Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

womp womp.

apnews.com/article/alin...

Donald Trump and Alina Habba posing on his personal jet.

December 8, 2025 at 7:58 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Bradley Whitford every 143 years...

Bradley Whitford, sporting a wonderful white beard while playing James Blaine who was James A Garfield's Secretary of State in the series "Death by Lightening". A quote box on the screen says, "Another Try? He's the worst vice president in history."

November 11, 2025 at 5:33 AM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Huh...

Heinrich Himmler's signature. Sharp peaks and valleys in the style.

Donald Trump's signature. Sharp peaks and valleys in the style.

October 9, 2025 at 4:26 AM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Watching Varsity Blues for the first time in years. My first reaction is Jon Voight did not have to crack his creativity bean to play Kilmer.

Jon Voight, playing Coach Kilmer in Varsity Blues, raises his right hand to silence the pep rally. It looks like a Nazi salute.

Maybe intentionally done by the director and/or Voight to build the character as a dick, but it proves the point because Jon Voight is a dick.

August 13, 2025 at 1:14 AM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

May 28, 2025 at 8:09 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

From a few weeks ago. He's committed and I applaud him for it.

May 3, 2025 at 7:43 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

April 29, 2025 at 7:46 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

I live on the West Coast. I took a trip to the East Coast. Wanna see my slideshow?

April 29, 2025 at 2:31 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Yeah!

April 5, 2025 at 4:35 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Indeed my fellow protester. Indeed. 🐱

April 5, 2025 at 4:20 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Rand Paul, Mitch McConnell, and Susan Collins.

April 3, 2025 at 2:36 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Richie Sexson in a Mariners uniform tossing a bat in disgust because he probably popped out or struck out again.

March 13, 2025 at 11:42 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

DDOS messages include "Piss off ya hoser!"

Bob and Doug McKenzie in front of the Great White North map with confused look on their faces.

March 10, 2025 at 8:52 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Infantile idiocy.

It's just unbelievable that our diplomatic nuance and leadership IQ has dropped into the Black Sea. A bunch of fucking idiots are pulling levers and pushing buttons like the stupidest of the chimps in the pool.

The exchange ended with Trump telling Duffy that he had to hire people from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as air traffic controllers. These air traffic controllers need to be “geniuses,” he said.

March 7, 2025 at 11:09 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

Relevant...

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles...

Trump claiming in a post: congestion pricing is dead. Manhattan and all of New York is saved..long live the king.

Charles was accused of treason against England by using his power to pursue his personal interest rather than the good of the country.[266] The charge stated that he was devising "a wicked design to erect and uphold in himself an unlimited and tyrannical power to rule according to his will, and to overthrow the rights and liberties of the people". In carrying this out he had "traitorously and maliciously levied war against the present Parliament, and the people therein represented", and that the "wicked designs, wars, and evil practices of him, the said Charles Stuart, have been, and are carried on for the advancement and upholding of a personal interest of will, power, and pretended prerogative to himself and his family, against the public interest, common right, liberty, justice, and peace of the people of this nation."

At about 2:00 p.m.,[285] Charles put his head on the block after saying a prayer and signalled the executioner when he was ready by stretching out his hands; he was then beheaded in one clean stroke.[286] According to observer Philip Henry, a moan "as I never heard before and desire I may never hear again" rose from the assembled crowd,[287] some of whom then dipped their handkerchiefs in the King's blood as a memento.

An image from Wikipedia of Charles I.

Charles I (19 November 1600 – 30 January 1649)[a] was King of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649.

February 20, 2025 at 12:00 AM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

This guy, David Mastio, can fuck all the way off. And the @seattletimes-rss.bsky.social should sit in the corner and think about why they would pick up this trash. I'm not linking.

The premise is we need chaos to affect change. That's great when you are not talking about life and death. Assholes.

Opinion headline in the Seattle Times: We need Musk's and Trump's creative destruction.

A picture of a penny under the headline.

Before President Donald Trump, change came to Washington, D.C., very slowly. Now it has come in a great, big, destructive whirl. Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency deputy and fellow billionaire Elon Musk is leading the charge in shuttering and rearranging government agencies, but much of the change is coming straight from Trump’s pen in executive orders and other directives to the cabinet to turn things in Washington upside down.

Musk considers himself more than an agent of destruction, though. He sees creation and destruction as going hand-in-hand — hence the term “creative destruction.” So far, it’s hard to discern the creative in all that destruction, but there is one coppery glint of creation that may be a sign of good things to come.

As I said, it is small — the change I am talking about is Trump’s decision to ax the penny. It’s a debate that has been going on for my whole writing career. In 1996, when I was fresh out of college and in my first job, the Government Accountability Office — DOGE before DOGE — was a glint in Trump’s eye. The GAO gave testimony to Congress that it might be time to get rid of the penny. Sixty percent of the billions of cents we were making never saw the inside of someone’s pocket.

Today, the case is even better. It takes eight of today’s pennies to equal the buying power of one penny when I was born. As a result of that inflation, the cost of the metal in a penny costs nearly four cents — we lose money on each of the billions we produce. And we don’t use them. The majority of the pennies we produce yearly are never circulated.

It’s not as if we don’t know what to do when they’re finally gone. Years ago, Congress held hearings and wrote competing bills on how companies should manage to round prices and taxes when the smallest coin we have is a nickel. Come to think of it, a nickel today is worth less than a 1971 penny and it, too, costs more to make than it is worth.

February 18, 2025 at 7:47 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

...More of all of this, but this snippet is interesting. The Seattle Times has no problem calling out BS here. I think the past year, they have done a pretty good job of it when compared to larger media. It's still nice to see it.

A screen capture from the previous post's article about a WA bill to provide funding for local journalism. There are highlighted sentences about testimony against the bill quoting, "...it would divert money" from low- and middle-income students." Later the article states, "It;s incorrect and misleading to suggest SB 5400 would reduce education funding."

The entire snippet reads:

The bill would provide yearly grants of around $13,000 to $15,000 per journalist. Recipients would need to have employed at least three journalists over the last year or two over the last two years. Grants would be administered by the Department of Commerce and given to all that qualify, with no decisions based on subject matter or ability to influence coverage.

Several trade groups testified against the bill. Emily Wittman from the Association of Washington Business said it would “divert money” from low- and middle-income students, and Rose Feliciano of TechNet said the education surcharge program is working and “we would not want to lessen its impact.”

It’s incorrect and misleading to suggest SB 5400 would reduce education funding. By collecting more from the state’s wealthiest tech companies, the bill may actually increase funding for education.

In 2019 the state added a business tax surcharge, now 0.25%, on the state’s largest software companies to support higher education and student aid.

SB 5400 would lift a cap on how much is collected from individual companies by that surcharge, from $9 million to $15 million.

Raising the cap is expected to collect at least $20 million more from the companies. Any additional revenue beyond $20 million would go to the education programs.

“We’re not trying to divert anything, we’re trying to be additive,” state Sen. Marko Liias, the bill’s lead sponsor, told me after the hearing.

January 29, 2025 at 11:53 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

MAGA:

January 28, 2025 at 8:18 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

We are all Tom Cruise picking that line...

January 23, 2025 at 8:01 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

I know how to fly a kite. Some may even say I am an expert kite flyer.

A friend recommends that based on my kite-flying ability, I should fly their 787 next year.

It's insane for that person to recommend. It's insane for me to agree.

This is about Pete Hegseth

An image of the Rainbow Patchwork Kite. Described on bellalunatoys.com as:

"Fly the rainbow! With this 20 inch Rainbow Patchwork Kite the sky is the limit for flying fun. "

"Made from durable ripstop polyester with a fiberglass frame, this kite will sail through the skies on endless windy outings. The kite comes ready to fly with an attached handle and line."

January 15, 2025 at 6:34 PM

Uncle Carrot

@thenice1ne.bsky.social

No Excel. I do not desire to wedge three columns in the middle of my table and shift all those values to the right. Ever. NEVER!

If someone wants to AI something, how about this feature? FFS!