WHERE WERE YOU THE DAY THE INTERNET DIED?
Brilliant thread filled with dire predictions which somehow, completely unexpectedly, never came to pass.
Author Archive: Stephen Green
June 11, 2019
JUST IN TIME FOR PEAK SUMMER ROADTRIP SEASON: Gasoline prices set to plunge at the pump.
Last year at this time, the average price nationally for regular gas at the pump was $2.92 a gallon, according to AAA. Now, following an 18% drop in crude oil prices in New York, the average sits at $2.75 at a time of year — spring time — when the price usually peaks in anticipation of more drivers on the road.
“We did see a 7-cent decline in the national gas price last week, and I think you can look for another decline this week, so motorists would not be advised to be so fast to fill their tanks,” said Patrick DeHaan, a GasBuddy.com analyst, by telephone. “I could see the national average down around $2.60 a gallon or even $2.59 gallon this week.”
That low a price would be an 11.3% drop from a year earlier, getting close to the size of the decline in crude prices over the same period. Still, some are paying much more than the average. While drivers in parts of Texas get to pay about $2 a gallon, motorists in parts of Northern California are forking over more than double that.
Californians have no one to blame but themselves.
MAKE TEXAS GREAT AGAIN… ER, MORE GREAT: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott signs bill declaring children’s lemonade stands legal.
Still sad and strange that such a law is necessary though.
THE RETURN OF THE PRIMITIVE: As summer heats up, Calif. utility starts cutting power to prevent wildfires. “New ‘public safety power shutoffs’ will be more common due to climate change.”
No, they’re becoming more common because California’s “environmentalists” refuse to tend the state’s forest.
CHANGE: New York Times to Cease Political Cartoons After anti-Semitic Depiction of Netanyahu. “The Times will end contracts of two of its leading cartoonists, who were not responsible for the Netanyahu caricature. ‘Maybe we should start worrying,’ one cartoonist says.”
If they can’t tell the antisemitic comics from the non-antisemitic comics, then maybe this is for the best.
JIM GERAGHTY: Joe Biden Is Convinced a Pro-China-Trade Stance Is a Winner.
Biden has always supported expanded trade with China. In 2000, he voted to approve Permanent Normal Trade Relations with China. In a presidential debate in 2007, when asked, “Would you call for tariffs to protect American consumers from unsafe products from China? Are you willing to go there?” Biden answered, “I’m not. No, I’m not willing to go there. You don’t need to start a tariff war. All you have to do is enforce the law. Enforce the law.”
In a 2012 speech alongside then-Vice President Xi Jinping, he declared, “I believe that a rising China is a positive development — not only for China but also for the United States and the world. It will fuel economic growth and prosperity, and a rising China will bring to the fore a new partner with whom we can have help meeting the global challenges we all face.” In that same speech, Biden declared, “China has responded to our concerns about procurement policies and established a high-level body to strengthen enforcement of intellectual property rights as well.”
Supposedly, Biden’s strength as a nominee is his appeal to the Rust Belt Obama-to-Trump voters who put Trump in the White House. But staying soft on China and endorsing health benefits for illegal aliens would seem to put that appeal at serious risk.
See also: The Evitable Nominee.
Kate Nixon considered taking a gun to work on May 31, the day a co-worker killed her and 11 others in the country’s deadliest mass shooting this year, an attorney for her family said on a radio show Monday.
The public utilities engineer was concerned about DeWayne Craddock “as well as one other person,” said Kevin Martingayle, an attorney working with Nixon’s family. So on the night of May 30, Nixon had discussed with her husband, Jason, “whether or not she should take a pistol and hide it in her handbag,” Martingayle said. She decided against it because of a city policy that prevents employees from bringing weapons to work.
The next day, Craddock, who had worked as a city public utilities engineer for nine years, used a .45-caliber handgun with a legally purchased silencer to fire at colleagues in Building 2 of the city’s Municipal Center in Princess Anne.
So needlessly tragic.
LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: House Democrats’ Hearing Recycles Anti-Trump Felon. “Remember, the point of these hearings is to put on a show, have selected segments air on television and disseminated on the internet, hope the public turns to support impeachment and then go forward with impeachment. Sadly for Fat Jerry, the NYC helicopter crash directed media coverage away from the Judiciary’s freak show so he didn’t get the intended media coverage.”
Showbiz is like that sometimes.
ELIZABETH NOLAN BROWN: Kamala Harris Tries (Again) to Rewrite Her History as a Prosecutor of Petty Crimes.
If we’re to rely on Harris’ own words and writing about who she is and what she believes, we’re left with a whole lot of contradictions and all sorts of major gaps—as I note in Reason’s latest print issue. Throughout her political career, Harris has been prone to playing up her progressive bona fides when it suits her and her carceral-centric side at other times. But her actions as a prosecutor almost always fell in the latter camp.
I don’t presume to know what Harris truly believes or who she really is behind the mask, which is why I think that her actions as a prosecutor and legislator are probably a better guide to how she would govern than anyone’s commentary. And that record bears little resemblance to the prosecutor that Harris has been conjuring on the campaign trail.
The Harris campaign slogan is “Kamala Harris For the People” (a callback to her days representing Alameda and San Francisco counties in court), and her campaign is pushing hard on the idea that America needs a prosecutor-in-chief to counter President Donald Trump’s corruption and lawlessness.
This seems to be missing the point of running for president.
Much more at the link.
THAT’S DIFFERENT BECAUSE SHUT UP: Vox Is Destroying YouTube Over Crowder, But It’s Actually Promoted Edgy Anti-LGBT Humor Recently.
THE DRUNKBLOGGING IS GOING TO BE EPIC: Gillibrand locks up June debate spot. “The New York senator announced that she got 65,000 unique donors.”
Gillibrand had long ago crossed the polling threshold to qualify for the first debate. But hitting the donor threshold shores up her spot on the debate stage, because candidates who have crossed both thresholds take priority over candidates who only crossed one. The Gillibrand campaign confirmed to POLITICO that she has also received 200 donors in 20 states.
She joins 13 other candidates who have “double qualified” for the debate stage, according to a POLITICO analysis: Joe Biden, Cory Booker, Pete Buttigieg, Julián Castro, Tulsi Gabbard, Kamala Harris, Jay Inslee, Amy Klobuchar, Beto O’Rourke, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Marianne Williamson and Andrew Yang.
In addition, six other candidates have qualified through polling alone so far, according to the POLITICO analysis: Michael Bennet, Bill de Blasio, John Delaney, John Hickenlooper, Tim Ryan and Eric Swalwell.
A maximum of 20 candidates can qualify for the first round of Democratic debates, which will be hosted by NBC News, MSNBC and Telemundo in Miami on June 26 and June 27. Candidates have until Wednesday to qualify for the first round.
I’m just hoping to survive two consecutive nights of debates.
YOU’RE GONNA NEED A BIGGER BLOG: Democratic Presidential Clown Car Update. “Biden flip-flops, the race tightens in Iowa, Bennet and Gillibrand qualify for the debates, de Blasio and Messam earn goose eggs in Iowa polling, and Swalweel continues his All Cringe All The Time Campaign.”
OF COURSE SHE DOES: Ilhan Omar Declines to Address Terrorist Recruitment in Her District.
THIS IS NOT SHOCKING: Trump More Popular in New York than Mayor DeBlasio.