The talks are theater. Trump is running around like a headless chicken, so it may look like a lot of "diplomacy" is happening, but if you look at the Iranian side, they remain in control over the strait, and their demands haven't changed. The fact that Iran agreed to talk is because Trump caved-in enough.

I find it a little odd when you're clarifying someone's comment and someone else wades in and replies (without even a "not the person you replied to but ..")

There's no ceasefire until Israel stops attacking. Iran retains control over the strait, and their demands haven't changed. Nothing's new other than Iran is ready to sit at the negotiating table because Trump caved-in enough.

I will side with any country that's being illegally attacked, and whose population is being illegally targeted, thank you very much. Sovereignty is fundamental, it's been broken. The state of Iran is the result of US and Israeli meddling. There was time for criticizing Iran before it was attacked.

I think it's useful to drive the point home that there is no good reason to give birth lying down. Otherwise you make it sound like "scientists say you should try this", and not "this was a stupid idea in the first place".

My issue with the article in general is that it undermines its own persuasiveness. It doesn't seem to say "giving birth sitting is better", or even "doctors wanted to have better visibility", but tries to cast it as a story of deliberate male oppression.

It's just unnecessarily divisive to try to turn this into a case of sexism, and I feel it takes away from the scientific angle of the article. Someone might very well dismiss the valid scientific findings as more about gender politics than science. It just doesn't seem to me like there's a need for the gendered slant.

I agree with you. Whenever anyone says "oh this is actually the males doing XYZ" it reduces the persuasiveness.

It reminded me, I'm in an activist parents group and the other day a mom there was arguing that when the media uses the word "parenting" in the context of our focus subject, it's really a manifestation of the patriarchy keeping women oppressed (the implication that dads don't really parent, they just help the moms). There's loonies everywhere.

I can imagine these two inverse outrages being deployed almost simultaneously:

* "When you call that parenting, you give unearned credit to men who aren't contributing, call it mothering."

* "When you call that mothering, you're letting men escape their duty to contribute, call it parenting."

Some sort of... prescriptive versus descriptive paradox, I bet it can be found in other contexts too.

The military propaganda in the US is so strong that it doesn't matter how many innocent lives US soldiers take, even the staunchest US liberals will thank the troops because "just following orders" or "poverty draft".

"Thank you for your service!"

They took a page from the US administration playbook and manifested a victory into existence.

Considering the number of friendly fire incidents these moronic planes cause, Iran would probably be better off leaving them be.

All CAS can cause friendly fire, but that doesn't remove the need for CAS.

The A-10 flies slower and closer than our fighter jets which means they have more time to assess the situation before taking action.

The A-10 will be cited in every future American CAS program as the reason FLIR is built-in. Deserved or not, the aircraft earned it's reputation.

I stopped watching him because I don't understand why a competent finance expert is slinging ads for earbuds and quick meals. Feels like he's just making "Youtube content" rather than anything serious.

Sorry, are you suggesting that the US top brass wants less of something, but the politicians won't let them? That the US top brass would reform and modernize the military if only politicians wouldn't get in the way? Is this April Fools?

No,I'm not suggesting that at all. Some of the brass love spending the taxpayers money on new toys. I'm saying that one control mechanism for them not being able to do that, namely, an effective Congress, is totally AWOL and captured in that regard. And re: the policy/planning types that work with them, the good ones have been defenestrated in the last 15 months or are not in a position to do anything like their best work if there is any risk it will differ from the administration's preconceived worldview.

It's a waste. Iran can't win against the US army. They'll win by being as disruptive as possible, for as long as possible. They'll keep seldomly launching rockets until they get what they want or the global economy collapses. This whole situation perfectly illustrates that wars are won with intelligence, and not by gung ho "warrior ethos" morons like Hegseth.

Are you saying Iran, a country that was just sanctioned to hell for almost half a century, with a defense budget of at most $30B is outsmarting our $2T/year military which we consider to be the greatest in the world? The can't be. That's literally the only thing that makes this nation "great". That would imply that our country is being led by morons