> Try flying Lufthansa (or one of their half dozen subsidiaries created almost entirely to give worse service) anywhere inside of europe. Everything is a money grab and the service and boarding are terrible.
FWIW, I just took such a flight and didn't notice anything that compares unfavorably to a domestic U.S. airline. (To be clear, it certainly wasn't better either.) Is there anything specific you can point to?
Every drink is for sale, even coffee. They aggressively use the bag sizer and try to take bags away at the gate, under the ruse that their tiny Airbus overhead bins cannot fit them (they can).
Just put it in the hold. I can’t stand waiting for the cheapskate to find somewhere to put their 45kg “rucksack” in the over head bins just to save a tenner.
Checked luggage is lost luggage, in my experience. I think I've only checked maybe two or three bags in the past 20 years (after two lost-luggage incidents prompted me to switch to a carry-on-only packing regimen), and then only because I needed to transport liquids in excess of the in-cabin allowance.
I also like to leave the airport after my plane arrives, not stand around a conveyor belt for some unguessable amount of time.
But I get your frustration; I'm the kind of person who barely breaks stride out of the aisle and into my row as I sling my bag up into the bin. It makes me want to scream when someone is standing there in the aisle for 30+ seconds, holding up the boarding process.
Then again, the airlines are to blame as well, most of them having terribly inefficient boarding processes.
"Put it in the hold" is a decent argument for point-to-point flights, or when you do gate checking. Otherwise it's a crap-shoot whether your stuff makes it (which can end a two-day business trip before it begins), what shape it will be in, and how long you'll have to wait. As soon as you have a connection, all bets are off.
How long you'll have to wait is mostly a function not of the airline, but of the arrival airport and the competence of the handling company.
The airlines deserve no money above the price of a ticket. The way i see it the hold comes free with the rest of the plane. I see no reason why i need to pay another 40 pounds to bring a case, so i will shamelessly abuse my allowance. (if it was a reasonable amount like a tenner, that would be a different story, as it stands it's a cash grab)
> It very much is. No where else in life are people forced to mixed with the general unfiltered public.
I'm baffled by this. Many workplaces? Mass transit? Walking down the sidewalk? At a concert? Buying groceries? True, there don't all expose you to the full sweep of human existence at once but, in aggregate, it seems pretty similar to what you'd encounter at most public schools. What if they want a career in a hospital, or law enforcement, or social services, ... the list goes on.
You might hope that your child will live a privileged existence unbothered by the rabble, but it seems to me they need to be prepared for a future where they encounter all kinds of people. I'm sure this can be compatible with homeschooling but I can't see how it's not generally a disadvantage. (Though perhaps onerous clearly outweighed by other advantages, depending on the situation.)
The closest social equivalency to public school socialization I can think of is prison. You're stuck there for N hours per day with limited or zero control over what other people you're around. Maybe parts of military training might also be similar.
That's the kind of thing that is very much not like the "real world." It's more than just being "exposed" to less optimal peers (like you would on a bus), it's an entirely different social experience.
> Most workplaces are highly filtered. The whole interview process is specifically geared towards filtering out undesirable people.
This just isn't true or is born from a standpoint of extreme luck. Like have you genuinely paid attention to the people you work with? Coworkers, CEOs, the stuff people say in slack channels or the things people gossip about at work? The only way I think someone can genuinely hold an opinion like this is by being so unaware of what workplace politics that they are unaware that most workplaces are like Highschool 2. Even the professional ones. Especially the professional ones.
It's absolutely undeniable that interviewing is meant to filter out undesirable behavior. What in the world do you think it is? So many people cannot just walk in and start working next to you, very few will be selected.
You are pointing out behavior that is different, but not undesirable. Which is not being discussed. i.e., kids who distrust other kids learning is undesirable. As would people who create hostile work environments, or are inefficient, or unreliable, or don't have the right connections.
In my place of work people nearly universally went to top end universities, a much larger proportion than the normal population have phds. you think that's random? And more locally if you work on a sales team you are going to be hired to work directly with people that have certain shared traits that make them effective sellers. It's so obvious that interviewing is an active filter I'm not even sure what to do to convince someone that thinks otherwise.
I'm not sure how you equate any of that to workplace politics or gossip. Even if it was relevant, the fact that it is not a perfectly effective filter doesn't make it not a filter.
You don’t have to sit side-by-side rubbing shoulders and squabbling with rabble for 12 years in order to understand and deal with it, just like you don’t have to wrestle with gators for 12 years to learn respect for nature.
> You might hope that your child will live a privileged existence unbothered by the rabble
I think it's telling that the other responses seem to focus on exactly this; the idea that their child will exist in a class apart from the rabble, and will not have to interact with them.
It seems to speak to two very different views of community. On the one hand, there is community as a collection of all the people in a space: people who share local resources, frequent the same local businesses, and have the same local concerns. On the other, there is a community of choice: people who share the same social class, and possibly the same religion or cultural beliefs. I think it's fair to say that you can have both, but trying to say that you can belong solely to the communities you choose and treat everyone else as beneath notice sounds quite problematic, and it will absolutely not give children a correct or complete view of the world.
Isn't this exactly what society is built on though? Mutually beneficial interactions borne of choice, not compulsion? And isn't it the sane, rational thing to do to oppose people who compel you to join their community?
I reread that old thread, and then skimmed the Penn State article (a bit quickly, I admit). I gotta say: I think you're overstating your case here. Certainly, the author of that article is skeptical about the 100-mile zone and makes plenty of good (and, IMO, obvious) points about why it is constitutionally suspect. But, to read your comments, you'd think that some important court somewhere has actually placed meaningful limits on immigration enforcement within that zone (outside the context of an actual border crossing). If so, I don't see where you're getting that. If that's actually in the article, could you tell us where?
To be fair, though, I think it is also true that the ACLU is too eager to talk about the "Constitution-Free Zone" as though it is fact. I also agree that people should not simply accept that the Constitution-Free Zone exists. It is definitely not that simple and what would otherwise be 4th Amendment violations should absolutely still be challenged even if they occur within the zone. There is still every opportunity for more good law on this.
Without wanting to recapitulate this argument for the Nx1000th time if we don't have to I'll just say that the points I'm making are points ACLU itself now makes.
Since the ACLU is largely the origin of this meme, I think that's pretty dispositive.
Importantly: I am (for the Nx1000th time) not saying that federal law enforcement officers won't make abusive claims, or directly abuse the law; they certainly will. As I said in the previous thread, they managed to detain Senator Patrick Leahy more than 100 miles from a border, which, when you think about the implications of the 100-mile-zone, is kind of a feat!
>The federal government defines a “reasonable distance” as 100 air miles from any external boundary of the U.S. So, combining this federal regulation and the federal law regarding warrantless vehicle searches, CBP claims authority to board a bus or train without a warrant anywhere within this 100-mile zone. Nearly two-thirds of the U.S. population, over 213 million people, reside within the region that CBP considers falling within the 100-mile border zone, according to the 2020 census. Most of the 10 largest cities in the U.S., such as New York City, Los Angeles, and Chicago, fall in this region. Some states, like Florida, lie entirely within this border band so their entire populations are impacted.
Which, upon re-reading both of your comments in this thread makes me actually think there is no argument at all and everyone here and the ACLU agree: there is a no consitution zone, it has practical consequences, and it does extend out 100 miles from internal foreign borders.
The executive branch asserts that there is such a zone. But the truth is likely that many, if not all, 4th Amendment rights still apply in many situations within that zone. It's situation dependent, so it's difficult to make a sweeping generalization. But some of the executive branch's most aggressive claims and tactics, at least, may well not hold up in court.
I think one thing that happens in these discussions is that people lose sight of how big a deal an actual border search is. An actual border search (I've had the pleasure! And mine was on the mild end of things.) is much worse than a search incident to arrest.
What I feel like people do here is map everyday abusive law enforcement behavior onto that border search exemption without realizing that what they're actually suggesting is that people should expect (and thus roll with) a "tear everything apart, search under clothes, maximally invasive" border search, which is what the Constitution authorizes at an actual border crossing.
Drive a white Altima across I20 from Abilene to Shreveport. Be a good boy and drive within the speed limit. You'll get pulled over for suspicion of being a drug mule. Of course you're innocent, but if you decline to allow them to search your car, they'll call in a drug dog that's trained to alert whenever its handler wants. So they toss your car and all your belongings. Strip out all the door panels, everything. If they want, they can plant evidence and jail you. If they decide to be nice, they just leave you on the side of the road trying to figure out how to put your car back together.
> The executive branch asserts that there is such a zone. But the truth is likely that many, if not all, 4th Amendment rights still apply in many situations within that zone.
Technically, the entire fourth amendment applies. BUT All the fourth amendment requires is probable cause for warrants, and that searches and seizures be reasonable. It doesn't require warrants for searches or seizures (although courts have found that that is usually necessary for reasonableness), and it doesn't require probable cause for searches or seizures without a warrant (though courts have found that that also is usually necessary for reasonableness.)
What the courts have allowed is the use of the border zone to justify exceptions to a lot of the things that are usually required for reasonableness. This isn't, technically, an exception to the Fourth Amendment, because searches still need to be "reasonable". Its just proximity to the border makes searches "reasonable" that wouldn't be anywhere else.
I'm doing ["border search" "miles" site:uscourts.gov], getting cases --- recent cases, including some with cites to Ameida-Sanchez, which of course makes my point --- and not seeing much to suggest that CBP can randomly search random cars in Green Bay WI under the border search exemption.
Congress asserts this since they passed the 2001 bill that destroyed the country. It was called The PATRIOT Act. It created this, not any particular president's interpretation. All the executives since Bush jr. have asserted it. And I called it out then, in the past, over and over and over. But our leaders were too charismatic to hold to accord. None of them sunset the PATRIOT act in 2003 when it was supposed to or any time it could have been thereafter. Niether that nor the 2001/2002 authorizations of use of military force used for assassinating US citizens(1). Which was formalized via the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disposition_Matrix created by Obama and used by Obama/Obama/Trump/Biden/Trump. We had our chance. No one cared.
And now here we are with most of the population of the USA without rights and the president able to declare anyone left a terrorist and use the military against them.
I'm also curious, why would Russia continue to send thousands to their deaths while holding back supplies and stuff? Unless it's intentional to appear weaker than they are.
But I don't see how that would work, unless the US is intentionally witholding intel from their allies - the US, since the invention of spaceflight, has had spy sattelites trained at Russia and they would see large accumulations and transports of tanks and tank parts.
Ok I spent the last hour looking for this interview and I honestly can't find it - the closest I can get to the source is this article saying that Russia is building a strategic reserve of tanks:
But it's not the one I read which was literally a general saying "they are building tanks and not sending them to the front - why if not to fight with NATO eventually".
> Russian factories are working at full speed, producing new tanks and repairing those that have been dusty for years," writes "Le Figaro". The French daily refers to its sources and data from independent study groups. On the other hand, experts also point to the fact that this year the losses of the Russians have decreased - this year it was only 200 tanks. According to the newspaper, this may be due to the fact that the participation of these vehicles in the fighting at the front has been reduced. This, in turn, is the result of greater use of drones.
This actually strikes me as fairly plausible: it suggests that Russia has decided that tanks are not ideally suited for the current drone war in Ukraine. So they're continuing to ramp up production, but aren't (at this point) sending them to the front.
This doesn't necessarily mean that they have a long-term plan to invade NATO, however. I can think of many other scenarios where it would be in Russia's strategic interest to have a large modernized tank force in reserve.
We're in peacetime, but the current leadership perceives us to be in a pitched great-power struggle, and perhaps near-term shooting war, with China. Similarly, while we are not literally at war with Russia, we are in a very acute global conflict with them of another type that might be thought to warrant a different pace of military innovation. Perhaps these factors are what GP had in mind.
Got evidence that they supplied weapons? GP’s Wikipedia article does not seem to say that they did (apart from an unclear reference to US military aid, which I don’t think refers to US military aid to Sudan specifically).
China never directly supplied weapons either. Yet its weapons have been found on both sides. The RSF got them through the UAE and the SAF got it through Iran.
If GGP is going to count China as a supplier it's only fair to count the US. Js. Fwiw, both China and the US place sanctions on the RSF and denounce it as a genocide. Neither directly does business with either side.
Russia is involved directly in the conflict however, literally sending in Wagner mercenaries. They used to back the RSF but in early 2024 switched sides and now fully back the SAF. The sad truth is that most major international players don't care about the Sudanese people. They just want to have the support of whichever side comes out on top so they can continue exploiting the gold reserves of the country like they did before the dictator Omar al-Bashir was overthrown by a popular revolution.
I think it’s possibly fair to say the U.S. doesn’t want this war to continue and probably doesn’t even want the UAE to supply weapons to it, but that was likely true of Israel’s bombing of Gaza as well and no one batted an eyelid when holding the U.S. responsible there.
I haven't found any articles implicating the US, which has export sanctions on Sudan. The only thing I could find was something about small arms from the UK.
That is like saying Russia is suppling Ukraine with weapons to kill Russians because Russia has exported weapons to X that then made it to Ukraine. That is just silly claiming Russia is a supplier of arms to Ukraine.
It's more like stating that Margaret Thatcher knew what her son was up to and could have stopped him had she wanted to.
It's exactly embracing the notion that five eyes track the volumes of their arms sales and are indiffeent to their arms being used to kill children, civilians, etc. as long as they're not being stockpiled for use against the originating nation in any significant volume.
I'd suggest that Russia is less adept here than the US or the UK if they're being harmed by thir own supply.
No, it is not. It is the exact same situation. Do YOU think it make sense to put a headline claiming Russia is supplying weapons to Ukraine? Is that an accurate description of reality?
You're using the word "stolen" here with a lot of conviction but, imho, not a lot of rigor. In what sense did people "own" the artifacts that the British removed from Egypt? Who owned them? If nobody owned them, how were they "stolen"? That's the weak version of the problem.
The stronger version: how is it the case that Egypt, or Egyptians, today "own" something that has been in the British museum far longer than any of them have been alive? Even if the artifacts were wrongfully taken in the first instance, does that automatically mean that the only right thing to do is to return them, even after centuries? Are the myriad other interests that have accumulated in the interim simply not matter? How long domes something have to remain in Britain for it to meaningfully become part of British heritage as well as Egyptian? Should we also be working to return artifacts looted by the ancient Egyptians to their own ancestral homes, even though the looting occurred thousands of years ago when they were the dominant power? Perhaps they should give back everything south of the First Cataract to the Nubians. (Hopefully it's clear that this is a reductio not a policy proposal!)
That's not to say I think it's categorically acceptable for powerful nations to take historical artifacts. But I don't think this has really anything to do with "stealing" in the usual sense. if anything, that rhetoric just obscures the issues here that might truly be worth thinking about.
The Egyptian peasant lives today much the same as his ancestors did. It's a remarkable degree of continuity! And some works were removed contrary to law quite recently like the head of Nefertiti.
Interesting points, but can you explain how they apply here? It's interesting and, afaik, true that modern Egyptians's lives today are more similar to their ancient ancestors' than you might expect (moreso than in many other nations). But how should we think about the relevance of this fact to debates about looted artifacts? Does the fact that they still work fields irrigated by the Nile suffice to give them a claim to repatriate artifacts taken generation ago? (Perhaps there are more similarities than this. I don't mean to be flippant on this point, I just am not an expert on all the similarities.) Or is it significant that they have generally abandoned the ancient Egyptian religion in favor of Islam, have a President rather than a Pharaoh, own televisions and smartphones, are now generally safe from crocodiles, have controlled the Nile's annual flooding (whose volatility was a dominant source of danger and drama in ancient life), etc.?
Regarding the Bust of Nefertiti, I guess it's debatable whether 100 years ago qualifies as "quite recently," but I suppose it does seem like yesterday when one is thinking about ancient Egypt! In any case, the analysis certainly may differ depending on the artifact. If the the date of the looting makes a difference I think that only supports the general thrust of my argument.
Probably so. I imagine the U.K. has laws that make such artifacts the formal property of the state. Was this true for 19th century Egypt?
I think it was true, on some level, at the time the bust of Nefertiti was taken in the 1920s. Supposedly, the Germans nominally followed some sort of legal process for removing the artifact -- though perhaps with less-than-full transparency.
Perhaps there are other reasons to claim that Egyptian artifacts were 'stolen.' But I'm trying to have a conversation about what those might be since the subject is not as obvious to me as others seem to think it is.
The view among "authorities" is certainly something I find relevant in assessing a highly opinionated but thinly sourced medium article from someone who, respectfully, I've never heard of and know nothing about. Certainly it would be defeasible by a closer look at the research itself. But, barring that, it's a very useful heuristic.
I'm not suggesting you should take the medium article at face value either. Just that if you don't know enough to evaluate the evidence, you don't know enough to dismiss any particular opinion.
People are far too willing, today, to defer their thinking blindly to a consensus of opinions, but worse, to accuse anyone who also doesn't defer of being malicious.
FWIW, I just took such a flight and didn't notice anything that compares unfavorably to a domestic U.S. airline. (To be clear, it certainly wasn't better either.) Is there anything specific you can point to?
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