That's the whole theme song. I don't understand this meme.

That's great. I wish all this stuff was more accessible to watch.

I really hope to see more of this kind of thing.

I love when animals are intelligent but still animals. I think people underestimate their resourcefulness. I had a dog that could open the bedroom door at my old apartment. It didn't even have a handle, just a knob. But the house had settled in such a way that if you just turned the knob about 10 degrees or gave it solid jiggle the latch would release, and the door naturally opened an inch or so. So when a firework would go off or something, or it just got late enough that he was tired of napping on the couch, he'd sit up, trot over to the bedroom and stand up, and swipe the knob with a paw, and then just nose his way in and put himself to bed.

He was like a roommate. He was such a cool guy.

I like technomancy, although I don't know how it would apply to uplifted/enhanced wolves.

The Beastman thing feels pretty off. They seem to be anthros, and also bad guys. Uplifted wolves are still quadrupedal, and also not bad guys.

I am here to gently wake you up.

Biden has been losing the whole time, pretty badly. I listened to Pod Save America to get their read, and one of them pointed out that predicted election outcomes can change in one of two ways: a major event can force a big shift, or you can rise or fall slowly over time. Tonight showed that neither is coming for Biden. At his best possible opportunity, he didn't under perform, he made it far worse. The theory that he could slowly gain ground with media appearances is now popped.

Biden is a nice guy, but he's experiencing a pretty normal cognitive decline, and voters aren't going to magically come around to him when they've been telling pollsters for months that he's going to lose.

That isn't going to change unless the nominee changes. You're right that this isn't the end for Biden. But sadly, that's because it's actually been over for a long time. It's time to pick up the pieces and begin the overdue work of fielding a competitive nominee.

Oh, this is WAY worse than 2016.

Before, people said that Biden was fine. Now, they're saying, "There's just no way to change, so we have to accept it."

Bullshit. This is supposed to be a democracy, and every volunteer and staffer and voter and activist and voter needs to rattle the bars of the cage that the Democratic party is trying to put us in. Do. Not. Let. Biden. Do this to us.

I think you're out of touch.

Fascism isn't unpopular. It's very popular when people are feeling desperate.

I keep hearing people say stuff like this: He can't win! He's so fascist! He can't win, Biden did such a good job if you actually look at the facts!

That's not how elections work. People vote based on what they think will satisfy their interests, and a lot voters don't see any reason to vote for Biden, and so they'll stay home. People don't need to vote for Trump for Trump to win. They just need to give in, and Biden is a "give in" machine. He's poison to voter hope or enthusiasm, and he's going to lose if he doesn't get off the ticket.

If we want to take the threat of Trump seriously, no more hiding our heads in the sand.

Unfortunately, this is not in touch with the reality of our situation.

I find people, when trying to cope with the hard truth that Biden is going to lose, revert to talking about how much he SHOULD win.

He should. He's been a pretty good president (a genocide not withstanding).

That's not really relevant. Because if he loses, we are likely to lose our democracy. And currently, he's going to lose.

He is losing in the polls. He has been losing in the polls and the swing states for the entire election. At some point, this needs to change, or we're going to watch Trump get reelected. And last night made clear that as long as he is the candidate, this isn't going to change. When he applied all his effort to proving he could win the election he failed spectacularly.

I don't just mean flubbing lines. I mean he lost complete control of the narrative. He demonstrated that when trying his absolute hardest, he cannot reliably explain to voters why the vote for him. That isn't a debate problem. That's a fundamental candidate problem that doesn't appear fixable (except with a new candidate).

If he were winning, at least by a little, we could pretend that maybe that's not a big deal. But he's not. He is losing. He has been losing the entire campaign, and if he doesn't step aside, the election result will be the same as every time pollsters have asked in the last year:

President Donald Trump.

No more "it's not that bad". This debate is a clear synopsis of the campaign until now, and the outcome in November. If this debate "isn't that bad", you might as well say losing is not that bad. (It is. It really is.)

This is why they should've had a primary.

We could've watched Biden collapse months ago while figuring out who is actually fit to run a good campaign. Now we're going to have to go through it the hard way, because they tried to hide from the obvious for about the last 8 months.

That's true, but I don't think they can do that with Biden at the top of the ticket. He's spoiled goods.

I'm not a Democrat. I left and joined the Green Party. I'm that crazy lefty. But even I can readily concede that I'd like democrats to win, and I think they could with someone like Elizabeth Warren. Or Cory Booker.

I'm not demanding Bernie or AOC or that Ro Khana be the nominee. But don't act like there aren't a few Democrats who have credibly taken a stand once or twice in their career for the greater good. They aren't the majority, but they're not so rare as you couldn't find one.

We don't have much control over this, frankly. But if we have any, I say we use it.

My personal attitude is that although I will concede that it is possible for Biden to win, if we don't want to have to hope for a prayer, the only way things get better is if we all pop the bubble that Biden and his supporters are in that they can just ignore reality and hope for the best.

It has to be so clear to the Democratic party that not only are they likely to lose this election (and obviously with it, democracy), but they're going to lose their jobs. No one who works in the election industrial complex is going to keep getting invited to cocktail parties and get hired on for whatever Potempkin election follows this one if Trump wins. No LARPing that they're "the resistance!" in their endless fundraising emails while they enjoy being in the minority FOREVER. Rattle the fucking cage. Make it clear we blame them for this nonsense, and will continue to assign them the blame for choosing to run a failing candidate in a time of crisis because no one wanted to be the one to speak up and suggest doing anything else.

People keep getting mad when I criticize Biden, as if doing so is helping Trump win. My take: NOT doing so is helping Trump win. Protest this guy like our lives depend on him dropping out of the race at the convention. (They might).

"I have to have two houses, one which is shared with Great Grandma (the elderly retired geneticist who did the uplift upbringing), and one which is the PC's Mom's Pack (and she's a forester) so the forest lodge elements make sense. For the Latter definitely going with a great room for mixed species guests and socialization, and two layers of Dens (well within capsule hotel standards) with those rough slopes for the upper levels. After consulting with a forester who trains work dogs, going with a Water shower with a bristle spinner, and giant hot air dryer, for the cleaning oneself when coming inside. He hadn't thought of the giant hamster wheels but laughed when I mentioned it, and says it makes perfect sense."

Some quotes from responses:

"The mind goes straight to a forest lodge, although that is unfair stereotyping I should move past! (But who doesn't want a forest lodge? College students!)

Lots of giant hamster wheels! Seriously, they need how many miles a day to keep their bowels working? Maybe a vibration massage plate bed for grandma.

Some equivalent of a shoe rack - maybe a wax tray you can rub your paws on for protection against hot/cold pavement, and a cleansing tray with bristles to clean your paws on the way back in. More extreme climates might need dog boots secured with velcro straps.

Steep rough slopes (duckboard ramp) rather than stairs. Maybe fixed on half the stairs width if it is shared accommodation with plains apes.

Western humans still tend to have liminal guest space and kitchens ect on the ground floor with bedrooms placed defensibly above on the next floor.

There may be a slight tendency among wolves to favour basements/enclosed/bunker like spaces for the bedrooms, and very large open communal rooms up top for guests. No point having seperate kitchen areas when you can smell everything anyway, just lots of flop down futons."

That's actually a great pitch.

Well that's dystopian and dark.

Sounds interesting. The FF are characters that I really like in concept, but if you ask me my favorite stories I can't think of one's outside my head. We'll see what they do with them.

That's nuts. I was hoping it might explain how, but nope: they're like, "We've got no idea."

Remarkable. It's nice to be reminded how much about our world still lies undiscovered.

I shouldn't bother responding to this, but I have to point out that this weird assumption that scholars of Christianity are all Christian partisans seems pretty similar to people who say that climatologists are all biased in favor of a global warming hoax.

You don't think anyone goes into studying a field to challenge the orthodoxy? That's the fastest way to get famous. Even if the rest of your field hates you, you can make an incredibly lucrative career out of being "the outsider". I literally linked to a collection of experts who agree with you.

If you don't believe the experts, I guess it's fine. But it's weird when people use expertise on a subject as proof of bias to discredit expertise. It's just such a silly thing to do.

I didn't say which side I come down on. I just said that there is lots of information with plenty of high quality citations.

I'm really happy that everyone is a winner.

It's weird how many people in this thread are vaguely debating the validity of the historical research into this question when one person has posted a link to a well cited article on this very very heavily studied subject.

There's even a link to a well cited article examining the skepticism of the historicity of Jesus: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_myth_theory

I don't feel compelled to argue an interpretation. The facts are well documented and their interpretations by experts available. What anyone chooses to do with these are of no real concern to me.