How to Think Like a Roman Emperor
If you have anger issues, this one is a great tool (h/t mindyourbusiness)
This week’s book:
Discourses and Selected Writings
Disclaimer: I’m not your Supervisor. These are my opinions after reading through these books a few times.
Epictetus was born a slave around 50 ad. His owner was Epaphroditus, a rich freedman who was once a slave of Nero. Though he was a slave Epictetus was sent to study philosophy under Musonius Rufus.
Epictetus was lame and there are some stories it was caused by his master and others that it was caused by disease.
He was a freedman when all philosophers were banished from Rome in 89 by the Emperor Domitian. He then started his school in Greece, and had many students. He did not leave any writings from his lessons, but one of his students, Flavius Arrian, took notes and wrote the Discourses.
Epictetus did not marry, had no children, and lived to be around 80-85. In retirement, he adopted a child that would have been abandoned and raised him with a woman.
He died sometime around AD 135.
He is my favorite Stoic teacher. I love his bare bones and very straight forward approach.
Following is a paragraph-by-paragraph discussion of one of his lessons. Epictetus’s text appears in bold, my replies are in normal text.
That we ought not to yearn for the things which are not under our control Part IX95For this reason the good and excellent man, bearing in mind who he is, and whence he has come, and by whom he was created, centers his attention on this and this only, how he may fill his place in an orderly fashion, and with due obedience to God. “Is it Thy will that I should still remain? I will remain as a free man, as a noble man, as Thou didst wish it; for Thou hast made me free from hindrance in what was mine own. And now hast Thou no further need of me? Be it well with Thee. I have been waiting here until now because of Thee and of none other, and now I obey Thee and depart.” “How do you depart?” “Again, as Thou didst wish it, as a free man, as Thy servant, as one who has perceived Thy commands and Thy prohibitions. But so long as I continue to live in Thy service, what manner of man wouldst Thou have me be? An official or a private citizen, a senator or one of the common people, a soldier or a general, a teacher or the head of a household? Whatsoever station and post Thou assign me, I will die ten thousand times, as Socrates says, or ever I abandon it.[16]
Even as a non-religious person, this paragraph gives me a goal to strive for. If I substitute God for nature or fortune, it loses none of its meaning. I try to live a free life insofar as what I can control. I also understand that I will die someday and am working to be as unbothered as the man says he is here. If I am truly unhindered by external forces then there will be no struggle against the natural order of life. On the other hand, if I still am trying to control externals, I will rage against fate and add to the misery of myself and anyone that cares for me.
100And where wouldst Thou have me be? In Rome, or in Athens, or in Thebes, or in Gyara?[17] Only remember me there. If Thou sendest me to a place where men have no means of living in accordance with nature, I shall depart this life, not in disobedience to Thee, but as though Thou were sounding for me the recall. I do not abandon Thee—far be that from me! but I perceive that Thou hast no need of me. Yet if there be vouchsafed a means of living in accordance with nature, I will seek no other place than that in which I am, or other men than those who are now my associates.”
Have thoughts like these ready at hand by night and by day; write them, read them, make your conversation about them, communing with yourself, or saying to another, “Can you give me some help in this matter?” And again, go now to one man and now to another. Then, if some one of those things happens which are called undesirable, immediately the thought that it was not unexpected will be the first thing to lighten the burden. 105For in every case it is a great help to be able to say, “I knew that the son whom I had begotten was mortal.”[18] For that is what you will say, and again, “I knew that I was mortal,” “I knew that I was likely to leave home,” “I knew that I was liable to banishment,” “I knew that I might be sent off” to prison.” And in the next place, if you reflect with yourself and look for the quarter from which the happening comes, immediately you will be reminded of the principle: “It comes from the quarter of the things that are outside the sphere of the moral purpose, that are not mine own; what, then, is it to me?” Then comes the most decisive consideration: “Who was it that has sent the order?” Our Prince, or our General, the State, or the law of the State? “Give it to me, then, for I must always obey the law in every particular.” Later on, when your imagination bites you (for this is something you cannot control), fight against it with your reason, beat it down, do not allow it to grow strong, or to take the next step and draw all the pictures it wants, in the way it wants to do. If you are at Gyara, don’t picture the style of life at Rome, and all the relaxations a man had who was living there, as well as all that he might have upon his return; but since you have been stationed there, you ought to strive to live manfully at Gyara, as beseems the man whose life is spent in Gyara. And again, if you are in Rome, don’t picture the style of life at Athens, but make your life in Rome the one object of your study and practice.
Learning to be happy wherever the Marine Corps sent me was a learned skill. The worst place I was ever stationed was 29 Palms. It was especially difficult for my wife because that was her welcome to the Marine Corps life and since I was in artillery, I was either deployed or in the field quite often. We made the best of it and everywhere after that seemed nice in comparison.
110Then, in the place of all the other relaxations, introduce that which comes from the consciousness that you are obedient to God, and that you are playing the part of the good and excellent man, not ostensibly but in reality. For what a fine thing it is to be able to say to oneself, “Now I am actually performing what the rest talk solemnly about in their lectures, and are thought to be uttering paradoxes. Yes, they sit and expound my virtues, and study about me, and sing my praise. And of this Zeus wished me to get a demonstration in my own person, while at the same time He wished to know whether He has the right kind of soldier, the right kind of citizen, and to present me before all other men as a witness about the things which lie outside the sphere of the moral purpose. ‘Behold,’ says He, ‘your fears are at haphazard, it is in vain that you desire what you desire. Do not look for your blessings outside, but look for them within yourselves; otherwise you will not find them.’ These are the terms upon which now He. brings me here, and again He sends me there; to mankind exhibits me in poverty, without office, in sickness; sends me away to Gyara, brings me into prison. Not because He hates me—perish the thought! And who hates the best of his servants? Nor because He neglects me, for He does not neglect any of even the least of His creatures; but because He is training me, and making use of me as a witness to the rest of men. When I have been appointed to such a service, am I any longer to take thought as to where I am, or with whom, or what men say about me? Am I not wholly intent upon God, and His commands and ordinances?”
It is easy to claim not to care about money or health when I have both. It is harder to be unconcerned when I have a hard time keeping either. A few months ago, we went through a time where money was bleeding from us nonstop. I had to put new tires on my truck for $1,200, then my clutch went out in my Saab, $2,500. I put new struts on my wife’s Corrola for $400. Right after that, the Corolla got totaled by a woman that turned left into my wife while my wife was driving through an intersection on a green light. Luckily nobody got seriously injured, but we ended up renting a car for a couple weeks. Then we bought a 2011 Camry and while it was solid with 89,000 miles on it, I did have to put new struts on it and also 4 new tires and 4 new TPMS sensors. We went from having a nice safety cushion to having no extra money in the bank. That was the end of our emergencies for now and I still had a credit card if another unexpected expense reared before we could recover. I did not get very stressed about it, but it was not a comfortable feeling. On the bright side we did recover enough to be able to be home for the 1 year anniversary of my Mom’s death and are currently almost back to where we were before the snowball hit us.
115If you have these thoughts always at hand and go over them again and again in your own mind, and keep them in readiness, you will never need a person to console you, or strengthen you. For disgrace does not consist in not having anything to eat, but in not having reason sufficient to secure you against fear and against grief. But if once you win for yourself security against grief and fear, will there any longer exist for you a tyrant, or a guardsman, or members of Caesar’s household; or will some appointment to office sting you with envy, or those who perform sacrifices on the Capitol in taking the auspices,[19] you who have received so important an office from Zeus? Only make no display of your office, and do not boast about it; but prove it by your conduct; and if no one perceives that you have it, be content to live in health and happiness yourself.
I am currently traveling for work again and had an opportunity to test my Stoicism Wednesday night. When I schdule my Audits, I send confirmation of the date along with the preparatory paperwork to the person I am auditing. As I was going through my emails last night trying to find the address for the office I was supposed to go to on Thursday, I realized that not only did I not send him the confirmation but because I had not done that, he had not asked me for a visitor access request (VAR). Because it is a classified space, I could not go in without the VAR. I was worried that I would be unable to do my audit and had wasted the company funds for a trip to Pensacola. As I laid down to sleep, I had to consciously decide to not worry about it until the morning since all I would do by stressing about it now would be to lose sleep and it would not help or change anything in the morning. I slept well and first thing in the morning I called and he was able to submit a VAR for me and by the time I drove on base and to his office it had been approved. If he was unable to do that, I would have had to tell my boss that i had screwed up and I was fully prepared to do that without worrying about any consequences until they actually happened. A few years ago, this situation would have cost me sleep.
Finally finished this lesson, it was long, but I think it is a very important one.
I will be flying back from Pensacola on Friday after flying to New Orleans on Tuesday and driving here Wednesday. I had enough points with Southwest that my wife was able to fly with me and we have had a great time. This was her first time in both places and these trips are much more fun when she travels with me.
I bought some Kona Big Wave beer yesterday. I don’t like it. It tastes unpleasantly sweet (floral?) to me. However, I don’t dislike it so much that I would dump it down the kitchen sink. I’ll drink it, but I won’t buy it again. I have had their Longboard, and liked it.
You don’t know until you know.
I endeavor to persevere.
Beer bread?
Beer Bratwurst?
Beer Cheese Soup?
Beer Battered Fish?
Beer Braised Short Ribs?
Kona is owned by A-B/Inbev (last I checked). There is no reason they shouldn’t make good beer, they have a huge pool of talented brewers, and yet….
Last I checked was apparently before the Pandemic. AB-Inbev sold Kona in 2020.
And correcting my correction, its complicated.
Kona-Hawaii is independent, owned by a form AB president.
Kona-Mainland is still owned by AB-Inbev.
I think. At least as of Feb 2023.
I was in Twentynine Palms for radio school right after MCT in 89. We really liked it for a few months. No humidity, no bugs, good chow. Also close enough to Southern California areas to meet pretty young ladies.
I did the Stoic thing and scheduled a colonoscopy for June. My Cologuard came back “positive”, but it didn’t say if it was DNA or blood or whatever, so it could have been 4 or 5 things, only one of which is serious. Nobody at the doctor acted like this was an emergency. I will continue to practice the Stoic arts until then.
I can only assume that you tested positive for having a colon.
I did. Seemed a little involved to find that out.
Something that I was unpleasantly surprised by was the doc saying “hand me the jumbo forceps.”
Also the local rules about anesthesia suck. They wouldn’t give me any for the colonoscopy if I didn’t have someone babysitting me for 12 hours afterwards. Ditto for my upcoming bone graft (that will be local only if the Jewess flakes out).
WHAT IS THIS ABOUT A BONE GRAFT?!?!?
Being prepared for the unexpected is one of the most powerful stress-reducing tools in mankind’s arsenal.
I find it helps mostly when the unexpected comes knocking to find that I had prepared for the potentiality.
Simply having done the preparation doesn’t soothe any.
“Expect everything, I always say, and the unexpected never happens.”
– The Phantom Tollbooth
You go mad if you do Everything.
Risk assessment (probability-impact analysis included) is a must.
You may be thinking you’re funny lookin’
Well you’re right that’s right you’re plenty odd
But think about it think about it
If you were funny enough
You could play great god
-Baron Von Tollbooth
Agreed. Be prepared for the majority of potential issues and you will avoid major problems.
I think I’m better at handling the unexpected than handling uncertainty. I have been around a few medical emergencies (nothing too serious thankfully), and I did stay pretty calm. I have a pretty decent autopilot. But give me something with an uncertain outcome and time to think about it, and I definitely stress about it. That is a big struggle for me. (See: colonoscopy, above.)
I know exactly what you’re talking about.
Amen!
I thought it would be classy to see this in the original Latin, so I used a translator:
Oday otnay ooklay orfay ouryay essingsblay outsideyay , utbay ooklay orfay emthay ithinway yourselves; otherwiseyay ouyay illway otnay indfay emthay . ’ esethay areyay ethay ermstay uponyay ichwhay ownay ehay . ingsbray emay erehay , andyay againyay ehay endssay emay there; otay ankindmay exhibitsyay emay inyay overtypay , ithoutway officeyay , inyay sickness; endssay emay awayyay otay aragyay , ingsbray emay intoyay isonpray . otnay ecausebay ehay ateshay me—perish ethay oughtthay !
*throws a wrench at Tres*
Errr…R.J.
Whatever
Hahahahahahaha
You can call me Ray, or you can call me Jay, or you can call me Tres, or you can call me R.J.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCqh5ROtQRg
I’ve had a rough week at work.
*shrug*
The guy in that clip does say RJ, and is wearing Sean’s hat.
* pats self on back *
Most excellent!
Blocks Sean w/ fat chick
/wrench bounces harmlessly away
https://x.com/Mericamemed/status/1908112312239600067
Instant karma.
I didn’t even see why the motorcyclist was pissed off in the first place.
I think it is because the guy pulled out in front of him and into his lane. But the car was so far ahead I don’t see why that was a problem.
On closer inspection, I think the car wasn’t pulling out. He was just changing lanes with plenty of room to spare.
So, I am still baffled.
It was probably something off-camera.
I can only judge based upon the evidence in the record.
The motorcyclist comes off as unhinged.
My assumption is the video starts in medias res – who knows how it got started?
gonna get you
Someone else giving you the finger isn’t a valid reason to try and kill them. I wish that video had ended with the motorcyclist getting up, dragging the asshole driver out of his Yaris, and beating him to death with his own car door.
I concur. There wasn’t a threat there that require attempted vehicular homicide.
The rider smashed the driver’s mirror prior to the latter’s retaliation. Whatever the driver did, it doesn’t merit having his mirror smashed.
Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
No. The driver was already actively trying to run the bike off the road, when the biker smashed his mirror.
The last time I was flipped off on the road I just smiled and waved back. That pissed him off even more. I think he was pissed at me because I was driving the speed limit? Oh well.
OK, upon rewatching, the driver did move into the right lane toward the biker before the mirror smashing.
Prior to that, the driver also moved away from the biker and tried to change to the left lane but couldn’t without cutting off the car in that lane.
Like others said, without knowing how it started, it’s hard to assign blame. It’s a bad idea to chase people and antagonize them.
A guy I knew in college bragged about throwing pennies at cars in traffic for whatever offenses he perceived. He was also scared to ride a horse a took 7 years to get a 4-year degree. Typical douchebag and bully.
The problem with being an asshole is that you run into a bigger asshole on occasion.
^^
I’m gonna write that down. Thanks for the wisdom.
I jumping in late on stoicism. Where do I start? From what I can tell, the top of the post is the same every week.
I genuinely need help with this. I do not like uncertainty and work is a goldfish rodeo.
Start at the first bold paragraph (not the disclaimer) and go from there. The bold is the original translation, the standard font is Ron’s response and thoughts about it.
Start moving in that direction. If you reach Nihilism, you’ve gome a smidge too far and need to step back.
Personally my favorite Stoic work is Seneca’s “Letters”. It’s a bit long, but they’re letters of just a page or two that would be well-suited for a routine of reading one per day or something. It’s not exactly a philosophical treatise where he lays out arguments and such, but rather a collection of letters to his friend wherein he gives Stoic advice on difficult situations in life. The tone is very casual and conversational; I really enjoy reading and re-reading it.
I didn’t even see why the motorcyclist was pissed off in the first place.
Me neither. And you can either speed up or slow down, but why stay side-by-side and get squeezed to the curb?
I call attempted suicide.
“Suicide by Yaris” is way too uncool for a biker.
Admittedly, it is uncool for anyone.
But Yar’s Revenge looked pretty metal on the cover art.
I loved Yar’s Revenge. I have noticed that over the years it went from the package looking awesome to the game looking very simpe, to the package looking plain and the game looking awesome.
So, the Yaris makes a right turn (I presume on a red) way in front of and into the same lane as the motorcycle. If you pause the video at the 2 second mark, you can see the car finishing the turn. At that time, the rider is at least 100 ft away from the intersection, a distance which he closes in about a second. Thus, the rider was going about 60 mph on a road with stoplights. That is grade-A stupid.
Something similar happened to me years ago, but the cyclist went around me and flipped me the bird from the front.
🙄 Donor-cycles.
I’m sure he was running the factory exhaust so there was no way for the Yaris to hear him.
/sarc
tl;dr stoicism
don’t cry cuz it’s over, smile cuz it happened
rudeness is how the weak imitate strength
the best things in life are free and the rest are dirt cheap
at death, the rich take nothing and the poor leave nothing
the path of least resistance is what makes a river crooked
it is impossible to wake someone who is pretending to be asleep
Tres, a Mitch Hedberg AND a Patsy Stone quote within an hour? 💘!
Dragging forward the conversation from the mourning lynx.
I’ll be just as surprised as yall if the income tax gets repealed. I don’t buy that Trump is Chaos President™️
It’s not 4D chess, but it’s also not merely a megalomaniac reacting to slights and flattery. He has goals, he knows how to play the game. He’s happy to let his enemies think that he operates based on emotions because it makes them less effective.
I’m not sure whether the tariffs will achieve any good, but I do know that I prefer sales tax over income tax.
“I prefer sales tax over income tax.”
I do to…but there is a tax I prefer even more.
Yes, the “Punish the farmer and homeonwer tax” from the “Eat the Rich” sentiment of the times when it was proposed.
If you want to be accurate, it is “punish the speculator”. Bryan Caplan has some good criticisms of the SLT, if you want to actually learn something.
That sounds like splitting hairs.
Both the SLT and Income tax are based on Envy, and were sold as such.
If you are opposing anything based on envy, I guess you have become an anarchist.
I was discussing this with a German friend and it gave me a thought about what may be Trump’s intention here. My friend was giving me the Euro perspective on this, which is that The US has just thrown aside 80 years of relationship and alliance soft power, and that Europe will be forced to rearm and possibly seek out other allies and trading partners.
That is all kind of obvious and I am sure most people here will laugh about it and think “Good riddance, we have been subsidizing them in a variety of ways for that whole time and it is time they grew up”, but it triggered a thought.
Trump wants to dismantle the established order of things. One problem with that is that once his term ends he cannot prevent the usual suspects from just rebuilding all the nonsense Trump has torn down. But what if the chaos and distrust the tariffs etc. are creating internationally is in fact the point? Europe is now on notice that relying on the US Hegemony to keep them safe, prop up their economies, and insulate them from the consequences of their irresponsible social arrangements is not possible. Even if some Democrat wins in 28 and starts rebuilding the machine, the Euros have had their face slapped and are now aware that at least half the population in the big, goofy US is willing to take an economic hit just to wipe that sneer off their oh so sophisticated face. They are on notice that the dependable shield they shelter behind while mocking it and undermining it, can in fact be removed without warning. The Democrats and Rinos may want to go back to the way things were, but can they? I wonder if part of the point of this was to poison those waters in a way that precludes a return to the status quo ante.
Sweet – KC-46 & 2 F-35s just went over my house ~ 1,000ft on their way to the Fenway opening day flyover.
Stoicism needed. I just discovered my dog has yet again dug up things I planted. WTF is that? This time tabasco peppers. I kept my cool and replanted the ones that were not completely destroyed.
My dog is standing out in the drenching rain, digging to China. Why isn’t she hanging out in her dog house instead of getting sopping wet? Dunno.
The good news is that the flooding rain is filling her holes and making it impossible to dig. The bad news is that the entire side yard is under water.
From the sound if it you may need to improve your yard’s drainage.
But that gets expensive.
We’re coming up on 4″ of rain just today and it has been raining on and off since Tuesday.
I saw videos from in town where the water in people’s yards is feet deep.
It’s bad. And we have a long round over night through TX that is headed your way. Lots more. Keep your trash can dry.
My dog was obsessed with roots: don’t know why. We’d cut the thick ones so he wouldn’t break his teeth.
It’s not 4D chess, but it’s also not merely a megalomaniac reacting to slights and flattery. He has goals, he knows how to play the game. He’s happy to let his enemies think that he operates based on emotions because it makes them less effective.
I think… Trump is forcing some people to seriously think about things, instead of merely nodding along with the consensus conventional wisdom. Some people cannot be shaken out of their preconceptions. There may actually be a few people out there asking, “What if he’s not completely wrong and crazy?”
If you look at that Brownstone link from the other day (Winston’s mom?) about manufactured reality, consciously or not Trump is pulling back the curtain.
I do notice we’re suddenly having conversations you never heard outside of a Ron Paul interview.
I find it telling that no MSM articles are sharing the tariffs these countries have had in place on American imports. Levying these reciprocal tariffs may be a bad move, but let’s at least have all of the information on the table and paint an accurate picture of what’s going on.
I’m stunned that South Korea and Japan have tariffs on us. Same with much of Europe. They should be the ones paying us a blood tax. Between this, USAID, NATO, the UN, etc, it seems like US taxpayers are just being bled across the globe.
What really, really shocks me is how rich this country has to be to have lived with all of it for so long.
At one point we were that rich, but now we just have bigger credit cards.
“There is a great deal of ruin in a nation.” — Adam Smith
SSD:
I’ve seen numbers, but they’re the cooked numbers that include currency manipulation and trade imbalance bullshit. No one wants a simple and understandable process or system when there’s money to be made by introducing complexity and ways to pick winners and losers.
Nephilium,
Yup.
Piggybacking on what Neph said, I was more or less indifferent about the tariffs until I saw that the numbers presented were BS. I don’t like being deceived by the Democrats and I don’t like it when the Republicans do it either.
Ed:
Yep. I’d be alright with something as simple as reciprocal tariffs (even if I think it’s a bad idea, it at least has some consistency and predictability to it), and that’s what these are being called. They are not.
If this were just reciprocal I’d be a lot less mildly annoyed.
I’m not sure whether the tariffs will achieve any good, but I do know that I prefer sales tax over income tax.
But teh poors! Consumption taxes are regressive. Besides, we want to punish people for producing, not consuming.
It is possible to do a progressive consumption tax. Basically, keep the income tax around but give unlimited traditional IRA-type deductions (and not required to wait until 59.5 to cash out).
Basically, you can invest any income you don’t want to pay tax on (today), and pay tax on it when you divest instead. It is a backdoor consumption tax.
There was also the Fair Tax method (receive a prebate of the tax up to the poverty line for the household) that was pitched a while back, but that got linked to UBI.
I find it telling that no MSM articles are sharing the tariffs these countries have had in place on American imports.
I keep thinking back to the media freakout when Trump deep sixed Obama’s Pacific “Free Trade” agreement. Whatever that was, it was not free trade.
Trump’s tariffs are not much based on foreign tariffs. They’re based on trade deficits and a fundamental misunderstanding of economics.
“fundamental misunderstanding of economics.”
Adam Smith destroyed mercantilism in 1776. And yet, here we are.
What really, really shocks me is how rich this country has to be to have lived with all of it for so long.
If it comes down to it, we have an economy big enough, and sufficiently diversified, with enough natural resources to survive a “trade war”.
Trade Wars are really stupid. I like the David Henderson metaphor from years and years ago.
Adding tariffs in response to a country tariffing you is like seeing your enemy shoot himself in the foot and you shoot yourself in the leg in response.
Neil Boortz had a proposal called the Fair Tax. It was meant to eliminate the IRS and income tax and replace it with a national sales tax combined with a stipend to offset the cost of living. People shouldn’t have to pay taxes on the money they need to live.
Neat idea, went nowhere.
It got debated in congress, so it went further than most proposals.
Huh. It was and it looks like they’re trying again:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/house-bill/25/text/ih
I am willing to throw in the ability for some chicks to work from home if it defeats the filibuster on this.
It was. The main problem is the government would have to control itself and not constantly grow beyond all bounds. So the idea went nowhere.
Trade Wars are really stupid.
I didn’t say it was a good idea. I like coffee, and bananas, and avocados.
10 for $10 this week.
$10,299
I’m gonna pass. The chain is kinda lame too.
I knew I need to lose weight. But the doc didn’t have to say “open your mouth and say oink”.
I know the healthcare system is expensive, but if you’re gonna switch and go to a vet, you’re just going to have to put up with such things.
I thought it was weird during my last prostate check that he put one hand on my shoulder, but then he put both hands on my shoulders.
After 75 you’re pretty much home free from the back door bodily invasions, unless there’s evidence to the contrary
Now explain why I had to stand six feet away from people in a restaurant and why once I sat down it was OK to take my mask off.
Ousted Vaccine Chief Says RFK Jr.’s Team Sought Data to Justify Anti-Science Stance
Kennedy is an asshole, but fuck you.
Wait, so they’re looking for data to back up their claims, and that’s anti-science?
Science is more about feelings now, specifically the feeling of a wad of cash in your pocket.
“Wait, so they’re looking for data to back up their claims, and that’s anti-science?”
Yes.
I’ll play devil’s advocate.
We have pretty good evidence at this point the earth is basically spherical. I’d call it a big waste of time and money to yet another study suggesting it is flat.
However, what we have here is far from “settled science” although much of the research and medical profession seems to think it is. They are reacting like Kennedy wants more proof the world is round and/or studies supporting the idea that it is flat.
Those things “kind of came out of nowhere”, but Fauci represented The Science at the time so it was legit.
“Now explain why I had to stand six feet away from people in a restaurant and why once I sat down it was OK to take my mask off.”
That is the best response to give to them when they start on their bullshit anti-science tirades. The whole COVID theatre was rooted in anti-science/authoritarian bullshit.
Trump and all the whining the world is doing: My son just now about Canada “They need to shut the fuck up. They are only a country because we let them be.”
He’s right.
A motorcycle fueled by bacon (well, biodiesel made from fork fat)
https://drivenbybacon.com/
There are many here that saw through the covid BS, recognized Biden’s decline prior to the 2000 election and understand that the consumer has to pay the tariffs. Yet we keep hoping, hoping for a good outcome.
The damage was done a long time ago, by getting us into situation where only the government can save us. The debt, the deficit, we ain’t seen nuthin’ yet!