Wednesday’s Forum
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FILED UNDER: Open Forum
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The VP debate has me concerned that slick, slimy confidence will win the day over honest substance.
As is the traditional American way.
Election season always has me regretting not moving to Europe when I had the opportunity as a younger man.
@Tony W: The VP debate has me concerned that Vladimir Futon is all-in for coups and Jan 6-style terror attacks. JD Vance opposes the peaceful transfer of power and is thus manifestly unfit for office. In a serious country, he and all like him would be booted from the Senate.
But, I’m pleased to see him and his party sprinting away from their desired national abortion ban. Run, JD, run.
@Tony W:
Move to Belgium. They can go over a year there without a government.
Quote from elsewhere: “So with all the stuff going on lately I offer a possible thing to look forward to…
We’re all going to see Cybertruck owners try and drive through snow soon.”
I myself am looking forward to watching how all that unprotected steel reacts to road salt =3
@Tony W:
Is Europe actually any better?
Far right wins Austria election, boosting European right-wing surge
I find myself wondering what Vance’s wife, Usha, tells herself when listening to her husband’s white supremacist rants
Stormy- First, I believe she is in the faith group that believes women should submit to their husbands. Second, I also suspect he doesnt think it applies to her or her family IOW it’s the leopards eating faces thing.
Steve
Back at work after using up almost all my vacation time (I think I’ve tow days left, which I probably won’t be able to use).
On the other hand, I nailed the beef in onion sauce in the pressure cooker. It’s good, but what I really need is a larger cast iron pot or dutch oven (I think the later is cast iron with an enamel lining). Something that will make for better browning of the beef and caramelization of the onions.
I paired it with pasta with a sauce made of sauteed garlic and a mix of eggs and shredded parmesan (which I think constitutes carbonara sauce). I find it amazing that when you drop this mix in the hot pasta and add some pasta water, it doesn’t taste remotely of eggs.
Now to think of what to make next week. It’ll have to be something quick and easy, as I need to finish the story I’ve been working on over my vacation. I think I need to add a scene, maybe a short one, because two consecutive ones that are meetings with the ship’s captain feels too repetitive.
Here is a long piece on Dominionism in Texas, which dominates and controls Texas politics:
“NYT Gift“
@Stormy Dragon:
Europeans don’t have assault rifles.
I’ve been ready to move overseas since 2016, but the spouse had obligations. It’s still a live prospect.
There are a lot of complications involving visas and tax residency and foreign tax offsets. Spain or Portugal for the weather. Southern France for the food and decent weather. Already did Italy. Cannot hack the Greek language, ditto Romanian or Bulgarian or Croat. Czechia has great beer and shitty weather as well as a tough language. The UK and Ireland speak a version of English, but again: weather. Then there are the over-touristed places that are sick of furiners, and we’d respect that, so no Barcelona or Lisbon. It’s complicated.
In some places we can get ‘talent’ visas. In other places we can get digital nomad visas. It’s a fucking nightmare of bureaucracy and lawyers and accountants.
@Michael Reynolds: Congratulations on your first world problems.
Tip for iPhone/iPad users who are as oblivious as I am: for a while now when I am trying to swipe on something, it occasionally takes me to a different app. Annoying, but I could never figure out why. It turns out there is a horizontal line at the bottom of the screen that when swiped to the left will take you to the app you previously used. Left again gives you the one before that, and so on. From that point you can swipe back and forth to go either direction in the stack. It turns out I was accidently swiping activating it. But now that I know about it, I think it will be actually useful.
@steve:
She’s a practicing Hindu. JD Vance was raised Evangelical but converted to Catholicism.
My hunch is that she thinks that “wives should submit” stuff is utter nonsense, but understands that her husband’s career requires her to cater to some of this type of BS. I wonder how long she’ll be able to keep up the act.
@Michael Reynolds: My husband is a British citizen, and we’re considering what we’ll do if Trump manages to win again (JFC, I cannot believe we’re here again). Complicating factors for us are aging parents who need help.
I care less about the weather, so the cold, gray, wet locales are fine.
@Michael Reynolds:
If the fascists control the government, they will have assault rifles…
I am beyond angry today. We just left Costco and the place was packed. PACKED. Everybody is stocking up because of the longshoreman strike. What angers me is this: Just how many of these Wednesday mid-morning shoppers are Trump supporters who complain about how “bad” the economy is? “Biden’s economy” is terrible, but your ass is financially comfortable enough to be up in Costco getting everything you need and want, right?
And then there’s the debate. Everybody expects — no; REQUIRES — Harris and Walz to be 100% on point and policy specific, with ZERO gaffes and perfect performance. Meanwhile, the American Saddam Hussein, with his corrupt versions of Uday and Qusay gets a pass from the media on his blatant and open attempts to burn down America and leave the international system to Putin, Xi, and the other authoritarians.
I’m f*kg ANGRY today.
@DeD: I hear ya. I was angry last week. This week I’m scared. My anxiety is ratcheting up hourly.
I hope I get to swing back to angry soon because I can get stuff done when I’m angry. When I’m anxious, pretty much nothing gets completed.
@DeD:
@Jen:
I’m so freaked out right now I can’t think straight. I’m trying to set up a wire in Pounds so that I can pay the solicitor. Right now I’m going to have to claim UK citizenship so that we have a place to flee to. Terf Island is the last place I want to go, but it will be marginally safer for me and my family than here.
What kills me is the lies. So many people have just bought in to the lies and they’re not even good lies. They are just blatant obvious garbage lies and people believe them. As far as I can tell there’s absolutely no way to combat the lies cause any response is going to be complex and have caveats. The lies are just certain and simple.
@Kathy: The carbonara I used to make had parmesan only on top, but most current recipes I’ve seen mix cream and or cheese into the eggs. My carbonara was not particularly “saucey” and tasted pronouncedly of egg, but that was sort of the point, in my view.
@DeD: When I moved out of the snow belt I started to hear talk of the “White Sale” – In places like Maryland, whenever snow is predicted, even a half inch, people flood the supermarkets to buy milk, eggs and toilet paper. They clean the whole store out. Ok, milk and eggs I can see, if you are at all low you might want to get an extra carton of milk and a dozen eggs. But in the half day it takes to clear the roads around here, just how much more toilet paper are you going to go through?
@Joe: Good to see that retiring to foreign countries is working its way back as an advantage of wealth. For several years, the stories were of lower middle/under rich moving to developing countries and the third world because they couldn’t afford to live in the US anymore. The not afford to live in the US part is still true, but it’s a relief to see that this condition is not at the forefront of people’s minds anymore. The rich have to have something that is theirs alone.
@MarkedMan:
I think that’s a hangover from the Blizzard of 1978, when the area it affected was limited to eastern Mass., but the stories about it afterward became legend.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
I’ve never tempered egg yokes for custard or anything else, but I’ve seen the technique demonstrated a number of times in videos. Just about all of them state you must temper the eggs so the end result won’t taste of scrambled eggs.
When I make the pasta this way, I add it to the pan where the garlic was sauteed, then I add the egg and parmesan mix, then mix everything, then add pasta water as needed. The pasta goes in wet. I take it out with a slotted spoon or tongs; I don’t strain it first.
However this cooks, ti tastes nothing like scrambled eggs.
@Jen:
@Beth:
I’m not in a panic yet*, but I kind of expect Biden to use his newly granted absolute immunity to perform some kind of official act if one is needed to save the country.
*On the other hand, his majesty’s parting gift was to make the judiciary accountable and dependent on the president.
Well, well. I went to look for a dutch oven online, and found an AI summary of the reviews in the first product I looked at.
This was at a site called Mercado Libre. It’s a clone of Amazon very popular in Mexico and Central and South America. I went to look at Amazon’s site, and didn’t find the same thing.
It’s spreading. Soon there will be generative AI junk all over the place.
@Stormy Dragon:
Saw the first one I’ve ever seen on the road yesterday, felt compelled to look at the driver to see what kind of person would actually buy such a thing. Changed lanes to get beside him for a bit on the freeway. A skinny white guy in his forties or thereabouts. Plaid shirt, Eddie Bower-ish. Glasses. A nerdy-engineer kinda look to him but nothing particularly unusual. His attention was unusually on his panel though. About half of the time there and poking around on buttons instead of on the road.
@Kathy: were you making pasta alla genovese?
https://www.seriouseats.com/pasta-alla-genovese-neapolitan-beef-ragu
I tried making that once, and while it turned out good, the end of the hall my apartment is on smelled like onion for about a week. I’m sure my neighbors just loved that.
@Michael Reynolds:
Except they do and like in the USA it’s a rare thing. If you mean the made up term “assault weapon” then you’re still wrong. You can own an AK/AR style rifle in most of Europe including the UK. BTW “assault weapon” style rifles account for less than 1% of all murders in the USA. More people are killed via hands and feet (punch/kicks) than “assault weapons” every year in the USA.
Crime statistics in generally are different in Europe and there’s some argument that culture matters. The USA’s worship of the stereotypical jock/ignorant mindset along with the “fuck you I got mine” and the “violence solves every problem!!” VS Europe’s tendency to believe we should work together for the benefit of society.
@Kathy: The recipe I was taught had no garlic–sauted or otherwise. Just bacon, egg, salt, pepper, parm. I had carbonara in Korea made as you describe. I didn’t see the point–it tasted like alfredo to my palate.
@Mike in Arlington:
No. I got this recipe from an ep of Giada DeLaurentis’ cooking show on Food Network years ago. It’s the sauce for her version of timballo Genovese. That is alike a pie made with pasta and a filling of bacon, meatballs, peas, and the onion sauce. I didn’t find the dish appealing, but the onion sauce intrigued me.
Short version is to caramelize around 1.5 kg of sliced onions, then cook them for like two hours on the stove at low heat, along with beef and other things. I can post the recipe I use if you want.
For the timballo, you’re supposed to save the beef for another use. Me, I shred it and mix it with the onion sauce. It’s kind of sweet in tone.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
When I make actual carbonara, I do the same as described above, except there’s bacon along with garlic in the pan.
@Matt:
This might be technically accurate, but in reality it’s far more nuanced. In the UK, you jump through a LOT of hoops to own any kind of gun. You need to get a certificate from the local police. You have to have a valid reason to purchase one. Someone has to certify that you can “safely” own the weapon. Your license to own a gun is only for five years, it has to be renewed after that, and the police can revoke your license to own a firearm at any time, for pretty much any reason.
So, yeah, you *can* own a gun in the UK. But it’s hardly the barely regulated environment we have here. If we had UK-style regulations here, a lot fewer people would qualify.
Breaking news:
http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/trump-resorted-crimes-stay-office-2020-loss-jack-smith-team-says-rcna172340
Um, no shit?????
@CSK:..no shit…
Link does not work. I will log on to nbcnews.com to see what I can find.
@Mister Bluster:
Try it now.
Trump ‘resorted to crimes’ to stay in office after 2020 loss, Jack Smith team says
is on the homepage of nbcnews.com
When I click on it it goes to the item that has the exact same address as your link that doesn’t work for me.
The internet is a mystery to me.
@CSK:..
Now it works!!!
@Mister Bluster:
It’s on The Guardian now, too
The Internet is a mystery to all of us.
According to The Guardian, which has obtained a copy of her memoir, Melania is ardently pro-choice.
@Jen: https://youtu.be/0ZEuWJ4muYc?t=1
😛
The SAIGA forum I visit occasionally has a number of Europeans posting. Surprisingly to me those in England have stated that the “valid reasons to purchase” was the easiest part. Overall the process seemed to work better than my experience in Illinois when I had to wait half a year for a FOID card because the democrats were playing games. I was relatively “lucky” as some people waited over a year for a renewal. The law itself states that applications are to be approved or rejected within 30 days. It seems the Democratic party stopped playing games and FOID applications are being granted or rejected in under 30 days for the most part now.
If you need a bright spot of news, Xlon’s data mining app has dropped an estimated 79% in value, according to some “investment giant” named Fidelity.
This makes El Weirdo a near equal of Xlon. Imagine a Felon and a God Mars Emperor of Phobos having so much in common. It’s, well, it must be something (everything is something*).
News and commentary two years ago made it clear Xlon offer for Twitter was massively overpriced. Remember the Emperor Mars God himself wanted to back out of the deal (and he really should have).
What’s really terrible about all this, is that a vainglorious egomaniac can blow over $30 billion on a whim, and suffer little, or nothing, in the way of personal consequences. If there’s ever been an argument for a wealth tax, this is it.
*That’s my re-statement of Aristotle’s Law of Identity.
@Kathy: That dude has so much money he could be literally doing anything anyone could ever dream of. He doesn’t even need to watch over his money makers either. Just hire some people to deal with the “little details” and focus on enjoying life instead. If he wants to be loved he could just run around building hospitals or some shit. He has all the cheat modes engaged for life right now. Yet he chooses to have the personality of an edge-lord angst ridden 12 year old. It makes no sense to me. Although it does make my cold shrunken heart feel a little warmth at the thought of someone with so much money being so miserable.
Can’t wait for the videos of cybertrucks in snow 🙂
@Matt:
I don’t think Xlon’s purpose was money, but rather he wanted to do something with his money. Ergo XpaceX and Texla. That may not be so anymore, not after he demanded, and got, an outrageous “compensation” from Texla worth more than the GDP of some countries.
It may be he’s realized he can’t do what he set out to do, so he’s branching out to other areas. And with these he’s not doing well at all.
One curious thing, though, is that XpaceX and Texla benefit a lot from government spending, but Xitter does not.
@Matt:
Only vehicle since the Yugo that makes a 78 El Camino look stylish and classy. I’ll bet the trash can handles worse than the El Cam did. I’m picturing one slithering down Queen Anne Hill backwards in Seattle snow. @Gus, are you in on this too?
@Flat Earth Luddite: My first car was a 1983 Dodge Rampage. Two-toned red and black. I loved that fucking thing. 😉
@Kathy:
I absolutely love to bring that factoid out when talking to certain types of people. I also point out it was NASA that figured out why SpaceX rockets were exploding AND wrote most of the procedures that SpaceX uses.
@Matt: I’m not really interested in what people say on forums…I’m very familiar with the UK, we have friends and family there, which include both a lawyer and a police officer. I know full well that it’s a much more stringent process to own firearms there than here.
@Jen: So what? If you’re not interested why bother? Are you just trying to find something to argue about? If that’s the case I have much more interesting topics like Cake VS Pie. Is a cheesecake a pie or a cake?
@Jen:
Just to be clear I thought such a statement was so obvious as to not require being made.