Walker88

Darwin always wins. Best you get used to that, because with AI coming, it's only going to get worse for the redundant and superfluous. The US economic system is Capitalism. The strong survive and prosper. trumpers, not so much.

trump is catadonic He sleeps so much in court now, he probably thinks it's his home, and soon enough he'll be storing stolen classified documents there.

Admittedly the Booming Biden Economy does require a good education and being able to bring talent and job skills to the market. Sorry if that leaves you out.

Unlike trump and most of his goobers, I have read the US Constitution, including the First Amendment. Perhaps I missed it, but I did not see "Hang Mike Pence" in there as protected speech. Generally, threats against the President or Vice President are felonies, not an exercise of free speech. Also, beating police officers with trump flags, shooting cops with bear spray, and sh!tting on the floor of a Federal Building do not constitute speech. It seems the courts agree with me, not you, which is why the idiot thugs are in jail.

Just as one would have expected, the cultish goobers are claiming "STOLEN!" as they watch the stock tumble, now down 71% from its first day high barely 2 weeks ago. "Sick of MY investment money being stolen!!" one user wrote in a Truth Social post, as quoted by WaPo, accusing Wall Street of unfairly shorting the stock. "They’re stealing peoples [sic] money and you’re allowing it!!" Others are so moronic they still believe, as Britney sang in "Do it to Me One More Time": "I know good and well it’s in Trump’s hands, and he’s got plans," 71-year-old Oklahoma City native Jerry McClain, who invested in the stock, told WaPo. "I have no doubt it’s going to explode sometime." (I do think he meant "implode".) The "plans" trump has is what his plans always are: try to enrich himself off of his goobers' idiocy, naivete and gullibility. Still others claim (lying, trying to play the sweet lemon card) that they just wanted to help trump by giving him some of their money. (And if anyone believes that, they probably believe trump is innocent of the myriad of felony charges against him.) "If I lose it, fine. If I make a profit, wonderful," prominent conservative commentator Carol Swain, who put in $1,000, told WaPo. "But at the end of the day, I wanted to show my support." Yes, Carol Swain, the 'billionaire' messiah needs your $1000. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-supporters-horrified-value-truth-141358796.html Ah, yes...trumpers....I guess somebody has to be way left of the mean on the IQ Bell Curve.

Two things to note in this long thread.... One is that, since the advent of the internet, most people's IQ has jumped 50 points. This seems to be due to the ubiquitous nature of self-directed IQ tests available online with scoring via the honesty method. Personally, I put more faith in expert-administered tests in a controlled environment, which are somewhat rare. I guess I'm particular in that way, or just a Luddite who hasn't completely adopted "online lying learning". My second point---and I state this knowing you tried to make a distinction between bargirls and non-bargirls---is that I am not really sure there is much of a difference. From my admittedly limited experience after a decade or two visiting and now living in Thailand, I have not developed much confidence in the Thai education system, even if someone took it all the way through university. While I am sure there are Thai women out there with an excellent degree of general knowledge and a keen intellect, I cannot help but think they are either all rare as unicorns or else the more savvy members of this Forum have already scoffed them all up. They had to use those genius IQs for something. Having lived in many countries, I know that certain cultural beliefs and idiosyncrasies get inculcated into citizens, and some are too difficult to bridge for folks from other cultures and societies. As a non-Thai example, even if a woman was in my university classes, if she believes a woman must dress like a giant eggplant, because some deity demands it, I doubt we'd have much in common to cover years of marital conversation. An Ayaan Hirsi Ali would be okay, but she is not common. Rula Jebreal even better. I feel similarly about beliefs of the predominant Thai faith, especially how it is practiced at the retail level. Belief systems can rarely be hidden or sublimated, so they will arise over the course of a sustained relationship like marriage. If I had to listen, over time, to such silliness, I would quickly become a fan of TikTok videos of people doing cute dances, and immerse myself in hours of that banality, rather than listen to my partner spouting her 'spiritual knowledge'. No thanks. I can get along and enjoy many Thai women over limited periods of time, but there always comes a point when topics of mutual interest are exhausted, and the silence ensues. I am sure I would become just as much of a bore to them, as what holds their interest and what they believe is alien to me. For those Western men who can do it, good for them.

I always get a chuckle when people worry about the NSA or CIA monitoring them. How little these people know about what can and cannot be done., or even if these entities care about nobodies. Most people give everything away via social media or online purchasing or just using a credit card. Amazon and Facebook know infinitely more about people than the NSA. Also, both use what they know to target individuals. Phone companies know where you shop and know how much time you spend in each aisle, so they know your spending habits and can sell the data to whomever is interested. It is even possible to know if a female is pregnant before she knows it, because hormones will impact her behavior and interest while shopping, and she will spend extra time in certain areas of food stores. I wonder if people know what their home Amazon devices can do (which is record every conversation and send it to Amazon). I wonder if people who own Chinese-made cars know everything they say inside the car is captured and forwarded back to the manufacturer, who then forwards it to the MSS. It might be aimed primarily at domestic Chinese drivers, but the system works just as well wherever Chinese cars are sold. Even German auto manufacturers have installed the same system, though it's unclear if this is intended to get customer feedback in order to improve the driving experience, or forwarded to the BND. Already there is precious little privacy for anyone who uses modern conveniences.

Reasonable people know nobody is coming back, so they want to maximize this one iteration and be as healthy as possible until closure and entropy wins. The OP noted taurine supplements have some evidence to suggest it helps prolong this one shot at existence. Certainly the folks suffering severe dementia have already left the building, save for their body organs not yet shutting down. Whatever they were in terms of thought and personality is gone. Those still maintaining their neurons and frontal cortex can try to avoid any of the things that lead to dementia, at least the things that can be prevented.

If you do the needful from a young age, Viagra will never be necessary and best avoided. Many men go into their last years never needing any more than a sexy woman. I give you two anecdotes: I cannot find the research, so readers can take this as apocryphal, but I read years ago that some clinic was doing research on how quickly a man could go from flaccid to ejaculation. They had different age groups as subjects. The "winner" took something like 11 seconds, and he was 83 years old. The second involves the assassination of Kim Jong-un's brother at the airport in KL. Two unwitting women applied VX to the face of the brother. Apparently VX is extra potent (absorbed much faster) against guys who regularly use Viagra, and the brother was known to be a regular user. BOOM! Dead. The two women washed their hands and didn't absorb enough to do them harm, besides not being Viagra users. An aside to this aside....Kim Jong-nam spent a lot of time in Macau. He often could be found sitting in a bar having a drink or two, and was more than happy to strike up chats with fellow bargoers. Someone I know had a chat with him and was told by Kim that "I once killed my chauffeur with a 7-iron". Nice family, those Kims.

While theoretically true, Cohen is rather pedantic about keeping documents and recordings of phone calls. Also, if trump's defense takes that route, the prosecution will pull out all the stops to prove trump's (alleged) affairs, which means Stormy and McDougal on the stand and asked very 'delicate' questions where their descriptions would corroborate each other. While trump's team could still argue Cohen took it upon himself, the fact his account was made whole by "somebody" can be traced to specific bank accounts and authorizations. Besides, I really don't think trump wants the case to include detailed descriptions by the women who allege affairs. Remember how upset he got in the first Repub debate in 2016 when Marco Rubio commented about trump's 'tiny hands'.

There are two facts that will be difficult for trump's team to defend: 1) Stormy was paid $130,000 for 'some reason' 2) Karen McDougal was paid $120,000 (I think, may be slightly different) for 'some reason'. The man who actually orchestrated the payments admitted he did so, and was subsequently prosecuted and served time for that, plus other things (Michael Cohen). Unless Cohen just had some uber-altruistic tendencies and decided to give these two women a gift, there's a larger story behind all of it. It all points to trump, his affairs, and his fear of public knowledge of the affairs affecting his election chances in 2016. Of course it will be up to the jury to decide if there is a link, and if the link represents felony or misdemeanor behavior. Let trump have his day in court (finally) to either prove his innocence or pay the price for his alleged crimes. There have been more than enough delays, and the voters have a right to know if one of the Presidential candidates committed felonies or not. To delay all of trump's criminal trials to after the election is unfair to the voting public. If trump is innocent of all 91 felony charges, let's find that out. If he's guilty, best we know that before giving such a person the nuclear codes.

Interesting how time creates its own reality. When I had access, I did a lot of looking into the Mossadegh coup, and tried to parse it against the narrative that is in print. Major differences. Kermit Roosevelt had a CT (career trainee), a secretary, a $500,000 budget, and little more. He used the funds to buy printing presses and paper, and provided that to anti-Mossadegh forces in Iran. I find it hard to believe that his efforts alone, in a nation of (then) 18 million, toppled the regime. Even if it wanted to do so, it's very difficult for the agency to take any meaningful credit for the coup. Of much greater import seems to be what the Brits, and British Oil did. Their efforts were much more large scale and involved significantly more money. Ultimately the Iranian anti-Mossadegh forces prevailed, and the brutality of the Shah and Savak years ultimately resulted in the mullahs and a theocracy. Of course there is no denying that the US, under a host of Presidents from Eisenhower to Carter, supported the Shah.

Having experienced many Songkrans and Maha Thingyans (Myanmar), I can say that neither Thailand in general, nor Pattaya in particular, can hold a candle to Yangon. Despite being limited to 3 days, Yangon is absolute madness. The city sets up pandals (grandstands) near lakes or in major shopping districts. A thousand water-pump driven hoses are available for those on the grandstands. Every truck within 100 miles of the city is rented out, and folks jump on board and ride around the city, slowing down in front of each pandal they encounter, getting soaked or even blown off the truck by the force. Many cars have their doors and trunks taken off, so as to hold more passengers, and these follow the same pattern as the trucks. People sit on the roofs and the front hood. It isn't uncommon for some to fall off while the car corners, and accidents also happen because the (drunk) driver has his view blocked by people on the hood. To quote from the boy in the movie The Sixth Sense, "You see dead people". One year I was in Yangon someone put a bomb under one of the pandals and killed several people. Others die in fights, or else get run over after falling off a car. And on the 4th day.....the lines to enter a major pagoda for prayer are a mile long, all of the previous days' madness seemingly forgotten. Back in Thailand, what I have noticed is that most Thais, while having fun, are polite in how they douse people, and most seem to put the guns down at sunset. It's the foreigners, drunk from a day swilling beers, who keep it going until the wee hours.

One key to the trial is that trump has denied the affair, much less the hush money. He ought to tread carefully regarding the former, because if the prosecution has to produce testimony as to the fact of any affair, that will require calling both Stormy and Ms McDougal to offer "some kind" of proof of any dalliance. That would likely involve a description of trump's "supposedly" peculiar anatomy. In interviews, Stormy has used the phrase "funny mushroom shape" and the description "not quite freakishly small, but well below average". Should Stormy repeat such words under oath on the stand, the prosecution would also call Ms McDougal for corroboration...all, of course, in the interest of establishing the fact of the affairs. While law precludes trump's current wife from testifying, there is no law preventing any previous wife from being called to the stand, so Marla Maples would be fair game, if the prosecution was forced to prove the veracity of various affairs with Stormy and McDougal. While there are no cameras and sound equipment allowed in the courtroom, nothing prevents courtroom witnesses and media from detailing exactly what has been said. One suspects that trump will not like his physicality, or lack thereof, to be broadcast for all of magaland to hear. Part of his 'appeal' is that he portrays himself as some Alpha Male, but that gets knock back a bit, or significantly, if his cult learns he comes up short. Another thing that Stormy has mentioned, which may or may not be raised in the trial, is that during their assignation, trump insisted Stormy spank trump on his posterior "with a rolled up copy of a Forbes magazine that had trump on its cover, while he wore his tighty whiteys". That sounds.....kinky, and might not sit well with trump's so-called Christians, to whom he is currently trying to schlepp autographed copies of the Bible. So far, that demographic has either not believed an affair took place, or their peculiar moral code finds no fault with someone who dallies while his wife is home taking care of a new baby. Perhaps that changes. In Tweets and some public statements, trump---well known to give critics and adversaries nicknames---has called Ms Daniels "Horseface". Obviously she would be entitled to give him a nickname in return. Perhaps "Small Dick Donny" would be one such nickname, if she was intent on getting even. She probably has too much class for that, however.

Another foolish comment based on nothing rational. The JCPOA was incredible effective. Rather than repeat what I wrote elsewhere, it took Iran out of the nuke game completely. That and the Stuxnet virus Obama unleashed on Iran got their attention. The JCPOA was also designed to be used as a stepping stone to additional negotiations on, for example, halting support of Shi'a terrorism. trump abrogated the JCPOA for no other reason than that Obama had engineered it. Iran instantly re-started its U235 enrichment and nuke development. Obama and Biden knew the days of the mullahs was almost over. WAS. The youth of Iran want modernity and secularism. The mullahs are aging and will be gone soon, but they are now using external threats to rebuild the anti-Western theocracy. What should be an incredibly successful nation will remain undeveloped and an instigator of regional strife.

Calling it the start of WWIII is a bit of hyperbole. Iran has few friends in the world...a few fake and opportunistic ones like Russia and China, but neither of them cares enough to get upset if Israel attacks Iran. Israel also has few friends in the world, though the ones it has are pretty powerful. If Israel attacks Iran, the most the US would do is resupply Israel with weapons (which for some people is too much, for others not enough). The US is not going to commit its own forces, save perhaps for a Cruise missile or two if Iran moves to block the Straits of Hormuz. Israel is quite capable of neutralizing Iran by itself, and for the US, Ukraine is of infinitely greater geopolitical significance than Israel. Since the US cannot commit massively to both, it will choose Ukraine over Israel if push comes to shove. Russia might try to keep the fires burning, because as Eastern Europe's gas station, a closed down Straits of Hormuz is good for business. As a scary aside, Israel has thermonuclear bombs. If they dropped one on Tehran, people in a radius of 40 miles from Ground Zero would be sucked up in the mushroom cloud.

Silly comment from a guy who supports a clown who was unaware India and China share part of a border (over which they fought a war), and that near India are countries called Nipple and Button.

Interesting chart, and no doubt influenced by these events. However, there has been massive turbulence over the mountains of Turkey since Wednesday, and many Gulf flights were diverted over the Sinai and then across Saudi since a few planes over Turkey had some wild rides.

Too late for my deleted post (where I assumed everyone had read the news by now), but here's the link: https://www.9news.com.au/national/major-incident-declared-at-westfield-in-bondi-junction/0d713266-ca1b-449d-8dd5-cdf422ea092b

TRT is not a good idea, unless absolutely necessary. The body produces testosterone as it produces sperm. With TRT, the body stops producing sperm (and possibly reduces desire for doing the deed). Also, when the body finds it has sufficient testosterone, it stops producing it, and may lose its ability to produce it. That means people who go off TRT might not be able to produce their own anymore.

So many bits of accepted wisdom were never put to the test. Today's current billionaire class seems to want to maximize the time they get to enjoy their billions, so they are funding all sorts of research. Researchers try to isolate for different factors, kind of like doing a laboratory regression analysis. Surprising to many has been the decreased importance of diet, within reason. Yes, limit sugar, limit processed foods and foods with pesticides or polluted with industrial metals (like almost all seafood), but heavy exercise seems to come out as #1. Look at photos of Bezos, Zuckerberg, even Musk from few years ago, and today. Bezos in particular has gotten sculpted and buff. Zuckerberg less so, but he's more cut than before. Same with Musk. They paid for the research, and they're paying attention.

The life extension stuff is secondary to healthspan extension. The #1 thing folks can do to extend healthspan is resistance training, using heavy weights. Under physical stress the body produces more testosterone and more HGH. AN added benefit is one will feel good and look spiffy if there's still definition. #2 seems to be good sleep. According to lifespan researchers such as Peter Attia, #1 accounts for maybe 50% of the positives, #2 about 35%. Diet seems to have a lesser impact, unless one is currently consuming too many calories and in particular, too much sugar. Supplements might make a few percent difference, so they're best for someone already exercising, sleeping well, and eating decently. Avoid obesity or Type II diabetes, avoid smoking, and limit booze intake, and one is mostly already there in terms of extending healthspan. The research indicates the best supplements are: Creatine (the body's first choice of fuel, and something the energy-hungry brain just loves) Omega-3 (helps repair the blood-brain barrier, which deteriorates with age and allows nasties to get into the brain) Vitamin D and Vitamin K in MK7 form Collagen (for both skin and tendons/ligaments) Magnesium (involved in over 200 differnt body chemical processes) After that, there is anecdotal evidence about things such as NAC-Glycine (allows the body to produce Gluthathione, which is an anti-oxidant that aids liver repair and cleaning up from pollutants, but which if taken as a supplement just gets broker down, hence the precursors). Hyaluronic Acid might have the same benefits as collagen. Some form of Ashwaganda helps reduce cortisol, an inflammatory (but don't take it after a workout). Taurine might have benefits. One that is weird but which might also have a host of benefits (as it turbocharges mitochondria activity and seems to be an enemy of Tau protein and amyloid plaque) is methylene blue (an industrial dye). With the right mental attitude, life is great fun, so those who enjoy it can pay the price for increased healthspan by doing the needful in the gym and the bed, as well as the dinner table. The last thing: choose your parents well.

Caffeine and other methyl xanthines are vasoconstrictors from the neck down, but vaso dilators from the neck up. That is why coffee helps people focus.

What you note is part of a much larger problem, although it might be slightly off topic. What could Thailand do to wean itself from Tourism? The world is awash in productive capacity, and production is getting increasingly efficient and less human labor intensive. Thailand should build another auto plant? TV plant? Good for robots and warehouses to store the unnecessary production (China is filled with these warehouses, a lot of which is steel). Nothing is needed that doesn't already exist in the world in spades. If there's any plus side, it's that many nations are self-culling, at least not making copies. South Korea's fertility rate will be about .8 this year, which means not even replacing Mom or Dad. Thailand might drop to 1.3, which takes away one or the other, but not yet both. The downside of the self-culling is that most nations have at their core a Ponzi Scheme that requires an ever-increasing population. I would not want to be a not-self-funded retiree around age 50 or so, because that govt pension is by no means guaranteed. There won't be enough workers paying into the system so that old people can draw out. Expats in Thailand living primarily on a govt pension had better "hope" they die sooner rather than later, because whether it's a UK, Aussie or even US Social Security payment, it is either going to be cut or inflated away via printing. As AI kicks in and obviates yet more people, two things happen, neither of which is good. 1) Govt is going to have to take care of more redundant people, further straining budgets 2) Self-serving autocrat wannabes on the right are going to spew out a siren song of false promises and lies to give the obviated and redundant some form of hope, even false hope. Anyone who is paying attention can see it happening already. Finally, I wonder if those of us who never felt the urge to propagate our gene pool might realize we might as well take all the limited resources we feel like using, rather than save them for people who popped out copies and expect us to leave resources for their spawn and their spawn's spawn. Maybe the childless will just become selfish and fill the gas tanks in our Lambos and Cigarettes boats, plus aircon our McMansions and use the resources the progeny who will never exist would have used. Strange times we live in.

What would those results be? Joel Cauchi? Blue-eyed white guys?