Posts by Charles Chase4

Megan Green72 said:Your comment has zero to do with mine.

So what, you'd rather have "experts" design policy based on a best-case scenario? 🤔
Of course you ask for the worst-case scenario to plan your response. I don't see what the big deal is.

Yeah, I heard those analyses were done by some low-level hacks from the Robert Koch Institute too.

By that logic, we could just construct a worst-case scenario where 20,000 people die on American highways in 2021, and then use that specific projection to justify banning motor vehicles entirely.

That scenario is perfectly valid and theoretically possible, and any measures resulting from it would guarantee—and I mean absolutely guarantee—that at least a few lives are saved. No cars on the road means no traffic accidents and no fatalities. It’s a simple matter of cause and effect.

I really don't understand why this is being contested. 🤷

And fine, I know what comes next. You'll argue that the virus was an unknown variable, that it was unpredictable, and that even the most brilliant scientists in the world couldn't have foreseen how this completely novel respiratory virus would behave compared to anything ever recorded in history. Fine. Theoretically, that scenario was just as plausible as my highway example above.

However. If it has since become clear that such a scenario was off by several orders of magnitude, is it actually controversial to point out that we are still implementing policies based on it? Or that after a full year, the perceived danger is still being communicated through the lens of that flawed model? Is there perhaps some merit to questioning that? 🤷

Matthew Young35 said:Well, yes and no.
Just look at the USA, Italy, Spain, or France. In those places, we're talking about tens of thousands of deaths.

To me, the entire issue with this media coverage from the start is a total lack of context.

Ten thousand people isn't the same thing when you're talking about China versus the USA, or the USA versus Italy, or Italy versus Canada, or even comparing the US to the Czech Republic or Slovakia...

In the States, tens of thousands of people lose their lives in traffic accidents every single year, but does that mean we should panic over a sudden spike in road fatalities here in America? Not necessarily.

I'm trivializing it, sure, but this constant inflation of raw numbers on news banners across the country feels remarkably similar to that kind of sensationalism.

brightpilot6 said:Honestly, what is wrong with you people? 🙏

It’s either one extreme or the other: you’re either some self-proclaimed genius skeptic who thinks they know everything (🙏), or you’re just someone blindly swallowing whatever the news anchors at ESPN tell you.

There really isn't any middle ground, is there? 🙏

By the way, when was the last time we saw people being hauled off to mass graves in places like Central Park because of the flu? Or are we just going to keep ignoring international headlines unless they happen to be coming out of Sweden?

That article on Index prompted me to run a quick search, so I can provide an answer for New York: it seems to be happening about once a week.

As it stands, they've moved the burials for those without next of kin to five times a week; the number of gravediggers has been bumped up from 25 per week to 24 per day, all while shortening the wait times.

Yes, the increase is significant, and yes, the situation is dire. But this hyperinflation of information—this media scavenging where headlines scream "NEW YORKERS ARE BEING DROPPED INTO MASS GRAVES DUE TO COVID-19"—combined with throwing absolute numbers at us without any semblance of context makes it impossible not to wonder how this would look if COVID-19 had stayed under the radar like some minor seasonal bug.

After all, New York City is home to twenty million people...

edit: https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/...-dead-70072042

ruggedjackal46 said:Everyone seems perfectly fine with a few thousand people dying, as long as those people aren't us, our families, or our friends. 🙄

While I’m trying my best to be considerate of everything surrounding this new virus—and I’ll be the first to admit my own perspective on how serious this situation is has shifted quite a bit over the last month—I still can't help but notice a certain level of absurdity. There seems to be a significant disconnect between the raw data and the sweeping restrictions being implemented globally.

Yes, every single human life is priceless, but let's be honest: hundreds of thousands of people pass away every single day across the globe.

I find myself wondering what would happen if, every time we picked up our phones or turned on the TV, we were met with live counters showing deaths from every possible cause—from the common flu to smoking, alcohol, or just about anything else you can imagine. We're talking about numbers that dwarf the ones currently making headlines.

For instance, you could technically prevent every single traffic fatality just as effectively by banning everyone from leaving their houses and having the police intervene the moment they see someone sitting in a car. At the end of the day, those are also someone's family, friends, or neighbors.

Then there’s the inevitable argument regarding hospital capacity, which I respect, but let’s not forget that here in the States, we have waiting lists that stretch out for YEARS for basic medical screenings. In that waiting period, more people will likely die than will ever succumb to Coronavirus.

Take a moderate earthquake, for example. If the damage is limited to cracks in old facades and historic churches, and we only need to find housing for about a hundred people in town and half of the local HOSPITALS—which, frankly, are some of the most dilapidated buildings in the country—then the situation is nothing short of insane and SCANDALOUS.
I highly doubt the economy is going to grind to a halt just so we can build twenty brand-new medical facilities to replace these crumbling structures that are a safety hazard even during peaceful times.

I don't know; it all feels like a global chain reaction of panic-driven policies. Given the nature of the virus, I don't see any other way out than eventually coming to terms with its existence, filing it away alongside all the other diseases that claim lives, and slowly returning to business as usual.

I'm not necessarily trying to make a grand point, and I am personally following all the guidelines, but there it is—just my two cents. 🤷

Peter Thompson4 said:

No, lol.
For example, my granddad left for West Germany a long time ago. Why? Because, obviously, it was a more developed country than this place, among other obvious reasons. And nobody is claiming it was perfect; I'm just saying that this place was on par with the old federation. This other part of your argument makes zero sense because you're comparing apples to oranges. Just look at any Eastern Bloc country and check their development. Take the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, or even Bulgaria and Romania.
Just look at their growth from the 90s to 2019 compared to ours.

In principle, the core issue is that the former federation was clearly communist enough to warp the local mindset for the next ten generations, yet somehow stayed liberal enough to avoid leaving that bitter aftertaste seen in the other mentioned countries. It didn't leave us with that visceral, automatic drive to sever every single tie to that way of life once everything finally collapsed.

ruggedjackal46 said:Rimac’s global success wouldn't even exist if his old man hadn't been that corrupt, "big government" type of politician. That stolen taxpayer money was essentially the seed capital for Rimac’s "free market entrepreneurship." It’s a classic case of "winning the market competition" in the United States.

Manchester United didn't just manifest success out of thin air; it happened within a very specific context. You're dealing with a league where half the clubs can barely make payroll, and your big suggestion is that they should all just try to mimic Manchester United? Really?

I’ll just jump in here to add my two cents and address that last point.

Look, the initial capital is what it is; there’s no use dwelling on the past now. But the real takeaway should be this: Rimac’s company—and frankly, any firm, even the massive conglomerates—must survive based on its own merits and operational quality. Success shouldn't depend on having political backups or being bailed out by government funds meant to mask incompetence, unsustainable models, or old-school nepotism.

As far as I can tell, when Rimac hires people these days, they're looking for actual education and genuine skill sets rather than a letter of recommendation from some local party official. Personally, I find that acceptable, regardless of where that initial startup cash actually originated.

ruggedjackal46 said:The eternal issue in America is that nobody ever builds massive wealth purely through talent in a fair market. I mean, credit where credit is due to the young Tesla visionary, but let’s be real: his entrepreneurial success wouldn't exist without the massive initial capital provided by an older Tesla figure.

Then there's the bigger question: why do we act like "market skills" are somehow more virtuous than "ballot box skills"? At the end of the day, both involve the same group of people making the calls—the only difference is one group is dropping cash while the other is dropping votes.

I agree, though I would argue that this cycle remains eternal specifically because the government ensures it stays that way—constantly subsidizing companies that aren't actually capable of surviving on their own.

As for your second point, I’m honestly not sure how to respond; I feel like it’s one of those things that should just be self-evident.🤷

Consider Person A, who launches a tech firm and, ten years later, employs thirty people using revenue generated from clients who actually found their services valuable. Now consider Person B, who holds a press conference to scare an underinformed electorate with tales of foreign threats and old-world radicalism.😁

Who would I rather have deciding whether or not I have a paycheck?🤷

ruggedjackal46 said:Sure, but if you take that power away, it doesn't just vanish into thin air. It has to go somewhere. Who gets it?

Look at how Mamić built an entire empire using taxpayer money, leveraging ties to both local and national politics alongside the sheer incompetence of inefficient government agencies. 🤷 A club with finances comparable to a small startup wouldn't stand a chance in a true free market without the blind, corrupt patronage of the city and the state propping it up just like it is now.

Alright, let's say public entities stop funding soccer and LA Galaxy becomes a standard corporation. What actually happens next?

In my view, this "general privatization" being pushed is specifically about reducing political patronage and minimizing influence over various sectors of business and daily life as much as possible.

Some higher authority—whether public or private, held by a community or an individual—is always going to exert influence over different spheres of business and living. In other words, our lives will always be politicized, whether those decisions are made in Congress or on the board of directors at Walmart. The only real question is: who gets to pull the strings?

I'm not going to get bogged down in the fine print right now; the core argument is already in bold.

It would fall to someone who actually has to earn that authority through their own merit and market skills, rather than relying on nepotism or handing out a ceremonial turkey to some big shot in a political party who clawed their way to power by campaigning on historical grievances.

Look, we aren't going to magically transform into Japan overnight where this first scenario provides an absolute guarantee, but it feels like a significantly better option to me.

Or, to put it quite simply: when I'm applying for a job at a company, I'd much prefer my employment to be decided by a boss who evaluates whether I'll actually be useful and profitable, rather than some political hack looking to see what color my party registration card is—assuming I even had one, which is usually a prerequisite just to get an interview.

ruggedjackal46 said:But look, Yellow and his crowd aren't saying pure capitalism is somehow "less evil" than the mess we have now; they're claiming it’s the actual solution. My question is: how? Honestly, I am completely fed up with this whole "choosing the lesser of two evils" argument. Everyone becomes a PhD expert when it's time to list everything wrong with the current system, but when it comes to actually proposing a fix, the best anyone can come up with is, "Well, let's just pick something slightly less bad," or "Let's just hand the keys over to private corporations." Sorry, but that doesn't strike me as a solution—especially since, as ZZ pointed out, the biggest private players in this country are usually tied at the hip to the same corrupt politicians.

So, I suppose the core argument would be stripping power away from those corrupt politicians.

Take Mamić, for example; he built an entire empire using public funds, leveraging deep ties to both local and federal politics alongside the sheer incompetence of inefficient government agencies.🤷 A club with finances as thin as a wafer wouldn't stand a chance in a truly free market without that heavy, blind, and corrupt patronage from the city and the state that allows it to function as it does today.

In my view, this "wholesale privatization" being advocated is precisely about reducing political oversight and minimizing government influence over business and daily life as much as humanly possible.

ruggedjackal46 said:The real question isn't whether the current system is broken—it clearly is—but whether the "solution" you’re pitching actually fixes anything. All I ever hear from you and your crowd is a relentless stream of valid criticisms against the way things work now, but I have yet to hear one convincing argument for why massive privatization and total deregulation would actually benefit society. Beyond just handing more wealth to the tiny handful of billionaires who already own everything? I'm still waiting for that part.

If we could somehow dial back the political interference and all the rot that comes with it—and let's be honest, in this country, about 95% of what we deal with in business and daily life is pure nonsense like cronyism, nepotism, and blatant corruption—then even the harshest version of capitalism starts to sound like a more plausible path forward. It feels far more realistic than the alternative, which seems to be sitting around hoping and praying that this society will suddenly grow a conscience, educate itself, and start electing competent, less corrupt leaders on its own. Perhaps in this century, or maybe the next. 🤷

edit: I'm not some hardcore neoliberal extremist or anything; I'm just stating my observations.

Of course, the dream is to have a healthy nation guided by an intellectual, moral, and professional elite—people who actually understand how to manage vital economic and social levers with the competence of a seasoned CEO...

But let’s be real: the odds of that happening here in the next century are roughly the same as a bottom-tier minor league baseball team winning the World Series in that same timeframe.

That’s why, in this country, at this specific moment in history, I find myself siding with privatization. If we could just privatize everything—or at least most of it—maybe we could finally break this entrenched culture of cronyism and the broken value system that plagues our society. People love to blame the corrupt politicians and the shady tycoons, but isn't the systemic rot itself the real issue? Perhaps a shift toward private ownership might actually pave the way for a functional future.

gentlefox52 said:Man, just look at Pittsburgh. Out of a population of 50,000, only five of us were ever showing up to support the local club.

Five out of 50,000. Quite the ratio, isn't it?

When you consider the sheer size of Washington, D.C., and the scope of "activity" (if we want to be generous with our terminology) provided by the capital (not to mention the current state of the club itself, which is a factor we can't ignore)—the ultra scene, the merch, the whole supporter culture is actually holding its own remarkably well.

At the end of the day, the situation surrounding the club is the only metric that truly matters; everything starts and ends there. Given the current state of Real Madrid and looking at these numbers alongside the Chelsea supporters' activity levels, what they're doing is nothing short of a global phenomenon.

brightpilot6 said:It’s almost effortless how the "elites" in this country manage to fleece the public; one can't help but wonder if their counterparts in more sophisticated parts of the world watch them with a sense of envy.

All they really require is a few commemorative dates and a handful of radical zealots from every political faction, people who constantly stir the embers of a fire built on chauvinistic myths and irrational fears.

Meanwhile, the folks in the windward seats quietly pass legislation that facilitates the looting, followed by laws that somehow make the looting legal, and then further regulations that prevent anyone from being prosecuted—even in such a thug-friendly system—if they happen to get too reckless. For the most clumsy and crude among them, the final line of defense remains a judicial system capable of dragging even the simplest proceedings out for decades, waiting until the collective memory—which is otherwise elephantine when it comes to blood feuds—fades into a mere shrug, or perhaps even a quiet, veiled admiration for the outlaw who once screwed over the state and now spends years successfully pulling the wool over its eyes.

Everything becomes crystal clear when you consider how Daddy needed perhaps two press conferences to label various fan groups (of which there seemingly aren't any radical right-wing organizations in this country 😁) as Democrats, American, or extremists, and how that narrative was instantly swallowed by his target audience—just so he could show up on camera the next day with a red star tattooed on his forehead. 🙏 🙏 🙏

Look, if a debate about Mamić breaks out on a football forum, the context is pretty obvious—it’s not exactly an assessment of anyone's mathematical prowess. It usually isn't just random chatter from people who actually follow the sport; it’s typically a reaction to specific comments on news articles, Facebook, or even just people cheering for Tatt from the nosebleed seats after he gets out of prison. The issue isn't when someone lacks knowledge about a subject; the problem arises when they lack that knowledge, claim to be experts anyway, and then proceed to lecture those who actually *do* know what they're talking about. Honestly, thank God for that—it seems to be a favorite pastime for many Americans, and likely even more people beyond that. It’s idiotic, or feel free to pick a different word if "idiotic" is too harsh for you.

I assume you're just trolling, but I found it a bit strange to see that this affects you so deeply, even back on the football forums. 😁

Paul Chase95 said:We’ve drifted pretty far afield here—from discussing intelligence all the way to the Democratic Party versus the Republican Party. It all started with the claim that people are just stupid, but honestly, I don't buy it; I think people are generally underestimated, especially over here. I was reading a few days ago some post by Casual where they seemed convinced they were *the* one—the only one who actually gets it. You see posts like that all over this site; people patting themselves on the back (and the worst part is they actually believe it) thinking they are the intellectual elite of society, the chosen Renaissance warriors, while everyone else is just a clueless idiot. This stuff keeps popping up day after day on this forum and it’s starting to get on my nerves, which is why I spoke up.

I mean, look at the geniuses at NASA, MIT, Harvard, or the European Legal Institute—they scout the best of the best... They look for educated, smart, successful people, but if they just checked this forum and listed this "intellectual and moral cream of the crop" who supposedly "understands everything" while everyone else is a moron, they'd be set. After that, they could just slide into their DMs and offer them jobs ranging from legal regulatory work and space flights to solving millennial problems or studying the properties of silver cuprate. And frankly, if Đikić had ever read this forum, I’m pretty sure he’d tell Goethe in New York City or anyone at Stanford to get lost.

Anyway, to wrap this up—the point is that too many people are inflating their own egos without any actual basis for it and, in the process, insulting everyone else. That’s the gist of it. We aren't surrounded by idiots or mindless sheep being led around by Željko Markić or Oliver Frljić.

You've lost the plot. Surely, within a niche field like American soccer, those who follow and study it daily on these forums can claim to be more informed about that specific subject than the general public, who doesn't spend even a fraction of the time thinking about or worrying about it.

I didn't see Casual posting anything about satellite trajectories around Mars on the soccer forums. 🤷 As for politics, James Anderson5 already explained that perfectly above.

ruggedjackal46 said:Finally, the students over at MIT might actually learn something useful—biblical theology.

It’s been part of the curriculum for quite a while now. It sits among those seven or eight humanities electives you can pick from, all of which carry just as much weight in the degree structure as any core requirement. 😁

There’s actually a decent crowd that signs up for it, whether it’s because of their specific career interests or simply because they think it’ll be an easy pass—though, if you ask me, I don't think it's any easier than the other options.

Robert Torres said:Judging by all the ups and downs in these threads and the constant back-and-forth references, there are a ton of ASOIAF fans hanging out here. It makes me wonder if anyone actually sat through those last few episodes of Game of Thrones? I've heard they're absolute fire, like... legendary level...

Personally, I checked out after season four. The way they were butchering the source material felt like a straight punch to the gut. So now I'm curious—is what we've seen lately actually that mind-blowing and unexpected that it could satisfy even the hardcore readers who can't stand the show? Is it worth spoiling the books if anyone even bothers reading them, or is it still just that same overhyped, boring train wreck that HBO’s flagship always seemed to be...

That's a tough one.

Look, this has absolutely nothing to do with match results or some logical breakdown of what makes sense for the sport. It’s about how a club's success—or lack thereof—hits you emotionally. For some people, seeing them win might spark something positive, but for me? It’s purely negative. Honestly, just being near their stadium makes my stomach turn, and that feeling has zero correlation with league coefficients or stats. And frankly, I don't see that changing anytime soon.

Can anyone give me a quick rundown on what’s actually written in the Lex Todoric? And honestly, how much of this noise about the government swooping in to save him and bail out his debts is just pure theater? Is this really about preventing the entire economy from going down the drain, or is there a more sensible way to handle this? I'm looking at 🤷

Carol Lewis said:As a two-time voter for the Bridge Party, I really have to find myself agreeing with what Carlitov was saying... it's just all getting to be way too much...

I’m on the same page, and honestly, the decision by the Republican Party didn't sit right with me either—even though, by some strange logic, I'm not exactly a Democratic Party voter. Who knows how much truth there is in these theories about them trying to fracture the opposition? If we look at the seat count, that would have been much easier for the Democrats to pull off than for the Republicans. But then again, who knows how much weight those conspiracy theories actually carry when they claim they aren't a factor?

But here's the thing: looking at how the seats were distributed, they could have easily stayed in an opposition where nobody bothered to ask their opinion, remaining completely irrelevant like a living wall. Or, they could have stepped up and tried to make something happen, even if it was lukewarm at best. You can't stage a revolution with 15 out of 150 representatives; that’s just simple math, isn't it?

Edit: To actually achieve what everyone expected from them, you’d need half of the Parliament and the people out in the streets whenever the big bosses from the structures that have been playing this game for 25 years start making threats...