Be Careful Out There

Chatgpt made a guy think he found a significant scientific breakthrough.

If I were to teach class on using AI, I would include Her in the syllabus. Also I believe, the Seinfeld episode "Serenity Now" should be mandatory viewing in all schools to teach people to beware of easy solutions to mental problems. Serenity now means insanity later.

Logging

TV: Atlanta S1 E2

In jail lock up episode, one of my single favorite tv episodes from any show of all time. 

TV: FNL S4 E1

What they did to reboot this show in S4, genius level. Also, they found Michael B Jordan. Give them some credit.

Script: Taxi Driver

Can't believe he wrote this at age 26. 

Agree

The assessment of Palestine/Palestinians seems to me correct. I don't believe their problems with Israel are uniquely anti-semitic, but are rather political in nature. Or at least they were. No more than Americans in the 1940s were uniquely anti-Japanese. Although, to be fair, the original hostility toward Israel has morphed into what could easily be described as anti-semitism, even if it didn't start that way.

But whatever. The fundamental problem with the Palestinians are refusing to acknowledge their position or to accept their lack of power. I know, they will claims justice, justice, justice. But let me ask this - why do no other communities from this period deserve justice, justice, justice. What of the German citizens who were savaged by the Soviets? What of the Chinese displaced by the Communists? What of all the Eastern Europeans who were similarly "occupied?" To me, it just seems pathological at this point to even care about your great grandparents losing a home. And even if that is wrong, even if you should care, the relevant point is that if you can't actually do anything about it but blow yourselves up or murder random Israelis then it seems like you ought to reconsider your life decisions.

The Game

LA won't let people who lost their homes in the fires rebuild without going through onerous bureaucratic hurdles. Now, they offer to buy the land to put up "low income" housing.

Who knew the Soviet Union reconstituted itself in California. Despicable.

Deadline

Nearly ever headline on deadline about Emmy nominations right now says something about "first time in history..." followed by a fill-in-the-blank. Sort of dilutes the "first time in history" thing... Call it "first time in history" inflation.

Logging

Film: Sorry, Baby 

Positive critical response to this film is a good example of the spread of a negative emotional contagion.  The A24-verse can be said to serve this demographic. It's a bit more whimsical and light than other misery porn entries, yet the defining characteristic of the main character is her contemplation of suicide. Where do these suicidal thoughts come from? I don't want to give it all away, but suffice to say, the "incident" didn't merit that reaction, in my opinion. The word snowflake came into my frontal cortex.

The film also lacks structure and hence a climax. It doesn't feel like it builds toward anything. More like a long, flat line. 

A good "first film" by any measure and impressive achievement for the writer/director/star, but not a great movie, nor my kind of movie at all.

Did like the academic setting, though.

Climate Change

Interesting how the topic absolutely disappeared from the world's agenda the moment national security issues came to the fore.

Underestimated issue in general - timelines. Impossible to focus on long or medium term issues when faced with short term crises.

RFK

Not only normal, but awesome. People giving him shit for taking his family fossil hunting? That's an awesome idea.  

We've Lost the Plot

Since we're talking about whether Superman is an illegal immigrant. As one of my kids used to say, jeez weez. 

Safetyism

This all sounds about right. 

Logging

Film: Howard the Duck

70mm series. Lea Thompson deserved an Oscar. How do you act with a midget in a duck suit? Very impressive. 

Popularity Overrated in Geopolitics

Would you prefer to be in Ukraine or Israel's position? Ukrainians are popular round the world, yet their reality is daily bombardment by an evil enemy who kidnaps their children and wants to brainwash them into being Russian. Their front is a slaughterhouse for their young men. Israel on the other hand is now "unpopular" round the world, but they can sleep at night because their enemies are decimated. 

Who would you rather be?

Point is, the only time it was "popular" to be American in my adult life was post-9/11. So take that as you will. 

Logging

Film: The Searchers

70mm screening at the Egyptian. One of the great pleasures of living in LA. Packed theater. Amazing crowd. Amazing film. Several impressions - surprisingly funny on this watch, a bunch of romantic slapstick bits. Implication in the film that John Wayne is a crook and a racist. The runtime for such an epic film only about 2 hours. It goes by fast. Very economical storytelling. Really, pretty close to a perfect movie. Music though doesn't age great.

Film: A Quiet Place, Day One

Needed something more from this movie. The family, emotional stuff helps propel the other two. This one needed more relationship situations or some good old fashioned alien killing. It had neither, so it just became internal and meditative without frankly much to say about the characters other than they were experiencing trauma. Relying too much on the cat to generate sympathy.

Logging

Film: Crash (Cronenberg)

So many thoughts on this film...but the main one being - the characters have so much freedom back in 1996 compared to 2025. None of movie feels plausible today because the characters would be far too constrained to do what they do throughout the film. And it isn't the government, but rather work demands, social demands, etc. Fascinating. Haunting.

Social Security

Everyone thinks we've got a crisis with Social Security, but I believe there is a fix. The system was designed and sold as an insurance system, but we gamed it into a pension system. Therefore, rich people need to give up on some of benefits that turns their retirements into easy living. The system is meant for grandma to have a roof over her head and get groceries, not to fund an inflation protected annuity for those with assets in the 5-25 million range. The true benefactors under this system are the children and charities who will inherit the unspent assets for people with too much dough to spend in their lifetimes. Is that what social security is for?

Value Investing

Is not in fashion at all. But here's why I tilt. 

Value stocks rise with inflation. So when you need the money, it's there. This is an important point. 

Just read any story about booms and busts. People buy 13,000 square foot homes in Midland Texas during oil booms when they have a huge net worth. 2 years later, they find themselves in millions of dollars of debt, in possession of oil rigs and homes they can't sell for 20% of what they paid for them. The point is not having the money, but having the money when you need it. 

Brains

Most people are too dumb to understand why capitalism works, including myself. But I am smart enough to know socialism doesn't, whereas many of my fellows in the State of California are not.

Code Breaking

People on the internet arguing about Mamdani calling himself an African American on a college application. Let's discuss.

1) Detailed arguments supporting Mamdani inadvertently argue for getting rid of affirmative action. They rest on the point: it's absurd to categorize on race. Exactly. 

2) The offended people are American blacks, an important coalition in the Democratic party. Why? Because Mamdani and everyone else damn well knows what African or Black heritage means. (Mamdani is Indian, okay. That counts in our world as Asian, South Asian specifically).

3) The Mamdani gamble/predicament is that the noisiest and most likely to call foul on the claim of his African American heritage are likely to overlap with his pro-Socialist, anti-Western views. Think AOC, Briahna Joy Gray, etc. These people will give him a pass, I'm positive. An interesting political question will be whether this "group" now outweighs the group who might actually be offended - someone like Stephen A Smith, for instance.

4) The worst case scenario is that we are indeed already in a 1984 type of situation where the unwritten "rules" for this type of thing are deliberately opaque so that who possess "power" dictate whether Mamdani broke the rule or didn't break the rule. Very dark, Russian-esque. 

Deep Risks

1) Inflation

Combat with: hard assets, inflation protected bonds, value stocks, stocks in general, fixed rate mortgage (negative bond)

2) Deflation

Combat with: cash

3) Confiscation

Combat with: nearly impossible to do, but...Roth IRA? Some might say crypto or foreign real estate

4) Devastation 

Combat with: nearly impossible to do, but...community ties in out-of-the-way places? Insurance, if possible?

Many Weird Things

If you were in a coma in the late 1990s and woke up today, one of the weirder things would be to discover that in the Jurassic Park Franchise apparently humans and dinosaurs now live amongst each other? 

That factoid alone would suggest something has gone very awry in the world, perhaps even moreso than Donald Trump being President.

Logging

Film: F1

Perfectly enjoyable but not A-plus level. A hair below the joys of Top Gun Maverick. A bit too long. Poker scene was forced. But still lovely to be in a packed theater with gorgeous images and actors and a classic stranger comes to town story. 

UPDATE/NOTE: Prior to F1, I hadn't seen a trailer. Was there a trailer? I'd only seen posters and heard of it. Meaning I went in with no sense of the story whatsoever. It got me thinking - maybe this is a way to regenerate interest in films - tell us less about them. Then we actually have a reason to go. Often, trailers tell us waaaaay too much. Just give us vibes. Brad Pitt, car racing. I'm in. No need to tell us more. So even though this story was familiar, I didn't mind it. Don't give us so many hints about the story...just let us vibe.

UPDATE/NOTE 2: Is there anything to be made of Joseph Kosinski's mother being from French-Canada, same as Denis Villeneuve, the two biggest and best studio filmmakers out there right now?

What To Do With Dumb People?

Genuinely difficult question. Our answer over the past 25 years or so seems to be: let them feel smart by letting them into college and make "learning" easier. 

The result: far left and far right become pseudo intellectual morons who want to drag the world down. It was so much better when they did blue collar jobs, drank beer, and rooted for sports teams. 

America

Still remains a mysterious place to me.

"People are pouring baby oil over one another"

"It's not RICO, it's freak-o"

Maybe movies are having a hard time because real life so magical. 

Random Thought

An amusing aspect of Brokeback Mountain is how shitty Jack and Ennis are at all their jobs. 

Logging

Film: Love Hurts

More interested in "being a movie" than reflecting life or human existence. The tone doesn't totally work. Ke Huy Quan does a Jackie Chan impersonation. He's not terrible but also isn't Jackie Chan. I wonder if the casting sheet for one the characters read simply: he drinks a lot of Boba. Still, I watched the whole thing.

TV: The Day of the Jackal

Terrible end of the season "twist," undermined the entire show. Reminds one of how cheap and pointless television can be.

Did anyone watch this show? I've never heard a soul talk about it. I go online. Rotten Tomatoes very vague - don't even show numbers. Then go onto IMDB - over 100k ratings. So someone watched. 

But I can't find anything intelligent written about the show on a brief perusal of the internet. Maybe I'll check chatgpt.

No Less Absurd Than Other Political Platforms

Hot people for hot people. "Ugly people do not deserve to hold office." 

Remember A Couple Months Ago

When Trump critics cited the plunging stock market as a sign of his policy failures. Does this mean those same critics will regard new all-time highs as policy success? 

Indeed

Good readers are hard to find. 

A Phenomenon, Again...

Once again when I offer extra credit in a class, the results are: A-students who don't need extra credit do it. Students whose grades could actually benefit from it don't.

All Socialists need a model to explain this phenomenon. Should I redistribute the extra credit?

Fascinating

Summary about Chinese car-making. A good model on how grit and competition work over the long haul and why not to be deterred by failure.

Is She Drunk?

She thinks Biden deserves a victory lap for the stalemate in Ukraine-Russia and the Iranian nuke situation?

Say Whatever You Want

About Trump, but he seems to be addressing and on top of the issues of the day. You might not like how he's handling them, but he addresses them. This is so foreign to the Democrats who literally ignore the relevant issues or just let the issues coast along. And then prioritize "non-issues" endlessly.

My Bias

If I were campaigning against this NYC mayor candidate it would be along the lines of his nepo-baby luxury beliefs and far left liberal madness NOT the fact that he lived outside the US for some part of his life and is a Muslim. 

Weird Theory

School needn't be difficult to learn a lot. Working on a theory that school could 2x the amount of material learned while simultaneously being easier and less of a grind.

My only issue with this theory is that perhaps learning to grind is itself a useful skill, though I'm not 100% convinced.

Me Either

"I'm upset that my parents never got rich enough for me to become a socialist."

Key Point

For those who seem to think the Iranian program was only set back a small amount or not at all. 

Lastly, as Iran starts thinking about digging up that 60% HEU and rebuilding its program, it now has to contend with the almost certain possibility that Israel and/or the United States will strike it again as those efforts begin in earnest.

The timeout works because the child knows the consequences of future misbehavior. Yes, Iran can continue toward the bomb. However, the people who must do it knowingly put a target on their back (and are incentivized to snitch to Mossad). Plus, the Iranians risk doing the work only for it to be blown up again.

Logging

TV: The Day of the Jackal S1 E1-E2

Strong set pieces, acting, and production value. So why isn't it very compelling? Because thrillers don't work terribly well in TV format. TV requires dimension and relationships, so they give the Jackal a wife and kid. The fucking Jackal! Not gonna work. Imagine the TV version of No Country for Old Men where Anton Chigurh goes home to deal with his gay son. Fuggetaboutit.

TV: Poker Face S2 E1

I can't figure out why I liked the first three episodes of S1 and abruptly stopped watching, and never felt a reason to go back. One theory is the format. I always liked mystery-of-the-week shows like Columbo, Murder She Wrote, even Scooby Doo. The problem with Poker Face - it's not a mystery! We know what happened. The format of the show is actually a short film from the villain's POV, followed by a truncated procedural from Natasha Lyonne's POV. In theory, this should work because I like procedurals and I like short films. But here's the rub - in the mixing of genres, they remove the two elements I like most from each. In short films, it's all about the tone and style. Story doesn't matter as much. But the tone and style of Poker Face is set. Once you've seen it once, you get it. Quirky, "intelligent" humor, for the avante garde college student. Good, great. Get it. Even like it. But the pleasure of short films is seeing a new, original, unexpected tone and style or place. What are the pleasures of the procedural? The mystery, the puzzle, the whodunit or perhaps even why dunnit. But in Poker Face we know who and we know why, so the only tension is seeing HOW Lyonne cracks the case. And it's not as compelling. The show knows it, so it leans on the charm of the performers. I suppose whether the show works rests on this question. It does seem like actors are "having fun" and yes, I put that in quotes. 

Good Idea

Villenueve to direct James Bond. 

American Socialists - the Lena Dunham Crowd

Rich kids who can't compete at the highest levels use their social charisma and terrible policy ideas to gather support amongst the lower 85% within elite and semi-elite society. I don't see this as a winning formula. These are the kids who had advantages but couldn't get into Ivies or semi-Ivies or elite professions - so you see them coming from Oberlin, Bowdoin, Boston University, etc., and having done jobs like aspiring rapper, waitress, assistant, etc. All they want to do is redistribute status away from the strivers toward themselves, but will incidentally turn our cities into shitpiles.

Iran and Nukes

We don't know the extent of the damage, but many of those who opposed any strikes seem pleased it "only" set back the program a few months. They don't see the irony that doing nothing would not have set back the program at all.

If these people were parents, they wouldn't discipline their kids, arguing to themselves that the kids would probably misbehave in the future anyway.

Suggestion to New York...

Run a Republican. Why not? This socialist nepo baby got 430,000 votes in a primary. You don't think a Republican can beat that?

Immigration

It is true that if Trump were serious about cracking down on illegal immigration, he would go after the employers rather than the ICE raids. Similarly, if the Iranians were serious about getting revenge, they would unleash terror cells around the world.

Perhaps these theatrical stunts are better for everyone. What do you think?

Local Hearts Foundation

I give it a 40% chance someone in this organization gets convinced of an awful, heinous crime within the next 5 years. People will then say, "I can't believe it."

The guy is driving around in a white van picking up vulnerable immigrants with promises of food and money.

Narcissim vs Ideology

Would you rather have a leader who desperately wants to be loved and admired by his "people" or a person guided by ideology? Which option has better checks and balances and leads to better outcomes?

Irony

Could closing the Straight of Hormuz ironically benefit the United States as a net energy exporter?

Wow, And Just in Time For Father's Day

Karl Marx's dad shits all over his philosophy. 

Incredible.

Reminder

Trump is actually moderate on illegal immigration. He's prioritizing sending back criminals, not the regular hardworking folk. 

Value Proposition

Can someone explain the value proposition of AI making movies or writing novels or journalism? Say you drive down the costs. What does this achieve? More movies and novels and news articles? Has anyone out there seen all the movies or read all the novels they want to? I doubt it. In fact, my lists are too long already.

It's like AI is designed to put Hollywood out of work so they can get back to the real fun stuff like gardening and washing dishes and raising kids. 

When you step back, the thing makes no sense. Why invest trillions in this? Why not invest trillions in solving real problems? Like maybe AI could solve medical problems or have a military function, but that's not what we see right now.

What I've Been Saying

"Watching Morning Joe talking about California and Trump and Newsom and the military and I'm seeing Republican dominance of American politics for the next two decades unless these people stop being psychotic"

Democrats been captured by the mentally insane wing of the party.

PS - Pitch: to hold elected office one needs to pass a mental health check. Reasonable, right?

"Fascism"

LA Times reports 330 illegals detained. Hundreds protest. Consider the population of LA area - around 12 million. The turnout and stakes of this situation is smaller than a high school football game. 

Live action role playing for all involved. 

What Am I Missing?

Republicans and Democrats see immigration differently. Republicans want to crack down on illegal immigration. Democrats don't. Republicans won the national election handily and thus control policy. They won the debate politically. California Democrats think it doesn't matter, they want to oppose how the Federal government enforces immigration policy under vague reasoning like "democracy is under assault." I think what they are attempting to argue is that what Trump is doing violates rights. But they can't articulate what rights. So what they are really arguing is that it's "mean." Their actions in this matter are seditious.

I Don't See the Argument

Maybe ICE raids are brazen, cruel, and unnecessary. But I don't see how they are illegal. Newsom and Bass are encouraging insurrection and non-compliance with federal law. We live in a country last time I checked. 

Democrats

Burning an American flag is freedom of expression but burn a Mexican flag or a Pride flag is a hate crime.

Why Does Anyone Object to ICE Raids?

If in the US legally you should man up and accept the occasional ICE raid. This seems to me entirely fair game. If you're under 21 and wandering around drinking booze and acting like an idiot, accept you'll get an occasional minor in possession. If you keep it on the down low, you'll probably get away with it. Same with being an illegal immigrant. If you act cool, you'll probably be fine. 

This systematic rejection of any immigration enforcement makes zero political sense. You're just helping Trump. If anything, let him overextend himself. 

Da' Mayor

Karen Bass claims we would not have protests if not for ICE raids. Another way to look at it - we would not have ICE raids without open borders and sanctuary cities. 

UPDATE: After spending about 6 hours over the last couple days weather treating a new gate, I am officially in favor of all illegal immigrants, especially for those with painting and fence building skills.

Great Tweet

"Hey guys, instead of taking the 20% side of 80/20 issues, let's take the 5% side of 95/5 issues"

Trump's greatest skill is simply knowing how to bait liberals into looking like the idiots they are. 

LA Riots

First they rioted for BLM, then Palestine, now immigration. It's all organized by the same people. The only unifying idea is a hatred for what Americans prefer (no DEI, Israel to win, and legal immigration).

Logging

Film: The Plot Against Harry

The most Jewish movie I've ever seen and you can consider that a recommendation. 

Also one of my favorite subgenres called "Man Gets Out of Prison and struggles to recacclimate." 

They Won't Dude

Bill Maher suggests to liberals bringing Elon and Joe Rogan back into the fold. 

They won't because they can't. They bet the farm on pronouns and Hamas. Aren't gonna recover. 

Best Headline of 2025 So Far

"Alex Jones-Catturd Proxy War Breaks Out Amid Trump-Musk Feud. 

Logging

Film: The Substance 

Starts terrific but gets progressively worse. Need a word for that in a film. It's the same beat over and over. I got so sick of the film last night, started thinking this should've ended 15 minutes ago. What's going on. Then I check the time - 30 minutes left! Unbelievable. When did we start taking 90 min genre pics and attempt to turn them into 2.5 hour epics? Horrible idea.

20 Years

Like I've said, Dems won't win a Presidential election for 20 year operating at this level of absurdity. They don't want to enforce immigration laws and give illegals free healthcare. And this while our national debt spirals out of control. They want to bankrupt the country.

Evil

Officials in North Carolina charging parents with a felony for letting their kids walk to the store and one gets hit by a car and dies. 

Weirder

Seems like things are just gonna keep getting weirder for awhile longer. I wish there was a way to bet on this.

Democrats Are Quiet Quitting

In Minnesota, a boy "powers" his softball team to state championship while the league, etc force everyone to remain silent.

I continue to think Dems won't win a Presidential election for 20 years. 

“You’re looking at a whole team of future Republicans,” one man said.

Personally, I don't see why the teams don't protest now and sit it out, but I'm sure it comes with annoying consequences. But the real dummies are the Democrats. Do you think people are going to forget this - ever?

Liberals

I'm sure liberals don't know how to react to the Elon / Donald feud. My guess is they start removing the bumper sticks off their Teslas? 

Class Based Affirmative Action

I want to congratulate myself for coming to this conclusion in high school roughly 30 years ago after a friend claimed he was African American because he had French ancestors who lived in Morocco at one time.

Oh, Good News...

"Life really does begin at forty. Up until then, you are just doing research." Carl Jung

Accreditation for Columbia

If colleges want to die on the DEI hill, I suppose they will get their wish.

Be Careful With AI People...

"To the red country and part of the gray country of Oklahoma, the last rains came gently, and they did not cut the scarred earth."

Here are a few improved versions, depending on the tone you're aiming for: 

Option 1 (More concise): "The last rains fell gently on Oklahoma's red and gray counties, barely touching the scarred earth." 

 Option 2 (Maintains original rhythm): "To Oklahoma's red country and the gray, the final rains came softly, leaving the scarred earth untouched." 

Option 3 (More vivid): "The last rains whispered across Oklahoma's red and gray counties, too gentle to heal the wounded earth." 

The original has a nice biblical cadence, but "part of the gray country" is awkward, and "they did not cut" is unclear—rains don't typically "cut" earth. The improvements clarify the geography, strengthen the imagery, and create smoother flow while preserving the elegiac tone.

No.  

Bi, Non-Binary

Although I don't really understand these fashionable concepts, the closest thing I can come to is that I don't identify as my actual age but as both 37 and 57. 

A Possible Future

AI won't write our fiction for us, but we will write our fiction for the AIs. 

Yes...

The majority of guys I know are Democrats.  I would guess exactly 0% are pleased with the direction of the party in the past 10 years and every single one at least flirts with jumping to the other side if they haven't already.

The guys who are super vocal supporters of Dems nowadays are weird tools and normal dudes see right through them.

Delusions

On the left and right.

China - Pretending to Work

In China, they pay to pretend to work. In America, we simplify the expression and just call it work.

Logging

Film: Wicked

Watched last weekend and forgot to log it...suppose it had that much of an impression on me. Story not bad, emotions not bad. If China could make such a film, I'd be worried. But still not my cup of tea.

Film: Sicario 

Rewatch...although this film seems right up my alley, I never loved it. In fact, I contend the sequel is better (contrarian coming out). But upon rewatch, I'm not totally wrong. Something is off about the film. The main issue is the lack of an underlying morality, or the moral universe in which the film operates. It's so deeply pessimistic about human nature, the vibe asserts that "American" values are only slightly superior to the cartels because we manage to be moderately less evil. Bleak! No universal, humanistic concerns. In fact, Emily Blunt's moral objections to the actions of Brolin and Del Toro seem to amount to "not following the rules." As if FBI procedures are the thing that makes us non-savages. 

In Public Enemies, Michael Mann shows numerous characters disgusted by the FBI guy torturing a woman for information. In Sicario, we are all meant to understand and root for Del Toro the torturer because he gets results. 

But this isn't the biggest problem with the movie. The biggest problem is how the film represents itself as gritty reality, but is in fact completely absurd. A former lawyer becomes a Sicario for the Columbian cartel to get revenge for his family while secretly also working with the CIA? We're sending over Delta Force and the CIA to Juarez to kill cartel dudes because of bad press in Arizona? Huh? If you've seen any of the Tom Clancy or Michael Mann films, I don't see how this film feels plausible to you. It bears closer resemblance to John Wick than Jack Ryan.

Credit Default Swaps

"Analysis by Torsten Sløk, chief economist at Apollo, suggested that US government credit default swap spreads — which reflect the cost of protecting a loan against default — are trading at levels similar to Greece and Italy."

I can't pretend to understand what this means, but it can't be good.

Ukraine and Drones

Can't stop reading about this Ukraine attack. So impressive. I guess I keep going back to my theory on these wars - my feeling is our strategy should be to help Israel and Ukraine win.

Logging

Film: Mission Impossible Final Reckoning

Every parent of a young boy in the world is familiar with "hey dad, look at me..." followed by jumping off the bunk bed, climbing the monkey bars, or throwing a curve ball, etc. These films are Tom Cruise doing "hey dad look at me" to the whole world as a 60-something year old man with a $500 million dollar budget.

Other observations:

-a lot of nuclear bombs laying around on timers in this world

-exposition at the beginning comically poor

-set pieces are beyond incredible

-nice final moment as a callback to the conceit of the franchise

The best part of the later part of the franchise: side character casting. A lot nice discoveries.  

Seems Right

Lessons from a Russian oligarch. 

"A man must regularly, every five to seven years, change his life. If he doesn't do that, he becomes internally boring." It goes on.

Logging

Film: Sing Sing

A film emblematic of our peculiar moment. They insert a subplot about Coleman Domingo contesting his wrongful imprisonment, implying his innocence. But the the filmmakers elide entirely past whether he was wrongly imprisoned for decades or unable to admit his guilt. They will surely argue their film "wasn't about that," to which one might ask - then why make it a subplot at all? I know the answer. They want to make us empathize with the character and thus suggest he was an innocent man. But then they want to insist the film itself isn't about injustice but rather the power of art to heal. In other words, they want their cake and to eat it too. 

The steel man case might be - we are telling the film from the perspective of Divine G - and from his perspective, he was an innocent man. I call bullshit. You might as well say Norman Bates was actually his mother. Come on people. Lets grow up.

The first time I encountered this phenomenon with younger people was around the time of the podcast Serial. After listening to 8 hours of this thing, I asked some younger folks whether they thought Adnan murdered Hae. They couldn't answer. Literally couldn't come up with a thesis. All they knew were the cops acted poorly and Adnan should be free. So I said, well then that means you think Jay the friend who Adnan showed him the body was lying. They said, no. So they managed to hold this position in their minds that Adnan both didn't murder her, but Jay also didn't lie. As if this were possible. 

We see this everywhere now. We had to believe Christine Blasey Ford's testimony against Brett Kavanaugh even though literally not a single person could corroborate any of the details. Nor could she present any evidence of anything like the incident ever taking place. To this day, I would bet 80% of Democrats "believe" she told the truth. Why? Because they find it mentally impossible to think it couldn't be so. And so yes, Coleman Domingo is innocent because his character believes it to be so. If only there were no such thing as reality.

WNBA Racist Fan Incident That Wasn't 

Reads like an Onion article. 

Everyone seems to love how the WNBA handled the non-incident. Incredible. 

Lawlessness

I have a lingering sense the so-called liberals will regret only following laws they feel are moral. 

Logging

TV: The Four Seasons

I thought it was a White Lotus rip-off, turns out not to be the case. Coleman Domingo steals his scenes. The show...what can I say? I finished it... Will Forte much better when weird than serious.

Film: Return of the Jedi

As a kid, my favorite Star Wars but as adult I see why least loved of the first three. Film peaks in the first third.

Film: The Phantom Menace

Pod-racer sequence underappreciated! The acting...not so much.

War and Irony

The more Putin succeeds in Ukraine, the greater opposition he will face. 

Similar Thoughts 

Tyler Cowen rips Scott Alexander a new one for not thinking...this is a huge problem for all the anti-Trumpers - they simply think reflexively everything he's doing is evil. 

Take Harvard. A common refrain at this moment amongst those I'm most sympathetic to goes something like this - yes, Harvard is really messed up and needs fixing, but Trump has gone overboard and wants to vindictively destroy the institution. But where I differ from them - I don't see Harvard fixing itself. How can they? What indication is there Harvard is even trying? The place is captured. All the canaries in the coal mine are dead. It's probably been captured or borderline captured for 25 years, but only now is it self evident to everyone outside their walls. There are approximately 0% conservative faculty. They had a President who was a plagiarist. They are controlled by a cabal of billionaire offspring with weird agendas. If they could've changed, it would've happened. They can't. And everyone knows it. So the only choice you've got is Trump or someone like Trump or more of the same. 

Interesting

Brief snippet about why Harvard could be in financial trouble despite a "50 billion" dollar endowment. 

Points:

1) 80% of their assets are in private equity and real estate and are essentially overvalued or not properly valued. Why? Because the things they own don't have many buyers. It's like owning a 50 million dollar house but needing 100K to buy something. Where do you get the money? You can't sell a bedroom. Plus, you can't easily sell a 50 million dollar house. You might have no buyers or one buyer. And with one buyer - guess what? He isn't paying 50 mil. So is it really worth 50 mil? 

2) So Harvard borrows against their assets. They have something like 7 billion in debt. Not the behavior of an entity with "50 billion".  They are looking to me house poor.

3) For "income," Harvard depends on a few sources: Fed government, donors, tuition. Trump is threatening Fed govt and tuition (by targeting foreign students who pay full freight). 

Interesting stuff. Harvard might be in a worse position than they imagine. Say you own an NBA team. Those are worth 5-6 billion these days, right? But what happens if NBA ratings tank? Or like in golf, a rival league with big pockets starts poaching your stars. What happens to that 5-6 billion dollar value? It doesn't just stand to lose 20%. It can start to look like an albatross. It can go to zero. It can go negative. 

It seems almost unimaginable in the case of Harvard. But if the Roman Empire collapsed...

More Murders by Leftists

Everyone who celebrated Mangione knew they would be encouraging copycats like this new kid in DC. Hope you are happy, sickos.

Trump

Wins because despite many flaws he seems very human whereas the Democrats are the opposite - they dehumanize all. It all starts with identifying people by their race. 

The Moment I Think The Dems Are Peak Retard

The Republicans go "hold my beer." The guy wants to get rid of OPT for college students. This is a way for foreign students who come to the US to learn to get a work visa to find a job for 1 year. These are literally the exact cohort of people we would WANT to immigrate here - college graduates proficient in school and English to succeed. Essentially the most likely candidates to become be productive citizens. 

We want to discourage this talent pool? Are you kidding me? I don't even know what to say.

And if you want to be cynical and consider this program an immigration scam - well the scam is working both ways. It's a way for rich kids to come hang in the US. Is this a bad thing? What is the argument against rich kids coming to the US? Are they a drain on the resources in this country? I think not! They contribute by spending their rich parents money. Ask any club owner, movie theater chain, or clothing shop owner. And in general, the rich kids are more likely to be productive down the line with parental help, etc whether you want to admit it or not. I just don't see the problem. 

Let me put it another way - if we don't want these people at the party, who do we want?

Beginning to Think

Nancy Mace might not be okay upstairs... 

Smartest Decision of My Life...

Is not following the WNBA... 

Credit Rating Downgrade

US loses AAA credit rating for first time. 

Seems not good.

If Pres, I would cut $1k on every monthly social security check for every senior citizen raking in over 200K. Of course, I'd never get elected but our country is in shambles and someone has to pay for it.

Our "Elites"

As I've suspected/known from years ago, Pfizer executives held up the vaccine trials for political reasons (ie to avoid Trump getting reelected). These brilliant idiots killed thousands of their countrymen to get a dementia patient elected and provide us 12 years of Trump stealing oxygen ether rather than 8. Bravo you idiots.

An AI Tell

Good writing has a "hang out" quality to it. Meaning on some level you want to hang out with the book, script, author, etc - at least for a bit. When I read AI (and maybe I'm not using it correctly yet), I don't feel this. Everything takes a bit too long. Too many caveats and big, unnecessary words. Everything feels a bit generic. Overexplained. And not very fun. Like you want to punch it. 

Question

What percent of Mandarin speakers around the world immigrate back to China for better lives and opportunity? I figure the answer to this question will tell you a lot.

Newsom

After 7 years of letting homelessness fester in all our major cities, spending billions on "combatting" it, finally Newsom decides to "ban" encampments. What a complete piece of shit this guy is. He trashed our cities and wasted our money for his own political convenience. 

Shameful

Of all the people who knew of Biden's decline, not one called for him to resign. Why not? You call yourselves patriotic Americans? You can yourselves responsible citizens of the world? We had a President with dementia in charge of nukes and the "free world." You think the Russians and Chinese didn't know this as well?

When push came to shove, these folks chose partisan political calculations over wisdom. And the most pathetic thing - it didn't even work! They still lost the next election.

I Suspect

This will not work. 

Trump's prescription drug plan will likely lead to fewer new drugs being developed. 

Logging

Film: The Empire Strikes Back 

Watched with kids...they laughed out loud when Luke reacted to "I am your father." Striking thing to me - the film goes on for another 10 or so minutes after this climax with another climax -- Millennium Falcon escaping from Vader with Luke aboard, etc. Star Wars should be studied not for dialog or special effects, but how editing impacts storytelling. 

Film: The Equalizer 3

Watched over the course of several nights...went to finish the film and realized I had finished it the night before. It was that memorable. I wonder how many days Denzel committed to for the paycheck...my guess is 15. 

TV: Common Side Effects

Good show but has internalized all woke liberal platitudes of the moment which means it can only be admired but not loved.