As someone who has had to walk Luddites through Computers 101, I've found that people really can't be fucked to learn something unless it's something that might apply to their day to day. This is especially true the lower you go on the socioeconomic scale. I suspect Farmer Brown's son doesn't see the value of learning about Alexander the Great because he's already getting up at 4 in the morning to help his dad fondle cow tiddies. Why would he care about some guy who drank himself to death hundreds of years ago? Knowing what I know now, I wish someone had been able to teach me how to budget including how taxes work, health beyond a fucking DARE class and graphic STD descriptions, plan and cook a week's worth of healthy meals, and be able to do minor fixes around my house and car when I was in high school. Instead, I got math that I haven't used since I learned it, Mark Antony's funeral speech from Julius Caesar, and putting landmarks on a map of Washington state. While the stuff I learned was nice to know, it ultimately had little impact on my day to day. Given the amount of work parents have to do just to financially support their families, it seems to me that it would be in society's best interest to teach kids basic life skills. I've lost so much time in my life making up for stupid mistakes that classes like these would have helped me with. Life is too short to go through it without knowing what shit like credit scores are and knowing the difference between a Roth and an IRA.
My point is that that stuff is built on the "useless" stuff they tried to teach you in school. You can't understand investing without understanding compound interest, and what is compound interest but an exponential function? People who bailed on step 1, but then complain that they were never taught step 3, don't get a lot of sympathy for their view on education from me.
I lament that a lot of this education has gone away. The most likely reason is it's expensive and risky. I think if we had universal healthcare, it would reduce the risk: so many of the lawsuits that happen because someone had an accident occur to cover prodigious medical expenses. Ie, junior saws his hand off, the lawsuit is to cover his pain and suffering, negligence, etc. but the six figures in medical expenses aren't hung on the school. The expense just boils down to having too many kids for a single teacher. One of the reasons our education system is so rigid now is that it's cost effective, year over year: you can plug 20-40 kids in and it won't change a thing. Also: you can't make this shit up:
Oh wait... this means there are MORE than 74 million supporters! It WAS stolen! There are 75 million reasons in America to put a “Do Not Drink” warning on bottle of bleach. Because they’d certainly cry about it if it wasn’t there.
Oh and by the way, The Daily Wire produced a movie. It’s a ripoff of Die Hard in the setting of a school shooting massacre. Kevin Sorbo isn’t in it.
I guess getting emasculated by Lucy Lawless will make someone unworthy to that crowd. Oddly after reading up on the movie, Run Hide Fight, it looks like it was one of those typical conservative "here is $5 million so we can sell some DVDs" films that got green lit by a guy who then got charged with having sex with a minor films. Then the Daily Wire dove in to distribute the film on their new steaming* platform. *Pun intentional.
American conservative propaganda films are hilarious in all the wrong ways. “The Reliant” and “Range 15” are so retarded they make late-career Steven Seagal films looks like Scorsese directed them. They try to be pro-gun, pro-military and the result is they simply make you want to go out and fuck a soldier’s wife while her husband is on deployment, just out of spite.
I'm not sure if this is the thread, but I guess it's political so here's a rant: the Michigan Government has demanded that Enbridge's Pipeline 5 be shut down by May. THIS. IS. INSANITY. For sooooo many reasons. It's the equivalent to pinching off the main artery to your left leg because you don't like blood. Pipeline 5 feeds all the airports their jet fuel. Including on the Michigan side. It provides all the farmers with their propane for farming. It provides the majority of stock for natural gas, which is what the Michigan side primarily heats their house with. It's been installed since the 50s and is constantly maintained and monitored. It is the safest way to move crude into the refineries (never mind that shutting it down will collapse the economy in Port Huron and Sarnia. We all know that an impoverished city is way better for the environment). Today, Imperial Oil (Exxon Mobil) released their contingency plans in case this goes through. It involves drastically upping the rail car traffic, utilizing fuel tankers on the St. Clair River, and transporting the rest via truck. If you think that shipping crude over ground and in boats on the water is safer than running it through an established pipeline, you're out of your mind. Enbridge has filed suit in federal court, because it appears that Michigan may not have the jurisdiction on the state level for a federal pipeline. I hope this is one big game of chicken to look good to environmental groups, because if it isn't the governor might actually be insane. "Stop using the crude pipeline that fuels our homes, businesses, farming and airports and please put it in ships and float it on the Great Lakes. It's safer!" Jesus Christ.
Part of me says, "fuck it, let them". If you protect stupid people from doing stupid things, it just empowers them to make even more stupid decisions in the future.
It sounds like an extreme over reaction at first but then saying that the Enbridge has 180 days to shut it down makes me think that it is going to end up in court where hopefully the truth will come out. It looks like this line is in the process of being replaced with subterranean pipes that will be placed in a tunnel. I guess we'll know more in four to six months. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/enbridge-oil-pipeline-michigan-governor-1.5870247
The water in the lakes is far far more valuable than the oil, and Michigan determined that Enbridge has been in violation of the easement agreement. Personally I have no problem with all fossil fuels being made more expensive, but for those who like the status quo, they can resume piping oil over that route once the tunnel is complete. Running pipelines through bodies of water is the kind of foolish shit we did in the 50s and shouldn't continue doing.
So...putting it in ships and floating it is better? And 180 days to figure out an alternative fuel source for farming, jet engines and houses? Not going to happen. If we don’t want oil, but we also don’t want fracking, and we for sure don’t want nuclear but everyone should switch to electricity without appreciating that electricity needs a power source, I don’t know what to say. If this logic is the same people who vote we’re all screwed.
No building a tunnel and the running pipes through it is clearly the obvious solution. When did we start talking about nuclear? What's wrong with it? The 59 deaths at Chernobyl too much of a cost? The zero deaths from Fukushima too much?
The free market will provide. I don't know about others, but I'm totally fine with nuclear. I do think the days when nuclear was a better financial choice than solar are behind us (assuming no significant cost reducing technologies in nuclear), but if we replaced fossil fuels with nuclear I'd be perfectly happy.
Sorry, my comment about nuclear and fracking was general bitching about the condition of wanting alternate power without consideration of how. Not directed to anyone here. If the plan is to redirect the crude, call me crazy, but I would wait until the new system is in place before I shut off the tap to the old. I hope the federal court sees common sense.
Nothing motivates a company to get off their ass and build a better system than when the old one stops producing money.
I’m all about nuclear. The only issue is storage. If yucca mountain wasn’t on sacred native land, they would have great storage space die the spent pellets. It produces tons of power for a long time. It really is quite safe and the power plants employs thousands of people.
Building a nuclear plant costs billions. Decommissioning a nuclear plant costs billions. The waste lasts for-fucking-ever. The fuel is a hazard to mine, store and transport. Like apocalyptic hazard. I’m speaking from an industry where we built these things. I don’t believe the cost is worth the carbon savings.
If you build the right type of reactors not only do you produce almost no waste, you can "burn" the current stockpiles of nuclear waste you have.