World News Thread

[N.E. Brigand]

Has anyone here ever had lamprey pie?

[Jude]

Didn't Henry I die from a surfeit of lampreys?

[RoseMorninStar]

Didn't Henry I die from a surfeit of lampreys?

Yes he did. Some say they are good, but I'll pass.

[Dave_LF]

Any thoughts on the situation in Israel? As I understand it:
-IDF attacked multiple targets from the air last night with the goal of killing Palestinian jihadi leaders and succeeded in at least one case (maybe more)
-Israel told its citizens to stay near bomb shelters until Wednesday
-Reserves have been called up
-Statement from Israel that they're prepared to fight Iran on multiple fronts if necessary

[Frelga]

I did not have this on my Bingo card, either.

20230528_132900.jpg (96.96 KiB) Viewed 2840 times

In case you missed it, there are border clashes between Iran and the Taliban. Possibly Iran should keep its kamikaze drones for its own defense instead of giving them to Russia to shoot at Ukraine.

[narya]

This is a rather confusing article, but it relates to California, Canada and Australia, so I'll put it here:

https://www.npr.org/2023/05/31/11791842 ... vation-act

[Impenitent]

The deal struck in 2021 was one of the (few) ticks for the Morrison Government, IMO.

I hope California - and other states across the US - see the benefit of supporting professional news journalism by curtailing the current parasitic relationship bw news sources and tech platforms.

Wishing luck to Canada.

[Frelga]

What's happening in Serbia?

[River]

I don't even know where to start but it can be summed up as lots of people are fed up with Vucic's shit and Vucic is responding by trying to stir up newer and more distracting shit.

Kinda glad we're not going this year. It wouldn't be dangerous, AFAIK, just a huge PITA to do some of our favorite things with all the demonstrations clogging the center of Belgrade.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I'm glad to hear that you are not going this year, River. It sounds like a huge clusterfuck.

[River]

Yeah, my husband hasn't been moping too much about that decision. Especially since his sister is coming to us this summer! And her visa is good for ten years, so if she finds visiting the US to her liking we can arrange more. It's a lot cheaper to fly her in than to fly the four of us out...

Last year there were demonstrations shortly before our trip and S was legitimately concerned that we might be stuck at the Belgrade airport, or taking some whacky alternative route, because the demonstrators were shutting the main highway back into Belgrade down. But it all cleared out by the time we got there and stayed calm while we were there.

[N.E. Brigand]

Boris Johnson, who was Britain's Prime Minister in 2019-2022 and who has been a member of Parliament since 2015 (during which time he helped to mislead his country into voting for the disastrous Brexit plan in 2016), is leaving Parliament today after receiving an advance copy of a not yet published report -- which he says is "riddled with inaccuracies and reeks of prejudice" -- about how he misled Parliament regarding his office's evasion of lockdown rules during the Covid-19 pandemic.

[N.E. Brigand]

Nicola Sturgeon, who from November 2014 until her unexpected resignation in March 2023 led the Scottish National Party (that country's biggest political party) and, as First Minister for Scotland, was the country's head of government, was arrested today for financial crimes related to mismanagement of SNP funds (about £600,000, or roughly $750,000).

Who do the Scots think they are, arresting a former leader like this: Americans?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Just another Banana Republic.

[Sunsilver]

By now, most of you have probably heard that the mini-sub, Titan, imploded while diving to view the Titanic wreck. All 5 passengers would have died instantly.

You may also have heard that an employee, David Lochridge was fired from OceanGate, the company that built the sub, in 2018, for pointing out flaws in its design. He said its carbon fibre construction was only safe to a depth of 1,300 metres, while the company planned to go as deep as 4,000 metres.

He sued the company for wrongful dismissal, and they counter-sued, saying he'd breached his non-disclosure contract. They eventually settled out of court. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/titanic-su ... y-lawsuit/

Well, looks like he was right about the sub not being safe at those depths.

This is why he wasn't listened to: ‘Safety Is Just Pure Waste’: OceanGate CEO In 2022

https://www.dailywire.com/news/safety-i ... eo-in-2022

If there isn't a major lawsuit - or several lawsuits - to come out of this, I'll be very, very surprised.
What. an. Idiot.!!

[N.E. Brigand]

[Sunsilver]

Here's what N.E. is referring to:

The Wreck of the Titan, or Futility:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wreck ... ,_Futility

It was written shortly before the sinking of the Titanic, and the Titan's sinking was eerily similar.

Here's what James Cameron has to say about the mini sub. Cameron not only did 33 dives on the Titanic, he has also dived to even deeper depths in the Mariana Trench, and designed submersibles.

[Túrin Turambar]

As someone who was fascinated by the Titanic as a child, I was following this closely.

I wasn't surprised that some sort of cowboy outfit was running tours to the wreck on an unsafe submarine. The techbro mindset of disruption and ignoring good risk management in order to innovate and stay on the cutting edge was going to lead this way sooner or later. I am genuinely surprised that a submariner with the experience of Paul-Heri Nargolet went willingly onto this contraption and I'm afraid his presence might have persuaded the others. I'm actually glad the end was mercifully quick - the sub would have popped like a balloon and the water would have hit them at close to the speed of sound so they might not have even realised anything was wrong. I went to bed last night with horrible images of freezing, suffocating or drowning in a frigid pitch-black metal tube. Like James Cameron, I had noticed the irony of an egotistical inventor believing he had tamed the dangers of nature to take an unsafe vessel to the see the wreck of an unsafe vessel which had sunk after its owners believed they had tamed the dangers of nature. Sadly, I doubt this will be the last time something like this happens.

[N.E. Brigand]

Some interesting history of the project here. I didn't realize that the late Steve Fossett had been working on a carbon fiber submersible.

- - - - - - - - - -
CNN's Christiane Amanpour interviewed former U.S. president Barack Obama in Athens yesterday, shortly before news broke about the fate of the Titan, and responding to a question about media practices generally, he mentioned something that a few other commentators have said in the past couple days: this tragic event which cost five lives has received much more attention that the death of more than six hundred migrants in a shipwreck off the Greek coast.

[Sunsilver]

CNN's Christiane Amanpour interviewed former U.S. president Barack Obama in Athens yesterday, shortly before news broke about the fate of the Titan, and responding to a question about media practices generally, he mentioned something that a few other commentators have said in the past couple days: this tragic event which cost five lives has received much more attention that the death of more than six hundred migrants in a shipwreck off the Greek coast.

Yes, I saw that mentioned by several people too. So very sad...