And no parents aren't superior adults to those without kids. It's what you do with your time here, the experiences you seek out, what you take away from them, etc. I do know that personally I'm a better person for my daughters than I was before them. But I was trying to be better before and after.

Second attempt at saying: kids literally do rework your chemistry - if you're present and paying attention you're going to become a different person. I have almost no hope for the Epstein class to change, but for the baby's sake and all of us, I hope Altman proves to be an exception to the rule.

Put another way...how did Iran fare against Israel - US with their handful of conventional, older missiles and their thousands of modern drones that Russia is using on the battlefield?

...which is not to say guerilla warfare against a super power can't work - we know it can. But if you're talking about a conventional war, drones are a small augment to the massive firepower that can be called upon by a modern military.

(can't help but notice who gets to be "young" and full of talent and who doesn't.)

We just did Christmas shopping for some kids in need like we do every year and the bill was double what we paid last year for same number. Coincidentally, more kids signed up this year and not enough people kicked in, so we grabbed some more but guessing the non recession recession is not great.

liberalism is going to require something martial and vicious and somewhat fanatic if we want it to survive. it won't be the liberalism we grew up with. it will be an uglier, harder thing for an uglier, harder world.

there is this idea that we've accepted in modern liberalism that we have to accept all viewpoints and give them their permitted space to compete, and that nothing is truly evil, nothing can demand genuine punishment.

we are learning this is quite wrong.