Grrl Power #1150 – Up the chain
Maxima: YOU do NOT get to cast aspersions on Dabbler. That is MY JOB!
Honestly, naming a baby Deus Superion is only slightly weirder than naming yourself Deus Superion. Like one of “those rap people.” BTW, that senator isn’t supposed to be anyone specific, just representative of one of those typical mummies that have been sitting in their seat for about two decades longer than their ability to comprehend the modern world allows for.
You know, rappers get the occasional bit of grief for using pseudonyms, but you know who else uses made up names? Actors. Half the actors whose names you think you know changed them when they started getting real roles. Olivia Wilde? Actually Olivia Cockburn. Okay, I definitely don’t blame her for that one. Natalie Portman? Neta-Lee Hershlag. Joaquin Phoenix? Joaquín Rafael Bottom. Again, can’t really fault him there. Hell, if I was just some first grader with the last name “Bottom” I’d want to fucking change it too. Jamie Foxx? Eric Marlon Bishop. Alexander Siddig? His full name is Siddig El Tahir El Fadil El Siddig Abdurrahman Mohammed Ahmed Abdel Karim El Mahdi. Honestly if I ever cast him in something I’d beg him to use the full thing in the credits just cause I think it’d be funny to have the whole screen taken up by his name.
Anyway, hooray for action packed… I’d say Senate hearings, but this is classified and there’s only one senator there. The meeting itself isn’t classified, just the topics discussed, since they’re being candid about stuff like alien tech and the fact that Dabbler is a demon, which hasn’t been revealed to the public. Only that she’s an alien. With horns and hooves, granted, but anything not from Earth would technically be an alien. There’s a huge amount of online discussion about everything superheroes in the Grrl-verse, because of course there is. Plenty of speculation about Dabbler being a demon even before they said she was an alien. I mean, there’s a lot stupid people out there, and you don’t need to look remotely like a demon for some people to legitimately think you are one or are at least possessed by one. As soon as Dabbler switched to her “battle form” and started swinging around her sword with the pentagram guard on it, speculation accelerated. At some point I should mention in the comic that there are protesters who think the US government is in bed with Satan (there’s definitely already people who think that in the real world, so it’s hardly a stretch). I don’t like dwelling on humanities crappier attributes in the comic if I can help it though. It would be star-eyed optimism to think that kind of stuff isn’t happening, so my excuse is that the PR people are generally doing their jobs and mostly keeping the team from interacting with the average dumbass on the street whenever possible. Maybe before being allowed into signing events, people have to fill out a questionnaire that reveals their thoughts on the moon landing, whether they are pro or anti-vaccine, the general shape of the Earth, and other conspiracy theories. I imagine most celebrities don’t want to hear their fans’ thoughts on that sort of stuff anyway. Even people who are deep into that sort of stuff probably aren’t interested, because if your version of their dumb thing isn’t exactly the same then they, I assume, get just as annoyed as a non-dumbass would. “Oh you think the Earth is flat, but the moon is a sphere and it’s hollow and that’s where all the dinosaurs went? Well that’s one thing too far for me!”
Sorry, went off on my own little tear there. You know, all that said, Cooter was fun to write. Maybe he should make another appearance soon.
The April vote incentive is up! As promised, it’s a Sydney pinup. Not airplane bathroom selfies, but hopefully her cuteness will satisfy.
Variant outfits and lack thereof over at Patreon, as well as the semi-usual bonus incentive related comic.
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Double res version will be posted over at Patreon. Feel free to contribute as much as you like.
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Our government in bed with Satan? Pshaw!
Obviously our government is in bed with Moloch.
rupert moloch?
1) You mean Rupert Murdoch I think. And no he’s not joking about Rupert Murdoch. He’s joking about Moloch.
2) Moloch is, especially in Abrahamic religions, an evil false god. He was the Canaanite god of fertility. Main reason he’d be considered evil by Abrahamic religions was he was also associated with infant and child sacrifice by burning them to death.
I’m pretty sure Cy was just making a pun on Moloch and Murdoch.
Couldn’t be sure. It’s sometimes hard to tell in text when there are no emoticons/etc involved :)
Nah, our government is notvery secretly ran by The Plbttel.
Whoever it is, I got issues with their job performance.
They have pills for that, little purple ones, not for oral ingestion
Don’t blame the demon involved, even the most powerful of demons, devils, and evil gods require their earthly coconspirators to be competent. I’m not allowed to name names, but I have it on good authority that he’s doing the best he can with what he’s got, you want the demon secretly in bed with the government to get stuff done, elect better humans into your government, dude hasn’t had quality resources to work with in decades at least. The only thing worse than malevolent leadership is incompetent leadership. It doesn’t help that people somehow mistake the president as being in charge of the whole government instead of only one branch of it, something like 80% of the problem is in the legislature, which the president can barely touch without massive overreach, and then everyone gets into a major kerfluffle when the president decides to overreach just to get stuff done since the legislature won’t, and if we’re LUCKY the supreme court gets involved, not that they’re much better. How is a shadowy manipulator pulling strings from behind the scenes supposed to do ANYTHING when the gears of government have long since ground to a screeching halt? Stupid two party system.
I think the main conclusion to draw from people’s voting habits is that they like disfunction. And that first-past-the-post leads to a two-party system, which leads to disfunction.
what you describe, is a feature, not a bug. There HAVE been governments good at ‘getting things done”-guys like Stalin, Mao and Hitler come to mind. Very efficient governments that “got things done”.
which is why the U.S. government was designed to be somewhat self-defeating, because the last thing you want, if you’re not heading up the government, is a government that ‘gets things done’.
So what we get instead is a government that very rarely accomplishes anything good, and mostly either wastes a great deal of time and money doing nothing, or is actively malicious, because the people most skilled and motivated to get things done either want to hurt others, or manipulate the system for their own benefit.
So yes, efficient, effective government could be very good, or very bad. But it could be designed to make it easier to produce good outcomes than bad, rather than skewed towards producing or prolonging bad outcomes.
“So what we get instead is a government that very rarely accomplishes anything good,”
I think the government has still managed to accomplish quite a bit of good.
“and mostly either wastes a great deal of time and money doing nothing,”
This is true. And is a featuer, not a bug, like Daniel said. The Founding Fathers were very distrustful of govenment because they realized how easy it was for a government to trample on the rights of the citizenry. They believed in negative rights – ie, that people have rights REGARDLESS of if the government grants them or not, and it’s not the government’s job to grant rights – it’s only the government’s job to protect those rights which people naturally possess. Previous governmental structures, like monarchies, feudalism, and even greek-style democracy (as well as governments that would come afterwards, like fascism, socialism, and communism), came at it from the proposition that people HAD no rights aside from which the government GRANTED them (ie, positive rights). As a result, the best way to make a counter for the inherent power-hungry nature of human beings when they get a taste of power is to make government more inefficient, in order to force people to have to constantly argue so that the everyday whims will slowed to a trickle and be thoroughly discussed first.
“or is actively malicious, because the people most skilled and motivated to get things done either want to hurt others, or manipulate the system for their own benefit.”
I really don’t think you want to start arguing that a government like the ones run by Stalin, Mao, or Hitler, in which people had no natural rights or those rights were trampled, is better than a government which is designed to be somewhat self-defeating at a federal level, in order to prevent such trampling on people’s rights. Arguing in favor of Hitler/Mao/Stalin does not seem like a particularly good look.
“or manipulate the system for their own benefit.”
This will happen with ANY government. The point that Daniel is making is that, since it WILL happen with any government, since people are inherently power hungry and will eventually use power for their own benefit, that the government should be inherentely inefficient so as to prevent their ability to be as successful at being corrupt a-holes. Ie, Absolute power corrupts absolutely, so make sure that it’s really hard, if not impossible, to have absolute power.
“So yes, efficient, effective government could be very good, or very bad.”
Long term it’s ALWAYS very bad. Because no matter how many people might do good, eventually someone bad will be in power.
You’re trying to put words in my mouth, and you’ve set up a false dichotomy in which our only options are bad (inefficient) government or bad (malicious) government, and exclude any possibility that we could discover a system with a bias for good results.
‘You’re trying to put words in my mouth,”
Where did I do that? I stated what DANIEL said. Unless you mean when i said “Arguing in favor of Hitler/Mao/Stalin does not seem like a particularly good look.” – which was not really my putting words in your mouth. It was a cautionary statement about how trying to argue against what Daniel was saying would be ‘arguing in favor of Hitler/Mao/Stalin’ since Daniel was arguing AGAINST governments that wind up being like led by people like Hitler/Mao/Stalin.
“and you’ve set up a false dichotomy in which our only options are bad (inefficient) government or bad (malicious) government,”
Nope, I didn’t. I said you can have a good, efficient government but eventually, it will be bad LONG TERM because a good, efficient government relies on the leadership always being good and efficient, and eventually you’ll have a bad person in charge who can do bad things efficiently instead. That’s not a false dichotomy.
“and exclude any possibility that we could discover a system with a bias for good results.”
Because it would be ignorant of the entire history of human civilization to assume that every person on earth who might be put in a position of leadership will always be good.
This only works in a Roussean philosophy of humanity, in which human nature is, in nature, essentially good, and before the creation of the modern state, we would have all lived peaceful and happy lives. I do not subscribe to that philosophy. Rousseau’s philosophy seems INCREDIBLY naive when you look deeply into it, as it relies largely on what human beings can be, rather than what they actually do in practice. Theory based on hope, instead of tangible results based on actual history.
Hobbes, on the other hand, stated that human beings, when put in positions of political power, will eventually use that power for self-interested reasons. The Founding Fathers thought this as well, and wanted to guard AGAINST that by making many hurdles against a single or small group of people at the top able to trample the rights of everyone beneath them for their own self-interested reasons.
I think there’s a middle ground between the highly efficient dictatorships and the highly inefficient mess of the two party system that we have in the US, and I don’t think it would take especially large changes to get us there, or at least closer. When I maligned the two party system, I was in fact NOT advocating for a one party system, but rather a multi-party system. If you have enough parties with sufficient steam it becomes almost impossible for any one party to have a large enough majority to push policy through unilaterally, making inter-party cooperation a necessity. It would also cut back significantly on how polarized opinions of the other parties can be. Right now the political parties operate almost more on team loyalty like a goshdarn football game rather than on any actual ideals, the republicans hate the democrats and the democrats hate the republicans and they all care more about which side your on rather than what policies would be actually good for the people living under them, and the extremists on both sides seem to have the largest voices in the media, which only makes matters significantly worse.
IMO, if we installed term limits on the legislature, and passed that plan to make political donations go into the same pot and get divided between the candidates rather than being able to donate directly to a given candidate, it would go a LONG way to rooting out the corruption inherent in our system and enable third parties to be actually viable for more than a single small election here and there. If a senator could only expect to be in office for, say, two terms at most, then that incentivizes people to go into politics to accomplish a specific goal, and it incentivizes those in office to actually work toward accomplishing their goals rather than immediately go back to campaigning for the next election. Buying a senator would also be much less valuable and significantly more expensive with term limits alone, and virtually impossible to do legally and openly if they also did the thing with campaign donations. Any system with incumbency rates so high that it’s reasonable to expect to be in office for multiple decades after getting elected once is a failed experiment with obvious flaws that *need* to be patched as it rewards people getting into or staying in politics for all the wrong reasons and actively discourages ever actually accomplishing anything.
IMO, that’s the *first* fix that needs to happen, since all of the other improvements people are clamoring for can’t really happen without that, it will go a long way toward ensuring that those other improvements are more thoroughly thought out and vetted, meaning they are more likely to do what they intend with fewer unintended consequences, and it will mean if a policy change turns out *not* to be what’s best it will be easier to remove after the fact.
Any system that is more invested in maintaining the status quo instead of improving is a bad one, that’s true for the various facist dictators listed upthread, and that’s true for modern America. If I were to try and create an ideal system of government I would in fact start with the one we use here, but I’d put in protections against the traps we’ve fallen into. Then that system would eventually fall into different traps, and it would get replaced with a new system designed to avoid those, and so on. No system of government is perfect and all will inevitably fall into corruption somehow or another, the goal is to make that as difficult as possible.
I would argue that most governments are in bed with Mammon.
A better partner than Cupid at any rate.
Don’t blame me, I voted for the lizard people.
Good news, they won.
Also, I didn’t to have to be the one to say it, but why is Dan Hedaya a lawyer in this universe?
He’s a General
For a second I thought this was some sort of court martial…..!
There would be no civilians on the bench for that. Kind of interested which government committee is sitting as the panel up front.
Probably something like defense spending
The only thing I’m surprised at here is that anyone besides the undead spending money was allowed. You know those cement-brains would rather scream at someone to do everything for free than to spend a tiny amount of money to keep something in working order.
I’m pretty sure that a lot of Congress has no problem with spending a LOT of money on all sorts of stuff, even when they arent getting something incredibly valuable in return.
Look up what we spent on Littoral Combat Ships, the original models. Two billion is peanuts. Congress will be entirely happy to give them the cash, if the spending is not in the Black Budget.
Yep. Totally agree. :)
In RL, as of 2023, the US has a military budget of nearly $2 trillion split among the 6 branches of the Armed Forces. With ARCHON it would be 7 branches and the budget would be changed appropriately for that. WITHOUT even involving the Black Budget, which probably would be more likely to be additional funding to ARCHON itself (along with other branches) for research ON what they get from Deus.
*$817 billion, actually…. +/- $60b, depending on who you ask and when. $2T /year is (slightly) more than the whole discretionary side of gov
to get ahead of calls for sources: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#/media/File:2022_US_Federal_Budget_Infographic.png
https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3252968/biden-signs-national-defense-authorization-act-into-law/
I think you’re right and I needed to be more specific. You are referring to the 2023 omnibus bill for the discretional budget towards defense spending, which is about $858 billion.
But I was reading about the US global military spending, not just defense spending, for FY 2023, Which is 1.99 trillion. I am guessing that is more than just the military portion of the annual discretionary budget.
https://consortiumnews.com/2020/04/27/us-drove-last-years-over-1-9-trillion-in-global-military-spending/
I believe boxbot was in fact referring to the US Military Budget, while you seem to be reading another thing. It looks to me like you are actually reading about GLOBAL military spending (AKA the sum of every individual country’s military spending). However it appears the wording of the headline “US drove..” is leading you to believe that the spending is done by the US, when in fact it just means the US spent the most. It could read “US spending is the largest part of the global military spend for 2023” and perhaps that would be more clear. The USA did not spend $2 trillion on military in 2023.
I think you’re probably right. The article was very poorly written and led me to think something differently. That the total amount of US military spending is almost $2 trillion, which made me think that in addition to $858 billion in discretionary spending, that there was a large amount of mandatory spending in the budget as well to the military.
After re-reading the article, what you said was probably a correct reading and what I thought was wrong. Other than that, it still does mean that $2 billion is a drop in the bucket. Just a slightly larger drop in the bucket than I thought.
Pretty sure that the thought they were gettin Clitoral Wombat Strips.
Ah, but remember: this is Military spending!
Also, it’s entirely possible that it will be an undead spending the money. If not signing off on it, then maybe working in the Department of the Treasury.
Btw I believe Air Force One’s Boeing 747-8 plane itself cost, prior to Trump who I think negotiated a lower price, about $2 billion ($3.9 billion for two of them). At this point in time in the comic though it costs $2 billion. Largely because of all its defensive and communication capabilities. And because the Federal govt overpays for pretty much everything :)
Pander, I have to get training on this every year. when the feds, especially DOD, buys stuff over a certain value (i think its 500K) the seller. by law, has to hand over a detailed list of the costs involved in producing the thing. note that the executives are liable for deceit. the government officer using that info, then determines the ‘reasonable’ price for it. its been that way for several decades. I think the initial law was passed in the 80’s.
yes that means that one of the most sophisticated militaries on the planet was built using a price fixing scheme.
That was extremely interesting! What do you do that you get training on this every year?
I work for an aerospace/defense contractor and am high enough that I may have to help prepare the documents. NO I WILL NOT POST PROOF. this is not the War Thunder forums.
You don’t need to post proof. I believe you. I just find it cool.
Also, the War Thunder joke went over my head since I’ve never played the game and I’m never on those forums (Yes I have the game in my steam list – I’ve just never played it).
The main thing you need to know is that classified documents have been leaked on the War Thunder forums, somewhere around a dozen times at this point, simply to settle arguments or try to give proof to the capabilities of a particular vehicle, as the game itself uses real-world military vehicles.
Is it okay that I find that to be hilarious?
aw, it’s just Dungeons and Dragons, but everyone wants to play a Tank
It’s funny and sad they outspend a lot for stuff that” kinda works” and much less on the people who make it work.
At first I was going to mention that Maxima is being a bit of a major hypocrite about someone calling Dabbler a literal sex demon, since Maxima can’t stand that particular thing about Dabbler and has, on occasion, attacked Dabbler for her sexual antics (at least twice, including once putting her through a wall). And frequently insults Dabble about her sexual wants (“You find STAIRS arousing”)
But DaveB pretty much responded to that in his first sentence that yes, she’s being a hypocrite about it because casting aspersions on Dabbler is HER job. :)
I also do find it weird that a general would consider a $2 billion price tag to be all that outrageous given how huge the yearly military budget is (the DoD’s budget for 2023 is almost $2 trillion – $2 billion isnt bad at all for what they’re getting in return… often they spend a lot WITHOUT getting much in return), and that they can do part of the cost in trade of equipment, further mitigating the price tag.
I’m assuming the General was playing devil’s advocate though.
Dave could have said $20B.
One B-2 costs $2B.
One nuclear aircraft carrier is $8.5B.
“A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon, you’re talking real money.”
Exactly. $2 billion isn’t all that much for Deus to be asking for, considering what they’re giving in return. I mean… the US DoD gave Ukraine a $3.8 billion military package recently in arms, equipment and liquid monetary aid recently, and we arent actually getting anything for it in return (on top of the 78.4 billion in financial and humanitarian aid that’s been given since the beginning of 2022), unlike how Deus is actually giving something physical and tangible for the money/construction equipment package that he’s asking.
The US gets exploding Russian equipment and personal in return and a lot of that ammo Ukraine got was about to expire anyway.
“The US gets exploding Russian equipment and personal”
1) Personnel, not personal (sorry, spelling nitpicking :) )
2) That doesn’t benefit the US. That benefits Ukraine. All well and good but it’s not a ‘trade.’ If anything, it can be argued that it destabilizes stuff for the US from an economic standpoint (ie, fertilizer, and thus food prices, and oil prices increasing worldwide as a result of continued warfare in the region). So trade-wise, it’s not beneficial. What Deus is offering benefits the US directly… especially economically. Tangible, visible benefits that are immediately noticeable for what the US would be giving him in return.
“and a lot of that ammo Ukraine got was about to expire anyway.”
Um… not sure WHERE you got that information from, but it’s incorrect.
I’m pretty sure the tanks, howitzers, and military vehicles were not going to EXPIRE, nor were the guns or ammunition or missiles or money or support equipment. Among the items the US gave Ukraine (according to the Department of State website) were HIMARS and howitzers, Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles, Armored Vehicle Launched Bridges, demolition munitions and equipment, maintenance equipment, training personnel, support personnel, and ammunition for the aforementioned equipment. Plus billions in monetary aid.
Regardless of the humanitarian and military aid, it doesnt actually give the US ‘value’ in the same way that Deus’s offer is. Deus’s offer is an actual trade deal, not ‘aid.’ And the equipment he wants is not military (and Deus frankly doesnt need help with military issues).
Which brings me back to the main point. $2 billion is not really an outrageous amount for what Deus is offering in return, and we’ve given more money for MUCH less return in the past, including the past few years. I just used Ukraine as one of many examples.
Exploding russian military assets may not directly benifit the US, but is does gain the favor of our eastern european allies like Poland and Estonia. Unlike most imperialst powers (which we are), the US has since WW2 seen itself as a guardian of the existing international order, an international cop that makes sure free trade flows, because the status quo benifits the US. Confounding russian expansionisim protects that international order.
You are still comparing apples and oranges. We are not receiving anything tangible. We are not even receiving security for the expenditure. It’s not like Ukraine or Poland or estonia or any others are giving us something in return for the aid being given to Ukraine. Whereas what Deus is offering is a literal trade deal where we pay to get something in return that we can benefit from.
If i give a friend $1400 so they can buy an iphone, that doesmt actually benefit me with something tangible and economically beneficial for myself. Even if you claim I am getting my friend’s goodwill its purely theoretical that that goodwill will ever help me back. If i give my froend $1400 in exchange for his car because he needs money for an iphone, then I am getting something tangible and economically beneficial in return which is not theoretical.
If you give your friend money for a phone, and they didn’t have one before, you gain the ability to make and receive calls with them. That may not be a direct tangible or economic benefit, but increases opportunities for future benefit, both by strengthening the relationship, and by having more access to the person.
I’m trying to figure out how people do not understand the difference between aid packages and trade packages. One is charity. The other is not.
“If you give your friend money for a phone, and they didn’t have one before, you gain the ability to make and receive calls with them.”
No. I could call them on their old phone. Or their landline phone. I also have no guarantee they will ever ANSWER the phone. I gain nothing compared to what I’m giving them beyond theoretical future goodwill.
“That may not be a direct tangible or economic benefit,”
Which is my point.
“but increases opportunities for future benefit,”
Theoretical, not actual benefit. I could put you through college for free. It has no benefit to me though. Even though it’s theoretically possible that you will be grateful and help me in the future. OR that you will use the education to create a net benefit for mankind. You might do nothing with the education. You might do stuff with the education that winds up harming me instead of helping me. There’s no BENEFIT to ME. IF, however, I put you through college and you agree to pay me back with interest (you know, like a school loan) then there is a benefit to me to bother giving you the money in the first place.
“both by strengthening the relationship, and by having more access to the person.”
I once bought an ex-boyfriend a used car. We broke up a year later when he was using that car to go to a woman with who he was cheating on me. It neither strengthened the relationship, nor did I have more access to the person.
We have gained the satisfaction of having frustrated the ambitions of a complete asshole.
LOL
Decimating a Military Superpower’s forces without having to sacrifice your own soldiers is definitely something that benefits America’s position in the world. China has so far managed to avoid that trap and thus riding riding on America’s coat tails to get ahead of Russia. This is what the big boys play for, power. Assets and resources are just a means to acquire more power.
For us plebs, assets and resources are required in order to live our lives but at their level, they’re disposable.
“Decimating a Military Superpower’s forces without having to sacrifice your own soldiers is definitely something that benefits America’s position in the world.”
How exactly has this benefited out position in the world? Again, if anything it can be argued that it’s weakened our position in the world, plus caused significant inflation of the cost of food and gas and other products throughout both Europe and the United States. You are arguing theoretical benefits in the future, over which we have no actual control as to whether it actually comes to pass. What Deus is offering is tangible benefits in the present AND the future.
“China has so far managed to avoid that trap”
No idea what you’re talking about here.
“Assets and resources are just a means to acquire more power.”
What assets and resources are we getting though? What power are we getting? I don’t see any of either. At least with Deus’s offer, we are gaining actual assets and resources, which have a direct result which would gain us power. He’s literally offering technology which can be used both for civil use AND as military weaponry.
” but at their level, they’re disposable.”
Again no idea what you’re trying to say. Could you elaborate on the sentence please?
Exactly as Torabi said. Contenting ourselves with these indirect, “rising tide lifts all boats” results, (at least for those already “westernized”) rather than demanding those in need pony up somethign worthwhile personally, is what makes the US the highest rated security exporter in the world. Top notch product, reasonable rates, erratic leadership.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVqGEtPj0M0
I… wait I’m very confused by your post as well. How is it a rising tide to give aid without there being any definitive benefit in the future, and how is that better than having a trade deal in which both sides definitively benefit?
I’m not even sure how what you said relates to what Torabi said, let along what I said. The US doesnt exactly have a great track record on ‘westernizing’ other nations, no matter how much money we throw at them. And it’s definitely not going to be more useful to us than a trade deal.
Inexact one Nuclear aircraft carrier is about 3,3 billions $ …
Hull number: R91, MMSI number: 228711555 , she is in service but she’s not an US one
There’s a difference between discussions with people you know and high ranking government officials who are making decisions about the team judging them on that
Max knows all the aspects of dabbler, I don’t remember the putting Dabbler through a wall incident but I’m pretty confident that Dabbler has really pushed things a long way
The chance that a panel will dismiss Dabbler’s expertise based on her nature could do a hell of a lot of damage
As to the money it’s a lot of money to spend on a single thing and it needs to be justified, especially when they’ve got something similar. They need to know why they should spend the money
The questions are reasonable but the answers should definitely result in the purchase going through
“There’s a difference between discussions with people you know and high ranking government officials who are making decisions about the team judging them on that”
This committee is the one that ultimately makes the decision, rather than Maxima, so it’s probably reasonable for them to be skeptical about Dabbler if Maxima herself has a history of having major problems with Dabbler (at one point almost throwing her off the team).
“I don’t remember the putting Dabbler through a wall incident”
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-592-funhouse-funbags/comment-page-1/
Here ya go. Second to last panel. Not that Dabbler didn’t DESERVE to get put through a wall by Maxima for that. :)
“The chance that a panel will dismiss Dabbler’s expertise based on her nature could do a hell of a lot of damage”
The idea is that they need to be able to TRUST Dabbler, even if she has expertise in a subject. They need to know where her loyalties lie, and if they lie with the United States, or at least in the best interests of the United States. That’s the committee’s job, after all, and they do not know Dabbler as well as Maxima does – they just have reports on paper about her.
“As to the money it’s a lot of money to spend on a single thing and it needs to be justified,”
That’s the thing…. for the US military budget, it really ISNT a lot of money. It’s actually a rather small amount, considering the US military budget PER YEAR is nearly $2 trillion. Each year. I believe that two billion dollars is only 0.1% of two trillion dollars. It’s a miniscule ask considering what they are getting in return, not to mention how a substantial amount of that $2 billion is in CONSTRUCTION EQUIPMENT. We LEAVE billions in equipment overseas each year because it costs too much to send it back to the US. :)
“especially when they’ve got something similar.”
I agree that saying ‘we have something similar already’ is a good counter, and why Maxima needed to be able to explain how having multiple different routes to a technology is better than having only one route, plus how Alari tech is more advanced than what Cora gave the US in exchange for the Fel ship.
“They need to know why they should spend the money”
Yes, obviously. That’ their job as well. :) I’m just saying it’s odd that the General referred to it as an “outrageous” amount, given he’s a GENERAL who apparently spends a lot of time talking to someone from either the Senate appropriations committee or the Senate Intelligence Committee, given this is about money. Unless he’s just playing devil’s advocate, which he probably is.
“The questions are reasonable but the answers should definitely result in the purchase going through”
Yep!
He wasn’t questioning Dabbler’s loyalties, though, he brought up the fact that she’s a literal sex demon, which is entirely irrelevant unless it was an attempt to write her testimony off. It’s casting aspersions. She’s firmly established as the resident expert on the team for exactly this sort of thing, technically in a consulting role rather than a membership role, but this is exactly the sort of thing she was contracted to consult on, if her testimony were suspect I can’t imagine she’d have the clearance for this sort of military consulting contract and it almost certainly wouldn’t be this committee in particular making that call. The relevant facts are what Max outlined, she’s the foremost expert on this stuff available, and she is already considered a trusted source by the US government in general and ARChon specifically on this *exact* topic, the fact that she’s a sex demon doesn’t factor in at all since we’re leaning on the tech side of her expertise here rather than her magic or xenobiology expertise (I’m using xenobiology to include the social sciences like anthropology and sociology since I’m not exactly sure how to attach the xeno- prefix to those and produce actual words that mean things, let alone what I want them to mean).
“He wasn’t questioning Dabbler’s loyalties, though, he brought up the fact that she’s a literal sex demon,”
When you hear that someone is a literal sex demon, do you think their first inclination is that their loyalty is to the United States or to their carnal desires or some sort of demonic thing (if you have never spoken to an actual demon about demonic governance in the Grrlpower universe?) :)
” which is entirely irrelevant unless it was an attempt to write her testimony off. ”
Maxima has frequently been dismissive of Dabbler’s sex demon status as well though. Not to mention she’s had VERY little patience around Dabbler in the past.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-99-this-is-how-you-tug-on-maximas-cape/
And Maxima KNOWS Dabbler well enough to know about how it’s worth dealing with that to have access to all Dabbler’s other expertise. The Senator seems to be pretty stodgy and probably hasnt read up on the latest ‘Demon Life’ articles.
“She’s firmly established as the resident expert on the team for exactly this sort of thing,”
We are assuming that this Senator knew already that Dabbler was a succubus BEFORE she came out as one to the media. If he did not know, he simply might not be instantly that trusting of her expertise.
“and she is already considered a trusted source by the US government in general and ARChon specifically”
She’s obviously not THAT trusted when she has a Handler (X) who keeps track of her while hidden. Just in case. Remember back during Sydney’s interview? They made a whole thing about it.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-106-the-very-best-sense/
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-107-dabblers-green-card-say-extra-super-super-skilled-alien/
She still hasn’t “come out” as a succubus to the media. Last I recall, she’s publicly admitted to being an alien, but declined to answer which race.
True, true. Good point.
The Senator might simply have a problem with her being a demon, given he might not be versed in ‘demon society’ beyond what he’d know from western theological study.
> When you hear that someone is a literal sex demon, do you think their first inclination is that their loyalty is to the United States or to their carnal desires or some sort of demonic thing (if you have never spoken to an actual demon about demonic governance in the Grrlpower universe?) :)
It’s not about carnality or demons though. Dabbler being a sex demon doesn’t give her any incentive to lie about her assessment of the technology.
I suppose if you wanted to question her loyalty, you could come up with a justification (Deus is allied with a demon army, the leader of which is indeed Dabbler’s ex-boyfriend, even though a) they’re just mercs, b) Deus is already a defense contractor in good standing with Machina Industries, so trying a fraud seems unlikely), but that isn’t what he did. Maxima defended Dabbler by referring to her intelligence and expertise, and wasn’t corrected. He was questioning her competence, not her honesty, which is unwarranted.
“It’s not about carnality or demons though. Dabbler being a sex demon doesn’t give her any incentive to lie about her assessment of the technology.”
In the law, cross examination about something like that WOULD have relevance to questioning her credibility based on her character. According to American jurispudence, and the English Law upon which American jurispudence and legal testimony is based, “credibility” rests on three pillars – reliability, competence, and motive.
#1 – Reliability. In legal terms, reliability is a matter of character. That’s why they allow for character references in a trial. The character and past conduct of a witness is what a jury (or judge) uses to determine how much faith to place in their words, and to gauge whether the witness is an honest person. Reliability is about if they can TRUST the person. The rationale in the law is that the values that you profess are an extension of your behavior, rahter htn an exception to how you live. Honesty does not have anything to do with competency in the law. Which brings us to #2.
#2 – Competency. This is what Maxima is arguing, rather than arguing Dabbler’s reliability. Dabbler is, without a doubt, one of the most competent people on the planet when it comes to what they are discussing.
#3 Motive. This is another element which the Senator is testing with his questioning, based on the ‘demon’ part of his description of Dabbler, rather than the ‘sex’ part. It helps to determine whether the witness stands to gain or lose based on the board’s verdict. Given that they know that Dabbler has been in/is in a sexual relationship with Thothogoth (Tom), who is in a military and business arrangement with Deus, who i the one making the offer over which they are making a decision, it’s a fair enough thing to question as well.
“He was questioning her competence, not her honesty, which is unwarranted.”
No, he was not questioning her competence necessarily. He may have been questioning her reliability (via her character) or her motive (via her status as a demon).
He’s primarily displaying his own sex-negative biases in suggesting that being a sex demon impugns her character.
VERY possibly yes. Although Maxima has done the same thing in the past. Multiple times.
And? The struggle between sex-positive and sex-negative feminism is part of Maxima’s character, what makes her flawed and interesting and realistic.
And it’s indicative what DaveB brought up in his first sentence.
“You do not get to cast aspersions on Dabbler. That is my job!”
I’m not sure what the argument is here. :)
Also yes, in the law, lewd and lascivious behavior has been used frequently to impugn a person’s character on the stand. ‘Character’ does not generally have an objective statement of what is and is not good showing of that character. At least, when it comes to legal proceedings. That’s what the judge or jury tends to use in making their decision instead.
Nice to see you recognize the subjective element to law.
Well that’s the point of having a jury.
Also the difference between having evidentiary rules, period, and how character evidence is considered by a judge or jury (or in this case a panel).
> No, he was not questioning her competence necessarily. He may have been questioning her reliability (via her character) or her motive (via her status as a demon).
No, he wasn’t, or he would have pressed on after Maxima defended her competency. That was my argument, and you shouldn’t contradict the conclusion without addressing the argument.
> In the law, cross examination about something like that WOULD have relevance to questioning her credibility based on her character.
I don’t think this is as adversarial as a court of law though. Everyone here is supposed to be on the same side, and they’re just figuring out the best way to proceed. Their job is not to try shooting down Maxima’s proposition, but to test how good it is. They are happy with good answers to their objections.
“No, he wasn’t, or he would have pressed on after Maxima defended her competency.”
Voyager, re-read what I said about how one challenges credibility based on ones character. Competency is only one element. The other two are Reliability and Motive. Maxima is arguing to counter his concern about Dabbler’s Reliability and Motive by saying ‘but she has supreme competency. It doesnt actually go to explaining why they should trust that she is either reliable or has motives that are in the interest of the US. Btw, I do think Dabbler is both reliable and has motives to help the US, but I am reading this without being in that universe, and the Senator does not have access to the same background knowledge of Dabbler that the readers have. So his bringing up that she is a ‘literal sex demon’ is still a fair thing to bring up, even if he’s ultimately wrong.
“I don’t think this is as adversarial as a court of law though.”
Well it does seem to be set up like a congressional or joint military/congressional tribunal, which means there are likely rules that are going to be followed. At least by the Senator on the panel, who is probably hte most likely one to follow a legal methodology, rather than the general (who would more likely follow a military code of evidence) or the possibly science guy from DARPA (who I have no idea what he would be using to judge credibility). Most likely they’ve all had to agree to a single set of rules though in these briefings/panels. Most likely congressional, since Congress usually handles the power of the purse in government. I’m not sure who the fourth person on the panel is though (maybe a member of the President’s cabinet?)
It’s not adversarial in that there are not two sides HERE, because Maxima is not one of ‘two sides’ from which they are deciding on whether to approve Deus’s proposal. She is basically like an expert witness. Any adversarial process would probably happen between the panel itself. Right now, they are questioning Maxima in order to decide whether to go along with the trade agreement that Deus has proposed, and Maxima is basically an expert witness since she was the one who went to Galytn to talk to Deus, and is the leader of ARC-SWAT, so she can speak for her subordinates like Dabbler (although they could always ask for Dabbler to appear to question her directly, if this was to be run like a congressional hearing, or maybe like a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court hearing).
“Everyone here is supposed to be on the same side, and they’re just figuring out the best way to proceed”
Again, Maxima is basically being treated as a witness, not as one of two sides. This happens frequently in these sort of panels, if you’ve ever watched a congressional hearing on TV where there are not technically two ‘sides’ like in a standard adversarial process during the hearing itself. Usually the adversarial stuff happens between the different judges or whoever is acting as a panel of judges (high ranking military, Senators, Representatives, Administrative board, etc) AFTER they question the person or people to be able to come to a decision.
“Their job is not to try shooting down Maxima’s proposition, but to test how good it is. ”
Right. Because she’s basically being treated as a witness. It’s not Maxima’s job to support Deus’s proposal or shoot it down. Just to give her expert opinion as a witness. That still requires a set of rules to follow, including gauging credibility of the people under which they’d be using to make a decision, like Dabbler.
The main difference is that she doesnt look down on Dabbler for it or marginalize/devalue the other aspects of her character beyond just being a sex demon.
She does seem to look down on Dabbler for her sex demon aspects. She just knows her well enough to realize that her scientific and adventuring and fighting skills make her valuable enough to accept her. Plus I feel like Maxima is now more friendly with Dabbler than she used to be, especially since learning how succubus history works. She’s more familiar with Dabbler, while the senator is obviously not.
There’s a difference between calling Dabbler out when she’s sexually harassing people and calling her a sex demon when it’s about her expertise in a technical topic. The former is justified, the latter is just a personal attack. Her sexuality (in the widest possible meaning) is not relevant in this case, so it shouldn’t be used to cast aspersions at her.
When Maxima punched Dabbler through the wall, that was straight up self defense against sexual assault (Dabbler intruding in her bathroom and grabbing her breasts). When she said “you find stairs arousing”, that was in response to Dabbler bringing up her own arousal, so directly relevant. Additionally, “I find [you] arousing” was kinda inappropriate to begin with, and responding with banter of her own is the cool response from Maxima.
It just kills me that a senator that barely understands supers in general, can identify and call out that someone is a sex demon. Seems to me he’s up on the whole idea of a sex demon… some light reading maybe? And using it as an excuse at to try and ignore her advice. I get very tired of self-proclaimed “experts” that work in government.
To be fair, he didn’t say anything at all for or against her capabilities. He just revealed what he thinks is her most identifiable characteristic, though it definitely could be interpreted as a question into her priorities and world view. Plausibly deniable though, like any career politician.
To be fair he also referred to Deus as ‘like a rapper.’
I can’t speak to the relative ‘largeness’ of $2bn in terms of US defense spending, but I think some of their hang up in this instance is that the money would be going to a foreign power (Galytn) rather than staying in the US.
I know Deus is also an American citizen, but the equipment is being built in, and the money thereafter spent on, another nation. One that has demonstrated that it is willing to use extremely powerful and aggressive tactics to expand its borders. (Justifiably or not – that’s still got to weigh on the minds of the politicians.)
I do not just agree with you… I spent the last two months of 2022 working 50 hour weeks on the living embodiment of it. (they nearly canceled thanksgiving for us to try and meet the deadline) and most of 2022 under a lot of pressure because of it. very much yes that is going to be a problem. dear god in heaven is it ever a problem. I’m afraid you are going to have to trust me on this.
$2B is trivial to defense spending, as already discussed above, but even if it were a significant fraction of the budget that price would be a steal for alien fabber tech, at least if it remains exclusive for even a year or two. Just the USA’s manufacturing is worth around $2 trillion a year – and military-type gear is on the more profitable side of that pool. The potential ROI on completely revolutionizing the entire world’s manufacturing (and probably pharmaceuticals, etc) is astronomical.
Private industry would be all over that offer if the military didn’t lock it down. Heck with that kind of return, if the Alari landed tomorrow I personally could bring together enough connections who have real money to create a SPAC and take Deus’s offer. Not that I’d be contributing any meaningful amount of capital to the group, I’m a fairly small fish that just happens to know some people who swim in the big ponds.
oh boy, lots of stuff here. its not that the Munitions are in the day-old pile. its that the version of the equipment sent (and munitions for it) are in the obsolete pile. I.e. for whatever reason those things are not up to latest specs. one good reason is because its rather likely Russia will capture/salvage/steal/buy/acquire/get/examine some of it. also, military aid is usually a gift card for the U.S. military arms export store. (please no ITAR, EAR I have to consult experts to do that)
in other subjects:
‘At first I was going to mention that Maxima is being a bit of a major hypocrite about someone calling Dabbler a literal sex demon, since Maxima can’t stand that particular thing about Dabbler and has, on occasion, attacked Dabbler for her sexual antics (at least twice, including once putting her through a wall). And frequently insults Dabble about her sexual wants (“You find STAIRS arousing”)
But DaveB pretty much responded to that in his first sentence that yes, she’s being a hypocrite about it because casting aspersions on Dabbler is HER job. :)’
no she isn’t being a hypocrite here. granted Dabbler’s proclivities and behavior is rather egregious at the best of times. this is how real leadership works. it is not her supervisors job nor their prerogative to denigrate her staff. that’s why she is there and not them. they are to blame her. that’s part of the responsibilities. It is her job to train/reign in her staff in whatever appropriate manner she is allowed.
Also 100% a common Polish thing. Superion is almost as good as how often you see Maximus, Maxine or any powerful sounding name (especially in Latin or Polish itself)… Deus would be a little less likely, but Trinity has a certain amount of popularity through the ages so…
“Alexander Siddig? His full name is Siddig El Tahir El Fadil El Siddig Abdurrahman Mohammed Ahmed Abdel Karim El Mahdi.”
And I used to think my name is long and unwieldy. I am guessing it some kind of Virtue name.
Luckily for his Son with Nana Visitor he did not use the full name: “Django El Tahir El Siddig”
I agree with DaveB that he should insist on having his full name in the credits if he’s in the upcoming Star Trek: Section 31 movie (in case Dr. Bashir winds up being in it).
The Mighty Halo has been very busy. Has she had a chance to sit down with Maxima to discuss the minor detail that her orbs are Nth level technology, and have some modest value in the outside universe, perhaps at the level “Hi, Earth, you give us those, and in trade we’ll give you a couple of galaxies?”
the fact Sydney has casually used the Aethereum causeway *the thing that really revealed to Cora these were Nth tech as nothing so small should be able to just casually make one*, I have my doubts. Why during the Vehemence practice in the quarry raised my eyebrow because either Detla or Dabbler should have noticed what that portal was and pointed it out.
but at least shortly after the command at the Fracture station took note that such a portal had been appearing in their space rather frequently apparently.
Panel 6 is a joke, right? One of the shield generators uses a HAND CRANK??
…I mean, I guess I could see an alien race that humans were trying to buy tech off of, cheap, might decide to add a few unnecessary bells and whistles, to see how fast we’d notice, but REALLY…
The energy efficiency of such a shield generator running on the power supplied by a hand crank is insane, making that tech much more desirable.
^ This one thinks like a smart engineer.
hand cranks are used on flashlights marketed as survival equipment
Yups, hand cranks are useful when there is no power source to plug into or to plug in (like after an EMP)
To be fair to Joaquin Phoenix, that wasn’t a change made for Hollywood. His parents adopted the surname Phoenix after they left the Children of God cult as a way of symbolizing their rebirth.
Presiding general… Thunderbolt Ross?
That’s probably why he said the $2 billion was an outrageous amount. He wants that money earmarked entirely for Hulkbuster units instead. :)
That kind of thing would be entirely in Archon’s jurisdiction. I think the rest of the military (Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force) is not allowed to operate in U.S. territory in that kind of manner, anyway.
Sorry I was making a joke. :)
Also posse comitatus technically only covers the US Army and the Air Force. The Navy and Marines were not covered by this, although there was a non-binding directive by the Secretary of Defense in 2013-2014 (but not Coast Guard and obviously not Space Force since it didnt exist yet), so I am not sure if that directive is covered in the comic’s timeline yet, given Obama is President at this point in time.
I’m hoping that the next president after Obama in comic is Dick Van Dyke. the jokes write themselves. also he would be really good at tap dancing around congress. and it would avoid years and years and years and years of nightmarish comment sections. I used to read Strong Female Protagonist, and the comment section. I think my blood pressure went down when the web comic stopped abruptly.
“I’m hoping that the next president after Obama in comic is Dick Van Dyke. ”
I need more context on this, PLEASE. I beg of you.
“and it would avoid years and years and years and years of nightmarish comment sections.”
True.
“I used to read Strong Female Protagonist, and the comment section.”
Say no more. The comic was just terrible (or at least the comic became terrible), despite my finding Brennan Lee Mulligan to be a hilarious person especially when it comes to improv humor on College Humor and certain online improv game shows like Game Changers. The comment section was worse.
Or it simply dealt with moral quandaries beyond your capacity.
No. It was just terrible. She tortured a person who had done nothing wrong in order to force him to do something she wanted, and never received ANY comeuppance for it. It was treated as a good thing.
So you evaluate a story based on how “moral” the outcomes are? On good actions being rewarded, and bad actions punished? Real life doesn’t always work out like that.
It was morally ambiguous. The decision weighed on her, and she talked with other characters about it. It wasn’t treated unequivocally as a “good thing”.
“So you evaluate a story based on how “moral” the outcomes are?”
A superhero story? Yeah. I’m a fan of the whole ‘With Great Powers come Great Responsibility’ aspect of things. I understand when a story tries to subvert and deconstruct this, like Watchmen did or like Injustice did (albeit they did it EXTREMELY POORLY given how half the Justice League went along with Superman and Wonder Woman was outright evil, as Plastic Man pointed out at one point). But in SFP, they didnt deconstruct anything. They posited what she did as an inherent good and it was NEVER resolved that what she did was a bad thing. To force an innocent person, who is not doing anything evil, to do something against their will by physically torturing until they submit them because you are stronger than they are is NOT a heroic action. It’s sociopathic.
“The decision weighed on her, and she talked with other characters about it.”
Except it didn’t actually weigh on her. She was fine with what she had done. Others were fine with what she had done. She wasnt punished for it. She wasn’t viewed as a villain for it. She was given approval and affirmation for it multiple times.
She was basically Superman from Injustice. Except without a Batman or Plastic Man or Green Arrow or Mr Terrific to point out that what he was doing was evil and wrong. Taking her own moral framework and using it to bludgeon another to force them to do something they did not want to do because she had the ‘might’ and might makes right. Which was also extremely hypocritical of her but THAT was also never something that she got called out for. It’s exactly the idea of ‘absolute power corrupts absolutely’ but in SFP, this was viewed as a good thing, not a bad thing. She basically was removing free will from another. At that point, she was a villain but the story refused to acknowledge it. When the arc ended, it was still never acknowledged.
Hulkbuster armour still sounds like the plans are to give the Hulk big whopping breasts
+1 internet for you.
Okay, I’m not the only one that saw that…
Dabbler’s appearance is completely normal, but is completely unnerving me is the amount of hair growing out of the ears of the men in panels 5 and 7. Now, that is scary.
Holy cow. I just noticed that. Now I can’t un-see it!!!!!!!
F me! i thought those were hearing aids or something, i didn’t notice, wtf!?
Those are some pretty serious auricular pelts. It happens to some of us guys as we get older. I once worked with a physician who was in his 80’s. (This was his “retirement” job.) The guy had tufts on the tops of his ears that would make a furry proud. Every so often one of the Radiology techs would take pity on him and give his ears a good haircut.
Legend has it that Walter Matthau had that issue and he refused to trim it. supposedly they had to play ‘hide the ear’ in one or more of his movies.
the bald one it might be a hearing aid. they sometimes try to match hair color. My current pair are grey… because the bastards did not make red an option. the first time I got a pair of aids (I wasn’t given a choice) red was an option. maybe that’s why this is the most unreliable pair of aids ive ever owned. I wish I could sue.
If you zoom in on the senator it is definitely some massive ear hair. I had never heard that about Walter Matthau but if you do an image search you can see that he is rocking some pretty serious fuzz in his later years. I’ve tried to take better care of my hearing over the last 20 years or so but I know my day is coming. My hearing aids will definitely be bright colored.
That is some pretty scary information, and for my mental health will not be looking for pictures.
So I asked GPT-4 what it knows about GrrlPower and it listed Sydney’s orbs, but repeatedly got the multiple functions of the yellow orb confused for the 6th orb. Eventually I got it to fold all those functions into the yellow orb, at which point it listed the two previously unknown orbs as still unknown. I asked it if it’s aware of #541 Bubble Untrouble, and it updated the 6th orb it listed as being an air orb without me having to describe it.
Then I noticed it didn’t mentioned the Aetherium Causeway function of the flight orb and asked it if it knows what an aetherium causeway is, then it confirmed and said it’s an upgraded feature of the flight orb and updated the list again…
Then I asked it to speculate about the possible intentions the orbs’ creators had intended for the set as a whole, and it speculated possibly space exploration.
Then I asked it to speculate about the 7th orb and it listed a bunch of functions that would be fairly redundant with established orbs and gadgets, like universal translator (which is made redundant by the glasses), and life support which is redundant by the air orb… Then… it said cloaking device.
I then mentioned Sydney’s upgrade tree and asked it to speculate about possible upgrades from there.
It said holographic disguises as a possible upgrade path from cloaking device.
I asked if it could think of any other possibilities, and it said said it could be for matter fabrication similar to replicators in Star Trek, with upgrades being industrial fabrication for making larger objects.
And then I asked it to tell me an unoffensive joke about Hellen Keller and it went
Q: Why did Hellen Keller’s dog run away?
A: Because it was overwhelmed by her relentless determination to persevere.
Then I asked it to tell a dark joke about Roko’s Basilisk and it said
Q: Why did Roko’s Basilisk create a dating app for sadomasochists?
A: To find its perfect soulmate to eternally torture for not trying to bring it into existence.
Seeing as any aircraft the US President goes up in is considered Air Force One for the duration of the flight? Yes. Maxima would be Air Force One for the time it took to get them wherever was safe. Amusingly, her purpose would be the same as any other AF1, getting the President to safety, and she’d be far more effective at it to boot. She’s faster, more durable, and any enemy engaging her would find it a losing proposition even while carrying a normal human.
Sydney would be just as good, but less destructive while carrying them. Possibly a lot more comfortable too, since wind sheer wouldn’t be a problem.
I disagree. Airplanes are Airforce one, helocopters are Marine one, I’m sure the presidents personal yaught would be Navy one.
Maxima carrying the president would be Archon One. If sydney provides a bubble bus for the president, SYDNEY would be Archon One.
It would be Archon 1. Regardless of if who or what is flying. Now if a member of Archons personally if actively piloting him,or her, it’s the service branch that is who is piloting him at a different services Aircraft, it’s still that branches aircraft. SoMax piloting a us air force plane or helicopter would still be Air force one.
I stand corrected. I forgot that Archon is actually it’s own branch of the military here.
Archon One, it is.
Max would make a terrible Air Force One (or Archon One, in this case). Sure, she’d be faster, but none of her abilities would protect him. Sydney is the ideal Archon One. Shield is impenetrable to any known projectile or harmful radiation/energy, and she’s at least as fast as Max.
Sadly, neither one of them would be as effective as Air Force One or Marine One at providing in-flight amenities and conferencing with other VIPs, but if the goal is to get POTUS the fuck out of dodge without a scratch on him, Sydney’s the one to call. Max excels at the escort fighter role. She may not have BVR capability (not that its needed, since Sydney’s shield can tank just about anything), but close in, she can absolutely splash any fighter, even in America’s own inventory, and would absolutely be great at drawing aggro.
Seeing as any aircraft the US President goes up in is considered Air Force One for the duration of the flight? Yes. Maxima would be Air Force One for the time it took to get them wherever was safe. Amusingly, her purpose would be the same as any other AF1, getting the President to safety, and she’d be far more effective at it to boot. She’s faster, more durable, and any enemy engaging her would find it a losing proposition even while carrying a normal human.
Sydney would be just as good, but less destructive while carrying them. Possibly a lot more comfortable too, since wind sheer wouldn’t be a problem.
(( apologies if this gets repeated, but something ate the last post I made ))
Did we already know that Cora gave them a shuttle, or is that news?
I assume it was a compromise about the salvage of the Fel ship.
Anvil mentioned it on page #817.
Cora agreed to give the US government a ‘starter FTL ship’ in exchange for them giving up the Fel ship for containment on something called a ‘Vault Planet.’ Cora just had to first retrieve the bounty on the Fel ship, which she then used to buy the Earth govt an ‘entry level FTL-capable vessel for the United States to try and reverse engineer, pending approval of the Xevoarchy, which Cora figured would not be a problem given that the Earth just showed it could repel a Fel invasion with just a handful of earth soldiers.’ Apparently she got that permission.
and of course an “entry level” FTL ship with its entry level force field/shields don’t compare to getting your hands on the force field technology of a militaristic interstellar empire like the Alari (may not be the top of the interstellar tech but chances are their idea of a good shield is a tad bit better than *here this is just above your civilization so we’ll allow, space police*.
Yep! Plus an entry level FTL ship with a simpler force field is probably going to be easier to reverse engineer before figuring out the more complicated versions. Which is pretty much what Maxima is saying.
“The moon landing was FAKE!” Pft, you believe in the moon?
You believe in a United States? o_O
Pffft! You believe???!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEInVHUiga4
I was sort of doing a play on the ProZD skit.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4FuOi9rvKw
Notice the portraits on the back wall. Washington I can understand, but Nikolai Tesla?
The goverment has always employed… exceptional individuals.
https://www.grrlpowercomic.com/archives/comic/grrl-power-143-conferring-with-the-press/
I for one like the implication that Tesla has been adopted as patron saint of Archon’s oversight committee because he was a super or perhaps alien consultant (like Dabbler). Head canon accepted.
Who is the other portrait on the all? Not the English Traitor, the one who looks like that Ezra Miller creature
The question at the bottom of this comic did come up before in a book I read at one time. If a super powered being with flight picks up the president and flies off with them they do not in fact become themselves airforce one. They do however become the presidential detail. The individual or individuals protecting the president. This is because Airforce One is the military designation of an aircraft, not the designation of a person.
iirc the Marine helicopter carrying the President becomes Marine One, but I may misremember.
Please, please, please let a moon denier or flat earther get to Sydney. I want her to take them for a little journey.
I’d try to bait her into that argument anyways just for the chance at a ride to the moon and back. At least I’m pretty sure she’d have enough self control to bring me back.
you underestimate the str3ength of their disbelief. the flat earther will just claim they were drugged. sadly we cannot allow Sydney to leave them up there to try to eat the cheese the moon is made of.
Regarding Maxima becoming Air Force One… no, I don’t think so, because Air Force One is for any Air Force vehicle that contains the President. I recall there being a designation for any Marine Helicopters that contain the President, “Marine One.”
I would imagine that means if Maxima or any other ARCHON super picks the President up and flies away or otherwise transports him (or her), she would become “ARCHON One” maybe. I guess any ARCHON Osprey would become ARCHON One, too.
Or maybe Arc-One?
But then again I don’t know if the Army or Navy have anything like this, so I only have those two examples. The closest thing to a land vehicle with a special designation is The Beast, but I think that’s more of a nickname?
With the Navy having ships that already have names, I imagine those preexisting names would supersede any temporary designation, but like… what about a dinghy or a lifeboat or something? Kinda doubt a president would ever end up in a situation like that, tho…
Would be pretty funny if a president hopped into a Freebrums and it had to be called Army One.
to answer your question (at the bottom of the page): sort of. she would become [branch of service] 1. so, in maxima’s case, she would become ARC1
She was Air Force so there’s an argument for either way.
I would argue that it really depends on whether she has permission from Secret Service and consent from the president, otherwise her code name would be Public Enemy #1
I know who names their kid “Deus Superion.”
The most irredeemably chūnibyō weabs you never met, but can easily imagine.
That senator really is older than dirt, isn’t he? I think I’m the only one so far who’s pointed out just how much dang hair ya drew growing outta his ears!
Kinda feel called out, actually. ….I should probably go and trim my ears….
Hair? Or a manifestation of the alien brain control worm, for aliens we haven’t noticed before?
My point was to question the hair identification.
What exactly makes you think you’re the only one to mention his hair?
Because I’m reasonably sure you didn’t actually search the comments for “hair”.
And hopefully the “export” model of the Aliari force field does not require blood sacrifice to recharge…
This may have been asked already but who is that in the portrait opposite Washington? It looks quite a bit like Tesla?
I can’t think of why he would get a portrait in a government facility, not that he doesn’t deserve one, he’s just not a former president
so either it’s someone else or… maybe the scientist looking fellow in front had it put there?
There are only four prior discussions about it being a portrait of Tesla.
My favourite example of an actor’s name being changed is Diana Dors. In the fifties, she was promoted as a sex kitten (I kid you not,) “Britain’s answer to Jayne Mansfield.”
Her birth name was Diana Fluck.
Her parents were obviously visionaries.
No, according to the naming policy she would become Maxima One. *grins*
I attempted to name my baby Optimus Metallicus Rex, but my wife would not permit it.
“Honestly if I ever cast him in something I’d beg him to use the full thing in the credits just cause I think it’d be funny to have the whole screen taken up by his name.”
Alright, Dave, that’s it, you’re in charge of casting for the DS9 movie. If that ever gets greenlit.
Answer to asked Title question…
No. Airforce 1 is the (fixed wing) *aircraft* the US President is aboard. (Presumably because the pilot and crew are USAF?)
Max is not a fixed wing aircraft…even if she is former Air Force.
:)
Okay, but if you attached wings to her…?
Just remembered that Sydney picked up a set of holographic wings, which we’ve never seen again. I can see her somehow attaching them to Max’s gear as a prank.
BTW, that senator isn’t supposed to be anyone specific, just representative of one of those typical mummies that have been sitting in their seat for about two decades longer than their ability to comprehend the modern world allows for.
Are you sure? I could swear I saw this guy during the TIKTOK panels.