TheBrett
@thebrett.bsky.social
I don't want such a regime to happen, but it would genuinely be funny if a couple red states accidentally hosed themselves and elected a ton of Democrats because they passed "citizenship verification" requirements for voting and the people w/ passports were skewed heavily liberal.
February 1, 2026 at 3:38 AM
I don't want such a regime to happen, but it would genuinely be funny if a couple red states accidentally hosed themselves and elected a ton of Democrats because they passed "citizenship verification" requirements for voting and the people w/ passports were skewed heavily liberal.
The WaPo piece about the Chinese govt's increasingly coercive policies to try and push up fertility is eye-opening, but thankfully they probably won't work. It's like with their pushes against corruption, where they can't really seem to address the root causes of it.
January 31, 2026 at 10:26 PM
The WaPo piece about the Chinese govt's increasingly coercive policies to try and push up fertility is eye-opening, but thankfully they probably won't work. It's like with their pushes against corruption, where they can't really seem to address the root causes of it.
I'm not sure how the AI stuff is going to interact with influencer culture. It seems like it would make them more important, with people leaning ever more on "real people" they trust for recommendations in a sea of AI fluff and content. But the influencers would have to prove they're real
January 31, 2026 at 9:53 PM
I'm not sure how the AI stuff is going to interact with influencer culture. It seems like it would make them more important, with people leaning ever more on "real people" they trust for recommendations in a sea of AI fluff and content. But the influencers would have to prove they're real
Disappointing, but not surprising that Musk is talking up an xAI/SpaceX merger. All of the AI companies except Google need massive amounts of outside funding, and SpaceX will have a nice, juicy IPO cash hoard that can be immediately funneled into the xAI business to try and improve their 4th place.
January 29, 2026 at 11:23 PM
Disappointing, but not surprising that Musk is talking up an xAI/SpaceX merger. All of the AI companies except Google need massive amounts of outside funding, and SpaceX will have a nice, juicy IPO cash hoard that can be immediately funneled into the xAI business to try and improve their 4th place.
If you're looking for Ramen Seasoning, the Clean Monday Meals seasoning is very close (it smells just like it), but it's missing something. Adding MSG fixed it for me, but actual Top Ramen supposedly doesn't have MSG so they must be using something else to get that savory soup flavor.
January 19, 2026 at 11:56 PM
If you're looking for Ramen Seasoning, the Clean Monday Meals seasoning is very close (it smells just like it), but it's missing something. Adding MSG fixed it for me, but actual Top Ramen supposedly doesn't have MSG so they must be using something else to get that savory soup flavor.
xAI is probably the least successful major AI company right now, but given that the owner is super rich and the key money man to Trump and Republicans, I wouldn't rule out it getting more entrenched. They'll try to integrate it tightly into government networks, give xAI preferential contracts, etc
January 15, 2026 at 6:31 AM
xAI is probably the least successful major AI company right now, but given that the owner is super rich and the key money man to Trump and Republicans, I wouldn't rule out it getting more entrenched. They'll try to integrate it tightly into government networks, give xAI preferential contracts, etc
Sorry, one last thing then I'll go back to mostly not commenting on current politics: it really is bizarre to me that we expect untrained people to be calm and obedient in the face of an angry guy waving a gun in their face and shouting profanity-laded commands, rather than expecting a calm officer
January 11, 2026 at 5:18 AM
Sorry, one last thing then I'll go back to mostly not commenting on current politics: it really is bizarre to me that we expect untrained people to be calm and obedient in the face of an angry guy waving a gun in their face and shouting profanity-laded commands, rather than expecting a calm officer
Internally overthrowing a dictatorship that keeps the military and security forces loyal is incredibly hard. It took 20 years in Syria, and more than a decade in South Korea. If you can't get the military to turn sides, then you have to break the regime's economic ability to pay them.
January 11, 2026 at 4:22 AM
Internally overthrowing a dictatorship that keeps the military and security forces loyal is incredibly hard. It took 20 years in Syria, and more than a decade in South Korea. If you can't get the military to turn sides, then you have to break the regime's economic ability to pay them.
I still don't think Trump actually would try to just blatantly seize Greenland, but I'm less confident in that than I was before. Big warning sign will be if he starts talking about how negotiations with Denmark over Greenland are going well. When he said that for Iran and Venezuela, it was a ruse.
January 4, 2026 at 9:58 PM
I still don't think Trump actually would try to just blatantly seize Greenland, but I'm less confident in that than I was before. Big warning sign will be if he starts talking about how negotiations with Denmark over Greenland are going well. When he said that for Iran and Venezuela, it was a ruse.
So since they don't have actual troops occupying Venezuela, I'm assuming they've got somebody from Maduro's clique or the military who is willing to be a US loyalist (and probably funnel money secretly in the direction of Trump and his cronies).
January 4, 2026 at 9:49 AM
So since they don't have actual troops occupying Venezuela, I'm assuming they've got somebody from Maduro's clique or the military who is willing to be a US loyalist (and probably funnel money secretly in the direction of Trump and his cronies).
I wish I could find it, but when right-wing evangelist Jerry Falwell died, there was a pretty funny troll post from a buddhist expressing his sorrow that he was going to end up in one of the buddhist hells.
January 4, 2026 at 6:25 AM
I wish I could find it, but when right-wing evangelist Jerry Falwell died, there was a pretty funny troll post from a buddhist expressing his sorrow that he was going to end up in one of the buddhist hells.
I doubt a war is coming from this. It’s like the Iran bombings - they did the thing and then backed off. They’ve got Maduro, so Trump can brag about Winning on Venezuela and also claim to match Obama on another thing (He’s always jealous of Obama and Obama got Bin Laden)
January 3, 2026 at 3:44 PM
I doubt a war is coming from this. It’s like the Iran bombings - they did the thing and then backed off. They’ve got Maduro, so Trump can brag about Winning on Venezuela and also claim to match Obama on another thing (He’s always jealous of Obama and Obama got Bin Laden)
We will see what happens. Sounds like they mostly bombed some shit in Caracas but didn’t kill Maduro.
January 3, 2026 at 8:41 AM
We will see what happens. Sounds like they mostly bombed some shit in Caracas but didn’t kill Maduro.
It seems that California's wealth tax might have a pretty serious legal weakness - they're trying to classify it as an excise tax rather than a property tax.
January 3, 2026 at 3:27 AM
It seems that California's wealth tax might have a pretty serious legal weakness - they're trying to classify it as an excise tax rather than a property tax.
If it wasn't life-ruining for him, the whole debacle around Kilmar Abrego Garcia would almost be comical. All they had to do was quietly let him leave at midnight and dismiss the case once they figured out they'd fucked up in arresting him, and they just kept digging themselves deeper in the hole.
December 31, 2025 at 1:45 AM
If it wasn't life-ruining for him, the whole debacle around Kilmar Abrego Garcia would almost be comical. All they had to do was quietly let him leave at midnight and dismiss the case once they figured out they'd fucked up in arresting him, and they just kept digging themselves deeper in the hole.
I've always thought of a wealth tax as being like an expanded property tax, although that's not quite true. A property tax actually is a tax on the property, whereas most wealth tax proposals are on the holders of wealth based on their personal characteristics.
December 31, 2025 at 12:31 AM
I've always thought of a wealth tax as being like an expanded property tax, although that's not quite true. A property tax actually is a tax on the property, whereas most wealth tax proposals are on the holders of wealth based on their personal characteristics.
You know, if somebody ever got control of Twitter from Musk again and really wanted to clear out most of the problem accounts, the easiest way to do it would be to ban/delete any account that ever used a "cry-laugh" emoji in a tweet.
December 29, 2025 at 12:44 AM
You know, if somebody ever got control of Twitter from Musk again and really wanted to clear out most of the problem accounts, the easiest way to do it would be to ban/delete any account that ever used a "cry-laugh" emoji in a tweet.
I tend to think the LLM AI stuff is going to get heavily used in "outsourced" special effects and animation first, while writers and showrunners will lie about using it for a while if it's useful (depending on how Online they are).
December 28, 2025 at 10:58 PM
I tend to think the LLM AI stuff is going to get heavily used in "outsourced" special effects and animation first, while writers and showrunners will lie about using it for a while if it's useful (depending on how Online they are).
I think it would be good to get phones out of schools, but I'm not super-optimistic about all the "screen-free child-rearing" stuff. The older folks who basically had scree-free upbringings besides TV seem very prone to social media brain poisoning.
December 24, 2025 at 7:36 AM
I think it would be good to get phones out of schools, but I'm not super-optimistic about all the "screen-free child-rearing" stuff. The older folks who basically had scree-free upbringings besides TV seem very prone to social media brain poisoning.
I'm a bit more optimistic about data centers in space after watching Scott Manley's video on it. You can probably modify Starlink satellites to run an AI server on 30 kWe with some extra radiators in the near term. You'd need a couple thousand of them just to equal one large data center on Earth.
December 22, 2025 at 7:15 AM
I'm a bit more optimistic about data centers in space after watching Scott Manley's video on it. You can probably modify Starlink satellites to run an AI server on 30 kWe with some extra radiators in the near term. You'd need a couple thousand of them just to equal one large data center on Earth.
I can’t help but suspect that Iger peacefully transferring power to D’Amaro at Disney won’t go well. Ever since Roy Disney Sr retired, the only good CEOs at Disney have been those who came to power in a coup.
December 21, 2025 at 11:07 PM
I can’t help but suspect that Iger peacefully transferring power to D’Amaro at Disney won’t go well. Ever since Roy Disney Sr retired, the only good CEOs at Disney have been those who came to power in a coup.
What's interesting is that there is something behind "Exodus" in real history, although IIRC it was probably a set of different stories imperfectly welded together from migrations fleeing the Nile Delta during the Late Bronze Age Collapse.
December 20, 2025 at 3:08 AM
What's interesting is that there is something behind "Exodus" in real history, although IIRC it was probably a set of different stories imperfectly welded together from migrations fleeing the Nile Delta during the Late Bronze Age Collapse.
The weather is bizarrely warm for mid December here in the Salt Lake Valley. It’s almost 50 degrees F at 9:30 pm at night, almost four hours after the Sun has gone down
December 19, 2025 at 4:28 AM
The weather is bizarrely warm for mid December here in the Salt Lake Valley. It’s almost 50 degrees F at 9:30 pm at night, almost four hours after the Sun has gone down
It's funny what things stick in your brain. Every so often, I remember the Arcade Victory Cinematics for Shao Khan, Kung Lao, and Jax from one of the later Mortal Kombat games and chuckle.
December 17, 2025 at 1:29 AM
It's funny what things stick in your brain. Every so often, I remember the Arcade Victory Cinematics for Shao Khan, Kung Lao, and Jax from one of the later Mortal Kombat games and chuckle.
It might not be as visible to other folks since the Wasatch Front is sort of ground-zero for this, but there's been multiple attempts to massively grow a new fast food chain in the wake of Crumbl's heavy expansion. For most of them, it hasn't worked - some just outright imploded, like Dirty Bird.
December 16, 2025 at 7:19 AM
It might not be as visible to other folks since the Wasatch Front is sort of ground-zero for this, but there's been multiple attempts to massively grow a new fast food chain in the wake of Crumbl's heavy expansion. For most of them, it hasn't worked - some just outright imploded, like Dirty Bird.