Grrl Power #1037 – Rough(ly equivalent) trade
I imagine two billion dollars is an easier sell if it’s mostly in backhoes, cement mixers, and those asphalt Zamboni trains that resurfaces roads all in one go. Even though a bank transfer (or however massive inter-country transactions take place) would be a lot easier than loading up a shitload of cranes and dumphoes and trenchers and bigger diggers and whatever this is, or this, and put them all on a boat and ship them halfway around the world. But hey, at least Deus has ocean access now.
A BelAZ 75710 will set you back about $6 million, which honestly is a lot less than I would have guessed. Of course, a CAT 797 can carry ~85% as much weight but only costs $3.4M. Probably better off with two of those.
I assume the BelAZ transformer would turn into something where the dump bay or whatever it’s called would fold up into a massive shield. The wheels are frikkin huge though, so unless the toy makers could come up with a way to unroll the wheels and turn then into part of the arms or legs, I think it’d have to turn into something with a shield and the world’s largest pair of inline skates.
Yes, there was a BelAZ 75710 in the Transformers movie with Devastator, (maybe it was a generic “large dump truck”) but I’m not aware that it did anything besides become the left leg, so it doesn’t count.
Totally unrelated to anything, but the first skit in this video is definitely one of the better things that’s happened on the internet recently. I haven’t even played Elden Ring but it’s still >chef kiss noise<
April Vote Incentive is up! Looks like someone had better make sure their life insurance includes acts of Snu Snu.
Alternate versions over at Patreon include less cloth-y versions as usual, but also some of those color changing chokers.
Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
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SeriouslySeriously you guys. If you like Grrl Power the check these out.
"Mature"Mature subject matter and occasionally something explicit but usually safe. Can't guarantee the ads are safe though.
Dongs Ahoy!Full frontal and backal. Lots of skin, sex on some or all pages, explicit or otherwise.
Colada/Cohrada from the Beast Wars/Beast Machines. Slitherfang is more recently a snake Transformer that turns into a road.
They did make a Power Ranger series themed around trains, Power Ranger Lightspeed Rescue. It was incredibly dumb.
Well technically, Lightspeed Rescue was themed around Rescue vehicles, like a firetruck, that’s why it was called Lightspeed Rescue.
The supertrain rescue was basically a fill in zord/second mech that did emergency duty during the mid season period, almost blew itself up in its first outing, got damaged in the second, before they pretty quickly hit the real upgrade to the Omega Megazord.
Which was made out of space shuttles, because the original sentai footage had a different story involving a mission to Mars.
sounds like their version of the big sauropod from Mighty Morphin that barely showed up, was supposed to be this ultimate weapon, and then was destroyed. It really existed to sell more toys.
Actually it never got destroyed. It just kinda sank a little and then was phased out entirely. It was supposed to get an upgrade and reappearance in the space series, but the idea got scrapped.
Lightspeed is more based on emergency services than trains, it just so happened that their megazord was a train. however, Super Sentai, which PR is adapted from, does have a Train-Themed team, Ressha Sentai ToQger. which as of this comment being written, does not have a PR equivalent.
Well you could, sure. That is if you want all the guys at the
yachtdump truck club to make fun of you for you itty bitty little dump truck.Two 797s instead of one 75710 reduces the cost of on hand spares and halves downtime from breakage and scheduled service. Also the relative material strength is higher and the roadbase load factor is lower. Unless you have a dragline that can fill them in one scoop you may even be better off with haul trucks a size down from that.
They did make a Power Ranger series themed around trains, Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue. It was delightfully dumb. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_K5ZGhx4QIM
Light speed rescue had a train zord but so did mystic force and RPM but the train Themed season Toqger never got adapted
You know from this conversation, I think, or hope, Maxima will see that Sydney is able to understand / think on Deus’ mental wavelength. I just want sydney to do a whole random rant of “Deus Thoughts” that accidently fall upon the “evil mastermind plan” that he has
Nooooo!!! Sydney!!!! Stop giving Deus ideas.
Is clearly what Max wanted to say.
Deus is the most unnerving bad guy I’ve seen in fiction since David Xanatos, and that’s saying something.
That’s because he isnt a bad guy. He’s actually quite good and so when a person tries to paint him as a villain, they can only really point to his love of villainous tropes, while he is winding up continuously doing good instead. That realization can be quite unnerving to those who have yet to realize the paragon-like and ‘opposite-of-bad’ qualities of the savior of humanity, protector of the oppressed and needy, philanthropist, renaissance man, futurist, mathematician, physicist, strategist, inventor, warrior poet, lover, genuinely good business partner AND genuinely goid boss, and example to all on how disparate peoples can get along in profitable peace and harmony, be they human, super, alien or infernal, Deus ‘X Machinae’ Superion. All praise Deus, amen.
While his past behavior has not been particularly evil, he did just recently declare war upon a neighboring nation, and then used an army of summoned demons to force upon them his annexation of a fairly significant parcel of land. And since that parcel included a river, which has a fairly large economic value as well as of course being a river in Africa and all that implies for the people of the nation that lost the land, I’m not at all certain I can agree with you any longer on Deus being ‘just a good guy who likes evil overlord tropes.’
He’s a guy who knows what he wants. A utopia, with him at its head and its opposition crushed underfoot.
If invading other countries is evil then he is less evil than the USA, Russia, China, and quite a few other countries. It would make him about averagely evil. Basically, if invading makes Deus evil, then for precisely the same reason it makes him normal.
He is succesful at waging war, as in quickly conquering, without decades of half-assed occupation full of continuous civilian casualties due to unrest (which seems to be the norm for the more aggressive countries). Are you arguing that causing less civilian deaths for a shorter time makes him more evil than the other countries? I assume not, because that would be intellectually dishonest of you, and I’d prefer to think well of you.
Having discussed how ownership changed hands we can discuss owning a river on its own. If ownership of land is inherently evil, then, everyone is evil again. It would only prove he is about average, morally speaking. No, what matters with ownership of land-patterns that channel natural resources (like rivers, which channel precipitation) is how you treat the, in this case, river. And I am pretty sure Deus will treat that river better than the previous owners.
I just want to say I love your post. Nicely argued. :)
Very little is black and white. The US doesn’t invade countries for imperial expansion. Deus did. The US invaded Iraq, as part of a coalition of nations, in the first Gulf war in defense of it’s ally Kuwait. And then left after achieving the destruction of almost their entire military might and the liberation of Kuwait.
The second Gulf war is far more arguable, but again the US didn’t do this alone but as a part of a large, multi-national coalition. And also again, held no land as it’s own.
He is successful because he is written that way. It’s really easy to point to a fictional character who has highly unrealistic successes handed to him by the author and compare them favorably against the trials and challenges that real nations face in the real world.
“Very little is black and white. The US doesn’t invade countries for imperial expansion.”
The plains native tribes would disagree. Manifest Destiny and the Monroe Doctrine, et al.
The US did exist before the 80s, much as I do agree with you about Kuwait and the first Gulf War.
“He is successful because he is written that way.”
That’s sort of a cop-out as an argument about Deus. The idea that ‘he’s evil but written as good’ makes little sense as a defense of the ‘Deus is evil’ standpoint.
ALL the characters (heck, all characters in ALL fiction), good, bad, or somewhere in between, are written a certain way. That’s not the point. The point is, as written, Deus is NOT actually a bad person at all. Quite the opposite in fact.
“he did just recently declare war upon a neighboring nation”
1) The mere act of declaring war is not in itself evil. Nations have been declaring war on other nations since nations first existed. Almost every nation of any significance in history has, at one time or another, invaded another nation or people. This alone does not make Deus evil.
2) Technically, the war was already ongoing before Deus even came to Galytn, thanks to King Indinge, who was at war with EVERY one of his neighbors, or who’s neighbors had already declared war on the fledgling nation of Galytn.
3) Mozambique is NOT a nation that has ‘clean hands.’ It’s one of the most corrupt nations on the planet, and its people in the region that Deus went into were privately BEGGING him to come in to take the area over and improve their infrastructure and lives, like he had done for Galytn. This has already been stated in the comic.
4) Deus took every conceivable step to try to PREVENT there from having to be a war, and once there was a war, he took steps to make sure the war was over quickly and with a minimum of casualties, allowing surrender at the first possible moment and IMMEDIATELY allowing for peace talks within a few days of the start of the war. After Mozambique surrendered and asked to be included in the infrastructure program, Deus was more than willing to oblige. For the safety of Galytn, he did insist on having control of Mozambique’s military, not that it was much of a threat in the first place. When the US defeated Japan, part of the terms of surrender was for Japan to give up having an army. As with the US’s treatment of Japan, Deus allowed Mozambique to continue to have their own government as well. This is the opposite of being evil.
“and then used an army of summoned demons”
As Sydney has pointed out, just being a demon does not mean you’re evil. Dabbler is a demon, as is Tamatha, as is Decolette. and Dabbler works for the US government and is apparently a US citizen somehow. If Deus is evil for employing demons then so is ARCHON.
“to force upon them his annexation of a fairly significant parcel of land.”
They would likely have agreed anyway. The demons just gave them an additional incentive. Deus believes in Peace Through Strength. So does the US, based on how they have one of the most powerful supers on the planet working for them. Also based on a large portion of the history of the United States and many other western democratic nations. And many other nations as well. Peace through a show of strength is not automatically evil.
“And since that parcel included a river,”
A river which was NOT being used well at all, and the inhabitants along that river were begging Deus to come in to help them. Which makes the location where Deus should invade much easier to decide upon.
“which has a fairly large economic value”
Check out Mozambique’s economy. They make very little, if any, use of their rivers, hence why they’re one of the poorest nations on the planet, while simultaneously being one of the most corrupt governments.
“as well as of course being a river in Africa”
One of many problems in Africa from an economic standpoint is poor use of resources – especially the rivers, and ESPECIALLY in southern Africa, which is where Mozambique is located. The only real exception is South Africa.
“and all that implies for the people of the nation that lost the land”
The people of the nation that lost that land were wanting Deus to come in to improve their infrastructure in the first place. They’re now going to have clean running water instead of polluted water, electricity, and their median income will increase at least fivefold. And if Galytn is an example, their life expectancy will rise, their child mortality rates will plummet, their education will skyrocket, and their GDP will go up (since Deus has a real incentive to make sure that happens, since that’s how his company will make a profit). Not to mention security from soldiers ‘disappearing’ people, which does happen in Mozambique.
“I’m not at all certain I can agree with you any longer on Deus being ‘just a good guy who likes evil overlord tropes.’”
I think you’ll need a more convincing argument than ‘there was a war, hence Deus is evil.’
He is very much a bad guy. When you murder people because they’re in your way to getting what you want you’re a bad guy. Just because you’re a pragmatic villain that recognizes slave labor isn’t anywhere near as profitable as a well off,well-educated populace and far less need to worry about uprisings and the like doesn’t make you not a bad guy it just means you’re a smart bad guy. A bad guy doing the occasional good thing doesn’t make him a good guy, it just means he’s got a bottom line or isn’t into pointless acts of evil.
“When you murder people because they’re in your way”
Are you referring to the murderous tyrant King Indinge, who raped, murdered, and tortured men, women and children after having his nation break away from the DRC/Zaire, who was at war with all of his neighbors, and who was running his country with incredible levels of corruption at all levels? The same Indinge who was so angry at Deus when he would not simply give him a blank check and was told exactly WHY he would not be getting a blank check that he threatened to have Deus shot, and then was going to order Deus thrown off the roof, had Deus not been prepared for that? Not sure killing an inhuman monster like Indinge Senior makes you a bad guy. The people of Galytn sure don’t think so. They’re quite joyous that they now have electricity and food and clean water and jobs and a future and don’t have to worry about being rounded up and shot. To the point that children want to give him ashtrays to thank him for freeing them from that awful, murderous tyrant.
“Just because you’re a pragmatic villain that recognizes slave labor isn’t anywhere near as profitable as a well off,well-educated populace”
Okay I need to figure your reasoning out here.
Because Deus does NOT enslave the population of Galytn, and in fact pays them quite well, spending billions to create a burgeoning middle class in the nation that have a real future…. that makes him a bad guy?
That’s A VERY odd definition of ‘bad.’
“and far less need to worry about uprisings and the like doesn’t make you not a bad guy”
Pretty sure the reason deus isnt worried about uprising is because they DO see him as a good guy. A hero, in fact, who cares about their well-being and freedom. Something no one else has ever done for the Galytn people (and now soon to be the Mozambique people).
” A bad guy doing the occasional good thing doesn’t make him a good guy”
By ‘occasional good thing’ I think you mean ‘CONSTANT GOOD THINGS FOR A DECADE.’ He’s not an bad guy who occasionally does good things. He’s a good guy who occasionally realizes he has to get his hands dirty in order to protect people and achieve his goals, which are actually EXTREMELY GOOD AND VIRTUOUS GOALS as far as the people are concerned.
The fact that it also directly benefits HIM does not make him bad. The only thing I agree with in your post is it does mean he’s pragmatic. But pragmatic GOOD, not pragmatic evil.
“it just means he’s got a bottom line”
Yes. A bottom line. Because in addition to being a good leader, he’s also a good businessman.
“or isn’t into pointless acts of evil.”
Not only is he not into pointless acts of evil, he seems to go out of his way to do as much good as possible instead, and minimize the negative effects of anything bad, which is only done as a last resort with great restraint, which might be necessary.
I don’t see how that is the definition of a ‘bad guy.’
Sure, Deus has killed people, but they were all bad.
Well, my moment for Deus was when they were in the vault, the mummy guy had the knife that has to kill ninety people to work again, and Deus offered him a shift and maybe being able to help him with the knife, too.
Alarm bells!
Remember that the thing that makes someone Evil is willingness to go over the line, NOT the fact 99% of what he does is perfectly fine. Deus makes it plain he’s totally happy to walk over the line, do whatever he wants, and walk on back. The fact we haven’t seen him kill puppies or something makes him pragmatic and genre savvy, yet the point that he’s willing to happily give over an artifact to an alien mass murderer who literally wants to make a portal home so she can bring her alien empire here to conquer Earth is just a little bit of a stretch for anyone wanting to claim he’s a Good Guy.
Sure, he had sex with a hot alien, and she got to think she was worth $80 mil. Actually, her putting together the portal-making tool was worth the 80 mil, and what he gave her, he got back, essentially giving up nothing and getting an addition to his black book for free.
Yeah, there was no conquering alien army, he probably trusted in Archon to handle it, but he didn’t know, and it didn’t matter, in the end. He did what he wanted, he got what he wanted, and he didn’t care all that much about the means he had to use to do so.
Also, he’s totally used to being around death and treachery, which is a BIG tipoff as far as his standards go.
Pragmatic evil that keeps the bad stuff out of sight is still evil. He’s just got a Wisdom score of 18 to balance that Int, something more masterminds should have.
Just remember, in the universe of what people can do in any given scenario, anything and everything a Good person can do, an Evil person can also do… and generally, would be wise to do so. However, the reverse is very, very not true, and it’s that willingness to do so which makes someone evil, not that most of the time they don’t do so.
I will respond to this soon but for some reason I cannot access grrlpowercomic.com ffom my wifi, only from my cell data on my phone and my response is VERY long.
“Well, my moment for Deus was when they were in the vault, the mummy guy had the knife that has to kill ninety people to work again, and Deus offered him a shift and maybe being able to help him with the knife, too.”
Glad you brought that up. Lets take the wayback machine to see what ACTUALLY happened there, and what was ACTUALLY said there.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-573-fair-play/
Cthilla: “Sure, I have what I need … once I recharge it.”
Deus: “Perhaps I can help with that as well.”
As we’ve seen earlier in this same scene, on Comic #572 and #570, Deus tends to find workarounds for things which could otherwise involve killing people. Sciona’s method of getting through the Death Field was to sacrifice (or attempt to sacrifice) Wyrmil. Also to sacrifice Coot in order to get into the vault in the first place. Deus, on the other hand, used methods that involved not killing anyone for the same result, because “large groups can become so paradigm locked on a solution that they fail to consider simple workarounds.” And he used houseplants in order to bypass the death field without hurting anyone. Because Deus sees the value in trust and loyalty.
Deus also considered many other ways to get into the vault – including opening it with the proper credentials, which would have involved coercing them from people with seats ON the council, which would have involved kidnapping and torture, but he decided AGAINST something like that. Because he’s not evil. He also considered simulating council members biometrics, but his method was simpler and just as effective, if not moreso.
Now… Deus just told Cthillia that he had a way to help Cthillia recharge the Epimorph. According to Sciona, “It can be recharged. At the cost of ninety-nine lives.”
Now… Deus is very good at finding loopholes for magic restrictions, just like a certain David Xanatos in Disney’s Gargoyles is. I suspect one of the reasons he offered to help Cthillia, other than recognizing the value of trust and loyalty, is his method would be able to recharge the Epimorph WITHOUT killing 99 innocent people. Or possibly not killing people at ALL.
Maybe Deus owns a string of kosher slaughterhouses, and the Epimorph could be used to drain the animals of blood.
Maybe it can be used during wartime as a weapon in self defense.
Maybe he knows some Klingons who want to die with honor after having their backs broken in a cargo hold on the Enterprise, or who’s brother dishonored their family before the High Council.
There are probably dozens of methods for someone who knows how to think outside-of-the-box, like Deus does. Only people stuck in a paradigm would go for the obvious ‘murder 99 people’ angle.
Check the tape – recharging takes “99 lives”, but so far as we know that’s not actually 99 human lives. We don’t even know if the knife has to be used or just present – maybe you could just hold it and step on an ant hill.
Or if the criteria is revealed to explicitly be only human lives, take the knife to a country where physician-assisted euthanasia is legal and do a quick charity tour of volunteers in the hospice centers. Deus could even incentivize volunteers by setting up funding for research into their specific ailments – eventually he would make money from the cure while benefiting humanity as a whole.
“Check the tape – recharging takes “99 lives”, but so far as we know that’s not actually 99 human lives. We don’t even know if the knife has to be used or just present – maybe you could just hold it and step on an ant hill.”
Right. That’s my point. :) I think Deus knows ways around the idea that many people would have that it requires killing 99 sapient beings. Heck, using it in a florist shop to cut roses might work. The wording is vague, and as Deus said, “large groups can become so paradigm locked on a solution that they fail to consider simple workarounds.”
I agree with everything else you said as well. There are obvious workarounds and if anyone could figure them out, or has ALREADY figured them out, it would be Deus.
“Remember that the thing that makes someone Evil is willingness to go over the line, NOT the fact 99% of what he does is perfectly fine.”
1) That’s actually not accurate. There are a lot of things that even the best of people will go over the line to protect or achieve. A good man who goes to war might wind up killing another man, even though they would not normally do so. A doctor might do a risky medical procedure that’s technically not legal, with the patient and family’s consent (and maybe them BEGGING him to do it), because he truly wants the patient to have every chance to live. A saintly but impoverished fellow might steal a loaf of bread to feed a starving child.
2) Not to mention, ‘what makes a person evil’ is depends on what the ‘going over the line’ is. Otherwise you’re getting into what, in the show ‘The Good Place’ was the problem with their concept of Unitarian philosophy, so that NO ONE EVER WAS JUDGED TO BE GOOD – not even the most saintly and pure Mother Theresa-esque of people.
“The fact we haven’t seen him kill puppies or something makes him pragmatic and genre savvy,”
He hasnt killed puppies or whatever because he’s not a psycho evil person.
“yet the point that he’s willing to happily give over an artifact to an alien mass murderer”
Technically, most if not all of the people she killed were members of the Council, who were also trying to murder her. Although I do consider Sciona to be evil.
“who literally wants to make a portal home so she can bring her alien empire here to conquer Earth”
Yes, she wanted to get home. Also if he had not been there, she would have gotten the Epimorph and Skyripper anyway. Him fighting with her would not HELP anything. He wasnt ‘giving her’ the Skyripper. He was just not preventing her from using it – she would have likely found Coot anyway. IF anything, he minimized any possible collateral damage by telling her where he was – and remember, at this point, Coot CANNOT BE KILLED anyway. Also it’s not like she wasnt able to kill people even as is in the troll or ogre body. If anything, he was trying to temper her wrath.
Not to mention he almost seemed to know what was GOING to happen anyway (Deus does tend to seem to be really good at guessing what is going to happen, hence why I think there’s time travel shenanigans involved), but you get to that in the next paragraph sorta when talking about ARCHON.
“Actually, her putting together the portal-making tool was worth the 80 mil, and what he gave her, he got back, essentially giving up nothing and getting an addition to his black book for free.”
As a result, he was able to make his Stargate ™ work, which apparently was part of his big plan. AND he knew where her secret lair would be. AND he knew that it would be destroyed and had Vale go there to recover it before ARCHON would find it. Because Deus tends to know things he shouldnt. Much like Layla from X-Factor Investigations – the ‘girl who knows stuff’ (who wound up knowing stuff because she was a time traveler with a LOT of microcosmic data and an eidetic memory).
“Yeah, there was no conquering alien army, he probably trusted in Archon to handle it, but he didn’t know, and it didn’t matter, in the end.”
Yes. He trusted ARCHON to handle it. In fact.. he seemed to know a lot more than he should have about what was going to happen. He knew ARCHON would handle it. He knew there would not be an invading army after all. He knew Sciona would get back to Alar. He knew the mountain would be destroyed. He knew WHERE the mountain lair was. He knew what she was using the skyripper to do in the first place, and devised a technological variant of the magical Stargate that Sciona was using.
So it’s a bit presumptuous to assume Deus did NOT know. Everything he’s done until now presumes he, somehow, DOES know what’s going to happen, which is why his plans work so well.
“Also, he’s totally used to being around death and treachery, which is a BIG tipoff as far as his standards go.”
He’s a businessman who has legal and business dealings with the US and the US Armed Forces, namely ARCHON. ARCHON does everything you’re accusing Deus of, but much, much, much worse. And they’re the superheroes. Heck, ARCHON is willingly in business with him so they can reap the benefits of his brilliance, and thought they’d be putting a double agent in his midst. Who’s the treacherous one again?
“Pragmatic evil that keeps the bad stuff out of sight is still evil.”
What ‘bad stuff’ is he keeping out of sight? Deus seems incredibly forthcoming about everything he does, including his long-term plans. And none of it seems to be evil or even ‘bad stuff.’
“He’s just got a Wisdom score of 18 to balance that Int, something more masterminds should have.”
Being wise does not make you evil.
“anything and everything a Good person can do, an Evil person can also do”
I’m not sure how this helps your argument.
“However, the reverse is very, very not true, and it’s that willingness to do so which makes someone evil, not that most of the time they don’t do so.”
I think I already showed above about ‘good people who cross over a line’ that the reverse actually IS true. Good and evil tends to be about the intent and motivations far more than the action.
Case in point – Winston Churchill and the Bombing of Coventry during World War 2. You probably know the story, but in case you don’t, during World War 2, the Allied Powers, specifically England, had broken the German Enigma code at Bletchley Park. In short, Churchill had advanced notice, including the exact date, that the Germans were going to bomb either Coventry, Central London, Greater London, the Thames Valley, or Kent. In addition, a German pilot who had been shot down on November 9th, under interrogation, confirmed this, saying that both Coventry and Birmingham wuold be attacked in a colossal raid between November 14th and November 20th. The Germans did so on November 14, 1940, when 300 German bombers dropped 500 tons of explosives, 33,000 incendiary bombs, an dozens of parachute mines on the industrial city of Coventry. 507 civilians were killed and 420 were seriously injured.
Churchill could have evacuated the city. He did not. He could have stopped production in Coventry. He did not. He could have more heavily reinforced Coventry’s air defenses. He did not. Because doing so would have let the Germans know that the Enigma code had been cracked. In which case major offensives that the Allied had planned would no longer have the advantage of being able to tell what was going on in German encrypted codes.
It was a bad thing to let Coventry be destroyed, although it was allowed so that the Allied would have a chance of actually winning the war and defeating the Axis – and THAT was a good goal. So a bad thing was allowed in order to serve a good purpose.
I’m not defending or condemning the sacrifice of Coventry – I’m just pointing out that good people can do bad actions for good purposes.
Another case in point would be closer to my own experiences. I’m a lawyer as I’ve mentioned a few bajillion times on the forum boards here. For a year and change, I actually worked in the ADA’s office in the 2nd Department in New York City. I knew a lot of people, some of whom were friends, who worked in the Public Defender’s office, and a few private criminal defense attorneys as well (the only time I’ve ever been on the defense side in law though was after I left the ADA and did private practice, when I’d occasionally do per diem work, usually for minor stuff like arraignments).
ANYWAY…. I knew a few very good, heck, practically saintly people who worked in the PD’s office because they were very ‘rah rah’ about how everyone deserves an fair defense, even if they are absolutely guilty…. even when guilty of AWFUL crimes. These defense attorneys were not evil. They were actually really nice people. They just believed that without fair representation by a zealous advocate (which is actually a requirement under the Rules of Professional Conduct for attorneys – ie, legal ethics), the entire justice system would become meaningless, and at best a kangaroo court. They were good people who were doing what one might consider ‘bad actions’ (ie, defending a murderer or a rapist or some other violent felon) for a good purpose – upholding the sanctity and usefulness of the criminal justice system. It’s actually a reason I would never be able to in the PD’s office. I wouldnt be able to do it – I don’t see the people who do as evil though – I thought it was noble that they believed in the legal process so diligently.
Are you admitting that you can’t live up to the Rules of Professional Conduct? Verily, we can’t all be Saints. (And yes, this is a joke, kids.)
Anyway, defending the defendant, guilty or not, is a requirement to make the system believable and therefore function, as well as deemed so important to be declared a human right. It is ment to keep the prosecution on its toes for it has to come up with legally sound accusations and backing proof, rather than just declare the defendant guilty and ask a judge to “hammer it good”. Too bad even that bastion of self-declared goodness the USA has managed to subvert its system into prejudice and dysfunction despite all those safeguards.
Your description is perhaps a good indication that both the concept of justice and the whole legal system is indeed backed, and in a very real sense kept aloft, by sheer make-believe.
I don’t think that an attorney defending the guilty is a bad deed per se. The guilty deed itself may be bad (well, let’s just assume is, no ifs or buts about it), but forcing the prosecution to keep to the rules is a vital service to the system. Though if whether justice is served all hinges on who’s the better dramatist in court, and/or who can spend more on lawyers, that is a failing of the system. (STR “oregano”)
Were I a defense attorney, I probably would refrain from letting an unequivocally guilty party who is in the game so as not to have to face up to his own deeds get away scot-free at all costs. But I’d still focus on making sure the prosecution justifies their every step beyond a shadow of a doubt, as the American phrase goes. Because accidental justice isn’t.
Writing this I can understand why defense attorneys can be rah-rah about it. It’s maybe not so much making a difference as being a very vital cog in a high-stakes system.
“Are you admitting that you can’t live up to the Rules of Professional Conduct? Verily, we can’t all be Saints. (And yes, this is a joke, kids.)”
Good joke but I’ll answer anyway. :)
Obviously I can. Because if there’s a field which would cause me to be unable to do so, I don’t enter that field. :) Thus I have lived up to the Rules of Professional Conduct by not putting myself in a position where I would violate those rules.
“Too bad even that bastion of self-declared goodness the USA has managed to subvert its system into prejudice and dysfunction despite all those safeguards.”
I know :( It’s both disappointing and demoralizing.
“Were I a defense attorney, I probably would refrain from letting an unequivocally guilty party who is in the game so as not to have to face up to his own deeds get away scot-free at all costs.”
Part of the way to follow the rules of professional conduct as a defense attorney is that, at least in private practice, you generally have the option of turning down a client if you do not think you will be able to provide zealous advocacy because you not only think he or she is guilty, but also don’t think that person deserves a proper defense. Instead of taking the case and failing you turn it down. The only exceptions to this is when you work in the PD’s office (Public Defender) who HAVE to take whatever cases they get, which tend to be a lot of indigent cases btw, and when you’re in a state that requires a certain amount of hours of pro bono work in criminal defense (and you’ve already passed on it a set number of times in the past and you havent volunteered your hours elsewhere to make up the minimum). But people don’t go into the Public Defenders’ office in general unless they actively believe in their work. It’s not like it’s great pay compared to other fields of law.
“Though if whether justice is served all hinges on who’s the better dramatist in court,”
Depends on if it’s a jury trial or a judge trial, and also depends on the judge. Most judges that I’ve seen are not very swayed by drama, and the one that are tend to be crappy judges in genera, jury or no jury, and sometimes judges who are there appointed due to political favors instead of merit or dispassionate legal knowledge.
“Were I a defense attorney, I probably would refrain from letting an unequivocally guilty party who is in the game so as not to have to face up to his own deeds get away scot-free at all costs.”
Then you’d be violating your oath and breaking the Rules of Professional Conduct. You can refrain from doing certain things, but not if you think it will tank your own case. That would NOT be zealous advocacy if you did and breaks the Model ABA rules for zealousness.
Namely Rule 1.3 – Diligence… especially 1.3 (1):
“A lawyer should pursue a matter on behalf of a client despite opposition, obstruction or personal inconvenience to the lawyer, and take whatever lawful and ethical measures are required to vindicate a client’s cause or endeavor. A lawyer must also act with commitment and dedication to the interests of the client and with zeal in advocacy upon the client’s behalf. A lawyer is not bound, however, to press for every advantage that might be realized for a client. For example, a lawyer may have authority to exercise professional discretion in determining the means by which a matter should be pursued. See Rule 1.2. The lawyer’s duty to act with reasonable diligence does not require the use of offensive tactics or preclude the treating of all persons involved in the legal process with courtesy and respect.”
Like I said, being a GOOD defense attorney (by which I mean more than just winning) is not for a lot of people, myself included, but I do respect people who can do so while adhering to legal ethics. :) Probably some of the nicest and most constantly stressed-out people I’ve met during my brief stint in the ADA’s office. Not at all like you see on shows like Law and Order. :)
Actually, “A lawyer is not bound, however, to press for every advantage that might be realized for a client.” is about what I was thinking. I didn’t say I’d tank the case. I said I wouldn’t push really hard for letting him get away scot-free. The “at all costs” part is operative here. I’d take a partial win over a total one if that would serve society better, for such a specifically-motivated client.
Unless, of course, I had no choice but to take the total win. It would annoy me if I thought the client really should own up but the prosecution tanked the case, and yet I wouldn’t help the prosecution untank the case because doing any such thing would certainly be deeply unethical for a defense attorney.
But anyway, closest I’m likely to get is “language lawyer”. Which is not quite the same as attorney-at-law.
Sorry that I had to split this up. When I tried to post it as one post, Grrlpowercomic.com would not let me and would do an ‘Internal Server Error’ then after a few times, it would not let me even connect to the site. I still can’t connect on my main internet connection.
Oh I forgot dump truck enthusiast
Do the kids still say, giggity?, Or “phrasing”.
Both work.
and thus it was Sidney’s knowledge of giant dump trucks that put Dabbler over the edge in suspecting she is a sleeper agent spy for an ultra class alien civilization programmed to collect any and all random bits of information about humanity.
That’s decent, but check out this gem I ran into somewhere. Maybe Imgur? I don’t recall. And I also have not played Elden Ring.
Since I’m not playing I’m not tied into the community, but from things I’ve randomly heard apparently it lost a pile of subscribers after people ripped through the content. The content that was (sobbing noises) way too hard. I’m having issues meshing those two bits of gossip…
There are train combiners that were available in Japan based on anime that never got amaricanized in the Hasbro Transformers toy/story line.
>”I imagine two billion dollars is an easier sell if it’s mostly in backhoes, cement mixers, and those asphalt Zamboni trains that resurfaces roads all in one go.”
That’s such an incredibly easier sell, because with cash, you have to worry “maybe they want to buy something awful”, but with that you’d get “Oh. They really do just want construction equipment.”
It’s a similar mindset to giving homeless people food rather than money. If you give them money, there’s always going to be that niggling notion that they are going to spend it on drugs or booze. With food, you know rthat they are going to eat it.
Quite frankly, if they are able to parlay a large Big Mac Meal into drugs/booze, I’d be amazed and impressed.
Research shows that most poor people rarely spend the money on drugs and booze, and that cash payments are more effective at bringing people out of poverty.
I don’t know about other places, but in the Alberta tar sands, the huge trucks are mostly driven by women.
That is the usual policy of mine owners about hiring for those heavy machines everywhere, they prefer defensive over aggressive drivers, as stepping on the gas pedal just once costs easily 200$ fuel.
Always wondered of those trucks had a galley, head, and bunk room. They’re big enough for it.
It would make it a much nicer place to work right?
Transformers does have a dump truck as part of the Constructicons, its name is Long Haul, he makes up the lower torso on the Hasbro toys Devastator. I don’t remember which part he makes up in the G1 cartoons.
They get something far more valuable than money by trading in construction equipment. They get legitimacy. You see, cash is quiet. People buy things from mega corps all the time, but construction equipment? That’s saying you’ve reached an agreement to help build something. Yes they invaded countries and destabilized a region, but the good old u.s.a. is providing equipment to rebuild. They aren’t giving the other guys equipment, they’re giving DUES equipment and that means they trust him surely
One of the major reasons you have one gigantic thing instead of two huge things is you cut you fleet maintenance hours, spares inventory, and operator hours in half.
Big. Trucks. Are. Cool. Full stop. Especially when they actually do something like construction vehicles do. Make those little pickups cry in the corner. /kidding
I’m remembering Gargoyles and now want to see Xanatos and Deus in a chess match.
The Transformers movies bugged me more than Avatar. (Aliens, not elements.) At least Avatar had some significant world-building, even if the script had enough dead horse tropes for a dog food factory. Transformers didn’t even have that. It’s a movie about incredible giant robots, but you still need a good story -the story is fundamental to a work being good.
Avatar also, interestingly enough, had giant dump trucks in it!
I can picture these two looking down at the board without moving a piece, look up at each other, back at the board, back to each other, smile, and say in unison, “go again?”
The real funny thing to me about this scene is that Dabbler is probably still having this existential crisis, she may be proven right the Nth tier are real, HOWEVER, they are not some ancient mysterious race that went beyond the rim of the galaxy to parts unknown who maybe left some game changer stuff behind like all those tier 3 who after ascending leave their dangerous junk behind as if it is somehow now beneath them. No these Nth tier may still be Here, Now, and while doing the stay hidden from lower civilizations like the twilight council or Xevoarchy with less advanced cultures, they aren’t obeying a hands off prime directive. They are active, and are changing things from behind the scenes in ways that could dramatically shift the balances of power or at least cause major disruptions in the current system for unknown reasons, and maybe hope those reasons aren’t a golden apple before the galactic powers or tossing stones to kick things up…and the humans in the room who are the most impacted by this have moved on in the conversation to talking about big vehicles hauling dirt around.
Love Sydney’s little sexism dig at Max.
I now heart Halo even more, because Transformers.
Serious question. At what point is Deus going to start flirting with, and sexually propositioning, Sydney?
It looks as if he’s starting to find her… intriguing.
If he ever finds out she’s a baby Nth, maybe. Until then, he just seems to find her… perplexing.
I was about to type something like that, if he suspects/thinks she may be a Nth/Architect of the Supereon larva (or) spy, he may want to add that to his “black book collection” like with Sciona and the Alari.
If anyone might be a baby Nth it would be Krona.
She does have that little Washu vibe. And we never did learn where her power comes from, not a super, some kind of weird hyper magic that looks like when Washu uses her fifth dimension computer terminals. Sidney has the hyper active space girl vibe at times though. Between them, two anime tropes that are usually some kind of OP alien.
Yeah. And the fact that she’s rather unique does add to the possibility of her being an Nth being without realizing it. Plus she’s able to see the deep code in the orbs, which even Dabbler cannot do. And her powers seem to work very similar to how the orbs work on a code-based concept, but it’s a LOT more variable.
I see it as this – Sydney has a computer which can do things to the universe, based on specific programming pre-built into the system. Krona is a programmer who can program the universe on the fly.
While another page is up I didn’t want to randomly post this thought there as it belongs here.
Even if it turns out Sidney and/or Krona are Nth level beings, baby ones, spies, avatars with suppressed memories etc…
that would be no guarantee they are the same species as the ones that made the Superion Field, or if they are that they are the same culture, or at the least *oh crap there is more than one species like this messing with us at the same time complication*,
that even if they turn out that, there is no guarantee they made the field or know how to make it; they could be players not programmers. Like an episode of the real adventures of Johnny Quest did with an alien diplomat pointing out he is a diplomat he doesn’t fix toasters; just because you are a member of an alien species with advanced technology doesn’t mean you personally know how to repair, hack, or otherwise engineer that tech *likely though still some rudimentary knowledge above most humans, like they know what Dark Matter really is because its a common knowledge thing taught in their equivalent of high schools. and complex concepts the same way.
a sort of “I am beyond human comprehension and beholden to knowledge far beyond the reach of mortals…but yeah that one over there; even more so.”
To quote a certain Marvel series:
“I think someone REALLY wanted their acronym to spell out ‘S.H.I.E.L.D.’…”
I was waiting for someone to say something
Is it me or does she seem disappointed in panel 4?
…I’m surprised nobody has commented that she said nothing about the old animated Transformers movies.
The active question: which sucked more, the old animated Transformers movies or the new live action ones?
Obviously the new live action movies suck more because they don’t have the Stan Bush songs “The Touch” or “Dare” in them. Plus the new live action movies had wrecking balls as scrotum. No amount of Megan Fox poses can counter that terrible dialog.
The first Transformers movie have one of the best soundtracks ever.
There was an interesting review of the original G1 animated film that pointed out why, despite its many flaws, it nonetheless continues to resonate with an entire generation, when similar films (the animated “G.I. Joe” movie, for instance) have been all but forgotten.
Mostly it pointed out the underlying themes in the context of the decade in which it was released. The 1980s, the Reagan Years. When everyone was supposed to be all about “family values,” yet too many children knew from firsthand experience that real families were NOT the “traditional nuclear family.” That, coupled with the bone wearying terrors of the Cold War, were heavy factors in the script.
For starters, it’s a war film… where the leaders of both factions die in the first twenty minutes. Both sides are left to pick up the pieces and ask, “now what?” But beyond that… both leaders were essentially parental figures to their own troops (especially Optimus Prime). When Optimus dies, the Autobots are depicted as being like a family who just lost their Dad. The “kids” were forced to grow up and assume an ill fitting role, to try to survive without the rock that had been the center of their universe. Everything was uncertain and scary. And the ultimate moral of the story was: “it’s going to be okay. You’re going to get through this. You can do it.”
It was an unexpected dose of reality coming from an animated film about giant robots whose tinier likenesses were being unsubtly marketed at said kids.
By contrast, the Bayformer films have no real moral aside from “‘Murica – F@@k yeah!” They’re ridiculous CGI extravaganzas that regularly commit the worst sin imaginable when it comes to making a film about giant robots: they focus on the tiny humans, even to the point of doing zoomed in closeups of the humans during the fight scenes. It becomes nigh impossible to SEE the choreography of the fight scenes, when all you’re seeing is a couple of humans running and/or screaming, with giant robot limbs moving about in the background.
As a transformers fan, who looks at 3rd party figures and Masterpiece line of Transformers, I’m sure they could make one into a transformer.
Not lie, that one scene Wake me up with that childish “no way, did they gonna use? Yes! Whooho now we talkin” and later wrecking balls scene… curtain
Lol at Harem’s hentai face sleeve.
If other, similarly concepted Transformers are any indication, the bed would likely just be a huge hunk of kibble dangling on the back of the figure and making the whole thing poorly balanced, and the wheels would either dangle on the sides of the legs or compress together to FORM the legs (and possibly arms).
Uhh… where’s the binding on that book? The second frame suggests it’s at the top, but the third frame contradicts that. The only unseen edge is the right, but surely a book in English would be bound on the left…
…what..? I used to work at a printers, and I have OCD…
It is not a book, see the rivet on the top left? There’s most certainly one on the top right as well. Those are the things holding the pages together. It is basically a folder held together at the top with really heavy front and back cardboard.
Huh – sorta like a carpet sample ‘book’… fairy nuff
the Decepticon in the live movie is officially just called “Yellow Dump truck”, there is the Constructicon Long Haul who was given a movieverse *AKA junk yard scrap tech make over* that is basically the exact same design as the Revenge of the Fallen robot mode Yellow Dump Truck.
There is also another tranformer called Land fill who is a dump truck,
however neither is given a specific model of dump truck name and just generically called dump trucks.
speaking of dump trucks wouldn’t America be providing Leibherr dump trucks not Belaz with such a trade?
While playing Just Cause 3, I was obsessed with getting some of the vehicles, one of them being a gigantic dump truck that was so large, a tank or a SAM could be dropped in the bed. Problem was, the slightest tap while driving down the long road to a garage would make enemies aggressive as heck, call in tanks, and basically ruin it. So, my foolproof plan after SEVERAL attempts? Drive it down the mountain side, off-road, backwards! Worked perfectly.
So Deus needs construction equipment and has fabricators that has been demonstrated to be able to make complex vehicles like fighter aircraft. So instead of just using those machines to make any construction equipment he needs he’s going to trade his secret knowledge for them instead.
There seems to be something very wrong with this plan.
Complex-item fabrication is one thing, large-item fabrication is quite another. Fabbers are great for making intricate parts, especially if they can be printed ‘through’ a small aperture for maximum precision. But for big items that can be easily made by other means, it’s a waste of their capabilities.
Deus is producing “effectively free and really valuable shinies” to trade for lots of older infrastructure stuff, rather than using his limited fabber lines on trying to bootstrap himself.
If he can make 5 superfighters and trade those for 100 pieces of super-heavy construction equipment (that he needs) massing 1000 times as much (and would take 1000 times longer to fabricate), who’s getting the better end of the deal?
Yup, I agree with both the replies to the original post.
vertebreak (rid) was a train and a snake, but it doesnt look like any body wants to talk about him for some reason?
Yeah in most circumstances that’d be better, but I imagine there are issues with having 2x as many of the smaller unit.
Still, I would LOVE to see Deus trick out that MASSIVE Construction Vehicle! Even better if someone would Animate that for Pure Awesome!! <3
Wasn’t one of the Combiner-bots a dump-truck? You remember it from the first (or second?) movie, the bot with the big clangy balls on top of the Giza pyramid
Basically the same thing, just a bigger scale
Cue song
https://youtu.be/0k3Mc5HB2eg
That’s baggered up.
Heh. I wouldn’t want that chasing after me when the robot apocalypse comes.
Hi, I have a very specific and maybe a little weird request: some years ago, Dave posted here a music clip of a man with a German accent complaining that no one rewarded him for doing basic things like doing the dishes or going to work. Does anyone know what I am talking about? I tried searching for it, but didn’t find anything. Thanks
Why is Max asking about Sydney’s strange repertoire of knowledge? She should know by now the woman just learns what she thinks is cool.
DaveB: has verizon fios in new york been banned from your comment forum? I can no longer connect to your comic except by cell or by using a VPN.
I wouldn’t even know how to check that, but not that I’m aware of.
Okay thanks for getting back to me.
Must have been a problem with Verizon FIOS because now I can get on from my computer again without using the VPN or my cell phone data.
If they made one of a train that turned into a snake… they could name it Jörmungandr. :-)
KILLDOZER!!
What? Author if you haven’t heard of Killdozer, you need to learn about it.
The first steps toward a successful career as a truck driver are enrolling in truck driving school and earning a commercial driver’s license. Students learn from the instructors because of the breadth and depth of their knowledge and experience. additional students may be able to attend college if additional tuition alternatives are available. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance for people who are committed to making a difference.