To add on what you said since it was the most complete answer, the first credit cards didn’t start with a magnetic chip but had raised numbering that cashiers would emboss the numbering onto a carbon copy slip. The shop would keep two copies of the receipt and the customer would keep the third.

The switch to magnetic swipe on North America took a while because it required a phone connection to verify the card number. Europe switched to chips earlier than North America in part because a lot is stores didn’t have the required phone/data connections for continuous use, so the chip was developed to be used in cases where there wasn’t any connectivity with the card reader.

Pretty slow.

The problem is that your tools are going to have to be compatible with other people’s tools.

I think he’s credible as a witness for what he’s seen. He seems believable, but I haven’t looked into any criticism of what he’s said.

One modern issue is that sites like OnlyFans has caused is a unique type of spam as various models spam in a lot of places in order to build their audience.

Looking at the list of government expenditures, I don’t see space exploration as problematic as other things we are spending money on.

Regarding the Electoral College, the only thing I have an issue with it is that most states chose winner take all and the Senate is counted for votes. If the electoral college votes were given out as a percentage to each state’s popular vote, it would make the system work a lot cleaner.

For me, it depends if I’m getting a refund or not. If I’m getting a refund, usually by mid February after all my paperwork gets in. If I owe money, I’m waiting until April.

It will get given out every time FIFA needs to mollify a corrupt official that will impact their work.

“Opposition Leader” is only a role in parliamentary systems where the leader of the second party has that role.

Typically, legislative “minority leader” positions fill a lot of those roles that an opposition leader would, but it isn’t official.

Since you like At the Drive-in, have you listened to the Mars Volta?

Also, Nine Inch Nails is still on tour.

They have their greatest hits, it is best to stick to those.

About a year ago to go see “An Enemy of the People”. Great acting.

Get in the fucking robot versus don’t get in the car.

The Menzingers still play well in concert. “America, You’re Freaking Me Out” hits a lot harder now.

In context, Trump won 2024 with only 77 million voters. If you can get 100+ million to show up, that’s enough to demand control over Congress and the Presidency.

Looking back on my childhood, I see that my Mom had anxiety issues and there were a lot of cases where she was white knuckling to get things done while having a panic attack. She had developed some maladaptive behaviors to deal with this, in part because mental health wasn’t a thing back when she grew up.

It sounds like your mom had her own maladaptive traits.

The issue with Linux is going to be if there will be a single distro that dominates or if it will be more distributed. Right now, it looks like Google and Valve are the closest to making dominant distros, but I can see at least one EU government one being created as well. If there are few distros, then I can see development getting locked to those distros rather than across all Linux.

The same thing happened with Android, Google ended up controlling Android so the open source side got hollowed out and the closed source side controlled by Google became necessary to running Android.

No, my beard hair is strong enough to resist that kind of abrasion.

Is this related to Epstein or something else entirely?