Altherion

I don't think that this is how the process is intended to work in the modern era. The official nomination is the final step of the process, but the times and places when and where the decision on the nominee is actually made are the primaries and caucuses in the states and territories. If Biden is not the nominee now, this would not be like Johnson in 1968 or Truman in 1952 (both of whom dropped out at the end of March when it became clear they would lose their primaries). It would be literally unprecedented: since the primary system was established, there has never been an instance of either party deciding to completely disregard the primaries and (somehow) select a different presidential candidate less than four months before the election. I don't know whether a candidate other than Biden gives the Democrats a better chance in November and I don't think anyone else does, but according to the rules of the primary system, the time to end the conversations and unite is when somebody wins a majority of the primaries, not when they're officially nominated.

It's not a promotion -- it's at best a sideways move and more likely at least a little bit down. In April, one of Shoigu's closest allies was arrested for corruption on a particularly large scale so it looks like Putin is trying to put someone new in charge of military production. Post-Soviet Russia has been notorious for its widespread and practically legalized corruption almost from the start and given what they're spending on this war, the opportunities in that respect must be quite stupendous. Shoigu is not fired, but he will be a little further from the manger.

Russia has to be extremely displeased with Iran right now. Prior to that drone and missile barrage, it was a pretty safe bet that the US House of Representatives would hold up the aid to Ukraine until at least the election, but it appears that with a sufficiently blunt reminder that the world is burning, they decided to make a deal instead.

The issue is actually not unique to Boeing, it's just that Boeing makes a product that makes it obvious. Almost everything constructed today is deliberately made in a way that reduces costs at the expense of quality. That is, the item usually still functions as intended, but some fraction will be flawed from the start and the rest are more likely to break down sooner than expected or function incorrectly in corner cases. There are products (e.g. water heaters) where the manufacturer is actually happy about this because they don't want the thing to last too far past the warranty (the technical name for this is planned obsolescence). There are other products (e.g. most software) where this is not desirable, but people will tolerate it. Boeing's problem is that planes are a rare product where this is not just undesirable, but completely intolerable. They're some of the largest and most complicated machines we design, they operate in an unforgiving environment and can carry hundreds of people. It's not enough for most planes to work properly most of the time and we've reached the point where the latter is pretty much the case. Our problem as a society is that corporate culture is not something that stays confined to a single corporation. It's not really possible to have most corporations run by despicable parasites who mainly care about their own compensation and thus the stock price, but then single out a few critical spaces where these parasites are not welcome -- there simply isn't a pool of leaders to draw anything else from or of investors who would deal with the alternative leadership.

I am not sure if that is all, but it's probably enough. Armenia is currently a huge mess -- they are in a state of constant low-grade warfare with Azerbaijan (it's not reported in the press, but from speaking to people I know there, I can tell you that they are calling up reservists to guard the border). Also, it's suffering from inflation and the government is widely believed to be corrupt (as was the one before that and so on). I know quite a few people there and I cannot think of a single one who would not take an offer to come to the US. In fact, pretty much everyone would come even without the money; if there's a billionaire willing to pay you for doing what you're already good at, literally everyone would go.

Err... we don't actually have any universal moral principles beyond some very generic ones which are not at all useful in dealing with the complicated systems that we've constructed. Likewise, cooperation by itself is not going to deal with global warming. In fact, international cooperation has dramatically increased our consumption of fossil fuels as well as the amount of waste that we produce. What we need is cooperation of a large fraction of humanity in the direction of a specific goal which is much harder to get. I read that book and I find it wildly optimistic in multiple respects. I don't think it will work that way.

Do people here think it is worthwhile to play dubious but interesting gambits? I don't mean ones like the Queen's gambit which are perfectly sound, but something along the lines of the Rousseau gambit ( 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 f5? ) where Stockfish says that black is already losing (+1.4), but even with correct play by white, the position becomes pretty sharp for both sides. For some background, I have not played rated over the table games in more than 20 years, but I'm rated about 2100 in Rapid and Blitz on Lichess (a little more in Rapid, a little less in Blitz) which I think corresponds to something like 1600 to 1700 USCF or FIDE. Obviously, these openings are a very bad idea against master-level players, but they result in sharp, dangerous positions which I have relatively little practice with and force me to do things that I don't usually do (e.g. queenside castling). Is it worth it to try playing these or would they instill some bad habits?

Is it really as clear cut as the Saudi's buying golf? From what I can find of the terms:

OK, what exactly was that? I guess they're both really tired and nervous and playing mind games with each other, but chess is not poker -- it should not be possible to bluff and get away with it against players at this level. It's exciting and unpredictable, but this is not grandmaster level chess. If Magnus Carlsen was playing either of them and they played like this, he would be at +4 or +5 by now.

Many (but not all!) corporations pay dividends which are indeed part of the profits that are being returned to the shareholders. So if you invest in those companies, you will indeed get paid either every year or half year or quarter depending on how their dividend is structured. There is a school of investing (the "value" investors) wherein this stream of future payments should be considered the main reason to buy a stock and they avoid the companies that don't pay anything. Note that in the US (and possibly some other countries; I do not know international tax law) the dividends for stock that you've held for longer than a year are taxed at a lower rate so it's better than getting interest from a savings account (which is taxed as regular income).

I feel bad for the ordinary people who put money into cryptocurrency. This is why it is important to study at least some history: the crypto world is effectively reproducing the scams of ages gone by with the only difference being these online "currencies" (which are actually more commodities than currencies). On a different note, what do people think about investing in funds that have dual purposes: to make money and also to move the world in a specific direction? Most of the big investment platforms have these now (here's an environmental one from Vanguard as an example). The good part of this is that if it works as intended, the investors would make the world a better. The bad parts is that these funds have much higher fees (because they need active management) and they're also riskier than an ordinary broad index fund (because they invest in a specific sector rather than in the economy as a whole and possibly not even the whole sector). Does anyone have an opinion on this sort of investment?

When I read it, I thought that it might be related to Children of Ruin. That is,

It's interesting how Ding and Nakamura had completely opposite strategies from a very similar position. Based on his recap, Nakamura thought about how to beat Nepo and realized that playing for a victory with black against an opponent who only needs to draw with white is usually a recipe for disaster. Thus, he decided to go for the Berlin draw and play for second place. On the other hand, Ding was not trying to play conservatively and lost. The result is that Nakamura and Ding are currently tied for second with Caruana and Radjabov half a point behind and Nepo a full 2 points (!) ahead with two games left to play. It is mathematically possible for either Nakamura or Ding to catch Nepo, but it would mean that Nepo loses both games and one of them wins both (they play the last game against each other so there is no chance of a three-way tie). I think this scenario is extremely unlikely and Nepo will almost certainly take first. On the other hand, the race for second is alive and well. Nakamura is ahead on tiebreaks, but Ding controls his own fate as he plays white against Nakamura. Caruana and Radjabov also have a game against each other (Radjabov plays white) and it's by no means impossible that one of them can equal or surpass Nakamura or Ding.

Nepo and Caruana both won so after 6 games, Nepo is at +3, Caruana is at +2 and the closest behind them are Nakamura and Rapport at 0. There are still 8 games to play so in theory, anyone can still win (even Firouzja who is currently at -2), but thus far, it does indeed look like a two horse race.

I think it's not so much the popularity as that he keeps winning the speed chess tournaments and to some extent also the rapid ones. He's competitive with anyone (including Carlsen and Firouzja) in the faster time controls so they wanted to see how well he can do in classical chess.