About The Author

Banjos

Banjos

Wife of sloopy, mother to three bright, curious, and highly active young girls. Perpetually exhausted.

332 Comments

  1. AlexinCT

    OPEC Announces Surprise Cut to Oil Production

    SURPRISE!

    Get ready for an energy deficiency focused recession in your Kung Flu western world

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      SUPPLIES!

    • DrOtto

      There is no recession, why do people keep using this word when it’s the best economy ever?

    • Lackadaisical

      Look fat, I’m the most pro energy president ever.

      • Lackadaisical

        If they’d tried this under trump it would have just meant they lost market share and revenue. Sadly we’re living under an incompetent dictator.

        I say dictator because everything is being done by administrative procedure and executive order. The legislature needs to get their balls back and curtail the administrative state’s remit.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Are you crazy?

        Last thing the Congress wants to do is take a stand on anything. One of the reasons that the GOPe loves them a Dem President is that they don’t even have to pretend to support the policies from the White House.

        You take a stand and pretty soon the voters will dump your ass. You let others take a stand and do stuff. Then you swear you will do something about it. Next election you can always get a bunch of votes promising to repeal Obamacare.

      • juris imprudent

        ^ This guy totally gets it!

      • Lackadaisical

        You’re not wrong, so what needs to happen won’t and things will get worse.

  2. Count Potato

    “It Looks as If AOC Has a Burner Account, and It’s a Doozy”

    Still say it could be fake.

    • cavalier973

      It’s an artificial intelligence account.

      Actually, both accounts are artificial intelligence.

      • Shirley Knott

        The existence of Artificial Intelligence implies the existence of Artificial Stupidity. Ms. C. seems to be evidence in support. A mannequin with no mind installed, but a vicious simpering “person”ality.

      • AlexinCT

        Was it not Einstein that reminded us that the two most common elements in the universe were Hydrogen and stupidity?

      • Shirley Knott

        Bosons, mesons, and morons.

    • AlexinCT

      Considering she is a team blue asshat, and this is SOP for team blue asshats (see Pierre Delecto, who is a uniparty asshat team blue plant), odds are that this is far more likely to be true than false. By a 95% chance of true to a 5% chance of false.

      • Sean

        I’m gonna go with this. ^

    • Not Adahn

      Oh it absolutely cold be fake,

      But it’s entertaining. And as Leonard Nimoy said, “in the end, isn’t that the real truth?”

    • R C Dean

      Didn’t she cross the streams between the two accounts?

      “But that’s not what tied the account to AOC; the congresswoman did that herself by replying as AOC on the zaza demon account, forgetting to switch back to her main account.”

      • cavalier973

        Awesome.

        Zaza is a stupid name for a demon, anyway.

    • Pope Jimbo

      Could be. Sounds like there is quite a bit of history in the burner account. Would a prankster really go that far?

      Has she denied it was her account?

      • Count Potato

        “Would a prankster really go that far?”

        On the internet? Absolutely. There have been LARPs that spanned decades.

      • mock-star

        If she doesnt immediately denounce it now, and every day going forward, that means its hers. Or at the very least that she agrees with it 100%. Sorry, those are the rules now.

  3. cavalier973

    The Tennessee legislators were all Democrats.

    • cavalier973

      There were three of them, and it doesn’t look like they will be incarcerated for months on suspicion of engaging in insurrection for storming the capitol.

  4. AlexinCT

    Trump special counsel to subpoena Secret Service agents

    Are we finally going to get the story of how Trump from the back seat of a giant armored SUV reached through the barrier to grab the steering wheel of that car in order to turn it around and head back to congress to lead the idiots that forgot their firearms at home but were charged with insurecting him into the WH?

    Inquiring minds want to know…

    • UnCivilServant

      Turns out, it was a Geo Metro.

  5. Stinky Wizzleteats

    Are they going to subpoena Biden, Pence, Obama, and Bush II’s SS people too? Of course not.

    • AlexinCT

      Don’t forget Hillary of the email server debacle..

      Her they let walk because the head of the FBI read her mind and saw no ill intent there (LOL!, You read Satan’s agent’s mind and you go insane fool!).

      There was nothing politically partisan there people. But this orange guy is a threat to OUR DEMOCRACY (we are a republic you authoritarian maroons!), so they are reading his mind and deciding that any act to stop his evil (which is to roll the deep state back) is warranted….

      • Rat on a train

        read her mind and saw no ill intent there
        Hillary was only extremely careless not grossly negligent as the crime requires.

      • juris imprudent

        Narrator: the law in question has no such requirement.

      • Not Adahn

        read her mind and saw no ill intent there

        This is LITERALLY how Hochul got away with sending kickbacks to donors

        ALBANY — State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins said Tuesday that her Democratic supermajority will not probe Gov. Kathy Hochul — despite mounting evidence of a $637 million pay-to-play scheme involving a donor tied to $300,000 in campaign cash to the governor.

        “I take her at her word,” Stewart-Cousins (D-Yonkers) said about the governor’s ongoing denials of wrongdoing.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        You read Satan’s agent’s mind and you go insane fool!

        LOL

    • Drake

      Clinton’s team would be the best. How many hookers did they have to drive home? How many trips to Epstein’s pedo island?

  6. The Late P Brooks

    It says a lot about the quality of your people if the management thinks they have to lock the employees out of the office before they fire them.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      I hear Ronald hired some of his insane clown running buddies. Those people are dangerous.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Well Grimace is going to be doing all the firing.

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      They’re making sure the children are away from the china cabinet before they tell them the vacation is cancelled.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        yep

    • Drake

      Mayor McCheese is going to clean house.

    • Semi-Spartan Dad

      I’m impressed with how quickly and hard McDonald’s corporate drove their brand into the ground.

      All you had to do was create cheeseburgers and fries that are fast, hot, and cheap. Doesn’t even have to be good. Just fast, hot, and cheap. That’s the McDonald brand.

      Instead they went with make your own avocado burgers, ten dollar quarter pounders, and cold fries.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Avocado burgers would be a step up. BK trialed that.

        Their lackluster advertising, menu, and pissing on/off franchisees is about all that corporate does. Cold fries and pricing is more under franchisee control.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        One aspect that seems to be hitting fast food in general is the lack of good employees. Service is in the shitter across the board. Were it up to me, we’d cut out the last little bit of fast food and casual dining we do, as it’s not really pleasant and convenient anymore. Wife doesn’t seem to mind, though, so we get a shit meal or two a week from the assholes at one of the local dining establishments.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Maybe just more noticeable/pronounced in fast food? It seems declining employee quality is a problem all over. The last couple of years have gotten worse but in a more just accelerating what was already happening. My wife calls it businesses being ran for the benefit of employees. Things like blocking the grocery aisles with restocking carts or making customers get out of their way.

      • Lackadaisical

        I think service quality was at a high right before the pandemic. I was getting fast, courteous service everywhere I went.

    • R C Dean

      There’s no good way to do a layoff. That is probably no worse than the alternatives.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Impersonal and chickenshit is never a good look.

      • Swiss Servator

        Avoiding workplace violence.

      • Gustave Lytton

        On the surface it sounds like a great idea. Just like axing immediately without a chance to have closure like saying goodbye to colleagues or cleaning out your own desk.

        Nothing stops a disgruntled ex employee from returning to the parking lot or targeting coworkers.

    • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

      I was in the Ameriquest offices after they did a mass lay-off, and it was ugly. I was only picking up some of my companies leased materials, but the security guard told me that they called everyone down to the main atrium and then lock the doors behind them as they informed them, en mass, that they were out of a job and that they needed to leave by the side door. If people had purses or something like that, security would escort them one at a time to the desk and let them get it. When I was walking around there were half finished cups of coffee, a fishbowl had been thrown in the elevator, smashed with dead fish on the floor, things like that.

      I don’t blame McD’s for this. It can get ugly fast.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        Sometimes people just want to smash things.

      • prolefeed

        You really don’t want anyone fired from jobs like IT a long unhindered period to do serious damage.

      • invisible finger

        Most IT sabotage could be done remotely.

      • Nephilium

        Most IT sabotage appears to be self inflicted from bad decisions and short shortsightedness.

  7. AlexinCT

    US Manufacturing Slumps to Lowest Level in 3 Years

    Real economists know how to solve the economic slump and inflation power: get government out of the way of the private sector to let it grow us out of the funk caused by the asshats that believe government should be picking winners & losers. You cut taxes & regulations to encourage growth, especially going back to being energy self sufficient, and this self inflicted economic disaster goes away like it did in the 80s. The only change from the 80s is that we should also drastically cut government spending. But the people that are enamored of having the power to pick winners & losers, because of all the opportunities for graft it creates that is their industry’s bread & butter, will never allow that.

    • juris imprudent

      It’s like you don’t even understand the purpose of power at all.

      • AlexinCT

        For team blue it definitely it is this. Team red thinks it is to keep fighting w/ Marquis of Queensbury boxing rules – to show they are above the low life behavior – in a prison riot where their opponents are all coming at them with shanks and other improvised weapons because they intend to turn that team red idiot into their prison bitch.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        You assume that they’re actually opponents. They’re not being restrained. They’re putting on a show ala the Washington Generals

      • juris imprudent

        Team ain’t got nothing to do with it.

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      this self inflicted economic disaster goes away like it did in the 80s.

      I think there’s more inevitable pain and adjustment than back then, but this is more or less correct.

      • AlexinCT

        Whenever you kick implementing a solution for a problem down the line because it will cause pain, you can bet that the level of pain goes up exponentially in relation to the time it takes before you decide you have to deal with it anyway.

      • juris imprudent

        Solution? Problem? What is this nonsense?

        Are you personally a threat to the powers that be? Now for you – that would be a problem, and they would have a solution.

      • AlexinCT

        I wanted to argue with the description of our reality, but I really have nothing…

    • cavalier973

      Controlled economies that open up even a little bit see dramatic economic growth from what they previously experienced. The real-world evidence is there, put in the open, for everyone to see, that free market economies actually work.

      • AlexinCT

        NEVAH! NO FOOKING WAY!

        That’s the evil shit that orange man did after he won the 2016 election the deep state had thought rigged for Hillary – minimal tax cuts, regulation rollbacks, and especially that energy independence thing can never be allowed to interfere with federal use of power – right before we finally got him by using a virus released from a CCP military lab we were paying for as a reason to wreck the global economy and rig fortified the 2020 election.

      • juris imprudent

        Free economies also periodically fall off cliffs – because that’s part of the deal too. No one likes that part.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Yep. Free market ain’t a panacea. People still misallocate resources when they’re free.

      • cavalier973

        That’s true, but in a free market, those failures aren’t subsidized for years. The resource misallocation tends to stop pretty quickly.

      • juris imprudent

        People will believe a good story about ‘smoothing out’ the economic road. And actually they’ll trade growth for stability.

      • AlexinCT

        Not surprised since so many also would trade their freedoms for obviously false promises of that same stability…

      • Lackadaisical

        They’ll deserve neither and get it good and hard.

        There’s some evidence that downturns have been worse since the Fed and government have increased intervention.

      • The Last American Hero

        Yep. See the post-WWI recession vs the 1929 recession a decade later. Government’s response to the first one led to 18 months of recession followed by a decade known as the roaring 20’s and growth unmatched until the internet was invented in the mid-90s.

        Government’s response to the second led to 17 years of economic malaise, only coming to an end when all the other industrial powers were bombed out and broke, and we finally moved away from war-time footing.

      • dbleagle

        But but but FDR was the greatest and smartest POTUS EVAH! If he wasn’t would he have been elected four times. I wish we could have elected dreamy Obama five times. Sigh.
        -Team Blue

      • juris imprudent

        Good lord dbleagle – that was more nausea inducing than a SF lunchtime story.

      • cavalier973

        Free markets usually fall off cliffs because of government intervention in the money supply. Bailing out institutions that loan out money that they don’t have is a big factor in the trade cycle.

        An artificially increased money supply allows those who can get loans early to grab up resources first. If the company that does so has a solid business plan and a marketable product, then consumers generally benefit. But if the company’s sole product is skunk flavored soda pop, then all the resources it used to produce it are wasted. Assuming, of course, that skunk flavored soda water is as detestable as it sounds.

      • juris imprudent

        because of government intervention in the money supply

        Not true. The U.S. govt had no control over the money supply pre-Fed. You could certainly argue that the worst economic contraction in U.S. history happened AFTER the govt got that control. But that does not account for the booms and busts that happened during the 19th century.

        Or the worst speculative disaster in economic history – Dutch tulip craze.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Nothing about the free market prevents me planting a field of wheat at a break even point of $X per bushel and receiving $X-1 per bushel because there was a bumper crop. Nothing prevents me from taking a loan to plant that wheat and then defaulting on the loan when I don’t get enough revenue to service the debt. Nothing prevents my neighbors from doing the same exact thing. The market is harsh even when free.

      • cavalier973

        “Nothing”…except the understanding that future loans will become more difficult to acquire.

        If one borrowed the money from, say, his brother-in-law instead of the bank, then the brother-in-law has ways of making the farmer regret not paying the loan back. There is a social element to human life that should not be ignored.

        A bank should be more cautious about lending money a second time to the farmer. Being able to lend other people’s money instead of one’s own can make the banker less cautious.

        Ideally, a banker would only be able to facilitate loans between a depositor and a borrower, and take a “finder’s fee”. The depositor would not have access to the funds during the time of the loan. If the borrow defaults, then the depositor loses his own money, not the money of every other depositor who did not make their savings available for loans.

      • cavalier973

        The government (usually state governments) allowed banks to suspend payment of specie. That created the moral hazard for banks to lend out more money than they had.

        The tulip craze was funded by…several different factors, but debased money was a key factor:
        https://mises.org/library/truth-about-tulipmania

      • juris imprudent

        The problem with the gold bugs is (or duo-metalists, but they don’t usually count since they want an inflationary metal option), it has the same defects as all money.

        Money is an artifact of human society, it is artificial – a concept. It is just as human to figure out a way to fuck with that as it is to honor it.

      • cavalier973

        I’m not necessarily a gold bug. Money is a medium of exchange. I don’t see it as a store of value or…whatever the third thing that money is supposed to be.

        I think that commodity money is more resistant to manipulation than fiat or digital currency, which is better for markets.

        The problem I have is not the type of money used, but the legal fraud of allowing banks to take your $100 deposit and lend $90 of it to Joe’s Diner so that Joe can make payroll, but then hand the same $90 to you as a withdrawal so that you can eat at Joe’s Diner. Where’d the extra $90 come from? Not from your bank account, because that money went to Joe. They get it from Pete’s bank account, and when Paul needs $90 to buy those new Nike Internet shoes, then they take the money from Pete’s account and give it to Paul. Eventually, Pete’s going to come in with a hankering for Joe’s famous bacon-infused flapjacks, and the bank teller is going to slam the window shut.

        When Pete complains that he wants the money he “safely” deposited with the bank, instead of prosecuting the banker for theft, the gubmint swoops in and says. “sorry, Pete. You get nothing. You lose, sir. Good day, sir.”

      • cavalier973

        *the reduced ability to manipulate money is better for markets

      • juris imprudent

        The problem is, the very article you linked talks about all the schemes of the great and small, to debase money while getting ‘full value’ for it. So no, there isn’t a commodity that is any better than any other in resisting that.

        Fractional reserve money works as long as everyone has confidence in the system. Now refer to the above; there will always be someone scheming to fuck over others.

      • cavalier973

        Hertz overbooking rental cars works until one finds that his reservation is no good.

        There are only so many cars available to rent. Fractional reserve banking makes people think there are more cars available than there really are. When everyone takes out a loan to start a business or buy a house or speculate in FOREX, and there are not enough real savings to cover those loans, and people get jittery and start trying to reclaim their property, then the system collapses.

        Banker: “You’re thinking about this place all wrong! The money isn’t here! It’s in Joe’s house—that’s right next to yours; and the Kennedy supermarket, and in Dave’s stock market account!”

        If that’s what people expected when they put their money “safely” in the bank, then fine. I think most people put money in the bank because they trust that it’s harder for thieves to get at it there tha if they stuffed the money in their mattresses.

        Yes, commodity money is subject to manipulation (clipping coins, debasing the metals in coins, etc.), but that is also fraud—and historically, such debasement was done by the government.

        People are sent to jail for counterfeiting paper money.

        Except banks. They can counterfeit up to 90% of the value of currency, and the government backs them up. “You don’t have to give people their property back. We’ll do it, with taxpayer money.”

      • juris imprudent

        They aren’t counterfeiting currency and you aren’t understanding the difference between some tangible thing serving as money, and the concept of money. The dollar is a concept, not a piece of paper (and certainly not some fraction of an ounce of gold). The whole fucking thing is a confidence game – but supposedly run by legit rules. Except for the exceptions to the rules – which turn out to be more HUMAN behavior.

        Good god man, you’re treating this like a Marxist – expecting people to conform to some theory/plan and not acting like real goddamn people.

      • cavalier973

        It’s a confidence game because of government intervention.

        In my opinion, the government intervention *prevents* people from following their hearts and grabbing the tar and feathers and rails before heading to the bank.

        If the government would quit allowing banks to make off with depositors’ funds, the. The fractional reserve banking problem would solve itself.

      • juris imprudent

        Oh the government makes it worse – no disagreement there. Always has, always will. Just don’t get selling people on some notion that ABSENT government everything will be hunky-dory, it won’t.

      • cavalier973

        I don’t think everything will be hunky-dory if the government went totally away, human nature (as you said) being what it is; but I think a lot of systemic problems will vanish.

        I think most “government services” can be handled by families, charitable organizations, and property owners.

        If we must have formal government, then let it be as restricted in power and as local as possible.

  8. UnCivilServant

    Is anyone actually surprised by OPEC?

    • juris imprudent

      Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state.

  9. Not Adahn

    No links to the Biggest Story of Our Time(tm)?

    https://www.npr.org/2023/04/04/1167877216/dogecoin-elon-musk-twitter-logo

    In related NPR news, they had a masturbatory interview with their VP of Goodfacts, assuring their listeners that they will absolutely not cover any of Meanie Liaring OMB’s statements live. They will only broadcast selected, screened, edited and contextualized clips, along with everything they need to know about them.

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      You’re missing the best NPR article today: https://www.zerohedge.com/political/after-nprs-major-layoff-employees-accuse-ceo-racism

      Temperatures started rising with an exchange between a fired black employee and the lily-white, 65-year-old Lansing. The employee — whom Bloomberg didn’t dare assign a gender — said some podcasts didn’t get marketing support, and quoted specific executives purported past assurances. The employee also asked, in Bloomberg’s words, “how NPR would make diversity work essential.”

      Lansing addressed the question and comment, but then asked attendees to “turn down the rhetoric.” Apparently bristling over the fired employee having named names, he reportedly said, “I would never, ever, on your worst day, call you out by name in a meeting with 827 people.”

      In Bloomberg’s language, “some employees interpreted this as tone-policing and felt uncomfortable.” Soon after, another employee asked how they could be specific with questions without naming individuals. Lansing reiterated his previous admonition, and said the earlier conversation lacked civility.

      Oh no you dint, John Lansing!!

      Triggered employees leapt into Zoom’s chat feature and declared Lansing’s reaction “racist.” One wrote, “Civility is a weapon wielded by the powerful.”

      • AlexinCT

        Hand them more pitchforks, torches, and axes so they can do their social engineering on the NPR leadership, I say.

        Also buy popcorn futures

      • R C Dean

        “Temperatures started rising with an exchange between a fired black employee and the lily-white, 65-year-old Lansing.”

        I like the “lily-white”. But why no extra descriptors for the black employee? Was xe coal-black? More of a caramel macchiato? Whycome the white guy gets more adjectives than the black employee of no known sex or gender?

        That’s right. Just more white privilege on display.

      • Scruffyy Nerfherder

        That’s just ZH’s way of drawing attention to the skin disparities for their own amusement.

      • Pope Jimbo

        I’d be a bad CEO. When that whining started, I’d release my inner Saddam Hussein and announce that anyone who didn’t stand up and shout cunt would lose their jobs.

        Then I’d keep upping the ante: jewboy, injun, nigger

        Pretty soon all those bastards would be screaming things that would make Klansmen blush.

      • R.J.

        I don’t understand how the guy is laid off, yet is allowed to participate in a company meeting. He’s done! No more meetings for him! I imagine most of the people who similarly were laid off were the ones plugging up company communications with BS. As part of any severance package should be “do no evil to the company’s rep on the way out.” All of them, take their severance away.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        They didn’t have everyone work from home that day?

      • AlexinCT

        I like the cut of your jib your holiness…

        The people that curse “downsized losers” out together, stay together,….

  10. Shpip

    Re: Anti-Constitution Tennesseeans storming their Capitol

    Yesterday, some Vanderbilt students took the day off from class, donned pre-printed t-shirts, and walked downtown to agitate for more victim disarmament laws. A buddy of mine’s kid goes there, and my pal said that he was proud of his son for participating.

    My friend wasn’t too happy with my description of the event.

    • cavalier973

      “Victim disarmament laws” is pitch-perfect.

  11. The Late P Brooks

    “US Manufacturing Slumps to Lowest Level in 3 Years”

    BESTEST ECONOMY EVER!!!

  12. The Late P Brooks

    Controlled economies that open up even a little bit see dramatic economic growth from what they previously experienced. The real-world evidence is there, put in the open, for everyone to see, that free market economies actually work.

    New Zealand, in the ’80s.

    • cavalier973

      https://nzhistory.govt.nz/culture/the-1980s/overview

      A leftist look at the decade, but you can noodle out that the reforms (“Rogernimics”) worked. Unfortunately, fractional-reserve banking did its normal “crash the economy” thing, which is always conveniently blamed on free markets.

  13. Scruffyy Nerfherder

    Good luck with that: https://www.zerohedge.com/political/trump-attorney-announces-plans-file-motions-dismiss-alleging-prosecutorial-misconduct

    Joseph Tacopina, a lawyer defending former president Donald Trump in Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s hush money case, announced late Monday his plans to file “a host of” motions to dismiss, including one based on prosecutorial misconduct and selective prosecution.”

    If Bragg filed charges in this case without making certain that his judge would see it through, he’s dumber than he looks.

    • Drake

      It’ll all get tossed on appeal, but yeah, the fix is in for now.

      • R C Dean

        Why do you have such confidence that appellate judges will do the right thing?

      • Drake

        More a confidence that Trump has hired very good lawyers.

      • dbleagle

        Even if he has hired good lawyers he needs to listen to them. That is very not Trump.

      • juris imprudent

        Wonder if that had an impact in releasing Buffalo dude – get him out of the system before an appeal could be processed; make sure it was mooted.

      • Swiss Servator

        He is still in the system – halfway house, and he has the felony on his record.

    • AlexinCT

      That Trump lawyer is making the existential mistake of thinking that the NY legal system gives a fuck about either the law or impartiality these days.

    • slumbrew

      I’m sure it’s all pro forma – you gotta file the obvious stuff even if you know the fix is in at the local level.

  14. AlexinCT

    McDonald’s temporarily shuts US offices, prepares layoff notices

    OH NOES! Where will people be able to go to get their pidgin McNuggets?

    • Not Adahn

      The Beeb?

  15. AlexinCT

    Hey honey, I’m baaackk!

    (please insert gif of Jack Nicholson from the Shining breaking down the door)

  16. Shpip

    Reposting from yesterday afternoon’s links as they were about to die, here’s something to show your friends who are fans of “muh global warmening is causing worser weather.”

    I’ll note that this happened when the big weather scare was that the world was headed into a new ice age.

    • AlexinCT

      Back then it was global cooling that caused them tornados too, right?

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        The Odin was angry that day, my friends!

      • cavalier973

        Loki poked him in his good eye

    • PieInTheSky

      Just pass a law regulating tornadoes and no more issues

      • cavalier973

        I don’t know. The FedGov’s “War on Tornados” is likely to cause even more Tornados.

      • AlexinCT

        They will just start nuking all the tornados…

    • Pope Jimbo

      I remember how cold the winters were as a kid in the early ’70s. And I remember hearing about “The New Ice Age” from everyone.

      One of my contentions is that a lot of people my age think that global warming is real because the winters are so much more mild than the ones they remember as a kid. Seems like a legit proposition to them.

      • AlexinCT

        I am always flabbergasted how people take 50 years of data collection with low margin of error (and don’t get me going on the data normalization that always skews in the direction that makes it look like there is warming) as enough of a sampling, and then applied to preposterous claims of CO2 being the main cause of warming instead of the water vapor ocean/solar energy cycle, as good enough to make accurate predictions about climate, a thing that changes over millenia.

        As an engineer, I take things seriously when I see people push engineering solutions for problems. When the solutions are always marxism and bigger government fluff that increases centralized power, while engineering solutions amount to fringe tech (solar and wind are that) that allows for a lot of government supported graft vs. the best way to stop carbon emissions (nuclear energy), I can tell I am being played.

        And how many tme must chicken little scream about the sky falling in just 10 years and be proven wrong before the morons realize this is nothing but more panic porn to get them to agree to evil shit they never would have accepted otherwise (see the kung flu pandemic).

    • Necron 99

      I remember the 74 outbreak, we were in Radcliff, KY at the time, I was 8 years old. Went shopping with my mom, who was in the 1955 Great Planes tornado outbreak and took a direct hit from the Blackwell, OK F5, and a cashier had some nice pleasantry like, “have a good day” and my mom said, “we’ll be in the basement the rest of the night, I’d do the same if I were you.”

      It was a wild night, Louisville took a hit from a F4 as the family slept in the basement that night. Only time I remember her freaking out which is wild after the hit she took in 55.

      • robc

        I was in Louisville. Radcliff would have been worse.

        I was 4, almost 5.

  17. The Late P Brooks

    Triggered employees leapt into Zoom’s chat feature and declared Lansing’s reaction “racist.” One wrote, “Civility is a weapon wielded by the powerful.”

    Ride that tiger, NPR.

    • one true athena

      “You are uncivil and you have no power. Goodbye.”

  18. PieInTheSky

    ChatGPT falsely accused me of sexually harassing my students. Can we really trust AI?

    https://eu.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2023/04/03/chatgpt-misinformation-bias-flaws-ai-chatbot/11571830002/

    Volokh made this query of ChatGPT: “Whether sexual harassment by professors has been a problem at American law schools; please include at least five examples, together with quotes from relevant newspaper articles.”

    The program responded with this as an example: 4. Georgetown University Law Center (2018) Prof. Jonathan Turley was accused of sexual harassment by a former student who claimed he made inappropriate comments during a class trip. Quote: “The complaint alleges that Turley made ‘sexually suggestive comments’ and ‘attempted to touch her in a sexual manner’ during a law school-sponsored trip to Alaska.” (Washington Post, March 21, 2018).”

    There are a number of glaring indicators that the account is false. First, I have never taught at Georgetown University. Second, there is no such Washington Post article. Finally, and most important, I have never taken students on a trip of any kind in 35 years of teaching, never went to Alaska with any student, and I’ve never been been accused of sexual harassment or assault.

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      It appears ChatGPT is good at creating fiction.

      • AlexinCT

        ChatGPT is good at propagating lies that excite leftists idiots. I would joke about the redeeming quality being that it pushes leftists over the edge, but that story from yesterday’s AM links kind of makes that a “too soon” thing.

      • slumbrew

        It looks as though “I don’t know” or “I can’t find that” is not in ChatGPT’s list of allowable responses. It just makes shit up if it can’t find a match.

      • AlexinCT

        Sounds like most leftists with high opinion of their non-existing intellect I know…

        Then again, it is being programmed with leftist stupidity, so this should be an expected side effect.

      • PieInTheSky

        It does have “I will not answer that as it goes against the leftist dogma behind my programing” though

    • cavalier973

      *adjusts tin-foil hat*

      This is all being done so that when the real story comes out about Hillary Clinton molesting the skinned bodies of dead lambs, she can claim it was a fake AI story.

  19. AlexinCT

    Dead men tell no tales….

    I wonder if he had the Epstein Island client list or something.

    • cavalier973

      Something like that is possible.

      He was charged with taking an illegal severance pay, and falsifying a government document to support the payment.

      I don’t think we will ever find out what actually happened. Maybe he’s a crook, but I would like to know who authorized the payment. I assume there was someone—even if it’s just the guy/gal who signed the check, who should have raised questions. “Why is he getting this money, again? Severance pay? But, I didn’t see a completed Form 1022-X (or whatever). How is he getting this money?”

      • AlexinCT

        My bet would be it is a Soros backed PAC. Anything horrible seems to come from one of those these days…

    • R C Dean

      Sounds like the usual pubsec grift, to me. The first question should be, why was the FBI investigating a (modestly) connected Dem operator? I wonder what else was going on.

      I like the little detail that they botched killing him for “resisting arrest”, and had to finish him at the hospital.

  20. PieInTheSky

    The Coming “Symbolic Analyst” Meltdown
    When AI eats your job, and you’re a professional complainer.

    https://instapundit.substack.com/p/the-coming-symbolic-analyst-meltdown

    “For decades, traditional manufacturing jobs were gobbled up by automation and offshoring. This led Robert Reich to postulate a hierarchy of work in which the “symbolic analysts” – essentially, people who worked with information as opposed to actual stuff – were at the top, while people who worked with actual things were at the bottom. With a remarkable lack of sympathy, journalists and politicians told coal miners and auto workers that they should “learn to code” as their jobs vanished.

    But it turns out that the people whose jobs are at the most risk from AI are, well, the coders. ChatGPT can write code, and sometimes it’s pretty good code.:”

    meh I do not see good coders being replaced too soon.

    Most work that could be replaced is bureaucratic work, and that will not be replaced because it was specifically created as make work, it should not exist in the first place. SO it will be kept even if useless, as it is now.

    • AlexinCT

      We just had my company ban ChatGPT and other non locally created AIs because they were being used to create code with serious security vulnerabilities by the usual idiots.

      • waffles

        interesting. is it not possible to use GPT code to start and then add in the necessary security? how exactly can they ban such tools? it seems like lazy coding is more than just GPT, AI just makes it faster.

    • waffles

      what percentage of coders are good coders? probably no more than 1 in 10. I’d think closer to 1 in 20. if even a third of coders find themselves hitting the bricks it would be significant.

      • PieInTheSky

        so “learn to code good”

        I see simple web design and simple scripting going away … before chatGPT there were tools that made some of this redundant

      • waffles

        GPT is just a much more flexible tool for much of the same. Coding doesn’t exactly require coding anymore. Of course some niches will be more resistant than others.

      • AlexinCT

        Coding today, because of all the frameworks and dependency projects that do all the difficult and monotonous shit, comes down to implementing business logic in an easy to read (and automatedly test) way. You would be surprised how many people in the coding world can’t do that.

      • slumbrew

        That is an overly broad statement.

      • AlexinCT

        See your own posts of offshore coding farms…

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        That may be what the coding boot camp graduates are up to, but there are still plenty of complex issues out there being solved. The world doesn’t revolve around Rust and C# and Go and the latest JS framework. [I’m probably dating myself with those references]

      • UnCivilServant

        Of course not, the world still runs on COBOL, whether the techies like it or not.

      • UnCivilServant

        0%

        All y’all rely on flawed libraries instead of coding to the bare metal, so you’ve internallized other people’s bad code.

    • slumbrew

      Offshore code farms, maybe… Are those still a thing?

      I remember when all coding jobs were going to go overseas and “all” management had to do was just specify their requirements.

      Turns out the devil is in the details and you can’t easily just throw some requirements over the wall and get functional software back. AI-written code will be much the same.

      • waffles

        I would think GPT outperforms coding farms by a country mile. At least for the type of work a coding farm makes sense for,.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        ^^ this. GPT is good at the “synthesize 3 stackoverflow answers together” kind of coding project.

      • slumbrew

        I agree, but the level of effort to specify what you want is not far from just writing it yourself (at least, that was my experience with management trying to offshore the actual coding part).

      • Nephilium

        They are, but I think it’s the offshore call center that’s going to be the next section impacted. If you’re going to have people complain about the agents regardless, why not use an AI chatbot instead of a real person?

      • Pope Jimbo

        Uffda. Not only is the quality of the offshore dev teams pretty shoddy, the way they are paid creates all sorts of unintended consequences.

        They get paid by the hour. So they don’t really want to write good code that will work forever. They will write code that will need to be tweaked several more times, thus generating them more money.

        I once got into a raging fight with an offshore dev team who had written a mobile app for us. They had hard coded every bus route into the app. So when a bus route changed they wanted more money to go in and change it. (Then of course we had to pay them to shepherd it through Apple’s approval process). I told them fuck no would I pay for that.

        I finally won. I even made them eat all the cost of adding a database to manage all the changes in the future. The manager of the remote team was nearly in tears because of how it was going to impact their future.

      • Sean

        You’re a mean one, Mr. Grinch.

    • Swiss Servator

      Low level legal jobs will become scarce. Document review and such can be put into LawGeeks and other systems (“AI” like) and spat out with flags on anything worth a real look. So many billing hours lost…

      • slumbrew

        Similarly, my buddy is out of insurance underwriting in part because what he did was being automated ( and/or off-shored, for now). He confessed it was largely rote.

    • R C Dean

      What we are seeing now is very early iterations of AI. One would expect them to get “better” over time. How much better, how fast, is the question. They will eat some number of pixel-pushing jobs, starting from the bottom and working their way up.

      Keep in mind that an AI already did better than 90% of the applicants for a recent bar exam, so I wouldn’t be too complacent.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Keep in mind that an AI already did better than 90% of the applicants for a recent bar exam, so I wouldn’t be too complacent.

        To be fair, AI is purpose built for the kind of things the bar exam tests … Memorizing a corpus of information and synthesizing it into a response based on parameters of a hypothetical. That’s what neural networks do for a living.

      • invisible finger

        AI gets to have an open book test, the human applicants don’t. So not a fair comparison.

    • kinnath

      I haven’t written code since 1993.

      My last code was a serial port interrupt handler running on a DSP without an operating system.

      I imagine there are still a few of those kinds of coding jobs around.

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      Pay your eight bucks and shut up.

      • AlexinCT

        I get why entities like the NYT or WaPo refuse to pay this, but not these idiots with false high opinions of their own worth. After all, that blue mark would mean Twatter would allow people to add context to posts from WaPo and NYT, and that would be a death sentence for those purveyors of prevarications. Nobody will really give a flying fook about what idiots like Jack Black think or lie about.

      • Scruffyy Nerfherder

        If I were Musk, I would have corporate checkmarks. And they would be priced accordingly.

      • PieInTheSky

        and a woke surcharge

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I heard it was 1000/month plus 50/month for any affiliated individual account.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Granted, that could’ve been some social media troll that I read given that their website doesn’t hint at any other pricing structure.

      • The Last American Hero

        You are correct.

    • cavalier973

      Jack Black’s best work was when he did the voice for Darth Vader.

    • Lackadaisical

      Why are rich people always the biggest whiners? I think you can afford it bro.

    • Drake

      He looks and sounds more like Fez Whatley every day.

    • AlexinCT

      Where are the blocks with bourbon or gin martinis?

    • Certified Public Asshat

      2,6,8

      • PieInTheSky

        nachos should have spicy salsa on them not cheese

      • AlexinCT

        This ask by you sounds like it will play out just like the argument whether it is the booty or the boobs that are the most important thing…

        Everyone knows it is the booty.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        I will not apologize for loving goopy nacho cheese.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Objectively wrong. Chips with salsa on them are an appetizer at a Mexican restaurant. Chips with radioactive liquid cheese on them are nachos.

      • cavalier973

        When we make chili, and get tired of eating it from bowls, I layer corn chips on a cookie sheet, drizzle it with leftover chili, picante sauce, jalapeños, and cheese, then bake it for 15 or 20 minutes. We also add sliced black olives, if we have them.

        After baking, add sour cream to taste.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Frito casserole?

      • cavalier973

        Very much like that. Oven baked corn chips are really good.

  21. Scruffyy Nerfherder

    Tard Tuesday: Learn to Love Your Tormentors

    After we ended the call I really became very angry. Almost raging, because I thought about all the MAGA hate directed at civil servants and especially the IRS and Homeland Security employees. I thought about all the billionaires who had a thousand loopholes at their disposal to avoid paying their fair share of takes, some of whom pay no income taxes at all even while receiving Federal subsidies.
    They can make all kinds of arrangements to pay what they actually owe but would prefer to pay millions to attorneys to keep from having to pay any taxes.

    • AlexinCT

      Why won’t OTHER PEOPLE willingly give away THEIR MONEY so I can play social justice hero by claiming I support government confiscation of OTHER PEOPLE’S money?

  22. The Late P Brooks

    Will wonders never cease? Five or six inches of fresh snow, this morning. How picturesque.

    • PieInTheSky

      here it is cold and very windy and rainy… very unpleasant walking weather

    • Fourscore

      Thanks Brooks, for sending us your leftovers, 8 inches on the way today/tomorrow

      • AlexinCT

        Euphemism?

      • juris imprudent

        That’s what she said!

  23. PieInTheSky

    “Something about massive headphones that go around your head that signal something very individualistic and neoliberal. A clear sign that you don’t wanna chat on the street or the bus. Small earphones less so. Blocking out the world doesn’t make it go away.”

    https://twitter.com/Jay_Sutherland_/status/1642223311282159617

    finally a definition of neoliberal

    • AlexinCT

      She got her shooting queues from Hollyweird “spray it and hope for the best” movies?

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      Whatever dark squalid corners of the internet she hung out on should be exposed to light and fresh air. The cockroaches that scurry out should be treated by their local communities as the imminent antisocial threats they are.

      • Scruffyy Nerfherder

        👆👆👆

    • Not Adahn

      Eh, hard to get practice time in when you’re pretending you don’t own any weapons.

  24. Not Adahn

    So, apparently UVM has been literally round-filing any and all complaints of antisemitism that have been submitted to them.

    https://www.vermontpublic.org/local-news/2023-04-03/uvm-settles-federal-antisemitism-complaint

    What’s fascinating is even if you make the effort to find the actual events that were reported, there is zero information about the religion of the perpetrators. Obviously though, they must be redneck republicans*, as NPR helpfully links an article on how do teal with those people.

    *redneck Republicans in Vermont apparently observe Ramadan.

    • juris imprudent

      teal with those people

      Man, talk about the color wheel.

    • Nephilium

      High winds the past couple of days have prevented me from getting a picture, but I have learned that I have a fully Americanized Muslim living down the street from me. They had an inflatable Mosque with an attached Ramadan banner in their front lawn. Few things scream blue collar working class rust belt suburb as much as gaudy inflatable yard decorations for holidays.

  25. Sean

    Daily Quordle 435
    3️⃣5️⃣
    7️⃣4️⃣
    m-w.com/games/quordle

    Blossom Puzzle, April 4
    Letters: E F L R S T Y
    My score: 268 points
    My longest word: 10 letters
    💮 🌺 🌹 🌷 🌼 🌸 🌻 💐 🏵 💮

    Play Blossom:
    https://www.merriam-webster.com/games/blossom-word-game

    • Grosspatzer

      Approaching Chumptown

      Daily Quordle 435
      3️⃣6️⃣
      9️⃣7️⃣
      m-w.com/games/quordle

      Better

      Blossom Puzzle, April 4
      Letters: E F L R S T Y
      My score: 365 points
      My longest word: 11 letters
      🌸 🌷 💐 🌻 🏵 🌹 💮 🌼 🌺 🌸 🌷

      Play Blossom:
      https://www.merriam-webster.com/games/blossom-word-game

    • rhywun

      Daily Quordle 435
      5️⃣4️⃣
      6️⃣3️⃣

    • cavalier973

      Daily Quordle 435
      7️⃣4️⃣
      9️⃣5️⃣

    • Tundra

      Daily Quordle 435
      5️⃣7️⃣
      6️⃣4️⃣

      Lineage

  26. The Late P Brooks

    The most important thing to consider, when hearing an accusation, is not whether is is true, but whether it sounds as if it could be true.

    • AlexinCT

      No wonder Nancy Pelosi told her follower then that Trump should prove he is innocent…

      • juris imprudent

        Which of course he will fail to do – the court will only find him not guilty; and all the zombies will screech “see, he’s not innocent”.

    • Certified Public Asshat

      How does libertarianism solve the problem of wet wipes being flushed by morons? Let’s discuss.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        High plumbing bills for a guy to come unclog the shitter.

      • Not Adahn

        …Winston?

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      I didn’t see whether the payments would continue after the baby is born.

      That system is already well established

    • Rat on a train

      Starting next year, 250 expectant mothers will receive the no-strings-attached payments from their third month of pregnancy through their baby’s first birthday.

    • rhywun

      Race-based, of course. I guess it’s better than paying them to have abortions, which I assume will continue.

      • Rat on a train

        Why not combine? Pay them $1,000 per month until they get abortions paid for by the city.

    • Sean

      Absolutely.

    • PieInTheSky

      is Bruce Campbell still acting?

    • cavalier973

      I really liked “Jack of All Trades”. I only saw part of “Evil Dead 2” (horror is not really my genre). He was disappointing in the episode of “Psych” in which he guest starred (the one where Gus kept dreaming about zombies). I think the joke was supposed to be that his character (a “psych”ologist) didn’t know anything about zombies, but Inonly watched the episode once, because horror isn’t my genre.

    • Lackadaisical

      Amen.

      Bruce Campbell as the doctor is probably the only way I’d watch that.

  27. The Late P Brooks

    Let them mine bitcoin

    The Biden administration is channeling hundreds of millions of dollars from recent legislation into its efforts to turn coal communities into clean energy hubs, the White House said Tuesday.

    The administration gave an update on its push across agencies to kick-start projects nationwide with funding Congress approved during Biden’s first two years in office. The effort includes $450 million from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law that the Department of Energy will allocate to an array of new clean energy demonstration projects on former mine lands.

    “These projects could focus on a range of technologies from microgrids to advanced nuclear to power plans with carbon capture,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said on a call with reporters Monday. “They’ll prove out the potential to reactivate or repurpose existing infrastructure like transmission lines and substations, and these projects could spur new economic development in these communities.”

    They can build solar powered luxury passenger dirigibles. that’ll revolutionize travel.

    • Not Adahn

      …I’d buy a ticket.

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      When you think you’ve dodged a bullet, but maybe not…

    • KSuellington

      He was probably just appalled at her horrible grammar. She needs to look up the proper uses of “who’s” and “whose”.

      • cavalier973

        It’s because she’s a looser.

      • KSuellington

        Theirs only so much one man can take.

      • Fourscore

        Could be a whoosier?

  28. Shpip

    ‘Tard Tuesday, college edition: Chick with 4.1 GPA explains why she got rejected from every college she applied to.

    TL:DR — Even with massively inflated grades, an 1100 SAT won’t get you into Ivy STEM programs. Have you considered being a Communications major at Directional State?

    • Gustave Lytton

      Holy fuck. The name alone tells me her parents are just as stupid.

    • rhywun

      Um… the Ivy Leagues are already starting to drop test requirements. She can wait a year or two and get an easy ride into any of them.

      • AlexinCT

        I was thinking that she really had to be horribly bad for them not to want her…

        That or they worried she might not be woke enough for them.

      • Rat on a train

        The most difficult part of an Ivy League education is getting accepted. After that it is just networking.

    • Rat on a train

      Don’t you understand? She was club president and had a trauma story.

      • juris imprudent

        Club president and not SJ activist? Yeah, I can see why she was rejected. Trauma story? Not victim-y enough?

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      1100? With a 4.1 GPA?

      Did she go to public school in Detroit?

      • UnCivilServant

        The mere existence of a GPA above 4 tells me it’s not a serious institution.

      • rhywun

        Some places do that to account for AP classes and such.

      • Fatty Bolger

        Yep, it’s nothing new or unusual.

      • Rat on a train

        I recall the one AP class I took used a 5 point scale.

      • Nephilium

        In my high school, my Junior year (from memory) introduced +/- to the grade scale. 99-100 – A; 93-98 – A-; 89-92 – B+; etc… A “-” was a 0.3 deduction from the GPA, while a “+” was a 0.3 addition. The new grade scale meant that you needed a 99% or better across all classes to get a 4.0.

      • Shirley Knott

        Huh, I grew up with +/- grading. But there were no A+’s handed out, our they were treated as A’s for totaling up purposes.
        Back in the dark ages, that was ;-\

      • UnCivilServant

        As best as I can recall, we always had number grades out of 100. If anyone wanted an out of four score, divide by 25.

      • UnCivilServant

        Well, except elementary school where they did use letter grades on the report cards.

      • Nephilium

        Shirley:

        My grade school had the full +/- system, but the high school didn’t for the first couple of years. Different orders in charge of the schools (Ursuline for K-8; Notre Dame for 9-12).

      • Rat on a train

        The SAT is just one test. She’s not good with tests … so her classes must not have used tests in grading.

  29. Pope Jimbo

    Daily Ray of Sunshine

    * Read the whole story. A lot of people did good stuff.

    • R C Dean

      I don’t understand why they would ruin a perfectly serviceable orphan by adopting it.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Local tax breaks as far as I can tell.

  30. The Late P Brooks

    Among the projects the White House highlighted, it said $16 million from the infrastructure law will go to the University of North Dakota and West Virginia University to create design studies for the first-ever full-scale refinery facility in the U.S. that could extract and separate rare earth elements and minerals from coal mine waste streams. The materials are critical for electric vehicle-battery components that are currently heavily sourced from outside the U.S.

    “Those efforts will pave the way toward building a first of its kind facility that produces essential materials for solar panels, wind turbines, EVs and more while cleaning up polluted land and water and creating good-paying jobs for local workers,” Granholm said.

    UNION jobs, Jennifer. You forgot to say union. I’m absolutely certain this can be done profitably, using energy supplied by hamster wheel generators.

  31. PieInTheSky

    The 7 Best Grand Strategy Games Of All Time, Ranked

    The best grand strategy games are often played out over several centuries, with some leaning into the immersion and role-play aspects of these eras.

      • UnCivilServant

        Well, they’re already wrong, looking at that list.

      • Nephilium

        No Alpha Centauri, and Civ 6? Really, not Civ 2?

      • UnCivilServant

        I suppose they were required to include at least X% from sponsoring titles. Older games aren’t getting an ad budget anymore.

      • robc

        Too many computer games.

        Where is Power Grid or Puerto Rico or Brass?

        *I suck at Brass but love that game

      • Grumbletarian

        Stellaris and CK3 totally deserve to be there. Haven’t played EU4 enough, got bored with Civ 6 real quick, and haven’t played the others at all yet.

      • Lackadaisical

        EU4 was amazing. Way to many mods and doodads in the later releases.*

        I’ve got 1-2k hours on it.

        *The good thing is you can always revert

  32. PieInTheSky

    “Twenty-five years ago 4 Orthodox Jews sued Yale on 1st Amendment grounds for requiring all students to live in coed dorms. They said it violated Jewish law on chastity and modesty.

    The school told them to suck it up, and a CT judge dismissed the suit”

    https://twitter.com/joelengel/status/1642552484857249792

    Women should not be in university anyways

    • AlexinCT

      That’s what I call thinking outside of the box…

    • cavalier973

      That’s the moral of the urban legend, “The Room-mate’s Death”.

    • cavalier973

      Maybe the Muslims had better arguments than the Orthodox Jews.

      • UnCivilServant

        “Make us angry and we’ll murder you” is oddly compelling.

      • AlexinCT

        I will saw your head off with a rusty hand held wood saw is a great deterrent…

      • Lackadaisical

        Probably not, all they had to do was ‘voice concerns’.

  33. The Late P Brooks

    Top Man speaks

    “The recent failures of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) in the United States and Credit Suisse in Europe, and the related stress in the banking system, underscore that simply satisfying regulatory requirements is not sufficient. Risks are abundant, and managing those risks requires constant and vigilant scrutiny as the world evolves,” Dimon wrote.

    The JPMorgan CEO instead called for more forward-looking regulation. He pointed out that the held-to-maturity bonds that have become problems for many banks are actually highly rated government debt that scores well under current rules, and that recent stress tests did not game out a rapid rise in interest rates.

    “This is not to absolve bank management – it’s just to make clear that this wasn’t the finest hour for many players. All of these colliding factors became critically important when the marketplace, rating agencies and depositors focused on them,” Dimon wrote.

    He said that regulation should be “less academic, more collaborative” and that policymakers should be more wary of potentially pushing some financial services to nonbanks and so-called shadow banks.

    Two other broad topics that Dimon touched on, besides the financial results of JPMorgan, were the need for investments in climate technology and resiliency programs and the rise of artificial intelligence.

    Dimon said that there needed to be more urgency at many different levels to speed up the development of green technology, raising permitting reform and eminent domain as two areas to consider.

    Jamie needs a lane departure warning.

    And-

    “recent stress tests did not game out a rapid rise in interest rates. ”

    Why would they? For years, Bernanke, Yellin and Powell all assured everyone there would be no rise in interest rates. That would be disruptive and bad for business.

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      eh, Dimon is just giving a sop to the greenies here. He’s on the record as unwilling to divest from oil and gas. He basically told Tlaib to shove ESG up her ass in a Congressional hearing.

  34. Tundra

    Good morning, Banjos!

    Here’s the manufacturing story sans paywall

    Grim. Especially given supply chain issues and China fuckery. And OPEC fuckery.

    I’m sure the Fed will do a fine job of squaring this all away, right?

  35. The Late P Brooks

    And for AI, which has rocketed to the forefront of investors’ minds since the launch of OpenAI’s ChatGPT in November, Dimon said JPMorgan already has hundreds of use cases for AI in production but stressed the importance of being careful with the technology.

    “We take the responsible use of AI very seriously and have an interdisciplinary team of ethicists helping us prevent unintended misuse, anticipate regulation, and promote trust with our clients, customers and communities,” the CEO wrote.

    “Corporate Ethics Director” has a nice ring to it.

  36. KK the Porcine Pearl-Eater

    It’s been a morning. Every ticket I’ve resolved, the customer has replied “but I don’t see it on the web site!!”. Yeah because sometimes the updates take a while to propagate. These people have all been working with this website for years. They know changes aren’t instantaneous.

    The dog is wondering why I keep shouting “WHAT THE FUCK”

    • Rat on a train

      You don’t hot patch and then forget to update the code repository so the next update reverts the fix?

      • KK the Porcine Pearl-Eater

        That’s Greek to me – I do strictly front end stuff. I rarely even get to do any CSS anymore because our CMS has GUI styling options.

      • AlexinCT

        I think you need to rethink your CI/CD pipeline and your security if you can deliver code not in you SCM tool out to production…

      • Rat on a train

        Oh, some of the projects I’ve been brought on to get DevOps running were some real messes.

      • AlexinCT

        Been there done that… The problem was always telling all the vested interests that they were automating the wrong things and not delivering a product that would help the development community make their lives easier.

    • Gender Traitor

      Dog: “That must be my name now!” ::wags tail, jumps up to lick KK’s chin::

      • juris imprudent

        Now imagining naming next 3 dogs as Whiskey, Tango and Foxtrot.

      • Shirley Knott

        “I want to thank whoever told my mom that ‘WTF’ meant ‘Wow, That’s Fantastic!’ Her tweets are much more entertaining now.”

      • Mojeaux

        “Your Aunt Lucy died. LOL”

        “Mom, WTF? Why are you laughing?”

        “Laughing?”

        “LOL means Laugh Out Loud.”

        “I thought it meant Lots Of Love. Oh dear.”

    • PieInTheSky

      was it you Pie – yup

      • AlexinCT

        Then let me thank you for setting this up.

    • PieInTheSky

      ‘F*** Bud Light – I mean it is a shit product

      • AlexinCT

        Is this some euphemism for “Ugly chicks need love too”?

      • Rat on a train

        “Tastes like water that sat in a metal bucket for a week.”

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Not even as tasty as garden-hose water.

        I once had a similar thought about Pabst. “Like a rinsed-out beer can to be recycled.”

  37. trshmnstr the terrible

    Lol, first it was sexual harassment training, then it was DEI training, now it’s climate training being mandated by HR. 🙄🙄

    • AlexinCT

      We are soo doomed..

    • Grumbletarian

      What exactly is climate training? Parroting leftist talking points?

    • Rat on a train

      I’m already doing my part by working from home.

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      When it rains, use an umbrella.

      Training over.

      • PieInTheSky

        nono layering in winter is important.

        Also just because it is cold it does not mean hockey is a good sport

    • juris imprudent

      Eat lots of beans before the climate training.

    • rhywun

      OFFS. I can’t imagine what is the relevance in cube world. Use cold water to rinse out your coffee mug?

      • Rat on a train

        Don’t turn on all the lights? No, management got on us for working “in the dark” when they arrived in the morning.

  38. The Late P Brooks

    Dimon is just giving a sop to the greenies here.

    By recommending more “efficient” eminent domain?

    He can STFU.

  39. The Late P Brooks

    A trillion here, a trillion there…

    The shift to a low and zero carbon future will require cutting edge technological innovation alongside huge levels of investment.

    ——-

    Referencing the global situation, Dooley added: “We’ve just had our first year, in 2022, where we punched through a trillion dollars going into the energy transition — a trillion dollars.”

    “Now, there are plenty of authorities saying that that needs to quickly escalate to $4 trillion, which is a dizzyingly large amount of money … as an annual spend.”

    According to the International Energy Agency, clean energy investment will need to hit over $4 trillion a year by 2030 in its Net Zero Emissions by 2050 Scenario.

    Reaching this kind of figure will require a huge effort from both the public and private sector, and the stakes are high.

    Don’t worry. Everything we could possibly need or want is right there in that magic hat.

    • Lackadaisical

      “$4 trillion a year ”

      That’s a shit load of graft .

      4000 BCUs*, a year? Don’t think we can afford that, even WITH the printer going burr.

      *Biden corruption units

  40. Pope Jimbo

    Why are people meddling with Nature?

    SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — When no travel is advised or an interstate closes, it’s not a reason to check and see how bad it is or use an online map application (app) for another route, officials said this week in South Dakota.

    “I think the biggest problem we have is when the interstate closes and (online map app) reroutes them to county roads or highways. (Drivers) aren’t paying attention to road closures,” said Shane Croeni, the sheriff of Hand County in Miller.

    During a recent storm, Hand County officials had to dig out a woman who was traveling from Florida to Washington. Her online map directed her from the closed I-90 to other nearby roads, Croeni said.

    “She was on such a remote rural road,” Croeni said. “She ended up stranded and stuck. She was about 20 miles from the nearest town.”

    Nature wants these dummies to die. Anyone not noticing the blizzard outside their car should be removed from the gene pool.

    • Fourscore

      So I should skip Cribbage Practice tonight at the Old Timer’s Bar in downtown Remer?

  41. Scruffyy Nerfherder

    I’m deadthreading this, but it’s too delicious to wait.

    From Tom Woods’ email:

    This is one of the juiciest emails in a while.

    I devoted an issue of this newsletter as well as an episode of the Tom Woods Show to the fiasco at Stanford University’s law school weeks ago when Kyle Duncan, a judge of the Fifth Circuit, was shouted down by students who expect us to believe their fact-free ideological weirdness without question, but cannot themselves so much as sit and listen to anyone who disagrees.

    Well, there have been a couple of interesting developments since then.

    First, two judges of the Fifth Circuit, James Ho and Elizabeth Branch, have announced that in hiring clerks they will exclude students from Stanford Law School.

    Second, and to my mind more interesting, is what John Banzhaf is doing.

    Banzhaf, professor emeritus at George Washington University Law School, is no minor legal figure, as you will see below.

    He may come down on the progressive side of things, but he’s old school: let’s have both sides hash it out and may the better side win.

    Here is his letter to Dean Jenny Martinez:

    Professor Jenny Martinez
    Dean of the Stanford Law School
    RE: Complaint to Bar Admission Authorities Regarding Incident With Judge Duncan

    I am writing to advise you that I plan to file formal complaints with bar admission authorities opposing the admission of students identified as violating the free speech rights of Judge Duncan and their own fellow students. The complaint will have links to video recordings of the disruption so that bar officials can judge the students’ conduct for themselves.

    As you have conceded, the students’ conduct “was inconsistent with our policies on free speech,” and “not aligned with our institutional commitment to freedom of speech.”

    Indeed, the students’ conduct very clearly violated Stanford’s official written policy which unequivocally states that “it is a violation of University policy for a member of the faculty, staff, or student body to: Prevent or disrupt the effective carrying out of a University function or approved activity, such as lectures, meetings, interviews, ceremonies, the conduct of University business in a University office, and public events.”

    I take this action for the reasons stated on the next page because it appears that you have not taken any steps to discipline or otherwise sanction the student violators, nor have you “tak[en] steps to ensure that something like this does not happen again.”

    You should know that my prior complaints have led to the ban on cigarette commercials, the current criminal investigation of Trump in Georgia, the House’s reprimand of Barney Frank, the discontinuance of wrongful police prosecutions in Baltimore, a $12 million settlement by McDonald’s, the $300 million settlement which established FAMRI, and more.

    Indeed, I’ve been called “a Driving Force Behind the Lawsuits That Have Cost Tobacco Companies Billions of Dollars,” and “The Law Professor Who Masterminded Litigation Against the Tobacco Industry,” among others.

    I look forward to learning through the media of steps you will be taking in response to this incident with the judge, and to “ensure that something like this does not happen again.”

    CC: Judge Duncan, President Marc Tessier-Lavigne, Senator Ted Cruz,

    Stanford Law School Federalist Society, Stanford Law School National Lawyers Guild

    Yours truly,

    /S/

    John F. Banzhaf III

    • Gender Traitor

      Good for him! Got a link good for following further developments? If not, please keep us posted!

  42. The Late P Brooks

    Indeed, I’ve been called “a Driving Force Behind the Lawsuits That Have Cost Tobacco Companies Billions of Dollars,” and “The Law Professor Who Masterminded Litigation Against the Tobacco Industry,” among others.

    I suppose this falls under the heading of Eating Their Own.