Home » Open thread 12/26/2025

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Open thread 12/26/2025 — 23 Comments

  1. So several more left leaning media are now reporting about North Korea’s new nuke sub. I’m no naval architect, but that thing looks totally fake to me. Not that the image is fake, but I can’t imagine that thing would actually work.

    maritime-executive.com/article/north-korea-unveils-its-first-nuclear-powered-submarine

  2. Calling the wheel mankind’s most important invention is to ignore the observation by either Dave Barry or Tom Lehrer — I can’t remember which right now — who claimed the world’s most important invention was the whoopee cushion. Hard to disagree with that!

    But in all seriousness, trying to discover the historical basis for the wheel without even mentioning gambling games, particularly roulette, is a fool’s errand.

    Happy Boxing Day, all!

  3. Physicsguy, I have also noticed the articles about the NORK nuclear submarine. My reference on nuclear sub technology is Tom Clancy‘s books 🙂 but even if they got one from the Russians or the Chinese, it takes a lot of technology to maintain them and to train the crews.
    On a related matter, the new Japanese Prime Minister’s government is supposed to be a lot more hawkish about China than previous administrations. She may be putting pressure on the Norks. That may be part of the reason that the Chinese are rattling their sabers a lot more about Taiwan.

  4. Interesting that there is a mention of ball bearings, but not of roller bearings, which are just miniature rollers analogous to the purported progenitor of the wheel! Perhaps the reason is because roller bearings were a relatively recent development, and developed in America not Europe.

  5. Kate (12:44 pm) said:
    “I suppose y’all have seen this preposterous piece from Politico Europe:”

    Call me simplistic [okay, I often may be / can be], but it does seem to me that:

    – Christmas *does* now function as a marker of Christian civilization
    (but not the sole such marker; maybe even call it Judaeo-Christian civilization);

    – Christian civilization *is* under threat and
    – Christian civilization *is* the last line of defense against a hostile, secular left
    (not “supposedly”; plus be mindful of the left’s collaboration with islam* in that regard);

    * it’s a personal quirk, but I refuse to capitalize names such as “islam” and “nazi”.

    Hoo boy, will the secular left be amazed to find that they’ll be in the beheading queue right along with, if not in front of, the rest of us irredeemable infidels.

  6. Speaking of Japan and North Korea, the new government of Japan says they want to get nuclear weapons. The Norks are not pleased.

    https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/north-koreas-kcna-japans-ambition-for-nuclear-weapons-should-be-curbed

    Japan’s nuclear ambitions must be stopped ‘at any cost’, says North Korea

    SEOUL – North Korea said on Dec 21 that Japan’s nuclear ambitions “must be prevented at any cost”, after a Tokyo official reportedly suggested the country should possess atomic weapons.
    Pyongyang’s reaction came after the
    unnamed official in the Prime Minister’s Office was quoted by Kyodo News on Dec 18 as saying: “I think we should possess nuclear weapons.”

    The official was reported to have been involved in devising Japan’s security policy.

  7. The evolution from roller to wheel and axle could have resulted from the discovery that larger diameter rollers have significantly lower rolling resistance* and that a large wheel at each end of a much smaller axle is more practical and easier to make.
    Hence the use of very large wheels on later carriages and wagons.

    *especially on rough terrain.

  8. regarding Nort Korean nuke subs, two excellent naval submarine YouTube sites are HI Sutton’s “Covert Shores” and “Sub Brief”

  9. M J R– I so agree with your entire comment on Christianity. Sadly so true about being the last line of defense.
    … on this:
    “It’s a personal quirk, but I refuse to capitalize names such as “islam” and “nazi”.

    Me, too!! And muslim, for 3.
    And democrat.
    Autocorrect fights me a lot, lol.

  10. What the hell has happened to Tucker Carlson?

    A few years ago I used to watch what he said almost every night, because I thought that he was that rara avis—a very well educated, intelligent, and articulate conservative with a large TV platform, and I thought that he had a firm grasp of and a very reasonable view of the world, which generally coincided with mine.

    Then, I guess a couple of years ago, after he left FOX, I noticed him starting to “drift,” and being quoted as saying things which—more and more—started to diverge from his old conservative viewpoints, and the things that I had agreed with him on.

    Lately, he has been saying some pretty crazy things, as when the other day he was quoted as saying that “I don’t know anyone in the United States in the last 24 years who’s been killed by radical Islam.” *

    See https://www.frontpagemag.com/tucker-carlson-i-dont-know-anyone-whos-been-killed-by-radical-islam/

    Well, I really don’t know where to start, but how about with the late unlamented Ayatollah Khomeini, who stated categorically and very forcefully that there is no such thing as “radical Islam,” that there was only one thing, “Islam”

    Then, of course there is the butchers bill of all of the people in the U.S. who, during the last 24 years, have been killed by the followers of Islam.

    Funny how the particular number of 24 years avoids dealing with the slaughter on 9/11/2001

    Is Carson just playing word games, with this business about “radical Islam” and about how “he didn’t (personally?) know of anyone in the United States killed by radical Islam”?

    What is going on?

  11. Bob Wilson: ref both NK and Japan possessing nuclear weapons.
    Seems to basically be the 2nd Amendment arguments writ large:
    “An armed society is a friendly society.”
    “The best way to stop a bad man with a gun is a good man with a gun.”

    And perhaps an eventual implementation of the corollary to the Golden Rule: Do unto others as they have done onto you . . . until they stop!

    Clearly two can play at the MAD “game” of nuclear annihilation.

  12. I noticed on the video, which was quite interesting and short enough to be informative but not repetitive, that the automatic Closed Caption generator reproduces the narrator’s accent.
    For instance, near the end, “flesh” for “flash.”

    One would hope for more accuracy from a true AI product, but I don’t think YouTube has invested in one yet.

  13. Let them be haughty back in dear old Mogidishyou (spelling intentionally incorrect, no “Fs” left). Chew khat all day long, steal from each other, it’s their culture.

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