domain:forecasting.substack.com
Forgotpassword
5hr ago
Shameless plug for something I run but https://shuffle.com/sports/novelties/politics/france/french2024 we were first up with markets and been surprisingly heavy betting on it. Super heavy RN action. No US/UK/AUS.
crushedoranges
5hr ago
Yes (although it's long finished.) I feel a little embarassed to shill my own stuff, but I'm currently writing fun science fiction. Fun in that 'there are as many cute girls as I can feasibly fit into the suspension of disbelief.
Don't judge me.
TIRM
6hr ago
Yes. Whedon said the list of required character vs character fights or interactions was so large it took up all of the run time for The Avengers. To the point where he had no time to conclude the story and simply decided that all the aliens would fall over dead at the end to instantly wrap things up. Which he thinks is a bad ending, but he had no choice given the constraints.
sarker
Where are the Snowdens of yesteryear?
6hr ago
I can't really identify people as British from their singing, personally.
FD4280
6hr ago
Blah. Thanks for the correction. I stopped at two when grad school got really busy, planned to get back to it... guess that's out.
edmund-nelson
7hr ago
Oh War and Peace is great but was a terrible movie precisely because so much of the book does not translate to the big screen.
I watched some drone footage of Russians fighting drones and it's a really depressing scene, lots of footage of drones flying not seeing anything then transmission ends via shotgun blast. (you often see the shotgun shells just before impact).
I can imagine at some point a video game where you are using drones shotguns and artillery to fight your opponent with drones shotguns and artillery in a trench, maybe even some Rifles and machine guns placed in for more trench warfare. Clearly you being the player would have to control drones, but small drones dropping mortar round after mortar round would be a fun game maybe idk.
Glassnoser
7hr ago
Wouldn't you have known he was British when you heard his voice?
Glassnoser
7hr ago
Do you mean higher than it used to be?
ChickenOverlord
7hr ago
LotGH is far above the average for stories when it comes to caring about the plot and world making sense, but even then it has a few things that seem poorly explained/motivated. Off the top of my head:
Everyone's insistence of following Commodore Fork's invasion plan regardless of how retarded it was
Trunicht's motivation for letting the child emperor live in alliance territory and form a government in exile
Almost everything surrounding the Reuental Revolt, though I feel like the author was starting to run out of steam at that point
ChickenOverlord
7hr ago
Translations of the first two books were ok (not amazing). They changed translators for book 3 onwards and they were pretty awful, it would have been almost impossible for me to follow if I hadn't already seen the anime.
IGI-111
God was a dream of good government.
7hr ago
Chaos in French Politics
After a heavy defeat in the European elections, French President Emmanuel Macron has used his constitutional power to dissolve the French National Assembly and call a snap election.
The significance of this move cannot be overstated. Dissoudre is not something you do lightly, it's a very risky move that can easily have unforeseen consequences.
The last invocation of that power in 1997 by Jacques Chirac had devastating effects. Chirac, who was President alongside a right wing majority that he couldn't properly control sought to get a more presidential majority and in the end the left wing formed the Gauche Plurielle coalition led by Lionel Jospin, won a majority in the election and got Jospin appointed Prime Minister.
Many are speculating about Macron's motives. Not least because he has a reputation as a schemer.
Some see it as a trap laid for whoever wins the necessarily narrow majority. Historically Jospin's own cohabitation government would end up being so unpopular that he wouldn't make it to the second round of the presidential election following his tenure and would retire for public life altogether. Macron has had to rule with a very narrow majority since his own election and he may be ceding power to the left or right blocks which he knows are disunited to lay the groundwork for the next presidential elections.
Others even speculate this may be part of a complex scheme to allow him a third term beyond the two consecutive ones allowed by the constitution, as he would resign and then come back.
Whatever his motives were, he has succeeded in plunging the entire spectrum of French politics into unmitigated chaos. The elections are on the 30th of June and everyone is scrambling to ally and/or betray each other in most dramatic (and French) a fashion.
The Rassemblement National at the gates of power
The clear winner of French seats these European elections, Marine Le Pen's RN has never been so close to power.
This is the culmination of a decade of "dédiabolisation": efforts by her and her party to to become more respectable and erase the stigma of her infamous father and his ex-SS friends.
The broad appeal of the RN has surprised many. It is no longer a reactionary old man's party but has voters in pretty much all social stratas of French society. Young and old, poor and rich, everywhere the RN is now a force to be reckoned with.
The reasons are only now being admitted by French intellectuals who refused to see them for years and recently were even acknowledged by Macron himself: a broad rejection of France's policy on public safety and immigration.
This broad appeal is perhaps best represented by the RN's current party leader and would-be Prime Minister, Jordan Bardella. A 28 years old of Italian, French and Algerian ancestry who used to be a Call of Duty youtuber.
Despite this growing popularity, the RN has never led a French government and is still the would be target of the barrage républicain, the informal alliance of every other party against them on antifascist grounds. Though as we will see, this is now cracking.
The RN is in a sense the board onto which this whole election is played, and all stratagems relate in some way to its growing popularity.
Civil war among Les Républicains
LR is the established center right party, the party of Sarkozy and Chirac.
The party has waned in popularity under Macron but its position at the gates of the right and established apparatus has maintained its importance in French politics. LR parliament members have been the kingmakers as of late since Macron's party couldn't get a clear majority.
However the party's historical roots as a big tent for the right have posed a problem. Within it are now two coalitions, one of center right liberals sympathetic to Macron and another of conservative nationalists sympathetic to the RN.
Party leader Eric Ciotti is squarely on the conservative side which is more popular with the base, while his lieutenants are on the liberal side. A high-low vs middle configuration if you will.
As a result of the dissolution, Ciotti announced an alliance with the RN. This immediately lit the fires of rebellion.
His lieutenants unanimously moved to remove him from the party over this. However he ignored the decision, saying it was illegal and barricaded himself at the seat of the party.
This led to a number of dramatic scenes, including Ciotti talking down to journalists from the window of his office, as if on the battlements of a castle, as well as various party officials saying they were going to remove him by force, or call emergency services to remove him as he had lost his mind. French twitter went ablaze with memes comparing him to Tony Montana and his last stand.
Eventually the party officials found a key to the seat, opened the door and held an exceptional session of the political bureau to remove him with the forms. However Ciotti kept ignoring them and contested the decision before a judge.
His legal arguments were just recently vindicated and his exclusion stayed. Whatever this means for the future of the party or that of their alliance with the RN, nobody really knows.
The implosion of Reconquête!
R! is the party formed by right wing intellectual Eric Zemmour as part of his presidential bid. More radical than the RN on immigration but more liberal on economic questions, it was joined by Marion Maréchal, the niece of Marine Le Pen.
Maréchal and Zemmour share very similar politics, but a very different disposition towards the RN. And have led a bifurcated campaign during these European elections.
Zemmour antagonized the RN quite a bit, and Marine Le Pen in particular as being ineffectual, weak and ultimately left wing, whilst Marion Maréchal held to a more conciliatory stance seeking the union of the right.
This came to a head right after the dissolution, when in a party address, Maréchal, with Zemmour right behind her, announced apparently without his knowledge or consent that she was in talks for an alliance with the RN. To the applause of everyone but him.
They then proceeded to accuse each other of duplicity and treason on various media interviews. Zemmour excluded her from the party and she is now calling for people to vote for the Le Pen-Ciotti coalition.
The rise of the Nouveau Front Populaire
Before dissolution, the French left wing had been at its most fragmented for years. The Gaza war had finished to highlight the division between Jean-Luc Mélenchon's LFI and less radical parts of the left.
Mélenchon's conciliatory stances towards Palestinians and Islam in general may have played a big part in the surprise rejuvenation of the Parti Socialiste under Raphaël Glucksmann. The center left party which used to be the big tent for the left was left completely destroyed by Macron's first election and has only recently recovered the ability to contend with LFI for the leading spot on the left.
LFI had recently managed to put together an uneasy coalition with the left and the greens under the name of NUPES, but it was functionally defunct by the time of the European election.
Nevertheless, dissolution and the possibility of RN government turned every left wing mouth in the country to one word: union.
The same people who were at each other throats over Gaza quickly signed an unanimous pledge to unite under the name of the Front Populaire the famous antifascist 1936 left wing coalition of Leon Blum that instituted paid leave, the 40h work week and led France into its WW2 capitulation.
This new popular front has made a large contrast with the disunity of the right, however it seems on the left the knives still do come out, if after declarations of unity.
Mélenchon himself has not wasted time to attempt to seize control of the alliance. He has already declared himself the putative candidate for prime minister and his party cronies have started unilaterally nominating candidates.
As part of this, Adrien Quatennens, a high ranking LFI MP, who in 2022 had been convicted of domestic violence, pretty brazenly called for feminists to support him after being nominated for his own seat. To massive backlash.
The alliance also nominated François Ruffin (a documentarian and MP very popular on the left) for his own office seemingly without telling him. This angered him so much that he started attacking them and listing all the ongoing controversies with respect to the nominations.
This includes Quatennens' case but also the ongoing purges that Mélenchon has been doing, removing potential seats from anybody who ever criticized him. Committing the crime of "lèse-Mélenchon" as one of the purge victims put it.
The center left is no less divided in this unity. Many see Glucksmann's timidity towards LFI as weakness given he held a larger share of the vote in the European elections, and some, including two former prime ministers have denounced the alliance's inclusion of parties that supported Hamas, including the NPA, a small trotskyist party which is currently under investigation for making the apology of terrorism (which is illegal in France).
The mess in the background
All this political chaos has conspicuously overshadowed what are usually major events in French life: the football Euro and the coming Jeux Olympiques. Whoever wins this election will have to preside over the JO and the already expected chaos of them is to be compounded by the disorganization of a new administration.
Meanwhile and ever since the results of the European election, there has been a constant movement of riots and both declared and undeclared demonstrations against the popularity of the RN. Police officials have opined that with how occupied and exhausted they are with the JO they wouldn't be able to handle widespread riots that are sure to come with a potential RN win.
Overall France is at its most disorganized it has been in years. Even the election itself, the cause of all this ruckus may be difficult to make happen in the given timeline. There are concerns that there physically isn't enough paper to print all the ballots in time and many jurists have deposed motions before the Conseil Constitutionnel to stay Macron's move or delay the election, though the timeline is on the face of it within the bounds described by the constitution.
Outlaw83
8hr ago
Because it's much simpler to primary people - like, in a parliamentary system, yes, Trump would've created the America First Party and gotten 21% in the parliamentary elections, and maybe gotten a coalition with the Mitt Romney-led Republican's, etc.
Also, here's the thing, yes, a lot of people are upset with the current parties, but nobody agrees that much - some people think both parties are too left-wing, some parties thing both parties are too right-wing, some parties think they're too war-mongering, others think they're too soft, etc., and so on.
The Whig's had also been falling apart for basically 20 years over splits over slavery, and the reality is, there is no issue in America today - even abortion, immigration, etc. that comes close to what slavery was in America in the 20 years in the lead-up to the Civil War, so there was that. Also, whether you think the Democrat's or Republican's are weak, they're both getting 45-50% of the vote every national election - a party would have a chance if say, the GOP was losing 60-40 every time, because hey, why not try if we're losing anyway. But, since both sides believe that defecting means the side they agree with even less could win and install a lot of terrible policies, you stay as a good soldier and try to win the next primary.
Started watching BCS because of this post. I'll watch the 2nd episode tonight but probably won't manage more than a couple a week.
I also came back to this thread to add that I just came across this...weird...Reddit post just now. Here it is (I was scrolling /r/all if you must know). It's bizarre that everyone is being so insistent about how good-looking the actress is. The circling of the wagons around "Ms Piggy" kind of give the whole game away.
Gaashk
8hr ago
You could, but then it would be a War Movie, not a Summer Blockbuster, and would appeal to fewer potential audience members.
Gaashk
8hr ago
Reading /r/combatfootage sort of shows just how hard it is to even come close to making modern weapons interesting storytelling, you walk around in a trench and then boom an artillery round killed you. No drama between you and the antagonist, just nothing nothing nothing dead.
Tolstoy did a good job of it where Prince Andrei was just walking around, pacing somewhere, and then boom, a cannon ball, then, because it's Tolstoy, FEELINGS, Universal Love, loss of consciousness. But that has probably never translated well to screen. Also the scene where (someone who's name I've forgotten) is in the middle of a battle, and it suddenly occurs to him that the other fellows are actually trying to kill him -- whom everybody loves! But it's really difficult to pull off inner monologues in movies. But, also, Tolstoy makes it pretty clear they weren't using much in the way of tactics, just throwing men at the problem, so it might not count. A relative has been watching drone footage from Ukraine, and it really just sounds depressing.
curious_straight_ca
8hr ago
I find it amazing that someone who's been here for a long time and is clearly pretty smart can end up with these interpretations of themotte's viewpoints, reading the same words I have but interpreting them so differently, lol.
From the post you linked about someone being downvoted for advocating colorblindness, I upvoted this reply:
As far as I'm concerned, the policy of acknowledging both race and additional information you have about a person is strictly superior to doing the same but ignoring race. I'd be more concerned if a black doctor was treating me since I know about how much AA they receive, I'd be less concerned if the doctor publicized his SAT score or had other objective markers for performance like a specialization in a field where his race counts for nothing (I doubt that's the case in the US, but I could be wrong). This is where AA in general taints by association, said doctor could absolutely be someone who managed to get in without not so subtle nudges, but since they usually lack a way to prove it, they're automatically discounted in the eyes of a rational agent with no additional information.
This is ... not speaking against meritocracy. If you have a way to measure someone's merit, use it, If not, because it's being suppressed, then use race as bayesian evidence. The replies to the post are evidence against, not for, your claim that a lot of mottizens believe 'people should be treated differently solely because of the race they were born as'.
anon_
8hr ago
This is supposing that there are no other issues that they care about at all.
If two candidates are indistinguishable on some set of issues, the only way to decide for whom to vote would be to look at other issues.
ABigGuy4U
9hr ago
It makes the doom possible but does nothing to bring the doom about in and of itself.
RandomRanger
Just build nuclear plants!
9hr ago
Astartes was universally beloved though, it's the platinum standard for 40K fanworks. The guy who made it was clearly super talented but it proves that it can be done. 'Show don't tell' is great!
I think you could have a film with a nailbiting, dialogue-free action finale between drone operators. Or maybe they do psy-ops to taunt eachother with pre-recorded messages on their drones? If you can send a signal from your person to the drone, you could send a message too. Occasionally there are these scenes where soldiers bait drones to attack and then dodge. Or that Bradley-BTR duel from the other day, these crazy moments are rare but do happen.
Tanya the evil novels were fun, I liked all the autistic stuff they put in about how Russian air defences were so shit a random Finn landed a light aircraft in Moscow, so they could do a deep strike there and get away with it.
FD4280
9hr ago
The novels behind LoGH were quite good too. I think the English translations were released a few years ago.
Mottizen
9hr ago
Yeah the Aboriginal statistics are pretty inherently tainted by the amount of 1/16th suburban Sydneysiders who get meshed in with the residents of Meekatharra. I did a year in Darwin and until you've been out there it's hard to really understand what the situation on the ground is like with the remote populations.
Mottizen
9hr ago
would they have been treated as full community members had they stayed, or would they have been discriminated against?
IIRC this was part of the justification for removing them from the communities after some bad headlines around treatment of half-caste children
YE_GUILTY
9hr ago
A recent example I'm thinking of is Frieren, where - minor spoilers - it turned out that the demons actually were bad. That is, the story didn't follow the "what if the bad guys were actually good and the good guys were actually bad" subversion seen in, for example, every single webcomic that ever included an orc and/or goblin: instead of being different-looking people wrongly oppressed for looking different by the retrograde powers-that-be, they are actually inhuman predators who exploit the former mode of thinking.
On some more-progressive corners of the internet (I saw kerfuffles in threads on RPG.net and SomethingAwful) this made (a minority of) people upset for being a racist idea. Racist against what group, exactly? Well, it wasn't that: it was just that the idea of irreconcilable differences existing between groups that could (apparently) communicate with each other was too dangerous to be entertained at all.
I think that betrayed a weakness of faith in anti-racism on the part of the people who said that. Frieren demons are clearly unlike any real-world humans, and thus their example should be a positive thought-experiment for coexistence in our world. One thing I like about fantasy and science fiction and so forth is its utility as a lens upon our own world: it lets us consider what things would be like if something we believe is true were different. What would things look like then? If they're necessarily obviously different, then perhaps your beliefs have stood the test. If the result seems more like reality than your understanding of the real world does - then perhaps you've learned something, too.
Rov_Scam
9hr ago
In Pittsburgh, sidewalk maintenance is the responsibility of the adjoining homeowner. The city isn't going to get on you for a crappy sidewalk unless it's hazardous to the point of a code violation, and maybe not even then unless a lot of people are complaining. The image I posted is from a low income area, and the suburban style houses were built in the 70s when the neighborhood was going downhill fast as an attempt to stabilize it. There's a good chance that these homes are owned by elderly black people who simply can't afford cosmetic sidewalk improvements, especially considering that sidewalks are often bad in much nicer areas. The ones on the opposite side of the street were probably redone when the houses were built a few years back, whereas there's a good chance that the suburban side hasn't been touched since those houses were built decades ago.
Sure, I wouldn't want ancestry rules applied in a professional context, but I think there should also be some amount of loyalty to your fellow countrymen. I don't have a strong opinion over how much precisely that would be. The way I see it, countries should follow a general "[insert country here] first" framework, and people with deep roots should have relative priority over newcomers. Though even the latter I wouldn't want to go too far, so it won't turn into a dick-measuring contest over who's ancestors were here the longest.
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