So I was looking for something to watch while eating my dinner, and on a whim I went with The Fellowship of the Ring - Extended Edition. Now it’s been probably 15 years since I’ve seen the LOTR films, and I’ve only ever seen the theatrical versions. I thought that I’d be sorta half paying attention while I ate, then I’d get bored entirely with this movie I’ve seen before and start scrolling on my phone.

Instead I sat enrapt for the entire three-and-a-half hour runtime. Man, I’m not one of those people who wouldn’t consider watching a movie that’s longer than 150 mins, but for any movie I’ve watched that was three hours or more I’m distinctly aware by the end of it that I’ve been sitting down watching a movie for a long time. But all I could think at the end of Fellowship was that I wished I had time to watch the next one today. What an incredible movie.

Hearing and reading libs says shit like “See, Dick Cheney knows that Trump is even worse than he was, that’s why we have to vote blue” is infuriating. How can’t they see what’s really happening here?

The alternate world where this guy livestreamed the assassination of Donald John Trump and the subsequent battle to the death he would have had with secret service is fun to think about.

Bawhstin

Just like how Michael Moore was bowling during the Columbine massacre.

Watching Kevin Can Fuck Himself, I love the format. If you don’t know the show is a satirical take on King oF Queens style battle-of-the-sexes sitcoms. You’ve got the B plot, which is a single camera brightly lit sitcom in which a boorish husband gets in dumb manly shenanigans in which he is broadly insensitive towards his wife and uncaring of her needs and desires. Then the A plot of the wife, Allison, which is all moodily lit and darkly color graded, like a serious drama, in which she fantasizes about the violent murder of her husband.

So I’d love to see a political thriller done in the same way. Like the A plot is, I dunno, maybe some unelected government bureaucrat who stumbles across a conspiracy and starts getting harrassed by feds and/or non-state actors. Like that movie The Report starring Adam Driver, about the guy investigating the Torture Memos in the aughts. But then anytime he’s in a room with an elected it’s like a scene out of West Wing or VEEP, brushing off his concerns as they’re more worried about that week’s antics and ignoring any pleas for help with a see no evil hear no evil attitude or else so ready to give grandiose speeches about civility and the strength of our democracy that they ignore the cloak-and-dagger drama playing out in front of them.

Edit: I think the show is actually a multi-camera sitcom.

What? No way, I love the app. I think my favorite thing about is how if you click on a video it just loads forever, only playing if you back out of the video and then click on it a second time. Highly functional phone app, *reddit.com.*

It’s always a minefield talking to the guy at work who likes some of the same mass media as me (Witcher, he’s a big Star Wars guy, a really big WH40K guy (which I have a passing interest in but it’s fun to talk about), and is the only guy I’ve ever spoken to irl who knew what Conan: Exiles and Kingdom Come: Deliverance are) but has clearly had his brain poisoned by the manosphere. Maybe that’s not so surprising, given that particular list of media properties, but we’ll be having a conversation about some obscure bit of Star Wars lore we both think is cool and then he’ll say some shit like “the woke are ruining everything,” or “Henry Cavil will save WH40K from the wokes who destroyed The Witcher,” or “Why does all media have to make men out to be evil these days?” (I think the answer was probably the woke).

He’s a nice guy and I generally like talking him but I’m always wondering when this genial conversation is going to be derailed by vile nonsense.

But I live in a pretty conservative area so this sort of thing is to be expected. I assume everyone I meet here is a deranged christofascist until they give me cause to think otherwise. Perfect example of this, there’s an older man, upper sixties, at work who always stops to make polite small talk with me if we cross paths. Happened to overhear a conversation between him and another coworker who said she was homeschooling her child. And he said “That’s good. I don’t trust the state run schools. Teaching kids about evolution, and gender…”

Which she emphatically agreed with, as did several other coworkers who were nearby, all of various ages.

What if the worst man alive endorses our candidate? Would that be good for us?

Feels ghoulish to even talk about an ongoing tragedy this way, but I do find it curious that the shooter surrendered. Seems like that rarely happens in these situations.

A swishy dress? No sir, this is simply an extra length tunic in the style of the Anglo-Saxons made of a lightweight material. That it swishes most pleasingly when twirling is simply a happy accident.

A swishy dress? No sir, this is simply an extra length tunic in the style of the Anglo-Saxons made of a lightweight material. That it swishes most pleasingly when twirling is simply a happy accident.

Decided to play a little Bannerlord. I’ve played a bit of it and Warband before, but I really don’t know much about the mechanics or progression of the game. I just build as big an army as I can and rely on the old “select all, Charge” to defeat my enemies, until eventually I run into a situation like I am in now, where my total lack of tactical knowledge will lead to my destruction.

So I’ve got an army of 73, working as mercenaries for the Southern Empire, who are currently at war with the Northern Empire. Most of my troops, ~40 or so, are infantry. Then maybe 15 archers, 5 horse archers, and 5 cavalry. I got boxed in by two armies, one with 120 troops, the other with 87. They are also a lot of infantry, but combined they’ve got about 30 regular cavalry and 40 horse archers.

Now I am playing on the easiest difficulty, so I can win lopsided battles. But I think when I boot up the save again tomorrow I’m going to be overmatched on this one. I know some players are good enough at the combat that they can take one enormous armies all by their lonesome, but I’m terrible at it. Right now I’m a one-handed-sword+spear+shield cavalry. But not one of those polearms that has slashing attacks , just a low and high stab, (I think there are also lances in the game? I don’t have one of those either, if they do exist) and it’s just hard to time that attack while also riding full tilt on a horse. I might land 5 or 6 blows in any given battle that don’t get blocked, and of those maybe one outright kills a guy.

I’m normally not much an anime guy, but this show was wonderful. Considering reading the manga.

Forming relationships? No, I simply admire his posts from afar. And fight in flame wars for his honor.

(for real though, I debated whether or not that was the right term in this context, and since the OP used ‘fan’ in his question (and since I think I’ve never actually interacted with UlyssesT) I decided it does work)

Trying to lure me into a false sense of security are you? Exactly what a fed would do.

With respect to the power posters keeping this site alive, I refuse to form a parasocial relationship with an anonymous poster on a leftist shitposting/fed honeypot web forum.

It’s mind-boggling to me how fake the border is. One of the central political footballs of US domestic politics for… I don’t even know how long. As long as I’ve been alive. All the sweat, all the ink spilled, the dems constantly tacking rightwards on the issue, the untold millions of people immiserated, news cycles yammering about it endlessly. And for what? Just naked racism? Who does a “strong border” benefit, exactly? What does it even mean? Some other political bullshit, like being “Tough on Crime” or the “War on Drugs” I can see the twisted logic where you could convince regular Americans that those things were good for them. The only cogent logic I’ve ever heard about the border is that, apparently, back when Labor was strong they wanted strict controls on the border and immigration because they feared employers would replace them with slaves. Not that I agree with that, but I can see a logic at work there.

I suppose I could see where somebody who doesn’t know that cartels aren’t real could buy that the intersection of the war on drugs and the southern border represents some legitimate threat to their safety. But I’m pretty sure I read once that most drugs come in on boats and planes and commercial trucks (and is being done so at the behest of state apparatuses i.e. CIA, cops, DEA, etc.).

I could see where, if you gave a shit about illegal border crossers and lived in a border state then that would be a humanitarian crisis, but that’s never what the news or the politicos are talking about when they talk about the border.

It’s like in America we talk in a nonsense language about made up bullshit that then translates into the mass deprivation of huge swathes of humanity. Of course most of the common political talking points in this country are bullshit, but the border in particular seems almost entirely abstract in terms of the rhetoric surrounding it.

Those not born into wealth will be ground under the wheels of the Great Machine. Like the rest of us. The Machine will not care if they were devotees of Capital or if they memorized every quote from Mao’s little red book or if they never once considered the horrible thing hanging over all of them all their lives. Regardless of belief, whether they understand or not, they live to serve—and this service grants them the only purpose their lives could ever have had.

or maybe not idk lol

Adam McKay is fed up with the dems