DEET destroys plastic, such as.. car upholstery, car interiors, etc.

If it does that to plastic, what is it doing to the wearer?

This is empirical, not "internet" based. The shit ruined the finish on my shooting ear pro, and also ruptured the seam where my DEET-ed back of the knee would contact my car's seat, and the center console where my DEET-ed elbow would contact it.

DEET is yeeted from this house in favor of picardicin (or whatever the correct spelling for that is)

To quote a line from the OG Animaniacs, the best cartoon in history:

"Whoa. Dumber than advertised."

Isn't this guy supposed to be one of those super-respected "intellectuals?"

I think old age is getting to him.

I've had convos with some AI chat bots and all I can think is "it needs constant correction, outright makes shit up, this is really just a reflector and cross-referencer, this isn't 'smart' in any way."

I'm not the type to read the tripe the media in general produces or promotes.. but on my own, I recognized the cybershackle had been usurping my "me" time.

So now, I pretend the smartphone is just a phone, like in the old days: It stays at a fixed point in my house. If I'm in the cine watching anime brianrot, the phone's in the other room. If i'm at my desk, the phone's in the dining room.

I don't need to check email every 2 minutes. Or look something up every few minutes. With the phone in the other room, I just focus on what's in front of me.

If I'm on call, they'll call, and only phone calls ring through to my watch, where I can pick it up from. That's the only 'forward' from phone-to-watch. Texts, email, etc etc -- none of that shit matters anymore, so none of it rings through to the watch. Only phone calls do.

Such duplicity. Why didn't they do this (or if they did, why didn't the media trumpet it like they are now?) back in the deep dark days of 2022? Gas was more expensive then, than right now.

Anything to throw mud at the politicians they don't like, and you people play right into it.

I'm so tired of the manipulation.

Has it been "Fundamentally Changed" enough yet?

One of the lessons we've had as the Federal, multi-branch nature of the US governmennt has frustrated Trump is that the government may be fucking us over, but it's not doing it in *unison*. It's doing it piecemiel, on the initiative of many interests working against each other, just as the framers intended. The motto on the Great Seal notwithstanding, there are myriad roadblocks to consolidating power in the hands of a single individual. It takes time and repeated failures. This is why the second Trump Adminsitration is worse than the first; they've figured out ways around things like Congressional power of the purse, put more of their henchmen in the judiciary, and normalized Congress lying down and letting the president walk all over them. It's a serious situation, although fortunately Trump isn't long for this world.

Do it. Reddit, and stop talking about it.

Throw that last coil of rope around your neck and kick the chair out.

I wish utter failure for any platform that engages in id verification.

So what?! CNN, MSNOW/MSNBC, and others were 100% state-ran media during the Biden and Obama years. And still are, they see themselves as "tHe reSiSTaNce"

Now the Right gets some more air capability and you're losing your shit?

Cry harder. Turnabout is fair play.

The damage done by consistently and solely pushing the Leftist talking points since *checks calendar* at least 2000 has consequences. Take a bath in those consequences.

It's time to start re-equalizing this nation. The Left runs the schools, the media, and much of the government. Lucky you that we have the system of government we have. Had we had a real King or a real Dictator, there would've been a pogrom the very first day. I mean a real pogrom -- not a single solitary Democrat left in DC. Not the softshoe bullshit we got with DOGE.

In this instance, I bemoan the loss of a broadcasting icon, an historical piece of radio heritage -- but make no mistake, I do not mourn the loss of another Leftist propaganda spreader.

I look forward to more Leftist whinging and tantrums as other outlets realize 20+ years of proselytizing a single political viewpoint is poisonous to their own bottom line.

While that's true, a responsible generation aims to boost the next generation to a *higher* level than the education they received. The world has become more complex and faster-paced, and even if that weren't true, the consequenes of aiming high and falling short are better than the consequences of aiming for the status quo and falling short.

So while I'm 100% onboard with skepticism that technology will magically make education better, I think the argument that "the education I got worked for me should be good for them" isn't a strong argument. What we need is a better ecducation that would have been a better education fifty years ago: stronger math, science, and language skills, general knowledge, and, I think critical thinking and media literacy. Possibly emotional intelligence -- it's kind of pointless to teach people critcial thinking skills if they are carried away by emotions.

There are no economic or security reasons to blockade Cuba, so that leaves *political*.

It used to be believed that bullies were low status individuals who are lashing out out of frustration. But research has shown that bullying is an effective strategy for achieving and maintaining social status. In other words it's a political winner. So the focus of research has shifted from the bully to the people around him who enable the bullying. The inner circle are the henchmen -- people without the charisma and daring to initiate the bullying, but join in when the bully gets things started. Around them are the audience, the people who wouldn't risk participating but enjoy the bullying vicariously. And around them are the much larger group of bystanders, who don't approve but are waiting for someone else to stop the bullying. Then off to the side are the defenders, who stand up to the bully.

Perhaps the least appreciated supporting factor in the phenomenon of the high-status bully is the silence of the bystanders, which is dependent upon the perception of widespread approval. Since you can't visibly see the the line between the approving audience and the apalled bystanders, the silence of the bytstanders is absolutely essential in sustaining the bullying.

Lot's of Americans are apalled at the idea of using military force to inflict suffering on the Cuban people. But that's only politically advantageous *because* of *them*. Tney are indistinguishable from the relatively small number of people who are thrilled when Trump announced he can do anything he wants wtih Cuba. The gap between actual approval and *perceived* approval is absolutely critical in establishign and maintaining any kind of authoritarianism. This is why would be authoritarian leaders are so focused on punishing and marginalizing any kind of expression of disapproval.

In 1790, the US population was 94.9% rural. There is no country. in the world today that rural -- Burundi, which looks like blanks spot in the world at night satellite picturs, is 88% rural.

The largest city at the time was New York, with a population of 33,000. Northern Manhattan was near-wilderness, mid-town was farms and country houses.

In 1790 the US was. country you could "police" with sheriffs and volunteer posses, largely to keep the peace. If you got robbed, you hired a private thief catcher. This works in a 95% rural country with just 3.4 million inhabitants. It would be chaos in a country 87x larger.

Wish i had mod points.

No, the West wont' get it until the UK has an Islamic radical as PM, and the US a radical Islamic president.

The West won't get it until there's minarets in every city and town, calling you to prayer.

And by then it'll be too late.

The Left has managed to weaponize "Racist!" and "Islamophobe!" to the point where people are cowed into not speaking up and taking action.

We're thinking it.. but we're not saying it. Much. Yet.

It's time to say it, and say it loud enough that those with fingers in their ears and heads in the sand can hear us.

You went to a theater, the theater had uniformed ushers ready to eject miscreants. There were curtains, not ads, covering the screen when not in use.

The sound was crisp, the picture clear.

People dressed fairly nice, and were polite.

Now, movies are like flying cattle-class in a low-cost airline. Pajamas, flipflops, and everyone's lighting up the theater with their retardophones.

Then there's the software. Hollyweird has shat on every tentpole property they have. They've reduced Star Wars to lesbian Force witches, they've reduced Star Trek to pew-pew idiocy

Ralph Broke The Internet was so bad, after the first one being so good, that I swore Disney off. I will only buy opened, used blu-rays of theirs now. I refuse to buy new from them.

Maybe the bigwigs oughta fix the presentation issue and also start realizing that if you make movies for the 80% of us, it'll sell. But when you make movies squarely aimed at a very small segment of the population, don't come crying with Pikachu face that "Waaah, no one's watching our movies!"

Make shit we want to watch and we'll watch. Pitch shit at a niche audience, enjoy the niche returns. Simple math.

8GB is plenty of RAM for what most users use their laptops for, if the OS doesn't gobble it up with background tasks. Probably be a good idea to steer clear of Chrome as a browser on these things.

It's actually more like an iPhone 16 Pro runing MacOS in a laptop form factor. Apple basically rummaged through their parts box and pulled out a mobile CPU that'll deliver 50% more single core performance than what's in a high-end Chromebook with only 80% of the power draw. And Apple's got *massive* economies of scale on those parts, so they can afford to deliver a lot of bang for the buck.

The only place the Neo appears to falls short is in RAM, but this is *not* a power user machine, it's for basic office tasks and multimedia consumption. Realistically 8GB is plenty for many users.

In any case, the desktop isn't the center of most users's universe anymore; the switchboard of their life is their smartphone. This is a gateway drug to MacOS IOS integration, and eventually onto the upgrade treadmill. Users will switch seamlewssly between their iPhones and Neos all day long, with data on iCloud and iMusic etc., and when it comes time to upgrade their phone or their laptop, they won't be *stuck* exactly, but if they leave the reservation they lose a lot. But they certainly could upgrade to a *much nicer* Macbook....

It's no wonder the other laptop makers are sitting up and taking notice. Apple has set up a one way conversion ratchet for people tempted by a really nice and perfectly adequate entry level machine at an entry level price.Nobody else has the vertical integration -- chip foundries to device manufacturing, to software platform -- spanning desktop and phones that's needed to do this.