I would love to see some enterprising politicians try to pass massive funding for solar/renewable and just call it some stupid nationalistic thing to make it popular with the grey matter-challenged demographic.

Go renewable to save the planet? Fuck off hippie! Go renewable because then we can bomb with impunity? I’m listening…

“Can the US lose in a way that allows the crazies in office to save face in their eyes?” seems an important question to me. Because if the options are the US clearly losing vs. the US clearly losing but nuking Iran so everyone loses…

They made the decision that would save the most lives, which is their job.

But they lied to the public, which undermines trust; IMHO this was a myopic decision.

As for the people doing what’s best for society, that’s antithetical to American individualism

Can’t speak for everyone, but Flex Alerts in California do indeed work (it’s when we’re asked to reduce energy consumption).

your faith was proven wrong with both masks and toilet paper being bought for resale at predatory prices, or just to maintain personal supplies at the expense of everyone else.

That’s a fallacy/faulty generalization — I’m not saying everyone behaves well, but from my experience, the vast majority do. The pandemic for me was a time where I really felt like we looked out for our fellow people, at least locally.

In 2020 they recommended against face masks for non-healthcare workers. My understanding is that they did this to conserve masks for healthcare workers, as did the WHO. IMHO that was a really shitty thing for them to have done. Presenting all the facts and pleading with the public would, I think, have resulted in higher trust in them as an institution, ultimately saving lives, but that’s just my opinion I guess.

But yeah, completely agree that even then it was more or less well meaning, as opposed to now.

They say “everything’s bigger in Texas,” but maybe that’s just because California hasn’t whipped it out until now…

Gosh I wonder why they’re against mail-in ballots.

Any voter in CA is eligible, and honestly, with the number of propositions and local stuff on the ballot it’s essential to do research ahead of time regardless of your political preferences. So much easier to fill it out over a few weeks IMHO.

Beware though, there may be new rules about needing it received rather than postmarked by the election date (which is obviously bullshit).

Global Outbreak World Response Outreach Network, perhaps?

It doesn’t change your point, but he was impeached for perjury and obstruction of justice, not for a sex act.

A professional degree is historically different from an academic degree though. Math, chemistry, physics, biology, computer science—these typically produce (well compensated!) professionals, but they are not professional schools.

I am professional; I get paid to do the kinds of things that I did in grad school. But afaik no one would say I hold a professional degree.

All of this is besides the point of course—our student loan system shouldn’t disqualify people based on these sorts of semantics.

I was interpreting the quoted text as encompassing all engineering fields, e.g., EE, mechanical, computer, etc.

If that’s not the case and this is for specific professional engineering degrees then yep, I certainly agree with you.

I was interpreting the quoted text as encompassing all engineering fields, e.g., EE, mechanical, computer, etc.

If that’s not the case and this is for specific professional engineering degrees then yep, I certainly agree with you.

This is actually the one that I would agree with (edit: see below), if the difference is “professional” vs. “academic.” I certainly wouldn’t call a natural science degree professional, and if you’re in a research institution studying some form of engineering I’d probably put you in the same category. Just my experience/opinion though (and the rest of the exclusions are super stupid, I agree).

Edit: from the replies, this is referring to Professional Engineering; in my corner of the world, “Engineer” is an overloaded term that generally means electrical, mechanical, software, and sometimes computer engineer. My comment was referring to these engineers, who are rarely licensed and study alongside scientists in school. I completely agree with parent in the context of “professional engineering” (I mean…it’s right there in the name…).

San Francisco is north of 40¢/kWh.

First, that would be lousy public transit design and the route should be rethought.

Second — does this hyppthetical bus run other routes? Is it electric, powered by overhead lines?

Of course you can up with niche counterexamples for an argument presented in meme format, but that doesn’t mean it’s not, broadly speaking, correct.

I’m drunk, and it’s all Mexico’s fault!

“Enters”? You mean they weren’t already in racist meltdown mode?

Let’s see Stephan Miller’s card…

I’m too lazy to verify my hunch, but I’m guessing Texas is largely oil (exploiting natural resources), whereas California is largely intellectual output (tech, with some Hollywood and other sundry stuff), though California certainly does exploit its natural resources too (good farming conditions, some oil…).

“Political choice is between a turd sandwich and a giant douche” being my favorite example.

Neither candidate is/was ideal, but good lord to say that what’s happening now is no different than when the other side was in power is beyond asinine, it’s an incredibly disingenuous and offensive take on reality. (I know the SP episode wasn’t about the current US political situation, but the current US political situation absolutely has its roots going back to those SP episodes.)

From our experience in the US, the birth is nothing compared to the financial drain of the other expenses. And at this age, childcare dwarfs all the other child-related expenses.

We have great insurance and don’t rely on family for childcare though, so the math is very very different for someone with “free” familial childcare and no/lousy insurance…