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bolverk

Certifiably Surly
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Everything posted by bolverk

  1. Full article from link: Elon Musk Shared, Then Removed a Post Absolving Dictators for Genocide The post falsely claimed that Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and Mao Zedong were not responsible for the murders of millions of people, but rather public sector workers were. Early on Friday, Elon Musk shared a post written by an X user about the actions of three 20th century dictators β€” then quickly deleted it after it sparked a backlash. The post falsely claimed that Joseph Stalin, the communist leader of the Soviet Union until 1953; Adolf Hitler, the leader of the Nazi party in Germany; and Mao Zedong, the founder of the People’s Republic of China, didn’t cause the deaths of millions of people under their watch. Instead, the post said, their public sector workers did. Mr. Musk shared the post without any other comment. He removed it soon after users on X criticized the post, saying it was antisemitic and dismissive of genocide. Historians have widely chronicled that millions of people died under Stalin, that millions of Jews were massacred under Hitler during the Holocaust, and that millions of Chinese were displaced or killed during Mao’s cultural revolution. It was the latest post by Mr. Musk to devolve into controversy. In 2023, Mr. Musk endorsed an antisemitic post on X as β€œthe actual truth” of what Jewish people were doing, prompting advertisers to flee. And after an assassination attempt on Mr. Trump last year, Mr. Musk wrote β€” then deleted β€” a post suggesting it was odd that nobody had tried to kill former President Joseph R. Biden Jr. or former Vice President Kamala Harris. Mr. Musk has long appeared to favor strongmen and has promoted right wing modern-day leaders. He has repeatedly used X to support politicians like Javier Milei of Argentina, Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil and Narendra Modi of India, leaders in countries where he also has business interests. Most recently, he threw his support behind the hard-right Alternative for Germany party, hosting an online town hall for its candidate for chancellor. β€œIt is deeply disturbing and irresponsible for someone with a large public platform to elevate the kind of rhetoric that serves to undermine the seriousness of these issues,” the Anti-Defamation League said in a statement about Mr. Musk’s sharing of the post. Mr. Musk did not respond to a request for comment. Mr. Musk frequently uses X as a megaphone to share everything from juvenile memes to major U.S. policy proposals, blasting his opinions to his more than 219 million followers. But his viewpoints are drawing more scrutiny since he has become a close adviser to President Trump helping overhaul government spending. Mr. Musk has transformed X, removing many rules around hate speech and disinformation and allowing thousands of accounts banned by the company’s prior leadership for problematic posts to return to the platform β€” including Mr. Trump’s. Around 2:30 a.m. on Friday, Mr. Musk shared the post written by an X user that said, β€œStalin, Hitler and Mao didn’t murder millions of people. Their public sector workers did.” Mr. Musk in recent weeks has battled with public sector workers in Washington as part of his work with his cost-cutting initiative, known as the Department of Government Efficiency. He has accused federal workers of trying to conceal fraud and encouraged them to quit their jobs. The post sparked backlash from federal employee unions, among others. β€œAmerica’s public service workers β€” our nurses, teachers, firefighters, librarians β€” chose making our communities safe, healthy and strong over getting rich. They are not, as the world’s richest man implies, genocidal murderers,” Lee Saunders, the president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, said in a statement. Mr. Musk on Friday shared several comments on X defending himself from accusations of antisemitism and claiming his critics were the ones aligned with Nazism. Mr. Musk also recently came under fire for a making a gesture that resembled the Roman salute, which is also known as the β€œFascist salute” and was later adopted by the Nazis. β€œLook at what they did to President @realDonaldTrump,” Mr. Musk wrote in one post. β€œHe was loved by democrats until he ran for president. Now they call him Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, etc and try to kill him,” referring to another dictator, the Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini.
  2. Watchu got against the ding dong daddies, huh?
  3. 2024 population estimates were released by the Census Bureau last week. https://www.texastribune.org/2025/03/13/texas-urban-population-census-2024/ https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-releases/2025/population-estimates-counties-metro-micro.html
  4. I'm sure the penthouse on the 15th floor has lots of stories to tell. From what I've heard, it was basically run like a casino up there. I bet they did good business, too, between all the airmen at the base (Webb AFB, now closed) and area oilmen/cattle ranchers. Alas, we were just born too late.
  5. Let's just hope it doesn't spread to Puh-flugerville.
  6. No, I'm a Mighty Steer, but I did go out to Glasscock County with the same crew I mentioned looking for y'all's glowing grave late at night. I graduated in the same class as Pze and was a good friend of a friend of Tex (RIP). If you're from the Big Spring/Garden City area, you've likely heard of that family. The hotel reopened in 2012, so it's been open a little while now. It's got a nice restaurant and bar on the ground floor that's a good place to get together with friends when visiting town. csb: The painting is the mom of local native Brint Ryan (Ryan LLC), to whom he dedicated the hotel's restoration. If I remember the story right, his parents had just gone through a rough divorce when he was a kid, and his mom went out partying at a local bar. This would've been the late 70s/early 80s. Anyway, near the end of the night, she was out in the parking lot and was accidentally run over and killed. So that painting and plaque underneath it were dedicated to her. another csb: The dad of one of my best friends used to tell us that back in the day before it closed, the folks who ran the place were in cahoots with drug smugglers who'd fly in their product from Mexico. The story went that if they knew the cops were waiting for a flight of smuggled drugs to come in, the owners would only light up part of the sign to where it would read "HOT SET," like a hot setup or something. The story was likely bullshit, but a lot of old-timers have similar stories about the hotel being a vice den with gambling and prostitution back in the 1970s.
  7. Good piece on the impact of retaliatory tariffs on specific industries and their geographies in the US, suggesting they're targeted to hurt areas that voted a certain way in this past election. The story also provides links to studies from Brookings and MIT showing similar results. Some pulled quotes: The jobs that could be hit by retaliation are especially concentrated in pockets of the upper Midwest, South and Southeast, including many rural parts of the country that are responsible for producing agricultural goods. It also includes areas that produce coal, oil, car parts and other manufactured products. The message foreign countries are trying to send, he said, is, β€œYou think you can bully us, well, we can hurt you too. And by the way, we know where it really matters.” Rural parts of the country are once again at risk from retaliation. Agriculture is a major U.S. export and farmers are politically important to Mr. Trump. And rural counties may have one major employer β€” like a poultry processing plant β€” that provides a big share of the county’s jobs, compared with urban or suburban areas that are more diversified. Mark Muro, a senior fellow at Brookings Metro, said that many of the counties affected by retaliation were rural, and β€œhard red territory.” The geography of Mr. Trump’s political support, he said, was β€œno secret to our trade partners.” β€œThey’re very cognizant of these industries, the geography of these industries, and how American politics work,” he added. Sharing gift link so you can move your cursor around over counties to see the number of affected jobs and their share of the total in each place. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/15/business/economy/tariffs-trump-maps-voters.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4U4.EjUu.clGohPPmoEo_&smid=url-share Top Ten states with the highest share of impacted jobs (4% in Texas):
  8. Back in the late 1980s, when it was still a derelict shell of a building, my high school crew may have snuck in it and gone exploring a time or two. Exterior:
  9. Wordle 1,366 4/6 πŸŸ©β¬›πŸŸ©πŸŸ¨β¬› πŸŸ©πŸŸ©πŸŸ©β¬›β¬› πŸŸ©πŸŸ©πŸŸ©πŸŸ¨β¬› 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Connections Puzzle #644 🟨🟨🟨🟨 🟦🟦🟦🟦 🟩🟩🟩🟩 πŸŸͺπŸŸͺπŸŸͺπŸŸͺ πŸ™‚ Daily Quordle 1147 4️⃣6️⃣ 5️⃣7️⃣ m-w.com/games/quordle/ ⬜🟨⬜🟨⬜ ⬜⬜🟨⬜🟨 ⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜🟨⬜🟨⬜ ⬜🟩🟩⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜ ⬜🟩⬜⬜🟩 ⬜🟩⬜🟩⬜ 🟨🟨⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜ ⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜🟩⬜⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜⬜🟨🟨 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
  10. Wordle 1,365 5/6 β¬›πŸŸ¨πŸŸ¨β¬›πŸŸ© β¬›πŸŸ©πŸŸ¨β¬›πŸŸ© πŸŸ©πŸŸ©β¬›β¬›πŸŸ© πŸŸ©πŸŸ©β¬›πŸŸ¨πŸŸ© 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 Connections Puzzle #643 🟨🟨🟨🟨 🟩🟩🟩🟩 πŸŸͺπŸŸͺπŸŸͺπŸŸͺ 🟦🟦🟦🟦 πŸ™‚ Daily Quordle 1146 5️⃣8️⃣ 7️⃣6️⃣ m-w.com/games/quordle/ 🟩⬜⬜⬜⬜ 🟨⬜🟩⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨 🟩🟩⬜⬜⬜ 🟨⬜⬜🟨⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟨⬜⬜🟨🟨 ⬜🟨🟩⬜🟨 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜🟨🟩 🟨🟨🟩🟨⬜ 🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ ⬜🟨⬜⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
  11. I listened to the first one and read the full thread of the second, and they’re both absolutely infuriating. What was most telling was how Rubio commented twice that this whole maddening fever dream about the US economically conquering Canada is based on a disagreement between the Canadian government and the President of the United States, as if he were the entire US government. Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but just the thought makes me boil inside.
  12. Best vantage point I can show using Google Maps. They're on the brownish rail bridge, crossing the river.
  13. The opposite: https://www.facebook.com/ABCBig2NewsKMID/videos/1152296386379741/ Over Midland: https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=122227512038209050&set=pcb.122227512680209050
  14. Relevant to the discussion: Young Democrats’ Anger Boils Over as Schumer Retreats on Shutdown A generational divide, seen in newer lawmakers’ impatience with bipartisanship and for colleagues who don’t understand new media, has emerged as one of the deepest rifts within the party.
  15. Republican mental gymnastics have gone on far longer than the past 10 years. I'd say they first hopped on the pommel horse with Nixon, and they've only gotten better at it since.
  16. Well, it doesn't sound like he or his team of 15 are even attempting to support his district. Fuck'em.
  17. I hope my lesbian cousin, who's a women's coach living in aSheville (yes, she's living the stereotype), was in attendance kicking some ass, too.
  18. I checked this out on the map, and the rail bridge they're passing over is almost exactly 49 miles SOUTH of where Putin's Palace (Google map link) is located. So, it's within range.
  19. I guess that means no more high school mascots or productions of The Wizard of Oz.
  20. Wordle 1,364 4/6 β¬›β¬›β¬›β¬›πŸŸ© β¬›β¬›β¬›β¬›πŸŸ© πŸŸ¨β¬›πŸŸ¨β¬›πŸŸ© 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 I knew it but accidentally clicked the stupid wrong word. Connections Puzzle #642 🟨🟨🟨🟨 🟩πŸŸͺ🟩🟩 🟩🟩🟩🟩 🟦🟦🟦🟦 πŸŸͺπŸŸͺπŸŸͺπŸŸͺ SW quad was a tough one for me. Stared a long time at it. πŸ™‚ Daily Quordle 1145 7️⃣4️⃣ 9️⃣6️⃣ m-w.com/games/quordle/ ⬜⬜⬜🟩⬜ 🟩⬜🟨⬜🟩 ⬜🟨⬜⬜🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜🟨⬜ ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜🟨⬜⬜🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜⬜🟨🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨 ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ ⬜🟨🟩⬜⬜ ⬜⬜🟩⬜🟩 ⬜⬜⬜⬜⬜ 🟨⬜⬜⬜⬜ ⬜⬜⬜⬜🟨 ⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜ ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜ 🟩🟨🟩🟨🟩 ⬜⬜🟩⬜⬜ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬜⬜🟨⬜⬜ ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟨⬜🟩🟨🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛ 🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 ⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
  21. He's just signaling to his buddies that he's still a racist and a homophobe.
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