Thanks, Heebie -- and in a different way Opinionated Epoxy in the abundance thread -- I kinda needed something like that just now.
Also, good grief, the Bush twins are in their 40s now. In about four years, they'll be as old as Bill Clinton was when he became president.
I told this story awhile ago, but now it's finally coming to a head.
Local school district goes to submit data to TEA, for the 2022-2023 school year. By mistake, we said that we graduated 89 students. That's actually the number of graduates that took up to 6 years, and we actually graduated 495 seniors on time. The error was caught about a month later, and the district submitted new data to TEA.
TEA said, "Thanks so much! We'll use the corrected data when we submit our data to the feds. But we're still going to grade you on the original data. Sorry! You'll probably get an F. That's a really bad graduation rate!"
Then the school rating systems gets tied up in the courts, because the state implemented a new ratings system in October of that school year, which seems a little unfair.
Anyway, the court case finally resolved and the school scores for 2022-2023 were finally released, so our superintendent sent a message out to try to remind everyone how insane the situation is.
Anyway, it turns out that we got a D, not an F. So that's good? Also they retroactively grade 2021-22 under the new system to give you some context, and we got a D in that year too. So now it's just a weird story.
Also I can't find the source for this picture, but it's Austin public schools, with only the A schools and F schools shown. Gee. It's almost like the scoring system is just another complicated way of measuring SES.
So I admit I find the whole Hegseth/Signal situation kind of baffling -- is it a lot of nothing? Is he a foreign asset? Where do you think this is headed?
Apparently FBI Director Patel posted that they were arresting a judge for interfering with ICE. https://www.newsweek.com/fbi-arrests-judge-over-immigration-case-2064204
4: I don't know that he's a foreign asset, but 10 intelligence agencies probably know every time he flushes the toilet.
Over the past week a new scandal has dripped to the press every day, presumably from the many, many people he's already scapegoated and fired. The question is if, for him, that noise breaks through the Trump RDF.
About a week after the election, I said over on twitter that the Pentagon bureaucracy tries to roll every president and that Hegseth probably wouldn't even know that they were rolling him. It couldn't happen to a more deserving person or administration.
An Irish-American friend, who's clearly better at one-liners than I am, said the biggest thing that Hegseth had ever run was his mouth.
3: That picture! Are there actual traintracks?
Another thing about Hegseth (obviously I get this secondhand from Bluesky) is that he got just high enough in the army to see himself as a big man doing big things, but not high enough to realize that everything is logistics. So to the extent he has any policy ideas, it's this "warfighting" pap that seems to believe the problem is soldiers aren't pumping iron in all their spare time.
9: Thought of you, Megan. We're losing another late-term abortion provider, because Dr. Warren Hern (age 86) just closed his clinic in Boulder, CO. I
Hegseth initially was going to the back area of his office where he could access Wi-Fi to use his devices, one of the people familiar said, and then he requested a line at his desk where he could use his own computer.
That meant at times there were three computers around his desk -- a personal computer; another for classified information; and a third for sensitive defense information, both people said.
Now I want you to imagine these computers as bottles in a liquor cabinet. What are they?
Now I'm picturing Hesgeth playing with liquor bottles, the way Dark Helmet gets caught playing with figurines in Spaceballs. "Kiss me!" "No!" "Yes!" [smooching liquor bottles]
9: I-35 doesn't quite line up but is the bigger E-W dividing line looming in people's minds. However, the actual train tracks do match up exceedingly well.
9,14: I suspect the era most of the area in that map got developed was post-car dependence. (I-35 opened in Austin in 1962; even before then it had been a pretty wide thoroughfare, East Avenue, albeit with big medians too.)
And in 1960 the population of Austin was less than one-fifth what it is today.
Map of city limits starting 1959. And I'm sure the outer sectors of the city area circa 1959 were not super populated either.
The Kilmar Abrego Garcia story is apparently devastating to Trump's approval rating among Latinos, which is why Democrats should stop talking about it and go back to talking about egg prices.
10 is interesting. Hegseth left as a major, which over here can be quite a responsible rank - brigade chief of staff is a major's job, which means you are running a headquarters that commands a couple of thousand people at least. Company command is a major (in charge of 150 people). But the US army is a lot more centralised than the British army so maybe a US major would be more like a captain in terms of seeing the big picture.
And of course there are majors and majors.
This year we watched Jesus Christ Superstar twice - first on Good Friday per household tradition, and then again last night, because the New Beverly was showing a new 35mm print. (I've watched that film more than a dozen times, and this time there was a surprising transition in the temple scene, which makes me think the negative was damaged and they had to re-splice the film?) Anyway, when Peter appeared on the screen the theater erupted into laughter, which made me curious. It turns out that Peter the Apostle is most famous for acting in and directing literally hundreds and hundreds of pornos!
22: You will deny him three cocks, I think?
Canada's federal election is on Monday, and my December predictions look like they are going to age terribly! The first one was a freebie. The rest genuinely seemed like very safe predictions at the time.
"Trudeau won't be Liberal leader for the election.
Poilievre will win a large majority (no points for getting this one right).
The Liberals will win fewer than 40 seats. The Bloc Québécois will be Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition.
At the end of 2025, neither Crystia Freeland nor Mark Carney will be Liberal leader. (Sub-prediction: if Carney does get it, he will be so bad it will make the Liberals' Michael Ignatieff experiment look good by comparison.)"
You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.
If I told you had a great basilica would you hold it against me?
24: If Poilievre loses his Riding, I will dance a jig.
