mjt

I offer help to people who want to deliver software sensibly.
Facilitator and lover of humans.
Interesting, handsome, shy, erudite.

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npub1jdc5r7qk72lztk28968vr5w7phh3hcaytw3nr9j3ksuz9jjj5j7s88mtrq

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mjt_at_mastodon.online@mostr.pub

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Last Notes

2024-09-20 01:17:08

"If Donald Trump wants Kamala Harris and others to stop saying that he is a threat to democracy, then he should stop threatening democracy. Perhaps he shouldn't be trying to overturn elections, overthrow the government, and inciting insurrectionists if he doesn't want people to be honest about what he is, who he is, and what he's doing."
~ Don Lemon, interviewed on CNN

2024-09-18 04:46:47

“Style over substance. Image over issues. Lies over facts. Distractions over policy. Repeated violence,” said Tomasz Płudowski, the deputy dean of the School of Social Science, AEH, in Warsaw. “That seems to be the contemporary American reality.”
Second Apparent Assassination Attempt on Trump Prompts Alarm Abroad https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/17/world/trump-assassination-attempt-world-reaction.html

2024-09-15 03:45:40

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Variations on the experiment demonstrated that this “go along with wrong” effect dropped to only one-third when the stooges alternated giving wrong and correct answers. (3/3)

2024-09-15 03:45:40

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A group of six men were told they were participating in a visual perception experiment. Five of the six were instructed to give the same wrong answer every time, while the subject was told only that they were part of a group participating in a visual perception experiment. Fully two-thirds of the subjects agreed with the five others EVEN when the five gave the wrong answer. (2/3)

2024-09-15 03:45:39

This (https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/09/saving-idea-university-dartmouth/679790/) article in The Atlantic cited an even more fascinating paper in which Solomon Asch describes an experiment in conformity and social pressure that produced the perhaps-not-astounding-but-indeed-fascinating result.
Here’s the paper: https://pdodds.w3.uvm.edu/teaching/courses/2009-08UVM-300/docs/others/everything/asch1955a.pdf
For those who don’t enjoy clicking or reading multipage articles, in other words tl;dr: (1/3)

2024-08-16 05:55:36

I’ve read two of the three books pictured, and they are *great.* https://fosstodon.org/@defuneste/112963597232029585

2024-08-14 05:47:51

“Criminal-record barriers meant to promote safety often have the perverse effect of preventing people from accessing employment, education, housing, and financial security, all of which have been shown to decrease recidivism. Eliminating barriers that aren’t tailored to real risks would promote safety by supporting reentry and rehabilitation.”
What does society or the people who comprise it benefit from banishing felons into a permanent lower class?
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/08/criminal-record-erased/679408/

2024-08-14 05:33:09

“Trump, enraged and rattled, is reverting to his feral ways. … The rise of Harris instantly cast Trump in a new light. He formerly seemed more ominous and threatening, which, whatever its political drawbacks, signaled strength; now he seems not just old but low-energy, stale, even pathetic. He has become the political version of Fat Elvis.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/08/harris-trump/679444/

2024-08-05 19:14:54

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And it wasn’t exactly the Black enslaved people who decided to have sex with white people, thus creating “mixed race” children (I’m talking to you and tens of thousands of other rich white enslavers, Thomas Jefferson).

2024-08-05 19:14:29

“…[W]hen a mixed-race Black American appears to be ascending to the pinnacles of American power, some white Americans suddenly forget the race rules that white society created.” The “one-drop rule” wasn’t created by Black people. The myth of white “purity” survives even today, and that’s a crime.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/04/magazine/kamala-harris-black-identity-history.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&sgrp=c-cb

2024-07-27 18:44:45

Spot-on observation from Thanh Neville MD (@thanh_neville) posting at The Bad Place:
“I actually think #Kamala has really cool first name, but am I the only one who has noticed that’s been Obama, Trump, Biden, but now Kamala and not Harris?”
#UsPol #Sexism #Harris

2024-07-26 00:12:46

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Can’t remember how to add text for graphic, so here’s the text on the accompanying graph:
“The gap between productivity and a typical worker's
compensation has increased dramatically since 1979
Productivity growth and hourly compensation growth, 1948-2022
From 1948-1979, average annual growth in:
Productivity: 2.5%
Compensation: 2.4%
From 1979-2022, average annual growth in:
Productivity: 1.2%
Compensation: 0.3%

2024-07-26 00:10:10

Starting with Reagan, US workers increased productivity but wages fell. So much for trickle-down economics. George Bush Sr. was right: it’s voodoo economics, and manifestly unfair.
#Wages #Workers #Productivity https://hachyderm.io/@danilo/112845066634618472

2024-07-25 17:26:57

“Research also indicates that clearing encampments may be of limited value. One recent study of three Los Angeles encampments, by the RAND Corporation, found that dismantling them cleaned up the area for a few months but seemed to have little or no long-term effect on a city’s homeless population. (1/2)

2024-07-22 16:15:25

Life in big-city, liberal Seattle.
https://files.mastodon.online/media_attachments/files/112/831/032/470/492/392/original/ca53b6763b811927.jpeg

2024-07-22 05:49:47

Today was surprising.
https://feelingagile.wordpress.com/2024/07/22/surprises/

2024-07-19 05:29:48

How about this? They switch: Kamala for president, Joe for vice president. She gets the most experienced vice president of all time, they swear a pact to cooperate, and TFG goes away forever. #uspol

2024-07-19 05:24:45

George Conway, former #GOP attorney: “The funny thing is, this guy thinks he’s a genius.”
Ana Navarro-Cárdenas, CNN political analyst: “And you all are screaming that Biden has dementia….?”
:“Sometimes it seems like both parties are trying to throw this election.”
~ Nate Silver, 538
#Trump #unfit #RNC #Republicans #cult #idiocracy #autocracy #democracy #BidenHarris2024

2024-07-08 06:41:06

Would that that would be the outcome in the US. https://mastodon.social/@thelinuxEXP/112749419548815474

2024-07-06 03:02:34

As my daughter once declared at age five, “Boys are stupid.”
https://files.mastodon.online/media_attachments/files/112/737/317/944/910/541/original/af31b1755c8280ae.jpeg

2024-07-04 16:22:16

“It is important to note how thoroughly made up this Supreme Court ruling is. … Presidential immunity from criminal prosecution exists nowhere in the text of America’s founding documents, nowhere in America’s history and tradition. The Republicans on the Supreme Court just made it up.”
https://open.substack.com/pub/findinggravity/p/they-say-they-want-a-revolution?r=4d7dj

2024-07-04 06:30:41

“If the entire press establishment sees fit to call on Biden to drop out of the race because of a bad debate, why haven't they applied this same logic to the convicted criminal who promises to destroy American democracy and rule as an authoritarian dictator?”
Democrats don’t understand—and never have, really—how to use framing. Trump is excellent at that, as are the Republicans, most of the time.
https://www.theframelab.org/unfit-for-office-trump-biden/

2024-07-03 05:35:16

Heather Cox Richardson today reminds us about Common Sense:
“If we omit [creating a government of laws, not kings] now, some [dictator] may hereafter arise, who laying hold of popular disquietudes, may collect together the desperate and the discontented, and by assuming to themselves the powers of government, may sweep away the liberties of the continent like a deluge.”
Tom Paine knew what he was talking about. These days, I wonder if we all do.
#July2nd #July4th #immunity #UsPol

2024-06-30 17:16:53

It’s time for workers to claim and redeem the fruits of their 2.5x increase in productivity since the 1950s. We earned it, and giving that to the owners of corporations is plainly wrong. https://hachyderm.io/@scottsantens/112700774035437428

2024-06-29 00:18:19

“Biden had a bad night. Trump is a bad man.”
#uspol

2024-06-28 23:31:43

“I don’t debate as well as I used to,” Biden said, his voice rising. “But ... I know how to tell the truth. I know right from wrong. I know how to do this job.”
What else is there to say?

2024-06-28 09:05:25

“About the effect of tonight’s [US presidential “debate”], former Republican operative Stuart Stevens warned: ‘Don’t day trade politics. It’s a sucker’s game. A guy from Queens out on bail bragged about overturning Roe v. Wade, said in public he didn’t have sex with a porn star, defended tax cuts for billionaires, defended Jan. 6th. and called America the worst country in the world. That guy isn’t going to win this race.’”
https://open.substack.com/pub/heathercoxrichardson/p/june-27-2024?r=4d7dj&utm_medium=ios

2024-06-18 06:37:31

ASU study points to origin of cumulative culture in human evolution | ASU News https://news.asu.edu/20240617-science-and-technology-asu-study-points-origin-cumulative-culture-human-evolution

2024-06-11 08:35:59

Loooooong post, but fascinating, if you’re like me. https://mastodon.social/@ancientjames/110948067275036967

2024-06-11 08:32:17

“‘The whole idea of writing truth in a memoir is so preposterous,’ Ciment said. ‘You have these scattered memories, and you’re trying to carve a story out of them.’”
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/10/books/jill-ciment-memoir-consent.html

2024-06-09 22:46:17

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“Trump revels in and glorifies our worst human traits: self-absorption, greed, mendacity, vindictiveness, ignorance, and so much else. He embodies all that we should aspire, and teach our children, not to be.
“Worse yet, he gives permission for others to be their worst selves. And that is the ultimate danger he poses. (2/3)

2024-06-09 22:46:17

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“He’s a threat to truth, honor, reason, and decency. And that’s mostly without regard to policy—remember, Trump’s party is the party without a policy platform—although it does have implications for policy. But those are secondary.
“First and foremost, Trump and Trumpism pose a moral test, not a political test.
“I hope and pray and believe that our nation will pass and survive it.” (3/3)

2024-06-09 22:46:17

George Conway over on The Bad Place:
“t. The critique of Trump is that, yes, he *is* bad. Yes, he *is* evil.
“That doesn’t mean, however, that everyone who supports him is all bad, or that everyone who opposes him is purely good.
“That’s because Trump embodies the worst in *all* of us. For we are all human. (1/3)

2024-05-31 03:39:20

Megahone Mark, for our century.
https://files.mastodon.online/media_attachments/files/112/533/619/205/887/916/original/5bdcf0f1de04c4ca.jpeg

2024-05-30 05:16:25

The hail in Texas was so big Tuesday that it required a new description https://wapo.st/3VlgVA0

2024-05-24 03:37:10

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@npub1c5u…sr87 60 80 120 220 320

2024-05-15 15:19:43

Article is on a different subject, but I’ve never been able to express this sentiment so clearly
https://tedbauer.medium.com/work-wife-has-long-been-one-of-the-creepiest-white-collar-narratives-3549ff2318f8
https://files.mastodon.online/media_attachments/files/112/445/776/319/659/381/original/79af13f1ae24555b.png

2023-12-16 17:20:55

“FBI data…found that violent crime dropped 8%, while property crime fell 6.3% to what would be its lowest level since 1961 […]
“Murder plummeted in the United States in 2023 at one of the fastest rates of decline ever recorded…and every category of major crime except auto theft declined.
“Yet 92% of Republicans, 78% of independents and 58% of Democrats believe crime is rising, the Gallup survey shows.”
Most people think the U.S. crime rate is rising. They're wrong. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/people-think-crime-rate-up-actually-down-rcna129585