dogslayeggs

US: "OK, the war is over, Ukraine! You're free!"

Ukraine: "Awesome, but when did that happen?"

US: "Well, it hasn't yet, but soon! Once you pay us this protection money, all your problems will go away."

Yeah, it looks like there was a slight roll just before touching down that put all the weight on one set of wheels. The wheels just seemed to collapse. Maybe it was the lack of flare or a structural failure on the landing gear? It definitely didn't look like it flared at all.

I'm not making the connection between what you are discussing and the story here.

I looked into it. They have deputy mayors for specific functions, like Health/Education/Finance/etc. Los Angeles has 3 deputy mayors, which was a surprise to me as someone who has lived here for 20 years. Also a surprise to me: one of our deputy mayors called in a fake bomb threat to City Hall 2 years ago. How did I not hear about that??

I'm not sure you read what that person wrote correctly.

Trump has already directed the removal of language saying Taiwan is NOT independent (pissing off the Chinese) and is trying to scale back the CHIPS Act (making us more dependent on Taiwan). Putting those two things together with this "deal" for Ukraine, it feels to me like he is setting us up for a Chinese invasion of Taiwan where he can make a similar "deal" with Taiwan where we protect them in exchange for 50% of their chip making profits.

I was unaware NYC had 4 deputy mayors. That seems like 3 too many??

"Welp, my work here is done." wipes palms and walks away

He did as much damage as he could while Trump was out of office and is now ready to hand over the reigns to someone worse.

getting the marriage license took about five months, and it was only valid for six weeks.

That sounds about right for government efficiency.

It's unbelievable how much hatred these people have.

Yes, let's just grind the entire worldwide economy to a halt. Smart idea, genius. You do realize, don't you, that more than one country ALSO does international trade in the waters between Europe and Asia, right? The US has the most to lose, so they foot the bill. But the rest of the world benefits from the US military presence in pirate-filled waters.

Also, US citizens and US businesses pay taxes (well, some of the do), which pays for the US military... so in reality they ARE footing the bill for their own protection services. If you want them to pay 100% of the bill, then every single thing you buy in every single country will suddenly triple in price. I'm sure you'd love that. Jesus, you're as good at managing the economy as Trump.

It's almost like that's a very dangerous area of the world where US citizens and businesses are forced to operate and having a US military presence keeps them safer, along with nearly every other nation with international commerce.