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..and in other news

Speaking of the US. Our population in 1960 was 180 million. By 1980 it was 230 million, and today is about 345 million, no idea whether that includes Biden's migrants.

We sometimes watch cooking competitions from Gordon Ramsay (another immigrant), and many of of the contestants are originaly from other countries. Chef'ing must be a good entry job and these competitions attract a lot of contestents who originated in Europe, S America, the Caribbean, SE Asia, and elsewhere.

As much as we criticize Biden for his stupid open borders, these "migrant" chefs almost always came to the US before Biden took office. Whatever the immigration rules were, my impression is they didn't follow the slow, "work through the embassy and come thru the front door process". They wanted a better life and are willing to work hard to get it.

I hope the US can set up fair but real immigration rules under Trump. It is interesting that the migrants don't seem to want to go to China, Russia or Iran, where they would be put in concentration camps or worse.

Another tough, broken situation that Trump is inheriting.
 

And more about the big, green lie…
I am now wondering why certain electric vehicles use as an advertising gimmick, their 0 - 60 time and their Top Speed above 120 MPH ?

Who among us has been trained to drive at top speeds ABOVE 120 MPH ? Other than ME ! Who knows that their tires are rated to NOT fail at those speeds ?
 
I am now wondering why certain electric vehicles use as an advertising gimmick, their 0 - 60 time and their Top Speed above 120 MPH ?

Who among us has been trained to drive at top speeds ABOVE 120 MPH ? Other than ME ! Who knows that their tires are rated to NOT fail at those speeds ?
They don't put tires on cars that aren't rated for the top speed of the vehicle.
 


Another example of declining American culture. We have just accepted a crazy amount of death on our streets, and the # is undercounted. LA with about 6 per day. That’s f’n nuts. Denver is close to 1 per day.

People act like it’s no big deal. Oh well, metro areas are going to have a lot of unhoused dearh, just a minor inconvenience.

Our standards have fallen, there is no debating it. We haven’t just accepted mediocrity, we’ve accepted much worse. It seems like some want American culture to be branded based on how the top 10% live. What does life look like for those that aren’t living in the suburbs? It’s not that great.
Learn of what you speak.

NYC used to have homeless units that patrolled the streets of NYC, all the Boroughs. These multi-person vans would have social workers and specially trained NYPD Officers as well. Their job ? Was to find homeless people living on the street and counsel them to transported by van to FREE shelters where these skels would get everything free, housing, food, bathing facilities, clean clothing, drug re-habbing, you name it.

It was eventually disbanded, why ? The homeless would not come off the street !
 

Half of America’s young men aren’t even trying to find a woman anymore. They have given up.

Do you think business owners typically prefer a family man that is motivated to make $ for his family, or a single man living at home with his parents or in an apartment with a roommate? Give me the family man, 9 out of 10 times.
My response to 50 % of men hiding in Brandons basement ?

MORE for me !
 
Need to get back to getting drunk at a bar is OK, too. Support your local live bands. Get the 4 O'Clockers having sex again. Alcohol is good and righteous. Getting lit breeds temporary confidence.
I assume this is tongue and cheek !

40 - 50 years ago, part of the State of NJ attempts to curtail the alcohol death rate in cars, they had a program. The program used social workers, ABC Agents and NJSP (on OT details !). Just before closing time (2 AM in most of NJ), the others would go into bars. Identify drunks at the bars and quasi detain and transport to center, where the drunks were talked to by trained social workers. The NJSP were just along if the drunk got rowdy !

It didn't work ! Why ?

Because you were working with drunks !
 


The United States is not crushing it when it comes to healthcare, either. Costs are skyrocketing, including deductibles on individuals and families. Doctor shortages means more NPs and PAs instead of primary care physicians.

Another area where I would say we accept far less than excellent.
 
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That's what the Hudson Valley air quality looked like when we were last subjected to the uncontrolled forest fires in Canada, 350-400 miles AWAY !
Played a doubleheader in it. You couldn’t see the sun as it was setting. Had one player back out for athsma reasons, which I totally understood. It was crazy.
 


That’s pretty clear by now. Cares about no one? Does that sound like an excellent culture?
 
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I assume this is tongue and cheek !

40 - 50 years ago, part of the State of NJ attempts to curtail the alcohol death rate in cars, they had a program. The program used social workers, ABC Agents and NJSP (on OT details !). Just before closing time (2 AM in most of NJ), the others would go into bars. Identify drunks at the bars and quasi detain and transport to center, where the drunks were talked to by trained social workers. The NJSP were just along if the drunk got rowdy !

It didn't work ! Why ?

Because you were working with drunks !
To a certain degree it was tongue in cheek. People need to support the live band scene and get out to the dance clubs again. Between the no-smoking in the bars (I support that) and Covid, those are just 2 factors that have hurt the mingling of people to talk and potentially doing the nasty…bare minimum set up a coffee date…add in an over-reliance on dating apps and communicating with people via text or apps. Have to make a strong effort for everyone to socialize more…even the socially awkward, the well overweight and even the butterfaces.
 
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To a certain degree it was tongue in cheek. People need to support the live band scene and get out to the dance clubs again. Between the no-smoking in the bars (I support that) and Covid, those are just 2 factors that have hurt the mingling of people to talk and potentially doing the nasty…bare minimum set up a coffee date…add in an over-reliance on dating apps and communicating with people via text or apps. Have to make a strong effort for everyone to socialize more…even the socially awkward, the well overweight and even the butterfaces.

From what I hear from my single friends, American dating culture blows. Just another area where developed countries’ advances have made things worse.
 
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"America’s crime trends in 2024 were remarkably positive with an enormous decline in murder, a continued small but steady decline in violent crime, and a sizable decline in motor vehicle theft on the heels of several years of surges. The nation’s murder rate has largely erased the post-COVID surge and was roughly around or 2019’s level while reported violent and property crime were likely amongst the lowest rates recorded since the 1960s and 1970s. This assessment is based on an evaluation of data from multiple official and unofficial data sources all painting the same picture.

Murder likely fell at the fastest rate ever recorded in 2024 after falling at the fastest rate ever recorded in 2023 based on an assessment of 2024 crime data from numerous sources. The Real-Time Crime Index has murder down 16 percent in 309 cities with available data through October 2024, the FBI has murder down 23 percent through June (though it’s almost certainly overstating the decline), the CDC has homicide down 14 percent through May (provisional count), and the Gun Violence Archive has fatal shootings down more than 11 percent as of mid-December."


2025 is not off to a great start.

I bet if you add up the overdoses, murder, and “unhoused deaths”, they would add up to more than the old numbers that just included overdoses and murder. We didn’t use to keep track of outside deaths.

A lot of the “unhoused deaths” are overdoses. They just don’t get to people fast enough, and they don’t do autopsies on people found dead on the street.
 
Overdose deaths going down while unhoused deaths go up is gaming the stats. A high % of unhoused deaths are overdoses that go unrecorded. But hey, people that aren’t curious believe the deaths are going down. Success!
 
It beats the hell out of the competent gangs and poor unskilled labor the current administration has been importing.

Yes, we asked a lot of less than mediocre people to enter the country the last 4 years. Hopefully we get back to a culture of excellence. Not one where we look at every migrant as equal. They aren’t. We are getting an ugly lesson on this.
 

Half of America’s young men aren’t even trying to find a woman anymore. They have given up.

Do you think business owners typically prefer a family man that is motivated to make $ for his family, or a single man living at home with his parents or in an apartment with a roommate? Give me the family man, 9 out of 10 times.
The young boy I worked Security at OCCC was single and had that app on his phone where you see a picture of a single girl. Swipe one way she's history the other way you hook up for a semi-date. So I picked out a beautiful girl, he swiped her. They started dating, he graduated from NYPD (His Dad retired NYPD), got engaged, married, everything well !

She told him, that he was the only person that swiped her positive ! Believe me beautiful !
 
To a certain degree it was tongue in cheek. People need to support the live band scene and get out to the dance clubs again. Between the no-smoking in the bars (I support that) and Covid, those are just 2 factors that have hurt the mingling of people to talk and potentially doing the nasty…bare minimum set up a coffee date…add in an over-reliance on dating apps and communicating with people via text or apps. Have to make a strong effort for everyone to socialize more…even the socially awkward, the well overweight and even the butterfaces.
I bounced for years in the old smoking years ! I would come home late at night and take a shower and leave my clothes in the shower. STINK !

My first long time date after living on Thompson Island was from following Mom's advice ! Go to a Church dance, you'll meet someone nice there !
 
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