This is the result of China’s “nine dash line.” If the countries impacted, Vietnam, Philippines, Mtaylasia, Singapore, Indonesia, etc., started a discussion at the UN, it would immediately implicate Taiwan, and nobody wants to touch that. So, local scuffles will continue, as China flexes her muscle.

Aza 'Merican maseff,… um, maybe try for mid-Atlantic.

That’s understandable, but every complex situation requires a good deal of nuance. In this case, for example, not all Israelis are Zionists (anymore than all Palestinians are Hamas), and not even all Zionists (or Hamas) are “bad guys.” There are clearly some fucked up political agendas at work, and could well be more bad actors on one side than the other, and if you look close even “sides” become blurred. But there are definitely agents working to accentuate that distinction, and I don’t trust any of them. Which is different from saying all sides are the same. All I know is that war, greed, and power are all bad, and that good people are suffering, but beyond that I don’t know enough to take a public stand (though I’m working on some opinions).

Edit: let me clarify. I’m not trying to be neutral either. When I see something happening in my immediate world, in front of me, I will say/act for the common good. But I’m not going to read something online, about a place I’ve never been, and take a public opinion about it. I trust that there are people there, in that place, that are doing what I would do, and I hope they succeed.

AI: “Um, …these aren’t the droids you want. Squirrel!”

“Iceland is green, Greenland is icy.” Oh, shit, it’s also the biggest island that’s not a continent.

Now I got that ZZ Top intro ear-worm…

(or)… but you can’t wipe your friends off on your saddle.

If they practiced trying to cut some random cable in the East China Sea it might raise suspicions, right? Maybe better to practice somewhere else.

Just FYI: Media Bias Fact/Check reports Reclaim The Net as having a right-wing bias and mixed factual credibility.

Who plays Wash, …and Jayne?

Wow, must be some rogue pirate vessel, because any formal government ship, especially one flying a bright red flag, would be too easy to identify. It’s a mystery. /s

Businesseses?

“business’”

Whadaya bet he was in his bathroom, maybe with boxes of documents but never mind that, practicing different faces late into the night. Oh joy.

The headline would be unsurprising even if it ended at the word China.

It always amuses me how politicians and community “faith based” leaders can blithely condemn what scientists have been warning about for decades, as if they know better (with no training or experience). Anti-intellectualism is the Dunning-Kruger effect applied to politics, known as Populism, aka the idiots revenge.

They are trying to save money by adding a solvent mixture refined from recycled plastic. But since the feedstock contains a wide variety of junk (called “UVCB substances" or “Substances of Unknown or Variable composition, Complex reaction products or Biological materials”) the resulting additive is a very complex mixture, including many untested and/or potentially toxic chemicals.

These children cough syrups are sweetened using ethylene glycol and/or diethylene glycol, which are extremely toxic, especially to small children and cause acute kidney failure. Why? Because the non-poisonous propylene glycol usually used costs twice as much. Greed is killing our planet.

They mention high mercury levels as a trap or from wine that the emperor drank, but neither is likely (they often used to add lead to wine as a sweetener, but not mercury AFAIK). But, mercury contamination in tombs, especially in Asia, is very common from the heavy use of the deep red pigment cinnabar, also called vermillion, which is mercury sulfide.

The reason they don’t identify these chemicals is, um, …because they don’t really know what they are. They are the reaction products from recycled plastic feedstock, which contain a wide variety of source materials, and so they call them “UVCB substances" meaning “Substances of Unknown or Variable composition, Complex reaction products or Biological materials”. Also called “Natural Complex Substances (NCS) of biological origin.”

In other words, junk from plastic garbage that will be added to boat fuel.