Scholars at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business analyzed the plan and found that the massive spending splurge—which costs roughly $13,260 per federal taxpayer—would only cause a “slight uptick” in economic growth in 2021. The analysts warned that this minor boost would just be “instant gratification,” and that the skyrocketing government debt caused by the blowout legislation would undermine any gains in the medium-to-long term.
“The existence of the debt saps the rest of the economy,” Wharton analyst Efraim Berkovich said. “When the government is running budget deficits, the money that could have gone to productive investment is redirected.”
“Effectively, what we’re doing is taking money from [some] people and giving it to other people for consumption purposes,” he continued. “That has value for social safety nets and redistributive benefits, but longer-term, you’re taking away from the capital that we need to grow our economy in the future.”
Biden’s costly plan would explode the national debt. This, per Wharton, would lead to a “crowding out” effect over the coming years as more loan money is taken away from productive business/private sector investments and instead consumed by government debt.
So the Biden Administration hit an Iranian-backed militia stronghold in Syria in retaliation for attacks on Americans. I know we’re supposed to compare Warmonger Biden to Peacemaker Trump for the cognitive dissonance luls, but this is similar to President Trump’s missile strike on a Syrian chemical weapon faculty in April of his first year in office. I’m sure there’s plenty of Biden foreign policy stupidity ahead to rail against, but in this case it’s not significantly different from Trump policy.
A surprising body of research links increases in the minimum wage to increases in criminal offending by those most likely to lose jobs as a result of the wage hike. One analysis concluded that raising the federal minimum to $15 could create crime costs of up to $2.5 billion—a bill that would be borne disproportionately by the very people whom the wage hike is meant to help.
The minimum wage’s economic trade-offs are well known. It raises the take-home pay of some, while causing others—particularly teens, young adults, and less-skilled workers—to lose their jobs. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that a $15 minimum would boost 17 million workers’ earnings by 11.8 percent, on average, but would also cost from 1 million to 3 million jobs.
Higher wages could make working more appealing than illegal activity for some. For others, put out of work by the hike, losing a job heightens the risk that they will go on to commit both property and violent crimes. After all, the people most likely to feel the economic downsides of a minimum-wage hike, in the form of lost jobs—the young—are also among those most likely to commit such crimes. Youths aged 16 to 24 make up just 12 percent of the population but were 23 percent of those arrested as of 2019; they account for a full third of those making less than $15 an hour. The CBO estimated that 16- to 19-year-olds alone would account for half of the job lost if the minimum wage reaches $15.
In one paper from last year, researchers evaluated decades of data to consider the relationship between minimum-wage hikes and crime among 16- to 24-year-olds, finding that the wage hikes tend to correlate with increased property crimes, particularly larcenies—a sign that some unemployed people decide to earn their keep through theft rather than finding another job. Minimum-wage hikes also lead to increases in disorderly-conduct arrests, indicating an increase in loitering and other idleness among teens and young adults. Based on this data, the researchers estimate that hiking the minimum to $15 would lead to an additional 423,000 property crimes, creating the aforementioned $2.5 billion in damages.
Along with price increases, employers may reduce hours, and Belman and Wolfson note that “[i]t has long been suggested that employers may respond to minimum wage increases by reducing spending on training, fringe benefits and working conditions valued by employees.”
Another important finding is that employers often respond to higher mandated wages by replacing low wage workers with those who have more education, skills and experience which make them more productive. This adjustment may have little effect on the observable employment numbers, but the effect is devastating for those who are replaced. Employers can be forced to pay higher wages, but they can’t be forced to hire or retain employees whose contributions don’t match the higher wage.
Some studies (see Clemens 2019) suggest that the pace of job creation slows when mandated wages rise. The increases also accelerate automation, which reduces the number of entry-level jobs and further penalizes those whom the increases are meant to help. In coming years, the combined effect of substitution, slower job creation, and accelerated automation is likely to be a growing core of workers, many of whom are young and poorly educated, who are unemployed and unemployable.
Social activists and progressive editorial boards now regard the minimum wage as another welfare program that can reduce the costs of programs like Medicaid and food stamps, and can reduce inequality. But the minimum wage is very poorly targeted for these purposes. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that “roughly 40 percent of workers directly affected by the $15 option in 2025 would be members of families with incomes more than three times the federal poverty level.” If the goal is to aid low-wage households, rather than teenagers and other part-time workers in middle-income and affluent families, expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit would be far more effective, because it is designed to aid the working poor.
History will record Covid-induced lockdowns as the product of pseudoscientific ideology, manifestations of an unprecedented mass hysteria and drummed-up fear.
When Sweden strayed from the herd of nations hellbent on lockdown, it suffered intense vilification. The modellers who agitated for lockdown as a profoundly necessary step opined that veering from the mainstream playbook would see Sweden suffer some 100,000 excess deaths, double its normal annual death toll. Daily articles, notably in The Guardian, berated the country or the murder that would surely ensue if it didn’t rejoin the herd.
A lot was riding on this. In taking up the lockdown baton from China, the world was conducting a dangerous experiment. That experiment involved tearing up the public health policy guidelines for respiratory virus epidemics of the World Health Organisation (WHO), the US’s Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and many others.
These guidelines were the results of a century of evidence and deliberation that was summarily ignored when the virus arrived. Detailed statements of principle governed the evidential processes required to revise them. These too were ignored.
The basis for all of this was the assurance of the WHO’s Bruce Aylward that China’s lockdown had contained its epidemic. This in turn was based on speculation that everyone was susceptible to Covid-19 and that, without lockdown, exponential growth of disease and death was inevitable.
Snip.
But Sweden did not lock down, becoming the one of the most alluring control experiments the world has ever seen. And it did not suffer 100,000 excess deaths. Not even close. Instead, this is what happened:
Whether you are a lockdown fan drawing trend lines that suggest Sweden had 8000 excess deaths or a skeptic concluding there were none because of a build-up of very susceptible people from an abnormally low death rate in 2019, this reality dealt a devastating blow to the lockdown theory and the models used to justify lockdown.
Covid-19, it turned out, was not only far less deadly than modellers had predicted, but they couldn’t credit this to the lockdowns they’d promoted. Sweden clearly showed that failure to lock down did not constitute genocide.
The favorite hobby of California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, Joe Biden’s pick for Health and Human Services secretary, is targeting Little Sisters of the Poor. He “chose to pursue this litigation even though it is completely meritless; even though it would, if successful, punish nuns who simply want to carry out their calling to care for the indigent elderly; and even though only ideological zealots intolerant of moral views different from their own can take any pleasure in its continuation.” Every knee must bend.
Massive explosion rocks Cameron, Texas (about 75 miles northeast of Austin) after a train collided with 18-wheeler. Fortunately there were no injuries.
Biden’s energy plans are bad for our national security, economy, public health, and overall quality of life. But the American people’s ingenuity and creativity — and the very nature of how our planet and energy systems work — mean all is not lost.
Under Biden’s attempts to “phase out” natural gas, petroleum, and coal, the prices we pay for energy will go up.
This should be no surprise to Biden and his political allies, since costs have soared everywhere “going green” has been tried. Californians are paying 30% more for electricity than they did 10 years ago. In Denmark, where wind energy became a priority in the mid-1990s, prices have more than doubled.
Because everything we do, from the moment our alarms go off every morning to when we turn off the lights at night, depends on energy, these higher prices will be a heavy burden for American families. Expensive energy means producing, marketing, transporting, and selling goods and services will also become more expensive, creating less a ripple effect than a tidal wave.
The rising cost of living will hurt the poor the most. Low-income Americans already spend a higher percentage of their paychecks on electricity and gas, and they have less disposable income to afford higher prices for necessities.
Coupled with the tax increases that would be needed to further subsidize unreliable wind and solar energy, Biden’s plans would cripple the poor and even put their health in jeopardy.
An equally critical consequence of moving away from fossil fuels is the destabilization of our national security. Since becoming the world’s dominant energy producer and a net energy exporter, America has a stronger influence in global negotiations and advancing the cause of freedom.
Thanks in large part to America’s growing influence over OPEC and Russia, multiple Middle Eastern nations have committed to normalizing relations with Israel, an unprecedented development National Review described as “something suspiciously resembling peace.” It’s the reason President Trump has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize four times.
America used to go to war over energy, but now we’re actively loosening the grip of unstable, totalitarian countries not just on oil markets, but on the global balance of power. This is good news for Americans, who benefit from a safe and peaceful nation, and also for the entire world.
Sounds like the entire union should be fired, then.
"Teacher's Unions: We won't let your kids go back to school, but we will make sure the guy jacking off in front of Middle Schoolers can't be fired!" pic.twitter.com/Fkbqlv7bG5
If you wanted to get your hands on Gwyenth Paltrow’s $95 vibrator, you’re too late; it’s sold out. The way that woman creates ridiculous overpriced crap that gets everyone talking about what ridiculous overpriced crap it is, which then makes said ridiculous overpriced crap sell out almost immediately, makes me think she’s actually some sort of marketing genius…
“We just wanted to give our viewers a heads-up that the show contains jokes, comedy, laughter, and free speech,” said a Disney spokesperson. “It feels very dated nowadays, since the show is packed full of problematic things like jokes, innovation, and quality. It’s like, come on, people, this is 2021, not the Dark Ages!”
If you or I can’t sleep at night, we might read a book or waste time on the Internet. When Colin Furze can’t sleep at night, he makes a hydraulic powered shark head.
Truth:
While I don’t know how to be “less white,” I do know how to drink less coke
(Note: This is partially recycled from a previous post in honor of the 30th anniversary of the battle, but the video is new.)
Thirty years ago, on February 26, 1991, units of the American Second Armored Cavalry Regiment engaged the armor of the Iraqi Republican Guard Tawakalna Division in the Battle of 73 Easting.
The furious action lasted twenty-three minutes. The troop stopped when there was nothing left to shoot. Sporadic contact ranged from nuisance machine gun fire to one company-sized counterattack of T-72s and BMP armored personnel carriers. Tanks and Bradleys destroyed enemy vehicles at long range from the dominating position on the ridge. Three Bradleys from first platoon, led by Lieutenant Michael Petschek, encountered and destroyed four T-72s as they moved north to reestablish physical contact with G Troop. Medics treated and evacuated enemy wounded. Crews cross-leveled ammunition. Mortars suppressed enemy infantry further to the east as our fire support officer, Lieutenant Dan Davis, called in devastating artillery strikes on enemy logistical bases. Scouts and a team under the control of First Sergeant Bill Virrill cleared bunkers using grenades and satchel charges, and then led a much-needed resupply convoy through minefields to our rear. A psychological operations team broadcasted surrender appeals forward of the troop and the troop took the first of hundreds of prisoners including the brigade commander. Soldiers segregated, searched, and secured prisoners through the night. Many prisoners cried because they had not expected such humane treatment; their officers had told them that we would execute them. The prisoners were incredulous when our soldiers returned their wallets without taking any of the money that they had looted from Kuwait City. Just after 2200, 1ID conducted a forward passage of lines in Third Squadron’s area of operation to our south.
The morning after the battle, soldiers were exhausted. Many of the approximately fifty T-72s, twenty-five armored personnel carriers, forty trucks and numerous other vehicles that the troop destroyed were still smoldering. Our troop had taken no casualties.
Other sources say Americans suffered a small number of casualties, but it’s unclear whether these occurred during the Battle of 73 Easting itself, or immediately following it but before the larger engagement of the Battle of Norfolk.
Here’s a video on the battle:
In addition to being an overwhelming victory, and part of the larger overwhelming victory of Desert Storm, the Battle of 73 Easting was important for several other reasons.
For one thing, it was the largest tank battle between American- and Soviet-constructed armor since Israeli M-60 Patton tanks faced off against Egyptian T-62s in Sinai campaign of the Yom Kippur War in 1973. All throughout the 70s and early 1980s, various media outlets talked about how much better Soviet military equipment was than American equipment. (I remember a 60 Minutes episode that talked about Soviet equipment being better “all across the board.”) And Soviet equipment was better—on paper, with thicker armor, higher top speeds, etc. And then 73 Easting happened, and M1A1s wiped the floor with T-72s. A lot of that was American troops being much better trained and led than Iraqi troops. But the Republican Guard was the best the Iraq army had, and on paper the T-72 was a match for the M1A1s. In actual combat, the T-72s started blowing up before they realized the Americans were engaging (and destroying) Iraqi armor at the extreme range of the American computerized fire control systems. Soviet armor still used reticules reticles, where the gunner had to manually calculate distance and windage to put shots on target.
In Vietnam, early computerized combat technology was clunky and unreliable. By the time of Desert Storm, the furious onrush of Moore’s Law had rendered technology smaller, more compact, more reliable, and more user-friendly. By pursuing what Jerry Pournelle called the strategy of technology, the United States was producing weapons that were qualitatively superior to those of its communist foes. That technological gap (especially in the form of SDI) was one of the drivers for the end of the Cold War, and it was on full display in Desert Storm. The Soviet Union itself would dissolve later the same year.
The Battle of 73 Easting has become the single most accurately recorded combat engagement in human history. Army historians and simulation modelers thoroughly interviewed the American participants, and paced the battlefield meter by meter. They came up with a fully interactive, network-capable digital replica of the events at 73 Easting, right down to the last TOW missile and .50-caliber pockmark. Military historians and armchair strategists can now fly over the virtual battlefield in the “stealth vehicle,” the so-called “SIMNET flying carpet,” viewing the 3-D virtual landscape from any angle during any moment of the battle. They can even change the parameters – give the Iraqis infrared targeting scopes, for instance, which they lacked at the time, and which made them sitting ducks for high-tech American M1s charging out of blowing sand. The whole triumphal blitzkrieg can be pondered over repeatedly (gloated over even), in perfect scratch-free digital fidelity. It’s the spirit of Southwest Asia in a digital nutshell. In terms of American military morale, it’s like a ’90s CD remix of some ’60s oldie, rescued from warping vinyl and remade closer to the heart’s desire.
Like Agincourt or Amiens, the Battle of 73 Easting heralded the arrival of a new type of technology to the battlefield, one that every army in the world would henceforth need to take into account.
Australian Sky News host Cory Bernardi addresses the elephant in the room the U.S. media won’t:
“U.S. President Joe Biden is struggling with dementia, and is clearly not up to the task he was sworn in to do.”
It’s not his fault, but he did run for office knowing that the decline in his capacity was accelerating. And so did the media. And so did the Democratic Party, yet they all chose to cover it up, just like many of them sought to cover up the Hunter Biden laptop and cash for access scandals.
I hear that Facebook is refusing to let users post links to this YouTube video directly. Well, now you can post links this post instead.
Paul Martin, a much more serious prepper than I, has an after action report on what went right and wrong in his own disaster preparations. Following winterization checklists and having good gear on hand were among the successes. On the other side of the ledger:
I need a better cold weather management plan for the tankless water heaters. This was our weakest point in our house. The drain lines would freeze up, requiring me to go out at all hours with a heat gun to thaw them out to get them back on line and to prevent damage. I was up between 3AM and 4 AM on the coldest nights, outside in the elements (temps between 10 to 15 degrees), working on them. Not fun.
I should have started working the checklist items sooner than I did. My original strategy was to do a few items on the list every night until the big event on Sunday night/Monday morning, when the snow fell and the temps really dropped. The problem came when the first ice storm on Thursday night/Friday morning took out a bunch of limbs around the house, requiring me to spend several hours cleaning that up instead of preparing for the bigger storm that was coming. Hindsight being 20/20, I should have burned a day of PTO and just done everything in the milder temps and when there was still food and ample supplies at the stores.
I should have cleaned out my gutters before the storm started. That’s going on the checklist. Leaves from the winds filled the gutters in the first storm, which then got backed up with rain, which in turn froze in place. Not good. Cleaner gutters drain quicker and collect less ice.
Plus some sobering thoughts:
You’ve now seen our grid under stress. Cold snaps in 2011, 2018 and the worst cold on record in 2021, along with the boil water order of 2018, provide real world examples of what the local grid will do when it’s stressed. You are now on notice of the grid’s limitations. What if the next emergency isn’t in the cold, but in the 105 degree heat of a Texas summer? And what if the power is off for a week or more? What if the failure is caused by a cyber attack which not only shuts off the power but causes physical damage to the grid? By the way, don’t think this can’t happen:
Texas’ power grid was “seconds and minutes” away from a catastrophic failure that could have left Texans in the dark for months, officials with the entity that operates the grid said Thursday.
******
While generators rapidly dropped off the grid as the weather worsened, operators monitored the difference between the supply of power on the grid and the demand for that power. As supply dwindled and demand grew, the margin narrowed to more and more dangerous levels, forcing grid operators to enact emergency protocols to either increase supply or decrease demand.
The worst case scenario: Demand for power outstrips the supply of power generation available on the grid, causing equipment to catch fire, substations to blow and power lines to go down.
If the grid had gone totally offline, the physical damage to power infrastructure from overwhelming the grid could have taken months to repair, said Bernadette Johnson, senior vice president of power and renewables at Enverus, an oil and gas software and information company headquartered in Austin.
Things could have been much worse. They could be much worse in a future outage. Is your family ready for that? If your family isn’t ready, you will then be relying upon not only the grid operators but also your local elected officials to provide you with answers and solutions. Some of you may not be very keen on doing so after all of this.
And that’s where much of our community’s struggle lies. As a community, we need to make sure that while we’re holding our government accountable that we’re also holding ourselves accountable. I get it: not everyone can afford to have a whole house generator. But a lot of people can afford less expensive options that would have made their lives a lot more comfortable and safer.
I plead with you: make preparedness a priority for your family. If it means you have to take a smaller vacation or put off buying a nicer car for a year or so, do it. Many people can implement the step by step preparedness plan I have created in the Ready Citizen Manual which is absolutely free, which will quickly get you to a base line level of readiness enabling you to handle what we just went through.
I don’t see things getting easier in the days ahead. Our economy is showing worrisome signs, our communities are still seething from the last election with no sign of abatement, our grids are vulnerable, and we’re still dealing with a pandemic for the foreseeable future. We now see how uncomfortable things can get. Take steps now to protect yourself and family from enduring that again.
The recent Texas ice storm and power outage crisis once again emphasized how important it is to prepare for such events.
There are some people who put significant time, effort and money into preparing. I am not one of them. What I am is a cheap prepper who probably spends about $20 a year on prepping supplies. But I found that just doing that made me much better prepared for surviving the ice storm/energy outage/boil notice event than other people. So here’s a brief guide to cheaply prepping for a range of disasters.
I’ve included Amazon links, but for some items (like batteries), Sam’s or Lowe’s tends to offer better prices. Batteries are among good that can be purchased tax free during the Texas emergency preparation sales tax holiday, which is April 24-26 this year, along with smoke and CO detectors, fire extinguishers and first aid kits.
The Basics
These are just all-purpose tools everyone should already have, listed here for completeness sake.
First aid kit: There are a lot of different makes and models of these, and this is another one where Sam’s offers a kit that’s a bit cheaper than this one. Has a little bit of everything. A good thing to keep in your car for emergencies.
Smoke alarm: Everyone should already have these, but if you don’t, or want more, these are cheap, and it has a silence button so you can put it in your kitchen. This batch seems to be made in Mexico, but First Alert also makes stuff in China, so caveat emptor.
Carbon Monoxide detector. Doean’t say but I suspect it’s another made-in-China item. There are some combination carbon monoxide/smoke detectors, but I think you want to avoid the possibility of a single point of failure there.
Fire Extinguisher: Every home should have at least one, and make sure it’s not expired. This is what I have (I think it’s made in Mexico), but fortunately I’ve never had to use it.
Water leak detector: A lot of people don’t have these, but I consider them essential basic gear, as they can save you hundreds or thousands of dollars in water damage. I had one of mine go off a week before the ice storm hit because a shutoff valve I had closed to plunge an overflowing toilet had started leaking. Usual made in China caveats apply, but it’s very simple tech (two parallel wires on the exterior that water closes the circuit and sets off when wet). That link goes to a 5-pack, because I recommend putting one behind every toilet, under every sink you use, under your water heater, and next to your washing machine (I’ve had mine start rocking for an unbalanced load that pulled the drain hose loose). (There’s an even cheaper five pack from another manufacturer (also made in China) that I have no experience with.)
Speaking of plunging toilets, I imagine everyone already has a plunger, but if you don’t, here’s one, and you might consider one for each bathroom, or at least each floor. Also, the black bell shaped ones are a lot more effective than the small old red ones.
Speaking of things everyone should already have more of, everyone needs flashlights. I have an old bulb-type Maglite, but here’s a pretty close equivalent with LEDs. As a bonus, it’s also heavy enough to conk someone out. I have flashlights in my bedroom, my kitchen and in my car’s glovebox. The highest rated flashlight on Amazon is the Streamlight 75458 Stinger DS, which is about four times as expensive as the Maglite. I assume it’s brighter and with a longer life, and maybe you have a use case that justifies the cost. And if you have a flashlight, chances are you’ll also need…
Batteries. The Maglite takes D-Cells, and you’re going to want, at a minimum, enough to reload every flashlight twice, which should be enough to get you through a couple of evenings of power outages. Check your flashlights every six months when you check your smoke and CO detectors. Speaking of which, those and the water leak detectors take 9 volt batteries, and you want enough around to be able to change out every battery in your detectors as needed. Those links go to Duracells, which I’ve been pretty happy with.
Car jump starter: Much better than jumper cables, and can save you money when you have a dead battery, or beacuse it’s just not cranking in the cold.
Water shut off tool. The toilet valve problem made me keenly aware that I did not have the specific house water shutoff valve tool, so I went ahead and ordered this one, which also has a gas shutoff tool. You need one of these for the same reason you need a water leak detector, i.e. it will greatly limit damage before the plumber gets there.
Sawyer Products Water Filtration System: Austin is still under a boil notice, and the Sawyer system (which I bought the last time Austin was under a boil notice) is Good Enough, even if it is a slight pain to fill and squeeze the bag enough times for my dogs and I to drink (but still less of a pain that boiling water and waiting for it to cool).
Duct tape is useful to have year-round, but especially during an emergency, to patch a small leak or keep something together until the emergency is over and you can replace it. Link goes to 3M all-weather duct tape, which is better than the generic stuff for outside tasks, like sealing around the edge of a faucet cover.
Cold Weather
Here are some specific prep items for cold weather:
Faucet Covers. If you’re a homeowner, you probably already have those, but if not, here they are, and they seem to work better than a rag or dripping the faucet, and neither of my faucets busted in the ice storm. That link goes to the cheap Styrofoam version, but these plastic ones look a bit bigger and stronger.
O’Keeffe’s Working Hands hand cream: I walk my dogs 2-3 times a day pretty much every single day of the year, and I found my hands getting cracked and raw in the cold, even through gloves. O’Keeffe’s Working Hands fixed the problem. I frequently give this stuff out as Christmas gifts.
Carmex lip balm. A small, cheap jar that solves the chapped lips problem in winter. I know some people prefer Chapstick, but to me the main result of using Chapstick is that 30 minutes later you fell a need to use more Chapstick.
Eucerin Intensive Repair Foot Creme: For some reason, my feet were really hurting after a few days of walking around in the cold. This seems to have fixed the problem. A podiatrist had previously recommended Kerasal Intensive Foot Repair for the same problem, and I have some of that on order, but it’s considerably pricier per ounce, and I couldn’t find any locally.
De-icing spray. You can stand there for 15 minutes ineffectually scraping your frozen windows like William H. Macy in Fargo, or you can keep a bottle of this in your trunk.
I think I’ve covered the basics, and I’m not tackling things like food, clothing, generators, etc. Feel free to add anything I missed in the comments.
Michael Malice explains why the departure of Donald Trump from the White House will not result in less chaos, but in more:
The reason: It’s now become clear that not only our elites are thieves, but that they’re stupid thieves, manifestly stupider than the ordinary Americans they intend to rule, and without Trump in the White House, ordinary Americans no longer have a meaningful voice in the ruling class. “They are so up their own ass, and so not use to think strategically, all they know how to do is repeat what they said before.”
“I’m being told I’m a white supremacist, insurrectionist on a daily basis. If you regard me as a Nazi, if you’re going to read me out of the human race, then we can’t really go forward having a conversation.”
They’re completely oblivious, they’re always telling themselves they’re on the right side of history. You know, if someone comes up to me with a knife, telling them I’m on the right side of history is really going to be a very weak tool. And if it is a war, just saying ‘I’m the good guys’ is really not going to gain you anything.
I’m shocked by how quickly they’ve come to realize that “Wait a minute, we didn’t win!” Because they thought very sincerely “We got rid of Trump, everything can go back to normal. Unity!” And then it took a couple of weeks and they’re like, holy crap, none of these Trump people, who or who they described as Trump people like, they call Glenn Greenwald a Trump person, none of these people missed a beat. “They’re not going home they’re not going anywhere. They’ve become even more radicalized, they’ve become even more contemptuous of us, what do we do?”
On trying to silence anyone pointing out the 2020 Presidential election was stolen: “This is not the approach of an elite that feels secure and in control.”
Malice is an anarchist, and I believe his views on a complete flip in popular views on the police near the end are wrong. But there are some real disconnect between the systemic dishonesty of a corrupt elite that thinks it can continue to shove a radical leftwing agenda down the throats of the American people while expecting those same people to ignore their endemic incompetence and corruption are sadly mistaken.
Hard left TV host and well-known all-around dick Cenk Uyger said Texas had the ice storm coming because…Joe Rogan moved here from California:
Only upside of Texas power outages is people like @joerogan, who were so proud to leave CA and move to TX, freezing their asses off. They said they wanted less government. Congrats, mission accomplished! I hope you're not asking the government to come help you. #Freedom
Today the Texas grid is back up and running normally and it’s getting up into the 50s today as the once-a-century Texas winter storm recedes. But I bet that come summer, California has to close down parts of its grid yet again because high winds took out another power line.
All that’s a handy hook to hang this amusing “Californian moves to Texas” video on:
And yes, it mentions Joe Rogan…
(Though if Calidude had moved to Austin rather than Houston, the homeless people would have been much easier to find…)
Regular readers know that Austin has been climbing out of a once in a century winter storm that froze our roads and wrecked our power grid. Right now it’s still 19°F, but it’s supposed to warm up to a balmy 39°F this afternoon…
Could be worse: ERCOT says that their quick thinking to impose rotating blackouts prevented the physical destruction of the Texas Interconnect Grid. That may even be true, but it’s sort of like a teenager saying “Thanks to my quick thinking, I only managed to burn down the garage and not the entire house!”
Passage of this bill this year would lead to job losses and higher use of labor-reducing equipment and technology,” said Sean Kennedy, executive vice president for public affairs for the National Restaurant Association. “Nearly all restaurant operators say they will increase menu prices. But what is clear is that raising prices for consumers will not be enough for restaurants to absorb higher labor costs.”
But for the fact that he’s president — given his track record of having been wrong on every defense and foreign policy issue for almost five decades — it would be easy to ignore his assessment of China. This is a man who said in 2019, “China is going to eat our lunch? Come on, man.” He added, “I mean, you know, they’re not bad folks, folks. But guess what? They’re not competition for us.” Despite the difficulty of being wrong on both occasions Biden managed it.
Focus for a moment on what he said about the conversation with Xi. It is natural that China would be spending billions on transportation given the size of the country and the billions who inhabit it. Whether it is true that China is spending billions on climate change is another matter. It has, for decades, been spending billions on coal-fired electricity generation plants and has only recently made noises about reducing pollution.
But “climate change” is probably the last priority for China while it is spending far greater sums on its military and cyberwar capabilities. Xi was clearly trying to gull Biden into some sort of race to reduce greenhouse gas emissions so that we could strangle our economy while China doesn’t do the same to its own. China may well be trying to reduce pollution — Beijing is infamous for its barely breathable brown air — but how much it is really doing remains to be seen.
Biden apparently wants to be known as the “climate change president.” If Xi can increase Biden’s desire to make climate change his top priority for legislation and regulation (which seems altogether likely in any event) China will be greatly advantaged by Biden’s concomitant reductions in spending on the U.S. military and intelligence communities.
To say that Biden is soft on China only proves the speaker’s command of the obvious.
What Tenev did not say, or explain, is why his company – which is merely a client-facing front of Citadel, which buys the bulk of Robinhood’s orderflow to use it perfectly legally in any way it sees fit – was so massively undercapitalized that the DTCC required several billion more in collateral to protect Robinhood’s own investors against the company’s predatory ways of seeking to capitalize on the gamification of investing making it nothing more (or less) than a trivial pursuit to millions of GenZ and millennial investors, a point which Michael Burry made so vividly.
The #mainstreetrevolution is a myth. Zero commissions and gamified apps were designed to feed flows to the two most influential WS trading houses. A few HFs got hurt, but if retail is moving toward more trading and away from fundamentals, WS owns that game. #Stonks by design. https://t.co/Y4raF0jiM3
— Cassandra (@michaeljburry) February 9, 2021
Incidentally we know why Tenev did not mention it: it’s because Robinhood’s back office is a shambles of a shoestring operation, one which never anticipated either such a surge in trading not a multi-billion collateral requirement; had Robinhood been a true brokerage instead of pretending to be one, and run merely to open as many retail accounts as it could in the shortest amount of time, thus generating the most profit in the quickest amount of time to allow its sponsors a quick and profitable exit, it would actually have been on top of this.
SpaceX wants to bring fast satellite broadband internet to the world — and in particular, to internet users in far-flung, rural locations, where download speeds are low and prices are high.
One of the first places in America to get SpaceX Starlink service was Alaska, the state with the lowest population density in the country — just one person per square mile. The company next extended service into Canada (population density: three people per square mile), followed last month by service in the UK — a big jump in concentration, with 650 people per square mile. (Even in the UK, there are plenty of isolated locations where internet service is expensive, slow — or both).
SpaceX’s globe-spanning satellite constellation should be capable of providing 100 megabit-per-second internet service to anywhere by the end of this year. You can expect that a lot of countries, no matter how urbanized they are (or not), will be lining up to sign up for Starlink service. And the more countries Starlink signs up as customers, the better the prospects for the SpaceX subsidiary’s promised IPO.
One country that most definitely does not want Starlink, however, is Russia.
Snip.
As Ars points out, “Russia is planning its own satellite Internet constellation, known as ‘Sphere.'” And in contrast to SpaceX’s Starlink, which is a privately funded and privately built communications system, the 600-satellite Sphere constellation will be a project built and run by the Russian state under the aegis of its Roscosmos space agency. And that could be a problem.
Sphere, you see, is rumored to cost $20 billion to build, may not begin launching until 2024, and won’t be completed before 2030.
Those numbers alone tell you Sphere will never be built, Starlink or no Starlink. Russia is a profoundly broke and profoundly broken country. Sphere is just the sort of prestige project Putin loves to announce to much fanfare, national greatness vaporware that either never gets built or else creeps out into the real world years (or even decades) late and in much-reduced form, like only ordering 100 T-14 Armata tanks.
Iranian fuel tanker convoy to Afghanistan goes boom.
The media want you to know that it’s Trump’s fault they couldn’t investigate such trivial scandals as Lincoln Project pedophiles, because how would they have time when Orange Man Bad?
Speaking of the Lincoln Project, founder Rick Wilson managed to pay off his mortgage early just as the John Weaver pedophilia scandal was breaking. How fortuitous!
Back in The Before Time, The Long Long Ago, newspapers actually defended free speech.
Back in 1977, the New York Times maintained that as long as Nazis did not engage in any illegality, they were “entitled” to the protection of the law, and then put the onus of maintaining peace on the Skokie residents:
The argument that they will provoke violence simply by appearing on the streets of Skokie only emphasizes the obligation of the police to keep the peace—and gives an opportunity the people of Skokie to demonstrate their respect for the law.
These days, the Times board will chase you out of the building for allowing anyone to voice an opinion that chafes against the brittle sensitivities of its writers. The paper employs full-time speech monitors to vet wrongthink.
The cancel mob comes for Baen Books. Book editors and writers kindly tell them to get stuffed.
Special for Black History Month:
Here are the names of the 200+ slaves owned by Kamala Harris’ ancestor Hamilton Brown in Jamaica in 1817. One of the largest planters in Jamaica, Brown now has a town named after him, Brown’s Town pic.twitter.com/6QnBpEQyez
Facebook head Mark Zuckerberg told employees they need to “inflict pain” on Apple because Apple won’t let Facebook steal every single bit of personal data from Apple devices.
“Bill Gates Bankrolling Educational Organization That Says Math is Racist.” “A conglomerate of 25 educational organizations called A Pathway to Equitable Math Instruction asserts that asking students to find the correct answer is an ‘inherently racist practice.’ The organization’s website lists the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as its only donor.” How many fingers, Winston?
A helicopter running on fossil fuel spraying a chemical made from fossil fuels onto a wind turbine made with fossils fuels during an ice storm is awesome. pic.twitter.com/3HInc2qKb9
“Man Asks That You Respect His Preferred Adjectives.” “‘Here are the adjectives I identify with,’ Becker put on social media. ‘Cool, witty, handsome, innovative, fun.’ Please use one of these adjectives when describing me. It distresses me when people use adjectives I don’t identify as,’ Becker later explained. ‘Like “creepy,” “weird,” or “off-putting.” That’s basically denying my existence and trying to genocide me.'”
Update: I ventured out to the HEB at McNeil & 183 and the major roads are passable. HEB closes at 5, and the meat section was picked almost clean, but there was a lot of edible food available in various departments if you’re flexible.
The Governor discussed the current power situation in Texas and what the state is doing to get more Texans back online. There still remains about 10,000 megawatts (MW) that are off the power grid in Texas. About 6,000 MW have been added to the Texas grid over the past day, which is equivalent to power for about 1.2 million households. In addition to the 6,000 MW restored to the grid, additional power generation from coal and other sources will continue to come online throughout tomorrow. Small natural gas generators should sporadically add megawatts over the next 24 hours to help bring electricity to thousands of Texans. There are still challenges with all sources of generation, resulting from mechanical difficulties, gas supply issues, and the effects of extreme winter weather conditions.
Very similar to yesterday’s list. Also, the Westgate Central Market is closed, but the North Lamar location is open from 10 AM to 6 PM.
Next up: Walmart. The situation here seems to have improved a bit. The Sam’s at 183 and Lakeline Mall Drive is open, as is the Walmart at Northcross, and the Sam’s at 290 West and Mopac, plus the Walmarts in Manor, Elgin and Buda. All other locations appear to be closed.(The Round Rock locations of both Walmart and Sam’s showed open yesterday, but closed today.)
Update: The 183/Lakeline Mall and 290 West/Mopac Sam’s appears to be closed, but the ones at 183 at 360 and on South I-35 now appear to be open. The Palm Valley Walmart in Round Rock also appears to be open.
Rush Limbaugh died Wednesday after a year-long battle with cancer.
Limbaugh’s death at age 70 was announced Wednesday on his influential conservative radio program, by his wife, Kathryn.
Limbaugh announced last February that he was diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer.
Although the cancer was expected to quickly kill Limbaugh, he received treatment and continued to host his radio program over the year.
Shortly after his diagnosis, then-President Donald Trump surprised Limbaugh at last year’s State of the Union address to a joint session of Congress by awarding him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Then-first lady Melania Trump put the medal around Limbaugh’s neck.
“The Rush Limbaugh Show” premiered in 1988, airing for 33 years.
Limbaugh’s program went on the air at a time when conservative media outlets were few and far between. Liberal opinion dominated all the broadcast networks, Time, Newsweek, NPR and most newspapers. He was a breath of fresh air, and became notably more conservative after Desert Storm. Straight from the git-go, liberals hated him for daring to bust up their media monopoly, and liberal Twitter is reacting to his death with exactly the sort of grace and tact you’d expect.
There isn’t one good quality about Rush Limbaugh. Not one. Fuck him. Wherever he is.
Rush Limbaugh was a coward and white supremacist. He aggressively and cynically exploited divisions in our country by weaponizing hatred and bigotry for his own personal gain. He was in service to his own greed, prejudice, and hypocrisy, and that is how history will remember him.
(With a side helping of wishing Henry Kissinger dead as well.)
Limbaugh always opened his show with the quote “…with talent on loan from God,” and now he gets to give it back.
A few tributes:
No words … I just got news the Rush Limbaugh has passed away. thanks Rush for all you taught, gave and were. A hero to many. An icon. A patriot. A revolutionary that saved radio. Heavens gain, our loss.
Like millions of conservatives across the country, I grew up listening to Rush Limbaugh, his ability to explain any given topic was unmatched, his intellect was legendary, over the years I have watched him do so much good helping out struggling Americans.
If you know a conservative under the age of 35, Limbaugh influenced them. Whatever you think of his career trajectory, and I have my frustrations in the Trump era, he was a profoundly important check on Democratic narratives in the press. A true legend. Rest in peace.
Farewell to Rush Limbaugh. A giant of American broadcasting, a man who inspired millions, and infuriated millions (and then inspired some of those, too). He saw through the media lies to bring out the greatness of this country. He fought to the end like the American that he was.
Don’t worry about all the negative stuff the communists are saying about Rush. Read all of them. Then go live the kind of life that ensures they’ll say the same thing about YOU when you die.
Make the right enemies. And make sure they hate you like they hated him.
