soderfoo

Americans will do anything to avoid roundabouts.

Exactly. Alot of this doesn't pass a basic smell test. It would take quite sometime to negotiate, draft, debate, and ratify any agreements. Nevermind the diplomatic tight rope the EU would need to walk internally.

It's fanciful thinking to believe this is a slam dunk that could get done anytime soon.

Seems like poor training and professionalism. Well run establishments typically train staff in silent service for this very reason, to not interrupt guest conversations.

Please do.

Nice. Does anyone know if a Stockholm group exists?

Hot Topic's "You laugh because I'm different, I laugh because you're all the same" shirt sold in every mall across America in the late 90s has always been my favorite.

I would be a bit more charitable in assigning motive for the pilot's actions.

Airline pilots are morally and physically responsibile for the lives on their aircraft. This necessitates respect for their authority.

Like other professionals, they must compartmentalize personal beliefs and professionalism.

Playful antics and silly BS, whether it be for the lulz, politics, or anything else, is a disrespectful act of defiance to the individuals you entrust to deliver you safely to your destination.

They are the final authority in flight, and have broad discretion they must exercise prudently with a bias for risk aversion.

I've known 2 airline pilots. They are the most even keeled people I've ever come across. Literally, the coolest and calmest people.

The system (should) weed out anyone who would act unprofessional, like letting their political beliefs cloud their judgment.

At first I thought, "Wow, he's much braver than I am."

But "audacious" and "bold" are probably better words to describe it. Maybe I'm overly cautious, but it's inherently risky to confront someone who has taken your property since they have already shown a willingness to break the law. It's a coin toss whether they will perceive the confrontation as a threat and react violently.

All that without even considering that he was dealing with a police officer who, de facto, will be given the benefit of the doubt in a confrontation and may behave accordingly. Not all cops are bad, I think most are good actually, but you have no way of knowing which one you will get in a situation like this. I'm very glad that this ended well (as well as it could have) for him.

Don't forget the wheel squeal... is there a transmission protocol for conveying the cornucopia of odors?

True. I'm not as familiar with the politics of DC, but my limited understanding of the PR statehood situation is that the GOP is unlikely to approve what would presumably be 2 new safe democratic seats in the senate.

If I remember correctly, the governor of PR would appoint the first 2 senators. A tactic could be to promise to appoint 1 republican senator as an enrichment to approve statehood. It's a real shit situation.

There are more Puerto Ricans living in NYC and Orlando than in PR. I'd like to visit before the little family I have left there leaves or dies out.

How do you think this would play out? Changing the apportionment of the Senate, aside from being a political and legal nightmare, would also create monumental constitutional crisis.

First, the Connecticut Compromise is a democratic underpinning of the US. It was central to the formation of the nation, and any attempt to alter it would be a foundational structural change to the constitution to say the least.

I understand the concerns about one generation binding another without recourse. Legal scholars differ on whether Article V, which implements the compromise, can be amended or not.

But for the sake of argument, let's say it can. It would be an insurmountable task requiring the following:

1. A supermajority in both houses of Congress (67% in the Senate and 66% in the House) to propose the amendment.

2. Ratification by three-fourths of the state legislatures (38 out of 50 states) or by conventions in three-fourths of the states.

3. Consent of the states that would lose their equal representation in the Senate.

4. Overcome any legal challenges that would likely arise at every step of the process.

The result would be a dramatic redefinition of federalism and democratic representation. This wouldn't be a cosmetic change, it would be a fundamental alteration to the structure of the government and constitution.

Very few things were deemed "unamendable" and entrenched in the constitution before, both explicitly and implicitly, but now it would all be up for grabs. Now nothing is irrevocable.

What's to stop future generations from altering other fundamental principles? While we may complain of being bound by the decisions of our ancestors, we would be opening up a Pandora's box of constitutional instability for future generations, binding them to the whims of a (slim?) majority of the current generation's political agenda.

I think that is the best case scenario. The worst, and I think a very possible scenario, is that states losing representation would claim that such a drastic and material change to the constitution upends the root of the bargain that led to the formation of the union, and would likely seek to secede. You may have achieved your goal of changing the apportionment of the Senate, but at the cost of the union itself. There are far easier and less risky ways to achieve political change.

If you're referring to telcos sharing their tech with government there are a few examples of Ericsson working with the Swedish military:

> Brigadier-General Mattias Hanson, CIO, Swedish Armed Forces, says: “Strengthening Sweden’s militarily and acting as part of a collective defense requires us to increase our defensive capabilities. We need to utilize the latest technology and all the innovative power of the Swedish private sector. Sweden has unique skills and capabilities in both telecoms and defense technology..." [0]

This is just one quick example I could find.

[0] https://www.ericsson.com/en/news/2025/6/ericsson-5g-connecti...

99% of the jokes I've made throughout my life don't land. For better or worse, if I find something amusing I impulsively share it.

In this case, I thought it should be obvious that OP must have faith in priests, given that they're Catholic, which requires faith as a prereq.

If you read my comment as a slight against Catholicism, I can understand, but I wouldn't feel comfortable publicly joking about any religion other than my own. If that's the case, you're in good company, with the multitude of nuns who've admonished me for similar offhand comments spanning 20 years of Catholic education from pre-k to college, this is old hat for me.

God willing, I'll mature or start telling better jokes some day.

To be fair, faith is the crux of Catholicism.

What's the "pull" that keeps people migrating to the UK despite the economic gloom?

Increased severity of punishment has little deterrent effect, both individually and generally.

The certainty or likelihood of being caught if a far more effevtive deterrent, but require effort, focus, and resources by law enforcement.

It's a resource constraint problem and a policy choice. If "they" wanted to set the tone that this type of behavior will not be tolerated, it would require a concerted multi agency surge of investigative and prosecutorial resources. It's been done before, if there's a will there's a way.

I've read that fMRI may be used as an objective diagnostic tool for autism. This was a few years back and I'm not sure how further research panned out.

This is a master work and spot on. Thanks for the laugh.

Spot on. I've long said that internet discourse will not improve until the implementation of a protocol to slap someone remotely.

"The Bible In A Year" podcast is a good companion.

Talk about the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon! I just finished reading 1 Samuel this week.

Very interesting insight.

There was no need to hold real estate expos because the ethnic cleansing was a bit more direct during the Armenian and Assyrian genocide.

It was atrocious then and it's atrocious now. There's almost something worse about zionst making it a business now. It's one thing to ethnically cleanse an area out of hatred, it's sick on a whole new level to try and turn a buck in the process.

I'm sure some ERP implementations go smoothly, but I've never heard of one.

About 10 years ago, I arrived at a company in the immediate aftermath of a failed implementation. There were many contributing factors, many of which I'm sure are common to other projects gone awry.

Is this problem as prevalent as it seems? How have these firms not developed a better methodology to avoid the most common pitfalls?

I went as a biljettkontrollant (Swedish ticket inspector) for Halloween—thought it’d be funny as a Yank expat.

Entering a room, I could feel the anxiety as some people instinctively grabbed their phones to buy a ticket.

There’s an old law school adage that A students become professors, B students go to work for C students.

It's similar for "shark attorneys," who will typically hail from tier 2 and 3 schools. They're the aggressive hustlers.

I think people often imagine hallucinations as glaringly fake—I did, at least.

It was an eye-opener when I finally realized the faint FM radio sounds I kept hearing in the middle of the night were actually manic hallucinations.

Visionaries and solution oriented devs can’t deliver the kind of quarterly “profitability” that careerist, KPI-chasing, promotion-hungry product managers love to promise.

> Instead, Close had sourced the original photo from the BBC Hulton Photo Library in London, now part of Getty Images.

That's a bit disappointing if I am reading it correctly. A photo library initially funded by the taxpayers, is now locked down by Getty Images?

Kind of late to the game, but can anyone recommend a good primer on GPU programming?

If you want to relocate to another country focus on the "pull factors" of that place, rather than the "push factors."

I moved to Sweden because my wife and I felt that was the best place to start a family. I'm on parental leave and cherish every moment I get to spend with my kid.

We would have made the move no matter what was happening in the US. Well, unless there was a major cultural shift and a generous grant of child care benefits equivalent to SWE.