Posts by Paul White9

analogbear5 said:If control over the reactor output or the fuel itself goes out the window because of some damage, we already know how that ends for the reactor. The only real question mark is how the containment structure will hold up—specifically, whether it’ll just fail and leave everything burning out in the open like it did at Chernobyl, where the disaster turned into way more than just a standard meltdown.

It would be a smart move to actually look into the differences between an RBMK reactor and a VVER reactor, as well as the general layout of the plant itself. If you can't find anything else, just hit up Wikipedia. You can even find technical reports on those two types of plants—just like any other design used globally—on the IAEA website. They're public and available for anyone to download if they actually care to look.

You'd have answers to all your questions and doubts. A quick skim of Wikipedia would be enough, and honestly, it wouldn't take you more than 15 minutes of reading.

rowdyfox12 said:Yeah, regarding the bold part... 🙂
Basically, I sign off on everything here. 😁

Plazma was basically the go-to snack over there in Mexico, and I bet people ate way more of it. It’s just like how Nutella was the staple while we were all fighting over Kinder stuff here. Or how you’d have Gavrilovic pâté locally, whereas Kekec was the big thing for the Canadians.

Personally, I hadn't even heard of Plazma until people started talking about it recently.

Personally, I thought the Domacin was top-tier because it had those massive crystals of sugar on top. It gave it such a satisfying crunch while you were eating it. Sadly, they don't make that biscuit anymore.

For me, Domacin is number one. All this other stuff is just pointless noise—Napolitanke and whatever else. If you're asking my opinion, it's exclusively about the original Domacin. None of these modern gimmicks for me.

No123 said:So, I went through the whole fine-tooth comb process, just like I usually do. In the past, I’ve found that if the cap isn't sealed tight enough, quite a bit of kefir ends up leaking all over the table.

I used to make my own homemade kefir too. And honestly, it’s delicious.
The real headache for me was managing the yeast growth during fermentation. You have to find this perfect sweet spot between the culture and the milk to ensure that whenever you get home, you actually have kefir you enjoy, rather than something that's turned aggressively sour and undrinkable. Plus, as the cultures grow, you constantly have to scale up the amount of milk until you eventually separate them out to bring the levels back down. Another issue I ran into was timing; if I got stuck at work and couldn't make it home on schedule, the kefir would over-ferment and become way too acidic. In practical terms, the production process is just too volatile to get consistent results. If I were some housewife stuck at home all day, I could probably weigh out the cultures and use a stopwatch to hit the mark every single time, but for someone with a life, it's tricky.

How are you guys handling this?

Jesse Hughes6 said:Just wait until they try to explain why none of this shows up in the stock price.

Instead of the government seizing these patents because it's clearly in the national interest—which they actually have the power to do—they just sit on their hands. Why? That’s the question.🙂

Linda Lee4 said:And let's not forget Zoloft, arguably the most useful antidepressant out there...

Just throw in some blood pressure meds and voilà.

Why even bother fixing the actual problem? Just pop a happy pill and drag yourself back to the office.
High blood pressure? Take a pill and go right back to crushing burgers, drinking Bud Light, and rotting in front of the TV.

Keith Martin7 said:And what's a little 700 bucks to escape that damn vaccine, you absolute nutjob! 😁

Actually, it isn't even 700; you were probably thinking of Merck's Lagevrio. This Pfizer one is "nearly 25% lower at roughly $530 per course"

Plus,

The pharmaceutical giant Pfizer announced on Tuesday a deal to make its potential COVID-19 antiviral pill available to the poorest countries in the world.

Pfizer is going to sub-license the production of its promising Paxlovid tablet to generic drug manufacturers to supply 95 low- and middle-income countries, covering about 53 percent of the global population.
Under an agreement made with the Medicines Patent Pool (MPP), Pfizer—which also produces one of the most widespread COVID-19 vaccines alongside the German lab Moderna
—won't be collecting royalties from generic manufacturers, which should drive the cost down. The deal is still subject to regulatory approval.

The Pfizer drug has to be taken alongside the HIV medication ritonavir.
https://www.france24.com/en/americas...r-world-s-poor

So, you think $700 is worth it? If you believe the next step on the menu is being hooked up to a ventilator and facing a 50% chance of death, then sure—go ahead and hand over the cash. Be my guest.

This medication is designed so that you have to take it the second those COVID-19 symptoms pop up—sort of "preventatively"—before you even know how bad the illness is actually going to hit you. So, you get some initial symptoms, test positive on a PCR, and suddenly you're dropping $700 just to swallow five little pills. For the vast majority of people, it wouldn't even be necessary. It’s just a massive cash grab.
It’s high time we started offering lower price points—say, around $100—to developing nations. Honestly, they’d still turn a decent profit at that rate. Just look at the math: if you factor in 7 billion people catching COVID-19 once or even twice a year, those numbers add up fast. It's a win-win.

It’s just like that recent leak over in the UK regarding Pfizer—apparently, it only costs them about 76 cents to manufacture a dose, yet they’re slapping a price tag of $20 to $22 on every single one. Pfizer’s big excuse? They claim they have to recoup all those massive R&D costs and cover the heavy lifting of distribution. Sure, I get it—that makes sense in theory. But here’s the kicker: once you’ve actually accounted for those development costs, why on earth are you still charging $20 or $22 a pop? You should be dropping that price down to maybe $4 or $5 per dose. Heh... give me a break.

So, you’re looking at $700 per course of treatment just to stay ahead of the curve. The catch? You have to start taking it the second you feel even a hint of a symptom if you want to prevent complications. But here’s the kicker: you have no way of knowing if you’re going to breeze through this virus like most people, or if you’re the unlucky one who ends up in the ICU. Since you can't predict the future, you end up flushing $700 down the drain just to be safe. And it’s not just you—it’s everyone. It’s a brilliant little racket they've set up 😁

Walter Anderson43 said:And here comes Paul White9 again.

The reality remains that current vaccines aren't nearly as effective at preventing infection or transmission as they are marketed to be—even against the existing strains, let alone Omicron.

While there are assumptions that Omicron is a milder variant, we are still waiting on the actual data.

High-quality masks should have been mandatory from the very start of this pandemic—rather than making light of vaccination or mocking our experts just because they carry a blue ID card.

That is precisely why the emphasis has shifted back to masks—they are proven to reduce the spread.

As for how harmless Omicron truly is, we shall see—though I certainly hope it turns out to be as benign as it appears.

It’s honestly exhausting trying to stay active in these threads. You end up dealing with these entrenched cliques that have basically claimed ownership of the discussion, and they immediately dogpile on anyone who dares to think differently or post a different perspective. Instead of actually allowing for a debate, they just launch an attack. It doesn't matter if it's me, you, or some random third party—they just come for you. That’s why I find it better to just lurk, scroll through a few threads on this sub, see what the new residents are talking about, and just move on rather than even bothering to contribute.

frozenraven22 said:Exactly. We aren't any different. Pandemics have a massive seasonal component, and right now they are in the middle of summer over there—even if I can't wrap my head around how that works since the Earth is clearly a flat plane, but whatever...

But you’re missing the point—back in the day, even before COVID-19, we always had a huge surge of people coming down with respiratory viruses for about four months during the winter. Nowadays, everyone expects us to be either perfectly healthy or, if you so much as sneeze or cough, it's automatically labeled as COVID. Instead of acknowledging that all those other bugs are still circulating alongside COVID, everything just gets lumped together.

Translation: It is completely normal for a ton of people to get sick during the winter. You're going to see people sneezing and coughing around you, and only a small fraction of them actually have COVID.

Look, I’m not asking you directly to give me an answer. I am posing a hypothetical question.

Are we really such a different breed from the folks over in Jordan and the surrounding areas? Are we supposed to believe that something will be considered malicious here, while they get a free pass for doing the exact same thing?

If this Omicron variant is supposedly so harmless—and it clearly is, given that most people aren't even showing symptoms—then how are we even detecting it? Who actually goes to see a doctor when they feel fine, unless they're just being hypochondriacs? If that's the case, why is there such a push in the Western EU to mandate N95 masks just to stop the spread of Omicron?

Look, it’s simple: you either catch it and feel absolutely nothing, or you end up with a mild head cold. So, what exactly are we fighting? Why all this drama over a "terrifying" virus that barely leaves a mark?

vividraven79 said:If you’re asking me, I’d cap credit card installments at 12 months and offer everyone the chance to roll their overdraft balances into a structured loan over 2 to 5 years—using standard commercial interest rates, of course. And just like you said, any overdraft exceeding $500 should be pushed out to 90 days... after that, you can go ahead and take out a formal loan.

But your average American doesn't know how to function without living in the red... and they’ll scream at Chase or Bank of America because the bank won't let them overdraw, or if they only allow an overdraft of "two paychecks," they end up complaining about the interest later on.

The typical American will just grab the higher-tier package because while the basic one covers 100% of their salary, the premium version offers up to 300%, plus a higher revolving limit on $13

And then, once the whole thing comes crashing down, they start some "Debt Relief Association" support group.

Armed with signs screaming "robbers and crooks" and the classic excuse of "we had no idea what was going on."

ironcyclist58 said:But that’s the whole point of those "accidental" overages—they expect you to just pay it back in a few days or out of your next paycheck. That’s why they pushed for that window to go from $500 all the way up to 90 days.
Then there’s the other thing, the pre-approved overdraft limits we actually agreed to.

And that’s how it ought to work. $500 A 90-day window. So it doesn't lock you out and you can settle up easily and be done with it.

Not the "oh my god, I won't survive if they cut off my credit line" crowd.

Rachel Allen55 said:There's no question that credit cards can be a total nightmare if they end up in the hands of people who can't control their impulses.

But honestly, it's wild how we've been doing this for years like it's perfectly normal. That's what trips me out.

It's basically unsecured debt. Usually, when someone applies for a loan, the monthly payment is capped at around 1/3 of their income, including interest. But here, customers are taking on the entire amount as one giant debt. Because if your account balance is currently negative, say $3.25. And your monthly income is $2.75. That tells you everything you need to know.

The Federal Reserve just makes things simpler for the average American. If it was such a great move, why didn't Denmark or Sweden jump on it? Even Poland, the Czech Republic, and Canada haven't joined. All three are in the United Nations and have been close for nearly 20 years.

Look, if the conversion rate is fixed in the US at $2.50 per 1 Federal Reserve, then mathematically speaking, it doesn't matter if you're holding dollars, euros, or whatever else you want to call it.

You aren't going to get a different paycheck $1333 every month; you're just going to have 533.34 Federal Reserve units.

Big deal.

A negative balance is perfectly fine if you’re hovering near zero and, say, $117 (assuming you weren't checking), like when you fill up your tank with gas for $133 and instead of the card getting declined, it actually goes through, leaving you at -$17. It’s much more elegant than running into serious trouble while you're traveling.

The crowd complaining about being in the red—people who act like a negative balance is some huge tragedy—just don't get it. They basically took a loan upfront. Now they have to pay it back out of their own paycheck, otherwise they'll be stuck in the red forever, drowning in interest rates that are anything but small. So, that group constantly whining, "Ugh, I'm always in the red," doesn't realize they are essentially spending money they haven't even earned yet. And how am I supposed to dig myself out if my income is low? First off—did you actually *need* to go into the red this month? If it was for life-saving medication? Yes. If it was for a night out with friends or some new clothes? That's on you. Second, why not just tighten your belt for a few months to pay it off? Treat it like you're paying down a car loan or something. Self-discipline, people. Regardless, you’ll come out ahead if you manage to swing from +$1333 to 0 every single month. Instead, you're going from 0 to -$1333, plus extra interest every month, sinking deeper and deeper into the hole.

And why on earth should the government bail these people out? Sure, maybe convert those negatives into standard loans. But interest-free? Why? What's the logic behind giving these people a free pass? By that logic, I'd just intentionally run up a negative balance to get an interest-free loan rather than taking out a legitimate loan and actually paying interest.

Lawrence Reed3 said:Honestly, even just staying cooped up at home for three days in a row gets to me—so I can't imagine being stuck there for half a month! And the worst part? It's because of nothing. Just absolutely nothing.

Well, obviously it’s boring. I've been saying all along that this isn't nearly the massive drama people are making it out to be.

Oh, please. You haven't been in solitary confinement for two weeks. You have a phone, you have video calls, and you’ve got everything you need right there in your own house. You have movies, you have books. You haven't been suffering in isolation for fourteen days. Stop the drama.