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Nice Guy Eddie

Certifiably Surly
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Everything posted by Nice Guy Eddie

  1. Surprise surprise surprise. Collins voted against the bill but only because the gop didn’t need her vote with JD’s tie breaking vote.
  2. Just rcvd a text message from Allred asking for my financial support. I replied that I’m not supporting another losing campaign. Not that I think anyone will read my reply.
  3. Texas needs a major event or crisis to go blue. One example could be if Paxton and Cornyn both decided to run in the general election, with one being the independent. That could split the GOP vote enough to let a Dem win. However would Paxton and Cornyn's hatred of each other be enough, and could both raise enough money to stay in the race. Also the independent in that example would have tremendous positive and negative pressure to drop out. John - drop out, and you can join this law firm as a partner with a $20m signing bonus, and you never have to actually work a single day.
  4. Don't get me wrong in that I'm completely opposed to someone putting everything in dividend stocks. If you do then you miss out on growth stocks. Diversification of growth and dividends is the right idea and its fair that someone can determine their best mix. You can find dividend investing "experts" who will demonstrate the strategy of going with >10% yield stocks. This is a great idea until it's not. You can argue it's superior to growth stocks. Who doesn't want a 20% yield with 15% tax rates after 2 months of ownership, but when that company eventually lowers or suspends their dividend, the price will tank and you're left with low value stock and no dividend. I like companies who have consistently raised their net income and dividends. But I also love growth companies that don't pay dividends.
  5. wait, is there a state Democrat party?
  6. I have a very low opinion of Maine just due to her. Her lack of convictions does nothing but create chaos. The only time she ever goes through with her concerns is when her vote doesn't matter? "You have enough votes to pass, cool, I will vote against you so I can look independent to my voters." And if others have a low opinion of Texas because of our senators, I agree with them. I think less of Texas due to Cruz and Cornyn, among others.
  7. Remember when Rick Perry had the audacity to suggest the idea that all Texas children should have the Gardasil vaccine to prevent HPV and future cancers. Since the virus is usually spread by sexual contact, the church going crowd cannot let their children have the vaccine since they believe it promotes sex. I give Perry credit that he saw this is a healthcare issue to prevent cancer, and not the ridiculous idea that it promotes underage sex. However even he had to retract the idea because conservatives look at the future cancer as a result of low morals and most likely they think the victims deserve it.
  8. The vehicle is telling me it's the right rear tire that has a fault. No idea if that is right or not. Ford is selling the sensor for ~$80 each but I assume that cheaper alternatives are out there. Sucks that I just bought new tires a few months ago and didn't even think of this at the time. This is the first time in my 55 years that I've had a TPMS error. most of me vehicles in those years didn't have TPMS.
  9. OpenAI could easily start to price their non-base ChatGPT models at a per transaction (token) level. that's how it works with agents. You can set it up to auto-refill your balance, along with a monthly maximums. Heavy ChatGPT users will complain. However if their ChatGPT usage is creating a work product, tough that their workforce will cost them more than $200 per month. not to mention that OpenAI can keep going back to the private markets to raise more funds. I imagine that we won't see OpenAI come close to an IPO until they're out of their heavy growth phases. The IPO era is over but that's a separate topic.
  10. Say that someone is sitting on a large (or small) capital gain on crypto. If Sen. Lummis' language is kept, it would exempt <$200 transactions from reporting the sale as a capital gain. Now if you have $2m in capital gains, that's a long haul to not report the capital gains across many many transactions but it legally eliminates the tax owed. Of course if someone thinks that BTC is going to 10x, you don't want to spend $15 on a burger that will eventually effectively cost you $150.
  11. Thanks. I will check out the tool, or see if AutoZones offer its usage for free. I'm a fan of seeing the tire pressure on my dashboard so it would eventually bother me not seeing it especially on road trips.
  12. Ford Explorer 2017. One of the wheels is throwing a warning that the tire pressure monitoring system has failed on one wheel. It's definitely not working according to the dashboard. Ford Quicklane quoted me $250 over the phone. I'm completely unfamiliar with these systems. Is $250 reasonable?
  13. Been screwing around more and more with AI agents. Basic training classes that mainly demonstrate the potential. I know we mostly hear hype regarding them but they're the real deal. As soon as more major software packages and email systems embrace them, corp America is going be transformed. Given that I've never known a VP or CFO to not want to lower headcount/cost, they will quickly grab onto tech that will increase productivity per worker. If someone's main role is working with transactions and/or dealing with customers via email/chat, start learning a new skill ASAP.
  14. Was a bill really required to allow Texans to spend gold and silver? I'm assuming this doesn't require companies, stores, vendors, whatever accept gold. Hell, some places don't even accept cash these days. Greg Abbott has morphed from entertaining the ideas of the fringes to mainly focusing on the fringes. Crazy how he's surpassed Rick Perry.
  15. I believe that we're due for another BTC pop. Perhaps closer to 125. caveat: if there are negative, external events, then it could easily drop as well.
  16. Maybe I was blinded because I was a kid, but those game seemed to mean more then. At a minimum they meant more to me. Can’t recall when I last watched or even checked out an all star game box score. If I had a ticket, I would go for the first few innings.
  17. Guarantee that if we sold off trillions of dollars of national land, whatever President/party that is in power would want to immediately give it back as a tax refund and not really touch the debt. I recall when GWB inherited a roughly balanced/maybe slight surplus, he said that Americans knew how to spend their money better than DC so let’s run up a deficit with tax breaks and a foreign war. and with the tax refund, the gop would give 95% of it to wealthy folks. Trickle down and all.
  18. I’m pessimistic about the growing movement to sell federal land to states if not private industry. Like @Kyrie Eleison stated many regions don’t have much federal land so this is a non issue for them. Second this is an idea that may only need to succeed once then the land would be privatized forever. ive seen a few billionaires (wanna be) types argue that the US is sitting on trillions of dollars of land value that could be sold to pay off the national debt. Maybe there’s partial accuracy in that, but pawning your assets is a big step in eventual downfalls of organizations.
  19. ‘79 series between the pirates and orioles stands out in mind as when I started to appreciate baseball.
  20. It's Houston 2-3pm. Hearing the thunderstorms rolling in. Time to get to wherever you need to be for the next few hours.
  21. I'm always so annoyed that when the state GOP officials want to provide tax relief, they only focus on property tax. Which further strangles local govt and schools, forcing them to be more dependent on the growing state of Texas govt. And Texas does it best to refuse federal funds. If Abbott or Patrick want to lower taxes, they should only have the right to change the state sales tax. If they want to lower tax revenue, they should start with state tax revenue first. I don't even see why or how they should have control of local taxes. Believe the sales tax rate has been 6.25% (state level) since 1990. If it was those nasty Dems that took it up to 6.25%, why hasn't the GOP brought it down. Funny how there's never a peep out of them to touch their funds.
  22. Since wealth inequality is showing zero signs of decreasing, we are going to turn to more and more policies like rent stabilizations. Poor people will continue to make up more and more of the voting public. Wealthy people should recognize that they will eventually have one of two outcomes: either the govt will take some of your wealth via taxation, or the mob will take all of your wealth, maybe your life, when they show up on your doorstep with guns. Of course there is a growing movement to only allow voting by those with a positive income tax payment. Surprisingly even some poor MAGA are supportive of losing their personal right to vote away. So odd.
  23. Weekday afternoon games are the best. I get that some fans can't make them, but it also opens up games to fans that nights are tough, especially with school aged kids in the summer. They're also bad ass in taking off work with friends and enjoying a beer at 1pm on a Wed. Finally I like the idea of giving the ball players a slight break in the flight schedule so every flight isn't red eye flight.
  24. I'm more and more impressed with AI every week. However, it's still be unable to perform some data analytic tasks that I've thrown at it. Perhaps I'm using the wrong models, or need to enhance the prompts. For example, I struggle to get AI to recognize that one data set has Eddie Smith and another is Eddie M. Smith, and to consider them the same. And that the first name field may have the middle initial in it as well. (Note in my limited data, I don't have currently have anyone with duplicate first and last names.) I also find that data hallucinations are less likely now. I've run through some training that demonstrates that you can apply steps to validate an answer perhaps even using a different model to validate. If Gemini tells you that Napoleon ruled New Zealand, you can ask OpenAI to validate the answer. If found to false or questionable, either model can be re-asked the question and validated again. The downside of answer validation is time/cost.
  25. I've never believed in the wisdom of rent control. I get it that it helps renters but it also creates an artificial marketplace that harms others as well. People can't afford a new place because a landlord needs higher rents to cover the fact that another tenant has been paying $200/mo for the last 40 years. Of course, my understanding is that new NYC rent control apartments stopped in the 70s, and those tenants at the time were grandfathered in. Very few of them remain. Their stories are crazy so they often get repeated and believed to be widespread. Rent stabilization is the current system that makes more sense. However it still creates an artificial marketplace that eventually gets out of line when its controlled by politicians who answer to said tenants. Who wants to vote for a politicians who indirectly raised your rent. Stabilization can also lead to subpar living conditions as the apt owner has less incentive to improve the building. Since they have limited availability to sign new tenants, they will do the bare minimum required perhaps even waiting to be forced to do so by the authorities.
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