This is incredible. Jensen went from being the poorest person I’ve ever heard of, to the richest man I’d never heard of.
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Month: December 2025
NYT: Rwanda and Congo Sign U.S.-Brokered Peace Treaty
Bongo, bongo, bongo, I don’t want to leave the Congo, oh no, no no no.
CBS News: Trump administration moves to roll back fuel economy standards set under Biden
If finalized, the plan would relax fuel economy standards by setting the industry average for light-duty vehicles at roughly 34.5 miles per gallon through the 2031 model year, lower than the 50 miles per gallon outlined by a Biden-era rule.
For fifty years, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) set fuel economy standards that car companies had to meet. It was a type of magical thinking. The NHTSA would issue a new fuel economy standard, and like Captain Picard on Star Trek, say, “Make it so.”
The NHTSA didn’t have to worry about physics, they just had to wish for it. The engineering teams had to figure out how to pull another rabbit out of the same old hat. The rabbits were getting smaller and harder to find.
A few days ago, this symbol showed up on the dashboard of my new Tacoma. I added the red circle to highlight the symbol of interest. The symbol is cryptic and persistent, so the dashboard photo was taken so I could look it up.
What is it trying to tell me?
It looks a little like a teepee or a campfire, so probably something about native Americans.
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Social media is all over the place.
Pew Research: Americans’ Social Media Use 2025
Polls like this are interesting because social media keeps changing, and most of use don’t want to join everything to figure out which ones are worthwhile.
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Sparky gets some exercise.
Sparky needs his exercise, but I’ve got a head cold, so don’t want my exercise. Running shuttles is a good compromise.
When traveling, I never thought to visit old libraries. The Old Library at Trinity College Dublin looks impressive. I’ve not been to Ireland, so this doesn’t count as a missed opportunity.
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Minnesota is rife with fraud.
NYT: How Fraud Swamped Minnesota’s Social Services System on Tim Walz’s Watch
Minnesota is a shit show, and that Walz was almost vice president.
The fraud scandal that rattled Minnesota was staggering in its scale and brazenness.
Federal prosecutors charged dozens of people with felonies, accusing them of stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from a government program meant to keep children fed during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Anybody who could figure out that Somalis aren’t Scandinavian, would have seen this coming.
The episode has raised broader questions for some residents about the sustainability of Minnesota’s Scandinavian-modeled system of robust safety net programs bankrolled by high taxes.
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Predator: Badlands just isn’t very good.
Predator: Badlands, is more like Predator: Bad Families, since it’s all about family dynamics. The synthetic human, predator and indigenous creature become a found family because their real families aren’t up to it.
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Prehistoric Planet is worth watching.
Since I’m a little bit sick and drowsy, I’m watching Prehistoric Planet 2.
David Attenborough is narrating as a more earnest version of his brother Richard Attenborough, who played the crazy old dinosaur enthusiast in Jurassic Park.
The production values are very good, and the prehistoric creatures seem lifelike and convincing, but I can’t help thinking that they are making up some shit.