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On the shooting of Renee Good
Everybody seems to have an opinion on the shooting of Renee Good, and I’m no exception, but I wanted to think about this a bit before posting. Also, I’m out of practice and don’t write as fast as I used to. I’ll start with three important points that shouldn’t be controversial The ICE agent, Jonathan Ross, shot and killed Renee…
Swift Descending
If you look in the right-hand column of this blog, you’ll see a new widget titled “Swift Observatory.” That’s because of a speedy satellite that is in need of some speedy attention. The Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory satellite was originally called the “Swift Gamma-Ray Burst Explorer” when NASA launched it in 2004. It has since been renamed to honor its…
GOA on Trump
So I got this email a while back from Gun Owners of America, one of the many gun rights groups that has been building a name for itself now that the National Rifle Association is faltering. Going out over the signature of Executive Vice President Erich Pratt, it’s an amazing bit of fantasy: Mark – President Trump has made it…
Yes, It’s a Bribe
I’ve been taking a break from posting for the last few weeks. I’d like to get posting again, so I thought I’d start with an easy one. I spent several years working for a defense contractor, during which time I sometimes had to meet with our points-of-contact in the Department of Defense. We’d usually end up going out to lunch,…
Talking to my fellow libertarians about DOGE
I was listening to Reason’s Just Asking Questions podcast episode about the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), and I thought host Liz Wolf was too willing to accept Elon Musk…
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Late night thoughts on the current crisis
I’ve been watching what’s happening in the U.S. government with growing dismay. Trump and Musk seem determined to destroy the government’s ability to perform certain functions, some of which are…
Joining The Cult
I’ve been curious about 3D printing for years. It’s cool technology that looks like fun to play with. The problem was that I didn’t have many ideas about what sorts…
Trump’s dumb attempt to define sex
(When I started to write this post, I thought it would be a neat little think piece about science, policy, and meaning. But given how much more is going on,…
Some advice for my transgender readers in the new year
There has been a surge of anti-trans violence in the last few years, including attacks leading to at least 36 deaths, and given the direction our country is going, it…
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Decoding Economics: Happiness and Taste
It’s the holiday season here in the U.S., so for this second post in my new series about useful ideas in economics, I thought it would be appropriate to talk…
Decoding Economics: The Real Economy
This is the first post of what I hope will be a series about some useful economic ideas. As fascinated as I am by economics, I have been frustrated by…
Of Guns and Groomers
About a year ago, I had a brief Twitter/X exchange with John Lovell of the Warrior Poet Society. Lovell is a fairly well-respected figure in the firearms training community, and…
A Heartfelt Message to Donald Trump
Congratulations, Mr. Trump, on your victory in the Presidential election. Your campaign was everything I expected it to be — and so much more — and you got the outcome…
Tasha the Adventure Cat, part 2: Wounds
In part one, I recounted Tasha’s first full year with us, filled with accidents, surgery, and lots of fights with one of our other cats. Now that all that was…
Tasha the Adventure Cat, part 1: Battle!
Some of you may remember that my wife and I adopted a new Siberian kitten about a year ago. We named her Tasha. Tasha’s life as a kitten has been…
Biden’s Path to Victory – 2024-07-20
As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m looking at some of the election forecast data to try to figure out how things are going for Biden (and by extension…
Thoughts on the Trump Assassination Attempt
Like everybody else, I have been having thoughts about the attempt to assassinate Donald Trump. It took me a while to gather those thoughts into something like publishable form. The…
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Biden’s Path to Victory – 2024-07-10
As I mentioned in a previous post, I’m looking at some of the election forecast data to try to figure out how things are going for Biden (and by extension…
Biden’s Path to Victory – 2024-07-03
No, this isn’t a rumination on whether Biden should be replaced as the Democratic nominee. It’s an attempt to display some election modeling data in a useful way. Nate Sillver’s…
Stonehenge: A Modest Proposal
As you may know, a couple of idiotic climate change activists just defaced part of the Stonehenge monument in England with some kind of orange colored substance. This has led…