T1B

Mikey wrote: ↑Thu Dec 12, 2024 6:17 pm It can’t be a coincidence that this is happening in New Jersey, where the Martians previously landed in 1938.

Mikey wrote: ↑Thu Dec 12, 2024 6:17 pm It can’t be a coincidence that this is happening in New Jersey, where the Martians previously landed in 1938.

Mikey wrote: ↑Thu Dec 12, 2024 6:17 pm It can’t be a coincidence that this is happening in New Jersey, where the Martians previously landed in 1938.

Meat Head wrote: ↑Thu Dec 12, 2024 11:27 pm Land prices have risen so much since 1937 they will probably move on to some place cheap, like the dakotas or tennessee.

Meat Head wrote: ↑Thu Dec 12, 2024 11:27 pm Land prices have risen so much since 1937 they will probably move on to some place cheap, like the dakotas or tennessee.

Diego in Seattle wrote: ↑Fri Dec 13, 2024 4:16 pm

Meat Head wrote: ↑Thu Dec 12, 2024 11:27 pm Land prices have risen so much since 1937 they will probably move on to some place cheap, like the dakotas or tennessee.

Living in the dakotas cost me my life.

-John Lennon

Softball Bat wrote: ↑Fri Dec 13, 2024 11:58 pm Extremely clear “Drone” footage from last night (12/12/24) in New Jersey.

https://x.com/Grail_Whale/status/186768 ... 2410%2Fpg1



These "drones" have been buzzing around like crazy for a couple/few weeks now, and the werd we get from the authorities is that there is no threat to our safety.

LOL

ummm...




Some way or somehow, sh!t's about to get real.

jmo

mvscal wrote: ↑Sat Dec 14, 2024 4:12 am Well, it's probably ours, it could be theirs and they definitely know exactly what it is. We aren't on a need to know basis.

HighPlainsGrifter wrote: ↑Sun Dec 15, 2024 7:59 pm

mvscal wrote: ↑Sat Dec 14, 2024 4:12 am Well, it's probably ours, it could be theirs and they definitely know exactly what it is. We aren't on a need to know basis.

This guy has a decent take.

Mikey wrote: ↑Sun Dec 15, 2024 9:37 pm

HighPlainsGrifter wrote: ↑Sun Dec 15, 2024 7:59 pm

mvscal wrote: ↑Sat Dec 14, 2024 4:12 am Well, it's probably ours, it could be theirs and they definitely know exactly what it is. We aren't on a need to know basis.

This guy has a decent take.

Makes more sense than a Martian invasion.
But not much.

HPG wrote:Our government's official response to these drones is fucking terrifying.

"It's not ours. It's not theirs. We don't know what it is, but we know it's not a threat so don't worry about it."

Meat Head wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 3:33 pm Given that the Secret Service was/is disfunctional due to DEI priorities being put above the real needs of the service.... and now we see the disfunctionality of any federal response to the drone thing going on...

Maybe the whole federal system is just as fucked up, and these are just two examples.

Maybe Trump can call out some of this shit and perhaps even fix some of it. I'm hopeful.

HighPlainsGrifter wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 5:07 pm Diego is still carrying water for his team like a good little boy. The idea Biden did anything wrong is anathema to him.

Diego in Seattle wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 9:27 pm

HighPlainsGrifter wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 5:07 pm Diego is still carrying water for his team like a good little boy. The idea Biden did anything wrong is anathema to him.

Muh Truuump!

Sudden Sam wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 9:53 pm I’m not your atypical Trumper. I love his policies,

Roux wrote: ↑Thu Dec 19, 2024 2:25 pmTin Foil Sam?

HighPlainsGrifter wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 10:20 pm

Diego in Seattle wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 9:27 pm

HighPlainsGrifter wrote: ↑Tue Dec 17, 2024 5:07 pm Diego is still carrying water for his team like a good little boy. The idea Biden did anything wrong is anathema to him.

Muh Truuump!

Never fails.

Column: Black spatulas and mystery drones: Your guide to the unfounded panics of the season

The “silly season” of news coverage used to refer to the dog days of summer, when there was so little of importance happening that newspapers and cable channels filled the vacuum with fluff.

Not this year.

Starting in October and gaining intensity through the season, Americans have found themselves awash in panicky health and safety warnings about previously unappreciated threats.


Most people don’t look at the sky. They don’t know what airplanes look like up there, particularly at night, and they don’t know what the stars and planets look like.

— Scientist Cheryl Rofer explains the drone panic

(or that the Earth doesn't look like a giant dinner plate)


It started with warnings about your black plastic spatulas and other such implements. Spurred by a study and press release issued Oct. 1 by the Seattle nonprofit Toxic-Free Future, news organizations from coast to coast — including The Times — posted articles advising consumers to ditch their black food utensils and children’s toys with black plastic pieces.

The black spatula panic was soon outrun by the drone panic, which has Americans scanning the skies for menacing aircraft.

...


Now on to the drones. When I first heard of New Jersey residents expressing panic over mysterious lights overhead, I flashed on the Firesign Theatre line, “Big light in sky slated to appear in East.” Except that the Firesign Theatre was a satire troupe of the 1960s and ‘70s, the line originated in their parody of a post-apocalyptic news broadcast, and the game was given away by the title of their best album, “Don’t Crush that Dwarf, Hand Me the Pliers.” The current panic appears to be for real.

...


The claims of an invasion of the Eastern seaboard by swarms of drones has every marker of a groundless social media frenzy. This started with some truly baroque partisan speculation; on Dec. 11, Rep. Jeff Van Drew (R-N.J.) cadged himself some airtime on Fox News by claiming that his home state was under attack from Iran.

“I’m going to tell you the real deal,” he said. “Iran launched a mother ship that contains these drones. It’s off the East Coast of the United States of America. They’ve launched drones.”

Three days later, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, declared “this has gone too far,” grousing that mystery drones had closed down a metropolitan New York airport. The bare-bones reporting on this event might have made people think that JFK or LaGuardia had been attacked by mystery drones. In fact, the airport was Stewart Airport, which is 60 miles from Manhattan, is served mostly by the ultra-low-cost Allegiant Airlines with routes to Florida, and was closed for one hour.

My favorite performance was that of former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican, who reported via X that on Dec. 12 he “personally witnessed (and videoed) what appeared to be dozens of large drones in the sky above my residence ... (25 miles from our nation’s capital). I observed the activity for approximately 45 minutes.”

It didn’t take long for Hogan to be inundated with responses from astronomers and meteorologists that what he had videotaped weren’t drones flying over his house, but the constellation Orion, which as meteorologist Matthew Cappucci informed him crisply, is “made up of stars between 244 and 1,344 light years away.”

https://x.com/GovLarryHogan/status/1867608947525386534



Since then, neighborhood groups in New Jersey have organized “sky watches” to track the invading swarms and traded reports via their Ring doorbells. Donald Trump advised people to shoot the drones down, which is a good way to make things worse.

Some people conjecture that the drone hysteria is the product of the public’s mistrust of government. That doesn’t explain much, since a large share of the hysteria has been promoted by elected officials themselves. Politicians are naturally averse to calling their constituents idiots, so they have been responding by demanding more transparency from government officials at the Pentagon and other agencies. It’s always safe for politicians to assure voters that they’ll hold bureaucrats’ feet to the fire.

The problem here is that government agencies have been very clear about what’s happening overhead. The “drone” sightings, they say, are of commercial or U.S. military aircraft, helicopters, and perhaps drone flights by hobbyists wanting to get in on the fun. Most of it is surely the product of ignorance. How much more do we need federal agencies to explain?

“Most people don’t look at the sky,” notes Cheryl Rofer, a retired nuclear scientist. “They don’t know what airplanes look like up there, particularly at night, and they don’t know what the stars and planets look like. They can’t estimate distance — which is tricky in the sky — and they aren’t aware of how things can seem to move. They aren’t aware of how to check if those objects in fact are moving.”

There may be one other explanation for why there are so many purported drone sightings in New Jersey. As the blogger Kevin Drum writes, there are a lot of drones in New Jersey, in part because a state law “indemnifies drone fliers against lawsuits from New Jersey landowners for use of their property for drone overflights.”

So, sure. New Jersey loves drones, which nobody noticed until a local congressman decided to blame Iran.

Michael Hiltzik wrote:The problem here is that government agencies have been very clear about what’s happening overhead. The “drone” sightings, they say, are of commercial or U.S. military aircraft, helicopters, and perhaps drone flights by hobbyists wanting to get in on the fun. Most of it is surely the product of ignorance. How much more do we need federal agencies to explain?

HPG wrote:Our government's official response to these drones is fucking terrifying.

"It's not ours. It's not theirs. We don't know what it is, but we know it's not a threat so don't worry about it."