jakee

Plus da change... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/may/09/clergy-molestation-survivors-pope-leo-xiv

Nice! When RIAT was at Cottesmore plane spotters used to be allowed into the farmer’s field just off the arrival end of the runway. Until one day the B1B display bird held on the brakes as it ran up the reheat for a performance takeoff, and the gathered crowd found out what 4 of the biggest afterburners ever made felt like from less than a hundred meters away. They cracked down on access to the surroundings after that. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iVdUi-8F8P0

Goddamn dude that’s some collection. Are you running real miniature gas turbines in any of them? You’ve got a Typhoon, B1B, display Typhoon ‘Blackjack’ (there’s a funny story about why 29 SQN’s logo is XXX) alongside a Rafale (though I had to cheat on that one - I wanted to say a Gripen because the colour looked Swedish). Then you’re onto a Phantom II, F16 (I don’t know the different versions / blocks) and rounding out with the truly terrifying F104 Starfighter. There’s a cockpit video from an Italian who flies an F104 and they’re using over 90% dry power on final because of the insane induced drag from those stubby wings at low speed. Doesn’t give you much get out of jail if you drop low and slow!

Supermarine didn’t make any bombers. You’ve got an Avro Lancaster there and a Supermarine Spitfire. A Mk IX I think? Reminds me of video of a scale model Eurofighter Typhoon taking off, it immediately pitches into a vertical climb before flicking into a dive and crashing…. Which is ironically exactly how the real plane would behave without the flight control computer making millisecond by millisecond adjustments.

The thing that really stands out from Trump 1 to Trump 2 is that they don't even bother to cosplay legitimacy anymore. Trump 1 was riddled with conflicts of interest and naked profiteering that would have sunk any other President ever, but they still felt the need to present the big table stacked with paper and say "look at all this paper that we promise shows how Trump is no longer in charge of his companies." In Trump 2, Trump's private business selling Trump Coin for personal profit is openly advertising that the biggest buyers of Trump coin get exclusive access to the President, in the White House, in his official capacity as head of the federal government. How do you recover from being that deep into Banana Republic territory?

We’ll have to agree that you’re lying, because you already said that you’re lying. And hey, that girl who was raped could have worn a longer skirt. That is, once again, an outright lie. Please understand, we all know you are a habitual liar. You will say anything, despite knowing it’s not true, to avoid having to back down from your position. Floyd did not resist until deceased. Unconscious people can’t resist. They can say it, but they can’t bring the receipts. But what about you? Do you believe that the money should be spent to reform America’s prisons? That money should be spent to make prisons safer for inmates, so that violent criminals and murderers can have a better life while incarcerated?

Hilarious results coming out of Australia. Lot of wannabe populists learning the hard way that MAGA does not travel well.

Careful now - absolute free speech is only free when it’s not about Elon.

Well that’s like 0.01% of the trillion bucks that Doge is gonna save, so really it’s just sensible budgeting.

At least now we know what him and Putin were really discussing on those phone calls. A birthday military parade is very Soviet chic.

She doesn't care. Do U?

But you're going to have to. One of the unique things about Trump is that he has no loyalty or respect whatsoever for the wider Republican party, so he doesn't really give a fuck about what's going to happen in the midterms. Elections that other Republicans are going to lose are a them problem, not a him problem. Therefore, while pretty much any other administration would already be panicking about how to change tack and stave off a potential electoral wipeout in Congress, he's going to just carry on full steam ahead for the entirety of the next 18 months, right up until polling day.

Problem is that, as Jan 6th proved, those who see themselves as willing to take up arms (and don’t already live in the woods) are far more likely to do so in support of an illegal authoritarian regime than against one.

I suppose unfortunately there are several Supreme Court Justices who definitely should be arrested (for non-partisan reasons) but the Trump admin are the absolute last people who ever would go after those particular ones.

Brilliant! Stunningly mediocre would be a refreshing, reliable alternative to the mercurially incompetent incumbent. Except it doesn't, because it isn't. There is no 'back atcha' involved in the tariff formulas. None. It is unprovoked and unwarranted attack. In addition (and I can't believe I have to say this to a functioning adult), having no rational game plan is a Bad Thing. I would laugh if what you were saying wasn't so depressingly racist. Trump is presiding over a huge expansion of Federally mandated DEI programs. This is the demand he made to the major private universities: By August 2025, the University shall commission an external party, which shall satisfy the federal government as to its competence and good faith, to audit the student body, faculty, staff, and leadership for viewpoint diversity, such that each department, field, or teaching unit must be individually viewpoint diverse..... Every department or field found to lack viewpoint diversity must be reformed by hiring a critical mass of new faculty within that department or field who will provide viewpoint diversity; every teaching unit found to lack viewpoint diversity must be reformed by admitting a critical mass of students who will provide viewpoint diversity. There's your MAGA 'merit' based hiring system - you have to hire enough Republicans. Engineering Professors can't be hired on the basis of purely being the best Engineering teacher if it means a Republican is going to be overlooked. Chemistry Professors can't be hired on the basis of who has the most promising research if it means a Republican is going to be overlooked. Mathematics undergrads can't be admitted on the basis of who had the best SAT scores if too many of them sound like they might be liberals. But hey - you're just happy they definitely can't give someone a little extra chance of an interview because they're black. Exactly the same reason to vote for the leprechaun who promised you the pot of gold, with about as much chance of success. Truly, you are an amazing specimen of the Dunning-Kruger effect. I marvel at how a person so desperate to be viewed as having an unparallelled grasp of the interconnectedness of history, society and politics can also be so completely uninterested in actually knowing anything about the world in which they live and the subjects on which they speak, and so ready to credulously swallow any line of bullshit that the conservative elites throw at you. If political scientists and biologists could team up to find a way to reverse whatever the heck it is that's going on in your brain we might even be able to develop an effective antidote to the new world order of populist authoritarianism before it's too late.

Moms and regular people did that when Trump was in power.

Only by people being deliberately obtuse.

Doesn’t matter at all though, because she doesn’t work there. Wendy would probably have some great input to a bunch of Pentagon meetings but it doesn’t matter, because she doesn’t work there. Any other staffer at the Pentagon might want their spouse to look over their shoulder while they work but they can’t do it, because they don’t work there. When my partner was in the military I went to some fun Officer’s Mess parties but I definitely couldn’t sit in on any meetings about the work because… well it’s just obvious, isn’t it?

Except no, thats bollocks. She shouldn't be there anymore than Bryan Noem should be in meetings about border security and domestic terrorism. Has the Trump administration seriously managed to normalise nepotism to this degree already?

He brings his wife into serious meetings with foreign counterparts. I mean for christ's sake - we're dealing with people here who've literally watched House of Cards and used it as a fucking instruction manual.

You give him far too much credit. He's only ever been an opinion contributor and 'TV personality' - he's never been a news journalist as in someone who investigates and uncovers stories. That would be way too much like hard work.

$3k? That’s not theft, it’s civil asset forfeiture.

Where does that number come from? Had a million or two people like you shown up we wouldn't be having the discussion. You had a binary choice between an agent of chaos with a declared intention to destroy the constitutional system of checks and balances and a normal politician who happens to be a Democrat, and you were unable to choose the normal person. Given your comment above you do appear to be happy with the idea that people who failed to vote against Trump are culpable, so it's baffling that you refuse to consider yourself one of them.

It now turns out that Hegseth shared the same information at the same time on another group chat he started using his personal phone... with members of his family and friends. I look forward to hearing him explain how his own wife tricked him into inviting her into the Yemen Warplans Casual Group chat. "It's not my fault, she changed her screen name! I thought she was the babysitter..."

Ok, so you admit that you lied. Why then do I need to watch videos to understand your point of view when you admit that your point of view is fake? People did assist him - and despite that he still killed Floyd. Would you expect him to give an honest answer? Would you expect any murderer to tell the truth? What is undeniably true is that, at the very least, he did not care if he killed Floyd. A man accused of a $20 fraud. Every single F'ing time the right accuses the left of something, it is what they themselves are actually doing. I think that the violence that is allowed to run rampant in US prisons is an absolute travesty that makes a mockery of the concept of justice and destroys any hope for an effective system of rehabilitation. I would be willing to bet that you have no problem with the idea of criminal 'shitheads' being shanked, raped and murdered in prison, just as you have no problem with the police murdering people over suspicion of petty theft.