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Showing content with the highest reputation on 09/24/2020 in all areas

  1. 1 point
    The gist of it goes like this: 1. In the last several elections, it has become common for democratic candidates to gain votes as absentee/mail-in ballots are counted, which often is up to a few days after election day. Generally this does not change the outcome, but in some recent elections the republican candidate is ahead (by a bit) on election day, but this changed as absentee ballots are counted. The situation is likely to be more extreme this election as (1) most democratic voters (60% by one recent poll) plan to vote by mail due to the pandemic. That means more ballots to count, which will delay the final tally. On the other hand most republicans plan to vote in person (only 28% mail-in by the same poll), so republican candidates are likely to be leading on Nov 3. 2. The Trump campaign (assisted by Barr) has been trying to discredit mail-in voting. The idea is both to get as many ballots disqualified due to trivial errors such as not having a second "privacy envelope", on the theory that this will disqualify more democrats than republican voters. However the basic idea is to create confusion and then use that confusion to try to get all mail-in ballots thrown out. 3. Also they plan to go to court to get counting stopped on Nov. 3. Even if you filled in your ballot correctly and mailed it in lots of time, it will be disqualified if it is not opened and counted on Nov 3. This is very likely to affect lots of votes because of the increased volume of mail-in ballots, the lack of resources to hire enough people to count them all quickly, and in some states there are laws to prevent mail-in ballots to be counted before Nov. 3. Even if they are received weeks before Nov 3 they will just sit unopened. 4. If all of the above does not produce a vote for Trump, they will go to court to argue the votes are so "tainted" they cannot be trusted, so they should all be thrown out (in-person and mail-in) and state legislatures should choose electors for the electoral college. Since slightly more states have republican legislatures, this should ensure a Trump victory. 5. There are a few states with republican controlled legislatures but democratic governors. In such a case the legislature can choose a set of electors, but so can the governor. However no state can send two sets of electors. In the event of a dispute, who gets to choose what set of electors to count? Why, the president of the Senate, who happens to be Mike Pence. Any guesses which set of electors is counted? The article goes on to discuss even more scenarios, all terrifying for the future of our country and all quite probable with this president. Things like using protests to send in troops in democratic-leaning cities to close the streets so voters can't get to the polls. Or worse things like inviting "citizen militias" to police polling stations and keep out "suspicious looking troublemakers". And on and on. I had planned on voting by mail, but now I am thinking about voting in person, but early to avoid some of the crowded lines.
  2. 1 point
    More like Bayesian notation for conditional probabilities.
  3. 1 point
    It means that Fancy Bear is yuck yucking it up in a Moscow suburb. Wondering about the genius of President Putin and the stupidity of Americans.
  4. 1 point
    Here comes the "But the time line is different " argument.
  5. 1 point
    Oh no! You have done it now! You have put a mirror in the faces of Democrat hypocrites. They are not going to like that.
  6. 1 point
    Great minds think alike. I have one on every jumpsuit. Front of my right thigh (I'm right-handed). If you don't have a hook knife when you need one, you may never need one again.
  7. 1 point
    Yeah, he actually texted me and told me that they told him never to come back
  8. 1 point
    This weekend of AFF is over and I am back home. I jumped 3 times. First time was not to bad but I still needed to stop rotation quicker. Second time was even worse. Instructor thought I would benefit from tunnel time more than doing a 3rd jump. I wanted to jump just to get practice with exit and landing too. 3rd jump was with a different instructor and I told him that I had no intention of passing but just wanted to have fun and relax. He said I needed a more positive attitude and we jumped. I nailed it this time. I even had a couple thousand extra feet after the drills to relax and enjoy the freefall. After I pulled and looked up to verify the canopy I saw the left side had a line wrap. I cut away at 4000 and landed the reserve. I managed a decent landing too. They recovered my canopy from the trees and powerline this morning.
  9. 1 point
    Call me a sceptic, but I think the only difference is in the marketing. There is nothing special or difficult about filters letting a little bit of air in/out.
  10. 1 point
    ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ so I apologize for the spelling mistakes. I was using voice dictating, and did not re read the post.
  11. 1 point
    I just put 3 jumps on the Gangster 96 prototype this last weekend. The openings are fantastic. Easily the best 3 openings I've had in the last 200 jumps. (I jump a Velocity 96.) Just to clarify, I don't work for Fluid, but here's what I know from talking to them and looking at photos... It's a 9 cell canopy. The center 3 cells are cross braced tri-cells, and the rest of the cells are bi-cells. It's worth noting that cells 3 and 7 are still bi-cells, but they have a single cross brace going from the inner-most line attachment to their unloaded rib, so you see 4 "V" shapes total. This design gives you 21 internal chambers, the same number as conventional 7-cell fully cross braced canopy. However, on the Gangster, the rigidity is more concentrated towards the center of the wing where it will most benefit the wing's efficiency. Out of the 22 ribs (including end cell/stabilizers), only 4 of the ribs are free floating...neither cross braced nor directly attached to a line. You can see these are the unloaded ribs on cells 1, 2, 8, and 9. Through this structure, the benefit of rigidity is maximized while the drawback of pack volume is minimized. There's also tail ribs to give the wing a more rigid trailing edge and sweet flare. Again, the wing I jumped is a prototype. It already kicks ass, but the production version probably has some revisions to make it even better. That said, here are some opening shots: https://www.facebook.com/kevin.dice/videos/10214701429152030/
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