KalVsWade

Good thread on probable use of HIMARS to strike Russian command areas in places Ukraine had not been able to hit previously:

Welp, I guess she supports abortion then

I mean, the first immediate thing to say is that we had 9 SCOTUS justices when we had 9 districts for courts and that's why we chose that number. We now have 13, so it stands to reason we should have 13 SCOTUSes. But really, as long as Dems are not willing to play hardball to get power back they are effectively not doing anything. On the administration ruling which I predict will be decided in favor of West Virginia - I think what you'll see is the courts happily ceding federal control for things that they are in favor of and happily nixing control over things they do not want. It will not be a one size fits all thing. California will have to cede their tougher environmental regulations as an example.

I'm joking, and making fun of everyone who exclaims that some random shitty book or 3 seconds of being told to use the force means that you can extrapolate across everything or that most people will even take that as the main viewpoint.

I had just assumed that Luke looks up at him and calls him General Kenobi as soon as Obi Wan says 'Hello There' After all, that's what is in the canon

Yeah, one of the things I do all the time when I am the guardian of kids is that I let people I describe as a 'crazy old wizard' and a 'hermit' just meet my 9 year old kid and give him toys

Yeah, while NZ does have some cost issues (it looked like food and general things were about 30% higher with wages being in general lower) it isn't exceptionally bad or unworkable. I would have taken a paycut and a quality of life cut if I had taken the job, but it would still have been fine...except for the medical thing. Auckland in particular is tough from a housing and cost of living perspective but it was still viable, and nothing like the costs of say SF or new York or Seattle right now.

Yep! If you're going to randomly decide that 3 minutes of training and Obi Wan helpfully reminding Luke to use the force during his mindfulness app is enough, I'll say a crazy montage of tons of force wielders is enough for her to know about how to do various powers and stuff.

No, not really. I mean, it has happened but I'm pretty sure that a decision that has been months in the making and also was leaked over a month ago was not planned to be released just so it could coincide with the Jan 6th hearings, especially since this is the 'normal' time that SCOTUS decisions get done.

Eh. Per previous reports he's been working on this for years. It's not like it's a quick cash grab. It just has for whatever reason remained remarkably secret.

Like, all the Jedi that she saw in her vision? Again, if that's really what is acceptable to you as far as it goes that's fine, but I don't think that your rationalizations are particularly persuasive or objectively valid. No, there really isn't. The one bit of canonical movie training has Luke able to block lasers after a 5 minute session of encouragement. We see zero lightsaber training with Luke and Yoda. We see zero lightsaber training with Anakin. The only other training session we see is younglings getting shot by drones. Again, she actually lost! Heck, she ends up losing TWICE - once on Takodana when she gets captured and again in the fight with Kylo Ren. But again, it's super convenient for you to gloss over the actual canon when it doesn't suit you, and then fanwank it when it does. Sorry - are you saying that perceiving things before they happen is a useful skill in piloting something at mach 3, but is somehow not actually useful when fighting people with a laser sword? No, we don't. We have absolutely no indication he's been talking with Obi Wan other than the scene in the blizzard, and he appears to be incredibly surprised. Obi-Wan sends him to train there because he needs training and Obi-Wan can't apparently do it. You can extrapolate that he's been training, but there's nothing canonical that says he is and nothing that happens other than that TK pull indicates he is. If he has been training he's kind of super shitty at it. We literally see the part where Kenobi tells Luke to go to Dagobah. The force does what it wants, and Rey is clearly stronger in the force than Kylo Ren is. That is actually canonical too. In the movie she's telling us she's been getting it ready to go and has been working on it for months. That is literally not what Kenobi tells Luke when he introduces Luke to the Force. So on that - she utterly gets her ass kicked by Snoke. The notion that Rey wins always and Luke loses always is another example of just ignoring the parts that don't work the theory. In TFA she gets captured and knocked out by Kylo Ren, then she starts getting her ass kicked by Kylo Ren before literally submitting to the Force and letting it guide her actions. In TLJ she is shown over and over to be fairly incompetent by Luke before getting herself captured by Snoke and being thrown around the room easily and painfully. She also needs Kylo to save her from the guards in that scene. And then she loses to Kylo Ren AGAIN in TRoS on the water, relying on Leia distracting Kylo Ren to win. But also - what does 'private study' help you with? Again, see above. Rey loses a bunch of fights and needs a ton of help from all sorts of people. Including the two parts you mention, where she is, ya know, losing. So yes, I agree - she wins all the fights except for the ones she loses.

Not a lot. I recognize that emigrating there is a major privilege. New Zealand isn't going to take a crazy amount of refugees, and I'm not talking about trying to go there as a refugee. Some places are a lot better than others. And you're welcome to stay and fight, but I don't think you understand either what that will mean or what you'll be able to accomplsh.

For people who are actually considering it I did a bunch of research, and in general the best overall place to emigrate to for the next 25-30 years if you want English speaking was New Zealand. Good, stable political climate, best overall political system, good healthcare, relatively shielded from the worst of climate change issues, reasonably good cost of living. It can be difficult to emigrate - they have a skills-based quota system - and for us the big gotcha was having an adult son with medical needs we would need to cover out of pocket (he could come and be there, but he would not be a NZ citizen and not be covered under the medical coverage unless he got a job). But that's a relatively niche issue and would probably not be a problem for most others.

It is almost precisely the same as what happened in TFA; the only difference was that Rey was telling herself and remembering what she was told, vs Luke being told "use the force". If that's enough explanation for you I guess that's cool, but I don't think having an alexa reminder is proof that there was a whole lot of training. The first part of the fight Rey fights Kylo she gets her ass kicked too. Per your criteria below we had 'established' that Rey was great at hand to hand combat earlier in the movie because she swung a stick. Why is that not enough? Also it's weird to think this, but consider: Luke needs to lose to Vader at that moment so that he can both find out that Vader is his father and so that he can use Vader to kill the Emperor. That is the Force throughline. If the Force willed that Luke would win, well, he would have won. Anakin's piloting skills are explained by a 9 year old being able to fly jets at breakneck speed? That's not an 'explanation'. That's saying he's amazing at it to start with. The explanation is that piloting is as much force-powered as anything else. We see this with Luke, with Vader, with Anakin, with other Jedi pilots having their own craft. I don't think it needs that, because TFA literally answers this. Rey even answers this. You see her getting her ass kicked, then she trusts in the force, and then she wins. Luke is shown to have problems with his computer, then he's told to trust in the force, then he wins. For some reason using absurdly force-powered physical skills is implausible for people but using absurdly force-powered skills to fly a technologically advanced military starcraft is entirely reasonable. I don't get it. Now, if you want to get into the weirdness of Rey being able to jedi mind trick someone without seeing it - yeah, I agree! That one is super weird. I think it's about as weird as Luke grabbing his lightsaber with the force; neither should have any idea that that's what the force lets you do. But it's still pretty odd! I wonder why you're not upset that Luke didn't ask Yoda 'hey, I was able to grab a lightsaber from a distance, what's up with that?' though.

Yep, this continues to be bullshit. Luke turns off a targeting computer and shoots a proton torpedo into a hole the size of a large dog and that proceeds to take a right turn. In TESB, Luke uses force telekinesis despite never having a single bit of force training or even seeing it once. Luke is able to block laser blasts because Obi-Wan tells him to relax, and is able to do so in a matter of minutes of picking up a saber. Anakin is able to fly a space ship and destroy a major war asset when he's like 9 years old, as well as pilot two jet engines strapped to a go-kart. You just don't need montages or heavy training if you're strong in the force or you trust the force. Note the most implausible things that get done in the movies happen when that person surrenders to the force entirely - Luke with the trench run, Rey with the duel. The idea that it takes some kind of different ability or that swordfighting requires physical training but shooting a torpedo only requires instinct is incredibly ass-backwards; if anything, you would think that dueling would be the least requiring training and most relying on the force for flow and behavior.