going on, and it was like “Oh Christ, how am I going to get to sleep?!” 🙄🙄 And “people literally kill themselves to feel like THIS??!! FUUUU-UUUCK NO!”
I don’t like it when I get over-revved from too much COFFEE, FFS!
I'm more of a decriminalization mindset than a legalization one.
The former limits some of justice system abuse while still maintaining the public and community posture that "x" is "bad."
I don't want some idiot non-violent teen to go to Rikers for a dime bag, but I DEFINITELY don't want a $200M weed startup backed by PE to be advertising on every interstate in my county.
People don’t really go to jail for possession. They get charged for a bunch of other things and take a plea for possession.
That was definitively NOT the case in NYC.
It was pervasive enough that the NYPD wouldn't publicly release stats to support this thesis.
I spent a month on a special drug enforcement grand jury in Manhattan in 2002. Every single case brought before us was a crack dealer with at least half a dozen priors, often so recent that they were clearly losing less of their liberty than I was by having to spend a month on a special drug enforcement grand jury. The idea that anyone was doing meaningful time for simple possession in NYC is either pure propaganda, or it is a manufactured result intended to motivate legalization so PE can cash in, and more people can have their lives ruined.
If you were on a GJ, you're self-evidently seeing people who have reached trial.
Rikers, like many jails, not only holds convicts serving time, but also holds people who have been arrested awaiting arraignment, or detention after arraignment if denied bail or couldn't make bail, depending on the plea.
It's true - very few people were doing long sentences for simple possession. But LOTS of people were doing weeks or months in Rikers because their arraignment took forever (even though the rule is 24hrs) or couldn't make $1k cash bail. And that's all it took to basically ruin a life.
Twenty long years for some dust in a baggy.
https://youtu.be/Y6CyQftidOw?si=tCLQDMjJq4eoiA9v
Always hated the fact we go after Johnny dimebag while the guys who raid your 401k go to club fed. Those guys need buried.
“Thieves of private property pass their lives in chains; thieves of public property in riches and luxury.”
Unfortunately too true!
Marijuana legalization was the beginning of Colorado's downward spiral.
"Anyone who has seen how easily drugs enter a prison"
That would be *me*, actually. In the Midwest they have a better handle on it than they do on the coasts.
'and trying to affect the supply of something so easily concealed (e.g. in condoms in your stomach as you fly back from wherever) is far more difficult than affecting the demand....'
Try getting drugs in Singapore, which is surrounded by a literal jungle. The difference is how they treat traffickers.
"Or better yet, just sell it at the state store. People know how much they need to get high and don't really intend to waste it;"
In my youth I firmly believed this. Seeing what legal weed has done to behavior on the road, and in the workplace, has removed a lot of my sanguinity on the subject. If we distributed fent the way we distribute weed, I think we would have a national collapse. The only thing that saves us WRT weed is that it's not physically addictive for most people.
"Remember that only about 7% of people vote in primaries,"
This should be on billboards.
With fentanyl in particular, you need so little of it, thinking that we can keep it out is just illogical.
IIRC, the total amount that has killed Americans to-date would basically fill only 2-3 tractor trailers.
You can make it harder to get, which reduces the amount available. Cutting the supply by 10 percent would save thousands of lives.
Also, we are all perfectly aware of how to stop it. You have the death penalty for anyone carrying it, administered with minimal judicial overhead. Which is repugnant to anyone raised on traditional American principles of justice and due process... but in 40 years the percentage of people living here who were taught that stuff will be a decided minority, so who cares?
I know little about about how intertwined US intelligence dollars are in the upper echelons of trafficking... but the little I do know tells me there are reasons that, say, the top financiers and money managers in that space mysteriously travel very freely and have no sanctions.
TBH, the MAIN foreign policy reason I'd want to limit US car production in MX is because of the money laundering opps within being a sub or supplier.
Clearly, First Brands Group didn't hire the right bankers because the right MX tie up would've solved their capital calls right quick lol
But what other infractions would get added to the list for that penalty?
I would think "expressions of racism" would appear immediately.
"Your honor, he used the numbers '13' and '50' in the same e-mail!"
"DEATH!"
Also having the same blood type as someone important in need of an organ?
Sir, that's why God made the Hayabusa, to ensure that organs are always in steady supply.
"sir you have both 14 and 88 in your email signature"
i was born on january 14 1988 its perfectly normal to have birthdates in your email
"okay but what about the hitlerrapist part"
I don’t pretend to understand the finances of Aston Martin, but it seems like they are propping up a brand that died precisely when they started using turbo AMG engines instead of N/A V-12s and V8s. They are still capable of producing a handsome coupe occasionally but I can’t get over the “slightly less negatively profitable than Ford’s Electric truck effort” business model.
All that said, the Valkyrie sounded like pure heaven at Petit LeMans.
I’d go back even further. To me, Aston died with the V550/V600. The Vanquish was a pretty terrible driving car, with that totally awful automated manual transmission.
Yeah, but it looked the business! And it was driven by such legendary poontang slayers as, uh, hold on, let me search... "Matt Farah"
lmao
Don't care. Looks cool, sounds cool, and he swapped a manual into it.
Maybe someday he will actually drive it somewhere.
I do find it odd that he leaves it to rot on the east coast and still drive's his mom's F type while he's there instead.
That’s because he is too busy slaying mass quantities of poontang to have time to drive it.
Were that I rich enough to have cars for different coasts...
the v550
because one supercharger literally isnt enough
Perhaps they and TVR died in the same time period?
Yes. Pretty well. Furreigners stepping in and running the companies into the ground.
TVR was always the poor step child of Aston.
It's really quite simply.
The foreigners smuggling drugs into America KNOW Americans will die consuming their product, AND THEY DON'T CARE. That's depraved indifference, at the very least. Accomplice to mass murder, arguably. These are hostile foreigners, and The State and its military exist to protect the citizens from hostile foreigners.
We are absolutely justified in using our military to stop these people, using every method available, up to and including lethal force. We're absolutely well within our rights to lock down and militarize our southern border. No one goes in or out between San Diego and Brownsville. Turn the airspace over the eastern Pacific and the Gulf of Mexico into free-fire zones. Any moving object on radar not carrying a transponder is presumed to be hostile.
That's DEFENSE. If they don't get the message, we do OFFENSE.
It's really quite simple.
Well said.
I'm from Buenos Aires, and I say kill 'em all.
Then what do we do about Indians?
Casino Indians or H1B Indians?
The casino ones are just fine.
I have no reservations about them!
Yeah, the casino Indians don't put Americans out of work.
nah they just vacuum up billions of dollars annually then complain about how oppressed they are while they drink
rimshot.wmv
Bahahahah. Love the sense of humor.
Dear Jack,
The US has 14-26% of the world economy (depending on how you measure it).
But, the US consumes 60-90% of the illegal drugs.
That is not a Political Issue; it is a Spiritual issue.
We (as a culture) are wedded to our vulgar amusements, so that we can forget our emptiness.
Heaven help us all.
sj
okay cool
lets prevent those drugs from ever getting here in the first place
Mandatory mass!
In Latin!
With the priest facing God the way Miles Davis used to!
That’s the Orthodox priests.
I went to an Orthodox funeral service for an aunt, and it was the most primal religious experience I’ve ever had. It made the Catholic services I grew up with look like a flight attendant explaining how to use the seat belts and what to do in case of a water landing.
I genuinely thought during this ancient service that my aunt’s soul was going to heaven directly from this Orthodox Church while I was there.
Before Vatican II, that's how it was done in the popery game, as well. I was there!
(Not really, but my parents were.)
The more I study what the Orthodox believe, the more I like what I learn. It’s amazing how much the Catholics changed over hundreds of years by adding things or ideas that are not in the Bible.
And don’t get me started on the Pope blessing the block of ice.
I grew up in a Polish Parish that was closer to an Eastern Rite Church than what would be considered a contemporary “Catholic” Church. Music only at Noon Mass, organ only. Heavy use of Latin. Weekly Mass in Polish. No Eucharistic Ministers. No altar girls. No female lectors. A Pastor who was a personal friend of JPII. I went to Mass at other Churches occasionally and those felt like a Baptist service in comparison.
The new Archbishop of Detroit took offense to this and did his best to kill that community. It’s been very difficult to find that again.
The Catholics have it out for the Latin rite masses. God forbid you try to make your church popular and bring in young families.
But the Catholics have always been bad at marketing. Add in some pedophile priests and you end up with empty churches. I just saw the other day that over 100 churches in the Chicago Archdiocese have been closed up.
JPII visited my boyhood Polish parish. There’s a statue of him outside the church.
As an EO who attends a Greek Orthodox Archdiocese church I look forward to the day when we smash the organ to pieces.
All that to say if the eastern rite is what you enjoy why not head on over to an Orthodox church and experience that and more?
Sounds like a good credo.
Credo is Latin for “I believe”.
What laws do other countries have concerning the flow of drugs entering and penalties for people using? BTW, not saying you are not correct.
The US has money to burn more than many countries. If you have a product and can make more money selling it in the USA as opposed to Luxemburg, why bother with Luxemburg?
well Singapore will cane you to death.
Now there’s a thought!
'The US has 14-26% of the world economy (depending on how you measure it).
But, the US consumes 60-90% of the illegal drugs.
That is not a Political Issue; it is a Spiritual issue.'
It's an economic issue.
Most countries can't afford to get high. I'm dead serious about this.
Many of those countries still embrace the practice of public shame.
Unfortunately, we in the US are shameless.
Perhaps in the old days, but fentanyl and meth seem pretty cheap these days.
"Most countries can't afford to get high." Forgive me, but this is bollocks. Any country (and its citizens) can afford to get high because the production cost is beans. Weed grows, er, like a weed. Fentanyl is tuppence a bag. Cocaine is lightly processed leaves. Supply is easy and the profit huge. Demand management, however, is hard; to be effective, it would need to blow up the Western idea of civil liberties, eg compulsory, random hair testing at the population level. I don't see that idea taking off!
In Bolivia, they chew coca nuts because the cost of extracting cocaine is beyond most people's income. Never underestimate how poor the world is as a whole. And illegal drugs are always expensive anywhere you go, because the cost of the trade is baked into the product. Weed grows for free but if you can be hanged for growing it, that changes the game.
The wealth disparity turbocharges the trade, for sure. But folk have been willing to pay to feel different since pre-history. "I feel so bad and wanna feel good" as Ry Cooder sings. Attempts to crush supply alone fail for this reason. I think it would require very aggressive measures to also curb demand to make an effective drugs policy and if a million dead from fentanyl hasn't done it I don't see it happening.
There are food deserts in the Akron-Canton area where low income folks can find it challenging to shop for groceries but cannabis dispensaries are readily available.
is it because dispensaries are harder to rob
They actually are
That’s thanks to the dain-bread Ohio electorate sending the state to pot three years ago!
Another threat, probably worse than opioids: https://issuu.com/wnd19/docs/whistleblower_--_october_2025_36aecaaad0b7bb
Public comment is OPEN on a castrated reform to a tiny part of the system: https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/09/24/2025-18473/weighted-selection-process-for-registrants-and-petitioners-seeking-to-file-cap-subject-h-1b