There has been a problem with the way law officers are trained for long, long, long time. The first people to tell me this were former policemen and sheriffs.

I’m with Ta-Nehisi Coates on this one. The police are but a symptom of a rot that runs right to the core.

“The truth is that the police reflect America in all of its will and fear, and whatever we might make of the country’s criminal justice policy, it cannot be said that it was imposed by a repressive minority. The abuses that have followed from these policies—the sprawling carceral state, the random detention of black people, the torture of suspects—are the product of democratic will. And so to challenge the police is to challenge the American people who send them into the ghettos armed with the same self-generated fears that compelled the people who think they are white to flee the cities and into the Dream. The problem with the police is not that they are fascist pigs but that our country is ruled by majoritarian pigs

Which also means that I agree with your assertion that guns are not the root of the problem, although I do think that American gun culture is more than tangentially related to the problem. At this point I’m not sure how productive “common sense” gun control measures would be. Nor am I sure that I wouldn’t want to arm myself in such a situation. And frankly I’m relieved I have the leisure of not thinking about it too much. It’s one hell of a mess you’ve got yourself into over there, that’s all I can say.

In other words, Russia’s information management is confused & contradictory, just as with the airliner shot down over Ukraine, which was shot down either by a Ukrainian SAM, a Ukrainian Su-25, it can’t have been shot down by a Su-25 because that’s not physically possible, it was shot down by a Su-27, there weren’t any Su-27s close enough . . . . All from official Russian sources.

As the above proves, we can’t trust what any arm of the Russian state says because even if we want to believe them, we don’t know which story to choose & some of them are unbelievable. So we have to set their stories aside for the moment & look for other sources of information.

This is not persuasive, swerve. You know as well as anyone that when incidents happen, and when parties have incomplete (or even erroneous) information, that multiple interpretations or explanations for events can be offered in good faith. You also know that not all information is communicated to all people simultaneously, and that multiple people from a variety of institutions can be in a position to comment upon issues at a variety of times.

Malaysian authorities came out with all sorts of garbled and contradictory messages when MH370 happened, reflecting incomplete information, failures in communication, and institutional inexperience. That doesn’t mean we should subsequently dismiss anything they might have to say.

So how about judging explanations on the evidence and/or plausibility rather than ruling them out based purely on the source? One of the Russian claims is that the damage doesn’t resemble that inflicted by airstrikes. That sounds like an empirically testable claim to me, for someone with the right knowledge and level of interest (of which I have neither). Why not look into that?

The Typhoon came after the Flanker and was purpose-built to beat it.

Good to hear you acknowledge the primacy of T-50, coming after the F-22 and having been designed to beat it. 😎

now that russia and china are lovers again..
the j-31, designed for export, could be a good mig-29 replacement for the russians

I know this is just a troll post, but there is a serious topic beneath it.

In the long-term, as the smaller power, Russia’s readiness to acquire Chinese hardware will be constrained by the imperative to maintain its own R&D and manufacturing base. That does not mean that direct acquisition or licensed manufacturing of Chinese platforms is impossible, only that opportunities to do so while preserving Russian interests will be limited. I think the best prospects for genuinely cooperative development and manufacturing are highly specialised platforms with limited production and export prospects, such as a super-heavy airlifter to replace An-124.

At 2500kg, is BrahMos-A the heaviest munition to be fitted to a tactical aircraft? My munitions-fu isn’t strong, but the GBU-28 “only” weighs 2250kg.

Of course the real problem with the “Australian plot” hypothesis is that it presumes a degree of competence that there is no evidence we possess. Recall that this is the country that not so long ago spent $1bn over ten years trying and failing to upgrade less than a dozen 1960s-vintage helicopters. I wouldn’t spend too much time worrying about what we may or may not be up to. Screwing over tiny nations with GDP equivalent to the annual revenue of Spotify is more our level.

I would be carefull of giving a fixed number, in order to mark a jet as a success or failure. I don’t think the F-22 deserve to get the failure stamp as it only sport some sub 200 units.

A specific, fixed number may be inappropriate, but the general principle is sound enough. The F-22 may be considered a success when assessed in its own context, but Russia cannot afford a “success” like it. Russia needs the T-50 program to deliver in terms of capability, availability, numbers (read: affordability), extensibility, and export success. These are the things that matter in the broader context of the program, not delays in development or flight testing.

Not a criticism of the OP, but unfortunately this thread seems destined to be consumed by the kinds of nationalist stereotyping and mudslinging that we’ve already had rather too much of lately.