Funny events in anti-woke world

[crimson5pheonix]

As I expected, you don't really know how the NHS works, then. A rejection of the insurance principle was one of its founding characteristics and you do not need to be insured.

It's a lot more than a "fund". Policy is directed by the government. Contracts are negotiated by the government. The trusts that run hospitals answer to the government and are audited by it. And it is explicitly the government's responsibility to ensure supply chains, regulations, and resource availability on a national scale etc.

Cool, then there should be a receipt somewhere as a matter of public record. Which NHS bureaucrat orders insulin for the country?

A failure to fulfil a job to a satisfactory standard doesn't somehow mean it was never their job to begin with.

No like, it literally isn't their job. Biden convinced the longshoremen of LA to work longer shifts to ease the issue and that's a diplomatic coup on his part, because the only tool he had to convince them was to walk up to them and ask. And it's likely the limit to what the government can do directly with a large shortfall as the next kink in the chain comes from truck drivers. The longshoremen have a good union and asking them to work overtime means overtime pay. The drivers don't have a union and are scattered, they don't have an incentive to work overtime.

But you are still talking about getting people to vote somebody into a position to do a job, but also not calling that an election?

Ask Gerger how he'd resolve it. There are a few different theories and I don't know which one he uses.

*Full direct democracy. I've stated over and over again that I have no issue with confirmatory referenda existing. I have been arguing, from the very start, against a system of full direct democracy replacing elected government.

And for the very stupid reason that you think people are too stupid to govern themselves meaningfully. And tried to say representative government is better at making a just society, lol.

Yes, some forms of representative democracy-- such as FPTP-- end up with governments who have not been voted into position by a majority (or sometimes even a plurality). It's a grotesque distortion. Thankfully there's quite a few alternative voting systems.

For example, direct democracy removes these unique distortions in causing minority rule!

: D

Formal study on the issue has been woefully lacking (including yours, which was based primarily on watching CCTV). This is kind of unavoidable, given the ethical considerations and observer effect.

I can agree that almost all studies being just asking people in a lab is basically the only reliable way to do it to a sample size ethically... until checking cameras came up. More than 219 would be nice, but that's a ton more than...

But instances are hardly difficult to come by. Wayne Couzens had a despicable reputation long before he murdered somebody, but nobody saw fit to report concerns. Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted someone, and nobody at the party saw fit to report it. EDIT: Huh, another prime example popped right onto the Current Events page only a couple of hours after I posted this.

A few anecdotes. Next you'll tell me Muslims tend to be terrorists because of high profile Muslim terrorism.

OK, question: what NGOs, institutes, research bodies etc do you think 51% of the population would vote to keep in official funding, if any?

Ones that immediately come to mind are AARP, USO, MSF (though they haven't gotten money from the US government since 2002 for political reasons), WWF.

Probably because the latter requires understanding of policy usually just in terms of broad principle, not detail, practicality or implementation. The requirements placed on the average person are obviously not equivalent.

Well no it doesn't, because your candidate can and probably will put forward how they plan to implement their policy and you need to know if they're either lying to you, or doing something in a stupid way. So you're still not free of that requirement. You just want to abstract people's opinions away from their will.

 

[Eacaraxe]

Selecting out the criticisms of a paper for skepticism, and even then which criticisms you want to be skeptical about, is hardly rigorous.

When they're exemplary of the truly astounding illogic (and deliberate, temporary incapacity to do basic arithmetic) involved with the overwhelming majority of critiques of the Lancet study, it's both appropriate and rigorous, thank you.

Especially when the one and only critique that actually stuck in a sea of partisan bullshit, was the one that got Burnham suspended: failing to re-submit data collection sheets for IRB approval after correcting typographical errors. And it's the one I've brought up...three or four times, now? which you have yet to even acknowledge.

Now start citing examples of what you find to be problematic with the Lancet study. I'm not here to do your job for you. Start meeting your own burden of proof.

No, I'm exposing your failure to understand what the study did and why it did it. But getting this sort of thing right is the basis of how we should trust your judgement about other analysis too, like how strongly we should value your opinions on criticisms of the Lancet 2006 study.

Then explain to me how a 2.89 pre-invasion mortality rate is representative, accurate, and in no way suspect compared to literally every other estimate of the pre-invasion mortality rates, which vary from 5.5 to 10 out of a thousand. Then explain to me how a 4.55 mortality rate post-invasion in any way whatsoever tracks with that.

Did "I" cite that as a criticism of the Lancet study?

Yes, you did. You just don't realize it, because you seem to have no actual clue what the criticisms of the Lancet study were in the first place. In fact, you did it in the next paragraph:

We've covered this already. There are numerous estimates of casualties, and the Lancet 2006 study is clearly an outlier.

It's an "outlier" (it isn't) because of the perceived discrepancy between using John Hopkins' estimated pre-invasion mortality rate, versus the post-invasion mortality rate they extrapolated from survey data. Which is where allegations of overestimating excess death rate come from in the first place.

Hence the quip about how the Iraq invasion couldn't have gotten that many killed, because they were already dying due to UN sanctions.

Pay attention.

A national average done properly should capture regional effects and reflect the nation.

"Eh, exclusion zone, shmeck-lusion zone. Ukraine's mortality rate is just fine."

If you only examine the places where the violence was highest and then extrapolate that to the whole nation, you'll get a huge overestimate, surely. Actually, that's kind of one of the criticisms of the Lancet 2006 study, isn't it?

Actually, the conductors of the Lancet study under-sampled Najaf, Basra, and Fallujah, knowing that as cities in which the heaviest fighting took place they would be outliers. Which is where, why, and how Roberts, Burnham, et. al. were accused of under-estimating infant and child mortalities.

Funny how that worked out. Damned if you do, damned if you don't. Which is what's to be expected when you're getting swiftboated.

But keep on proving your ignorance of the topic. And speaking of, "kind of" that criticism was about how households were clustered, not in what cities were being surveyed, hence the term "main street bias". Apparently, focusing on main residential thoroughfares -- otherwise known as "where most people live" -- is bad news bears because you're not surveying "enough" people that live off "back alleys". And when it was proven "back alleys" were indeed being reached, suddenly "back alleys" weren't "back alley" enough, and apparently researchers were supposed to be knocking on shithouse doors to see if anyone lived there.

Because critics moved the goal posts once Roberts, Burnham, et. al. formally responded to the criticism. Like they did practically everything else. Because the criticisms weren't serious, it was about swiftboating the Lancet study.

 

[Trunkage]

K this was much needed chuckle

Does this one include the vaccine clips? I was going to post this because of how easily he stumped the interviewee, it was mind boggingly how quickly the logic fell apart

 

[Agema]

When they're exemplary of the truly astounding illogic (and deliberate, temporary incapacity to do basic arithmetic) involved with the overwhelming majority of critiques of the Lancet study, it's both appropriate and rigorous, thank you.

Especially when the one and only critique that actually stuck in a sea of partisan bullshit, was the one that got Burnham suspended: failing to re-submit data collection sheets for IRB approval after correcting typographical errors. And it's the one I've brought up...three or four times, now? which you have yet to even acknowledge.

Here again, your argument that a criticism "stuck" suggests me you just don't understand the nature of studies. Methodology is not so simple as a "yes/no" in this way, it's a about the amount of error that it is likely to generate. There are numerous criticisms about the clusters they examined (whether there were enough or they were representative), with the risk that they introduced considerable error, or whether their survey collection teams were reliable. One might note other surveys with lower estimates are liable to be more accurate simply by including more participants.

Secondly, many of the criticisms are what I've already discussed, there there is basically no other study or evidence that supports this number of casualties except the extremely dubious ORB study. This is about consistency of data, not dissimilar in a sense from the concept of replication: if your results cannot be reliably replicated, they're probably not accurate. This is why you should look at lots of studies, rather than just pick the one that suits you. Other discrepancies exist. With certain other records, and even perceptions (e.g. of Iraqis and journalists) in the sense that the Lancet figures imply mass male depopulation.

Then explain to me how a 2.89 pre-invasion mortality rate is representative, accurate, and in no way suspect compared to literally every other estimate of the pre-invasion mortality rates, which vary from 5.5 to 10 out of a thousand. Then explain to me how a 4.55 mortality rate post-invasion in any way whatsoever tracks with that.

Read the paper yourself: it's public access and tells you.

It's constructing a consistent measure of deaths pre-/post-. This has methodological plusses compared to using different mortality measures pre-/post-. It is not necessarily going to be a perfect representation of reality (as is the case with many estimates). So what the study might imply is that deaths were increased by about 50% in the post-invasion period to 2011. They appreciate themselves this is an underestimate, however compensate by adding some extra casualties on top for their total.

So we could crunch the numbers and even starting from a death rate of ~5.5 increased 50%, although excess deaths to 2011 would still fall far below 1 million. I would however have caveats about putting a lot of strength on this as it risks speculating beyond the ability of the data to support.

Yes, you did. You just don't realize it, because you seem to have no actual clue what the criticisms of the Lancet study were in the first place. In fact, you did it in the next paragraph:

It's an "outlier" (it isn't) because of the perceived discrepancy between using John Hopkins' estimated pre-invasion mortality rate, versus the post-invasion mortality rate they extrapolated from survey data. Which is where allegations of overestimating excess death rate come from in the first place.

What the heck are you talking about? My issue, as clearly stated, is whether its estimates of post-invasion mortality from their are accurate, as above. Because there are plenty of reasons to think they may not be, as above.

 

[Silvanus]

Cool, then there should be a receipt somewhere as a matter of public record. Which NHS bureaucrat orders insulin for the country?

*facepalm*

An NHS bureaucrat doesn't. A company contracted by the government does. That contract will outline the duties they have to fulfil and the supply they have to provide. The health secretary then ensures compliance and sufficiency.

And no, I cannot give you contractual information on their behalf, obviously.

No like, it literally isn't their job. Biden convinced the longshoremen of LA to work longer shifts to ease the issue and that's a diplomatic coup on his part, because the only tool he had to convince them was to walk up to them and ask. And it's likely the limit to what the government can do directly with a large shortfall as the next kink in the chain comes from truck drivers. The longshoremen have a good union and asking them to work overtime means overtime pay. The drivers don't have a union and are scattered, they don't have an incentive to work overtime.

Yes, the United States has indeed outsourced a large amount of the government's traditional duties to private entities.

I thought we were against that happening?

And for the very stupid reason that you think people are too stupid to govern themselves meaningfully. And tried to say representative government is better at making a just society, lol.

Yes yes, we've covered all this ground before, the insults and such.

Can I at least get you to stop falsely claiming I'm against all forms of direct democracy? I've lost track of the number of times I've had to correct that.

For example, direct democracy removes these unique distortions in causing minority rule!

: D

Yup! And replacing them with complete dysfunction. Can't have minority rule if we don't have policy direction at all. Smrt.

I can agree that almost all studies being just asking people in a lab is basically the only reliable way to do it to a sample size ethically... until checking cameras came up. More than 219 would be nice, but that's a ton more than...



A few anecdotes. Next you'll tell me Muslims tend to be terrorists because of high profile Muslim terrorism.

What I enjoy is how willing you are to point to egregious examples in other threads, to support points you're making. But as soon as its the opposing side, it's a debating sin.

Ones that immediately come to mind are AARP, USO, MSF (though they haven't gotten money from the US government since 2002 for political reasons), WWF.

Hah, no chance, unless you mean the World Wrestling Federation. People tend to utterly balk a budgetary expenditures even for things like school meals. I have no faith these wouldn't be defunded.

Well no it doesn't, because your candidate can and probably will put forward how they plan to implement their policy and you need to know if they're either lying to you, or doing something in a stupid way. So you're still not free of that requirement. You just want to abstract people's opinions away from their will.

Yes, and healthy scepticism/ ability to read a costed manifesto is a damn sight easier than the ability to know everything that goes into the running of a country. A lot of people actually manage the former, even if its less than there needs to be. Almost nobody managed the latter except those in specific areas of study.

 

[crimson5pheonix]

*facepalm*

An NHS bureaucrat doesn't. A company contracted by the government does. That contract will outline the duties they have to fulfil and the supply they have to provide. The health secretary then ensures compliance and sufficiency.

And no, I cannot give you contractual information on their behalf, obviously.

Oh okay, so I was right the whole time? Got it.

Yes, the United States has indeed outsourced a large amount of the government's traditional duties to private entities.

I thought we were against that happening?

Question, you do understand that supply chains are almost all inherently international, which means that even if a country is somehow 100% nationalized, the majority of any given supply chain is going to be out of the hands of any government? Has the UK even nationalized commercial transport?

Yes yes, we've covered all this ground before, the insults and such.

Can I at least get you to stop falsely claiming I'm against all forms of direct democracy? I've lost track of the number of times I've had to correct that.

Oh yes, you're fine with the direct democracy where people don't really make meaningful choices.

Yup! And replacing them with complete dysfunction. Can't have minority rule if we don't have policy direction at all. Smrt.

So you claim, without evidence. Again.

What I enjoy is how willing you are to point to egregious examples in other threads, to support points you're making. But as soon as its the opposing side, it's a debating sin.

What I'm taking issue with is fighting a study with single anecdotes.

Hah, no chance, unless you mean the World Wrestling Federation. People tend to utterly balk a budgetary expenditures even for things like school meals. I have no faith these wouldn't be defunded.

Which is why of course these NGOs are mostly funded without government money in the first place. MSF in fact limits their government income specifically. A lot of them are supported by donations. So, y'know, the people who would be in charge.

Yes, and healthy scepticism/ ability to read a costed manifesto is a damn sight easier than the ability to know everything that goes into the running of a country. A lot of people actually manage the former, even if its less than there needs to be. Almost nobody managed the latter except those in specific areas of study.

Look at those goalposts move. Compare to much earlier in the thread where your complaint was that people don't know silicon is important. We've gone from "People are too stupid to understand raw materials make things" to "Well people have to know the literal minutia of lawmaking to make informed decisions on lawmakers, but that doesn't mean they know how to run a country."

And we're going to circle back to an old argument from then.

REPRESENTATIVE LAWMAKERS ARE IN NO WAY REQUIRED TO STUDY HOW TO RUN A COUNTRY, AND FREQUENTLY AREN'T PROFESSIONALS, RIGHT NOW, TODAY.

Why is this okay by you if your point is that people aren't professional lawmakers?

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Does this one include the vaccine clips? I was going to post this because of how easily he stumped the interviewee, it was mind boggingly how quickly the logic fell apart

I think that's just a small snippet of the Q nuts at latest Trump rally, post away! Did chuckle at the part where the guy said Trump is still president and controls the military, yet when asked if that means he's responsible for the withdrawal in Afghanistan, he's just like "nope! Nopety nope nope no!" with zero justification why.

 

[AnxietyProne]

I think that's just a small snippet of the Q nuts at latest Trump rally, post away! Did chuckle at the part where the guy said Trump is still president and controls the military, yet when asked if that means he's responsible for the withdrawal in Afghanistan, he's just like "nope! Nopety nope nope no!" with zero justification why.

Now now, don't criticize them. That means you're spreading them and therefore it's YOUR fault they feel that way...

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Argh, just hearing them talk gets under the skin! Release the tasers!


But comedic relief?

 

[crimson5pheonix]

I have no idea what this is from or even if it's real, but I like the idea of it.

 

[Trunkage]

 

[TheMysteriousGX]

All the better to help them steal the next one

 

[Trunkage]

All the better to help them steal the next one

That's exactly what I was thinking. Most of these people were Republicans

 

[Trunkage]

Also this


A person who got fame from cancelling people, and pretended she was cancelled from her last job when all she did was quit, claims that CNN cancels her.... WHILE BEING FUCKING INTERVIEWED BY CNN.

Also, she created the concept of the IDW. Also, also, unintentionally calls Tim Poole and Steven Crowder a canceller

 

[Casual Shinji]

Also, she created the concept of the IDW. Also, also, unintentionally calls Tim Poole and Steven Crowder a canceller

Speaking of, Tim Pool provided his expert knowledge on the show Squid Game and how it's actually critiquing communism.

Just when you thought it wasn't possible, he reaches new heights of stupidity.

 

[Cheetodust]

Speaking of, Tim Pool provided his expert knowledge on the show Squid Game and how it's actually critiquing communism.

... How?

 

[Casual Shinji]

... How?

Because it's a super popular and well loved show that he obviously can't dunk on or claim to like without the show's very obvious theme calling his grift into question, so he spins it as 'ackchyually communism' so it'll still fit his grift brand.

Oh, and I believe his stated reasons were that all the characters dress the same in the games, they get crummy food to eat, and they're not fat since obviously everyone in a capitalist society is fat due to the over abundance of wealth. And that the show's creator is too stupid to notice it was communism he was critiquing.

He very conveniently forgot the one character who escaped a communist regime and finds that a capitalistic one is just as brutal. Also, the giant golden piggy bank that gets larger as more people die.

 

[Trunkage]

Because it's a super popular and well loved show that he obviously can't dunk on or claim to like without the show's very obvious theme calling his grift into question, so he spins it as 'ackchyually communism' so it'll still fit his grift brand.

Oh, and I believe his stated reasons were that all the characters dress the same in the games, they get crummy food to eat, and they're not fat since obviously everyone in a capitalist society is fat due to the over abundance of wealth. And that the show's creator is too stupid to notice it was communism he was critiquing.

He very conveniently forgot the one character who escaped a communist regime and finds that a capitalistic one is just as brutal. Also, the giant golden piggy bank that gets larger as more people die.

Oh silly, communism means bad and capitalism means good. Don't you get it

I hope Tim Pool never finds Charles Dickens

 

[Silvanus]

Oh okay, so I was right the whole time? Got it.

No.

Question, you do understand that supply chains are almost all inherently international, which means that even if a country is somehow 100% nationalized, the majority of any given supply chain is going to be out of the hands of any government? Has the UK even nationalized commercial transport?

Lol?!

A supply chain being international doesn't mean that national governments don't bloody organise it. I really thought that was obvious. The relevant governments negotiate the trade, legislate the regulations, contract the couriers, and hire the staff at the borders. All of this is basic government function.

Oh yes, you're fine with the direct democracy where people don't really make meaningful choices.

If you want to characterise the referenda on the Chilean and Cuban constitutions as "not meaningful", that's your prerogative. I rather thought they were excellent expressions of democratic will, personally.

So you claim, without evidence. Again.

Hard to have demonstrable examples when full direct democracy has never been accomplished beyond the scale of a few thousand people.

What I'm taking issue with is fighting a study with single anecdotes.

OK. But I'm gonna need a bit more than one analysis of CCTV to fully debunk a fairly well-established psychological phenomenon.

Which is why of course these NGOs are mostly funded without government money in the first place. MSF in fact limits their government income specifically. A lot of them are supported by donations. So, y'know, the people who would be in charge.

I thought everyone would be in charge, not just the tiny minority who donate to these organisations?

Look, I think charitable orgs like MSF would probably continue to function in direct democracy through donations. It's easy to justify a straightforward charitable proposition to the people. But organisations like the IFS, or scientific research bodies relying on gov funding? No way.

Look at those goalposts move. Compare to much earlier in the thread where your complaint was that people don't know silicon is important. We've gone from "People are too stupid to understand raw materials make things" to "Well people have to know the literal minutia of lawmaking to make informed decisions on lawmakers, but that doesn't mean they know how to run a country."

Neither of those are my positions. The endless strawmanning really does get bloody tiresome.

People wouldn't need to know the "literal minutiae" of lawmaking. But hell yes they would require a knowledge of pretty much every area of running a country, if you needed 51% of everyone to vote for something In order for it to happen at all. And yes, that would include trade for vital resources. If you're not electing someone to actually do that as their job, and nobody has greater political authority to buy/sell/contract/negotiate. Then yes. A referendum is needed. For resources most people don't know we need, but we do need.

REPRESENTATIVE LAWMAKERS ARE IN NO WAY REQUIRED TO STUDY HOW TO RUN A COUNTRY, AND FREQUENTLY AREN'T PROFESSIONALS, RIGHT NOW, TODAY.

Why is this okay by you if your point is that people aren't professional lawmakers?

It's part of a legislator's job to understand it. They're expected to research the topics they vote on (with privileged access to information) and study practicalities. This is what we elect them for. We do not expect our representative's knowledge of government to be no greater than ours. That's absurd. The fact that some fail to do their job is irrelevant. It is their job nonetheless.

And yes, the executive-- composed of elected politicians-- are required to know how to run a country.

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Yes, this is happening in conjunction with Trump, Bannon, Flynn and a major amount of GQP influencers pushing their followers to sign up to for candidacy in not only these positions but every other position of power over future electoral planning and supervision. Whatever perceived notion of democracy people have right now is currently under a process of being stolen from right under them under the guise that it was already stolen...it's the peak of the republican strategy hitting its logical end point: gaslight/project upon the opposition to justify their own bad behaviour they were already indulging in to give the impression it was the opposition who forced them into it. Pure abusive relationship tactics applied on a national political scale. It cannot be understated how concerning this is for future elections.

Trump Is Pushing QAnon Candidates Into the GOP Mainstream

Trump is backing a number of candidates who’ve openly pushed QAnon’s wildest theories. By endorsing them, he’s mainstreaming the extremist movement.

www.vice.com

‘Down the rabbit hole’: Arizona GOP goes full fringe

Republicans have reacted to the state’s leftward drift by stocking the 2022 ballot with conspiracy theorists and extremists.

www.politico.com

Speaking of, Tim Pool provided his expert knowledge on the show Squid Game and how it's actually critiquing communism.

Just when you thought it wasn't possible, he reaches new heights of stupidity.

Yeah, he also claimed MCU Thanos was basically "communism/socialism/Marxism" ...I can't remember which one exactly but it's never mattered to these chucklefucks the differences. In fact I don't think I've ever heard a single one use any of those terms correctly, they're nothing more than vapid buzzwords meant to validate fearmongering vibes to their uneducated conceited audiences.