Pat @Pat@qoto.org

@alfredo_liberal @freemo

Also it's a great distraction to keep people from learning about the tax strike.

@alfredo_liberal

Yeah, but maybe you wouldn't be able to take mifepristone next time you get pregnant.

@LouisIngenthron

He IS fiction -- that's his entire MO.

(ps - you don't need to put pol behind a CW, it makes it look like participation in democracy is taboo.)

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Retro SciFi Film of the Week…

Killers from Space (1954)

This film was released less than a decade after the United States had bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki in WWII and just five years after the Soviet Union had tested their first nuclear weapon. It's very typical of 50s scifi during the height of the Cold War with all the giant bugs and lousy special effects -- but this one is special because it has a couple of well-known actors in it.

Steve Pendleton was a character actor whose face was well known to audiences at the time and Peter Graves, the protagonist in this film, was just getting his career going. He's probably most well known for his starring role in the comedy Airplane (1974), and to older folks he's most known for playing Jim Philps the lead character in the original Mission Impossible series.

Ironically the giant insects in this movie are not the result of exposure to nuclear radiation but they look just like the giant insects from any other 50s scifi. The rest of the special effects in this film are just as bad.

And the science facts presented in the film are just as bogus as most other scifi films at the time. (Some of the science mistakes are highlighted in this satirical trailer of film.)

You'll notice a picture of Eisenhower in the background on some of the shots in this movie. The actors were awkwardly positioned to make sure that you could see his picture in the background. I'm not sure what point the filmmakers were trying to make but it was obvious they were trying to include his picture in those scenes.

This is a really bad film with a ton of unintentional flaws but it's really rather entertaining for that reason. I recommend this film for anyone who enjoys watching silly 50s science fiction or who studies the Cold War period.

Accessible video description:

The video starts with a title, then the protagonist in tattered clothing stumbles up to a poorly acting guard at a building. then he's in a doctor's office with his shirt off and the doctor points at a large scar on his chest. then in an office with military men with Eisenhower's picture in the background. then his wife, is talking to a man who is investigating the protagonist and they subtly flirt as he lights her cigarette. then a man in a phone booth asks for the police. then a woman takes a printout from a teletype and puts it into a message tube which is sent to a dispatcher who reads it. then the protagonist is in the laboratory of the humanoid aliens who have big eyes. then a video screen shows pictures of an alien city. then a bunch of closeups of giant insects, lizards, a cockroach and a grasshopper with silly sound effects dubbed over them as the protagonist looks frightened. Then the protagonist is walking with the leader of the aliens and the alien tries to convince him to be a traitor. then the protagonist is talking to one of the military guys about how to destroy the alien facility while it briefly cuts to a shot of the woman in silence. after he gives his plan there are close-ups of people looking incredulously into the camera including a woman from another 1960s comedy and finally Larry Tate from the old TV show Bewitched.

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#science #fiction #ScienceFiction #SciFi #FTW #sfftw #film #movie #ET #extraterrestrial #alien #space #1950s #badmovie #coldwar #bigbugs #nukes #ruskies

(fair use satire with scenes from this film, The Absent Minded Professor (1961) and Bewitched (circa 1970) plus well-known sound effects from other films)

It was prescient of the producers of this old movie to use this metaphor.

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(Here's a GIF version of the video.)

Putt-Putt cars are headed off a cliff 😂

(fair use clip - Radar Men from the Moon, 1952)
#ev #puttputt #energy #oil #wars

@alfredo_liberal

Don't you understand that they use those two to block stuff that the people want but that they don't actually want to pass? It's not even a Dem/GOP thing; it how Congress works. When the people want something that the wealthy don't want, they go through all these theatrics to make sure it doesn't pass.

And now here we are wasting bandwidth talking about an issue that won't effect the privileged position of the wealthy and politically connected at all. That's what they want.

@alfredo_liberal

You don't need 60 votes. The SCOTUS justices who overturned Roe were nominated and then approved by the Senate with a simple majority. There is a procedure for passing bills with a simple majority. The 3/5 filibuster rule is not in the Constitution and they can bypass it anytime they want. They just didn't want to do it, because they wanted to rally naive voters with an issue that they knew would get their base to the polls.

They don't actually care about a woman's right to choose, they only care about getting reelected.

They could have easily passed a law making abortion legal, but they didn't. That's a fact.

@alfredo_liberal

What about the Republicans in Congress who support reproductive rights? Democrats controlled what was brought to a vote and an abortion bill to reverse Dobbs was not even voted on.

@alfredo_liberal

Abortion would be legal in the US right now if the Democrats had passed a law reversing Dobbs while they had a majority.

The SCOTUS opinion was released on June 24, 2023 and the Democrats had over six months to overturn it but they didn't. They did nothing.

Obviously the Democrats feel that having abortion as a rallying issue is more important than actually making abortion legal.

@dbread

Oh. Well I disagree with promoting unhealthy foods to kids. Actually, unhealthy foods shouldn't be promoted to anyone really.

@dbread

junkfluencer = an influencer that you disagree with

@admitsWrongIfProven

Yes, I was more concerned about what his belief was regarding an afterlife, irrespective of religion.

@freemo @crackurbones

@trz4747@mstdn.social @ech

Yes, "assault rifle" has an actual, long-standing definition.

'The American gun industry traditionally used the terms "assault rifle" and "assault weapon" to market to consumers who wanted to be military LARPers. When gun regulators then started to use the same term, the NRA reversed course and pretended it didn't know what that term means, hadn't heard of it.' (+8 images of images of gun periodicals)

Notice how the journals that used the term "assault weapon" had no universal agreement as to what that meant -- some of them showed sub-machine guns.

@strawd @JonKramer

@echoechoR

>"@Pat here has given a totally different definition of assault weapon."

I did NOT give a definition of "assault weapon", I provided a link to the definition of "assault rifle". There is no clear definition for "assault weapon", that's the whole point.

@freemo

@ech

The term "assault weapon" never had a definite meaning, it was always ambiguous; probably to give politicians more wiggle room.

>'However, this is not what people mean when they respond to shootings like in TN with "we need to ban assault rifles".'

I'm not sure what people mean when they say things because I can't read their minds and people often lie these days.

When Pete Buttigieg was running in the Dem primaries in 2015 he needed to take a position on guns and he said he supported restrictions on "assault rifles". I'm pretty sure he knows the difference since he was recently a lieutenant in the Navy. He was likely trying to appeal to the Dem base (because they're ignorant about such things) while sending a dog whistle to the 2A supporters in the party (many of whom would understand exactly what he was saying).

I no longer even watch coverage of mass shootings anymore because I don't want to see a distorted view of what's going on in teams of actual numbers.

@freemo

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The future of putt-putt cars...

(fair use clip - Radar Men from Mars)
#ev #puttputt #energy #oil #wars

@crackurbones

When I wrote that, I thought Altman was an atheist, but just now google says he is Jewish. I wonder what his specific views/beliefs are on an afterlife. I mean, if someone believes in an afterlife, then they would not be so concerned about extending this mortal life we have now, right?

Maybe he just wants to invest in the company because a lot of people don't actually believe in an afterlife and are worried about dying, so perhaps he could make a lot of money that way (irrespective of his own personal beliefs).

@ech

The term "assault rifle" has a very well defined and specific meaning:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assault_rifle#Definition

It's a fully automatic firearm (select fire actually).

They use a bottleneck cartridge (the cartridge is where the powder is and is a larger diameter than the lead bullet projectile so that more force is applied to the projectile). It can produce more net energy to the projectile than a pistol round (which is used in sub-machine guns like an Uzi.

It's basic physics p = mv. Even though the bullet is a smaller diameter (smaller mass), like the 5.56 NATO, it delivers more energy than a 9mm pistol round used in a sub-machine gun because it has more powder to produce more velocity. So, e.g., a 9mm Parabellum pistol round produces about 500J of energy, while a smaller caliber 5.56 NATO produces about 1800J because it has more powder.

And since powder weighs less than lead, assault rifles can deliver more raw firepower with a lighter weapon.

But as I said, assault rifles are already banned in the US (unless you have a special permit) because they are fully automatic.

@stux

Sadly, rules don't enforce themselves.