Year: 2018

Protecting Our Purity of Essence

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The latest health fad for people is untreated and untested drinking water:

Welcome to 2018, where some things never change. Selling snake oil to those with more money than sense is still a thing, and the newest “health” trend is already upon us.

According to the New York Times, a new “raw water” movement is springing up in the West Coast of America, particularly in affluent areas like Silicon Valley and San Francisco, in an attempt to “get off the water grid”.

We’re sure many of you are scratching your heads and wondering what on Earth “raw” water means, and, taking its literal meaning, why on Earth that would be a good thing. So, let us explain.

“Raw” water (yep, sticking to air quotes) is, according to Live Water – who sell 11-liter (2.5-gallon) bottles for a hefty $37 – unfiltered, unsterilized, untreated spring water, and this is a good thing because unfiltered water has some kind of loosely defined probiotic quality, filtering water removes beneficial minerals and tap water is poisoned by those in charge.

They are literally spending 7 times as much for water as I do for regular unleaded gasoline.

To quote a character from a comic book, “I firmly believe that if you can’t fool all of the people all of the time you should start breeding them for stupidity.”

Here is some musical accompaniment to this story:

OK, This is F%$#ing Amazing Trolling

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This may be the best troll ever done on Twitter:

this is the best pic.twitter.com/VondMhYhgk

— sam glover (@glovelyjubbly) January 1, 2018

When I first saw this, I thought, “People should never quote that overrated hack ……… Ummmm ……… I mean Freidrich Hayek, not Selma Hayek ……… I’m fine with quoting her ……… OMFG! That pack of right wing nut jobs just got completely owned.”

Well played, my friend, well played.

You got movement conservatives saying that Freidrich Hyek used his looks to get ahead.

That is brilliant.

H/t DC at the Stellar Parthenon BBS.

Better Judgement or Cowardice?

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A couple of weeks back, I went to lunch with my colleagues at work.

We went to Mission BBQ with colleagues.

Mission Barbecue includes a heavy branding on the whole, “Support the Troops,” thing.

One of the things that I discovered, when we arrived at noon, was that they play the Star Spangled Banner at noon, as we walked in the door.

Everyone was standing, looking at the flag with their hands on their hearts.

I just stood there, no hand on my heart, but then I thought, “Maybe I should go down on one knee.”

Instead, I just stood there.

Should I have kneeled, or perhaps (as a friend suggested) lift my arm in a Black Power Salute, or would that just make me an asshole?

I’m still conflicted.

It’s Called a Windshield Wiper

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I saw an article talking about how Silicon Valley is a terrible place for testing self driving cars because the weather there is too good.

Of course there is not a whole bunch of snow there, but there are ski resorts about 100 miles away, and mountains, etc.

They also make the point that this is a tremendously difficult problem.

The truth is that it is not a big problem.  The solution is called a windshield wiper.

In fact, I spent nearly a year working on a windshield wiper system for the LIDAR sensor clear on the US Army’s now canceled MULE (Multifunction Utility/Logistics and Equipment ) program.

The windshield wiper was complex, because the sensor covered about 200 degrees, and the windows were faceted with sharp edges, and I had to design a linkage to make the wiper follow the profile, and EMI/RFI shielded cabling, and gas tight seals, etc. ………

This is not trivial, but the solutions are straightforward, and California can accommodate pretty much all of the environmental conditions with the exceptions of tropical rain forest and tundra.

The real problem with the self-driving cars being developed in Silicon Valley is that the Silicon Valley ethos simply does not work for things that have to work outside of a computer.

The debacles at Theranos and Juicero are classic examples as to what happens Silicon Valley tries to conquer the real world, it turns to complete sh%$.

There may be self-driving vehicles capable of driving on any road before I die, but they will not come from the minds of Google, or Tesla, or Uber.

It might come from the NSA, it might come from Detroit, but truly autonomous cars are not cute cat GIFs, so I don’t expect them to come from the Randian supermen of Silicon Valley.

You Run the Most Incompetent Campaign in History, You Change Nothing, and You Want My Money

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The same incompetent people are running the same organizations, and are allowed to continue to be paid without anything even vaguely resembling adult supervision, but they are surprised when it proves difficult to convince people to throw good money after bad:

Democrats aim to win back control of Congress and build up their presence in state capitals during next year’s elections, but they begin this ambitious mission with precious little cash to finance it.

The Democratic National Committee had $6.3 million in the bank on Dec. 1, while the Republican National Committee had six times as much, at $40 million, according to documents the parties filed with the Federal Election Commission. In November, the DNC posted its worst fundraising amount for the month in a decade.

The Democratic Party’s political committees dedicated to House and Senate races show more parity with their Republican counterparts, but not enough of an advantage to outweigh the struggles of the DNC. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee ended November with $34.2 million in cash, compared with National Republican Campaign Committee’s $42.3 million, fundraising reports show.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a former DNC chairman who hosted a party fundraiser at his home Dec. 14, is among the Democratic stalwarts stepping in to try to reverse the course. “I have heard a lot of donors say they need to take a break,” said Mr. McAuliffe. “The party’s job is to convince them they can’t.”

The national committee’s lackluster fundraising is at odds with a wave of enthusiasm Democrats have experienced across the country: A new Wall Street Journal/NBC poll found 50% of respondents want Democrats to lead Congress after next year’s elections and 39% said Republicans—a Democratic lead that has widened since an October poll.

Over the last election cycle, the Democratic establishment in Washington DC:

  • Systematically eliminated Hillary Clintons’s potential opponents in the primaries. (Not just Sanders, but O’Malley, Biden, etc.)
  • Studiously ignored reports from the field.
  • Strip mined the state and local parties.
  • Lost to an orange haired carnival clown who was caught on tape bragging about assaulting women.
  • Spent over a BILLION dollars doing all of the above.

People are not donating because they think that the current “Professionals” running the party will just waste the money on stupid sh%$.

Clean house publicly, and send the current lot back home to flip burgers, and the money will return.

Missile Deal is Signed

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Turkey has officially signed a deal with Russia to buy S-400 Triumf surface to air missiles:

Turkey has finalized a deal with Russia to purchase the S-400 Triumph (SA-21 Growler) missile defense system, in a move that is likely to irritate NATO allies. The deal was signed by Ankara on Friday, Dec. 29. ………

NATO in general, and the US military in particular are freaking out over this, because, as I have noted before, the Pentagon sees NATO as a sales vehicle for American weapons.

The Russian system is more capable, and cheaper, and given its origin, it is probably easier to maintain, but none of this matters to NATO leadership, because it doesn’t support the western arms manufacturers.

So basically, you have the military industrial complex on one side, and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on the other.

I’m just hoping that there is a way that they can both lose.

Linkage New Year’s Edition

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Oh Man! Oh God!