WTF-Beta

Though I almost never use cash, I think it’s a good law just to prevent an electronic-only payment system from turning into a social credit regime. At least offline.

Great story.

I can’t imagine what such a monotonous diet does to someone year after year. It seems like a high risk that it would be missing some key vitamin or mineral.

it’s hard for me to disagree.

No treadmill for me today.

In some cases. If you need to log in to shop then they know who you are.

I’m all for differential pricing to clear shortages but when they do it because they think person A or person B is willing to pay more I get miffed.

Yeah I’ll peruse politico and/or the hill if there’s some big inside baseball political story that I know they’ll cover better than the majors.

I’ll look at Reuters now and then.

Capitalism is the worst form of economic organization. Except for all the rest that have ever been tried.

This is probably a good messaging bill for the Dems though.

It’s a center right never-trumpian group. If you’re the kind the person who seeks a range of views but doesn’t want to dive into cult fandom in the attempt then it’s a great site.

Most people aren’t looking for a range of views, they’re looking for confirmation. So I only recommend it selectively.

Wapo, NYT, The Atlantic, The Dispatch. I pay for a few podcasts and/or substacks - Sam Harris, Andrew Sullivan, Ken White, Matt Yglesias. I think that's it. Nate Silver during election season only.

So Delta screwed me. I had originally paid around 1300 for the ticket. The day I changed it, they were going to charge me another 400.

Because a few days (5) had passed before I contacted them, the new itinerary AND the old itinerary were going to be about 2600, they wouldn't budge despite it being their fault.

So I told them to credit me the original 1300 and bought a ticket on United.

Yeah, I'm pretty pissed.

There was a chat option that took about the same amount of time. It was better since I could have the phone sit there silently and wait for the noise of a text arriving. With the phone it would have been almost 4 hours of hold music with a ‘your call is important to us’ message every minute.

That's what Delta tells me the wait time is for an agent.

No call back option was offered.

Get this - I had a flight leaving Lima for NY on Friday, coming back to Lima the following Friday. A few days ago I attempted to change it to a Saturday departure. At the end of that transaction, it said there was a problem and I should try again later. But somehow the original reservation went 'poof' and disappeared. Now when I enter the confirmation code it says reservation not found.

People with really bad combovers (Netanyahu included) usually do realize on some level, but a bunch of psychological and social factors keep the delusion alive. Here’s why they often can’t (or won’t) see what the rest of us see:

1. Gradual progression
 - It doesn’t happen overnight. The hairline recedes a little → they shift a few strands → it recedes more → they recruit more strands from farther back. Each step feels like a tiny, reasonable adjustment, so by the time it’s a full wind-tunnel-defying sculpture, they’ve already accepted every incremental stage.
2. Mirror reversal + selective viewing
 - We see ourselves in the mirror flipped, and we tend to look only from the angles we like (usually straight-on or slightly tilted). A combover that looks catastrophic from the side or in photos can still look “passable” to the owner when they’re checking it in the bathroom mirror each morning.
3. Vanity + ego protection - 
Admitting the combover looks ridiculous would mean admitting defeat to baldness. For powerful, image-conscious men especially (politicians, CEOs, etc.), that feels like surrender. Keeping the combover is a way of saying “I’m still in control, still youthful.” Cognitive dissonance does the rest: their brain literally filters out how bad it looks to protect their self-image.
4. Enablers and yes-men
 - Staff, spouses, and admirers rarely tell a prime minister (or any high-status person) the brutal truth. If everyone around them says “It looks fine, sir” or stays silent, there’s no reality check.
5. Habit and identity
 - After decades, the combover becomes part of their “look.” Changing it (shaving it, buzzing it, or owning the baldness) would feel like erasing part of their public persona. Netanyahu has had that signature swoop for 30+ years; ditching it now would be like changing his voice.
6. Photos lie (or used to) - 
Before smartphone cameras and merciless X/Twitter close-ups, people could get away with it more easily. Professional photos were airbrushed or taken from flattering angles, so the feedback loop stayed gentle.
   In short: it’s a perfect storm of slow creep, ego defense, sycophantic entourages, and outdated self-perception. Most of them probably have a tiny inner voice whispering the truth, but it gets drowned out by all the above.
   (And yes, the same psychology explains Trump’s version, Boris Johnson’s “intentional” mess, and every 60-year-old uncle who still thinks the three hairs from ear-to-ear are fooling anyone.)

Fantastic. Are you done done? Or just done teaching classes? In other words are you returning next semester?

Not sure how representative it is. Young college students in the rural county they describe and then Charlotte which was Kamala +33 in 2024.

Sorry to be a buzz kill.

Unfortunately this is a situation where the broad question is not ‘do we aggressively pursue AI’, it’s do we aggressively pursue AI too, or just let China do it’.

The later likely results in a global technological panopticon - a perfection of power which renders its exercise unnecessary, to paraphrase Foucault. I wish it were otherwise.