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Texas Jeff

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Everything posted by Texas Jeff

  1. Yes they took a travel band, which is maybe 60 folks or so.
  2. Starting from this, written during a time when we were a frontier nation without radios, telephones or the most powerful military in the history of the world: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. We have made it to this, just in 2024 and this is just a sampling from this year: At least four people were killed and nine others were wounded in a shooting at Apalachee High School. A 14 year old male suspect was taken into custody. A 20 year old man opened fire on former President of the United States Donald Trump during a rally from a nearby rooftop, killing an audience member and wounding Trump and two other audience members. The shooter was killed by Secret Service personnel. A 42-year-old man from another county randomly shot nine people including two children at the Brooklands Plaza Splash Pad before driving to his home and shooting himself. Gunfire erupted during a parade at Kansas City Union Station to celebrate the Kansas City Chiefs winning Super Bowl LVIII. At least one person was killed and more than twenty others were injured. Three male suspects were detained, two of whom are juveniles and one of whom was shot. A 17-year-old male opened fire at Perry High School, killing one student and injuring seven others, including a school administrator, before committing suicide. The principal of the school, who was wounded during the incident, died from his wounds ten days later on January 14. And on and on and on. Militias everywhere it seems. Well regulated. It's all about securing our free state. Thoughts and prayers. Now is not the time.
  3. ... a well-regulated militia ...
  4. It would be interesting to know how many APD officers actually live in Austin. If you police a town you don’t call home and wouldn’t consider living in yourself, I believe you see policing as a paycheck. Austin is expensive to live in and I understand why officers may seek a home elsewhere, but it creates a disconnect that doesn’t help our city.
  5. Or they can vote at the LBJ school on campus, which is a ten minute walk east of the Union, or at the Travis County Civil Court, which is six blocks south of the Union. All are open 7-7 Mon-Sat and 12-6 on Sun during early voting. The Union location is open until 10pm on the last two days of early voting. If you want to hang out with frustrated coeds, get in line at the Union an hour before they close on Election Day.
  6. I got a jury duty notice for that courthouse which opened way back in 2023. The instructions to prospective jurors included a suggestion to park in the UT system garage. Why the hell did Travis County build a brand new family law court building without enough parking for prospective jurors? I get that there is a parking shortage around the main courthouse because it's pre-WWII but this was a brand new building.
  7. Well I get that the change might do that, but I would wait and see what they set up. It's reasonable to believe that the folks in charge might be trying to pull a fast one. However, in deep blue Travis County, it's hard to imagine that they would wish to suppress the student vote. Everyone could make voting faster by printing a sample ballot ahead of time, marking it up, and just entering your choices when you get to the booth. UT students have ample opportunity to early vote with no lines for two weeks. Lines form on election days because students are slackers who wait until the last possible minute to do something. Now, if Travis County decided to take away early voting from the UT campus I would agree that shenanigans were afoot.
  8. Yeah, it’s moving all the way to the Union next door. Squirrels could figure it out.
  9. Project Connect plans to close Guadalupe north of MLK, so maybe more of a how the heck do you go north thing…
  10. That’s just the Diet Mountain Dew talking…
  11. I would think that most people would just not sell at all and wait for a better time.
  12. This will be a tough year for Austin ISD. IMHO they have a top notch superintendent and the people implementing the bond that I have met have been fantastic. Hopefully they are up to it. In November, Austin voters will be asked to raise AISD taxes. The new tax will raise about $170 million. About $40 million will stay in the school district. The other $130 million will go to the state. Of the $170 million, about $17 million will go to teacher raises. It's a difficult decision and I think it's reasonable to vote either way on this. At the same time, the district will be considering cuts. They have a goal of cutting about $78 million over two years to get to a balanced budget. Last year they gave staff raises without new revenue to support the raises, which created a deficit budget. They were using savings to cover this deficit, but the savings fund is now down to the lowest amount they must keep. They have to get back to a balanced budget. They are going to start working through cuts this fall, which may include school closures and cutting programs. Trustees don't get elected to cut stuff, and many on the current board were elected on the heels of the last effort to close underutilized schools. The community is going to pressure the trustees to cut someone else's program or school. All of this is occurring with the school district under a state monitor for special education issues, which has the board under state guardrails for how they can behave.
  13. He and the lege control it. The state sets a value of wealth per child for each district. It can be anything they want it to be. School property tax on wealth above that value is "recaptured", i.e. sent to the state. School districts have some other options other than doing this, things like merging with another poorer district, but most choose to write a check. Lower the wealth per child or lower property tax rates and "recapture" goes down, meaning the amount sent to the state from the local property tax payer. The state sets the amount of money a school receives per child. It can be anything they want it to be. If the school district does not raise enough money to cover that amount, the state covers the rest. In theory this comes from the "recapture" fund, but in reality the state just cuts them a check. Raise the amount of money a school receives per child and school funding goes up. Lower it and it goes down. Keep it it same during times of high inflation (and that is what we are doing now) and school funding goes down ... inflation eats it away. Right now, these amounts are set such that the state is collecting more money than they are distributing, so the excess recapture money goes to the general fund. This general fund can be used for whatever the state wants. The lege can pass legislation to change this but they need the governor also pass it, and he's not doing that. He wants private vouchers to funnel public tax money into private schools. In 2016, some school districts sued the state saying that this was bullshit. They won. It was appealed to the Texas State Supreme Court. The court said no. The court said that things were screwed up, but everyone was at the wrong venue. The said everyone needed to work through this in the lege, don't take this to the courts. And eight years later the lege and the governor are draining public education through inflation and inaction while building up the general fund for whatever.
  14. He's two months younger than Trump.
  15. More than 10% of Trump's awards went to professional golfers.
  16. Sometimes they give the Medal of Freedom to a humble guy who's not expecting it:
  17. Hey man, taxes are going to go up until we make this place affordable ... it's simple math. When I was younger I thought that the city government really thought about this stuff and did the best they could to keep the place going. Now that I am older I am more cynical. It seems like there are thousands of groups that want to "do something" that in their worldview will improve the city, so they lobby the council, donate money to a politician, or get someone elected. They use this influence to fund their pet projects. This times a thousand causes budget bloat, and here we are. Each taxing authority says "we are just raising our rate a tiny bit, it's only a small increase when you look at your overall tax burden" or presents the tax rate increase as the increase, ignoring the idea that property tax valuations are also increasing faster than inflation, and your tax bill is your tax rate times your valuation.
  18. Bob Beamon will be 81 in 2028. Still holds the Olympic record in the long jump set in 1968 and his jump is still the 2nd all time unassisted by wind. He jumped almost two feet past the world record. Imagine taking off at the 10 yd line and landing close enough to the goal line to grab the pylon as you come in for a landing.
  19. Some context for those unfamiliar with the area: From the photos, the crash appeared to be at the intersection of Greenlee and Hillview. The truck may have been eastbound on Greenlee and turned right on Hillview, but it was hard to tell just from photos. It looked like the truck was southbound on HIllview just south of the intersection. There is a sidewalk on Hillview all the way from Exposition (near Casis) to Windsor, but only on one side of the road. There is a four-way stop at Greenlee and Hillview. Hillview descends as you drop from Casis down towards Greenlee, then bottoms out around that four-way stop, then goes back up the hill to Windsor. I think the city recently redid the sidewalk around that intersection and improved the crosswalk and sidewalk where Hillview crosses Greenlee, but there is only one crosswalk at that intersection. My thoughts: This area is on my 5k neighborhood walk and I've walked on Hillview sidewalk and turned west onto Greenlee hundreds of times. The walk down Greenlee between Hillview and Pecos is beautiful. It's an amazingly quiet and peaceful place. I walk with traffic on the sidewalk on Hillview and against traffic once I get on Greenlee. I have always felt safe. However, zero people stop at the four-way signs at Hillview/Greenlee or Greenlee/Pecos. All cars slow down a bit and then go, but no one comes to a complete stop. I have to cross Pecos on my walk and if there is a car I always make sure the driver is looking at me before I cross. I've lived in the neighborhood 18 years and I've never seen any traffic enforcement. Not even school zone enforcement. We have an awesome pre-WWII neighborhood layout that distributes neighborhood traffic through multiple entrances and exits, but we do have pinch points like Winsted near Littlefield's Tacos that are accidents waiting to happen. Recently, it seems like every middle school boy has scored an electric bike and they are roaming full throttle around the neighborhood in mini-gangs, helmet free. I'm surprised we haven't had a serious accident. I am sorry to hear that this couple didn't make it home from their walk ... I promise to slow down and look more and be more careful, but for them it's too late.
  20. BTW, I previously worked for Intel. They have a horrible internal culture. I'm not surprised that they are where they are.
  21. The United States needs a domestic chip manufacturing base. We rely too much on TSMC which is way too close to China. It’s ok to separate chip design from chip manufacturing, but for our own defense we need someone … or a few someones … to make chips here with the latest technology. Even if chip manufacturing is not profitable, we still need someone to do it here.
  22. American Airlines' market cap is 6.85 billion. Trump Media's market cap is 5.73 billion. American flys folks around the world. Trump's company publishes little messages. Something's off there...
  23. Perhaps there is something we don’t know about putting on Nazi killin’ undies that makes it a two man job…
  24. Pete for SoS. He already knows all of the languages.
  25. The famous “bowl and stroll”, named after the concept of bowling a ball and not waiting around to see it hit the pins. Usually observed right before someone goes on vacation, but can also come in to play before weekends or major holidays.
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