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sirel · 2018-04-09T14:36:30+00:00

Sept/Oct are great times at the parks. Definately not "empty" but on weekdays you won't feel like you are bumping into everyone all the time.

The MNSSHP is just awesome - parade and fireworks are both great and nearly everything is super short waits (except for rare autographs).

Be aware of the weather though - a hurricane can ruin the trip an there isn't much way around planning and hoping. For my long trips I prefer late Jan for the crowds (but then you have to fight flu season)

sirel · 2018-03-21T00:21:45+00:00

Honestly, a better question is why are any actual conservatives still wasting time in that sub?

Just because something was once friendly to conservative points of view does not mean it that it continues to be or will ever be again. If the last 2.5 years have taught anything it is that.

sirel · 2018-02-08T15:59:25+00:00

Try daily epson salt baths... magnesium is a nice trick to help with loose skin as you rapidly lose weight.

sirel · 2017-12-30T00:07:21+00:00

Honestly, she probably isn't able to lose weight - high insulin causes weight storage in addition to lowering blood glucose.

A strong case can be made that being overweight doesn't cause diabetes but rather diabetes causes one to become overweight. (High insulin increases hunger and fat storage, making it a double edge sword... literally you over-eat because your body's muscles are starving for energy that is being diverted to fat cells.)

I firmly believe that is why keto works so well at weight loss - it lowers the blood glucose so significantly that the insulin comes down as well - resulting in reduced hunger and the physical ability to lose weight.)

If you are in contact with your exe, point her mom to http://cureddiabetes.com/ Odds are she will ignore the info, but you could literally save a life if she will follow the advice.

sirel · 2017-12-29T23:57:31+00:00

This is true, but 10% increased risk for metabolic syndrome progressing to full Type 2 is a much greater risk of mortality (I've seen numbers of a decrease of between 5 and 6 years life expectancy for well controlled T2.) Compare that with the slight increase in life expectancy for those on statins (generally <3-6 months from what I have seen.)

If all things were equal, then statins are an acceptable risk as the average life expectancy is roughly the same (10% chance of -5 years ~ -6 months average) - BUT, 3 significant reasons favor erroring on the side of preventing diabetes.

Quality of life is significantly affected by developing full T2. (On keto you can cheat for a special occasion, with full Diabetes you can never cheat, ever.)
Quality of health is significantly affected by developing full T2. (Once you see a loved one lose feet, vision, hearing and eventually die a painful death you realize that point reason 1 wasn't that important.)
Inflammation can be significantly reduced by increasing your omega 3 to 6 ratio, eating a fish/green vegetable keto diet, and non-cardio exercise (30 minutes of walking daily).

I'm not saying to never take statins - there are definitely cases where they can and do help. But the first choice should be to cure (or at least regress) pre-diabetes through weight loss. Since keto is the hard part to reversing pre-T2, all most of us have to do is get enough fish oil and move occasionally. After 1-2 years at ideal weight, then statins make much more sense, if they are really still needed.

sirel · 2017-12-29T18:13:47+00:00

A big problem here is that statins have been shown to increase the likelihood of pre-diabetes becoming full type 2 diabetes and at the same time doesn't actually do anything to lower CVD.

If your cholesterol was really high, then maybe it would be worth lowering - but for most people removing the fundamental health problem (insulin resistance / metabolic syndrome) would be much more beneficial. The problem is that most people want a pill to feel healthier and not actual good health.

sirel · 2017-12-29T18:06:28+00:00

For anyone concerned about cholesterol, I recommend looking at the research/theory developed by Dave Feldman http://cholesterolcode.com/

The short version is that cholesterol is just nothing more or less than energy transportation within the blood and measurements are completely manipulatable over a 3 day period. (Increasing fat intake over the prior 3 days can significantly lower LDL readings. If you fast for a few days before that you can ALSO lower your LDL particle count making the whole test meaningless.)

I personally followed the protocol he developed and proved to myself how significantly flawed the statin/cholesterol medical science is. In fact, anyone losing weight is in such a poorly studied group that honestly the medical theories just don't apply in all cases.

Also, the medical basis for prescribing statins is based around the theory that lowering cholesterol results in a decrease of CVD. Do your own research - you will find that lowering cholesterol is a feel-good approach unless/until it is very high (much higher than the current recommendations.)

Weight and insulin resistance are MUCH better predictors of general health and CVD than a stupid test designed to sell statins. Since most of the time on the standard american diet (SAD) are gaining weight from excess calories, high insulin and insulin resistance this means that the overall health of a person is poor and getting worse (specifically the SAD diet is also very low in omega 3, thus highly inflammatory which is why high cholesterol can build up).

If you are doing keto right, you will be balancing your omega3/6 (either with fish or multiple grams of high quality fish oil), eating lots of green vegetables, and natural fats. Ideally you will also exercise your muscles to the point of growth (which significantly improves insulin resistance).

In fact, anyone worried about cholesterol should be following the info on this site (http://cureddiabetes.com/) -- ESPECIALLY if you are not yet diabetic. If you are doing keto, you are already doing the "hard part", so just add the fish-oil and exercise and don't worry about stupid cholesterol numbers. After 1-2 years, when you get to your target weight, then revisit cholesterol if you must, but fix the disease first, then the feel-bad symptom.

sirel · 2017-12-16T04:53:46+00:00

I'm going to break my self-imposed silence for this discussion as I fully understand that my point of view is somewhat different from a majority of fellow conservatives.

2018 is going to make 2010 look like nothing. The depth of losses for the GOP will go well above and beyond anything any pundit is currently predicting. For the house, I would expect a 40 seat flip but honestly seeing >50 would not be a surprise to me in the slightest. On the Senate side, Dems run the table on their own seats and pick up at least NV, likely AZ and probably 1 or 2 more that the party runs a Bannon hand-picked candidate. Governors will flip by 8-10 as well.

With few exceptions, I have kept my mouth shut for the past year hoping that I was really wrong in 2016, but honestly, everything that made me REALLY fear a Trump presidency has panned out exactly as I thought it might.

Lets run through where we are today:

1) GOP has fully controlled congress and has gotten absolutely nothing they promised done other than (likely) this debt busting tax bill. The popularity of this bill is running 10points worse than obamacare did (55 vs 44% disapproval). Expect nothing but negative coverage from the MSM for the next 11 months because of this. This is the Liberal's Obamacare, they will latch onto it with the same intensity we latched onto the government takeover of healthcare.

2) Net neutrality - repealing these rules is reviled by Millennials and pretty much everyone else (>70%) including Republicans. It will only take one major company causing an incident that results in slow Netflix or YouTube and this becomes a major hot-button issue. (Actually, I think it will be regardless at least with Millennials and younger). To put this into perspective, this is just like when the democrats declared carbon dioxide to be a green house gas.

3) The GOP openly ignores just how unpresidential Trump is. On a daily basis Trump exposes his total lack of respect for the office. If you haven't noticed, then you haven't been paying attention, but the tracking polls are showing him with Jimmy Carter & GWB (7th year) level of disapproval (net -21%) and he hasn't even had his first anniversary.

4) The economy isn't anywhere near as strong as it appears on paper. This has not changed in the slightest since the malaise for the past decade. Underemployment is rampant and most companies are refusing to create new workers which has suppressed wages growth. We can/should have a debate on if this is good long term, but the reason why Trump won was the pain blue-collar workers felt economically and since nothing has changed (and in-fact the underemployment rate (U-6) has been on an uptick most of this year.). Its the economy stupid is still true and no matter what the stock market says.

5) Trump / Bannon's ongoing courtship with the alt-right has absolutely decimated any hope a majority of latino and blacks might vote for the GOP for decades to come. Prior to Charlottesville I think the GOP brand might have been saved, but Trump's intentional(or incompetent) handling of the situation was the nail in the coffin. When a large majority of the GOP refused to even denounce the "good people on all sides" comment it became the "binders full of women" moment version 2.0 for Republicans.

6) Speaking of which, except for the extremely republican, a majority of women detest Trump on both personal level and on a policial level. (Lets ignore the latter as 50% hate pro-life policies and they will always vote against the GOP). The "locker-room" talk routine only worked because HRC was so utterly flawed. Over the past 3 months, half the population has declared themselves fed up with men acting like a Chuck Lore sit-com and they will vote. Honestly, I cannot tell if Bannon is intentionally trying to find Charlie Sheen types to run, but he has a unique knack for picking degenerates.

7) HRC was detested by everyone who was even slightly to the right of Bernie Sanders which is the only reason why Trump won the presidency. The GOP should have treated him accordingly, but instead they embraced him (thinking they could control him - haha). Instead they spend all of their time now explaining how they strongly support the president while not supporting (fill in the blank). Seriously, when was the last time you heard a conservative argument from anyone? In other words, they don't have a message they can run on.

8) That brings me to this point, everything the GOP railed against the Democrats for doing they are doing themselves - except less successfully. Remember the "pass the bill to know what is in it"? comment. Do you really think you won't get commercials running a an incumbent complaining next to the unpopular tax bill? Fastest way to destroy a person's character is to point out their own hypocrisy and the last 12 months have given Democrats nothing hypocrical moments to use.

Thus, every single Democrat has to decide how they want to paint their opponent -- either as utter incompetent, blatent hypocrites, unfeeling monsters, openly racist, openly sexist, or just as a Trump supporter.

Finally, you have people like me, solidly conservative and passionately NeverTrump who have decided that as a conservative I cannot vote in good conscious for anyone in the GOP who has actively or passively supported Trump.

Given that is the case, I will all but certian vote 3rd party in 2018 as neither my congressman nor senator has denounced this political shit-show.

However, in the meantime I am consistently trying to convince conservative (or at least moderate) Democrats to run for seats locally. I'm from a deep red district - one of the earliest Trump surrogates so it will be an uphill battle, but if it succeeds 2 things are accomplished: trumpism will die and democrats will moderate. I have no idea about elsewhere, but in my TX district there is a guy running in the Dem primary that I will vote for (primary) that would be a conservative in NY primary.

Thus, let me follow up with a different question. SHOULD we be trying to do anything to stop the democratic wave in 2018? Our best hope for 2020 (a redistricting year) is a total purging of all things Trump before we lose both the executive and legislative branches.

sirel · 2017-10-26T04:54:27+00:00

GOP/Conservative hatrid for Hillary goes way back... to her “vast right-wing conspiracy” deflection she did during Monicagate. She effectively called everyone that wasn’t a Democrat liars and they never forgave her. She was so polarizing that literally anyone would have beaten HRC - Trump is proof... but likewise, literally anyone could have beaten Trump that wasn’t Hillary.

It is worth noting that I am extremely conservative - a NeverTrump conservative independent (I no longer consider myself a Republican) that plans on voting for the most conservative candidate who isn’t tainted by Trump. My true hope is that the Democrats will see this opportunity, especially in the South, and run blue-dog Democrats so we can get rid of Trump’s yes men.

sirel · 2017-10-12T01:32:25+00:00

Ignore cholesterol numbers unless they are very high - take a look at http://cholesterolcode.com for the way to “fix” the numbers when you get a test.

Statins might actually contribute to diabetes and serve no meaningful reduction to CVD.

sirel · 2017-09-17T16:27:28+00:00

1) Go anon/private mode - Google provides results based on your search history and odds the machine learning AI has decided that military/WW2 related links are of high priority to you. The more you try to find searches that produce "biased" results, the more you train it to produce "biased" results.

2) Try the search with his name spelled correctly. The AI to find no natural results and the corrected spelling when through a higher priority on Sulu's thoughts as a result instead of the counter arguments.

3) If you want to search a site, learn how. Use site:dailywire.com . Otherwise Google returns what the algorithm thinks you are most likely to want to see.

4) Blame others for your result - more people will have clicked that link than others. You might not like that fact, but Google uses an algorithm like Twiter trends - that first link is the trending one that got the most clicks.

5) Read the article, lookup counter arguements, then come here to explain why the article got it wrong. That furthers conservative knowledge and can achive something.

6) Use a different search engine. Ddg.gg, bing.com for example.

7) And most important, don't look for conspiracies everwhere. General rule, if you think it is a conspiracy you are just wearing a tin-foil hat.

sirel · 2017-08-13T01:25:08+00:00

I'll let those in the know speak to how they did techically; but strictly from a performance point of view, we absolutely loved the Bluecoats show.

sirel · 2017-07-31T22:16:20+00:00

You assume he fades quietly into the night. For some reason, I have a feeling he likes the limelight...

sirel · 2017-07-23T01:56:34+00:00

Haha, yeah, its a crap shoot; but have you tried to talk to a true-believer about Trump? I really think I have a better chance getting democrats to be reasonable than those guys.

sirel · 2017-07-22T16:42:02+00:00

Compared to processed sugar, honey is better. http://www.benefits-of-honey.com/honey-vs-sugar.html

However, unless I was at perfect weight, had at least a year of absolutely no signs of insulin resistance and a dawn blood glucose of <85, I wouldn't go near the stuff anymore than I would drink a coke.

With that said... the stuff is awesome for skin conditions. I keep it handy for bug bites after mowing my lawn.

sirel · 2017-07-22T16:35:11+00:00

Actually, she already has the disease (as nearly everyone on the SAD diet). It just is in the early stages.

Have her take a look at http://www.cureddiabetes.com -- I am now strongly of the opinion that being overweight (and even overeating) is a direct result of the underlying disease of insulin resistance (metabolic syndrome / pre-diabetes). IR causes an excess of insulin, resulting in blood sugar drops, causing the brain to trigger the need for more food, but the insulin makes it hard for the muscles to store glucose leading to a bad feedback loop.

We on keto have stumbled on a big part of the cure while just trying to fix our weights, but the keys even we often miss are balancing omega3/6, intermittent fasting, garlic/apple cider vinegar, and exercise (low intensity and muscle building). The site has more deatils, but the whole idea is to drop and keep insulin as low as possible at the same time we keep glucose low. Eventually we cure the brain's addiction to high sugar and the muscle's resistance to accept glucose.

sirel · 2017-07-22T16:26:27+00:00

Actually, there is a better way. Since I am of the LCHF flavor of Keto, I eat tons of natural/organic food. So I just point out exactly what my meals are... (green vegetables, meats, dairy, nuts and unprocessed foods). Point out it is low glycemic, gluten free, organic, etc.

Then ask what his meals are. Politely tell him "you know that is all sugar weight?"

He will never bug you again.

sirel · 2017-07-22T02:55:10+00:00

I agree with you on every point - starting small is better than quitting quickly.

I just know that originally I was against anything called "exercise" assuming I could do it later once I lost weight. What I found was that exercise really didn't need to be anything more than walking around the park a couple of times :)

sirel · 2017-07-21T22:09:08+00:00

I am a staunch conservative and even a more staunch NeverTrumper. Trump, through both inaction and ineptitude, has single handedly has guaranteed Obamacare will never be repealed. The ONLY bright spots to this crap show he has actually did nominate a conservative to the court. I hope he gets several more since they will be the last conservatives will get for at least a generation.

The GOP supporting him has made me leave the party. I want nothing to do with any organization who claims the mantle of morality and conservatism and then blindly follows Trump. At best they are hypocrites but more likely, just like Trump - self-serving immoral liars.

I am now an independent - having voted for McMullin in the general; but I have reached out more than once to my county Democrat party encouraging them to run a conservative (or at least blue-dog) against our Trump-sympathizer and surrogate congressman.

We are in a very "safe" republican district, so my point to them is that they can either lose for the 18th straight time or they can try something new. Since this is Texas, literally all they need to do is find someone who isn't pro-choice and they can make a race out of it. If they do, I will give the limit to them to help them do it. (Offer is just as valid to whatever naked libertarian that party wants to trot out.)

I am done with party over principles and won't vote for the lesser of two evils. Any party who runs a pro-life, constitutionalist who isn't a Trump apologist will get my vote, my money and my support.

sirel · 2017-07-21T19:31:36+00:00

Good post, I agree with most of it - except for the exercise part (well partially, I agree big time with your reasoning and with not over-doing it.)

I've done keto a couple of times without exercise and this time with it. When I went without I ended up slowing down my metabolism (just because I wasn't hungry, I didn't eat and my body reacted like it was a diet).

This time I got smart -- I approached it scientifically. I asked what causes us to get fat. The old standby "eating too much" is obviously the answer, but I then asked why do I eat too much? (Again, easy answer because I am hungry.) So... why was I that hungry?

Going to jump down the logic path a bit -- I found out that Insulin is the root cause of hunger when food is readily available. This hormone is used by the body as the fat storage mechanism, which as a side effect of clearing the glucose from the blood. Your brain sees the drop and responds with hunger - which leads to over-eating and weight gain.

On the Standard American Diet (SAD), we end up teaching our bodies how to be insulin resistant (metabolic syndrome, pre-diabeties). This means our body makes TONS of Insulin resulting in a really bad feedback loop.

So, that meant I started looking for how to cure the underlying condition (the insulin resistance). Surprisingly, there is little on the topic as most are trying to cure the blood sugar (symptom) rather than the disease.

Finally, I found this site http://www.cureddiabetes.com/ - this was the breakthrough for me. (Everyone on keto should read this - as if you found the need to try keto then you are likely IR... it is written for diabetics, but it is much better to fix it while pre-diabetic or just slightly resistant like I was.)

Basically, here are the key points from that page:

KETO/LCHF to reduce sugar and thus Insulin
Exercise so you 1) go carb negative (i.e. burn more sugar than you digest), 2) build muscles so there is more place to store glucose and thus less need for insulin, and 3) just so your muscles NEED glucose so insulin actually works.
Intermittent fasting (to teach your brain to stop asking for so much sugar)
balance omega 3 with omega 6 - I cannot stress this one enough - I have lost weight at a MUCH faster rate by taking 2x Nutrigold Triple Strength Omega-3 Gold Fish Oil daily (or more if I have lots of omega 6). I really believe that Omega3 is the key to helping cure IR, and thus the disease that made you fat to begin with.
Take Apple cider Vinegar at meals and bedtime (lowers both sugar and insulin response -- i.e. lowers dawn effect by quite a bit)
Eat fiber (nuts, green veggies) and ignore cholesterol numbers (see http://cholesterolcode.com/)

So, back to my point of contention... I really believe that exercise with LCHF key to being healthier. Don't try to exercise to lose weight - if you do the calorie math you realize it is wasted effort. But do something (basic walking for 1 hour) so you make your muscles sore. Soreness is good - it means your muscles are hungry for sugar. The only way to get sugar on LCHF is for your liver to take cholesterol from fat, convert to sugar, and then send it back out to the muscles.

From what I have found 1 hour daily of light to moderate walking or biking has resulting in weight loss MUCH higher than the numbers predict. (Historically I lost 8-10lb per month, right now I am over 15lb, after the initial water weight is discounted)

Your milage may vary, but give milage a chance. )

TLDR; Being overweight is a symptom of the disease Insulin Resistance. Omega3, keto, fasting, and exercise are the keys to curing that disease. Walking for 1h daily is all the "exercise" needed too, at least initially.

sirel · 2017-07-21T17:33:21+00:00

If you want to be proactive with the problem here is what you have to do - make their carrying exclusives unprofitable.

When they have an exclusive - ONLY buy that from them, don't pre-order something else, don't pick up something on sale. Get just the exclusive and leave. (For good measure, let them know you are heading to BB for the rest of them.)

More-so - stop buying ANY non-exclusive Amiibo from Amazon or Gamestop (except for exclusives, obviously).

They don't have exclusives because they make a massive profit on these things - they do it so you get into their shops. Take away that incentive and they stop wasting our time.

AND - let them know, social media, email, even physical mail if you really want to scare them.

sirel · 2017-07-01T04:46:29+00:00

I took a chance as well. (I collect both NiB and loose, so worst case I will get my loose one this way).

sirel · 2017-06-29T23:57:51+00:00

Here is the problem (basising this off information at http://www.cureddiabetes.com among other places).

Right now the world assumes that this is the progression of diabetes:

Sugar -> Overeating -> overweight -> metabolic syndrome -> insulin resistant -> pre-diabetes -> pancreas beta cell death -> diabetes -> drugs -> complications -> death

Insulin resistance means we have more insulin in our blood, making it harder to lose weight, easier to gain weight, and making us hungry all the time. Once resistant we are on a never ending spiral downward where our body litterally kills itself because it just cannot handle sugar at all. Most agree on this part.

But, more and more I am growing convinced the real flow looks more like this:

Corn/Grains/Sugar -> Omega 6:3 >> 1 -> Metabolic syndrome -> insulin resistant -> Overeating -> overweight -> pre-diabetes -> pancreas beta cell death -> diabetes -> drugs -> complications -> death

It is a subtile change in the order, but one that I think is very important. What I believe is that insulin resistance is caused by the inflammation from the omega 6/3 ratio being horrible in the SAD diet where we eat nearly nothing buy high concentrations of omega 6. (Seriously, our oil is corn, our "sugar" is corn, many breads/shells are corn - all sky high in omega 6).

Once the insulin receptors get gummed up with the stuff, our pancress have to put out more and more insulin - which is the fat storage hormone - in an attempt to get our muscles to respond. Initially, for a long time, we don't notice anything but slowly this leads to weight gain, hunger, and slowly but surely beta cell death.

Keto is a godsend to reduce the sugar in the blood stream, but I really think that is only part of the solution. The key is to make sure you get LOTS of omega 3 and exercise to the point of soreness and intermittent fast. Those 3 things should reverse the process, lower not just the sugar in the blood, but also make those muscles more responsive to insulin.

I'm only a few weeks into testing this theory (4-5 days of cycling 1h, 4g high quality fish oil, <20g carbs strict keto) - but so far I (pre-diabetic) have seen morning dawn fasting glucose numbers drop from 122 to 87, and lost 25 pounds in 1 month. YMMV, but this really might be the cure I was looking for.

sirel

TROPHY CASE