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This trend - the dumbing down of discourse to the level of angry soccer fans - is something that was predicted years, even decades ago by authors like Al Gore, Mike Judge, Susan Jacoby and Carl Sagan. I'm sure you've seen Carl Sagan's quote from 1996: I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or my grandchildren's time — when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. The dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance." Replace that with "clutching our crystals and consulting our horoscopes" with "taking Ivermectin and reading Twitter" and you have today's level of public discourse. And 10 seconds? That's forever by today's standards. Today what people consider "substantive content" includes "Let's go Brandon" "Hunter's laptop" and "I did that!" Under a second.

Sure, there are some people who can use the internet to improve themselves. But the majority of news consumers are not discerning. They read what's in front of them - and now click on whatever's interesting and/or reinforces their beliefs. And then their news reader learns their preferences. That is a very fundamental difference. 30 years ago you read a newspaper, and the newspaper was edited to present a mix of news. Sure there was some bias but for the most part the stories were accurate and comprehensive. And they didn't change if you read the sports pages more than the news section. You got the same newspaper every week. Nowadays, if you read a newsfeed you eventually get only the things you have been clicking on. If all you ever click on are stories about how much Biden sucks, all you will see are stories about how much Biden sucks. And you will begin to believe that because you see absolutely nothing that counteracts that; your newsfeed is learning to give you only what you want. You have created your very own news bubble, and that shapes your worldview. And to a lazy news consumer, that's an accurate representation of the news he sees. That's true of everything. If you believe that Putin is justified in invading Ukraine because he wants to stop the evil Nazi Zelensky? Click on all those stories and that's all you will see. Want to believe that vaccines have microchips in them? That climate change will kill everyone within 5 years? That Jan 6th was just some tourists who got lost? Your newsfeed will alter itself to show you that. THAT is the big difference.

This is what truly frustrates me about the almighty algorithm - it's supposedly the best thing the brightest minds at these tech companies can come up with, but it's just so dumb... There's no sophistication to it, it doesn't learn anything about why you clicked on something, it just goes "ok here is more of what you clicked". In the last 6 months or so, I clicked on the comments sections of certain FB posts that had been shared by some of my "wooier" friends about vaccine mandates etc, just to see what sort of things people were thinking. I never engaged on the posts themselves in any concrete way - didn't like comments or posts, didn't comment myself, I solely read the comments there on FB. I only had to do this a handful of times before half my suggested posts ran the gamut from sceptical to full-blown NWO conspiracies. The algorithm is extremely dumb, but also completely insidious.

Agreeing with Billvon ... Over the last decade I have seen North American media severely dumbed-down. The decline started back during the 1990s when I worked in the Southern California skydiving industry: California City, Hemet. Perris and Elsinore, I soon concluded that the Los Angeles Times fixated on stories originating in the LA Basin. The LA Times only occassionally mentioned events in other states and largely ignored Europe, S during my days off, I drove 1 hour to a newspaper store that carried: Manchester Guardian, Paris Match, der Spiegel, Toronto Globe and Mail, etc. to understand the global picture. These days I read a half-dozen internet feeds and keep a PAPER copy of The Economist in my pocket. We have also seen North American severely polarized to the point that right-wingers only have to listen to their version of the "correct" news on a dozen different conservative news feeds. By the same token, I have to bite my tongue when my left-wing, tree-hugging friends get too excited about the latest "woke" news story. Bottom line, current trends towards polarization are scary because they only push voting blocs farther apart. .

Problem solved: https://gfycat.com/warmanchoredgerenuk

A Canadian success story. Where a Canadian business hoodwinked a US agency. Where he made a billion because of US political nationalism-pandering-corruption. Then in the end trump is out the cash, minus the fine of course. Good points, a Win-Win-Win.

I agree that using the 302's description of race as white does not rule out someone of Hispanic descent. I worked in market research for a few years and race/ethnicity always came up and was confusing even among experts in surveys. The technical aspects of the census or dictionary versions of race/ethnicity don't always align with how people use the terms in everyday conversation. Many people would say Hispanic is a race, even some Hispanics. Many would say their race is Caucasian, when that is technically not a race anymore (I think). The most recent batch of 302's has a number of suspect profiles. For race there were mainly white, but Caucasian was listed twice (not a race). There was no entry a few times, and one American Indian. Attached are the questions in the 1970 census regarding race and origin. This is where recordings of these conversations would have been useful. Realistically if race is listed as white then we can rule out a lot of races (Japanese, Chinese, Black), but not anyone of Hispanic descent or American Indian. It's best to look at the actual descriptions like you've mentioned Flyjack. I'd be more interested in asking "What descent do you think the person is?" or "What country of origin do you think the suspect is from or his ancestors?" I interpret the information as Cooper being American, probably native born, with relatives from Eastern/Southern Europe, which could include Spain, and therefore by definition any of the Spanish/Portuguese colonies (Mexico, Brazil, etc). Given the small population numbers of American Indians, I would guess he was not American Indian, but it could be possible. Also, if we figure Cooper was born in the 1920s, then it means his parents were born in the late 1890s or 1900's. The US is a melting pot now and many of us can trace ancestors back to many different countries and parts of the world. That was not as much the case if you were born in the 1920s. There would be a good chance that both your parents were descended from one part of the world, or even from the same country. Just look at the ethnicity pockets in US cities in the 1900's. There were Irish sections. Italian, Jewish, Hungarian, German, etc. In my mind, the olive/swarthy etc. clearly rules out Rackstraw, McCoy, Recca, Peterson, and probably some of the other candidates.

It constantly amazes me how those who shout the loudest about getting the government out of their lives are also the most likely to fawn over autocratic proto-dictators like Viktor Orban, Rodrigo Duterte or Vladimir Putin when they use their power to stamp down on people the ‘freedom lovers’ don’t like. Not only is it incredibly hypocritical, they just don’t seem to realise how quick that worm can turn. I guess the old saying “those who would sacrifice liberty to own the libs will get what they deserve” has never been truer.

I have seen a DZ (here in Canada) start out as "no full face" until say jump 50. After all, nothing wrong with having a cheap "standard" open face to start with before buying expensive equipment. But in recent years they relaxed that rule once people started coming to the DZ from the tunnel who already had had bought super pricy full face helmets. Added into the thinking is that modern full faces with big visors don't obscure vision of handles like some of the old designs. Searching the USPA SIM (the current '21-'22 one) I see no mention of "full face" or similar, other than that it can be more awkward to communicate in the case of canopy collisions. Similarly searching the SIM, I see no mention of any particular sort of visual altimeter suggested for any students or novices. No restrictions there at all that I can see. (Section 5-3 is the one that goes into details about altis.) They do recommend avoiding audible altimeters until a student already has altitude awareness. So if there are any recommendations by the USPA, they would have to be somewhere else, that I don't know about not being a USPA instructor. I'd be interested to hear other DZ's experiences.

Canada has been supplying the Ukrainians with real time satellite radar and conventional satellite imagery.

John was a Brother to me, I am fucking devastated to hear this, jumped at Cross Keys for a few years, we became great friends, I checked him out in the Astar so he could fly ENG for NBC Philadelphia, I told him the media assholes sucked, 2 years later he said to me "these media assholes suck"! WTF happened? This totally breaks my heart... God Speed John, my prayers are with your daughters and your family. This just sucks,

After all this blathering about this laptop story that has so many vague accusations I finally took the time to read what that known facts are. It comes down to this. The laptop appears to have a reasonably good chance of actually being Hunter's at one time. But not for certain. Two emails on it are the focus of all this talk. One thanks Hunter for giving an "opportunity to meet his father". The person in question could possible have been introduce to Joe when Joe briefly stopped into a formal dinner to say hello to an old friend and contact. Other than that there is absolutely no evidence of any meeting with Joe. None. Not while in office or afterward. None. The other one concerns some kind of deal that Hunter appears to be setting up with a Chinese company where it seems that one of the principles was offering a share position to Joe. It is followed by another that seems to report that Joe responded with "an emphatic no". Joe was not an office holder at the time of these emails. This is the complete thing as far as I can tell. The way I see it there is so little here that most likely in my mind the HD did belong to Hunter at one time. Simply because if someone was going to go through the trouble of faking evidence they would have faked something scandal worthy. Which none of this is. While it does suggest that Hunter was trading on his family connection, he is not and has never been a politician or in public service and therefore has done nothing illegal. And Joe has handled himself in a manner that does not bring any dishonour at all. The only story here is how the story was handled. And there was good reason for that.

Took that advice to heart. Did level 2 and 3 today. Failed 3, flipped over on my back. Legs weren't right, tried to counteract with the arms. Didn't work. Anyway I got lots of compliments on my canopy flights. Had beautiful openings. Got to the holding area, chilled, did some non aggressive 360s to drop altitude and went for my final approach both times. Didn't stand up either landing but I didn't get hurt. Lots of fun.

Yeah that makes perfect sense, law enforcement agencies are notoriously liberal.