lack of commitment, rather than any law, was the key point.

This is the rub. Can he officially? No. But then, he can’t officially rename the Department of Defense either. What they can do is go in arrears on payments and refuse to cooperate with allies or acknowledge that a given incident involves treaty obligations, and be extremely open about all of it. The only thing the law does is give the next guy cover to walk things back because it was never formal, but by then 99% of the damage will have been done.

Just from a sheer nuts and bolts point of view, the foreign relations damage is going to take literally decades to undo, including at least 8 years of republican administrations that top out at George W Bush levels of fascist exceptionalism. No sane government would trust the US with long-term commitments otherwise.

I have a halfway decent woodworking setup, plus a 3D printer and a cheap laser, but metalworking is just not really an option. The space dedication, plus the oils and the fire hazards and the scraps/shavings/slivers/chaff/god-knows-what-else all being completely incompatible with sharing a space with the rest of it. Sigh, just not likely to happen until and unless I can get in with the makerspace mafia. I am thinking of trying to figure out designing for mills and using metal-bending workbenches in CAD, though, and sending more designs off to be fabbed.

I agree with the general takes here, and can add one for specific situations. I have some very old keyboards, and frankly even my newer ones rely on designs that are over 40 years old. In this particular case, I find the old tech superior, because they simply feel nicer to type on, and that’s what a keyboard is for.

I also have quite a few fountain pens, but whereas with a little effort the keyboards are as good or better than an average modern model, I’ll admit there is a fussiness and mess with fountain pens you have to weigh against the nicer writing experience.

Good for the recall folks, though I’m sure there’s a share of pure NIMBYs in there and some folks definitely having the day they voted for. That’s funny that the supporters think the 1000 construction jobs will be for locals and not the specialized oilfield-like firms that are already staffed up to work these projects, or that Google will have 200 permanent staffers tied to the location and contributing to the town’s tax base.

“Gravity plating!” As long as there is floor, you’re good.

Based on the number of anoles, skinks, geckos, and Texas spinys in our yard, I’m guessing that little display was for someone else.

My brother used to catch them and let them bite down on his earlobes.

Weird dude.

However, after a weeks in the role, several FEMA officials said they came around to Phillips after seeing his initiative during the January storm response.

“Gregg Phillips is FEMA’s best hope at this moment. I can’t believe I’m saying that,” one high-ranking FEMA official told CNN at the time.

Same, unnamed FEMA official, same.

Experts report the alloy was unmoved by the masterful prologue to Pixar’s 2009 classic Up.

I don’t know what kind of vibe I’m giving off, but I always seem to get the “Deepstate, amiright?!” drivers. Okay, that’s a lie… I do know my vibe… I live in a Texas suburb and I’m a cishet white guy who wears cargo shorts and dadcaps and likes sports.

I hate it, but still, this person is taking me somewhere I need to be so I want to be nice, but I can’t quite bring myself to pretend to agree. Unfortunately, a polite “Oh, I’m not sure I’m sold on that” just gets them helpfully trying to probe, “so why would Kamala do a pizzagate if she weren’t a lizard person?”

Fuck me, I need some tattoos.

Yes, but they also extract every penny of value from them. Minimum legal time for breaks, no visible tattoos, cell phones turned off, and broad manager discretion about things like having a stool at checkout. Apparently they are very upfront about it in interviews, at least, but they know they’re often the highest-paying employer for miles around, and they leverage that to the hilt.

Employees seemed somewhat happy too.

They pay legitimately good wages for the markets they are in. However, they also know they are paying good wages, so they make the employees earn every single penny. I understand that it’s more stressful and tiring than an average retail job, but as Don Draper would say, “That’s what the money’s for!” In reality, it almost certainly depends on the individual managers and whether the store is hitting targets.

“For the warfighter.” I suppose there’s a certain clarity of assholery, but jesus, the marketing direct to Hegseth and Trump’s 80s rom-com bully personas is nauseating.

Also, while it’s always been hypocritical to soft-pedal what the most powerful military on the planet is for, the mere act of opening yourself up to accusations of hypocrisy moves the discussion to a place that culturally asserts some level of civilian control, which also implies some limit to the barbarity. People are inherently assholes and will seek the bottom; lowering the bar in advance just encourages even worse behavior.

It may have been “designed” by this guy, who seems to be from San Antonio. He seems like a peach among peaches.

Visibly upset, Martinez told Prokopas that he previously worked for the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office in Texas. He said he had just been discharged from Critical Response Strategies, the private contractor that provides security at the detention center, after a physical altercation with another guard inside the facility.

EDIT TO ADD: In Texas, Sheriff’s offices in big counties like Bexar, Dallas, Tarrant, Travis, and Harris aren’t even regular day-to-day cops. They run the jail and serve process if the constables don’t have the manpower.

I was around almost at the beginning of Eternal September. In December of 1994, I posted to a newsgroup that google eventually archived on the web. Beyond that, my eBay account predates y2k. The first purchase I recall was a parallel port ethernet adapter so I could use Arachne for DOS on my 386SLC33 laptop in the university library. I mailed out a money order and hoped this “buying shit on the internet” thing wasn’t going to be a scam.

I liked the way they’d introduce non-dinosaurs (and sneakily, the main pterosaur family are not technically dinosaurs either) from the fossil record, like the giant snake. There were definitely WAY worse things that I sat through, but PBS kids of that era had a ton of good shows (and now too? I dunno because it doesn’t have Hatsune Miku and friends so therefore my daughter doesn’t care). She actually still has an “Odd Squad” lore book in her backpack.

Matt Groening is his former brother-in-law. Dinosaur Train was in the rotation when mine was little. It’s not a top-tier “parents will notice the layers” one, but it’s very tolerable and a good show for the littles.

Imagine if that one fire were the series finale. All-time great show if you end it there.

Always grimly funny when you can basically suss out the lazy-ass prompt: “Now do the same message, but Spanish.”

They say they used a paid actor. Of course, even if that’s true, it’s not particularly hard to find someone with a similar pitch, accent, and timbre, and then finish fixing it to make sure it’s as confidently soothing as the NPR voice you wanted to steal in the first place. I suppose in one sense it’s not utterly different from hiring a soundalike, but now the soundalike is damn near perfect (the clips in the article are VERY similar and feel more like the difference in recording equipment than anything else) and doesn’t need to actually be available to perform for new impressions. Yet another example of “withstand motion for summary judgment, string it out, lobby against future guiderails” as the totality of Silicon Valley’s legal philosophy.