[Non-US] News That Makes You laugh/cry/neither...

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Fri Jul 18, 2014 12:14 pm

Such a spider does exist. I don't know if the Australian ones do, but the Banana Spider of Brazil mainly has serotonin in its venom. Which, as it turns out, hurts like buggery when simply injected via a bite.

Maj · Post by **Maj** » Fri Jul 18, 2014 6:22 pm

I'd probably go Canada, though you should consider looking at other places in the US, too. It's not like this country is particularly homogeneous.

...You Lost Me · Post by **...You Lost Me** » Fri Jul 18, 2014 6:33 pm

I constantly hear good things about Canada. It's also pretty close, relative to places like New Zealand.

Longes · Post by **Longes** » Fri Jul 18, 2014 7:01 pm

http://www.themalaymailonline.com/malay ... r-mas-says

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 4:50 am

The passport thing is very silly. People have them in their hand luggage and the plane broke up in the air, so they just fall. A falling passport doesn't disintegrate or burst into flame, and the booklets themselves are quite sturdy.

More on that story, The Ukraine military leader dude had recently said they were going to bomb the rebel held cities to force the rebels into the open, and this missile hit was right next to one of the threatened cities. Usual thing, lots of safeguards, every single one of them broken in a short period of time.

Oh, and if people are rich, moving to NZ is the bees knees. Low taxes anyway, but you can basically turn up a buy yourself a rural town on cheap loans, then gather up the subsidised rents and pretend you're losing money on it as a tax break. Some Irishman owns a little town down the road from here, shops and all, and everyone says he's a great bloke. Not that they have a choice. You can even set up private schools that don't have to follow the national curriculum or hire real teachers and still get full government funding, so just teach the young ones to serve you well. It's all good, at least until the next election.

The weather's not all that, though.

Longes · Post by **Longes** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 5:43 am

tussock wrote:The passport thing is very silly. People have them in their hand luggage and the plane broke up in the air, so they just fall. A falling passport doesn't disintegrate or burst into flame, and the booklets themselves are quite sturdy.

More on that story, The Ukraine military leader dude had recently said they were going to bomb the rebel held cities to force the rebels into the open, and this missile hit was right next to one of the threatened cities. Usual thing, lots of safeguards, every single one of them broken in a short period of time.

Well, luckily the attorney general of Ukraine has announced yesterday, that rebels don't have Buks.

Prak · Post by **Prak** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 6:00 am

tussock wrote:Oh, and if people are rich, moving to NZ is the bees knees. Low taxes anyway, but you can basically turn up a buy yourself a rural town on cheap loans, then gather up the subsidised rents and pretend you're losing money on it as a tax break. Some Irishman owns a little town down the road from here, shops and all, and everyone says he's a great bloke. Not that they have a choice. You can even set up private schools that don't have to follow the national curriculum or hire real teachers and still get full government funding, so just teach the young ones to serve you well. It's all good, at least until the next election.

The weather's not all that, though.

Huh. Reminds me of a thought I had to get a bunch of artists/gamers to buy a No.Dakota(?) town that was posted on Craigslist and turn it into a neo-nerd commune.

Also, I've always preferred cool, occasionally dreary weather. Portland is nice, Sacramento is, to use someone else's metaphors, Satan's ballsack.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 3:55 pm

Longes wrote:
tussock wrote:The passport thing is very silly. People have them in their hand luggage and the plane broke up in the air, so they just fall. A falling passport doesn't disintegrate or burst into flame, and the booklets themselves are quite sturdy.

More on that story, The Ukraine military leader dude had recently said they were going to bomb the rebel held cities to force the rebels into the open, and this missile hit was right next to one of the threatened cities. Usual thing, lots of safeguards, every single one of them broken in a short period of time.
Well, luckily the attorney general of Ukraine has announced yesterday, that rebels don't have Buks.

The Associated Press reports that they've totally seen Buks in rebel territory.

EDIT: Hey, I've found the original quote and you are in fact full of shit.

"The military told the president after the passenger plane had been shot down [in the Donetsk region] that the terrorists did not possess our Buk and S-300 missile systems. Such had not been seized," the prosecutor general told the Ukrainska Pravda online edition after the Thursday meeting of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council.

That is not a statement that they don't have them, it's a statement that they haven't seized them from Ukraine. But it's not like anyone else in the region has Soviet-era anti-aircraft wea- oh right

Laertes · Post by **Laertes** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 7:00 pm

Why would the Ukrainians even be shooting at planes? The rebels don't have planes. If a plane is there, it's either a Ukrainian plane or it's a Russian one in which case FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T ATTACK IT.

So yeah. I suspect it was a rebel shot. Dr Mark Galeotti, one of the smartest Kremlin-watchers out there, convinced me on that matter.

Interestingly, the real loss might be to the world of medicine. That plane was full of AIDS researchers on their way back from a conference in the Netherlands. The dumbass rebels inadvertently killed a whole fuckin' load of people trying to cure a disease.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 7:40 pm

Well, the automatic conspiracy theory is that the Ukrainians shot down the plane in order to frame the rebels. While I'm not prepared to definitively rule that out just yet, it would be rather a difficult frame job to pull off, what with it requiring getting a highly sophisticated missile launcher into enemy territory.

There's also the outside possibility that some third party which wants Russia to have a bad time did it, but that's even less likely.

Foxwarrior · Post by **Foxwarrior** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 10:15 pm

It's not much of a conspiracy theory if it doesn't have anything to do with the fact that it was a Malaysian Airlines plane.

Omegonthesane · Post by **Omegonthesane** » Sat Jul 19, 2014 10:30 pm

Laertes wrote:Why would the Ukrainians even be shooting at planes? The rebels don't have planes. If a plane is there, it's either a Ukrainian plane or it's a Russian one in which case FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DON'T ATTACK IT.

So yeah. I suspect it was a rebel shot. Dr Mark Galeotti, one of the smartest Kremlin-watchers out there, convinced me on that matter.

Interestingly, the real loss might be to the world of medicine. That plane was full of AIDS researchers on their way back from a conference in the Netherlands. The dumbass rebels inadvertently killed a whole fuckin' load of people trying to cure a disease.

I feel like any conspiracy theory explanation ought to mention it.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 3:04 am

The Russian government got caught out editing the Wiki page for the event.

Anyway, they were flying over an area where the rebels expected bombing to occur, and they were flying pretty low (apparently due to all the air traffic in the area), so it was probably a case of "rebel forces see an incoming plane, instantly assume it's a bomber, shoot it down". Which is unfortunate, but you can see how it happens, and it's unlikely a passenger jet was specifically targeted as part of some malicious act or GRAND MASTER PLAN.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 4:18 am

Yeah, that's almost certainly what happened, particularly since everyone has been talking about how the launcher in question is complex and hard to use. Unless Kiev is correct in accusing Russia of providing operators as well as the launcher, positively identifying a target would probably have been well outside the capabilities of the users. There's some currently unverified audio recordings that indicate they thought it was a military transport, which would look even more like a civilian plane.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 5:25 am

#Buk.

The thing is, they either came from Russia, or from The Ukraine. The rebels said before the shootdown that they had captured a Buk from The Ukraine. Maybe that's because Russia gave them one or maybe that's because there's a surprise civil war on and there's old military stores all over the place getting raided.

Unless peacekeepers get in there and dig up some serial numbers and also get access to all of the old Russian and The Ukraine military records, we can't actually know. But it's a many stage many-person grand conspiracy to secretly get them from Russia without also getting proper training, and just normal business to capture military gear that The Ukraine would be in character to keep near the new Russian border.

So they most probably nicked it. You can really only nick stuff like that from active war zones, which is The Ukraine right now. Occam and so on.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 5:44 am

The Ukrainian government is saying they've still got all of their missile systems and the rebels apparently said they'd gotten one but not how. I'm inclined to believe the Ukrainian government, since it seems reasonable the side with total air superiority would want to keep antiaircraft weapons away from the front lines where they could get captured.

As for getting the weapons without the training, it is quite possible Russia was willing to give them weapons but not military personnel with training in operating antiaircraft weapons and instead handed them a manual.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 5:51 am

They could have got them from Russia ages ago - they're not exactly known for keeping all of their military gear under lock and key. Or indeed knowing where they left it at any given time.

Laertes · Post by **Laertes** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 9:16 am

Tussock: minor point, it's "Ukraine" and not "the Ukraine." The term "the Ukraine" is sometimes used but it's a very politically contentious phrase which can get you in trouble with Ukrainians since it acts as something of a shibboleth. If you say "the Ukraine" then you are implying that it's not an independent country but rather a region of Russia. Therefore, the phrase tends to get used by Russian hypernationalists who advocate the eventual annexation of the entirety of Ukraine.

It's like calling Northern Ireland "Ulster", the West Bank "Judea and Samaria", Taiwan "Chinese Taipei" or the southwestern US "Northern Mexico." It's a term which makes tempers run extremely high because of what it symbolises; and therefore when foreigners use the term without realising the implications, it can lead to offence being taken.

Meikle641 · Post by **Meikle641** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 9:21 am

I've only ever heard Ukrainians call their home as "the Ukraine" until the civil war.

name_here · Post by **name_here** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 9:48 am

We've had this conversation before, in which Frank pointed out that that's literally the opposite of how it works. But I suppose as residents of United States we can indulge Ukraine.

Koumei · Post by **Koumei** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 9:51 am

Tussock: don't listen to Laertes. This argument has been had before, it's "The Borderland", and if being the (countryname) were a bad thing, we sure as fuck wouldn't have the United States of America and the United Kingdom. But Ukrainians really throw a shitfit over it, so as long as you're not actually there where they can punch you, it's recommended you go ahead and call it the Ukraine.

But you probably shouldn't call it the Ukrainian State of the USSR.

GreatGreyShrike · Post by **GreatGreyShrike** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 9:54 am

TiaC · Post by **TiaC** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 10:15 am

In 1993, the Ukrainian government requested that people use v (in) rather than na (on) before Ukraine. Russia ignored them. this seems to have been when the english change happened.

However, the use of the article in place names is somewhat arbitrary. Given that Ukraine is approximately 2.5 times as common as The Ukraine today, it's probably fine to leave it out.

Laertes · Post by **Laertes** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 10:31 am

Huh. I stand corrected. Thanks, TiaC.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Sun Jul 20, 2014 10:46 am

The most obvious and simple explanation for the plane being shot down is that The Ukraine's military shot it down. The Ukraine has notoriously poor fire control and back in 2001 they accidentally shot down a passenger jet with a missile and denied it for eight days. Even though back in 2001 there was no one else to blame the missile strike on and they literally weren't fooling anyone.

The Malaysian Airlines jet was supposedly last spotted by Ukrainian ground control in the West of The Ukraine, where it was flying low above restricted Ukrainian airspace as instructed. It does not at all seem unlikely that either the Malaysian Airlines jet dipped into restricted airspace because of turbulence or just some yahoo at the controls misread the radar display and thought flight level 330 was flight level 320 and decided to launch. Because as we know, Black Sea missile operators are fucking clowns and regularly shoot missiles at random shit that may or may not be occupied by innocent people.

Counter argument: Russia has not yet released tapes of Ukrainian authorities admitting to each other that the plane was shot down by one of their own. Since Russia is well known to do near-NSA levels of bulk information collection and has no compunction at all of releasing even slightly incriminating sounding phone calls of people they don't like, the fact this hasn't happened is an indication that it isn't true.

Counter Counter argument: Russia's turnaround with phone calls has been a couple of weeks during the unfolding crisis. So the fact that they haven't dropped the f-bomb yet, doesn't mean they aren't going to.

Now the next most obvious answer is that one of the various rebel factions had their hands on a piece of heavy anti-aircraft military equipment and shot down a passenger jet. This is tidy because if it's true then it's just crime being done by some private individuals. Private individuals who apparently have military grade self propelled missile launchers, but ultimately common criminals nonetheless. Since the various rebel groups aren't often on speaking terms with each other, this could be a story so convenient that people will latch onto it even if it isn't true. After all, if the guilty party is "some guys" rather than Russia or The Ukraine, that's a lot less likely to start World War 3.

Counter argument: The Ukrainian government claims to have all their Buk missile systems under control and denies that any of the rebel factions managed to get their hands on any of them.

Counter Counter argument: The Ukraine is about as credible as to what the rebels have and have not accomplished as Baghdad Bob. The Ukrainians won't even admit to how many missile systems they have, and thus their claims that they are all acounted for is automatically suspect. Then there's the whole thing where the government of the Ukraine has a long history of constantly lying about things that are laughably easy to check. Besides, even if the rebels never managed to loot a missile system from a Ukrainian military base, they could have acquired one from Russia or even a third country like Belarus. The Associated Press ran a story claiming to have spotted such a missile system in rebel-claimed territory (though not, to my knowledge, specifically linked to any rebel group nor even specifically known to not be Ukrainian or Russian military).

The third, and most disturbing possibility, is that Russian military could have either driven a missile system into The Ukraine or fired from long range at a passenger jet in Ukrainian territory. That would be very bad, because it would be an international act of terrorism and an act of undeclared war enacted by the country with the largest stockpile of nuclear warheads. That would be bad.

Counter argument: even if Russia wanted to shoot down a passenger jet in Ukrainian territory, it seems like it would be easier to just hand such a missile off to private citizens in Luhansk and have them fire it off for you. Russia is big and clever enough that hopefully it sees that it doesn't have to get its hands dirty on trivial bullshit like this.

Counter Counter argument: With great power comes great idiocy. George W. Bush invaded Iraq and all that. Powerful nations like Russia have a lot of hubris, so it's entirely possible that they would do something that stupid and simply assume they could talk their way out of it.

And the fourth option is that it was someone else looking to start trouble and kick over a hornet's nest. Belarus, Iran, the CIA, Al Qaeda, Cobra Command, whatever. If this was a Superhero movie, that would be what had happened, but since we mostly live in the boring ass "real world," this possibility remains remote.

-Username17