Tag: Stupid people

Tricksies & Accomplices

Legal Stuff, Resistance

From Reader Mike S., news of this little reindeer game:

As Republicans in Texas move full steam ahead with a plan to redraw the state’s congressional districts, Democrats are privately mulling their options, including an expensive and legally dicey quorum break.

If they go that route, it appears they will have the backing of big-dollar Democratic donors.

By fleeing the state to deprive the Legislature of enough members to function, Democrats would each incur a fine of $500 per day and face the threat of arrest. Deep-pocketed donors within the party appear ready to cover these expenses, according to three people involved in the discussions.

The donors’ willingness to foot the bill eliminates a major deterrent to walking out — the personal financial cost — and could embolden Democrats who might otherwise hesitate.

Two people involved in the latest Democratic fundraising strategy sessions, who were granted anonymity to discuss private conversations, claim their legal teams have found a way to disburse the funds to the members but declined to provide any additional details.

Rep. Jasmine Crockett, a Dallas Democrat who was part of the 2021 quorum break, sees a path to circumvent the campaign finance rules: With minimal limits on external income, Texas lawmakers can simply accept the donations as another salary, she said. As one of the most prolific fundraisers in the U.S. House, Crockett said she’s willing to tap her donor base — and her $3.7 million war chest — to cover the expenses.

On private donor calls, members of Congress, including Rep. Greg Casar of Austin, have been making the case for high-stakes Democratic resistance, including a quorum break, according to two people familiar with the calls.

Well, yes… except:

Attorney General Ken Paxton has also called for fleeing Democrats to be arrested and offered his office’s services in “hunting down and compelling the attendance of anyone who abandons their office” by breaking quorum.

And as Reader Mike points out, the last time these assholes tried this, they were tracked down in their little out-of-state hidey-holes by the Texas Rangers, arrested and brought back to Austin.

Maybe they could go to Cuba.  They’d fit right in, especially that Commie bitch Crockett — and by the way:  that “war chest” of hers?  It’s against the law to use campaign funds in this manner.

Should be fun.  And the gerrymandered districts are going to be redrawn eventually, anyway.

Idiots.

Finishing The Job

Hunting, Science!

This is interesting:

Burmese pythons, one of the world’s largest snakes, are also one of the most problematic invasive species in South Florida. First spotted in the Florida Everglades in the 1970s, the snakes were introduced, either accidentally or intentionally, through the exotic pet trade.

Since then, pythons have become top predators in the local food ecosystem. Despite the fact that they now exist throughout much of South Florida, they remain difficult to track down. That means researchers and conservationists need to find creative ways to lure them out into the open. 

And by creative, we mean really creative—and University of Florida (UF) researchers clearly understood the assignment.

Researchers led by UF professor of wildlife ecology and conservation Robert McCleery have released 40 solar-powered, remote-controlled robot bunnies in South Florida this month. The researchers replaced the plush toy’s stuffing with motors and heaters to imitate the motions and body temperatures of one of pythons’ favorite snacks: marsh rabbits.

I’m no professor of anything, but it seems to me that these boffins are missing a trick, here.  It’s all very well to “lure” these giant worms out into the open, but it’s pretty much useless when it comes to actually killing the loathsome creatures.

My suggestion:  a small explosive charge — it doesn’t have to be greater than, say, that of a large bottle rocket — inserted into the robo-bunnies, triggered by pressure on the outer frame.  This will do one of two things:  blow the snake’s head off when/if it bites the bunny;  or else blow the snake apart when it crushes the thing prior to ingestion.  Either outcome is satisfactory.

Of course, this will never happen because reasons.

Not-So-Greener Pastures

Immigration

I read the following article with interest:

More than half of young people have considered leaving Britain under Labour, a think tank has found.
Adults between 18-30 years old said they had “serious concerns” about housing, personal finances and their future in the UK, leaving them “overtaxed, underhoused and undervalued”.
According to The Adam Smith Institute poll, 28 per cent of young Britons are either actively planning (8 per cent) or have seriously considered (20 per cent) emigrating. A further 30 per cent have briefly considered it.

But:

The researchers found that Australia, the USA, Canada and Italy were the most popular destinations for young people considering emigrating.

Well, okay then.  Certainly, anyone looking for better prospects that they have in once-Great Britain might certainly consider the USA — although the current MAGA attitude of Americans might well stick in their craw, if they believe everything they’ve been told by the BBC et al.

But Strylia and Canuckistan?

I don’ thank so, Scooter.

There are good reasons to suspect that Down Under and the Great White Place provide, if anything, even worse prospects for the more youthful than their home country.  (Just wait till they try to find affordable accommodation in Sydney / Melbourne or Toronto / Vancouver.  Might as well go to Chelsea / Knightsbridge.)

As for the socio-political world… oy.  Both Strylia and Canuckistan almost define the term “woke” in terms of their attitude, and their respective national governments are on a par with Britishland’s when it comes to dismal economic prospects.

And finally:  I’m not sure that Murka really wants a bunch of young Brits transplanted Over Here, given that said demographic group is in thrall to working from home (WFH), wokeness and similar nonsense.  Now, if we were talking about their parents (e.g Mr. Free Market and his ilk) — now that’s a more acceptable prospect;  but those worthies have already made plans to move to Switzerland, Monaco and other exotic, low-tax or tax-free locales.

Try Italy, kids.  Just deal with the fact that you’ll have to learn to speak Italian because surprise, surprise:  not everyone wants to speak English, or is prepared to put up with people who refuse to speak anything but.  Also, I have a suspicion that your Italian peer group probably feels about their prospects in Italy in exactly the same way that you do yours in the UK.

Good luck with that.

Sidestep

Corporate Fuckery, Marketing / Advertising

I’ve spoken about this topic before, but this is a parallel thought.

Whenever I click onto a link which leads me to a PJMedia outlet, I’m often  / always confronted with a message blocking the article, said message requiring me to turn off my ad-blocking software before I may proceed.

Uh, no.  To quote Dubya, “Nahguhdoodat.”  It’s not that I have anything against advertisements, per se — hell, I’ve worked in the ad agency business myself, and I know that ad revenues help media companies remain in business.  What I object to, with a screaming passion, is that digital ads don’t just announce, they shout at me and intrude on my reading with pop-ups, loud audio and all sorts of other bullshit.  And let’s not talk about ads which have tracking software built in, which leads to all sorts of unpleasantness and bastardy down the track.

Side note:  To be frank, I also don’t want to be led to other ads which “relate” to any specific product in which I might show an interest.  Fucking Amazon’s “if you bought this, you might also be interested in this” trope heads the list, but other websites — e.g. Bud’s Guns FFS — also perpetrate this nonsense, even when my interest in, say, a .22 Beretta pistol generates a “suggested list” which includes a Glock 17 and Bergara rifle.

Anyway, I’m not interested in “allowing” ads into my reading of news items, thank you very much, because my indulgence does not extend to being abused by the advertisers.  So fuck you.

Now there are ways to sidestep this little device.  The one I use the most is to Ctrl-X the link, and in the blank thus created, type in “archive.is/” and then CTRL-V the original link and hit enter.  This generally leads to a page like this:

Click on the blue link, and voilà!  you get the article:

Now some websites have found ways to confound this method or the alternative archiving software products, in which case I do something radical.

I just close the page and OMG forget reading about the topic altogether, in that form.  Why?

There is no topic in the news that is so important.

PJMedia is not the only culprit, of course:  it seems as though almost every “newspaper” has created a PPV setup on the basis of:  “if we can’t derive income from ads, we’ll have to get the moolah from membership.”

Fair enough, I concede the point.  It always made sense back in the old print media days, but even then there were work-arounds.  Buying a magazine each week for $1.25 gets spendy — so the print companies made insanely-discounted offers such as “Get two years’ worth of magazines for only 25c per edition if you pay $6!”

And yes, the magazine contained ads — but those ads didn’t require you to read them before you could turn the fucking page, which is largely what digital media requires.

Finally, let me be completely honest about this.  If I’m going to pay to read a publication of some sort, my polymathic nature demands that I don’t confine myself to a single topic, unless it’s a topic I’m insanely interested in.  It’s why for many years I had subs to Gun Tests, G&A and the like.  (I also had a sub for TIME magazine, back before they became irretrievably leftoid, because they carried articles on lots of topics, not just political ones.)

But if I’m going to pay for a daily read, I want the publication to contain topics on just about every topic — and this is where Breitbart News  and PJMedia  fail, because there it’s 90% politicspoliticspolitics — and politics only constitutes about 40% of my interests.

And to be brutally frank, finding out someone’s guess about Georgia’s next senator is woefully insufficient for me to consider paying for the privilege.

Even more to the point, Redstate‘s top 6 articles have so little interest to me that I’m not going to bother opening any of them, regardless of whether there’s a paywall / ad unblocking demand involved.

Okay, #3 might be sorta interesting but hell, we all know that the Democrats aren’t going to give an attaboy to the good guy with a gun, so why bother?

So that’s why I do the digital sidestep.  And if the sidestep is eventually completely blocked, well then fukkem:  I’ll just go to the range or watch an unblocked video on why military pistols don’t matter.  Way more fun.

Sanity Returns, Part XVIII

Corporate Fuckery, Drive Time, Eco-Crap

Then:

GM CEO Mary Barra said in 2021 that the company would exclusively offer EVs by 2035, citing carbon emissions.

“For General Motors, our most significant carbon impact comes from tailpipe emissions of the vehicles that we sell — in our case, it’s 75 percent,” Barra said. “That is why it is so important that we accelerate toward a future in which every vehicle we sell is a zero-emissions vehicle.”

From another GM management dweeb, Dane Parker, former GM chief sustainability officer:

“We feel this is going to be the successful business model of the future,” he said in 2021. “We know there are hurdles, we know there are technology challenges, but we’re confident that with the resources we have and the expertise we have that we’ll overcome those challenges and this will be a business model that we will be able to thrive in the future.”

Yeah, about that:

General Motors has announced plans to expand production of gasoline-powered vehicles and SUVs in Michigan as well as the manufacturing of pickup trucks.

The Detroit-based auto manufacturer said in a statement on Tuesday that it will “begin production of the Cadillac Escalade, as well as the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra light duty pickups at Orion Assembly in early 2027 to help meet continued strong customer demand.”

Yeah, it seems as though not that many people want to buy their, or anybody’s Duracell cars after all — at least, not enough to keep once-mighty General Motors in business.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to borrow Sarah Hoyt’s Shocked Face.

But Wait! There’s Less!

Eco-Crap

In a development which should surprise absolutely nobody (with a brain and possessing the magic power of Logic), we have this shocking crisis:

The Netherlands is rationing electricity as its overloaded power grid buckles under the pressure of rapid electrification and ambitious climate goals.

More than 11,900 businesses are stuck in a queue for access to the network, alongside public buildings including hospitals, schools and fire stations. 

After shutting down production at the massive Groningen gas field last year, the Dutch government has pushed a fast transition to electric heating, solar power and battery storage. 

But the national grid has failed to keep pace, creating widespread bottlenecks and driving up costs.

…in trying to escape the much-prophesized “catastrophe” of Global Warming Climate Cooling Change©.

My favorite part of the report:

Thousands of new homes are also waiting to be connected, with some areas warned they may have to wait until the 2030s.

 Imagine buying a new house and being told that you’ll be living in medieval style for the next five or six years.  (The throngs of Muslim “refugees” from the Middle East and Africa might be able to cope, that situation being little different from back home;  the sophisticated Dutch, much less so.)

What amazes me is that the practical and hard-headed Dutch fell for the climate change hoax in the first place.  But perhaps it’s not so surprising given that the Dutch have always been supporters of the European Union;  and we all know what fuckheads those Brussels-based bureaucrats are.