Random Rant Thread

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It's time for Americans to realize that the Constitution is actually an outdated joke.

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The governments in the US and much of Europe now do seem to (finally!) recognize [talking loudly >>>> talking normally >>>> coughing and sneezing] in terms of spreading power. But their guidances still lack one important factor: Eating.

They still don't mention the fact that if eating/drinking and talking are combined the infection rates dramatically increase, like, REALLY drastically. Family dinners can be much worse than even *unmasked* office meetings for that reason.

I've been saying that forever in this thread, and it's nuts that's still not common knowledge in many parts of the world.

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If you really have some extraordinary reasons - or more likely just can't be assed not to be selfish and myopic and delusional - and have to travel to do full Thanksgiving, at least get good masks. N95 would be great, but if you don't have any, you should go with the cheap, boring surgical masks instead of the cool cloth ones. The quality of the mask does matter especially when the risks are this high.

Don't be that one who gets infected on a flight and spread it to your aunts and nephews.

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People, even including many Americans, don't believe me when I tell them that there are actually people who speak like Joe Pesci in his most gratuitous mode (he sounds a bit different in real life).

Young Americans are killing regional dialects/accents with their fake ass accents these days, but these Italians in Long Island/Staten Island/Jersey are keeping it real.

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I'm pretty sure that most of the American liberals/left calling Emmanuel Macron names for his so-called "anti-Muslim venom" and "Muslim registry" (both categorically false) would be saying 180-degree different things if they were French. The liberals in particular definitely would.

I don't rant much about these matters in this thread anymore, but I trust most of you understand my general stance on these issues. They are not simple. But one certain thing is that those bleeding-heart Americans are incredibly clueless or astonishingly disingenuous or both.

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I'm still waiting for all of you clueless fucks to apologize to me.

I even specifically said 15 years ago that 15 years later Giuliani would be just being the same old Rudy Giuliani and yet you would be shaking your heads saying crap like, "He has gotten old and insane." Talk about being spot on.

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Many health workers get mentally shot largely due to the enormous gap between the hospitals and outside world. They can't process it well.

In almost any country - even in a hellscape hotspot like Belgium - most people have been more or less shielded from the realities of Covid-19.

There's only a thin line between the two worlds, though. You can easily cross it to enter the dark place, like getting sucked into a blackhole. The outside world will be largely just fine without you.

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Holy shit.

Of course this says more about the sheer hatred of Donald Trump than about the love for Joe Biden, but 80M is a huge number.

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One thing that has been usually overlooked in the discussion of Covid-19 is the fact that Covid-19 patients are on average much sicker than other patients. They're very resource-hungry patients, to put it drily.

It's not just the number of sick people, but also how sick they are.

Everyone should be forced to take a peek at how things are even in the "mild Covid-19 symptoms" section of a hospital. They would be surprised at how sick they are.

If you are one of the immunologically unlucky ones who get sick enough to be hospitalized for Covid-19, you really need to be mentally prepared for a lot of pain.

If the hospitals aren't overrun already, that is.

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Those who regard 1-2% fatality rate as no big deal are either fundamentally math/statistics-challenged in that they don't grasp the weight of percentage and its implications, plainly lacking in common sense, or simply desperate to downplay it for whatever reasons.

Doug Sterner is a well-known military historian.



Obviously Normandy was much worse than this pandemic given the high injury rates, but the 1-2% fatality rate, especially for such an extremely highly contagious disease, is nowhere near "low" by any common sensical standards. If you think it is, that simply means you're an idiot.

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Things are always no big deal, until they hit you or/and your loved ones.

Be responsible.

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The fundamentally conspiratorial mind of typical Trump supporters does have a lot to do with it, but liberals didn't exactly accept the election result quickly four years ago either.

"The Russians!"

No, I'm not both-siding it; I'm pointing out the fact that the US election system needs to be seriously upgraded, or even downgraded if getting rid of some of those "technologies" can be called that.

It's almost designed to create mistrust on the losing side. The US election procedures and system always remind me of F-35; A bloated, confused mess that can't execute the most basic task in a simple way.

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I used to rant a lot about social issues in this thread, but rarely about the gun issue in the US.

This is why.

It's such a vote loser in America. You'd be absolutely electorally massacred in pretty much all rural areas in all states. I know it makes no sense to non-Americans, but that's just the reality.

If it wasn't for the Electoral College System, sure, it could be worth it, but even then only to a degree.

That's why I almost always called the issue "complicated," and didn't go farther.

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Er, what?

USA. Does. Not. Owe. You. A. Trade. Deal. 

Neither. Is. Anyone. Else. For. That. Matter.

This strange sense of entitlement without any actual power or leverage at all.

As Joe Biden once said (in private), who the hell do they think they are?

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I have to agree that AstraZeneca/Oxford haven't been very professional. It does arouse suspicion.