I use an eBike to commute 2.5 miles to work most days. It is faster than driving and parking, and much cheaper than Uber/Lyft. A few details: Uber/Lyft costs $12 each way, so $5/mile Uber/Lyft takes 20 minutes: 10 minutes … Continue reading
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State of the Union preview. I go off on a tangent. It’s tonight at 9:00 p.m. ET. Pfeiffer: Tonight, Joe Biden will stand before Congress and the nation to give what will almost certainly be his most important speech of 2023. Last year, 38 million people tuned in to watch President Biden deliver his constitutionally mandated report on the state of the union. A similar number will watch tonight’s speech. Absent a major national event on par with the Space Shuttle Challenger crash or the operation to take out Osama Bin Laden, the audience tonight will be more than ten times larger than that of any other speech Biden will give this year. The speech will also receive a ton of press attention. It has already been the subject of approximately one million thumb-sucking think pieces. The State of the Union really is a tradition like no other. The State of the Union is also a weird speech. It’s a grand venue with a big audience in the room and across the nation. Even the least presidential Presidents look somewhat presidential giving the speech. In many ways, the State of the Union is a high-floor, low-ceiling speech.
You mean not start with hostility? Efforts to reform policing in this country usually involve reworking the training, more of it, eliminating qualified immunity, or technical solutions like body cameras. Mona Charon offers a novel start at police reform that requires politeness. The first thing the Memphis “Scorpion Unit” did when it stopped Tyre Nichols before beating him to death, Charon writes, was to curse at him. Over alleged reckless driving. Why? In a society as gun-saturated as ours, I can understand an order like Let me see your hands, or if the police are planning a roadside sobriety check, a request to Step out of the car. But there is no reason that both of those orders cannot be preceded by Sir or Please or both. Our judicial system is founded on the principle of innocent until proven guilty. Yet our police interactions with citizens too often seem grounded in the opposite assumption. Obviously, in the Nichols’ case, the profanity was the least of the offenses the cops (and others) committed, but it seems that some police lapse into profanity with citizens regularly.
Aaron says this is Trumpesque, which it is on one level. But really, this is Viktor Orban all the way: Note the Orwellian “Truth” running behind him.It’s very creepy. Orban’s method of media dominance probably wouldn’t work here in the US with our media system but the intent is the same. And I could easily see President DeSantis trying some of these tactics. If they can simultaneously weaken the judiciary some of them could work: As Orbán has consolidated his grip on Hungary, his control of the media is now nearly absolute. In 2010, he cut all state advertising funds to critical news outlets and threatened to sever contracts with private advertisers that continued to support targeted media. The following year, he established a Fidesz-controlled media council with the power to levy bankrupting fines against news outlets that did not favor the Fidesz worldview. Hit on all sides by financial attacks, independent and opposition media began to fail just as news media across the globe were struggling financially to adapt to the online world.
I think we can all name quite a few people like this. But it really does define the Republican party these days. I don’t think that all narcissists are fascists but it’s almost certain that all fascists are narcissists.
It’s that time again … Yes, we are hearing all sorts of rumbling hat Biden needs to step aside for the next generation because he can’t beat DeSantis/Trump/whomever and the Democrats need new leadership. This always happens and it won’t make a bit of difference in the end. If Biden wants to run he will run and he will win the nomination because he’s the incumbent. JV Last with a helpful reminder: It’s worth remembering that the in-party frequently has doubts about the prospects of the incumbent. For instance, here are some headlines from 2010-2011: This is a dance we do. How often? Buckle up for some history, courtesy of Pew and National Journal: Drink that in. (1) Obama, Clinton, and Reagan were all < 50 percent on “should they run for reelect.” (2) The only two presidents who were > 50 percent were the two who ultimately lost reelection. It’s out of our hands. If Biden wants it it’s his no matter what. If he doesn’t want it then let the games begin. But there’s no point in wringing our hands over it. *And yes, if he drops dead before the election then the deck is scrambled.
It’s hard to believe that Sarah Huckabee Sanders is now a Governor but that says it all about today’s Republican Party. She’ll be giving the State of the Union rebuttal, a slot reserved for the GOP’s “rising stars.” Huffington Post gathered a list of Sarah’s lies and outrageous rhetoric as press secretary just to remind you all of what qualified her for her new prestigious post: During Sanders’ two-year tenure as the press secretary for Donald Trump’s White House, stint as a Fox News commentator and new job as Arkansas’ Republican governor, Sanders has earned a reputation among her critics for lying with ease ― something she’s admitted under oath to doing ― and fiercely defending Trump’s most offensive behavior.
None of the solutions to the Government's concerns about migrant boats crossing the Channel require the UK's withdrawal from the ECHR, writes Brad Blitz
Will Bunch has some thoughts: The sight in recent days of Santos and several of his Republican colleagues parading through the hallowed halls of the U.S. Capitol with a mini-celebration of a killing machine that serves no civilian purpose beyond mowing down large numbers of innocent people in the shortest possible time is perhaps the most hideous assault on human decency I’ve seen in more than 40 years of covering U.S. politics. But that’s the point, isn’t it? The lapel pins — like those Christmas cards of their adorable blond kids armed to the teeth with high-powered weaponry or the right’s new love affair with the toxic fumes of gas stoves — are meant to “trigger the libs” and sustain a career arc that generates prime-time hits on Fox News and fund-raising emails without ever having to get anything done. Yes, you could argue this column, then, is a perfect example of what these cons want. But what a choice: playing along, or remaining silent while America sheds the skin of humanity.
One month ago, he was leading the fifth-largest country in the world. These days, he is wandering around Florida supermarkets, eating fried chicken alone at fast-food restaurants, and holding court for supporters from the driveway of a modest home owned by a former ultimate-fighting champion in a gated community south of Orlando. Jair Bolsonaro’s re-emergence in Florida is a bizarre spectacle, even for a state with a long history of providing haven to eccentric characters. The embattled ex-President of Brazil, who refused to concede his electoral loss in October, left the country for the U.S. on Dec. 30, two days before the inauguration of his successor, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. On Jan. 8, his supporters stormed the Brazilian Parliament, Supreme Court and Presidential Palace, violently threatening police and destroying property in an assault with eerie echoes of the attack on the U.S. Capitol carried out by supporters of Donald Trump Meanwhile Bolsonaro, once dubbed the “Trump of the Tropics,” has been hanging out just a couple hours’ drive up the Florida Turnpike from his former presidential counterpart.