Here's the latest trend story from the New York Times. It's about—God help us—"TikTok economics": "Look at economic data, and you’d think that young voters would be riding high right now..." "Look at TikTok, and you get a very different impression..." "Social media reflects — and is potentially fueling — a deep-seated angst about the ...continue reading "Gen Z is fine and productive and happy"
From the Wall Street Journal: OpenAI is making efforts to bring back Sam Altman, the chief executive it ousted Friday, said a person familiar with the matter. (Updates to follow as news develops) Um, what?
This is a genuine question, not a debating point: Are the people calling for a ceasefire in Gaza asking for a unilateral ceasefire? Or are they equally insistent that both sides stand down? Again, this is an honest question. After all, pretty much everyone would prefer a ceasefire to endless slaughter.¹ But at a minimum ...continue reading "Is a Gaza ceasefire for both sides?"
I'm perplexed by the number of Democrats who continue to urge Joe Biden to drop out of the race. I mean, he's obviously not going to. For better or worse, he's the Democratic candidate. So what's the point of publicly slagging him? Is this just a matter of stubbornness? Or being able to say "I ...continue reading "Why are so many Democrats slagging Joe Biden?"
I have a correction. A couple of days ago I posted a chart of childhood vaccination rates by state plotted against each state's vote for Donald Trump in 2020. Unfortunately, I used the wrong numbers—which by coincidence produced results similar to the correct numbers. Similar, but not the same. Here's the corrected chart: As with ...continue reading "CORRECTION: Childhood vaccination rates"
The Border Patrol released its October numbers this week, and they're down a bit from last month's record high: Border encounters in October were up 4% from last year and down 11% (to 240,000) compared to last month. About 50,000 of these were legal asylum requests while the rest were illegal crossings between ports of ...continue reading "Border encounters decline 11% in October"
Hilbert was in the hallway quietly posing for the camera yesterday when Charlie decided to check in and see what was going on. Before long Charlie was rolling around and photobombing everything in sight while Hilbert sat there scowling at him. It is, after all, Hilbert's week for catblogging.
I want to highlight this tweet from James Fallows: Biden at last night's presser: 1) He looks, sounds, "reads as," and is ... old. 2) He also walked across an absolute minefield of issues and Qs — PRC/Taiwan, detente-but-diff w Xi, Gaza, Ukr, etc—without any missteps. #2 is much harder than it seem. He is ...continue reading "Choose: A real president or a high-octane fake?"
A couple of days ago a Random Guy on Twitter (RGOT) wrote that "Jewish communities" have been pushing "hatred against whites." Nobody would much care about this RGOT except that Elon Musk immediately replied, "You have said the actual truth." Now, Musk has a beef with the ADL, so maybe he was just venting about ...continue reading "Antisemitism is going mainstream on the right"
This is apropos of nothing in particular, but I felt like checking out annual increases in wealth for the top 1%. You can think of this as "extra" income, above and beyond what people spend, or as annual savings. Here it is: The annual wealth increase of the top 1% has increased about 150% since ...continue reading "It’s good to be rich"
This story about Fox Sports sideline reporter Charissa Thompson cracks me up: “I’ve said this before, so I haven’t been fired for saying it, but I’ll say it again. I would make up the report sometimes,” Thompson said in a recent interview.... Thompson, 41, added that she assumed that “no coach is going to get ...continue reading "Too good to check"
Last week, in a fit of pique, Republicans in the House tried to pass a bill reducing the salary of Joe Biden's press secretary to $1. What I didn't know was that this has become a regular occurrence. The latest outburst happened yesterday: It was the 25th time in the three weeks since Speaker Mike ...continue reading "We are now taking revenge on salt mine inspectors"
This is the first bronze cast of Rodin's "The Kiss," now displayed outside the Musee de l'Orangerie in Paris. The crowd in the background is from the Paris 10K run, which was finishing up when I took this picture.
Karen Petrou explains why so many people are unhappy with Joe Biden's economy: The mortal enemy of Bidenomics isn’t Donald Trump; it’s a reliance on aggregate and average numbers.... For most Americans, a sense of financial well-being doesn’t come from capital returns in the stock market or even from house price appreciation. It comes in ...continue reading "No, paychecks are not falling ever shorter these days"
From the Wall Street Journal: The prosecutor investigating why classified documents ended up at President Biden’s home and former office is preparing a report that is expected to be sharply critical of how he and his longtime aides handled the material, but the probe isn’t likely to result in a criminal case, according to people ...continue reading "Prosecutor expected to be “sharply critical” of Biden’s classified documents"
I have to admit that on my "things that will provoke massive political unrest" bingo card, I didn't have war in the Middle East. There's always war in the Middle East! Live and learn.
You may be aware that a section of Interstate 10 in downtown Los Angeles has been closed due to arson. How are residents taking it? The New York Times is at top. The LA Times is at bottom: Different parts of the elephant, I guess.
Fog of war and all that, but, um, yeah: Where's the photo of the Hamas command center and the entrance to the underground tunnel network? Because 10 AKs and half a dozen hand grenades doesn't cut it when you're trying to justify an attack on a HOSPITAL. https://t.co/RJOtVZanWi — Brandon Friedman (@BFriedmanDC) November 15, 2023 ...continue reading "Al-Shifa hospital has a few guns, but no Hamas command center"
Kiera Butler reports today that since the pre-pandemic era the overall childhood vaccination rate has fallen from 95% to 93%: Childhood Vaccination Rates Are Declining. You Can Blame MAGA. This latest development is no random statistical blip—actually, I’ve been dreading it for a while now. What started as a campaign by a small group of ...continue reading "Childhood vaccination rates have remained low this year"
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