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NEVERENDING ♾️ The NEVERENDING Political Discussion Thread

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Bloomberg just reported that the Trump administration has been canceling grants that would have been used to make streets safer, add pedestrian trail and implement bike lanes across the country. All because cars are their top priority. One project in San Diego was canceled because it "appears to reduce lane capacity and a road diet that is hostile to motor vehicles," while a Fairfield, Alabama project was also called "hostile" to cars and "counter to DOT's priority of preserving or increasing roadway capacity for motor vehicles." Meanwhile, a project in Boston got canceled because improving safety might "impede vehicle capacity and speed."


These aren't new grants, either. The Trump administration is going after money that was awarded years ago — one Albuquerque grant was awarded back in 2022 — all with the goal of making sure no driver is ever slightly inconvenienced by local governments trying to keep them from killing people. Wonderful.


Read More: https://www.jalopnik.com/1975826/feds-back-off-on-pedestrian-safety-requirements/
 
The Kirk memorial thing was last Sunday. The news showed the beauty of it all. The huge lines of trash just thrown down. The litter scattered throughout the parking lot. The streets lined with trash. Even Cardinals games aren't this bad. Then again, someone would have to go to a Cardinals game.
 
& on a lighter note - sarcasm


According to a new study published on Monday, there is a strong link between Donald Trump being president and increased use of Tylenol.

The study, which was published by the University of Minnesota Medical School, reports that consumption of the pain reliever has increased by nine thousand percent since Trump’s Inauguration in January.

Professor Davis Logsdon, who supervised the study, called the data “surprising,” adding, “We expected the increase to be much greater.”

Logsdon said that the medical school would soon release additional findings linking Trump’s presidency to an increased use of alcohol, marijuana, and crack.
 
Bloomberg just reported that the Trump administration has been canceling grants that would have been used to make streets safer, add pedestrian trail and implement bike lanes across the country. All because cars are their top priority. One project in San Diego was canceled because it "appears to reduce lane capacity and a road diet that is hostile to motor vehicles," while a Fairfield, Alabama project was also called "hostile" to cars and "counter to DOT's priority of preserving or increasing roadway capacity for motor vehicles." Meanwhile, a project in Boston got canceled because improving safety might "impede vehicle capacity and speed."


These aren't new grants, either. The Trump administration is going after money that was awarded years ago — one Albuquerque grant was awarded back in 2022 — all with the goal of making sure no driver is ever slightly inconvenienced by local governments trying to keep them from killing people. Wonderful.


Read More: https://www.jalopnik.com/1975826/feds-back-off-on-pedestrian-safety-requirements/
President who famously doesn't drive pushes car rights.
 
Transcript Highlights of DJT speech to the Generals & Admirals

And if you want to applaud, you applaud. And if you want to do anything you want, you can do anything you want. And if you don’t like what I’m saying, you can leave the room.

Of course, there goes your rank, there goes your future. But you just feel nice and loose, okay, because we’re all on the same team. And I was told that, sir, you won’t hear a murmur in the room.

And I told Pete we should use some of these dangerous cities as training grounds for our military — National Guard, but military — because we’re going into Chicago very soon. That’s a big city with an incompetent governor. Stupid governor.

 

I listen to NPR's Up First podcast every morning and they were discussing Kegseth's emphasis on physical standards and combat abilities and his calling out of the Special Forces and the Marine Corps they had a nice little subtle jab at him by pointing out that he does not have a "V" for valor device nor a Ranger Tab.
 
I was genuinely impressed with how the generals and flag officers were able to sit in stony silence for that long without ever once busting out in laughter or otherwise breaking character. I make this judgment from the position of being one who has had to stand at parade rest for many hours forced to appear respectful while listening to old windbags bloviate.

Philips Obrien, made this apt observation about the speech:
“If you listened closely to Hegseth and Trump, they were basically saying the US military should be more like the Russian military – unaccountable for its actions, using lethality in favor of intelligence, and where training can be used to abuse recruits. And if they do that, I can guarantee you it will be as effective as the Russian military.”
 
In the first 72 hours of the National Guard being in Memphis, they report 93 arrests and 28 illegal guns seized.


I will be interested to see what they were arrested for, how many get prosecuted, and what is the lasting impact on the area.
 
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National Gard

Lol!

I'm enjoying your inadvertent spelling malaprops! Actually, come to think of it, since this is the Failing Forty-Seven, a National Gard is not a mal-aprop; it is but a a tres-aprop! (That's a frenchified "very appropriate".)

Bigly thumbs up to you! Thanks for the laugh ~ tresaprop
 
Well, this is frustrating.

We have an internal policy requiring all our development services staff to get their CIS-100 certification. If/when we activate the EOC, I want staff to at least understand what people are talking about when staff gets reassigned.

2 new people started this week and went to take the course yesterday only to find this:
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They shut down a fully automated class, with a fully automated test and registration program due to the shutdown.
 
Well, this is frustrating.

We have an internal policy requiring all our development services staff to get their CIS-100 certification. If/when we activate the EOC, I want staff to at least understand what people are talking about when staff gets reassigned.

2 new people started this week and went to take the course yesterday only to find this:
View attachment 65470

They shut down a fully automated class, with a fully automated test and registration program due to the shutdown.

Yep.

A lot of the databases and datasets we routinely use from the DOL and Census/Commerce and BLS are all offline and I just noticed earlier today that some of the APIs that I've built out to pull data from federal sources to our website are starting to "break". Thankfully, most of the spots on our site will now just show the last data that was available but I did spend a good portion of yesterday and this morning going through and taking a few of our pages offline completely because the APIs were broken and returning error messages on our site.

I remember a lot of the databases going down during all the other shutdowns too but back then I didn't know how to use an API so it wasn't really affecting my pages and dashboards. I couldn't update things manually because of the shutdowns in the past but at least it didn't actively break parts of our site.
 
Treasury weighs minting $1 coin with Trump’s face for U.S. 250th anniversary


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"To avoid the appearance of a monarchy, it was long-standing tradition to only feature portraits of deceased individuals on currency and coin," it said. "That tradition became law with an 1866 Act of Congress."

“No coin issued may bear the image of a living former or current President,” says the federal law − 31 U.S. Code 5112 regarding coin denominations, specifications, and design,
 
I am reading a book on communication right now, and the author pointed out something about personal identity. He noted that the associations we belong to, the believes we have, the political parties we subscribe to, can become as much of our identity as how we look or the profession that we are in. He didn't dwell on the political party thing, but did expand on the idea that when we attack someone's beliefs, for many it is as if we are attacking them as a person.

That is when I realized a massive part of the problem. We (as a society) go beyond beliefs in policies and wholistically adhere to the entirety of a political platform or movement.

If you think about it for a moment, if you ask someone who aligns themselves with the Republican Party, specific characteristics and if they would support someone who is a narcissistic womanizer, they would say of course not. But the same could have been said about the Democrat Party during the Clinton Administration.

There are fundamental principals and policies from both parties that I think are essential for the future of this civilization. But unless we stop focusing on the party and start focusing on those principals, it won't get any better.


EDIT: Really? Come on....

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I am reading a book on communication right now, and the author pointed out something about personal identity. He noted that the associations we belong to, the believes we have, the political parties we subscribe to, can become as much of our identity as how we look or the profession that we are in. He didn't dwell on the political party thing, but did expand on the idea that when we attack someone's beliefs, for many it is as if we are attacking them as a person.

That is when I realized a massive part of the problem. We (as a society) go beyond beliefs in policies and wholistically adhere to the entirety of a political platform or movement.

If you think about it for a moment, if you ask someone who aligns themselves with the Republican Party, specific characteristics and if they would support someone who is a narcissistic womanizer, they would say of course not. But the same could have been said about the Democrat Party during the Clinton Administration.

There are fundamental principals and policies from both parties that I think are essential for the future of this civilization. But unless we stop focusing on the party and start focusing on those principals, it won't get any better.


EDIT: Really? Come on....

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I think there is some merit to the idea, but I know a lot of old men in their 70s who were diehard democrats before switching to the Republican party with Regan.
 
I think there is some merit to the idea, but I know a lot of old men in their 70s who were diehard democrats before switching to the Republican party with Regan.

I believe there are fractions within both parties that don't necessary fit the mold of the party. Just look at some of the Tea Party that caused issues for the Republicans and the Squad for the Democrats.


EDIT: (Add-on)

The National Guard has been in Memphis for a week and they had 321 arrests. More than half of which were people who already had warrants out.

I have gone into the City twice since they arrived and have yet to see anyone other than the local, county, or state police.
 
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Comrade Karoline told us yesterday that drug prices were going to come down 100%, 200%, to 300%. That's not what tRump said a couple months ago when he said they'd be lowered 1500%.

I can't wait to be paid to take my medicine. That's better health care than any other country.

You gotta love MAGAMath.
 
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