No cause for panic. The letters just got scrambled over the inter-webs: he’s not a convicted felon , he’s a convinced melon. There are many varieties of melons of course, for example watermelons, bitter melons, and musk melons.
A classic Monty Python joke from Live at the Hollywood Bowl. Definitely some truth in this… I live in Germany with some of the best lagers in the world, and having a Miller Light for the first time was a really weird experience.
Now when I’ve visited the US quite a few times, I can say I dislike the expensive craft beers way more compared to the classic american lagers… They are way too hoppy, but the worst thing is how much more expensive they are! Like a pale ale can be over ten dollars, but a pint of PBR is 3.50. Beer should be cheap, and I don’t really like how this craft beer culture made the prices go so high.
Why haven’t any American brewers been able to make a solid lager? I typically get Spaten or Becks, but pretty much every American lager I try is terrible
It is very hard to brew a good lager, like the good Helles style famously brewed in Bavaria. I’ve been on a mission every time I come to the US to find good Helles, and I found two places that get very close:
But quite often even if they advertise the beer as German style Helles, it has some quality that makes it very different. Usually it’s sweet or even hoppy. I think for an american a special beer should have a special taste, but a good Helles is just very fresh and crisp beer.
Edit: and Becks is one of the worst beers in Germany in my opinion… At least nobody tries to sell overpriced Sternburg here.
Yes “sweet or hoppy” sums it up so well. I’ve been traveling a lot to the USA the last few years and whenever I bring this up at the inevitable craft brewery we end up at the Americans think I have no sense of taste in beer.
But they’re all the same and horrible. They’ve been brain washed.
The problem is, is the craft beer industry is obsessed with hops and the different varieties. Since IPAs are one of the most hopped beers, they took it and ran with it, all the while going down the rabbit hole of adding more and more hops. (akin to a child learning to cook by adding continually dumping in different spices to try to balance out the others) playing with the mixture of hop varieties. Most of them are also brewed to be drunk close to 0C which lightens its bitterness a bit. Though, fruit-infused and some hazy ones can sometimes have that bitterness work in their favor.
The next time you are in the US and you are still curious, while not to common, look more towards the porter/stout side. The coffee ones tend to be really good along with the more niche bourbon-barrel aged stouts. Fruity wheat beers can be a hit-or-miss with some being hopped more than others, but there is a good portion which are really good; sour ales having the same issue. Craft lagers could be another, but are almost non-existent due to how it’s brewed.
Well… I’m still in the US, and on this trip I mostly just get a Budweiser or Modelo when I want a beer. I feel like I don’t need to make a scene about the beer I drink, because a beer is a beer… I also enjoyed Coors Banquet a lot.
Wines are a different matter. In the Oregon vineyards I’ve had some of the best pinots I’ve ever tasted, much better than the pinots I’ve had in France. One of the best things on this trip was our day of tastings in the different wineries.
I figured as much. Just wanted to give some suggestions if you ever were interested in going down that route again.
Being less than couple hours from Napa Valley, I do definitely get the appeal of a good wine though. I, myself prefer them over beer in most cases too.
My in-laws brought me back a pack of 4 different craft beers from a trip recently. I can’t drink and enjoy them - way too hoppy. Even the Pilsner - and I like a good Pilsner - was not enjoyable at all. The one that’s left is the dark beer - going to be an expensive dirty Diesel one day.
There’s over 9,000 breweries in the US, and you’ll find many aren’t all hopped up ipas. Go do some googles searching, maybe take a Lil tour if they’ll show you around, and just start trying to buy from the source when you find something you like. There’s likely one near you.
I took it as Fry is drinking non American beer, because American beer tastes like water.
But really, outside of a couple large national beer chains that sell their low cost “bud, coors, Busch, natty” America has a shit ton of small breweries that make a large variety of beers that aren’t that way. There’s literally over 9,000 operating breweries in the US.
Hey you guys I just had an amazing thought, wouldn’t it be amazing if he just sort of accidentally dropped dead of natural causes or whatever so we could be relieved of all this nonsense? And Biden too…
seriously, imagine what a huge relief that would be.
of course politics would just replace them with some other yahoos up there but can we just move on already…
I disagree actually. It affects your life but you can’t do anything about it. What the politicians say is just hot air anyway. It’s pointless to get emotionally involved and manipulated by their statements. Even bad for you.
I absolutely do NOT follow politics, but am addicted to reddit & Lemmy in my downtime when I’m not doing yoga or massaging people or sleeping and it’s pretty impossible to avoid getting hit in the head with posts mentioning political figures every time we leisurely browse Lemmy.
it’s exactly as you say, but i think moving on and on with worse and worse options is not gonna be better than the current iteration. and no one’s gonna fix the social divide or the voting system. i recommend just stopping to vote and stopping to watch news. the losers have already won, why are we still playing
Local elections are still significant and will have impact on your area. These are the people allocate funds in your city - could be the difference in roads getting fixed or yet another pet project no one asked for.
What really sucks is my local politicians are very outwardly partisan, even though the positions are supposed to be nonpartisan. The surprising thing is that there are more liberalish residents than I expected. Unfortunately it’s just not enough to change what we get.
You know I do kinda wonder what effect that would have culturally, especially if that became a kind of trend or mainstay. Like, obviously a big investigation would take place as to the cause of death. Doubt they would come up with anything, but obviously, huge scandal. After that, do the successors keep getting killed since they’d probably be the same or worse, or what happens? What would happen in response to that? Would they rename the party, launch further investigations, would they attempt to dissolve the party? Would they attempt to believe in different ideals out of a kind of fear or natural selection, or what? Would they all just devolve into extremely conspiratorial thought as they desperately tried to ward it off?
I mean, if they figured it out, then they might even just start putting them out under aliases or fake names or something.
What happens when the government figures out who is in possession of the death note and arrests them/confiscates the death note? I don’t know what’s scarier, some rogue nobody with the death note or the United States Government.
I mean the government pretty much already has a death note, of a kind. If you’re not Gary Webb, then they could always just slip some shit in your water main or whatever, or otherwise just kinda kill you however they want. So it’s not all that useful for them to have, other than being cheaper and maybe making some political assassinations much easier.
Nah, they just continue on as normal, believing the lie that he’s a “political prisoner” (Trump’s words actually) and that the charges were bullshit concocted by the Democrats to put him away.
…a customer of mine spewed this nonsense off at me just yesterday after the news broke, and I died a little inside.
Was thinking more about cameras from journalists or other organizations
Their ads usually don’t show them inside even when they live there
Bringing up a Tyson competitor, the farm manager wonders how other poultry companies handle supposedly free-range-raised chickens. The short answer: They don’t, really.
“Those birds don’t go outside — you know that,” the technician replies. “They don’t all go out … Look that up online.”
The manager chimes in: “It’s not like they make it like all of ’em come out and enjoy the sun.”
“That is strictly for commercial [advertising] purposes,” the technician says. “They pick the prettiest birds [for commercials] and they toss ’em out in the grass.”
In the mean time, there’s plenty of plant-based meats along with plant-based dishes and the like. If we only wait for cultured meat, harm will continue to be done
wtfffff. even for my American butt, that sounds crazy. a government forcing its citizens to conduct a year of national service strikes me like some medieval or fascist level stuff.
I think we have a different view in Europe on it - Germany had a model of national military service until 2011 (with the option of civil service), the Nordic model includes military service etc. So it isn’t completely unimaginable - we just have a different view on the topic.
Oh wow, soooo interesting! For me, it’s the government forcibly taking control of a year of your life. I’m not saying that my perspective is correct. It’s just that that’s how I see it. I voluntarily served 4 years in the American military, so I’m not opposed to government service. I guess maybe my American mistrust of government is what’s making me apprehensive of the policy. It’s like I fear that the federal government will misuse it while also taking a major formative year of its citizens’ lives. Moreover, even if the government tries its best to make ethical decisions, I don’t think government is capable of making those decisions. It’s too bloated and compromised by the selfish goals of politicians and elites. Thinking it through for this comment, I would be more comfortable with the government providing incentives for 18 year olds to contribute public service by providing extra benefits such as college tuition, home loan guaranty, preferential hiring for government jobs, so it might be the mandatory part that is the main factor driving my concern. Btw,…woahhh, I’m having a moment since I never expected to be so American with my politics because I generally swing quite left, even for those outside of the USA.
What’s the perspective you guys have on it? How do you see it? Is it something like, “This is a good policy because citizens should contribute to their country and government is an appropriate avenue to decide how to do so and enforce this?” I would love to hear how you guys generally see it because this seems like an interesting clash of cultures. I look forward to your response 😀
Yes, exactly - it is the idea of “well, you can gain life experience and serve for the state”. However, it is (rightfully IMO) criticized as just a cheap way of gaining labor forces. I think that German culture is generally more connected with respecting authorities, rules etc., so this attitude of " you need to return something to the community who raised you up" is still prevalent.
Since 2011 the service was not enforced anymore (but not abolished - in German it’s called “ausgesetzt”), but now there is a debate again to reintroduce it in light of the war. I personally am highly skeptical of it, for the exact reasons you outlined. A year ago I have went through the process of refusing to serve in the military in a defense case. We have something here called Kriegsdienstverweigerung: you can refuse to be drafted and serve under arms if it is incompatible with your conscience. I am glad to have went through the process, but I wouldn’t have done so if I were younger; in fact, I probably would’ve been absolutely okay with serving in the military. So instead of training people to shoot, I advocate for providing opportunities for people to learn medicine and science and stuff and leave war to professional soldiers, who aren’t 18- or 19 year old enscripted boys. It is also widely known that lots of guys cheated their way out of serving (e.g. drinking a lot the evening prior, so they make a bad impression on the recruiting officer), so the system was weird anyways. So I think the current debate is between “Russia and China are a threat, we need to get ready to fight, let’s pump up our military production” and “War is no option, our infrastructure is in a state of disrepair, we need to invest into schools and hospitals instead of arms, and drafting teenagers can’t be the solution of the problem”.
To be honest I actually don’t think it sounds all that bad. If it were forced military service I’d think it was terrible. But it sounds like you can just do community service instead of the military training. And it’s just one weekend a month for twelve months. Given how much we’re disconnected from our communities these days I think making sure kids engage with their communities in this way could actually be really beneficial.
That’s just thinking about this one policy in a Vaccuum though. I know nothing about British politics so I have no clue what other awful and heinous shit this party may or may not be into.
25 days of slavery is 25 days too much in my opinion.
Also if we’re arguing that it’s too bring communities together why is it only 18 year olds? Wouldn’t mixing with a wide variety of ages from 18 to 118 be better? Also why is the stick to make people do it a fine (so that the rich will just pay if their kids don’t want to do it)?
Wouldn’t mixing with a wide variety of ages from 18 to 118 be better?
You will work in the NHS or the firefighters and so on, so you will certainly engage with community members of all ages and from all wakes of life. For a year of mandatory service that everybody is meant to complete, 18 is arguably the best time to do it.
slavery
When you walk on a public road past a hospital do you think to yourself “they stole my money to build this”? You have rights and duties as a citizen. Your service benefits the community as a whole.
Also why is the stick to make people do it a fine (so that the rich will just pay if their kids don’t want to do it)?
You will work in the NHS or the firefighters and so on, so you will certainly engage with community members of all ages and from all wakes of life. For a year of mandatory service that everybody is meant to complete, 18 is arguably the best time to do it.
But anyone who’s not 18 will be denied that “opportunity”.
When you walk on a public road past a hospital do you think to yourself “they stole my money to build this”? You have rights and duties as a citizen. Your service benefits the community as a whole.
Exactly, I already give over a portion of my labour time via taxes to help society. Forcing people to do 25 days extra unpaid work is either slavery or a huge one off tax on 18 year olds.
There’s also no exceptions. So you’ve already got a job that requires you to do weekends? Touch shit. So you’ve got staff shortages. Already work for the fire service or police etc. Touch shit. You’ve got to go pick litter up for 25 days.
I agree with you. Military conscription is shit, but mandatory community service for young people on the cusp of adulthood could be very beneficial for a society. Particularly if it involves regular interactions with older members of the community (something Western countries lack due to households typically being limited to immediate family). Young people in developed Western nations are more disillusioned, detached and depressed than ever while some older people are really struggling to keep up with the pace at which life and technology is changing. Getting both groups together in their local communities could potentially build some important life skills and confidence for younger people while helping older people to feel included and relevant. I’m not saying a Tory government would be able to implement this effectively, but I can get onboard with the general idea.
Well let’s have a look at the Tory track record of implementing things effectively. How about Boris’s oven ready deal? Seems he didn’t have one. Was he lying? Or did he have one that he thought the EU would accept until they laughed him out of the room? How’s the Rwanda plan going? How much has it cost so far? How many flights have left? Hmm.
But besides that, the proposal is even worse than just conscription. His plan is that there’ll be about 30,000 placements in the armed forces, which will of course be paid. Everyone else will have to do 25 days of unpaid “volunteering”. Of the volunteering is mandatory and your parents will be fined if you don’t do it.
Effectively it’s slave labour for the poor and pay so you don’t need to do it for the rich.
Luckily it’s extremely likely he’s not going to get to try to bring it in. They’re about 20 points behind in the polls and on some they’ve actually been falling further behind since calling the election.
Exactly! Those people were drafted and sent to fight an unpopular war in a country that most of them didn’t even know existed until then. The rich were able to dodge it by paying off the right people and others had to leave as political refugees. I think that a lot of Americans learned to fear mandatory government service due that policy.
Effectively it’s slave labour for the poor and pay so you don’t need to do it for the rich.
The cold war is restarting. British troops are among the best in the world, but they’re poorly equipped and there aren’t enough of them to sustain more than 2 days of fighting against an army the size of Russia’s. National service partly solves the manpower issue.
Sounds like a great way to further undercut public services while turning young people against the Torries. Make this shit retroactively apply to everyone serving in government and I’d have no problem with it. Fuck legislation that by design will never touch them.
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