Kabe

All the major outlets are reporting that the FBI confirms it’s him now. Very confusing, all round.

https://archive.is/20240714054831/https://www.reuters.com/world/us/fbi-identifies-thomas-matthew-crooks-subject-involved-trump-rally-shooting-2024-07-14/

https://archive.is/20240714055509/https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2024/07/14/donald-trump-shooter-pennsylvania-rally/74396853007/

Shooter appears to be a white male, aged 20s or early 30s by the look of it. The t-shirt he was wearing is allegedly marked with branding for a firearms-related YouTube channel.

https://x.com/Shadi_Alkasim/status/1812315218258833590

Edit: Possible suspects are either Maxwell Yearick, previously arrested while demonstrating against Trump in Pittsburgh on a previous occasion, or a Thomas Matthew Crooks, according to the NY Post.

Hasn’t been officially ID’d yet though, so still speculation.

And every time, the taxpayer foots the bill. Until the funds start coming from police pensions, nothing is going to change.

Lol you’re right about this giving native English speakers a headache. I’m not sure the subjunctive is the correct explanation here, though.

The subjunctive mood in English primarily uses the past tense form of verbs (“were,” “were to,” etc.) to convey wishes or counterfactuality. E.g. ‘I wish you wouldn’t drink so much coffee’, or 'If I were you, I wouldn’t…"

However, ‘would you like a coffee?’ is a direct question of preference, which means it technically is using the indicative mood rather than the subjunctive. Here, ‘would’ functions as a model verb to soften the request and make it more polite.

Ah yeah, I see what you mean. Fair point.

True.

On what basis doesn’t it work, though? I’m still not sure I understand what the problem is with your example.

You would be hand picking less qualified men to compete with the women just to fill it up.

Another way of looking at it is that we would in fact be widening the criteria of who would be considered “qualified”.

I would say the opposite, in fact.

Eugenics is the belief and practices that aim to “improve” the genetic quality of a human population to meet an idealized optimal standard. Under my proposed system, you could argue it would allow for a greater diversity of individuals that would be able to compete, and therefore would lower the necessity of having the optimal physical traits required in order to take part in each sport.

But like I said, that’s fine. The point is that we would then be categorizing people not according to their gender but by factors that directly affect their athletic performance.

Another benefit would also be that it would allow a wider range of people to participate at the national and international level, seeing as it would not remove all but those women and men who possess the optimal physical traits required for that particular sport.

That’s why they would need to take more into account than simply weight. Surely multiple physical and hormonal factors could also be measured and an aggregate total value be applied to each athlete.

In general, sure, but not all men are more muscular and stronger than all women.

Furthermore, even if, say 90% (or even 100%) of the heavyweight category were men, it would still be fairer for everyone.

For a while I’ve been thinking that all sports should get rid of gendered male/female competitions and replace them with weight categories that take into account physiological characteristics like muscle mass, testosterone levels, weight, height, etc. This would result in, say, three to four categories ranging from lightweight to heavyweight.

Why wouldn’t this work?

Dolce et Decorum est - Wilfred Owen. A grim, anti-war masterpiece written by a soldier fighting in the trenches in WW1

Ozymandias - Percy Shelley. A reminder of human transience and hubris

Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night - Dylan Thomas. Helps me to endure when things seem bleak or hopeless.