ToaKraka
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User ID: 108
ToaKraka
Dislikes you
13d ago
A cursory Google search reveals that "big if true" has been around since year 2000 at the latest.
ToaKraka
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14d ago
Humble Bundle is offering a DRM-free collection of thirty books in the Vampire Hunter D series for just 18 dollars. Before reading the books, you may wish to first watch the acclaimed movie (loosely based on the third book) in order to get a feel for what you're supposed to be visualizing.
ToaKraka
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14d ago
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In year 1992, Dorothy dies at age 85. She has no descendants, so her only potential heirs are her two brothers, Yale and Zangwill. The probate judge appoints Zangwill's son John as administrator. Harold, a friend of the family for the past thirty years, submits a family tree to the probate judge and testifies to his personal knowledge that Yale, having been born eleven years before Dorothy, died six years ago at age 90, so Zangwill is Dorothy's only heir. Zangwill renounces his interest in Dorothy's estate in favor of John, so John gets the entire estate. The largest portion of the estate is a piece of real property in New York City, worth 280 k$.
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John renovates the property. By year 2018, its value has skyrocketed to 2.3 M$, and he decides to sell it. Whoops! A title search reveals that Yale actually died, not six years before Dorothy at age 90, but one year after Dorothy at the unlikely age of 97. This means that Yale should have gotten half of the estate back in 1992. John sues Yale's ultimate heir—a trust set up by Yale's now-dead brother-in-law, presumably for the benefit of the brother-in-law's children—to confirm that John has obtained full ownership of the building through the doctrine of adverse possession. The trust counterclaims, alleging that in 1992 (1) Harold committed fraud by giving false testimony and (2) John breached his fiduciary duty as administrator by failing to conduct a diligent search for heirs (compare the hiring of a professional genealogist in this other case), so adverse possession does not apply.
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The trial judge rules in John's favor, and the appeals panel and the supreme court affirm.* There is no evidence that Harold did anything but make an honest mistake. And Harold was a disinterested witness who provided both sworn testimony and a family tree, as required by state law, so it was not unreasonable for John to rely on Harold's mistaken facts. John has been in possession of the building for more than twenty years, so he easily meets the ten-year requirement of adverse possession under state law.
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One justice on the supreme court dissents. He thinks that Harold's unresearched testimony and family tree do not count as the "diligent search" for heirs that the law requires of an estate administrator (and for which the law permits three years of time), and therefore John's reliance on those mistaken facts counts as a breach of fiduciary duy. But the other six justices disagree with this view.
*New York's courts confusingly are named (from lowest to highest) "supreme, appeals, appeals", rather than the "trial, appeals, supreme" pattern that is more familiar. I have translated the New York terminology to regular terminology.
ToaKraka
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16d ago
It's annoying, but in the end implementing the Qualified Dividends and Capital Gain Tax Worksheet (or the Schedule D Tax Worksheet) in your preferred spreadsheet program is the work of only a few minutes.
ToaKraka
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16d ago
https://www.themotte.org/comments
Compare https://old.reddit.com/r/TheMotte/comments/ —or, indeed, https://old.reddit.com/r/all/comments/ .
This functionality is sometimes known as the "firehose" view.
ToaKraka
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16d ago
There's a setting to enable or disable "a warning before viewing +18 [sic] content".
The worst game that I've personally enjoyed probably is PS3 launch title Mobile Suit Gundam: Crossfire (called Target in Sight in Europe). In this game, the player participates in various engagements of the ground theater of the One-Year War—not as an ace pilot, but as a grunt who starts with a GM or a Zaku and doesn't get a Gundam or a Gelgoog until late in the campaign.
When it works, it's a reasonably fun game. The mobile-suit models are gorgeously detailed, with multiple paint schemes based on what stat boosts you give to them ("heavy" for better attack and defense, "water" for better wading speed, etc.), unlockable weapons, and even part-specific damage (e. g., if your MS gets its right arm knocked off by too much damage, it will also lose any weapon that it's holding in its right hand, but it still can wield other weapons in its left hand). The music, both in menus and in battles, also is exquisite. However:
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Battles generally run at approximately 15 frames per second (on original hardware; IIRC, emulation is a lot better when it doesn't crash).
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When you've locked onto an enemy MS, your MS will shoot directly at the enemy—without leading the target! There's an alternative aim-down-sights shooting mode, but it's pretty awkward to use, since (1) you can't really move around while aiming in this fashion, and you want to be moving in order to dodge enemy shots, and (2) all your projectiles, whether bullet or beam, are quite slow. Just resign yourself to missing half of your shots. (And, of course, the enemy Guntanks are pretty good at sniping you from their stationary positions at the far side of the map.)
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There are a few GM Sniper variants available for the player to use, but their sniper rifles carry so little ammunition (literally a single magazine), and are so hard to hit anything with, that they are essentially worthless. Why are they in the game if you can't even finish a mission with them?
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During battles, you often can refill your ammunition at supply bases. This is effectively mandatory on longer missions. However, supply bases quite often will glitch out and stop working! This happened to me so consistently on the extra-hard version of the Zeon campaign's final mission on "very hard" difficulty that I never was able to beat it.
ToaKraka
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21d ago
To be fair, this platform does not permit a single comment to include responses to multiple comments (as, e. g., Xenforo and 4chan do), and which workarounds for that limitation are best is not immediately obvious. Maybe you should clarify what your preferred workarounds are—e. g., one long response with a bunch of username alerts at the end, or a combination of one long response and a bunch of short responses consisting of links to the long response.
ToaKraka
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21d ago
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During Jewish synagogue services, a "Torah reader" recites portions of the Torah to the congregation. Since year 1999, Efraim Marcus, a professionally-trained Torah reader, has served as the Torah reader for a synagogue in Harrison, New York.
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Jews are forbidden from using cars or other means of transportation on the Sabbath, so they generally must live within walking distance of a synagogue. In 1999, Marcus lived outside Harrison, so he had to drive to Harrison before the Sabbath, stay overnight at the rabbi's house, and walk to the synagogue on the Sabbath. In 2005, after the birth of Marcus's first child, the synagogue rented an apartment one mile away and allowed Marcus to live there for free. In 2014, after the birth of Marcus's third child, Marcus determined that walking a mile to the synagogue on every Sabbath would be "implausible", so a congregation member bought a house 0.2 mile away and donated it to the synagogue, and the synagogue allowed Marcus to live in the house for free. The house is also used to hold events and to tutor students on Torah-related matters. Marcus also serves as a full-time assistant/substitute rabbi, though he is not "an ordained member of the clergy".
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Under New York law, property used for a religious purpose is exempt from property tax. Is this house, used as a residence for the synagogue's Torah reader, eligible for this exemption? The municipality's tax assessor says no. The trial judge agrees, questioning whether the synagogue needs a Torah reader at all when it could just return to the pre-1999 practice of having a rotation of college students read the Torah at services.
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The appeals panel reverses. This situation is quite distinguishable from a past case where a synagogue bought a house for the use of a part-time janitor. Marcus's ability to walk to the synagogue on the Sabbath obviously is an integral part of the synagogue's religious purpose, so a house that the synagogue allows him to use can be tax-exempt.
One of the more challenging parts of it was diagnosing the issue in the first place. It looked like every application simply refused to launch despite being "open".
Right-click on the taskbar, go to Taskbar Settings, and activate the option to show taskbar buttons on all taskbars (rather than only on the taskbar where the window is). Then you will able to tell when you're missing a window.
ToaKraka
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21d ago
The Supreme Court orders "wrongly" deported man to be returned to the US
That's a gross exaggeration of the order's actual text.
(1) The district judge ordered the government to "facilitate and effectuate" the alien's return by the end of April 7. The government appealed.
(2) Chief Justice Roberts issued an administrative stay so that the Supreme Court could consider the appeal.
(3) The April 7 deadline expired and became moot. The Supreme Court refused to reverse the rest of the order, but instead merely vacated and remanded so that the district jude could clarify what "effectuate" means, since it "may exceed the District Court's authority" (by forcing the US government to negotiate with the El Salvador government).
Even if we have excellent growth (>2%), and do something politically impossible like increase taxes by 2% and cut spending by 2%, we will still probably become unable to service the interest on the debt by 2032 or something.
Source?
The Government Accountability Office's most recent report on this topic is here. It projects (in figure 11) that, even in year 2054, interest payments still will be "only" 27 percent of federal spending.
ToaKraka
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22d ago
I thought that it was over-turned on the basis that abortion was a matter for States, not the Federal Government.
No, it was overturned on the basis that abortion was not protected by the federal constitution and therefore was a matter for the federal and state legislatures (or for the state judiciaries if they find that abortion is protected by their constitutions), not for the federal judiciary.
ToaKraka
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23d ago
There has been speculation that yesterday's huge fluctuations in the stock market were due to (1) a fake tweet claiming that Trump was considering pausing the tariffs for 90 days, followed by (2) Trump's denial that any such pause was in the works. But the truth of that narrative is disputed.
ToaKraka
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25d ago
The protagonist's internal monologue does discuss the attractiveness of his lovers Amaryllis and Fenn; he (or at least his close ally Amaryllis) does strong-arm concessions out of nominal allies; and he does engage in some mind control late in the story. But this is all IIRC, and I may be misremembering.
ToaKraka
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25d ago
Based fellow hater of Goody Two-Shoes protagonists
Worth the Candle probably satisfies your criteria, IIRC.
ToaKraka
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26d ago
Unlike Ryan’s other thoughts on monetary policy, he has not been as vocal about why he wants the Fed to follow the price of a basket of commodities, or which commodities he would want to follow and why. Ryan made his preference for this policy clear in two Wall Street Journal op-eds. In “Blame Congress for Inflation” (May 1, 2008) Ryan wrote:
[My] bill, called the Price Stability Act of 2008, allows the Fed to choose how it will put this single mandate into practice (my preference would be an explicit price rule anchored to a basket of commodities), as long as its overriding policy goal is to control inflation.
And in a piece titled “A Republican Road to Economic Recovery” (March 2nd, 2009):
I believe the best way to guarantee sound money is to use an explicit, market-based price guide, such as a basket of commodities, in setting monetary policy. A more politically realistic path to price stability would be for the Fed to explicitly embrace inflation targeting.
FrumForum contacted Ryan’s office for clarification of this policy preference, asking which commodities he thinks need to be in the basket and how Ryan would respond to criticisms of this policy. Ryan’s office responded by providing links to his op-ed, and clarified that Ryan was not in favor of a gold standard, but was not able to provide any additional information beyond that.
ToaKraka
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26d ago
In the opinion of at least one prominent economist, the ideal currency would be, neither fiat nor based on a single commodity (such as gold), but based on a bundle of multiple commodities.
By that standard, is the S&P GSCI, an index of commodities weighted by global production (or the iShares ETF based on that index), effectively the "one true currency" against which all government-issued currencies should be measured?
ToaKraka
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26d ago
tequilas or agaves (for copyright reasons)
This is closer to trademark, not copyright.
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Copyright = creative work
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Patent = useful innovation
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Trademark = identity
ToaKraka
Dislikes you
26d ago
On the BBC television programme The Plot Against Harold Wilson, broadcast on 16 March 2006 on BBC2, it was claimed there were threats of a coup d'état against the Wilson government, which were corroborated by leading figures of the time on both the left and the right. Wilson told two BBC journalists, Barrie Penrose and Roger Courtiour, who recorded the meetings on a cassette tape recorder, that he feared he was being undermined by MI5. The first time was in the late 1960s after the Wilson Government devalued the pound sterling but the threat faded after Conservative leader Edward Heath won the election of 1970. However, after a coal miners' strike Heath decided to hold an election to renew his mandate to govern in February 1974 but lost narrowly to Wilson. There was again talk of a military coup, with rumours of Lord Mountbatten as head of an interim administration after Wilson had been deposed. In 1974 the army occupied Heathrow Airport on the grounds of training for possible IRA terrorist action at the airport. Although the military stated that this was a planned military exercise, Downing Street was not informed in advance, and Wilson himself interpreted it as a show of strength, or warning, being made by the army.
ToaKraka
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27d ago
That's what the Bureau of Economic Analysis says. But, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, annual expenditure per household is only 77 k$. What explains the discrepancy?
ToaKraka
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27d ago
I've seen it on both my personal computer (built from parts, so no OEM) and my work computer.
Here's a screenshot. "Create Adobe PDF" on the right and "Save as Adobe PDF" on the left are advertisements, while "Create PDF/XPS Document" is the free (gratis) version.
ToaKraka
Dislikes you
27d ago
I remember the manual for Red Baron was about 1/3 game and 2/3 history, planes, and pilot profiles.
See also the gigantic wirebound manual for Jane's Fighters Anthology.
ToaKraka
Dislikes you
27d ago
List of all given names in the decedent's family tree:
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Decedent: Gary Stanislaus
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Wife: Nancy
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Parents: Stanley and Adeline
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Brother: Timothy
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Paternal grandparents: Isadore and Michaeline
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Paternal aunts and uncles: Stephania (married Bronislaus), Charlotte (born Wladyslawa), Rose, and Frances (born Franciszka, married Victor)
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Paternal first cousins: Sandra Antoinette (married Robert), Diane Marie (married Michael), Dennis, Kenneth, James
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Maternal grandparents: Frank and Anna
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Maternal aunts and uncles: Cecilia (married Harold), Margaret (married Frederick), Raymond, David, Irene (married John), Agnes (married Henry), Jeanette (married Robert), Diana (married Joseph), Frank (married Judith), Robert (married Mary Anne)
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Maternal first cousins: Harold Jr., Ronald John, David Frederick, John Jr., James, Priscilla, Patricia, Robert Jr., Paul, Richard, Douglas, Kathryn, Bonny, Ann Marie, Randolph, Leonard, Charlene, Joyce, Sandra, Jeremie, Michelle, Carol, and Deborah
IIRC, he's explained it before like this:
In order to buy a gun in New Jersey, you must get a permit. (NJ Statutes tit. 2C ch. 58 § 3 ¶ a.1)
In order to get the permit, you must provide, not just two references, but also a list of all psychiatrists that have ever "attended, treated, or observed" you "for any mental or psychiatric condition". (NJ Statutes tit. 2C ch. 58 § 3 ¶ e)
Filling out any part of the permit application falsely is a felony with strict liability—that is, there is no requirement that you "knowingly" violate the law, and lack of records is not a defense. (NJ Statutes tit. 2C ch. 39 § 10 ¶ c)
Therefore, if you don't have any records of a psychiatrist that your parents made you visit as a child multiple decades ago (or if your parents have the records but refuse to give them to you), then you're out of luck—you can't buy a gun in New Jersey.
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