Endymion_Mallorn

yt-dlp and VLC still work. I’m good.

He also played Gas in Existenz.

This one is actually classified. Nice!

This is the revenge they deserve for Citra & Yuzu.

Who did the most? I’d say probably the USSR by numbers. The US was a huge driver of the war effort, and used a blend of hard and soft power to push. The UK and (Free) France were necessary resistance and emblematic of the other western efforts. The Battle of Britain can’t be understated, they were a huge stopping block. ANZAC forces weren’t as prevalent in WW2 as they were in WW1 - they weren’t the leading force, but they were present and earned every ounce of respect. In theory, Japan could even be on here as a catalyst - even though they were allied to the Nazis and did many horrifying things, had it not been for Pearl Harbor, the US wouldn’t have gotten involved.

But really I think it is either the USSR or the USA, with the UK a distant but necessary third.

The regulation is there, it’s the enforcement that’s the problem. We don’t need lawmakers, we need cops.

Oh no, each claim is a new loan application. You pay in your premium to have the right to apply.

Yup, thank you for sharing the link!

We should stop calling it “insurance”, it doesn’t ensure anything. We should call it what it is - a protection racket. Either that, or we could refer to it as “medical loans” - of course, it’s all paid in advance, in many installments. Oh wait. That’s just defining a protection racket again, isn’t it?

That’s why you have to request the documentation and proof of specialty to confirm whether they’re acting out of scope.

I just like Archbang.

Show me a rat with a marriage license.

Unfortunately, given that I’m in the NYC DMA, individual franchisees probably couldn’t afford to cut their prices in half, as much as that sucks to admit. Minimum wage here is $15.49 per hour, which is ridiculous. Utilities, insurance (both for the business and the workers), sanitation, taxes, rent, ongoing franchising fees, and material costs do add up. Plus, they’re not seeing the volume that they had been, due to a combination of people like me who aren’t going there and the fact that they’re open less hours (because reliable overnight labor is too expensive).

For me, McDonald’s is way too expensive for what it is anymore. I’m a little ways away from the $8.29 Big Mac, but not by too much. At my local grocery store, I could put together a better burger for significantly cheaper. That’s even if I buy premade patties, buns, and sauces, rather than make them from base ingredients. Buying pre-prepped veggies could get expensive though. They’d need to drop the cost by about 50% for them to reach a point consider to be value, which they can’t afford to do.

If they’re too expensive, stop giving them money. Make food at home or go to a local small business, not a chain franchisee.

Add in the overhead:

• Refrigeration (electricity or otherwise)
• Labor ($7.25+; $15+ in some areas)
• Insurance (In case you get sick from the soda, and you sue them)
• Sanitation (outside contractor, with their materials, labor, and markups)
• Maintenance (machine repairs, etc)

I wish I could agree they were making that much money. But when you include all the costs that they have to run just the soda machine, with all the varieties of soda that they have, they’re not clearing that much profit per cup.

Insurance is a protection racket made to benefit a small cadre. They just managed to sneak it in to law and make the government require it. And you’re correct, you shouldn’t be forced to pay for something you’ll never use.

No, it’s all done by force if it’s paid for by taxes, whether I like it or not. It’s just whether I’d have chosen to contribute or paid a private business.

Charity is our choice. Taxes are the force of the government. Everything you want funded by others should be funded by charity. We shouldn’t be forced to pay for each other’s choices.

To borrow form MegaMind - I wouldn’t say “free”, but rather “under new management”.