TrickstaPriest

And this here is why I hate the current insurance system. Plus, with people who have ongoing conditions, their strategy is to 'wait it out and hope you die before paying for something'.

As far as Medicare's denial rate is concerned, I'm not surprised given the general age and health of the participants. I definitely would like to see the data on how it compares to private insurance for the same age group (and costs) though, because I'm inclined to agree based on what you are showing. (No, not asking you to do my research for me I have to start looking for sources for research on some of these programs, I just haven't gotten to it yet) I don't want us to get too hot under the collar. I wholly agree that the medical system costs have to be forced under control, but I don't think private insurance has been working to control this.

I think, instead of addressing the definition of socialism, I have been thinking of maybe approaching these issues with what specifically causes socialism to 'damage' society and how that relates to what the conversation is talking about. I've had some back-and-forth arguments, and they've usually summed up as 'people having different priorities'. ie- one person is talking about how belief is just an excuse to for individuals to do bad things, the other is talking about how belief galvanizes groups into dangerous mob behavior.

A lot of people don't have any understanding beyond basic talking points. There's been a lot of 'memeing' since before it was a hobby for internet people. I can say this about any particular movement or political party, but it's hair raising how destructive and galvanizing it has been for Trump in particular.

And in general, it's much nicer to argue about that than, let's say, what policies your donors / lobbyists are writing for you. It wouldn't surprise me if they encourage it, just so they don't have to talk about taxes/etc. There are a number of voters who seem to know that and like that it's a distraction... but they either are really happy with the concept of the Voting Teams (because politics is now football) or they must -really- like those tax cuts... It's frustrating. As a diehard environmentalist, it's especially frustrating.

This is the world they wanted, the world they created.

I'm going to have to start reading this properly again... 😛

My problem with a federal job guarantee program is that it's an indirect method to provide benefit; essentially, it's much easier to deny someone a federal job or disability benefits than it is to deny straight money, no conditions attached. For example, they are trying to say my brother's physical disease has been filled out by someone as 'mental', and then have taken doctor's scripts to demonstrate that "there's nothing mentally wrong, therefore no disability".

I really like this moment for the characters. I don't like what the Russo's are saying after the fact, because it doesn't feel right. The reason I liked that is that Thor was worried in that scene that Cap could potentially lift the hammer. He was almost sweating bullets. But in Endgame he was filled with -delight- that Cap could. So as a story, it sounds much better that both of them became better people through everything they've been through. Cap can become worthy (even the desire to rest, now, may be part of that), and Thor has become happy for someone else rising up to this stature. That's a really important moment for both characters, who don't show a lot of direct, positive character growth in their movies.

I'd love the deep dive on the details of what this does and would undo. I see a lot of voices trying to say that it allows for citizens to unite their funding to get heard, but all I've heard of in the years since is wealth pouring into SuperPACs from the top.

Unfortunately a political party with no challengers isn't exactly going to be known for best behavior. I vote. But someone wake me when I get a political party that will talk about the realities of global warming.

Literally what I was trying to tell my brother.... The entire setting is based around him. Yet that was what we saw...? The prince thing was just the icing on the cake of obnoxious... Princess or not. It's just that it was handled so... Boringly.

My brother and I were complaining about that quite a bit...

I'm glad Underdahl said that. I wholly agree with Black Widow being the one to decide that outcome... And that's why having a variety of people review/edit your writing is so important I also like that Loki is 'back' in a sense. Because the actor is well appreciated and liked, and he was badly wasted in Avengers 1 and 3.

I was really happy to see the Ancient One, and that she had a fairly good bit in the movie. I liked seeing her and Dr Strange, though I didn't see much of Strange getting the chance to work with the other major heroes...

After all that, I have to ponder how I'd want to adapt some of the ideas to write a long term super campaign from the ground up... 😛

I want to say I really admire how they took the "look back" concept and made it a core feature and point of the entire movie. They did it specifically in a way that really sold it, and I could have easily suspended disbelief if they hadn't done it so well. I also read a thing a year ago about how "Infinity War" was meant to be "a heist movie", and I realized that was more in reference to this movie than anything else.

I've always had a more difficult time running games in Champions. Largely, the 'isolated villain battle' seems to dominate imagination, and it's actually hard to conjure some of the scenarios in mind. Then again, when I look at the other games I've run, maybe it's them and their mindset (stab and kill?) that is just impacting my ability to run Champions. Originally I did a much worse job of that than I probably do now... Boy, it's hard to find good ways to indirectly encourage my DnD group's overly pragmatic (but not evil!) paladin. Compared to that, Champions might not be that bad... ?

And probably terribly cynically of me, any politician isn't likely to have a donor with any major loss based on either outcome of this battle. The only losers are the people, and politicians' reputations... not the companies. Though that's just my dubious thoughts, and eat them with a grain of salt, maybe some alcohol.

My expectation of their interpretation of this was this as well. Frankly I think he's forgetting how many Christian "sects" clearly, cheerfully, and willingly murdered and went to war with other Christian "sects". A proper historian could tell me if that oppression was part of the motivation in fleeing to America to begin with... My personal thought is just that if your uncle thinks a Christian country is going to be more united, more strong, he is in for a really bad surprise. If politicians have no outsiders to target, they have to look towards insiders... like the Irish. I'm pretty sure I've started hearing those slurs in the media again...

I see that sort of thing on my friends' FB posts all the time. Mostly people being smug about the shutdown being a "negotiating tactic" and "why can't you understand". I'm not fond of the dogmatic aspect of the back-and-forth, but there's a good subset of people who definitely fall into "flat earther" territory. It's good to see news organizations from other countries are as interested in this as we are.

Thanks! I've finished up what I hope is the serviceable version. If there was a game you were in on Hero Central, you can now message me and I'll send you formatted threads! I have no idea how you'd watch them on a phone, but any computer with a browser should handle it.

I've managed to resolve some JavaScript issues, and now the games build with a static and dynamic version of the posts. I also created post lists for both formats. If the dynamic file list doesn't work, the dynamic posts won't... so it works out pretty well!

Back in the day, there was a site called Hero Central. I've been experimenting with local file restores of certain campaigns on the site. In short, if someone wants to read a campaign they were in, I can pass them zips of specific campaigns from Hero Central. They require are offline files, they are JavaScript (so a reasonable browser and computer, not a phone), and at this point I'm trying to keep the list I give out small. That being said, if you know a campaign you were a part of, tell me, and I'll pass along the files for it. This is still in the alpha stage so there may be lots of bugs or debugging to get threads to work. I have no plans to upload them to the general internet, and for the sake of people's general privacy I request that you do not post them publicly either. In other words... 1) The files will not be hosted online. Please do not upload them to the general internet either, please. 2) This fix requires javascript. This means you'll want a computer browser, not a phone, to read these. Later I may make flat files. 3) The javascript is clunky. I can't guarantee it'll work. This javascript is used to let me completely rewrite the templates later, and to standardize loading schemes. 4) Files on the site are not included. This includes character sheets, images, avatars, attachments. I don't have any of those, sorry. 5) I haven't included thread visibility rules. Because anyone could lurk the site in general, anything meant to be "in private" on a thread was not actually private. My apologies if your expectations were as such but I never designed the site. 6) I removed most user's information before distribution. 7) I haven't 'interpreted' the [action]/etc forum blocks. I will later release updates to the templates that may resolve this. 8 ) There -shouldn't- be dangerous HTML, but right now HTML is rendering. I may decide to filter this out if I feel there is a safety issue. I don't recall malware ever being on the site. I can't guarantee safety however...