[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 15 points 1 day ago

I love John Pilger. All my homies love John Pilger. This rules. fidel-cool

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 19 points 1 day ago

ty saved me a click party-cat

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 4 points 1 day ago

Good ole' first past the post. The Bloc can get half as many votes but twice as many seats because they have regional (rather than diffuse, national) support thurston

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 6 points 1 day ago

The NDP doesn't have enough national support for the media to feel compelled to attack them as viciously as the yanks did to Bernie, but if it came to that they certainly would.

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 22 points 1 day ago

Can somebody give me a TL;DW

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 13 points 2 days ago

I don't mean to be the actually guy but that would pretty much guarantee a Conservative majority at this point if an election were called.

Pretty amazing that the NDP haven't been able to pick up one single percentage point of national support during this whole time. They've hovered at 16-18% basically forever, with the singular exception of the 2011 election.

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 1 points 3 days ago

90% of the F series trucks I've seen have only ever hauled groceries.

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 5 points 3 days ago

BTW here is the article (found it in view-source):

spoilerThe West's tightening sanctions are driving Russia nearly up against the wall — but Moscow keeps finding ways to keep the country's economy going.Russia's trade partners, too, are looking for ways to continue doing business with the country via alternative systems to rival the Western-led, US dollar-dominated global financial order.Discussions about de-dollarization have been gaining traction in recent years as Western-led sanctions against Russia related to its invasion of Ukraine are making other countries wary of the potential consequences of crossing Washington.There's been some success, with trade between Russia and China, as well as Russia and India, chugging along until recently. Now, even Chinese banks — buckling under the pressure of tightening US sanctions — are pushing back on processing transactions for Russian companies.But Russia and its partners have been looking at other ways to do business outside the Western-led order, in part because technology is making it easier to process payments and get around the US-dollar-dominated global financial order.As Brookings researchers Sam Boocker and David Wessel explained in an August post, "innovations in payment technology could reduce the dollar's role in the global economy."To be sure, king dollar is entrenched in the world's financial system, so it's unlikely to be dethroned, most experts say. However, new platforms are coming up that could chip away at its dominance.These are some of the alternative trading and payment systems that are trying to crack the US-led trade and payments order:Russia prepared for even more sanctions years ago, following trade restrictions after it annexed Crimea in 2014."There are risks in using the global financial networks," Elvira Nabiullina, governor of Russia's central bank, told CNBC in 2018. "Therefore, since back in 2014, we have been developing our own systems."Some Russian banks were banned from the SWIFT messaging system for banking transactions following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Moscow has been touting its homegrown ruble-based payment system — the System for Transfer of Financial Messages, or SPFS — that was set up in 2014.At the end of 2023, users of SPFS included 556 organizations from 20 countries. Of these, 159 — about a quarter of total participants — were foreign and their use of the messaging system more than doubled from 2022, according to Russia's central bank, per Interfax.In July, Russia and Iran — another heavily-sanctioned country — finalized details to connect the banking systems of the two countries, Iran's Mehr news agency reported.This means that Russia's Mir payment system would work with Iran's Shetab banking system, allowing for both pariah states to trade more smoothly.China's Cross-Border Interbank Payment System, or CIPS, is an alternative system that processes payments in Chinese yuan.Launched in 2015, CIPS has about 2,000 participants as of July, compared to 11,000 for SWIFT.CIPS "has been growing rapidly in recent years," the Brookings researchers wrote.In 2023, CIPS processed over 6.6 million transactions, totaling 123 trillion Chinese yuan, or $17.3 trillion — up nearly 30% by value from a year ago, according to China's central bank.India — now a key trading part of Russia — also has its own system.The country's Unified Payments Interface, or UPI, was developed in 2016 and is used extensively in India today, even among everyday consumers.The payment system has gotten so big that it's not just limited to India. The National Payments Corporation of India, which runs the platform, has partnered with financial institutions in other countries, including France, the United Arab Emirates, and Singapore.If the UPI's footprint expands to more countries, it could be a way to bypass the SWIFT banking system, wrote Evan Freidin, an international relations analyst, for the Lowy Institute, an Australian think tank."It is significant that UPI can also be used to bypass the SWIFT banking system, enabling payments with sanctioned countries such as Russia, thereby weakening US financial hegemony," Freidin wrote in July.Countries are also increasingly looking to build central bank digital currencies, or CBDCs. These currencies are similar to cryptocurrencies but are issued and backed by central banks.The Bank for International Settlements, an organization of central banks, is overseeing the trial of a CBDC platform for wholesale cross-border payment.Participants of the project, called mBridge, include China, Hong Kong, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia. It's dominated by Beijing, which has already rolled out the digital Chinese yuan.The Brookings researchers wrote that these CBDCs could "upend the dollar's role as a currency 'middleman' by reducing settlement times, making it cheaper and easier to trade non-dollar currencies."The CBDCs integrate messaging and payments, unlike current systems like SWIFT and major US dollar clearing system CHIPS.As doors to transact in fiat money close, Russia is now looking to trade in cryptocurrencies.It's in such a rush to get the system up and running that it plans to start crypto exchange trials as soon as September 1, anonymous sources told Bloomberg in late August.Creating this mode of payment has gotten more pressing because even banks from China are rejecting most transactions with Russian entities.Russian President Vladimir Putin himself said in July that Russia had to "seize the moment" to create a legal framework for digital assets, as they are being increasingly used to settle international payments.If all else fails, there's also the age-old method of barter trade.In August, Reuters reported that Russia and China are planning to revive the practice of barter trade to get around Western sanctions.The deals could involve agriculture and could come as soon as this fall, the news agency reported, citing anonymous trade and payments sources.The two countries are no strangers to barter.It was practiced during the Soviet era and in the years following the bloc's collapse. At the time, China was a key trading partner.In August 2022, the Taliban regime in Afghanistan also discussed barter trade with Russia that could involve trading Russian crude oil products in exchange for raisins, minerals, and medicinal herbs, according to RIA Novosti, a Russian state-owned news agency.Last year, cash-strapped Pakistan authorized the barter trade of specific goods with Russia.In 2019, China traded $150 million worth of palm oil from Malaysia for a range of products and services, including natural resources and defense equipment.

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 24 points 3 days ago

Russia's economy is the best performing in Europe right now by far - by far. It's performing better than most advanced economies, even.

[-] sexywheat@hexbear.net 8 points 4 days ago

I dunno, there are some recent polls that put Trump way ahead:

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/polls/president-general/

77

Not a lib

I need to be really careful here not to tread into any anti-vaxx territory here but this is just sus af. Why would they take a break from the mass-murder of children to ensure those same children are vaccinated against polio?

Not to mention that the vaccine is going to be administered by the UN - an organisation who have lost nearly 400 employees during this holocaust. Why would the Zionist entity suddenly change their tune and say "Oh, right this way, come on in!"

Is it a photo op? Are they legit worried that polio will spread to their soldiers?

There must be some ulterior motive, right? This just doesn't make sense. WTF is going on here?

(btw be warned there's lot of brainworms antivaxxers in the Twitter comments there, god damnit they make me so mad)

43
submitted 1 week ago by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/games@hexbear.net

In this post I'm going to give a quick overview as well as provide some resources for downloading song packs and whatnot, as it's a little bit unclear how to get started with this game.

So, for those of you who have fond memories of playing DDR at your local arcade, great news! You can play it at home basically for free! It's a shit load of fun, and doubles as an excellent cardio workout that you can do in your living room (if you don't live above people in a wood apartment building, that is).

If you have kids, it's also fun times for fun families (just make sure to do a cursory review of the songs and remove any that have any drug/sex references in them, they're rare but they pop up from time to time). Get the energy out of the kids & help build and improve their rhythm.

The software works on all major operating systems (including Linux) although from what I've read support for all versions of OSX is a bit dicey. You can download it from the official website here.

Out of the box it only comes with three songs. The main repository for downloading new song packs is here:

https://search.stepmaniaonline.net/

All of the old/original arcade song packs are also available for download on this website that looks like it was designed in 2003:

https://zenius-i-vanisher.com/v5.2/simfiles.php?category=simfiles

Furthermore, there's a good beginner FAQ here.

On Windows once you download the song packs they can be installed here:

C:\Games\Stepmania\Songs\StepMania 5\Songs

Not sure about Linux/Mac but I'm sure it's equally straightforward.

The dance pads themselves you can just buy online and they cost about $30. There are more advanced ones as well of course but if you're just getting started the basic ones work fine.

Additionally there is a decent reddit-logo community for the game.

PSA: People also play this game on their keyboards and there are song packs specifically designed for those players. Don't make the same mistake I did and try to play them with your feet they're absolutely impossibly difficult even on the easiest setting. Make sure you're downloading the right type of simpack!

PSA2: Different song packs are of course programmed by different people who have different ideas of what "easy" is. The standard DDR songpacks from the original arcade games are all very straightforward, but a lot of the other custom ones are way harder even on the easy settings, so just a heads up there.

I think that covers all the basics. Happy dancing!

72

502 errors, 502 errors everywhere kitty-cri-potato

48

Wild.

I will take this as a good omen.

fidel-cool

For those who don't know:

The 26th of July Movement was a Cuban vanguard revolutionary organization and later a political party led by Fidel Castro. The movement's name commemorates the failed 1953 attack on the Moncada Barracks in Santiago de Cuba, part of an attempt to overthrow the dictator Fulgencio Batista.

NATOpedia link

208
In bad country (hexbear.net)
submitted 3 weeks ago by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/memes@hexbear.net
101
title (hexbear.net)
submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/memes@hexbear.net
147
submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/news@hexbear.net

I've heard this from two different sources. Something to keep an eye on. If this turns out not to be true (it's just within the past few hours) just comment and I'll delete the post.

Edit: Not a lib

Edit2: There's also this

Iran Raises Red Flag Of Revenge Tehran- Minutes after Iran’s Supreme Leader promised a “harsh punishment” for Israel in retaliation for assassination of Palestinian leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran on Wednesday, a symbolic red flag was hoisted atop a major mosque in the holy city of Qom.

71
submitted 1 month ago by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/games@hexbear.net

So the only Metal Gear game I've ever actually played was the 1998 Metal Gear Solid for the PS1 when I was a kid. I've not played a single other game in the series since.

Which ones would you recommend? Would it be better to play them in chronological order to get the full overarching story, or do they work ok independent of one another?

213
JEZZA WINS (hexbear.net)

HELL YEAH

74
submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/chapotraphouse@hexbear.net

Not a lib

Edit: Just noticed the date. The fact that he was doing this shit even before the all-out genocide vindicates him even more IMO.

131
king shit (hexbear.net)
submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/chapotraphouse@hexbear.net

God damn the balls on this man

Not a lib

Edit: Holy shit I just noticed that bro is wearing a Lilo & Stitch onesie lmao che-smile

65
submitted 2 months ago by sexywheat@hexbear.net to c/movies@hexbear.net

Terrible. Just ... a very bad film. I do not recommend it.

Also, fun fact: The creator of the original comic strip's intention was not to make a comic that was funny but that was profitable / marketable

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sexywheat

joined 4 years ago