ScottishFox

No disagreement here. The current administration lies with the best of them. Also, politicians as a whole (both sides) are scummy liars who will say anything to get more power. The free speech threat I've seen has been growing steadily since the UC Berkley riots chasing Milo off campus. 150 violent, masked agitators. Apparently the openly gay, married to a black guy (now) speaker had the wrong opinions about some things and the very same campus that protested FOR free speech decades earlier protested against it. I've lost count of the number of conservative lawsuits filed because they simply can't get permission to speak at public schools as they are thwarted again and again for having speakers with the wrong opinions. I personally find Milo intentionally offensive and since his social media banning - tragically deranged. Still, if people want to see that show - they should be allowed to. College campuses have become incredibly intolerant. I've seen the police called on a PragerU reporter for asking a question. When the police came they asked what the reporter had done and the student says, "Well, they're racist so they shouldn't be allowed on campus and be able to talk to people". I remember people calling my wife - who is Mexican - racist for voting for Trump and promptly ghosting her. I had a guy show up to my home D&D game wearing a politically themed Punch a Nazi shirt. AKA - It's OK to punch Trump supporters (like my wife) because they're Nazi's. She's voted Democrat her entire (LONG) adult life and only in 2016 were things so crazy that she finally switched parties out of desperation. This same lifetime Democrat is HAPPY with how Trump is handling things. I'll probably vote for Jo Jorgensen because I'm so disgusted with Democrat and Republican I can't vote for either one. How many people have been punched for wearing a MAGA hat while people walk around with hammer and sickle shirts without issue? Che Guevara shirts? No problem. HR departments and big tech have picked up the fun with whole areas of discussion that will get you banned/fired for having the currently mainstream conservative opinion. How about The White Coat summit and doctors being tech platform banned for contradicting the W.H.O. (which has done a bang up job with Coronavirus so far. Especially fond of their refusing to listen to doctors from Hong Kong - which could have saved 10s of thousands of lives). How about the presidents twitter/twitch accounts getting suspended for - again - pretty mainstream conservative view points? I watch Bill Maher and John Oliver AND Tucker Carlson. I like to get a broad array of opinions, but one set of those opinions is getting smashed by cancel culture and big tech. Can you imagine if we would have allowed this behavior with telephone companies in the past? Says here you're a registered Democrat - No phone calls for you. I remember people calling my wife - who is Mexican - racist for voting for Trump and promptly ghosting her. Want to find out WHY she made that choice? No? Just assume evil and disappear? Okay.... That's pretty disgusting. Sorry you're going through that. I've heard and read similar things from left-leaning acquaintances of mine and it is beyond disturbing. Things like "If people are still conservative at this point you've had your chance. At a minimum they need to be taken into custody and re-educated.". Hard pass on the re-education camps - for anyone - in my opinion. Ditto. Last time the anti-Jewish sentiment ramped up things turned out badly for everyone. I also feel pretty similarly about the anti-white tripe the last few years. White Privilege is racist garbage, imo, though I'd be down for Majority Privilege. Because the former is racist and too often incorrect (I was a minority white for 15+ years and I did NOT feel privileged to be physically attacked and to struggle to find work for being white). Selecting any race for open season on abuse only leads to horrible things. I recall this KKK idiot passing around material in Junior High when I still lived in a overwhelmingly white area. Like over 99%. He was blaming black people for all of societies problems. And I told him something along the lines of, "Man, there's like 1 black guy in town. Your problems are because of YOU!" California this year - again - has on the ballot the option to roll back government protections against hiring based on race and gender. Unless I misread something it's like they want to repeal the civil rights act. Well intentioned or not - that road leads to hell. OK, I've rambled on for too long. Love this place and you guys for even entertaining conversations like this. And HERO system. God I love this game system. I got a table back up and running this Saturday (with clean freaky Corona protections in place). Blue and gold D6s for life.

This is correct and surprised me a bit. Our overall mortality rate is more than 50 per 100k? That was kind of shocking. The area I live in (roughly 1 million people in our burb/county) is clocking in at 9 and was not so long ago below 6. Crazy how different the outcomes are from area to area. Also, saw this today and despite quite a bit of cavalier rule-breaking and unwillingness to follow safety guidelines - America isn't doing too bad. Better than Germany and the world average? Given how fat we are as a country? Surprisingly good. I didn't pick the country list. It comes with those by default with an option to add others.

I hear you and trust me - this street runs both ways. Watch a sample of #WalkAway videos and the most common theme you'll see is that people who start to disagree with their 'woke' friends is instant and brutal ostracism, name calling and cruelty. I've watched Tim Pool (moderate Democrat) go from full on Bernie Sanders supporter to non-stop disgust at what passes for journalism these days and an angry, disgusted realization that he's going to have to vote for Trump (whom he openly despises ) because he can't vote for Biden and none of the candidates he liked made the cut. I used to consider myself pretty moderate, but by modern standards I'd be a nutter. Here's a poorly edited graphic borrowed from the NYT.

This is a byproduct of mutual intolerance. Someone who disagrees with you can't just have a differing opinion. They can't have had a lifetime of their own experiences and have reached a different conclusion on how things should work. They have to - at the very least - be dangerously, stupidly wrong. Usually that isn't enough anymore. Now someone who disagrees with you has to be evil. Not a little evil. Very evil. That's where we lost the plot. Trump's stupidity and diarrhea of dishonesty isn't killing relationships. We are. We've become intolerant ass-hats. My Sunday D&D table is pretty evenly split politically (couple of hard conservatives, couple of hard liberals and a couple of moderates) and we try to avoid political discourse while gaming, but it usually flares up once or twice. One of the die-hard lefties at the table pulled me aside the other day and just thanked me for being so easy to talk to and disagree with (which we do on a lot of topics). I'm old enough to remember when that was the norm. When we could disagree intensely, even mock each others ideas without throwing our friendships out the window. I feel like I'm in the twilight zone. It used to be the liberals defending free speech from tyrannical thought-policing evangelical types. Now it's completely reversed where the conservatives are defending free speech from tyrannical thought-policing political correctness types.

Curious which site you're using because the Covid Tracker doesn't have any days nearly that high. I mean, it is definitely the highest death rate Texas has had lately, but nothing approaching 863. Current averages are about 225-235.

And because America is really good at handling Coronavirus - The public health director in California resigned suddenly. It wasn't brought up in the resignation letter, but there's supposedly a very recently discovered flaw in the CA reporting system that may have as many as 300,000 cases not reported yet.

The neighbor, in an effort to get faster service from the police, told a lie that contributed to that guy being dead. If you're going to put two bullets into the back of a suspect as he immediately complies with a verbal command (free hand up, dropping to knees, putting pistol down) then police work isn't the right job for you. That officer might be better suited to a new career like inmate.

And another innocent dies. Crime? Playing crash bandicoot too loudly and running into incompetent police. Police get a noise complaint. Knock loudly and say, "police" in a voice that could not possibly be heard through the door at any distance. The guy answers the door somewhat aggressively (late at night, rental neighborhood) but as soon as he sees it is police he drops to his knees and tries to put the gun down. Officer Incompetine shoots him twice in the back even though the gun the homeowner is holding is pointed to the ground and inside the apartment.

Well, it's been over two months since my shoulder repairs. My left bicep is still very weak (max out at 10lb curls down from 30+ previously) and ... it's crooked. The relocation of my bicep tendon attachment point has left a distinct curve in the bicep. It's weird and makes me want to workout to plump it back up to a normal shape, but I have to wait another 4 months for that. /ugh

I think we'll find out over the next year or so. One of my biggest concerns from the beginning has been that our cure is going to be worse than the disease. UN Food Relief program was suggesting we might see more than 100 million people starve to death due to the economic impacts of Coronavirus. 2020 as a whole has felt like the 2012 the Mayans promised us. Plagues, wars, disease, famine (literal locust swarms eating massive swaths of African crops). https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/u-n-warns-hunger-pandemic-amid-threats-coronavirus-economic-downturn-n1189326 As a result of the coronavirus outbreak and the subsequent economic ramifications, the food agency found an additional 130 million people could be on the brink of starvation by the end of the year.

I strongly suspect that part of this is due to under-testing or under-reporting by some other countries. China and India have respectively 5 and 4 times our population but way, way smaller case loads? Not that America hasn't done a reasonably BAD job of failing to observe social distancing and mask rules. We have. I just don't buy the idea that much larger countries with higher population density and larger populations below the poverty line are controlling this disease so well.

It was the lack of gorgeous Hispanic maidens that lead future generations of Australians to be so cranky and their land so full of venomous terrors. Texas is just right. I just asked the Hispanic maiden I married and she approves this message.

If you can do a play through of Ghosts of Tsushima they do a great job of integrating Honor in their campaign / game. The way you solve your missions influences how people react to you and even random NPC comments as you walk through refugee camps, reclaimed villages, etc. You get feedback from your Uncle and other major NPCs and they do NOT make it easy to stay honorable.

Also, numbers continue to improve. Even here in Texas. Though I suspect the reason our death toll is so much lower than that of New York (We'd have 35k-40k instead of 7.3k) is that treatment options have improved so much. Mortality rates are down 70-85% from the initial wave depending on age bracket.

I think most of us soccer accusers are aiming at the scenarios when the soccer play doesn't even make contact with another player and then dives in a blatant attempt to draw a foul. Or takes a minimal impact and then throws themselves to the grass like a '70s era Saturday Night Kung Fu movie actor.

I'd like to see the testing on that to see how bad it is. Still, on a more light-hearted note, I'm imagining characters with entries like: COVID-19 Survivor: Flash Defense 3pts (taste, smell, hearing).

We had a coworker who lost their father last week. His family is from China. Nobody could travel to the funeral. Luckily one of the sons was still in China.

Do Capsicle years count towards "real age" ? Didn't MCU have him at well over 100 during all the time travel shenanigans in Avengers: End Game?

Oh, um, well... my bad! 😊

The mortality rate - without co-morbidities - in people under 50 is unbelievably low. While it's possible Stark, Nat, Clint or Spidey could get seriously ill or die the odds are TINY. High blood pressure and diabetes are the two biggest risks for dying in the younger age categories. Without them the odds of a battle-ready ultra-healthy superhero type dying from the 'Rona would be about 0.0%.

I really liked this one.

You're probably right and we're 39 days plus incubation period away from finding out.

Looks like Texas is starting to turn the corner. Not the smoothest run by a long shot because people here seem mask adverse, but it looks like we're going to be out of the pandemic zone pretty soon. Area we're in is still at 7 deaths per 100,000. Cannot wait for this sh*t to be over.

The cashier and bagger at the CostCo are doing hundreds of people a day. Same for the guy at the gas station, the lady at the liquor store, etc. I get what you're saying (I've taught kids in decades gone by for karate classes), but the sheer volume the cashiers are dealing with would seem to be a higher risk. Especially given how filthy money is.

Restaurant, Bar, Church, CostCo or other large retailer with thousands of daily customers, etc. There are LOTS of people in the essential worker category that are exposed to customers all day, every day. If kids can get a quality education online and not suffer from socialization and mental health issues - that'd be fine, but for many unfortunate kids staying home means they don't get decent meals, get abused or are lonely to the point of self-harm. 2020 sucks. I feel like all of the answers are variations of a Taoist symbol where death and misery chase each other around in an endless cycle. Right now with the quarantine we're losing more people to suicide and drug overdoses than the actual illness. That comes with a huge increase in domestic violence and child abuse. Though, I don't doubt that sending all of the kids back to school would eventually result in dead teachers and dead parents. Possibly even more than we're losing to staying home. I'd like to fast forward to January 2022, please.