Happy Hour

I did see my first Cybertruck. The reality is so much worse than pictures.

A Genuine Problem

That we went from "gambling is a thing you can do in Vegas, and then a few other places" to "bet the farm using your phone" in a few short years is a problem!

The Supreme Court unleashed this craze in 2018, ruling in Murphy v. National Collegiate Athletic Association that federal prohibitions against states legalizing sports betting were unconstitutional. Eight years later, 40 states and the District of Columbia have allowed some type of online gambling. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has reported that gambling was the second-highest service-sector industry for GDP growth between 2019 and 2024, behind only software publishing.

I used to think limited sports betting was relatively healthy (relatively), in that there was a time lapse between "pushing the button" and the result. No constant hamster treat rush like slots or similar. But that was before gambling on your phone, the immense variety of parlay bets partial game betting, and half of sports coverage being devoted to gambling.

The Inscrutable Acts of Elon Musk, Supergenius

The author of this piece is a longtime Elon fluffer. 

We cannot know Musk’s full rationale for pivoting to the Moon, at least in the near term.

Because he is a con man!!!  Lol:

All of this may sound like it’s straight out of the pages of a science fiction novel, and it pretty much is.

People Didn't Actually Vote For This

I don't say that to defend Trump supporters whose reasons for voting for him were Not Good, regardless. And some of them do want and love "this."

I say it to point out that Trump does not have any kind of popular mandate for what is happening. You can think they were racist idiots for this, and generally cruel still, but plenty of Trump supporters truly believed that the country was filled with violent criminal "illegals" and that this was the problem Trump would be "solving."   

Less than 14% of nearly 400,000 immigrants arrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in President Trump's first year back in the White House had charges or convictions for violent criminal offenses, according to an internal Department of Homeland Security document obtained by CBS News. 

People believe stupid things about immigration and immigrants. They believe that the solutions to these fake problems are something other than what they are. Again, that isn't a defense of them, mostly, but that people love the idea of removing all of those criminals that Joe Biden brought in to rape your wives, and illegally vote for Democrats does not mean they love "this."  

Culture Wars

Even if we believe "objecting to shitty banh mi in the college cafeteria" and "objecting to a Puerto Rican singer doing the Superbowl halftime" are somehow equivalent complaints from the Left and Right, it is important to note that Obama was not loudly objecting to the banh mi, something we only heard about because notionally liberal media outlets were including it in their Wokes Gone Wild coverage 

Needless to say, that coverage was not on the side of wokes.

The people who spent a decade thinking occasionally misguided (if they even were) college students were a threat to civilization are absurd and also they run our prestige publications.

Re-Evaluating

Any Dems who attend are just spraying themselves with loser stench.

This year, President Donald Trump is adjusting the guest list for the long, bipartisan tradition. Democratic governors have been excluded from the business meeting, and two of those governors, Wes Moore of Maryland and Jared Polis of Colorado, were not invited to the dinner, according to a source familiar with the matter.

“We are disappointed in the administration’s decision to make it a partisan occasion this year,” interim National Governors Association CEO Brandon Tatum said in a statement.

He added: “To disinvite individual governors to the White House sessions undermines an important opportunity for federal-state collaboration.”

...

With Moore and Polis disinvited from the dinner, two Democratic officials said several governors were re-evaluating whether they planned to attend.

If "not going" isn’t 100% obvious then they are useless. 

This Just In

Someone told our pre-eminent Mars explorer that getting to Mars is difficult.

Sure Why Not

Sometimes Gramps is funny.

Sunday Evening

Enjoy

What Are We Going To Talk About Today, Brain?

Same thing we talk about every day, Pinky. Whatever conservatives want us to talk about.

I didn’t watch this. It might even be good! But I do want to highlight how "we" talk about whatever stupid shit they are whining about, daily, as liberals are constantly lectured about how we need to leave our "bubbles."

We can't escape this shit!

Left Coast Time

I am traveling with some obligations and also I am in that very annoying time zone which is not very compatible with my normal schedule.  Just a warning!

Nothing to the rumors I am joining Newsom! 2028.

What Is The Goal

I am still not sure what Bezos thinks he is doing with the Post, or what Will Lewis thought his job was.

Did this really make Bezos mad or was it just what he wanted?

Senior management at The Post were livid when they discovered Lewis was attending Super Bowl-related festivities in San Francisco around the time of the news of the job cuts. It came off as “callous”, said one person in the newsroom familiar with the situation, adding that “the Super Bowl thing was the last straw”. “Bezos lost patience after the Super Bowl thing,” the person added.

Morning

Sunday funday.

Happy Hour

Get happy

Nonce Island

Never beating the charges.

America's Worst Democratic Congressperson

Rosa DeLauro 

I Am Sure All The Reporters Who Ran With The Lie Have Learned A Lesson

Just like the last 7000 times.

White House correspondent for The Hill but you can find many examples.

Morning

Slacker Saturday. Also a travel day. 

Friday Evening

Enjoy

Word Games

Humans don't drive the cars, they just frequently tell the cars where to go and what to do.

Peña, providing some clarity, explained that the human agents were only there to “provide guidance” to the robotaxis.

“They do not remotely drive the vehicles. Waymo asks for guidance in certain situations and gets human input. But the Waymo vehicle is always in charge of the dynamic driving task,” Peña said.

I'm too lazy to look at the moment, but I am sure (I have long been sure, this isn't new) that they have carefully worded all their releases and data submissions to obscure the frequency of what Markey calls phone-a-friend.