I suspect it is because he believes he can con Trump into giving him control over the entirety of NASAs budget

The cyber truck is, at this point, a malfunctioning status symbol. I suppose a 100K truck that sucks at being a truck is intended to communicate the driver is a successful tech guy but, whenever I see one, I think “there goes a rube”. I have a similar reaction when I see those gaudy designer bags or “luxury” branded tee shirts. I don’t think “there is someone who is successful” I think “that person is an idiot.”

There should be a catchy term for status symbols that communicate the opposite of their intention. Stupidity symbol? Status irony? Status error? None of these really roll of the tongue.

When bad people do good things they are generally seen as sinister, as if they are concealing a horrible action behind a facade of good will. So if you believe the government is fundamentally evil, and you see it trying to do something good (which is the whole purpose of FEMA) then its actions are going to look sinister to you. So stories about FEMA having camps (at their core, these are stories about the government using the facade of aid and assistance to hide something evil) will make sense to you because they are consistent with your sentiments about the what the government is. So too would stories about FEMA using disasters as a pretext for land snatching or stories about FEMA ignoring people in peril because these are all stories about an evil government. To the extent that they are consistent with your sentiments about the government, they are easy to accept as true, even if they contradict each other.

I often have the opposite experience when looking for technical documentation about programming libraries. For example I will be dealing with a particular bug and will google the library name plus some descriptive terms related to the bug, and I get back general information about the library. In those cases, it seems google often ignores the supplemental information and focuses only on the library name as If I were looking for general information.

What is worse is that the top results are always blog-spam companies that just seem to be copying the documentation pages of whatever language or library I was looking at.

Former CEO of the river poisoning company says there is no way to meet our river poison reduction goals, so we might as well build bigger river poisoning machines because they might help us figure out how to stop poisoning the river. /s

I feel like there was a time when the tech folks in silicon valley had a lot of credibility, and we are now living in a period where most of the world sees them as a joke but that fact has not yet entered into the culture of silicon valley.

longer version that includes defense and prosecution arguments as well has her bananas defense of her conduct.

Starting at 42:31 and going for about 2 minutes is a really stark example of how conspiracy theorists just do not care about the truth and will ignore evidence no matter how obvious.

Starting at around 1:45:12 and going on for about 2 minutes is a really good example of what not to do if you are speaking to a judge at your own sentencing hearing.

Used get my haircut at one of those “no appointment needed” haircut chains. Then they got an app, and every time I went it was “Why aren’t you using the app? You need to use the app. Next time use the app. Download the app on your phone. It’s gonna be an hour wait because you didn’t use the app.”

Now I just go to a local place.

Even if you accept the claim that they were duped at face value, what does that say about them? These folk’s whole pretense is that they can “see through the media’s lies” and that they are able to tell what is really going on. But they were not smart enough to recognize that they were part of a propaganda campaign? They want you to believe they have a sophisticated ability to recognize media manipulation but also now want you to believe that they were hapless stooges that were tricked into participating in a media manipulation campaign.

I went to one for a candidate for the House district I lived in a few election cycles ago, It was mostly stump speeches and other “rah rah we’re gonna win!” style pontificating. But one thing I did not expect and I actually found interesting was the house candidate spent a lot of time introducing other local politicians that were in down ballot races in the district. City council seats, education board seats etc. That turned out to be really useful, because it meant I got to meet/ hear from candidates who I either had no idea existed or who were just a name of a flyer before then. I suppose that experience may not transfer to a national candidate rally though.

The NYT ran an opinion recently where the author pretty clearly was using the NYT along with other outlets as part of a voter demobilization tactic in which the author lied about not voting. The NYT was skewered on twitter, and had to alter the opinion after the fact. It seems like some basic fact checking would have been useful in that situation. Or really, just any amount of critical thought on the part of the NYT in general.

Unhelpful Linux User Archetypes:

The Configurator: All problems are configuration problems. The fact that a user has a problem means they configured their machine incorrectly. All help requests are an opportunity to lecture others about configuration files.

The lumberjack: Insists on logs no matter how simple or basic the question. “How do I get the working directory in the terminal?” -Sorry, I can’t help you unless you post your log. “What does the -r flag do?” -You need to post a log for me to answer that question. “Is there a way to make this service start at boot?” -We have no way of knowing unless you post your log. When a user posts their log, the lumberjack’s work is done. No need to reply to the thread any further.

The Anacdata Troubleshooter: Failed to develop a theory of mind during childhood. Thinks their machine is representative of all machines. If they don’t have an issue, the user is lying about the issue.

The Jargon Master: Uses as much jargon as possible in forum posts. If a user doesn’t know each and every term, that’s on them. If you did not commit to mastering every aspect of a piece of software before asking for help, were you even trying to solve the problem?

The Hobby Horse Jockey: All problems are caused by whatever thing the contributor does not like. Graphics driver issue? Snaps. Computer won’t post? Obviously, Snaps. Machine getting too hot? Snaps. Command ‘flatpack’ not found? Oh you better believe snaps did that.

The Pedantfile: Gets mad because everyone asks their questions the wrong way. Writes a message letting the user know they asked their question wrong. Message usually appears within a minute or two of someone providing a solution to the user.

Or you only consider your expenses after savings and think that you are “living paycheck to paycheck” because you use up all your non-invested money by the end of the month.