Texas Jeff

After watching some coverage, I would encourage everyone to think of most of this through an Occam's razor lens. The simplest possible explanation for most of this is probably the correct one. A lot of what happened was probably "fog of war" and people are trying to find patterns and motivations that aren't there. The snipers probably saw the guy but didn't take him out because they thought that a guy on a roof near the president surely must be one of them ... they were also guys on a roof with guns. Surely, right? Nobody wants to be the trigger happy security guy that takes out another law enforcement officer that is just doing his job on another roof with another rifle. They were probably trying to figure out if that was a friend or foe right up until they got their answer. That's how they were able to take him out so fast. They were undecided about what to do until suddenly they were returning fire. The secret service guys looked they had had training on what to do and had practiced, but had probably never with a heavy elderly guy who was not getting up and was looking for his shoes. You can hear the guys trying to communicate with each other that the shooter is down and to move, and right after that moment their training appears to go out the window. They don't move. They were indecisive. They had probably trained with a guy who just gets up and runs or gets carried to a car. They weren't trying to stand up Trump or put him in to a photo op, they were just not well rehearsed for this. The kid was probably less of a Republican or a Democrat and more of a kid that was in need of mental help. I would bet that he donated to one cause because others in his class were donating, maybe he liked the person raising money and chipped in $15. A simple reason. I would bet that he's a "registered" Republican because his parents probably also registered as Republicans and when he registered to vote he just picked the same party as his parents. Something simple. He was probably a lousy shot, if indeed it was an "easy" shot, because he was a 20 year old kid who overestimated his abilities. What works in movies and video games is less likely to work in the real world. The roof was probably unguarded because ... well this is a tough one but prep is never perfect. JFK's protective car bubble was sitting at Love Field at the moment he was killed, and no one bothered to check the school book depository before his parade, particularly the one open window on the highest floor that had a line of fire to both the approach and the departure. I *think* that was the last time a president or candidate was attacked by a sniper, and that was 62 years ago. It is a tragedy all around, but I would encourage everyone to seek simple explanations.

IMHO, no. We elected him for a term and he seems OK to finish the term, but faltering. Biden is a decent guy and his job was to drive the bus back to Normalsville, which he has done. Give him a chance to finish. We also elected Kamala to be there in case Joe falters. Which he is now doing. Had Joe decided 18 months ago not to run, then we could have had a real primary. But we didn't. We trusted Kamala for three years to be able to step in for Joe -- we need to trust her now. And, just as a helper to the next generation of Black women and women in general ... they need to see someone like them rise to a position in power and then be given a chance to lead. Perhaps it is time to show women that they can be president too and show Black women that they will not be cast aside when we need a "real" leader. Joe and Kamala have a reasonable cabinet of capable people that seem to be running the country well. We are still seeing COVID effects, but things are pretty stable. Let Joe finish the term, let Kamala run in his place, and see what happens. If America picks a terrible man who will mentally degrade in his second term over a younger decent person with all of her marbles, then so be it. Try again in 2028.

This.

This is off topic, but I am an old in tech... I started in the early 90's and 50 year olds were getting early retired by the truckload, but to a nice pension with retiree medical. Olds in tech have a new advantage that young techies lack ... they are willing to work face to face and speak to others using their voice rather than text messages. They pre-date the smartphone era. Young people could counter this by getting together and talking, but I'm not sure they are willing to go that far. Many young techies are giving up their "energetic" advantage by trying to work alone rather than learning to lead groups. I see a lot of folks working on their own problems but lacking the skills to put the pieces together or lead others. If you are old in tech, build a team of people that are willing to work as a team and you'll have something substantial. They will eventually rebel and push you out because you are old, but at least you can enjoy the ride.

I actually did call AT&T when we dropped our land line. It took a while, but an AT&T guy did show up and did remove the line running between the power pole and the house. I asked him to leave the terminating box on our house because we had wires running out of our house to it. I just wanted the overhead wire gone.

When do we kill PowerPoint?

Reagan left office at 77, almost 78. Trump was 74 when he left office. Eisenhower, Jackson, Buchanan ... all right at age 70 when they left office. Biden is already over 80 and Trump, if you factor in the fat, is probably the same biological age. I'm around a lot of old people thanks to my parents. A tip to the young: Get everything done that you want to get done in life by age 80. Your 70s can be really nice, but kinda slow, but you're still there and you can still do stuff. And some people can keep going into their 80s. But things start breaking and a lot of people in their 80's are just hanging on. It's not a good time to take on a four year assignment, even if you are trying to keep yourself out of jail or keep someone else out of the White House.

They said "We need someone that does not matter to go out there and test the waters" and someone in the room said "Wake up Lloyd!"

I’ve been there. Fun place full of random stuff. Kinda hard to find. Not air conditioned so don’t plan a long stay. The times I have gone they have had some athletic stuff, practice jerseys, extra shoes, just a bunch of misc.

He's SEC ready....

I originally missed this skit on George Washington's dream for America, but here it is:

2023 Texas Alabama game on LHN tonight at 8pm. At 11pm, you have your choice of the 2023 Big 12 Championship on the SEC Network or the 2006 Rose Bowl on the LHN. At 2am, time to choose between the 2022 volleyball national championship and a UConn/Texas women's BB game on the SEC Network or stick with Vince at the 2005 Ohio St game on the LHN. For those of you still conscious at 4am, you can stay with Vince at the 2005 Kansas game on the LHN or wait for a Texas/Ok State baseball game at 5am on the SEC Network. At 6am, stick with Vince at the 2005 Big 12 Championship vs Colorado on LHN and you can make it to sunrise.

Austin ISD does have some examples of schools that are under enrolled that are very, very close to each other. Yet change is hard because as soon as you suggest change, the parties involved react ... uh ... strongly. Metz, which was closed in 2017, was four blocks from Zavala and six blocks from Sanchez. Sanchez was rebuilt and Metz was closed. Sanchez took the students. Zavala is still open. Neither Sanchez or Zavala is at capacity and the students at Sanchez now have a brand new school. People were really pissed off about Metz closing, even though the new school was not far away. LBJ HS is 2.5 miles from Northeast (Reagan). Both schools are getting bond investments of over $100 million. The population of both schools would fit into either school. Why are we refurbishing both of them? McCallum is over capacity and needs improvements. Half of Mueller goes to McCallum. But Northeast is closer. Why not zone Mueller to Northeast and ease the burden on McCallum? Add a little progressive diversity to Northeast? If I suggested any of these ideas, the folks affected would mobilize like crazy against me. There would be 100 callers to each board meeting all reading the same message over and over. There would be professionally printed t-shirts and signs. It wouldn't happen. AISD could consider many strategies to combine and consolidate schools without causing anyone more than 5-10 more minutes on a bus. And, having fewer schools would mean lower operating costs and fewer buildings to maintain. It's very doable but politically impossible.

Most people, when challenged on what the ten commandments are: 1. Do not kill! 2. Do not steal! .... uh .... 3. Oh yeah, no coveting! .... uh ... well there are some others but America was founded on this stuff....

I looked it up: WSU and TT haven't played since 1982. WSU and MSU last played in 1977. TT and MSU last played in 2021, and before that their last meeting was in 1970. So you have to hang your hat on the 2021 Liberty Bowl. Tech won 34-7 with Leach on the other sideline. They should just give Leach credit for the bowl game after his death. It was his team and he should get credit if he is so close to qualifying otherwise.

Alumni Band game kickoff at 7pm ... awesome. Last year's temps were beyond what I could take. This is the 125th year of Longhorn Band. The 100th seems like it was 20-something years ago...

How it started: How it's going:

Are we talking about Austin's plan to build a subway to the airport? Some fun facts: The City of Austin collects your tax money and gives it to Austin Transit Partnership, which is not governed by the city. Some city council members are also ATP board members. ATP now has 87 employees who split $16.1 million per year, or an average taxpayer cost per employee of $185,057. The median base salary of an ATP employee is up to $143,520. Over the last year, the cost estimate for the rail portion has risen from $4.8 billion to $7.1 billion, however this rise mostly reflects a change from 2022 dollars to 2033 dollars. They expect to break ground on the rail in 2027 and expect trains to roll in 2033. Expect to be disappointed. They are getting sued by folks that think that Project Connect promised a downtown subway with surface rail to the airport, and 20 miles of rather than 10. They got these ideas from the original Project Connect promotional pitch prior to the vote, which showed a downtown subway, rail to the airport, and 20 miles of track rather than 10. They are getting close to opening two new bus rapid transit lines. They got a federal match for those and they are very cheap compared to rail. Cap Metro is getting 26 miles of BRT for under $100 million with more than half of that paid for by the feds. Compare that with 10 miles of rail at a cost of maybe $5 billion in today's dollars. The two BRT lines are delayed because they want to use only electric buses and they are having trouble getting the buses and are figuring out how to keep them charged. Also, compare the BRT development timeframe (about five years even with the electric buses) with rail (13 years if it opens in 2033). For now, you'll have to wait if you want to take transit from the UT campus through downtown and on to the airport .... unless you hop on the #20 bus, which goes exactly down this route, is available now, arrives every 15 minutes, and costs $1.25 to ride. More info here: https://www.statesman.com/story/news/2023/09/21/austin-transit-partnership-budget-oks-190m-fiscal-year-2024/70913560007/ https://communityimpact.com/austin/south-central-austin/transportation/2024/03/25/71b-project-connect-light-rail-to-break-ground-in-2027/

No idea. Here's a pic from a reddit post of the ruins from 1908 and 2020. The post contains a clue: "Very close to Barton Springs. Just a few hundred feet upstream. You can see it if you walk down to the creek next to the greenbelt trailhead."

There was an original bridge over Barton Creek that I think connected Bee Cave Rd through Zilker to Lamar in the 1870-1900 timeframe: I have thought about taking a hike to find the foundations of the bridge, which I think are still visible from the trail through Zilker, but I've never done it.

Austin ISD's budget is in bad shape, although IMHO the admin is doing the best they can with the constraints they have. Austin ISD thought that their deficit for next year was going to be around $60 million, and they had a goal of cutting $30 million without touching classroom spending to get to a $30 million deficit for next year. Attendance was less than projected and home values did not go up as much as planned. They are now an additional $30 million in the hole ... so even with the admin cuts they are looking at a possible $60 million shortfall. Once solution to this is to ask the voters to up the tax rate to close the gap. They can, with voter approval, raise taxes by 9.1 cents -- this is called a VATRE tax election. 0.1 of these cents are "golden" pennies, meaning that the district gets to keep all of the money. 9.0 cents of these are copper pennies, which are subject to recapture. At Austin ISD's recapture rate, 75% of the copper penny funds will go to the state, and the district will keep 25% of the taxes raised. The state currently has a surplus, so these "extra" Robin Hood funds won't go towards education, they will just make the surplus larger. Austin ISD would get to keep about $41 million of the new tax revenue. From that bucket, Austin ISD teachers and librarians would get about $15 million and district would spend about $25 million on other stuff (individual specialists, registrars, reducing the deficit). The state of Texas would get about $120 million. Austin voters will probably have a chance to vote for or against this tax at the November election. The district can't deficit spend forever. Within a few years, their fund balance will hit a critically low level and there will be no more savings to spend. Without legislative action, they are turbo-screwed at that point, even if the new VATRE tax passes. Also, Austin ISD is currently under a TEA monitorship because of past problems with special education evaluations. As part of their punishment, the trustees had to agree to a "Lone Star Governance" TEA-approved process. Part of this process mandates that the board can only spend 50% of their time talking about issues that do not relate to student outcomes. The budget is a non-student outcome issue. So if they want to talk about the budget for an hour, they have to also talk about "student outcomes" for an hour. Talking about student outcomes is great, but at some point in the year you have to buckle down and talk about the friggin' budget for a few days -- and the board has to be very careful to not violate their agreement with TEA to avoid a state takeover.

A word of caution when looking at school ratings .... COVID caused school ratings to be all over the map and probably inflated scores. I don't understand 100% of the system, but here's the basic idea: The state ranks schools in a set of categories. Pre-COVID, they averaged all categories to get a rating for the school. School ratings were averaged to get a rating for the district. So a school could get a F, D, C, B, A in five categories and that would average to a C. During COVID, "bad" grades were changed to "not rated". So those same ratings could have changed to NR, NR, C, B, A during COVID for an average of B. Now, post-COVID, the NR's are being changed back to what they were before so a F, D, C, B, A school is back to a C average. In extreme cases, schools got a F, F, F, F, A before the pandemic for an F rating, then during COVID got all NR's and one A ... which gave them an "A" rating, and are now back to F, F, F, F, A post-COVID for a brand new "F" rating. Give it a few years to stabilize but I would not trust any school rating during the pandemic to reflect the real state of a school. I have seen test scores which show that eco dis populations were really hit hard by COVID and are struggling to recover.

Fair enough but I was actually thinking good for all of the plants and creatures on the planet, not just humans. Forests, whales, bison, whatever. Too many of us is not great for them.

1960 - three billion people 2023 - eight billion people The planet really didn't need an extra five billion of us. We obviously shouldn't kill people but a long term slow reduction through slower birth rates is probably good for the planet.