I often recommend Spain for US emigrants, quality of life and cultural norms are similar, and Spanish is easier to pick up when you’ve heard it as much as you do from US media.

Netherlands and Scandies have a great reputation, but there’s significant culture shock and you risk feeling more alienated for longer.

That’s probably exactly what I was thinking of.

I mostly see them in US media, and they always seem so thick. But then again, the Russian vest doesn’t, so I guess they’re for different uses.

Interesting, I learnt something new today.

Seems delightfully medieval as a solution. What does the Kevlar do? Mostly anti-spalling?

Maybe I just don’t know how bulletproof vests work, but shouldn’t there be some layers of energy dispersing material on top of that plate?

Is it a fair comparison without?

Dozens!

That’s almost an hour of soldiers at the current casualty rate

Damm shame, and it was so flammable too!

Estimate a week ago was that a counteroffensive can come next spring earliest. Might just be information warfare, but Ukraine is currently on the back foot.

The Chinese rank 60th in happiness, which is ahead of Greece, Russia, Turkey, India and other market economies.

There are other ways to care for your population than making them compete for basic necessities. It’s unfair to judge by your own lens.

But then again, this is probably much too much nuance for this thread.

But price increases of cereals ( bread, pasta, grains, etc.) increased by about 7,5 % last year alone, which is more than the inflation, and more than the increase after inflation.

That’s where people might complain. They still can’t afford food, as food prices increase faster than overall inflation

I appreciate a data supported argument, and love that you actually linked sources.

One thing that I feel is missing in most of the linked analyses is that inflation has also hit unevenly, and the price of basic goods has increased significantly more than overall inflation. Which would explain why households still have less disposable income, also the mean debt burden is much higher leading to loan costs being more common.

Or brought up by a neurodivergent parent, or sibling, or have an ND partner

What a well reasoned and well described set of posts. You are a credit to our community!

Yeah, it’s quite interesting, but it measures encounters without defining them, and it’s very hard to get anything specifically useful for Texas.

The data does more to show that Texas are being whiny about it, than what their criterion for invasion is. I fully expect a ComiCon or similar to drive as much tourists as the whole illegal immigration thing, and that Texans travel in similar sized crowds for any holiday. But there aren’t any clear data on either, pointing to dangerous ineptitude, and emotionally motivated (or “hysterical” as it was called in the olden days) governance.

Texas is about the size of Ukraine or France, not the whole continent.

True, but it might get you far enough that you aren’t “home”, and might be “invading” a neighbouring city.

But I agree, it’s a weakly relevant datapoint, but the only other travel data I could find was that 250k texans fly for Thanksgiving, which was even less useful.

I’m honestly baffled, how do you set policy, have informed debate or even identify business opportunities with so little reliable data?

I can’t find direct data on how many illegal immigrations are happening in Texas every year, but the undocumented population is estimated to be about 1,5 million, and stable. [source]

Between 2022 and 2023, the legal migrant population increased by 10k, and eligible migrants decreased by 50k. If we assume that the whole difference is only due to illegal immigrants naturalizing, that would mean that the Texas yearly influx of immigrants is 60k. [source]

That would mean that the “invasion” requiring armed self defence/martial law is for 60k civilians.

About 10 million Texans yearly travel over 50 miles, [source], does that mean Texas is invading most of the US annually?

(also, it’s ridiculous that you don’t have clear data and statistics on this exact question. Sometimes I love living in the EU)

Wasn’t the story that the light gun set off the explosive armor attachments to blind it?

Which essentially means that either Putin is bluffing, or believes that he could get away with it.

With Ukraine, even with operational disaster, it would seem he’s quite apt at getting away with stuff, and has prepared both political discord and the flexibility to capitalise on the shifting world stage.

Gearing the informational landscape is a commitment of resources, much more than the random blusters and threats they’ve been throwing around. Russia traditionally has had the capacity for large scale feints and diversions, so I guess we’ll have to see what more they’re doing and where.

How are we doing on this? I’m missing this feature almost every day.

Ah, but you’re just saying that as a professional troll.

Now compare that to: I think you’re mistaken, intent matters, and I believe extending trust that both parties want to convey something, rather than just dismiss others, is necessary for a discussion, and also for a communal discourse. If we’re just shouting into the void, no trust is needed, but for interactions and building a sense of community, we will need both trust and norms of collaboration.