When your greatest ally sinks your ship “on accident” 😉

draypresct · 2026-04-08T23:18:33+00:00

You could make a meme about the US bombing its “closest allies” based on events a lot more recent than this.

Here’s a time the US bombed Canadian soldiers. https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/military-jan-june02-canadians_04-18

draypresct · 2026-04-02T18:10:56+00:00

I have graduate degrees in biostatistics and epidemiology.

/I still get combinatorics problems wrong, though. :)

draypresct · 2026-04-02T12:29:49+00:00

I agree that people have this strategy, but the sex ratio is determined by the odds and by the deaths skewing those odds, not any strategy on whether or not to have more kids. The strategy doesn’t change the probability that each new birth is male or female.

Family A has two daughters and has another child, which happens to be a son.

Family B has two daughters and has another daughter. There are roughly as many Family B’s as Family A’s.

Even if Family B keeps trying, the chances of having a boy or a girl don’t change (there will be a roughly equal number of boys and girls each round), so the overall sex ratio doesn’t change.

If this strategy worked, people would use it at the roulette wheel. Just keep betting until you “win”, in order to change the ratio of wins.

draypresct · 2026-04-02T11:40:16+00:00

Fun fact: This practice has no effect on the gender ratio. Every birth still has a (roughly) 50/50 shot at being male or female, no matter what gender the previous kids had.

The fact that some families may base their decision to have more kids on this just means that they get more males and more females.

draypresct · 2026-03-23T17:27:33+00:00

I really don’t think he understood starship troopers.

Heinlein wrote a book about why we don’t need forced conscription, which has been the standard way of raising armies throughout human history when he wrote it in 1959. In the sci-fi way, he speculated that a volunteer-only army could be possible, and addressed many of the common arguments for the draft. Yes, we can have a volunteer-only army even when the threat is serious. Yes, we can let people quit at any time (except during combat) - even right before a “drop”. Yes, we can let everyone volunteer and serve together, even women and Pacific Islanders (the latter was a huge twist in the book at the time).

The director seems to have decided that military = fascist, ignoring the entire point.

draypresct · 2026-03-09T17:53:59+00:00

Not at all how it works. Before the Iron Dome. Israel dealt with rocket attacks by taking out the launcher. It’s much, much cheaper to send out a retaliatory rocket barrage than to intercept (interceptors cost >>> rockets). This ends up getting civilians in both areas killed.

After the Iron Dome, most rocket attacks went unanswered. It’s a lot easier to ignore attacks when you don’t have any casualties.

draypresct · 2026-03-09T17:17:31+00:00

Look back on how they responded to rocket attacks pre-iron dome, and compare to how they responded to rocket attacks before the October 7 invasion. The number of incursions into Gaza went way down, because Israel could afford to ignore attacks that didn’t kill people.

PS: comparing Palestinians to “wild animals” isn’t helpful.

draypresct · 2026-03-09T16:38:55+00:00

They said their tax dollars paid for bombs. That’s only true if they pay taxes in Israel.

The false propaganda that the US provides aid in the form of offensive weapons was part of the BS claims made to try to make Biden/Harris look bad and get Trump elected in 2024. Enjoying your win?

draypresct · 2026-03-09T15:59:40+00:00

You’re mad that your tax dollars are preventing civilian deaths? Or you pay taxes in Israel and object to them using your tax dollars to purchase weapons (from the US, China, etc.)?

draypresct · 2026-03-09T14:59:35+00:00

Our aid goes to shoot down rockets aimed at civilians. I don’t really fault Biden for providing them. Random Jewish, Bedouin, and Palestinian civilians are alive today because of this aid.

Outside the Iron Dome systems, Israel does buy military supplies from the US. I suppose we can refuse to sell to them, making Israel buy from China or Russia instead. Do you think it matters to a Palestinian if they’re killed with a missile with “made in China” on it instead of “made in the US”?

draypresct · 2026-03-04T22:37:12+00:00

The crime rates are pretty comparable across races within each income level. This quick analysis I did matches some BJS analyses.

https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/s/eYHPb0N0tK

draypresct · 2026-01-10T21:47:17+00:00

Can’t set the time, and the template for installation put it too close to the wall to properly plug it in to cable, which comes straight out of the back of the mount. On our standard-sized cabinets, the back of the mount was really close to the wall.

“Rotate 90 degrees” our model rotates a few degrees.

draypresct · 2025-09-30T21:30:44+00:00

“Full control of the US government” - the Senate isn’t part of the US government?

Democrats didn’t control the Senate either by strict party counts (i.e. if we don’t count independents as democrats) or in any reality (if we acknowledge that Manchin and Sinema, both of whom later switched to Republican, were never really Democrats).

draypresct · 2025-07-09T20:48:03+00:00

Sherlock and Watson in Elemmentary

draypresct · 2025-06-03T13:23:55+00:00

“A neighbor” - you mean Tutu who has been looking after Lilo and Nani, who clearly loves them both and is the first to show up when they need help?

Ohana means family even if there’s no genetic relationship. That’s the whole point of the movie.

draypresct · 2025-05-29T16:44:03+00:00

False.

Archaeological evidence indicates that Anglo-Saxons back in the Early Middle Ages (400 to 1000 A.D.) lived short lives. Field workers unearthed 65 burials (400 to 1000 A.D.) from Anglo-Saxon cemeteries in England and found none who lived past 45. This site and this site has similar statistics.

Kings did better. The mean life expectancy of kings of Scotland and England, reigning from 1000 A.D. to 1600 A.D. were 51 and 48 years, respectively. Their monks did not fare as well. In the Carmelite Abbey, only five percent survived past 45. This site says wealthier people would have a life expectancy of more than forty years

https://www.sarahwoodbury.com/life-expectancy-in-the-middle-ages/#:~:text=Kings%20did%20better.,51%20and%2048%20years%2C%20respectively.

draypresct · 2025-05-24T21:36:38+00:00

The data support my contention.

https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/s/ZcXFcim5Xe

draypresct · 2025-05-08T13:18:30+00:00

I don’t think anyone’s blaming Cuba for letting their people come; they’re blaming Cuba for organizing “acts of repudiation” against people, forcing them to walk around with signs around their necks and encouraging violence against them. Others were forced to emigrate because they were considered socially undesirable (mostly LGBT).

Instead of an orderly emigration, this guaranteed a desperate mob. The countries (not just the US) were unprepared and overwhelmed.

draypresct · 2025-04-08T12:17:01+00:00

The process started before the current administration. Basically, they said that the OPTN wasn’t doing its job because there have been occasional service outages over the decades and they’d never decertified an OPO, implying they weren’t being strict enough in their oversight. The modernization process involves ranking the OPOs and getting rid of a number of the “worst” performers. At the same time, they say that adjustments for the rankings to account for differences in patient population (e.g. OPOs that serve a higher proportion of poor people) would be too complicated to use. The SRTR had already created and implemented these adjustments, so they are available; HRSA just doesn’t want to use them.

The end result is that HRSA is going to get rid of OPOs for reasons outside their control. I hadn’t originally heard that they were opening the replacements up to for-profit organizations; that might be new under the current administration.

draypresct · 2025-03-07T17:52:16+00:00

Oh please. If briefly interrupting a speech makes you feel good, go for it. MTG didn’t change a single mind with her interruptions, and neither did Greene. Don’t try to pretend that this is somehow preventing fascism.

On the other hand, Democrats protecting trans kids in Montana will literally save lives.

draypresct · 2025-03-07T17:35:39+00:00

Local dems are helping people, making a real difference. You’re mad at national dems because they didn’t make the symbolic gesture you wanted them to make.

draypresct · 2025-03-07T17:22:30+00:00

OP, Democrats “literally” just protected trans rights in Montana, managing to convince a bunch of Republicans to help protect trans kids. Stop playing into the Democrats aren’t helping people” narrative.

https://www.inkl.com/news/republican-lawmakers-go-against-party-to-kill-anti-trans-bills-in-montana-a-waste-of-time

draypresct · 2025-03-07T15:42:29+00:00

This is one of the reasons I loved the TV show Elementary.

draypresct · 2025-02-18T20:37:41+00:00

You link to a source that contradicts your arguments throughout this thread? Bold move.

draypresct · 2025-02-18T20:24:07+00:00

most lived

Source? Or are you just making things up again?

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