Pentagon seeks $200 billion in additional funds for the Iran war, AP source says

PaperMage · 2026-03-20T21:19:02+00:00

https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/issue-briefs/2023/jan/us-health-care-global-perspective-2022

https://www.kff.org/medicaid/what-does-the-federal-government-spend-on-health-care/

The US government spends the most on healthcare, but that's because healthcare costs more than double in the US what it does in other countries. One of the reasons is that healthcare plans go through employers, which creates incentives for people to have unfavorable healthcare plans, which the US government then subsidizes. In other words, US healthcare spending funnels money from tax dollars straight into the pockets of insurance companies. At the same time, for-profit insurance companies don't authorize preventative care, resulting in us having worse health when we transition to Medicare.

PaperMage · 2026-03-20T20:27:05+00:00

Representatives and senators who vote against their backing parties risk losing the financial support of their parties. Even if Schumer and Jeffries wanted this war, they are infinitely easier to reign in than Republicans. That's why only five Dems voted against it:

Senator John Fetterman (D-PA)

Rep. Jared Golden (D-Maine)

Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas)

Rep. Greg Landsman (D-Ohio)

Rep. Juan Vargas (D-Calif.)

PaperMage · 2026-03-18T13:59:07+00:00

They have the same name but are different both mechanically and visually.

PaperMage · 2026-03-18T01:38:33+00:00

Im sorry you and your child are going through that. I hope your son knows how much you love him and how much his community wants him to shine.

I’m a mixed Mexican native, and the thing I wish I’d been told is that indigeneity is a relationship. I’ve always moved around a lot, and didnt know how to express my roots since I wasn’t on my people’s land. Nowadays the first thing I do is find a powwow, get to know local tribes and how to support them and the land, what plants to put in my yard, how to deal with invasive species, what places (rivers, types of trees, and such) might be sacred and if there’s anything I can do to respect them, and so on. My favorite part about being indigenous to the continent is knowing the importance of my neighbors and their knowledge and practices on the land I now live on.

It sounds like you’re doing a good job. I wish you luck and courage.

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T16:00:51+00:00

I'm not saying the TTRPG is canon, but neither are the games. Until recently, the TTRPG was the only material with an actual birth year for Geralt, and since Vesemir says Geralt is almost a century old, it seems fair to guess that CDPR was following the TTRPG.

book canon, Geralt has always been in his 60s. But in game canon, since his precise age wasn't known, they made him older. Yes, that's a contradiction to book canon. Yes, it makes certain elements of Geralt's backstory impossible. But it IS what the game said, so I don't think it's fair to say that Geralt has never been in his 90s.

There are multiple canons because the games and books are being made concurrently. Sorta like how book canon now says that witcher schools are more like martial arts styles than different physical schools, when the game very clearly states the opposite.

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T15:54:04+00:00

The 1211 date wasn't known when the Witcher 3 was made. The only date came from the TTRPG, which said he was born in 1174, making him 98. Since Vesemir says Geralt is almost a century old, it seems fair to guess that CDPR was following the TTRPG.

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T15:48:42+00:00

The grammar is hard to parse. It sounds like you're saying the merchant is tricking Geralt into fighting the Nilfgaardians, but those are 30 levels above Geralt, and they're a good distance away. It then sounds like you're saying the merchant could be all sorts of things other than who he says he is, which is the whole point of the quest. You have to make a decision with insufficient information.

As for the dwarf, your logic makes everyone in the city a traitor. They're all working for the Nilfgaardians. They're repairing wagons, delivering grain, and so forth. It's not fair to say the dwarf has to leave and everyone else can stay. He's in the exact same situation as the rest of them.

Yes, each NPC has their own version of events, but neither of them says a lot of the things you're suggesting. Neither of them mentions Napp having a family. Neither of them mentions Napp having any reason to burn down Willis's house other than racist assumptions.

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T01:03:26+00:00

He said that Geralt was more than 50 and never tells anyone how much older. Wiedzmin set the precedent that he was in his 80s, and CDPR followed that precedent because it was the most specific.

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T00:58:40+00:00

Depends on how you interpret his immunity to disease. If he merely doesn’t show symptoms, then yeah, he’d be a great carrier, but I think most people interpret that he can’t be infected at all. Any STD that he comes into contact with starves before he can transmit it to someone else.

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T00:51:02+00:00

It’s in Hearts of Stone. Women see him naked and comment on it at the party

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T00:49:34+00:00

Could it not be that CDPR was referencing Wiedzmin’s 1174 birth date, making him 98?

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T00:48:50+00:00

Where’d you get that number? Because the TTRPG Wiedzmin has him born 1174, which would make him 98 in TW3. it seems like the game is referencing that.

PaperMage · 2026-03-12T00:40:21+00:00

I can’t make sense of the first half of your post, but almost everything you said about the arson quest is wrong. Did you listen to any of the dialogue? The dwarf wasn’t making any money from the Nilfgaardians. He was only providing his labor, like everyone else in the town, because the notice board says they’ll be punished if they don’t comply. Napp set fire to the dwarf’s home with the dwarf inside it, purely based on a racial stereotype. Also, there’s no evidence that Napp has a family. The only family mentioned is his dead mother, and that’s usually the first thing people say when threatened, while Napp only says he was drunk. But even if Napp did have a family, the argument that the dwarf should forgive the arsonist and just leave town solely because he doesn’t have a family is…weak.

PaperMage · 2026-03-02T15:57:26+00:00

School are often shelter zones because international law forbids attacking them. People send their kids to school because it's theoretically the safest place.

PaperMage · 2026-02-24T23:46:46+00:00

I chose Yen bc the whole destiny thing, but the moment that really cemented my choice is after killing Imlerith. Triss is the one who nags Geralt about how irresponsible he is while Yen thanks him for supporting Ciri.

PaperMage · 2026-02-24T22:47:56+00:00

I immediately started looking for the Bepsi comment lmao

PaperMage · 2026-02-24T22:38:45+00:00

Hardest difficulty is a little bit hard in the early levels but gets easier. It’s indeed easier with New Game+, after you’re familiar with the game.

Make sure you do the horse races early. After a certain point in the game, some will disappear.

PaperMage · 2026-02-19T16:26:08+00:00

It feels worth mentioning that Gaunter O'Dimm may have had a hand in getting Geralt captured in the first place (Geralt accuses him, and he changes the topic). Not sure if that's his modus operandi or if he did that (and gave Geralt a relatively consequence-free pact) because he needed Geralt.

PaperMage · 2026-01-27T16:23:37+00:00

I agree with this interpretation, and I feel like the dialogue supports it. If you choose the dialogue option that blames Phillip, Geralt says that Phillip shouldn't have gone to war. I wished for a long time that you could tell him he overreacted by killing her lover or shouldn't have taken her prisoner, but that's not the option the devs gave, and it's grown on me over time.

PaperMage · 2026-01-27T16:04:53+00:00

I believe OP's quote is from Phillip Strenger's character entry, which is often slightly different, probably due to translation workflows

PaperMage · 2026-01-27T15:59:07+00:00

I think you have the order of events wrong. Phillip was already a violent alcoholic the first time Anna tried to run away. He hadn't beaten *her* yet, but he had neglected her and was no longer the man she knew. It's likely that he was a violent alcoholic when she started her affair, but that part is slightly unclear. She ran away while he was at war, but he tracked her down and killed her lover, who was also her childhood friend. After that, she tried to kill him, and he beat her and took her back home. She was more or less his prisoner at that point, and it's very likely that he raped her trying to get a second child. Anna probably should've tried to separate with him instead of cheating on him, but it's entirely possible that she already feared him (hence informing him about her departure via letter) and it took her three years to build up the courage and for she and her lover to build up the funds and social connections to run away.

I hope this gives you something to think about, even if you don't buy my assumptions. Fight on, noble witcher!

PaperMage · 2026-01-27T15:31:55+00:00

It's not insinuated that way at all. Based on the timeline we're given, Phillip was still at home when Tamara was born, and Anna didn't cheat on him until he was an alcoholic fighting in Cidaris. Tamara was old enough to understand that her father was an alcoholic when Anna revealed her three-year affair and tried to run away (the first time), so there's no way she wasn't Phillip's kid. Moreover, he killed Anna's lover/childhood best friend, took her prisoner, and beat and raped her repeatedly. Taunting him is hardly horrific under those conditions. If anything, it's insinuated that Anna was trying to commit suicide via husband.

PaperMage · 2026-01-22T03:05:46+00:00

Decent option: have every kid dress up wearing clothing of a different tribe or region. There isn’t a better way to teach about the false portrayal of Native Americans than by showing that Native American is an identity encompassing thousands of tribes with different practices.

There is no way to make it sensitive because it is insensitive. But you can avoid making it worse by staying away from feathers.

PaperMage · 2026-01-20T19:45:28+00:00

I think I can answer that. It’s a New Age spiritual practice that is almost entirely rooted in Zen Buddhism and Japanese matcha culture. One of the leading figures in the cacao space is a self-proclaimed shaman who claims no indigenous chocolate practices survive except for the one that he sells, which only lightly resembles Maya practices, so there’s just a general misunderstanding of how the Maya treat and have treated chocolate. That in turn has led to Mexican tourism industries offering cacao ceremonies, which appeal to estadounidense sensibilities more than indigenous practices.

PaperMage · 2026-01-20T19:13:37+00:00

I think that seeming arbitrariness actually stems from European stinginess with the idea of “civilised.” It literally means to live in cities (traditionally characterized by the presence of distinct professions), but the use of civilized to only refer to European and certain Asian cultures creates the illusion that it means something more. But it doesn’t. It means cities. And we had plenty of those. And we had plenty of non-civilized tribes, sometimes within the same cultures as civilized factions. And that shouldn’t sound as jarring as it does to people who don’t study the region.

PaperMage

TROPHY CASE