Assad falls

[SLD]

The Onion is just having a field day with this.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Clearly you are not a CNN fan...

"A small black hole would suck in our entire universe"?

A sufficiently small black hole would be blazing hot, intensely bright, and incapable of pulling you off your feet (much less sucking you, or your universe, in) from a metre away - as you approaced such an object, you would see it long before you even noticed its gravity, even in a vacuum. In our atmosphere, it would rapidly develop an even hotter and brighter accretion disc of air molecules.

Black holes get the energy to radiate Hawking radiation from their rest mass energy. So if a black hole is not accreting mass from outside, it will lose mass by Hawking radiation, and will eventually evaporate. For astronomical black holes, the evaporation time is prodigiously long — about 10⁶¹ times the age of the Universe for a 30 solar mass black hole. However, the evaporation time is shorter for smaller black holes (evaporation time t is proportional to M³), and black holes with masses less than about 10¹¹kg (the mass of a small mountain) can evaporate in less than the age of the Universe. The Hawking temperature of such mini black holes is high: a 10¹¹kg black hole has a temperature of about 10¹²Kelvin
...
The gravitational pull of such a mini black hole would be about 1 gee at a distance of 1 metre.

https://jila.colorado.edu/~ajsh/bh/hawk.html

In vacuum how would you see it? A black hole that's safe to be a meter from is smaller than visible photons, how would there be any image? (Now, seeing it's disk or seeing it's Hawking radiation are another matter--but neither are seeing the hole itself.)

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Sky News is reporting that he has fled to Russia, confirmed by Russian state media.

"Assad and his family members have arrived in Moscow. Russia, for humanitarian reasons, has granted them asylum."

Ah yes...nothing says "humanitarian" like a brutal dictator hiding under the skirt of another brutal dictator.

I don't think the replacement will be any better.

Yeah, the one certainty in all of this is that Syria will still be run by arseholes.

No other kind of leader can gain, much less hold, power anywhere in the Middle East.

Some are worse than others; None are good enough to really qualify as "better" though. I suppose it's technically better to be starving, terrified, and subject to arbitrary imprisonment, than it is to be shot at, starving, terrified, and subject to arbitrary imprisonment.

When local government is overthrown by violent revolution I do not believe we have an example of it not being bad. Keywords are "local" and "violent". Throwing out an external power isn't always bad. And we saw some basically bloodless cases in Eastern Europe--the problems were bad enough once it started everything fell with minimal conflict.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The incoming American President is clearly unhappy that his buddy Vlad lost his bestie in the Middle East, and has pledged to sit on his tiny hands over Syria. Had the US election turned out differently, the incoming administration would try to leverage whatever influence we could muster to apply pressure to the incoming Syrian regime to be a bit more moderate that the outgoing one. They're jubilant now, but (I'm guessing) woefully unprepared to run - let alone rebuild - an entire country. Unfortunately, we're going to have an administration (regime?) here in the states that can't think beyond coming up with a slogan that fits on a hat or a bumper sticker.

I would be surprised if we had been able to moderate them at all.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You're right. There is nothing wrong with a buffer zone. So if Israel wants a buffer zone for their people, they should create one within their own border, at a minimum, the border recognized by Israel and Trump and no others. But no. Leave it to Israel to forever take a little more of what doesn't belong to them. We'll see how long they see fit to keep this "buffer".

It's a matter of geography. Israel does not want to face fire from those mountains. They took the high ground and then later it became a buffer. With Assad's fall it ceased to be controlled so Israel moved in to keep the terrorists from moving in.

Why would they need "lines" and need to concern themselves with their "flanks" if the opposing force "melted away"? Their biggest threat right now seems to be falling rounds from celebratory gun fire & Israel.

Because groups like Hezbollah are still out there. Just because everything's great now doesn't mean it will stay that way.

 

[Tigers!]

Sinse Assad is in Moscow (the world's favourite holiday destination fro failed dictators) my only advice to him would be
1. Don't stand in front of any open windows
2. Don't touch any doorknobs or handles
3. Beware men carrying umbrellas

 

[barbos]

Sinse Assad is in Moscow (the world's favourite holiday destination fro failed dictators) my only advice to him would be
1. Don't stand in front of any open windows
2. Don't touch any doorknobs or handles
3. Beware men carrying umbrellas

Since your guys overthrew the other guy my only advice to you don't work in very high twin buildings and fly less.

 

[TV and credit cards]

Sinse Assad is in Moscow (the world's favourite holiday destination fro failed dictators) my only advice to him would be
1. Don't stand in front of any open windows
2. Don't touch any doorknobs or handles
3. Beware men carrying umbrellas

Think like Putin.
Assad has value, likely trade value. Putin will keep this asset around until such time as it becomes a liability.
Strip away all this love, joy, truth, peace, justice, beauty, and freedom crap and think of humans as a commodity.
Now you're thinking like Putin.

 

[TV and credit cards]

You're right. There is nothing wrong with a buffer zone. So if Israel wants a buffer zone for their people, they should create one within their own border, at a minimum, the border recognized by Israel and Trump and no others. But no. Leave it to Israel to forever take a little more of what doesn't belong to them. We'll see how long they see fit to keep this "buffer".

It's a matter of geography. Israel does not want to face fire from those mountains. They took the high ground and then later it became a buffer. With Assad's fall it ceased to be controlled so Israel moved in to keep the terrorists from moving in.

Why would they need "lines" and need to concern themselves with their "flanks" if the opposing force "melted away"? Their biggest threat right now seems to be falling rounds from celebratory gun fire & Israel.

Because groups like Hezbollah are still out there. Just because everything's great now doesn't mean it will stay that way.

Can you see your comments as the least bit Putinesque? This is how Russia solves its problems, is it not?
I'm not arguing against the need to destroy harmful munitions in Syria, particularly any chemical weapons there might be. It's in Israel's ham-fisted method of sterilization by devastation that I have issue with. Also what exactly needs to be destroyed is likely unilaterally being decided by one person, Netanyahu. Are they showing any concern for any human life that might be in the vicinity or are these lesser people like the lesser people of Gaza, not a concern here too?
Syria has thus far maintained some interim government throughout these events. Did anyone think to ask to come in and secure the more dangerous weapons. We're newly established Syrian forces, aka, the rebels already securing those that they knew of? We'll never know.

Before anyone could blink and before you know who you're dealing with...

"I warn here the leaders of the rebels in Syria: Anyone who follows Assad's path will end up like Assad," Katz said in Haifa. "We will not allow an extreme Islamic terrorist entity to act against Israel beyond its border, putting its citizens at risk."

Would this have been necessary? Perhaps. But trusting that a Netanyahu government's actions are right and proper is naive.

 

[TV and credit cards]

"We have seen over the years any number of militant groups who have seized power, who have promised that they would respect minorities, who have promised that they would respect religious freedom, promised that they would govern in an inclusive way, and then see them fail to meet those promises," State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said.

One word for you Matt, traunch.
Or we can doom them to failure, look back years from now and complain how the US fucked this all up by doing nothing.
Sincerely,
Mr. Foresight

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Sinse Assad is in Moscow (the world's favourite holiday destination fro failed dictators) my only advice to him would be
1. Don't stand in front of any open windows
2. Don't touch any doorknobs or handles
3. Beware men carrying umbrellas

Hell Yeah. He brought along 135 billion dollars with him. That's got to be making Vlad salivate like Pavlov's dog.

 

[bilby]

Clearly you are not a CNN fan...

"A small black hole would suck in our entire universe"?

A sufficiently small black hole would be blazing hot, intensely bright, and incapable of pulling you off your feet (much less sucking you, or your universe, in) from a metre away - as you approaced such an object, you would see it long before you even noticed its gravity, even in a vacuum. In our atmosphere, it would rapidly develop an even hotter and brighter accretion disc of air molecules.

Black holes get the energy to radiate Hawking radiation from their rest mass energy. So if a black hole is not accreting mass from outside, it will lose mass by Hawking radiation, and will eventually evaporate. For astronomical black holes, the evaporation time is prodigiously long — about 10⁶¹ times the age of the Universe for a 30 solar mass black hole. However, the evaporation time is shorter for smaller black holes (evaporation time t is proportional to M³), and black holes with masses less than about 10¹¹kg (the mass of a small mountain) can evaporate in less than the age of the Universe. The Hawking temperature of such mini black holes is high: a 10¹¹kg black hole has a temperature of about 10¹²Kelvin
...
The gravitational pull of such a mini black hole would be about 1 gee at a distance of 1 metre.

https://jila.colorado.edu/~ajsh/bh/hawk.html

In vacuum how would you see it? A black hole that's safe to be a meter from is smaller than visible photons, how would there be any image? (Now, seeing it's disk or seeing it's Hawking radiation are another matter--but neither are seeing the hole itself.)

How is seeing Hawking Radiation not the same as seeing the black hole?

We don't say "You can see the fur, but that's not the same as seeing the cat itself", because that would be an absurd level of pedantry. The fur blocks our view of the cat, but as it is a fundamental attribute of the cat, and is exactly what we expect to see when there is a cat present, it is functionally identical to seeing the cat.

Note to mods: The cat in my example is Syrian, just so that this discussion is not wildly and absurdly off-topic.

 

[Derec]

You're right. There is nothing wrong with a buffer zone. So if Israel wants a buffer zone for their people, they should create one within their own border, at a minimum, the border recognized by Israel and Trump and no others. But no. Leave it to Israel to forever take a little more of what doesn't belong to them. We'll see how long they see fit to keep this "buffer".

Funny, I don't recall you having similar objections when Turkish troops went into Syria.
 Turkish occupation of northern Syria
Stuff like this is ever only a problem when Israel does it.

Why would they need "lines" and need to concern themselves with their "flanks" if the opposing force "melted away"?

I said it - because allies of the Syrian regime such as Hezbollah could attack from Lebanon.
And really, if Hezbollah had supported the Assad regime the Syrian Arab Army likely would not have melted away anyway.
The Hamas attack on Israel let many other dominos fall, it seems.

Their biggest threat right now seems to be falling rounds from celebratory gun fire & Israel.

US is also flying attacks in Syria. So is Turkey.
What to Know About the Countries Still Dropping Bombs in Syria
Again, only seems to be a problem when Israel does it.

At least France and Germany are taking the right tack agreeing to work with the new government as long as basic rights are observed.

Syria doesn't really have a government yet.
Speaking of which, neither does France and Germany's Scholz is about to call for a vote of confidence after the traffic light coalition (Ampelkoalition) broke apart.

The rest we'll have to wait and see.

Indeed.

 

[Derec]

How is seeing Hawking Radiation not the same as seeing the black hole?

We don't say "You can see the fur, but that's not the same as seeing the cat itself", because that would be an absurd level of pedantry. The fur blocks our view of the cat, but as it is a fundamental attribute of the cat, and is exactly what we expect to see when there is a cat present, it is functionally identical to seeing the cat.

But how does that relate to the No Hair Theorem?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Sinse Assad is in Moscow (the world's favourite holiday destination fro failed dictators) my only advice to him would be
1. Don't stand in front of any open windows
2. Don't touch any doorknobs or handles
3. Beware men carrying umbrellas

Since your guys overthrew the other guy my only advice to you don't work in very high twin buildings and fly less.

Our guys? No way. We tried a bit in the past but realized that there were no good guys.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You're right. There is nothing wrong with a buffer zone. So if Israel wants a buffer zone for their people, they should create one within their own border, at a minimum, the border recognized by Israel and Trump and no others. But no. Leave it to Israel to forever take a little more of what doesn't belong to them. We'll see how long they see fit to keep this "buffer".

It's a matter of geography. Israel does not want to face fire from those mountains. They took the high ground and then later it became a buffer. With Assad's fall it ceased to be controlled so Israel moved in to keep the terrorists from moving in.

Why would they need "lines" and need to concern themselves with their "flanks" if the opposing force "melted away"? Their biggest threat right now seems to be falling rounds from celebratory gun fire & Israel.

Because groups like Hezbollah are still out there. Just because everything's great now doesn't mean it will stay that way.

Can you see your comments as the least bit Putinesque? This is how Russia solves its problems, is it not?
I'm not arguing against the need to destroy harmful munitions in Syria, particularly any chemical weapons there might be. It's in Israel's ham-fisted method of sterilization by devastation that I have issue with. Also what exactly needs to be destroyed is likely unilaterally being decided by one person, Netanyahu. Are they showing any concern for any human life that might be in the vicinity or are these lesser people like the lesser people of Gaza, not a concern here too?
Syria has thus far maintained some interim government throughout these events. Did anyone think to ask to come in and secure the more dangerous weapons. We're newly established Syrian forces, aka, the rebels already securing those that they knew of? We'll never know.

Some of that interim government has announced an intention of going after China next. Israel probably averted chemical weapon terrorist attacks.

 

[barbos]

Sinse Assad is in Moscow (the world's favourite holiday destination fro failed dictators) my only advice to him would be
1. Don't stand in front of any open windows
2. Don't touch any doorknobs or handles
3. Beware men carrying umbrellas

Since your guys overthrew the other guy my only advice to you don't work in very high twin buildings and fly less.

Our guys? No way. We tried a bit in the past but realized that there were no good guys.

You call 10 years a bit?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

In vacuum how would you see it? A black hole that's safe to be a meter from is smaller than visible photons, how would there be any image? (Now, seeing it's disk or seeing it's Hawking radiation are another matter--but neither are seeing the hole itself.)

How is seeing Hawking Radiation not the same as seeing the black hole?

A big black hole isn't going to have visible Hawking radiation. And a small one is simply a point of energy, you couldn't distinguish it from a white hole if such exist.

We don't say "You can see the fur, but that's not the same as seeing the cat itself", because that would be an absurd level of pedantry. The fur blocks our view of the cat, but as it is a fundamental attribute of the cat, and is exactly what we expect to see when there is a cat present, it is functionally identical to seeing the cat.

Note to mods: The cat in my example is Syrian, just so that this discussion is not wildly and absurdly off-topic.

I had a puddle of blackness when I was growing up. Without seeing features she didn't look like a cat.