Monday Links – Clearing the Tab
This is going to be a long one. Build up from last week, and a busy news week over all.
A slew of Reason first.
One good thing about the return of Trump to the White House – Lina Kahn will be removed.
If DOGE wants to successfully cut government spending, it must take on entitlements. Of course, it could also start with energy subsidies. Personally, they should cut all subsidies. Of course this is all predicated on Trump wanting to act financially responsible, which he hasn’t demonstrated any desire.
There are good reasons to oppose Gaetz’s nomination. I’m kinda leaning to the whole admitting to taking drugs and sleeping with underage girls. And the whole being the vanguard of treating Congress as a place to build the brand instead of doing, you know, actual work.
The FDA ordered Costco to recall and destroy 80,000 lbs of butter because the packaging failed to list it was made of dairy. Because rules must be followed – even when they make no fucking sense.
Apple quietly included an inactive phone reboot in the latest iOS update. It looks like if the phone has been locked and inactive for several days, the phone returns to a factory state. Of course, law enforcement is all pissed off because they can’t “get to evidence. “
A first amendment fight where Texas authorities are using whatever laws they can to shut down a citizen journalist.
That concludes the Reason portion of our blogcast. Now on to other news stories.
From Reuters, it seems that Amsterdam had some trouble with antisemitic bands were attacking Israeli soccer fans. This did not come across my normal newsfeeds. I had to go searching for it after a friend on FB posted about an Arab man who escorted a group of Israelis to safety. I’m sorry, but why did I have to go searching for a story about pogroms in Europe?
Also from Reuters, the CFPB wants to put Google under “federal supervision.” Um, what? Oh, you want access to their records? Fuck you. That’s what discovery is for.
From CNBC, FEMA fires employee who told relief workers to skip anyone with a Trump sign in their yard. I’m using CNBC, because honestly, this is the kind of story I would be skeptical about. Any story that fits too neatly into one or the other camp’s narratives, I get sketchy about without confirmation. Also, I’m surprised someone got fired.
From Tech Crunch, Mozilla Foundation lays off almost a third of its workforce and is shuttering its advocacy branch.
I got this one from Military.com just for the headline – Commander of Navy Leadership and Ethics Center Fired over Personal Conduct. This seems so indicative of the current state of military leadership.
Borepatch discusses some recent security issues with using AI in healthcare. Having recently completed my annual required HIPAA training, it astounds me that this wasn’t taken into account when deploying AI tools into the healthcare setting. But as Borepatch routinely reminds us, security isn’t usually among the top considerations when deploying new tech.
From Tynan Motors, a focus group of Hyundai owners told the motor company that they want physical controls back. I don’t mind the touchscreen in the Ward Wagon, but it also has physical knobs/buttons for all the major controls. And I won’t buy another car where that isn’t the case.
A couple of articles by Tam. One on what keeps the 1911 so popular. A second on the “Wheelgun U-Turn.” You really need to read it.
Now for some light items.
Take a look at this Spaceship Size Comparison. It’s floated around the internet for years. A copy of it will soon grace my office walls.
Heard about Ammosquared on the ACP podcast. Interesting way to buy ammo. Will have to investigate further.
Apparently, there is a local company that takes you out on boats and lets you shoot machineguns. That sounds like it needs further investigation.
November Anime Recommendations
Birds of Ward Manor – Glossy Ibis
I’m starting a new semi-regular feature on the birds of Ward Manor. The Wife and I set out bird feeders around the house to attract some of the local birds. Mainly for our viewing pleasure, although we have a couple that are primarily for the cats’ viewing/hunting pleasure.
This installment is on the flock of glossy ibis we have roaming around. Here’s the Wikipedia article. I like them because they’re like mini-plague doctors. Sometimes we have a few, but then are the days we have a flock of couple dozen. I managed to snap a couple of pics when the flock was between the two extremes.
Monday Reflections
I’ll probably do a links post either later this week or next week. Everything is kinda being dominated by everyone dissecting the election results. And the results are a freaking Rorschach test for people’s priors. But here are my reflections after most of a week of listening/reading various punditry.
Am I happy Trump won? No, but to be fair, I wouldn’t have been happy with a Harris victory either. Both of them were in extremely different quadrants than me. I’m not a populist, nor a protectionist, nor a statist. I voted for Chase Oliver, but that was mostly for ballot access. If we had more open ballots, I would have been sorely tempted to just leave it blank.
What am I happy about? First, I’m happy that Trump clearly won both the Electoral College and the popular vote. Not that I find the popular vote a helpful metric. It’s kind of like wealth disparity – it’s a useless measure that’s used to gin up a desired political outcome. At least by winning both, it lessens the “stolen election” rhetoric. Also, it magically makes the election legitimate in so many of my MAGA friends and acquaintances.
Second, I am happy to see the demographics shifting. Jonah Goldberg said it best – “In a multi-racial society, it’s good when both parties are multi-racial.” Hopefully, this will be a nail in the coffin for the idea the demography is destiny. That every other race – except whites – vote in lockstep with one party or another. That mindset leads down a dark road.
I am sure there will be actions the Trump administration takes that I will support. There will be others I will oppose. I worry about the new administration’s positions on Ukraine, Israel/Iran, and guns (I don’t trust Trump on guns).
Finally, let’s reflect on how truly bizarre this election has been. I’m hoping that it’s one of those highlighted in future history books, more because it’s an outlier than a harbinger of more turbulence.
Ward Manor Happenings
Halloween Happenings – Ward Manor was invaded by the great niece so she could trick or treat in our neighborhood. This year, she decided to be a police officer. We set up our table at the end of the driveway and handed out little trinkets. We avoided handing out candy because, well, that means having candy in the house. I will say the best costume goes to the next door neighbors. Not because they dressed up their 13-month-old as an Ewok, but because they turned his stroller into an Imperial Speederbike.
Orlando Happenings – The Wife and I spent the last few days in Orlando so that I could go to the Babymetal concert.
Sunday, The Wife and I traveled over to Disney Springs. We got there shortly before everything opened up and made a beeline to the Lego store. Because, if you’ve never been, they limit the number of folks into the store. The line gets long the later in the day. From there, we meandered through the different stores. They closed their big Star Wars shop and enlarged the smaller one. Not sure if that’s permanent or what. From there, we went up to get some groceries. Much to our surprise, there was a hot pot place advertising boba tea next to the Publix. So, we enjoyed boba while we picked up groceries. From there, we trekked over to the Airbnb. Which was in a place that was kind of like a hotel/apartment thing? I dunno. We had some fun with the door lock, but got all of the stuff dragged in. Then came setting up the workstations. I found some portable monitor/laptop stands. These improve the workstations a lot more. The Wife got the small dining table, while I got the much smaller desk in the bedroom.
Monday was a work day. I will say using laptop stands improved working remotely. Which was good because the day job threw me a quick turnaround – as in same-day – analysis. The internet at the AirBnB wasn’t the best, but it wasn’t the worst we’ve had to deal with on our travels. The chairs were in the same vein – not great, not the worst. We ordered dinner in from Carrabba’s – which neither of us had eaten from in quite a long time. Tuesday work day was similar, with the exception of my work headphones acting up.
Concert Happenings – There was some discussion on whether I should bring my sling bag or not. I ended up deciding against it because it would be one more thing going through security. Plus, I’ve never been to the Hard Rock at Universal – and I always get a bit anxious with new places. When I arrived the line was – shall we say long? I will give them credit, once the doors opened, the line moved pretty smoothly.
The good news was that I had a seat in the center of the stage. The bad news was that the seat was probably in the top row.
The opening act was Scene Queen. Grindcore with a female lead. Kind of like Letters From The Fire meets Bloodhound Gang. Not my cup of tea. At least the singer’s voice didn’t hurt my head like the lead singer from Edge of Paradise.
Babymetal puts on a good show. The girls are very energetic and played a lot of their hits. I will say that through my AirPods Pro I was using as earpro, you could definitely tell how produced they are. Still, even with that, I really enjoyed it.
Plus when the concert was over and the house sound came back on, I got to hear a couple of thousand metalheads sing the refrain from “Take Me Home, Country Roads.” I may have joined in the festivities.
Here’s a couple of pics:
Scenes of Ward Life
The Wife and I went to Disney Springs last weekend. There will be more about the trip in tomorrow’s post. This scene needed its own post.
We went to a store that is kind of a high-end Bath and Bodyworks. While perusing through the wares, we came across little packages of “solid shampoo”.
Me: These are interesting, particularly if we use them for packing for air travel.
The Wife: Those are supposed to be good for your hair, but I’ve never used them.
Me: I’ve used regular bar soap to wash my hair, but nothing like that.
The Wife: There are times you make my head hurt.