John Drake

I am referring more broadly to Walz's so-called Chinese connections over the years. Unless we see evidence he is advancing CCP interests, I don't think he should be put on the rack for going there as a teacher or taking students there on study abroad trips. Look, Walz is a really, really stupid guy. He's inauthentic, likes to brag, and exaggerate his past. Between Harris and Walz, I don't know who is the more inauthentic. It is terrifying to think the US could be led by the pair next year. It's also terrifying that it could have Trump presiding over things. I just don't understand how things got to this level of bad.

One thing I do think is unfair is to hit Walz with all the China stuff. He didn't do anything that the entire political, educational, and business establishment wasn't doing. Walz was a tadpole in comparison to the damage done by the likes of the Bushes, Clintons, and Obama as well as the Gateses, Cooks, and Jim Rogers who led the sellout of America.

These sorts of things work beneath the immediate surface. Watch over the next few weeks for sound bites, images, memes, and clips to emerge that will wear down the immediate responses. In the end, a fixed image will emerge.

A similar topic seems to run just about every seven or eighth month in this forum. Tiresome.

Yep.

Of the four people running on the presidential/vice presidential ticket, Walz is clearly the worst. Vance showed an enormous gap between himself and Walz. Walz simply looks terrible. BTW, I remember forty or fifty years ago political consultants saying we would never get a bald man running for the top two offices again after Eisenhower, because they look so old and uninspiring. (Joe Biden got hair transplants back in the 80s.) Humphrey and McGovern had partial hair covering. That leaves, I think, just Ford and now Walz as the baldest candidates since Ike and Adlai Stevenson.

The Democrats now have a self-proclaimed "knucklehead" as their vp nominee. This goes along with a presidential nominee who makes Chauncey Gardiner sound like King Lear.

He may have destroyed a cut rate guitar that nobody cares about. But at least he didn't try to destroy a Van Gogh like the anti-oil mob.

Walz: "I'm a knucklehead." Agree.

In today's America, $4000 is not that much. Maybe a night out at Chipotle for a family of four.

Are you a Swiftie?

Authorities failed to clamp down and as a result let things run wild with Katrina. The Superdome turned into Lord of the Flies. You stop looting with drastic measures or it easily gets out of control.

These are life and death conditions. Every source of food is vital to be delivered to those needing it the most. And not to mention that looters easily become murderers in the act of looting. Shoot them on sight.

It should be easy to vote for the opponent of people such as Harris and Walz who are so utterly lacking even the semblance of intelligence and coherent expression of thought. Unfortunately, it's not.

Just sit back and think of the food!

Yea, the clouds came and then they went. But they'll be back . . .

Clouds just starting to boil up from the north right now in western Bangkok at 1:30pm

The Shins don't do preventative maintenance. They don't even notice until the floodwaters are on their way downstream. But-- During Prayuth's time: Phutthamonthon Sai 3 (where I live) had a massive project to replace the old drainage system. So did my village just off Sai 3. And every two years maintenance teams came through to clean the drains. Same with the canals at the top of the village and all along Borom. Meanwhile, the last time the Shins were in charge 80cm of water flooded my house for almost three months.

I would guess that many if not most people living in cabins away from towns or cities did have stocks of food and water. But it didn't do them any good when the water either washed it away or it's sitting there right now under a lake of flood water where they can't retrieve it. This isn't an exercise for Doomsday Preppers. People likely outfitted with emergency supplies saw them destroyed and that is why they need help right now.

Presidents need to get up close and see what is happening and step in if it's not. "Heckuva job, there, Brownie."

Curtail UN staff's diplomatic immunity, especially in things like their double and triple parking. Haul off and confiscate their vehicles permanently for safety violations.

"Distance" is what we got with George W. Bush's Katrina flyover. A president needs to exhibit leadership in a disaster like this . . . or Maui . . . or East Palestine.

Supplies don't matter when they and your house are either under six feet of water or completely washed away.

What times are those? Just wondering if people post mostly late in the morning, as I do, and then some in the afternoon (rarely at night), or do they get plastered and drunk post in the early morning hours?

In his case, individually, I think he's okay. He's helping out elderly relatives and friends who lived in nearby towns. Everybody from the area is saying this was beyond imagination. And it had rained already for three or four days before the hurricane hit. I can cut these folks some slack, because I wouldn't have expected a hurricane to wipe out two inland areas either. It's the coastal residencies I don't understand. They just keep rebuilding and repeating the same old mistakes year after year--because insurance pays for it. Beach homes and beach businesses I think should be prohibited. In the past, that's why you had shacks for homes and businesses along the coast instead of multimillion dollar beach mansions.