Redneck Lefty

@rednecklefty.bsky.social

4755 Followers 3612 Following

Student of people, history and the sciences, scholar of fortune

Steven Miller with a lizard in his mouth, between his teeth, with tail sticking out, photoshopped.
National Constitution Center @constitutionctr.bsky.social Joined Nov ’24 Join Ilan Wurman for an #NCCBookClub conversation on his new book, "The Constitution of 1789: A New Introduction." Julie Silverbrook moderates. Register to attend Monday, July 27 at 6:30 p.m. ET: ow.ly/cans50ZnV5r
Wawa ad for cheesecake smoothies and milkshakes
@kenwhite.bsky.social aka Popehat Error Not Found Account has been suspended
John Herod, tyrant, gunman and killer of his son
UFO in large letters on top of an image of two hands holding a photo, obscuring the details of the photo
“Under the prevailing law of this Circuit, the prosecutor is not under an obligation to provide the Grand Jury with any legal instructions.” Finn, 919 F. Supp. at 1327 (citing United States v. Zangger, 848 F.2d 923, 925 (8th Cir. 1988) (Indictment should not have been dismissed because of prosecutor’s failure to instruct the Grand Jury on the applicable law of obscenity).
The Donald J. Trump and John F. Kennedy Memorial Center for the Performing Arts will present The 27th Mark Twain Prize for American Humor to Bill Maher bill maher Prize Will Be Awarded at the Trump Kennedy Center at a Gala Performance on June 28, 2026 Washington, D.C. — The Donald J. Trump
Understood in this framework, the LLM is simply the latest in a series of technologies that have promised the investor class that this time, finally, they can eliminate the need for competence and not have to consider or respect any value system other than their own. This is the fundamental conflict that competence engenders: rather than being a question of economic jealousy, a simple status conflict (it can involve status conflicts, but they tend to be more complex than the regular kind we're used to) or a question of being corrected on the facts (not fun, but everyone has some reality they eventually collide with and have to make their peace with), resentment towards or a desire to punish competence stems from the discomfort that comes from being forced into regular, serious conflict with people with a value system that differs drastically from yours and that you have, on some level, to acknowledge is superior to yours because it does things that yours can't. The competent engineer's value system can produce working, effective and maintainable software products. The competent medical researcher can produce mRNA vaccines that save lives. The competent public servant can arrange government projects in such a way that they get completed effectively and provide useful public services to everyone in a country.
In a new book, Liar’s Kingdom: How to Stop Trump’s Deceit and Save America, Weissmann makes the case for major reform to hold political liars to account when their lies damage democracy itself, without falling afoul of free speech rights under the first amendment. Weissmann proposes a Truth in Elections Act, built on existing law. The Stolen Valor Act of 2005, which criminalizes lying about military honors “with intent to obtain money, property, or other tangible benefit”, survived a US supreme court challenge. Laying out his case for new legislation, Weissmann pointed to countries that protect elections from damaging lies. Examples include Brazil, where former president Jair Bolsonaro was jailed for election fraud lies that fueled a failed coup, and the UK, where, in 2010, Labour MP Phil Woolas lost his seat after falsely suggesting an opponent supported extremist violence.
The development of Governing the Nation was guided by a distinguished scholarly advisory board representing leading universities and research institutions, ensuring a rigorous and balanced exploration of the separation of powers and federalism. Notable scholars include H. W. Brands, Cristina Rodríguez, Yuval Levin, Michael Klarman, Gail Heriot, and Ilan Wurman.
National Patriots Day info box in Wikipedia. 2026 date May 18, 2026.
Press Release Federal Grand Jury in Chicago Indicts Six Individuals on Charges of Impeding Federal Agent Engaged in Immigration Enforcement Operations Wednesday, October 29, 2025 Share right caret For Immediate Release U.S. Attorney's Office, Northern District of Illinois CHICAGO – A federal grand jury in Chicago has indicted six individuals for allegedly forcibly impeding and interfering with a federal agent who was engaged in immigration enforcement operations in a Chicago suburb last month. The indictment includes a conspiracy charge against all of the defendants arising out of the incident.
Cover of the book The Future of Truth
Headline from the Mississippi Free Press: Mississippi Governor Vows Thompson’s ‘Reign of Terror Is Over,’ But Cancels Redistricting Plans
On October 22, Gordon Richard, 77, from Georgia, Vermont, was sentenced to an 18-month prison term, to be followed by three years of supervised release, following his guilty plea to possession with intent to distribute cocaine.
One remedy is to keep fighting, expel the craven Republicans (and some Democrats) supporting Trump, then expel Trump himself. The remedy is to make certain that nobody involved in this travesty is ever respected or trusted or accepted again. That means among others W. Ellis Boyle, the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, and Matthew R. Petracca, the assistant United States Attorney responsible for this jurisprudential prolapse. Never trust them again, and never trust or tolerate again anyone who treats them as acceptable.
Goya's painting, The Third of May 1808 in Madrid
When elected leaders don't respond to democratic incentives, they are easier to beat at the ballot box. That's the good news. The bad news is that we have not just one fascist, but an entire fascist party to deal with. And that meansDemocrats need to do more than win elections. They need to crush the fascist party after they win Are they willing to do that? I hope so. But I am not as certain as I'd like to be.
The summons cited authority under 19 U.S. Code § 1509, which is part of the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930. The motion to quash by the defendant said the summons is not authorized by the law, which deals with imports of boats, alcoholic drinks, and animals, among other things.
Bun bun with switchblade saying, Bite Me Nerd Boy.
People call this friction "grunt work." Schwartz uses exactly that phrase, and he's right that LLMs can remove it. What he doesn't say, because he already has decades of hard-won intuition and doesn't need the grunt work anymore, is that for someone who doesn't yet have that intuition, the grunt work is the work. The boring parts and the important parts are tangled together in a way that you can't separate in advance. You don't know which afternoon of debugging was the one that taught you something fundamental about your data until three years later, when you're working on a completely different problem and the insight surfaces. Serendipity doesn't come from efficiency. It comes from spending time in the space where the problem lives, getting your hands dirty, making mistakes that nobody asked you to make and learning things nobody assigned you to learn. The strange thing is that we have always known this. Every physics textbook ever written comes with exercises at the end of each chapter, and every physics professor who has ever stood in front of a lecture hall has said the same thing: you cannot learn physics by watching someone else do it. You have to pick up the pencil. You have to attempt the problem. You have to get it wrong, sit with the wrongness, and figure out where your reasoning broke. Reading the solution manual and nodding along feels like understanding. It is not understanding. Every student who has tried to coast through a problem set by reading the solutions and then bombed the exam knows this in their bones. We have centuries of accumulated pedagogical wisdom telling us that the attempt, including the failed attempt, is where the learning lives. And yet, somehow, when it comes to AI agents, we've collectively decided that maybe this time it's different. That maybe nodding at Claude's output is a substitute for doing the calculation yourself. It isn't. We knew that before LLMs existed. We seem to have forgotten it the moment they became convenient.
Bill the Cat, sitting with legs apart is his disheveled glory, saying "Ack!"
The Conway horned sphere
Cover of Zelazny's Madwand
Inspired by other legal scholars’ use of Frankfurt’s “bullshit” concept to address serious controversies, including constitutional interpretation, I aim to apply Frankfurt’s definitional clarity to another legal methodology target: national security-related OLC opinions that rely extensively on previous OLC opinions as support for their key propositions. This matters because those key propositions in turn result in legal conclusions aligned with known policy preferences of the president. As Michael Smith put it: “Bullshit is worth calling out wherever it may be.” This piece takes up that challenge and finds that “the President’s law firm” is as guilty of purveying bullshit as any other group of legal professionals. This is an especially dangerous practice for a government agency. It often results in a superficial legal argument that supports a presidential policy preference well known to the OLC, that may or may not reflect the “best view” of the law, and provides a veneer of authority masking its objectionable “truthiness.”
Cover of Morris Kline's book, Mathematical Thought from Ancient to Modern Times
Sam Bankman-Fried with unkempt hair
Photo of Heather Weyker in police uniform, a white blond haired woman in her mid-40s. Above her is the statement: For years Weyker had been fabricating an interstate sex-trafficking ring she was supposedly investigating. The "investigation" led to 30 indictments - and 0 convictions.
In his statement, Keane said his office first learned about Shah Alam’s release from jail on Tuesday and will move to dismiss the charges against the man when they receive his death certificate. “I am saddened to learn of the tragic death of Nurul Amin Shah Alam,” Keane said. “I recognize the desire for answers sought by his family, friends and our community as his death remains under investigation.”
DESIGNATING PETITIONS – PRIMARY Feb 24 - Apr 2 Dates for circulating designating petitions. §6-134(4) Mar 30 - Apr 6 Dates for filing designating petitions. §6-158(1)
An oilcan of Foster's, standing in front of a full pint glass of beer.
Garden of Wisdom Timeless Teachings in an AI Era Book © 2025 Accessibility Information Overview Authors: Sharon Gal-Or To create a sustainable, human and nature-centric framework for the future Like the Kosmic Tree of Life and Circadian AI to align technology with human well-being Integrating ethics, ecology, and spirituality for a balanced AI-driven evolution Part of the book series: International Series on Computer, Entertainment and Media Technology (ISCEMT)
Book cover photo: The Joy of Factoring by Samuel Wagstaff featuring 3 adorable toddlers
George Kennedy as Dragline in Cool Hand Luke, feeding Luke one of 50 hard boiled eggs.
It would be great to try to break these habits, and I think that it is still, occasionally possible to find weird and surprising joy amidst it all. The most valuable transferrable lesson of Zohran Mamdani’s victory and early governing style may not be the talking points about “affordability.” Instead, it’s the capacity to discover delight in being outstaged by kids at press conferences, to admit fallibility, to experiment while admitting that things don’t always work, to build connections and to try to draw new constituencies in. I don’t see any fundamental reason why moderates shouldn’t be able to work with some version of that style of discovery and communication just as well as lefties, and I suspect that it would get them much further, and to more interesting and unexpected places, than doubling down on technocratic measures.
Mathematical Legends From Thales to Erdős
The Ministry of Truth BigTech's Influence on Facts, Feelings and Fictions Authors: Vincent F. Hendricks , Camilla Mehlsen Provides an in-depth analysis of the attention economy and information market Surveys BigTech businesses as potential arbiters of truth challenging democracies Written in a clear, crisp and concise style for a broad audience of laymen and professionals alike
9All Members-elect whose credentials have been received by the Clerk are included in the first roll call on opening day to establish a quorum. Delegates-elect and the Resident Commissioner, however, are not included in this roll call. See “Status and Rights of Members-elect” in House Practice, p. 158.
Man tells computer "say "I am alive"" Computer says "I AM ALIVE" Man says "oh my god"
Man tells computer "say "I am alive"" Computer says "I AM ALIVE" Man says "oh my god"
Man tells computer "say "I am alive"" Computer says "I AM ALIVE" Man says "oh my god"
A Springer Nature ad for the book Adversarial Machine Learning Attack Surfaces, Defence Mechanisms, Learning Theories in Artificial Intelligence
A list of speakers with photos at Turning Point USA, including Vance, Bannon and, circled, the editor in chief of Reason magazine.
Board of Trustees Leadership James C. Chambers ’81, Chair Emily H. Fisher, Vice Chair Brandon Weber ’97, Vice Chair; Alumni/ae Trustee Elizabeth Ely ’65, Secretary; Life Trustee Stanley A. Reichel ’65, Treasurer; Life Trustee Fiona Angelini Roland J. Augustine Leon Botstein, President of the College, ex officio Mark E. Brossman Marcelle Clements ’69, Life Trustee Asher B. Edelman ’61, Life Trustee Kimberly Marteau Emerson Barbara S. Grossman ’73, Alumni/ae Trustee Andrew S. Gundlach Glendean Hamilton ’09 The Rt. Rev. Matthew F. Heyd Catharine Bond Hill Matina S. Horner, ex officio Charles S. Johnson III ’70 Mark N. Kaplan, Life Trustee George A. Kellner Fredric S. Maxik ’86 Jo Frances Meyer, ex officio
Maria from Metropolis
Steve Bannon and Noam Chomsky sharing a laugh together.
Projecting modern attitudes backward though it may be, I refuse to countenance the idea of a god named Dave.
Checkerboard with shot glasses as game pieces