Posts Tagged ‘education’

Five Under the Fedora Truths Homeless for Fun and Profit, All Beers Look Alike to Me, Breaking a Twitter Habit, The Chosen Speeding Up and Biden Economy expectations

Posted: August 16, 2023 by datechguy in business, culture, economy, education, entertainment, tech, twitter
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Glenn Reynolds notes the shock of some that passing a law concerning homeless camps and actually enforcing it has caused camps to vanish. This is a disaster for some NGO’s in the sense that they get a lot of government and state money to solve a problem that can be solved by just enforcing the law.

Key quote:

We get urban decay because we tolerate it. And as for the nonprofits/NGOs, homelessness is far too lucrative a problem to solve.

There is no incentive to solve a problem that is both a profit center for you and allows you to claim virtue.

Speaking of profit centers there is a 2nd post at Insty today on a man who will be teaching about the Budlight fiasco at business school. It’s is certainly a subject worth scholarship but it that had a line that likely floated under the radar to most people that I found absolutely hilarious:

He emphasized that beer is essentially the same product, and what sets it apart is the power of its brand

I would submit and suggest this is pretty much true. I suspect a lot of brand loyalty in beer is all about habit. Break that habit and you break that brand.

And Speaking of Breaking the habit as of Today Tweetdeck is no longer a free service when I tried to access it today I was redirected to a screen offering me a blue subscription check for $80 a year.

The real point is Twitter’s value basically comes from addicting people to multiple streams of data and giving folks who want to reach a maximum size audience (advertisers etc) access to that stream. This move gives an incentive for people to walk away from the stream and once people are broken of the addiction your done.

While Elon Musk should of course make the best possible business decision for his product I submit and suggest this is rather foolish. Tweetdeck makes twitter useful because it allows you to view multiple streams in the same window. Without it twitter involves too many tabs and simply isn’t worth my time. I might keep a tab with my DM page available and I might answer embedded tweets I see elsewhere but if you want to get me to see something by putting it on twitter odds are starting today I’ll miss it

On a totally different note I was shocked to see that season 4 of the chosen was going to include the razing of Lazarus from the dead.

Given that this is the last big miracle before the entry into Jerusalem I figured we would see it till at least season 5, particularly since we are going to get the beheading of John the Baptist this season which comes much earlier.

That suggests that either season 7 is going to be all passion and resurrection, with season six all Jerusalem

(Don’t be surprised with the number of characters there is plenty of material for this to be the case) and Season five everything else OR that Dallas plans on moving up the Death, Resurrection and Ascension of Christ and having a large chunk of season seven covering a big chunk of acts.

Either way it will be interesting to see how he handles it.

Finally we have regularly been getting short weeks at work. Last week was 30 hours, the week before 32 and the week before 30 which is a great incentive to burn vacation days for people and unpaid time off has been offered which can be tempting on a really beautiful summers day.

Yesterday on the drive in all of us in the car agreed that we would be lucky to end up with four hours although one of us was optimistic enough to suggest me might manage 6.

Much to my shock and everyone else’s as well there seemed there was plenty of work in my department and by moving some people to it during the day ( and letting a few go home early who wanted to ) all of us who stayed managed to our delight a full 8 hours of work which guarantees us at least a 32 hour week.

That’s how bad the Biden economy is, it’s so bad that getting a full days work in the middle of a work week on a day you’re scheduled to work a full day is a pleasant surprise worthy of note

Pa gov tries to compromise on school vouchers, but fellow Dems block his moves

Posted: July 11, 2023 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper 

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro wanted to cut a deal with the Republicans, but his fellow Democrats wouldn’t let him do it. 

The issue was important: school vouchers for kids in failing public schools throughout the state.  

Surprisingly, Shapiro supported a $100 million program to pay tuition at private and religious schools throughout the state.  

The Republicans, who control the State Senate, wanted the deal. The Democrats, who control the House of Representatives, blocked it, bowing to complaints from teachers’ unions and other leftists.  

Shapiro had to back down because the Democrats had kept the state without a budget for five days over the issue. “One party can’t get anything done on their own. Democrats and Republicans need to work together if we are to accomplish anything here in our state capital,” said Shapiro, who added he was disappointed but did not want to plunge the state into a “painful, protracted budget impasse.” 

Some Republicans expressed shock at the turn of events. 

“If this was the plan in the end, (Shapiro) certainly will have ruined his credibility with us, which to this point had been pretty strong,” said Sen. Chris Gebhard, R-Lebanon. 

Senate Republicans have not necessarily lost all their leverage. Other items that Democrats had wanted in the budget bill — and that Senate Republicans agreed to in exchange for the private schools program — might need separate legislation to spend that money. 

And Republicans haven’t scheduled the Senate to return to session until September 18, allowing them to hold up the budget bill until then without the constitutionally required signature of the presiding officer. 

Rep. Tarik Khan, D-Philadelphia, argued that boosting money for public schools — not private schools — must be a priority for lawmakers to try to wipe out disparities. 

But public schools, particularly in large cities like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, have been a mess for years. After the COVID shutdown, tests demonstrate that the students have fallen way behind in math and reading at all levels.  

The budget impasse also means higher education support remains in limbo, particularly for Penn State, Temple University, and the University of Pittsburgh. All the schools are reeling from declines in admissions and scholarships.  

I must credit the governor for trying to reach across the aisle, but here it’s the Democrats, not the Republicans, who favor unions over student success.  

Under the Fedora: Felton on D-Day+79, Haiti the future of Chicago et/al, Loomer finds spare time, Stacy on coked up Elementary principal and Dallas answers Pride flag questions.

Posted: June 6, 2023 by datechguy in crime, culture, election 2024, elections, politics, under the fedora
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Today is the 79th Anniversary of D-Day and International Treasure Mark Felton has another new video on the subject, this time about the drop of dummies to decoy the German forces:

There are very few D-Day vets still left, but long after the last one is gone Mr. Felton’s videos will be informing generations yet unborn of their deeds and the deeds of others during world war 2.

It’s not equal to the legacy as those who fought on D-Day but it’s not bad.

Apparently the folks in Haiti have had enough of Gangs and police and pols who protect them for profit and have taken matters into their own hands, rather violently:

The 14 presumed gang members under arrest were arriving at a police station in Haiti’s capital, when a group of people overpowered the police, rounded up the suspects outside and used gasoline to burn them alive.

This has continued to the point where gang members are in hiding in fear of their lives and crime has plummeted.

Coming soon to Chicago , Oakland, Minneapolis and Philly? Let’s both hope not and hope that those cities don’t reach the point where it’s considered an option.

Trump supporter Laura Loomer confronted James Comey in Illinois during a book signing event. Gateway Pundit has the details:

It’s a nice change for her going after someone who has actually done wrong rather than going after Governor Ron DeSantis in an at best unartfully and at worst blatantly false manor.

I have admit while I’m glad Loomer was restored to Twitter the way she has been alienating some conservatives you would think Musk’s move to restore her was an in-kind contribution to the DeSantis campaign.

Trump has in my Opinion been the Best record of a US president since Teddy Roosevelt if it was up to me that would be my focus.

Stacy McCain has a story that has gotten very little press concerning a couple of married elemental school principles who got a tad involved with drugs and hasn’t ended pretty although fortunately nobody has died.

You need to read the whole thing but I want to you catch his close which asks an excellent question :

The school district can’t comment, but I can. More than a month before police found Michael Griffin ranting delusionally at the local grocery store, they went to their doctor because he was already suffering with delusional beliefs caused by his cocaine habit. Here’s a question: How much cocaine does it take to induce paranoid psychosis? And how could two public school employees afford such an expensive addiction?

A cocaine habit is not cheap, and you’ve got to be doing it pretty heavily — like, the Eagles on tour in 1977 — to reach the point where you’re in a grocery store parking lot babbling paranoid gibberish with a pistol in your pocket. How were the Griffins able to do this much coke while functioning as elementary school principals and nobody even noticed?

Finally while I was writing this post I saw Dallas Jenkins finally made a public response to the gay flag controversy that has been dogging the show for a week. It is a first rate response which I’ll post here:

His basic response was he hire crew or cast based on belief or lack thereof nor does he police people’s workspaces as long as they do their job and are committed to the show, nor does he police their social media, although there was a suggestion that temperance and judgement be used in some responses that were made online, which given the crowd funding nature of the show would be wise.

His bottom line is feel free to make up your own mind but he’s going to do what he does the way he does it because he’s not doing any of it for us per se but for God

As Gamaliel once noted time will tell who this work is from but, as for myself his explanation is good enough for me.

Five Assorted Thoughts Under the Fedora: Post Christian Old Twitter, Peer Pressure at FW Parker, Griner’s perspective, Sinema’s feint, Oil bills and Ben Franklin

Posted: December 9, 2022 by datechguy in culture, education, politics, tech, Uncomfortable Truths, under the fedora
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The 2nd batch of Twitter files dropped showing that the folks at Twitter pre-musk were lying though their teeth concerning shadow-banning and manipulating trends.

To conservatives this is no surprise, to the left now that denial is no longer an option have started calling it “Old News” but I suspect the endgame it what I predicted a while back deciding to say it’s justified and celebrate it.

This is what happens when you throw out the whole “Thou shalt not bear false witness” business.

Yesterday I speculated concerning the reaction of parents at the Francis W. Parker school over the Project Veritas revelations:

Now in fairness this is Chicago land of the left so it is possible that the school administration and the parents while wanting to avoid the drugs, guns and the lack of an actual education in the public schools, might pine for the indoctrination to the liberal/gay agenda that they kids are missing so it is very possible that they might be all on board with this kind of thing.

It hits me now that the school has publicly defended the Dean in question that even parents who are not onboard on this stuff might find themselves not only keeping silent but leaving their children in the school due to peer pressure, after all as part of the liberal Chicago elites who can afford to spend $40K annually for a private school they are part of an elite club and might get a lot of pushback socially for doing so.

Parents of courage and integrity will willing to pay the price for the sake of their kids, but for those who know this is wrong and stay silent, I say to them I have more respect for those who actually support this monstrosity than for you, at least they are acting according to their warped beliefs that it is right.

Social status or your kids welfare, choose one.

Of course if the funding dries up from Alumni all this will be moot as they’ll drop these folks like a hot iron.

Yesterday with the help of the Saudis and others the Biden Admin managed to get Brittany Griner back from Russia in exchange for a rather dangerous Russian operative.

To say the optics of the trade and the White House spin are bad is an understatement but I won’t begrudge the release of any American being held in a Russian prison for a trivial crime.

What I’m more interested in seeing is how Grimes who has not had a lot of kind words to say about her home country reacts the next time the Anthem is played at a WNBA game she is in.

There is nothing like being in a Russian jail cell to give a person perspective on the relative merits of one’s country vs another. One hopes Griner has gained said perspective through her ordeal but we will see.

There is a lot of fuss being made about Senator Kristin Sinema leaving the Democrat party. There should not be.

As long as Sinema is caucusing with the Democrats it will make no difference in control of the senate nor is it likely to make a difference in how she votes on issues.

The only reason for this change is to eliminate the need for her to run in a Democrat Primary.

What’s really going to be fun is to see her try to pull off a Murkowski but I suspect Charlie Schumer is going to be a lot less forgiving of this renegade incumbent than Mitch McConnell was of his.

After all for the left politics is their religion and they have no mercy for apostates.

Finally my first oil delivery and bill of the season came in. It’s double what it was back in the days of Trump.

A lot of people who happily voted for Biden in the Northeast are going to get an education on the principle that you get the government you deserve over the next few months.

And just wait till they get their local property tax bills because every single city and town is paying more for their oil and gas too and that’s going to be passed on in terms of limited services and higher tax bills.

Of course that’s not much comfort to me as I’m in the same boat despite warning them about it.

As Ben Franklin said: “Experience keeps a dear School, but Fools will learn in no other, and scarce in that” I don’t expect them to learn from this, because that would involve admitting they were wrong. They’d rather pay and buy blankets than face that horror.

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