Ok, not football at all, but it matters, eventually.

[WTF11]

OW,

Many of my Brit friends really struggle with the "freedom of speech" thing. They profess to understand it and the superficially do but they can't really grasp the full significance of it. They don't understand it's the building block of the US. It's the first amendment for a reason and the second amendment was not granted to "protect your home or kill animals for food on your table". The second was put in to protect against the "tyranny of goverment". They knew you would have to fight to protect the first amendment.

The journalists were given absolute protection against the government and litigation. The founders did not envision that the journalists would become tools and propagandists. They are the lowest form of life in our country. They have sold their souls for 30 pieces of silver. They knew all of the above was lies and tripe and they know that Trump is not going to destroy democracy. No single person can do that but a cabal of soulless federal politicians and bureacrats can. They need a puppet to appear to lead while they run everything. They had the perfect one in a senile old fool that couldn't pass a drivers license or basic cognitive test. Now they have one that's never gotten a primary vote for president in her career and they've propped her up as the second coming.

I think the 17th amendment was the beginning of the end for us. As you know we aren't a "democracy". We are a representative republic and the Senate was created to act as a balancing act on the will of the people vs what's best for the country. They aren't always the same and without that balance "mob rule" tends to take over. The most important thing is that we have learned we have the power of the purse and can just vote ourselves the treasury. Politicians do this all the time to curry votes and no one worries about the $37,000,000,000,000 debt we've left our kids and grandkids. That will never be paid off on the day of reckoning when the world financial community collapses because it's all just paper money and IOU's will be incredibly ugly.

I will discontinue my doom and gloom rants. It's depressing and nothing anyone can do about it.

"Many of my Brit friends really struggle with the "freedom of speech" thing. They profess to understand it and the superficially do but they can't really grasp the full significance of it.". What do you mean "the full significance"? It's not just the US where freedom of speech underpins all, democracy depends on it, wherever that form of government is practised, and the effects of the failure to enjoy such can be seen in Russia, China, North Korea, Iran etc etc.

What I find puzzling is that intelligent folks like yourself and some others who post here persist in believing that Trump and his acolytes believe in free speech. Were he to be elected, God forbid, his threat to be a Presidential dictator will become true, and your beloved freedom of speech will exist only for those who agree with him. The strength of a democracy isn't gauged by how much self serving agreement there might be, but how it copes with opposition and challenge. Trump hates challenge and opposition, his temperament and behaviour has shown that on every occasion where his views and actions have been challenged, the spots won't change were we to be faced with the horrific prospect of him as President.

BTW, just going back to the post by OW? Any real fact checking going on there?

One example from the list of supposed media snowstorms that caught my eye "The same media that tell us the US economy is just fine (with 20% inflation)."

So all these organisations, most of whom make their living from providing accurate, factual, peer-reviewed information regarding the economy in general and in this case inflation specifically, they're all conspiring with each other to provide false information?

https://tradingeconomics.com/united-.../inflation-cpi

https://www.statista.com/statistics/...ate-in-the-us/

https://www.statista.com/statistics/...united-states/

https://www.usinflationcalculator.co...flation-rates/

https://ycharts.com/indicators/us_inflation_rate

Criticise the media by all means, the get stuff wrong all the time, but at the very least do some homework before the "facts" that are given get held up to be as real as the eating cats and dogs story was.

[hopelesslyoptimistic]

Spaldy - it’s interesting if you trace the ownership of the various media outlets how concentrated it is into about 4 or 5 large groups. Some of those also have been (some might say with good reason) accused of pushing a particular left wing agenda (which some might call woke).

The stuff that came out recently about the pressure Facebook was put under during Covid and subsequently and some of the actions alleged by the Senate and Congress to have been taken by government departments are slightly concerning not least for a county founded on free speech.

Trump attracts a lot of attention for sure but some of it seems to be because be doesn’t play by the rules of the liberal elite so they portray him as a threat to society but it seems fit could really be because he wants to upset the status quo they so desperately want to maintain.

Listen to a lot of what the likes of Rand Paul and Jim Jordan who seem sensible as does Comer. The reaction to the Trump shooting seemed to bring out a lot of middle ground moderates from both sides united in trying to understand and get to the bottom of it all.

[spaldy]

Orgs, not meaning to get you stirred up. However, two sides to look at the presidential election process. As you know we are not a democracy. We are a representative republic. Big difference.

The other side of the electoral college is that it's the sole reason that the entire country is not controlled by a collection of large urban areas. You can see the brilliance of the founding fathers. You can see what happens when that happens at the state levels. Living down state IL, upstate New York or off the coast in California means you are basically without representation on any state or federal matters in those states. Chicago, New York City or So Cal or San Fran means you just pay taxes but have little or no input on how the state is run.

The whole intent was to provide equal representation as well as make it hard to pass laws/regulations. That's largely been destroyed when they passed the 17th amendment which made the senate a popular vote position. The senate, along with Judicial was intended to act as a "brake" on populist and mob rule that predominates in the House. With the 17th amendment the senate is little different that the house and when one party controls congress, the senate and the presidency it can just pass anything it wants regardless of the impact on the country. The $35,000,000,000,000 debt ($272,00 per citizen) is one simple example of not having guardrails on a system. This does even include trillions of dollars of liabilities that aren't included in "government accounting" on the debt.

https://www.usdebtclock.org/

I think the 17th amendment along with the politicization of our public schools sealed our fate. The old Ben Franklin saying "'When people discover they can vote themselves money that is the end of the Republic'.

[Orgoner]

Orgs, not meaning to get you stirred up. However, two sides to look at the presidential election process. As you know we are not a democracy. We are a representative republic. Big difference.

The other side of the electoral college is that it's the sole reason that the entire country is not controlled by a collection of large urban areas. You can see the brilliance of the founding fathers. You can see what happens when that happens at the state levels. Living down state IL, upstate New York or off the coast in California means you are basically without representation on any state or federal matters in those states. Chicago, New York City or So Cal or San Fran means you just pay taxes but have little or no input on how the state is run.

The whole intent was to provide equal representation as well as make it hard to pass laws/regulations. That's largely been destroyed when they passed the 17th amendment which made the senate a popular vote position. The senate, along with Judicial was intended to act as a "brake" on populist and mob rule that predominates in the House. With the 17th amendment the senate is little different that the house and when one party controls congress, the senate and the presidency it can just pass anything it wants regardless of the impact on the country. The $35,000,000,000,000 debt ($272,00 per citizen) is one simple example of not having guardrails on a system. This does even include trillions of dollars of liabilities that aren't included in "government accounting" on the debt.

https://www.usdebtclock.org/

I think the 17th amendment along with the politicization of our public schools sealed our fate. The old Ben Franklin saying "'When people discover they can vote themselves money that is the end of the Republic'.

You're not wrong. Even in NH, there is a big North/South divide.

Southern NH is not so different from Massachusetts, which has a much different vibe to those living North of where I live.

I guess no system is ever going to be perfect, but the whole election process seems more of a circus than anything else, even if important things are at stake.

[spaldy]

Said it earlier in the thread but it really, really, really is hard to believe with over 250,000,000 potential candidates that this is the best we could come up with. Of course, who in their right mind would want the job. You have to sell your soul and lose all sense of self identity.

Almost as hard to believe is the fact when Truman left the job in 1952 he packed up a U haul trailer and pulled it with a Chrysler that was loaned to him to head back to Independence Missouri to live in his 3 bedroom house. No secret service and no books, media or other money grabs. Just went back to normal life. I went through his house on a tour in the early 80's. it was little different than my Grandparents house in Pinckneyville IL. It just boggles the mind that this occurred just a few years before I was born.

[spaldy]

Francew,

Apologies, no reason to get all bowed up like I did.

[spaldy]

The Nazi Germany prior to WW2 was one of the best fighting machines ever assembled. Modern state of the are weaponry including the worlds best Air Force,Navy and weaponry. Brilliant commanders, well trained and motivated fighting troops. Russia has none of that. Frankly, China doesn't either but they steal technology better than any country in the world so they likley will have a technical equivalancy.

MT, your post caused me some contemplation last night. An an old yank I'm still kind of hard wired to the fact that great weaponry wins you a war. After reading your post and thinking a bit I realized full blast the next way isn't likely to be won by the best plane, ships or weaponry. They will still be critical in tactical battle plans but the real winner is likley to be someone that can shut the power grid down, disable cars and any equipment that runs with computer chips, and eliminate all of the digital currency. All of this from afar with no shots actually being fired. I knew this but never really processed the full extent of it. It's also really scary the rush to AI and robot fighting equipment.

[ozleeds]

The Nazi Germany prior to WW2 was one of the best fighting machines ever assembled. Modern state of the are weaponry including the worlds best Air Force,Navy and weaponry. Brilliant commanders, well trained and motivated fighting troops. Russia has none of that. Frankly, China doesn't either but they steal technology better than any country in the world so they likley will have a technical equivalancy.

MT, your post caused me some contemplation last night. An an old yank I'm still kind of hard wired to the fact that great weaponry wins you a war. After reading your post and thinking a bit I realized full blast the next way isn't likely to be won by the best plane, ships or weaponry. They will still be critical in tactical battle plans but the real winner is likley to be someone that can shut the power grid down, disable cars and any equipment that runs with computer chips, and eliminate all of the digital currency. All of this from afar with no shots actually being fired. I knew this but never really processed the full extent of it. It's also really scary the rush to AI and robot fighting equipment.

Correct Spaldy on tech. there is a lot of ways to win wars than fighting. Take India with making 90% of the worlds medicine as they like China copied other countries intentioned and how do they get away with it who knows. They can temper the medicine and kill millions. People are waking up to China but only a handful are stopping them eg Taiwan. People were laughing when they tried to take over the world with Haiwe tech till they were caught as they thought it was a hox. On the other side we won't need wars to destroy ourselves as you say technology will kill us as it already is with exploding cars, house's on fire due to scooters and well batteries everywhere the whole world will blow up as one blows and the rest go up at the same time.

[hopelesslyoptimistic]

Part of the challenge with modern governments is they are unable and/or unwilling to have a proper debate about the big issues.

They also don’t seem to get the maxim that just because you can doesn’t mean you should.

Hey ho!!

[WTF11]

The Nazi Germany prior to WW2 was one of the best fighting machines ever assembled. Modern state of the are weaponry including the worlds best Air Force,Navy and weaponry. Brilliant commanders, well trained and motivated fighting troops. Russia has none of that. Frankly, China doesn't either but they steal technology better than any country in the world so they likley will have a technical equivalancy.

MT, your post caused me some contemplation last night. An an old yank I'm still kind of hard wired to the fact that great weaponry wins you a war. After reading your post and thinking a bit I realized full blast the next way isn't likely to be won by the best plane, ships or weaponry. They will still be critical in tactical battle plans but the real winner is likley to be someone that can shut the power grid down, disable cars and any equipment that runs with computer chips, and eliminate all of the digital currency. All of this from afar with no shots actually being fired. I knew this but never really processed the full extent of it. It's also really scary the rush to AI and robot fighting equipment.

Agreed on the observation regarding how new conflicts might be fought and won, but that statement regarding Nazi Germany having "the best Air Force, Navy and weaponry"???????? Who there fella!!!

A few tidbits regarding what naval assets they had available to them, how "effective" they were at fighting and also "who had what" when it came to air power;

Firstly, I agree with the comment regarding commanders etc. A large part of the allied armies problems at the outbreak of WWII stemmed from the inability to find commanding officers capable of dealing with modern warfare and the development of tactics that were appropriate to that new way of waging war.

Observations on the Naval front;

Graf Spee was scuttled just off Montevideo on evening of Sunday, December 17, 1939 (about 14 weeks after war was declared), in the face of overwhelming British naval forces.

Bismark, the largest and most powerful capital ship in the Kriegsmarine, only sailed once. In May 1941, Bismark took part in an offensive operation codenamed Rheinübung, which resulted in the sinking of HMS Hood (the only vessel to be sunk by Bismark). Bismarcks single major operation lasted just over a week and ended in its destruction by the Royal Navy in the North Atlantic on May 27, 1941.

Tirpitz hid in Norwegian Fjords for almost the whole of its operational life, damaged in an attack by British mini-submarines and large-scale air raids. On 12 November 1944, RAF Lancaster bombers from 617 and 9 squadrons, equipped with 12,000-pound "Tallboy" bombs scored two direct hits and a near miss which caused the ship to capsize rapidly. It never sailed on offensive operations and fired its main armament just once when bombarding Spitzbergen island.

All these ships were in service with that "best navy" at the start of hostilities, but there's not much point having nice shiny toys with big guns if you're too afraid of your opponents to use them?

Where the Kreigsmarine was considerably better off was in the submarine fleet, which very nearly led to the British starving, that I'll give you!

And the air forces?

As the Battle of Britain began in July 1940, RAF Fighter Command had approximately 768 aircraft after the squandering of many during the failed attempt to help the French during the battle for France. Of that number, only 520 were still considered battleworthy. Due to aircraft manufacturers plans for increased production however, particularly distributed production centres making interdiction by German bombers less damaging, this situation improved radically over the next few weeks. By the time the Germans offensive reached its peak in early August, the number of RAF fighters available almost doubled to just over 1,000. British aircraft manufacturers were producing around 500 fighters per month (double the number estimated by German intelligence).

Equipment was not the main concern for Fighter Command, the availability of trained pilots was. The German airforce had had substantial operational experience during the Spanish Civil war, when Hitler assisted the forces under Franco. The experience for both fighter and bomber crews was of great value to the Luftwaffe during the Blitzkreig operations and during the early part of the Battle of Britain (less so as more RAF pilots gained the requisite battle experience and attrition rates fell).

At this time of the war, monthly Luftwaffe fighter production was approximately 300 airframes. However, German production capacity wasn't fully mobilized and failed to produce enough 109s required to overwhelm Fighter Command. By September 7, the Luftwaffe was down to just 533 fighters and temporarily dipped as low as 275. Given these comparative numbers early on the "real war (the "phony war having lasted from September 1939, until May of 1940), the RAF held a significant numerical advantage in both planes available and production capacity.[/B]

The RAF had aircraft broadly equal to those frontline fighters in the Luftwaffe, (Spitfire and Hurricane vs Messerchmitt BF109). The Spitfire had superior climbing speed and turn rates, was slightly slower in level flight and unlike the Bf109 employed a normally aspirated fuel system, meaning inverted flight was very limited. The Hurricane was slower still, and was used during the Battle of Britain as the major bomber attacking force given its superior gun platform performance. The Messerschmitt 110 and Junkers 87 were considerably less of a threat to the RAF, to such an extent that the Ju87 (Stuka) was withdrawn from combat operations after suffering catastrophic losses during attempts to bomb RAF coastal radar stations.

The Luftwaffe was never really that superior, only in numerical terms at the outset of the war and only then for a brief period. What's also worth noting is that the RAF had one crucial technical advantage over the Luftwaffe, radar. Without radar and the associated plotting and fighter control room network, the RAF is unlikely to have been able to maintain a constant airborne presence which would have been required to identify Luftwaffe raids. Without it it's equally unlikely that the RAF would have succeeded in winning the battle.

So yes, the German armed forces had some advantages at the outset of WWII, but the best? Nope.