A public record of some of my thoughts. Feel free to comment, but don't expect me to respond.
I keep hearing comments about two tiers of justice in the United States, but when I try to parse it out, I keep finding more than two.
There’s the justice for the ordinary folk vs. the elite. Then there’s the justice for the people favored by the incumbent administration vs. its enemies.
On top of that, some people would add different tiers based on race and sex.
The perception that justice depends on such factors is very bad for our culture.
Epoch Times has an article on the bank collapse that seems decently balanced to me. Not that I’m an expert at all.
Behind the Banking Crisis That Shook the Financial System
It basically says the banks have collapsed because of tightening by the Fed and/or because of reliance on cryptocurrency.
But this is what caught my eye in the story.
Former President Donald Trump — in an all-caps social media Truth Social post last weekend — compared the chaos to 1929, warning that banks are already beginning to fail because of President Joe Biden’s economic policies.
“Joe Biden will go down as the Herbert Hoover of the modern age. We will have a Great Depression far bigger and more powerful than that of 1929. As proof, the banks are already starting to collapse!!!”
I believe Trump genuinely wants the best for the country, but that desire comes after his desire to promote himself and destroy his opponents.
In this case, the risk of causing a crisis of confidence in the banking system is worth it if he can get in a dig on Joe Biden.
That’s disgusting, especially since there are so many other legit ways to go after Joe Biden without endangering public confidence.
My “science and technology” high school had the latest cool gadgets — for the 70s, that is. For driver’s ed, we had simulators with their own steering wheel, turning signals, gas pedal, and brake. Everything we did could be reviewed (and maybe recorded) by the instructor in the back of the room.
Unfortunately, the visual part was not responsive. It was just a movie, so nothing we did changed anything on the screen.
One day, the movie had us creeping closer and closer to the car in front of us. I applied the brake. As we got closer and closer, I knew what was coming, so I stomped on the brake.
A couple seconds later, the car in front stopped, the car we were “in” crashed into it, and the instructor said, “You’re all dead.”
I said, “Not me. I’ve been braking for the last two miles.”
It was a completely unfair test. The movie put us in a no-win situation, and then we were judged for not getting out of it.
That’s the way I feel about Ukraine.
We’ve been poking and threatening Russia for decades now. We’ve been inviting more and more states into NATO, pushing NATO’s borders closer and closer to Russia. Russia has warned repeatedly that they can not allow this.
It’s not a big surprise that Russia invaded Ukraine. But somehow we — the U.S. taxpayer — are on the hook to pay for it. (I also worry whether we’re replenishing our supplies of all that hardware we’ve send to Ukraine.)
I’m not saying Russia was right to invade Ukraine, or to conduct the war the way they have. Near as I can tell (if I can believe the reports), Russia has been exceptionally brutal and has attacked civilians. That’s wrong, and there should be consequences. But there are levels to “consequences.”
There are lots of conflicts in the world, and we can’t get involved simply because bad things are happening. We should only get involved when it’s in our interest to get involved, and that’s a debatable question — not only in terms of yes or no, but also in terms of how much.
Saying we shouldn’t be so committed to Ukraine is no more “pro Putin” than saying we shouldn’t get involved in the conflicts in Mexico is “pro cartel,” or saying we shouldn’t be fighting in the South China Sea is “pro communist” — and it’s simply idiotic to make such a claim. You can be against Putin, against the cartels, and against the Chicoms and still believe it’s not in our best interests to get in a particular fight, or to question to what degree we should get involved.
This is especially true when our provocations helped to start the whole thing!
How much have we given to Ukraine? It’s something like $112 billion. What if we took half that money to hire more border agents and judges to deal with the mess on the border? Or what if we took half that money and invested it in better naval weapons so we don’t fall behind the Chinese? Or what if we used it to fix our railroads and bridges?
“Oh, but there are people dying in Ukraine.”
Yes, and that’s awful. But that in itself doesn’t determine how involved we should be.
I was curious about an element of Lutheran theology and decided to ask ChatGPT about it. I was surprised at the generally good quality of its answers, but even more surprised that when I called it out on an error, it admitted the error and corrected its reply.
I enjoy DailyWire podcasts and listen to them regularly. The content is great, but their technology has a few problems.
The publicly available (free) version teases an additional 30 minutes that’s only available to DailyWire+ members. That’s a smart business model, which in my world is called a freemium.
You can listen to the free version through your regular podcast player, or you can get the DailyWire+ app and listen to the full version.
Unfortunately, the DailyWire+ app is not a good podcast player. (1) You can’t download the episodes. You have to stream them. (2) If you only listen to half of it, and come back later, it doesn’t remember where you left off. (Unless, I think, you leave the app on the whole time.)
I usually choose to download the free version to my podcast player. Streaming doesn’t work well for me, especially on long drives where cell coverage can be spotty.
At the end of the free version, they say “come on over to the member’s block,” but … that doesn’t work. If I listen to an episode on Podcast Addict, then go to the DailyWire+ app, there’s no good way to pick up the show at that point.
So here’s some free advice to DailyWire tech people.