LibertyBell

I always knew you were a surfing dude! You give off that vibe. I know a lot of them and surfing people are THE BEST people! East coast, west coast, Hawaii, doesn't matter.

Looks like Norway will be 100% ev by 2030 too

how did you guys do in 2012-13?

Chicago police threatening to go on strike unless Vallas wins is proof of that...FBI did the same thing when Clinton wanted to give clemency to Peltier, who is -still- unjustly imprisoned (going on 46 years now)

Yes they function the best.

that may portend to some good fortune, I wouldn't mind something simular to 2012-13 for neutral or 2002-03 for el nino or a mix of those two for that matter. I liked the preceding summers too. I know you don't do summer forecasts, but would you say a hot/dry summer is more likely, along the lines of either 2012 or 2002, Ray?

I wonder if we were in a stronger blocking regime back then, we didn't have that kind of blocking in the late 80s or late 90s/beginning of 2000s.

neutrals after la nina are some of our worst winters....1989-90, 2001-02, etc.

and dont forget the paper on the great January 2016 blizzard that gave us our first 30+ inch blizzard with true blizzard conditions for 12 hours straight!

Bud Selig should never have been allowed to be commish, the guy sucked. Golf is awesome, I live between two courses lol

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index Democracy Index, the US ranks as a "flawed democracy" at number 30 1 Norway Full democracy 9.81 0.06 10.00 9.64 10.00 10.00 9.41 2 New Zealand Full democracy 9.61 0.14 10.00 9.29 10.00 8.75 10.00 3 2 Iceland Full democracy 9.52 0.34 10.00 9.64 8.89 9.38 9.71 4 Sweden Full democracy 9.39 0.13 9.58 9.64 8.33 10.00 9.41 5 2 Finland Full democracy 9.29 0.02 10.00 9.64 8.33 8.75 9.71 6 Denmark Full democracy 9.28 0.19 10.00 9.29 8.33 9.38 9.41 7 2 Switzerland Full democracy 9.14 0.24 9.58 9.29 8.33 9.38 9.12 8 1 Ireland Full democracy 9.13 0.13 10.00 8.21 8.33 10.00 9.12 9 2 Netherlands Full democracy 9.00 0.12 9.58 8.93 8.33 8.75 9.41 Flawed democracies 25 4 Czech Republic Flawed democracy 7.97 0.23 9.58 6.43 7.22 7.50 9.12 9 Greece Flawed democracy 7.97 0.41 10.00 7.14 6.67 7.50 8.53 27 Estonia Flawed democracy 7.96 0.12 9.58 7.86 6.67 6.88 8.82 28 Portugal Flawed democracy 7.95 0.13 9.58 7.50 6.67 6.88 9.12 29 6 Israel Flawed democracy 7.93 0.04 9.58 7.86 9.44 6.88 5.88 30 4 United States Flawed democracy 7.85 9.17 6.43 8.89 6.25 8.53 31 4 Slovenia Flawed democracy 7.75 0.21 9.58 7.14 7.22 6.25 8.53 32 2 Botswana Flawed democracy 7.73 9.17 6.79 6.67 7.50 8.53 33 Malta Flawed democracy 7.70 0.13 9.17 7.14 5.56 8.13 8.53 34 3 Italy Flawed democracy 7.69 0.01 9.58 6.79 7.22 7.50 7.35

Happiness index scores tell the tale, the big boys and girls at the front of the line....these nations also handled covid the best, have the highest democracy index scores, etc. https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/rankings/happiness/ It's like clockwork lol Finland 7.82 1 2013 - 2021 Denmark 7.64 2 2013 - 2021 Iceland 7.56 3 2013 - 2021 Switzerland 7.51 4 2013 - 2021 Netherlands 7.41 5 2013 - 2021 Luxembourg 7.4 6 2013 - 2021 Sweden 7.38 7 2013 - 2021 Norway 7.37 8 2013 - 2021 Countries Happiness index, 2021 Global rank Available data Finland 7.82 1 2013 - 2021 Denmark 7.64 2 2013 - 2021 Iceland 7.56 3 2013 - 2021 Switzerland 7.51 4 2013 - 2021 Netherlands 7.41 5 2013 - 2021 Luxembourg 7.4 6 2013 - 2021 Sweden 7.38 7 2013 - 2021 Norway 7.37 8 2013 - 2021 Israel 7.36 9 2013 - 2021 New Zealand 7.2 10 2013 - 2021 Australia 7.16 11 2013 - 2021 Austria 7.16 12 2013 - 2021 Ireland 7.04 13 2013 - 2021 Canada 7.03 14 2013 - 2021 Germany 7.03 15 2013 - 2021 USA 6.98 16 2013 - 2021 UK 6.94 17 2013 - 2021 Czechia 6.92 18 2013 - 2021 Belgium 6.8 19 2013 - 2021 France 6.69 20 2013 - 2021

The rich should be taxed at like 90 percent on both wealth and income. They get away with paying zilch. Nordic countries are far better off and their "happiness index" high scores show it, as well as they get a lot more for their money than we do. Finland ranks highest on a lot of metrics, like social mobility and lack of income disparity and I believe they also have UBI (universal basic income) which we have been testing out in parts of NY and NJ.

Yes these hidden taxes and subsidies (like subsidies to big pharma and the fossil fuel cartels) really need to go.

this new schedule is so weird lol, I hope we don't have any of these games with NL teams in September during the pennant race.

dessert for breakfast sounds absolutely awesome!

thats opening day....the snow season is over, we need to move on (to warm and dry weather hopefully)

So you're saying if these countries paid their fair share then the burden could be more equally distributed. I still think we could have the same social programs they do (if the burden was equally shared), since there is outlandish overspending by the defense sector that doesn't need to occur.

This isn't 1800 or 1900, and US intervention has led to horrible outcomes in MANY parts of the world-- so no I don't buy that cliched propaganda. Eisenhower knew better and warned of the military industrial complex-- and being the leader of it-- he knew better than anyone else. https://www.npr.org/2011/01/17/132942244/ikes-warning-of-military-expansion-50-years-later https://www.npr.org/2011/01/16/132935716/eisenhowers-warning-still-challenges-the-nation In an effort to control the expansion of the military-industrial complex, Eisenhower consistently sought to cut the Pentagon's budget. The former general wanted a budget the country could afford, Bowman says. He upset all the military services with his budget cuts, especially the Air Force. Citing another quote from Eisenhower -- this one from another speech on military spending -- Bowman says, "The jet plane that roars overhead costs three quarters of a million dollars. That’s more than a man will make in his lifetime. What world can afford this kind of thing for long?" In today's government, Eisenhower has a fan in his fellow Kansan Secretary of Defense Robert Gates -- who keeps a portrait of the former general in his office at the Pentagon, Bowman says. Speaking at the Eisenhower Library last year, Gates talked about America's insatiable appetite for more and more weapons: But, Bowman says, it has only become more difficult to control the size of the nation's military industry. First, "there are only a handful of defense giants," he says, "which means you can't shop around for a better price." And companies such as Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman are also adept at both lobbying and marketing to promote their interests. Bowman says, "they also spread the jobs around the country, to lock in political support." Sponsor Message Gates has also discussed the difficulty of cutting military spending: Bowman says that some industry observers believe that "the one thing that could create that political will is the nation's huge deficit." Only that might force cuts in the overall defense budget.

did you see the one about Cigna using an automated program to reject lots of people for insurance benefits in a short amount of time? They didn't even open the applications, the program automatically rejects 50 people every minute lol private insurance sucks

and they are food deserts...many of our health conditions, like the diabetes epidemic are worse because of that...we have both urban and rural food deserts where fresh unprocessed food isn't commonly available.

As in the above post, the US spends/wastes WAYYYYY too much on the military industrial complex and could do much better if we spent that money on our own people right here.

This country spends/wastes WAYYYY too much money on the military industrial complex....if it didn't do that we could have the same social programs that other nations have. Notice how quickly they dole out billions for other nations and never do it for people who live right here.

I think thats how all nations to be, this nation is too big for its own good....most large nations eventually break up into smaller parts, because they are more manageable and easier to run.