April 2, 2025

Myth #6: Undocumented immigrants drain Social Security (AARP)

The facts: Some have blamed problems with Social Security's financial health on undocumented immigrants draining the system's resources. It's a popular complaint, but a false one. Noncitizens who live and work in the U.S. legally can qualify for Social Security under the same terms as native-born and naturalized Americans, but undocumented people are not allowed to claim benefits.

There is evidence that undocumented workers actually improve Social Security's bottom line. Some do obtain Social Security numbers under false pretenses, and payroll taxes are withheld from their wages even though they are not eligible to later collect benefits. Undocumented immigrants paid $25.7 billion into Social Security in 2022, according to a July 2024 report from the nonpartisan Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.

https://www.aarp.org/social-security/myths-misconceptions-explained/#:~:text=The%20facts%3A%20The%20two%20trust%20funds%20that%20pay,fund.%20Social%20Security%20is%20a%20separate%2C%20self-funded%20program.'



Hat tip to PeaceTrain for pointing out this article: https://democraticunderground.com/100220199534

April 2, 2025

Elon Musk's Cringey Chainsaw Act Exposes a Deep Ignorance Fueling DOGE (Tomasky/Fighting Words/New Republic)

The richest man in the world is an effing idiot. And something worse than that.
***
The way Musk’s DOGE is going about these cuts is the equivalent, as I heard former Biden administration official Mitch Landrieu say on TV this week, of a man thinking he needs to lose 30 pounds and deciding to saw off his leg. That’s funny, and true. But this is even worse. A man sawing off his leg hurts only himself. What Musk is doing will hurt millions of people in ways that we’re only beginning to see.

Here’s one small example, which you likely haven’t read about but which I take a little personally. If you’re one of my regular readers, you know that I was born in Morgantown, West Virginia, and went to my hometown university, West Virginia University, or WVU (not UWV, thank you). A week ago, West Virginia Watch, a small nonprofit news organization in the state, moved a story noting that the university expects to lose $12 million annually in funding that supports cancer and vascular research.
***
The right-wing myth about how things work is that the federal government is full of waste and bloat and you could cut two-thirds of it and nobody would even notice. This view is based on utter cynicism and stupidity on the part of right-wing shock jocks and cable hosts and others who want to promote hatred and keep people in a state of outrage.
***
And yes, they, too, are an important part of the economy. Imagine what the U.S. economy would be like if even 0.5 percent of airplane flights ended in a crash (domestically, that would mean 275 crashes every day) or if 1 percent of America’s beef supply carried some disease. It’s the federal government, not “self-policing” industry, that makes sure these calamities aren’t happening. If they did, the economy would be a shipwreck.
***
more: https://newrepublic.com/post/191811/musk-chainsaw-cpac-trump-right-wing-ignorance

February 21, 2025

6 great cookies to make without eggs (Denver Post) {actually mostly links & pointers to recipes}

By Bay Area News Group
UPDATED: February 20, 2025 at 2:38 PM MST

Nanaimo bars. This Canadian specialty is a no-bake three-layer bar: a base of nuts, coconut, graham cracker crumbs and melted chocolate; a middle of custard or buttercream frosting; and a chocolate top. Caveat: Many recipes call for an egg in the bottom layer to help hold it together; this one doesn’t. For a less ambitious cookie that uses a recipe similar to just the base, search for no-bake chocolate coconut snowballs.

Mexican wedding cookies. Also known as snowballs or Russian tea cakes, these are buttery nut-based balls rolled in powdered sugar. Many recipes online; here’s cookie queen Maida Heatter’s version.
***
Ginger snaps: Most molasses cookies and ginger snaps use eggs, but the recipe for Aunt Big’s Gingersnaps in Mark Bittman’s “How to Cook Everything” is egg-free. Bittman describes them as “not too sweet … super-crisp, the kind that stick in your teeth.”
***
Yogurt chocolate chip cookies: An easy drop cookie that — except for yogurt replacing the eggs — uses the same ingredients as the Toll House classic.
***
the rest, and links: https://www.denverpost.com/2025/02/20/6-great-cookies-without-eggs/

February 15, 2025

"If Americans want to change their government, they're going to have to get over their dictator phobia"

Quote from Curtis Yarvin, frequently cited by Vance as a big influence on his "thinking". So now he's serving as the thin end of the wedge for infiltrating extremist politics into the mainstream discussion.

https://www.salon.com/2024/10/01/rachel-maddow-sounds-alarm-on-jd-vances-pro-dictatorship-influences/

February 10, 2025

Lenin wrote out precise plans for Socialist movements to replace capitalist ones -- provoke the gov't in power, ...

convince the masses you are on their side and will make life better for them, harass those in power into becoming more intolerant and oppressive, and sooner or later the ruled will turn to open revolution to overthrow the rulers.

The very first time I heard all this, it immediately occurred to me that there is nothing in this plan to guarantee that the party taking over is in any way sincere in its purported intentions, only its real intention to grab power. Oligarchy A is replaced by Oligarchy B. New boss same as the old boss. Promised Workers' Paradise never arrives.

Turnip is taking a different approach -- still empty promises and agitprop BS for the unwashed masses, but the nature of it is different; it has to be, because he is replacing a whole system that actually works when it's not being obstinately thwarted with one which is nothing but an unrealisable fantasy, and he doesn't even notice that what's being introduced by his "subordinate" has a lot of features he never planned on (and still doesn't care about). Meanwhile, the real revolution is carried out by willing collaborators installed by the Radical Right over the previous decades. They've been waiting in place for the corrupting propaganda of Limbaugh, Murdoch, Cessbook, Xitter, etc. to weaken the system by brainwashing the masses into believing they really want a dictator, despite more than two centuries of opposing dictators with our blood and treasure. The present crop of dictator-fluffers representing red states in Congress demonstrate over and over that they have found the abuser of their dreams and will stick with him to the death of democracy.

February 10, 2025

Is Elon Musk A Replicant? (lawandchaospod.com)

Musk Sued For Crappy AI Plagiarism At Conference Celebrating His Brilliant Innovations

Andrew Torrez and Liz Dye
Oct 28, 2024

On the afternoon of October 10, 2024, just hours before an event to hype its “fully autonomous cybercab,” Tesla realized it had a problem. The company had acquired what it believed to be the rights to use a still image from the 2017 film Blade Runner 2049 from Warner Bros. Discovery Inc (WBDI) in its promotion. It had rented out Warner Bros.’ studio lot in Burbank, California and invited various luminaries to witness the beautiful future — always right around the corner — of self-driving cars. But at 2 pm, WBDI realized that it did not own the rights to the image, and the actual owner, Alcon Entertainment, refused to associate itself with Musk and his companies.

And so, according to a complaint filed last week, Musk’s minions used AI to generate a copycat image and proceeded as planned. Because if you can’t beat ‘em, get your plagiarism bot to steal ‘em, right?

Mistakes Were Made

In 1982, Warner Bros. released the original Blade Runner movie, adapted from the 1968 novel Do Androids Dream of Electronic {sic!} Sheep? by science fiction author Philip K. Dick. It was an instant classic, launching a franchise exploring the fraught line separating humans from machines. The iconic shot at issue from the sequel featured actor Ryan Gosling, portraying a replicant android sent to hunt down a child born to a replicant mother, something which would offend both law and the natural order in the Blade Runner cinematic universe. He’s pictured in a duster jacket, next to his autonomous flying car, known as a “spinner,” outside a post-apocalyptic Las Vegas, rendered uninhabitable by a nuclear bomb. The still was featured in publicity for the movie and is instantly recognizable to sci-fi fans.
***
The idea of self-driving cars has been a staple of science fiction for at least seventy years, which is perhaps why the science fiction filmmaker behind the movie adaptation of I, Robot tweeted out this joke, rather than actually suing Musk for copying his designs.
https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/
***
more, mostly long discussions of copyright law, and how Mush feels he's free to bend the law to suit his needs AND how his own 'futurist' approach to innovation is reminiscent of fictional dystopias more than utopias: https://www.lawandchaospod.com/p/is-elon-musk-a-replicant

Adds more fuel to the speculation on so many people's minds: Just what is wrong with this guy, anyway ? And how long can the list get ?


(SF {as opposed to "Sci-Fi"} fans will know it's *electric*, not *electronic*, sheep.)

February 8, 2025

PSA: It's not DOGE, it's "D"o"G""E".

It is NOT an established Department of the Federal Gov't. Only Congress can establish a Department, and it has not done so.

It is NOT any other institution of the Federal Gov't; it is the personal servant of the OCCUPANT of the Oval Office. They may be receiving gov't contracts and salaries -- in fact, they're probably double-, triple-, and quadruple-dipping, but they don't serve the gov't or the taxpayers. They serve only one vindictive individual who squeaked into elective office, and his boss.

It has NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING, to do with efficiency except as a (marginally) ostensibly plausible excuse. Efficiency is a measure of the results you get out for the resources and effort you put in. RWNJs don't want to put ANYTHING in, and want to outlaw absolutely anyone but themselves ever getting ANYTHING out. Nothing out for nothing in is not perfect efficiency, it's perfect INEFFECTIVENESS, which is exactly what they want, until THEY need help. No matter how much the Reich wing bitches and moans about "EFFICIENCY" -- a term which really means "our paymasters didn't get a big enough cut" -- real world results repeatedly reveal that what people, including taxpayers, really want (while seldom saying it clearly) is EFFECTIVENESS. The gov't that GETS THINGS DONE TO HELP ITS CITIZENS will always be more popular than the one that is only seen to collect taxes while playing Sugar Daddy to its Sweet Li'l (Billionaire/Corporate) Things and allowing the quality of life for the proverbial "ordinary American" to decline unabated for year after year, Congressional session after Congressional session. The GOP -- the party of hatred and bigotry, insider dealing, fossil fuel subsidies, regressive tax schedules, handmaiden to corporate interests, undisclosed gifts* of dark money, frequent sex abuse scandals (usually by people who loudly proclaim "traditional family values" without clarifying whose traditions they're referring to), voter purging, vote caging, voter ID restrictions, invalidated mail-in ballots and invalidated signatures, and a COMPLETE AND TOTAL RELIANCE ON THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE TO EVER "WIN" THE WHITE HOUSE, serves only one purpose: to DISTRACT the American voting public from all the destruction inflicted on our society by its financial underwriters with red herrings so blatant that even the dullest drooling knuckle-dragging red hatter can grasp the supposed offense he's being lied to about and know whom he's expected to hate for it -- furrners, nonwhite people, poor people, handicapped people, sick people, women people, educated people, generous people, or pretty much anyone who couldn't pass for himself, his spouse/servant, or other blood relative. We've all seen anecdotes or cartoons like the following, and it's time for our Dem representative and the public media to recognize that this ISN'T a metaphor or allegory, it's the literal Goddamned truth:



* Not really gifts, technically, since substantial and often disproportionate material value is expected in return, as both giver and receiver are well aware.

February 5, 2025

Resume, re'sume' or resume': Is this word spelled with accents or not?

All three ways of spelling the word, with accents or without, are considered correct: resume, résumé and resumé. Of these three, the third (resumé) is considered the least acceptable, as it follows neither French nor English conventions. So all things considered, it’s best to ditch this resume spelling and focus on the remaining two, resume vs. résumé.

The French word résumé (with two accents) means “summary.” That’s why it was borrowed by English speakers to mean a brief document that sums up a job seeker’s employment history, education and skills.

Be advised that “resume” (regardless of the spelling) is the term commonly used in the U.S. and Canada, but outside of North American, this document is usually known as a CV (curriculum vitae). For more information on this, see our blog “ Resume vs. curriculum vitae (CV): What’s the difference?”
***
Proper spelling of “resume”

When it comes to “resume/résumé,” dictionaries agree that both spellings are correct. The Associated Press Stylebook prefers “resume,” while the Chicago Manual of Style calls for retaining the accents in loanwords, so it prefers “résumé.” Neither resume spelling is wrong, so you can go either way.
***
more: https://resume.io/blog/resume-spelling

February 5, 2025

A Mexican couple moved to our area -- He spoke English; she didn't. He asked her to go buy him some socks.

She didn't want to go shopping without being able to understand English, but he told her "Don't worry -- the salespeople will help you find what you want". She was very dubious, but gave it a try. A sales woman saw her looking at men's clothes and offered to help, quickly realizing she had language issues. She showed her various suits, pants, shirts, etc. but each time the woman shook her head and said "noooo ...". Finally they came across a display with plenty of socks, and the woman said "Eso si que es !" ( "That's it!" ) Exasperated, the sales woman huffed, "Well, now, Honey, if you can spell it, why can't you say it ?".

February 5, 2025

Interesting trivia: for years, the Osceola New Life Assembly of God held services underneath a full-size SST mockup.