Joe Biden's State of the Union speech was more interesting than I expected. This is mainly for two reasons. First, he was surprisingly tough on Republicans and on Donald Trump in particular—though, as usual, he refused to mention Trump by name. It was a very bristly speech, one that's likely to rouse the liberal political ...continue reading "That was a pretty good speech from Joe Biden tonight"
Today is the day for columnists everywhere to tell us what Joe Biden should really say in tonight's State of the Union address. Don't bother with them. Without exception, they're all stupid ideas. What Biden is going to do is present a laundry list of stuff he's done and stuff he wants to do, interrupted ...continue reading "My preview of tonight’s SOTU"
This is from a Twitter post about a middle school in New York City that's adopted a phone-free policy: Yondr? What's that? That's clever. In comments to the Twitter post, a lot of people said they disliked phone-free policies because they wanted their kids to be able to contact them in case of a school ...continue reading "How to create a phone-free school"
This is a scraggly tree/bush of some kind out in the desert. I took it at sunrise a couple of years ago after a dex-fueled night of pre-telescope astrophotography. At that time all I could do was photograph the Milky Way, since there isn't much else you can do with just an ordinary camera on ...continue reading "Lunchtime Photo"
What precisely is the national security concern with TikTok, which is owned by a Chinese company? There's this: Both the FBI and officials at the Federal Communications Commission have warned that ByteDance could share TikTok user data — such as browsing history, location and biometric identifiers — with China’s authoritarian government. And this: We cannot ...continue reading "What’s the problem with TikTok?"
Oh look, another high quality poll is out today: The crosstabs for this poll are a little hard to make sense of, but they seem to show that Joe Biden has 80% support among Black voters and 63% support among Hispanic voters. Among independents, he trails Trump 46%-54%. These seem relatively reasonable, which provides reason ...continue reading "Emerson poll says Trump and Biden are dead even"
More news on humanitarian aid to Gaza: The U.S. military will build a temporary port and pier on Gaza’s coastline to provide a new route for humanitarian aid, President Biden is set to announce in his State of the Union address Thursday evening, according to senior administration officials. The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity ...continue reading "Biden plans to “flood the zone” with aid to Gaza"
The New York City subway is getting a show of force: Hundreds of National Guard soldiers and State Police officers will patrol the New York City subway platforms and check riders’ bags beginning this week, Gov. Kathy Hochul said on Wednesday. ....Subway safety is a constant concern in New York City, where the system’s recovery ...continue reading "Is crime rampant on New York City subways?"
Two weeks ago the Alabama Supreme Court blew up IVF treatments in the state by ruling that frozen embryos are human life. This made IVF too risky and forced hospitals and clinics to stop providing it. But everybody loves IVF—even Republicans—so the Alabama legislature moved like lightning to pass a bill giving IVF clinics absolute ...continue reading "Abortion foes are fighting against making IVF freely available"
Steve Benen writes today about Sen. Kyrsten Sinema's upcoming retirement: Sinema’s retirement puts the future of the filibuster in doubt This reminds me of something I've been meaning to mention: the filibuster is already dead. This isn't a controversial point. In 2013 Democrats used the "point of order" procedure to end the filibuster for lower ...continue reading "The filibuster no longer exists"
A few months ago the House took the 12 annual appropriations bills and split them into two packages. The first of those packages finally passed today, after several small disagreements were finally resolved. Here's how they went: Stopping the VA from barring gun purchases to veterans with mental health deterioration: Republicans won. $1 billion increase ...continue reading "House Republicans finally pass half a budget"
Here are EV sales through January: Despite some gloomy headlines, sales of EVs have actually kept up their trend growth lately. This becomes clear when you use a 3-month rolling average to smooth out the monthly volatility. However, there was a big drop in January, which was down 35% from December. A January decline is ...continue reading "Raw data: Unit sales of electric vehicles"
This is the Isle of Wight off the south coast of Great Britain. "It is known for its mild climate, coastal scenery, and verdant landscape of fields, downland, and chines." Chines?
LA Times columnist Mark Barabak comments on the victory last night of Adam Schiff in the primary race for US Senate in California: By choosing Schiff, a Burbank congressman who was the most moderate of the major Democratic candidates — and thus most Feinstein-like — [voters] rejected the leftward swerve promised by two more liberal ...continue reading "Adam Schiff won because he fought Donald Trump"
Today brings yet more handiwork from a Texas judge: U.S. District Court Judge Mark T. Pittman ruled that the Minority Business Development Agency’s presumption that businesses owned by Blacks, Latinos and other minorities are inherently disadvantaged violated the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection. He permanently enjoined the agency’s business centers, which have assisted minority-owned businesses ...continue reading "Texas judge kills minority business agency"
There wasn't much change on the hiring front in January: Hires continue to decline and are now at about their 2019 level. And just for laughs, here are the winners and losers in January compared to December:
Is it true that the United States has the lowest inflation rate of any major economy? Not quite, but it's close: China's economy is suffering, and they're starting to experience a bad bout of deflation. Aside from that, the US has the lowest inflation rate of the ten biggest economies in the world.
For no particular reason I got interested today in our long decline of trust in major institutions. Which party has seen the biggest decline in trust, Democrats or Republicans? That depends on the institution. But what if you took the average level of confidence in all institutions? Here it is for the forty years between ...continue reading "Raw data: Confidence in institutions"
This morning I read a piece in the New York Times about the Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis. I had never heard of it before. In a nutshell, a group of scientists announced in 2007 that they had discovered evidence of a group of meteor impacts dating to about 12,900 years ago. They believed these impacts ...continue reading "Did a bunch of meteors hit earth a few thousand years ago?"
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