Master-Debater131

Whats amazing about the Credit Suisse thing is that people on Reddit have been saying they will fail for a while now. The same subreddits that kicked off the GME and memestock boom have been saying that there is no way that CS can survive. Are we really at the point where random people on Reddit have a better handle on things than the "experts"?

He basically set the bar for what a post-presidency should look like. I dont think there is another former President who has done as much as he has.

https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-march-12-2023 There may be a bit of a proxy war between the Russian Military and the Wagner group taking place in Bakhmut. The UA has done an amazing job at holding the city with an estimated kill rate of 5:1. This has caused the Russian Military and Wagner group to start blaming the other for the failure, and the RM holding back ammunition from Wagner. This also is happening with growing signs that Wagner leader Prigozhin is falling out of favor within the Kremlin.

Former President Carter is perhaps the most famous for what he has done after his Presidency than for what he did during his time in the White House. He is famous for working with Habitat for Humanity and building houses. The images of him on construction sights are pretty iconic. Based on the above report from NBC its looking like this is just about it.

FDIC is trying to make something happen.

Last week Silicon Valley Bank took roughly 24 hours to go from a solvent bank, to collapsed, to being placed under control of the FDIC. Fear of contagion led to widespread selloffs of banking stocks and fears of another banking collapse and recession. https://apnews.com/article/silicon-valley-bank-svb-collapse-customers-ec0148382edb344c27c0bdfdcbd3cf66 Fears arent limited to just the US either. The entire UK Tech Sector may wind up collapsing if the UK Government doesnt step in. https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20230312-british-tech-sector-at-serious-risk-after-svb-collapse-govt "London (AFP) – Britain's technology and life sciences sectors are at "serious risk" following the closure of the Silicon Valley Bank, Chancellor Jeremy Hunt warned on Sunday. The California-based SVB bank, which was closed by US authorities on Friday, manages the money of some of the UK's most promising businesses, Hunt said." To put it in perspective of just how large of a failure this was take a look at this handy graphic. Back in the US there is already talk of yet another bailout for the privileged class. All sorts of tech bros on social media are screaming for a bailout and saying if they dont get their money the tens of thousands of people will lose their jobs, the economy will collapse, and the sky will rain blood. Treasury Secretary Yellen has already come out to say that she does not support a bailout. https://apnews.com/article/silicon-valley-bank-bailout-yellen-deposits-failure-94f2185742981daf337c4691bbb9ec1e "WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Sunday that the federal government would not bail out Silicon Valley Bank, but is working to help depositors who are concerned about their money. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation insures deposits up to $250,000, but many of the companies and wealthy people who used the bank — known for its relationships with technology startups and venture capital — had more than that amount in their account. There are fears that some workers across the country won’t receive their paychecks." So, here we go again? Whos up for yet another banking collapse in our lifetimes? All I know is they better not bail these bastards out. The leadership of SVB sold tons of stock leading up to this, and the CEO actively worked to convince the Fed that they didnt need any sort of oversight. https://unusualwhales.com/news/numerous-corporate-executives-sold-silicon-valley-bank-sivb-stock-before-the-collapse https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11847295/CEO-collapsed-Silicon-Valley-Bank-successfully-lobbied-Congress-avoid-imposing-extra-scrutiny.html "The president of Silicon Valley Bank appeared before Congress in 2015 to argue that his bank should not be subject to scrutiny - insisting that 'enhanced prudential standards' should be lifted 'given the low risk profile of our activities'."

Well thats dumb. The Feds need to hurry up and legalize it already. They wont because Big Pharma hates that idea, but they really should.

wait wait wait, youve never seen Idiocracy? Seriously?!?! You absolutely have to watch it. Its about the single best description of whats going on that exists. And it was made a looonnngggg time ago.

You arent wrong.

Totally agree. Its been pretty common for ages that anyone with any financial stake pays to create "studies" that they can rely on. It does bring into question the credibility of the people pushing the studies though. If you knew you had a financial stake in the study, failed to disclose that stake, and then relied on that study to further your own viewpoint then thats a pretty bad shot of their credibility. There used to be a joke that people in DC needed to wear patches of their owners like NASCAR drivers do. Im not thinking its much of a joke these days.

The real problem with all of this, and the one we will be paying for decades, is that all of the actions taken by the experts over the past few years has shot their credibility. Trust in our public institutions, particularly federal health officials, has cratered. The near term effects has been a constant fight to put policy in place that is backed by science and is something that the public will follow. The long term effect has been a decrease in the use of highly proven vaccines like the MMR vaccine. People dont trust our health officials and that distrust has spread to well established and highly effective vaccines. If people researched the vaccines and trusted the experts then we would still see participation in these vaccines, but they dont. This is going to have horrible long term effects on public health. These diseases were practically eliminated in the US, and now they are making a return. Even more worrying is that if there was another pandemic that had a real chance at wiping out a huge chunk of people, people wont trust the experts. Thats fantastic news considering the Bird Flu is showing dangerous signs of starting to transmit between mammals. That virus has a kill rate of damn near 50%. If that one takes over, its game over. There is a vaccine for it, but thanks to health officials torpedoing their credibility I would expect uptake to be a lot lower than it should if things really kick off.

New emails show Dr. Anthony Fauci commissioned scientific paper in Feb. 2020 to disprove Wuhan lab leak theory https://nypost.com/2023/03/05/new-emails-show-fauci-commissioned-paper-to-disprove-wuhan-lab-leak-theory/?lctg=607d8f6170302947037f76d3 " New emails uncovered by House Republicans probing the COVID-19 pandemic reveal the deceptive nature of Dr. Anthony Fauci. They show he “prompted” or commissioned — and had final approval on — a scientific paper written specifically in February 2020 to disprove the theory that the virus leaked from a lab in Wuhan, China. Eight weeks later, Fauci stood at a White House press conference alongside President Donald Trump and cited that paper as evidence that the lab leak theory was implausible while pretending it had nothing to do with him and he did not know the authors. “There was a study recently,” he told reporters on April 17, 2020, when asked if the virus could have come from a Chinese lab, “where a group of highly qualified evolutionary virologists looked at the sequences … in bats as they evolve and the mutations that it took to get to the point where it is now is totally consistent with a jump of a species from an animal to a human. “So, the paper will be available. I don’t have the authors right now, but we can make it available to you.”" From the beginning we were told to trust "the science" but its starting to look like "the science" had a thumb on its scales and wasnt actually science, it was science tinted propaganda. I never really bought into what so many were saying about Fauci at the start, but its getting harder to discredit them.

“When do we deploy the new variant?” Those are the exact words of the UK Health Minister that has been discovered in a private WhatsApp that has been leaked to the British press. Scandals surrounding Covid arent limited to the US, the UK is having its own moment as well. Government officials used WhatsApp to circumvent document laws in the UK and to have conversations that they never wanted to be public. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/03/04/project-fear-covid-variant-lockdown-matt-hancock-whatsapp/ Really starting to seem like the people who were called conspiracy theorists for years were actually right all along.

What fresh new hell is this.

So there are now videos of the Belarusian Partisans attacking that Russian jet. They flew a drone to it, landed on it, flew away, then flew back with a bomb and detonated it on the fuselage. It is stunning just how easily they were able to get to such a high value target. Russia truly has no idea how to fight a modern war.

This is the best trade deadline ever. It hasnt even waited until Friday to get going. Massive trades all over the place. Kane is a Ranger, Mier is a Devil, Quick isnt in LA anymore. Its chaos, and its great!

Bumping the thread because of some important news that broke over the weekend. US DoE is now saying that the virus did come from the Wuhan lab in China. While this doesnt fundamentally change anything, it does reinforce why its important to follow the science. We were told very early on that this was a conspiracy theory and to drop it. Now, its clear that this is a true possibility that deserves to be examined. This also follow a report that natural imminuty is just as effective as the vaccines. This has been an important question lingering out there for some time. If natural immunity is as effective as a vaccine then far more people in this country have immunity than was previously reported. https://nypost.com/2023/02/27/natural-immunity-as-effective-as-covid-vaccine-years-after-mandates/ For some, like me, the vaccine is no longer a viable option. Our reactions to it are too significant to justify it (my doctors have told me no way do I ever get another shot unless I can be monitored 24/7 for at least a week in a medical facility). So for people like me this is a huge deal because it proves that my having covid multiple times now is building natural immunity that should, in theory, prevent major complications when I get it next time. Covid is still around, its just not in the headlines anymore because of UFOs and Chinese Balloons.

The best part of this story is it happened in Belarus. Sounds like some partisans decided to get in on the action and take out a literally irreplaceable Russian asset. Russia cant just create a new one of these things.

Russia's Medvedev floats idea of pushing back Poland's borders https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russias-medvedev-floats-idea-pushing-back-polands-borders-2023-02-24/ "Former Russian president Dmitry Medvedev said on Friday that the only way for Moscow to ensure a lasting peace with Ukraine was to push back the borders of hostile states as far as possible, even if that meant the frontiers of NATO member Poland." I know this is likely nothing more than an idiot saying dumb shit, but wow. They really are doing everything they possibly can to expand NATO. This kind of talk, and their war in Ukraine, is exactly why NATO continues to expand. I also imagine that a ton of people in Poland are sitting there like "hahaha, try me bitch". Poland has been a massive backer of Ukraine, has had a ton of foreign fighters join Ukraine, and has been itching for payback against Russian occupation for as long as I can remember. If theres one country that Russia really doesnt want to mess with, its probably Poland.

Theres been talk today that Ukraine might help Moldova eject the Ruussians in Transnistria as well.

Theres some rumors starting to fly around about Ukraine potentially using a new weapon last night. There was video of HIMARS launches from Ukraine, and now this morning theres reports coming from deep within Russian occupied Ukrainian territory of a series of explosions targeting weapons depots. These explosions are in territory that is out of range of a usual HIMARs attack, but not of the longer range GLSDB munitions launched from a HIMARS platform. Ukraine has been asking for the longer range weaponry for some time. We havent officially sent them any, but we would probably keep that quite to maximize its impact just like what happened when the HIMARS first hit the field. This is all fog of war stuff, so it could be total BS. But it also could be another turning point in the war with Ukraine now able to target Russian assets much deeper than they could before.

Absolutely. Dates are huge to fascist dictators, so Biden going to Kyiv and Europe on the anniversary of the war is a massive slap in the face to Putin. He also said, and did, all the right things while over there. He continued to rally around Ukraine and made it explicitly clear that we will defend every single inch of NATO territory. Credit where credit is due, Biden has done a really good job at handling Ukraine and rallying NATO. I'm not sure that NATO has been more unified at any point post 9-11. And for a fraction of our defense budget he is leveraging our resources and the Ukrainian will to fight to absolutely kneecap one of our single biggest geopolitical adversaries.