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Captainant

Certifiably Surly
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Posts posted by Captainant

  1. 1 hour ago, High Plains Drifter said:

    I don't know anything about O'Dowd. But if FSD can't avoid hitting a kid in those circumstances, it absolutely should not be released to the general public. 

    IMO I'm less upset about hitting a pedestrian in a tricky scenario - I'd bet 50/50 that your average human driver would do just as poorly - but the fact that the car wasn't even aware that hit it something is a HUGE problem. Any closed loop decision making should be doing OODA - orient, observe, decide, act. If it's just deciding and acting to keep rolling without observing that it just pancaked a (simulated) child... That is nowhere close to SAE level 3 automation or even road safe for the public.

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  2. 12 minutes ago, elfenix said:

    there’s various plans in the competitive areas with “free” nights/weekends. Back when Griddy was around I’d watch the electric rate fall to 0 (or negative) late at night.

     

    consumers probably should be less insulated from the cost-at-the-moment without going full Griddy.  Getting charged the same rate all day doesn’t discourage waste.

    I've got one of those renewable plans with free nights and weekends, and while the metered usage is higher than I'd like, we mostly time-shift our power hungry tasks (mainly laundry) to nights and weekends and it definitely makes an impact on our monthly bill

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  3. 5 minutes ago, Newdoc said:

    Or we need to reduce and meet in the middle. Sounds like I need to bite the bullet and look into home solar.

    I really do think home solar + energy storage is going to be the answer. You can charge your battery up overnight for pennies on the dollar when grid demand is low, and then use your panels during the day with the battery available as additional capacity during the hot part of the day. It would remove a hell of a lot of strain from our grid, but would require government incentives to make economical.

    Unfortunately, the government incentives have been going to Chinese cryptominers that moved to Texas after they got kicked out of their home country. 

    Ah well, nevertheless. 

    • Like 3
    • Rage+1 2
  4. 1 hour ago, Murfdogg21 said:

    This all could’ve been act 1 of an episode instead of the entire episode. Two episodes left to resolve their fate, the M-count cloning program, and if the brought Ventress back for anything other than a cameo. 

    Up until now, Ventress was presumed dead so I think bringing her back was more about putting a toy back into the toy box. But I can't disagree that there's not that much screentime left to close out the Bad Batch story. I hope they do two 30 minute episodes at least, if not longer

  5. 14 minutes ago, Post Oak said:

    Any of you fellas have to use Barkeepers Friend on your ride.

    https://www.cybertruckownersclub.com/forum/threads/bar-keepers-friend-changed-my-cybertrucks-finish.14184/

     

     

    My Cybertruck was delivered with quite a bit of staining on a lot of the panels. It’s looked to be from rain. I tried a bunch of softer cleaners first to get off the stains. Windex, waterless wash, full soap wash, generic stainless polish, etc.

    None of that worked. So I tried some bar keepers friend that many other suggested. I tried it on a small area, and it looked fine. I then tried a door with lots of staining. I let it sit for one minute and then rinsed it off. The first time I applied very lightly and it dulled the stains, but didn’t remove them. The second time I scrubbed just a little more and it completely removed all the stains and created a perfectly uniform panel.

    However, The door is now lighter in color and the finish is a bit more dull / less shiny. I don’t love this effect, but it appears I’m going to have to live with it since I already started. I followed the directions, didn’t let it sit too long and didn’t scrub hard. To help others to do this well and decide if this is for them, I would love some advice or feedback from others if they saw this, or if I did something wrong.

    Pic: BKF used on rear door only

    Important Edit: after finishing the whole truck, I noticed that the front panel in the picture below still doesn’t match the panel in the rear. I am thinking bar keepers friend didn’t change the panel as much as I thought. When both panels were done the same way they still look different. So if my post scared you away, don’t worry too much. The truck looks amazing with all panels done and I do prefer it better now.
     
    Tesla Cybertruck Bar Keepers Friend changed my Cybertruck's finish! IMG_7932
     
    Last edited: Apr 

    It's more likely that the panels are different qualities or runs of stainless, and that's why the owner is seeing different surface finishes between treated panels. I think the acid in the barkeeper's friend is effectively doing a surface passivation - which is something Tesla should have done at the factory - which gives it a higher gloss and improved corrosion resistance properties. 

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  6. Not sure if it goes here or in a cyber attack thread or where, but it's crazy that the 911 system was offline for a while last night in Texas (and a few other states)

    https://www.reuters.com/world/us/911-outage-reported-across-multiple-us-states-officials-say-2024-04-18/

    That system has so many redundancies (on paper at least) it's crazy that it went offline for any period of time 

  7. 42 minutes ago, bolverk said:

    Who are the folks "stubbornly spurning nuclear energy"? It's not like individuals can mount a nuclear reactor on the roof of their house like they do solar panels or that some rancher can cut a deal with a nuclear power plant builder like they would some wind or solar farm developer.

    I believe you live in the Waco area, meaning your electricity provider is Oncor. What's stopping Oncor from building more nukes like they have in Glen Rose? The cost. It's expensive as shit because of all the safety regulations due to the inherent risks of an accident, and building new ones likely wouldn't be profitable. So, are you saying we should get rid of the regulations? Which regulations are especially onerous or unneeded? Are you volunteering to live within a couple of miles of one?

    If these plants can't be built profitably while also being safe, who should build them? A government that doesn't have to worry about direct ROI? Which government, federal or state? Guess what? There aren't good answers to those questions, and there haven't been any for quite a while.

    So, in the meantime, we have these two revolutionary new technologies that are super cheap now that can generate a whole fuck load of power under the right conditions and that don't cause a bunch of air pollution. The problem is just managing the distribution and storage of that power so that it can get to where it needs to be (transmission) when it needs to be (storage).

    Has anyone priced out the cost of a new nuclear power plant versus the transmission lines and batteries we need to continue supplying our energy with renewables? I'd bet Oncor has, and there's a reason why they're not building any today.

    Maybe SMRs will revolutionize the business and solve all our energy problems. I'd be 100% in favor of that. How cool would it be for each town to have one set up next to their water tower? 

    But, then, what the hell do we do with the waste?

    It's not that nuclear reactors are unprofitable - once they're running they just keep churning out power pretty much indefinitely with planned outages. But building and certifying them is immensely costly and full of risk due to the long construction times. This professor has a load of great talks on nuclear energy, but this is a great primer on why we aren't building more big nuke plants

     

    But as you note, SMRs sidestep much of these problems. Waste is easier with them too since each fuel pebble element is it's own dry cask storage (in theory)

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  8. 1 hour ago, Goredho said:

    I have a friend like this, a guy I played sports with and did all the sporty esprit-de-corps things with.  So we've been tight, almost lifelong friends.  He's a self-described libertarian that has gone way down the conspiracy rabbit hole and is now basically working to try to bring about the downfall of the US.  His legitimate business failed and he is rebounding by starting a podcast and writing two books simultaneously "with the help of AI."  It's all aimed at promoting conspiracies and at least indirectly undermining confidence in our governmental institutions.  His social media used to be full of stuff about sports and his kids and real life.  Now it's just a stream of conspiracy nonsense that no one reacts to.  It's like he's posting in a vacuum.

    Hows 8badmofo doing nowadays?

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    • Haha 5
  9. 12 minutes ago, Trey3216 said:

    Perhaps some folks should stop stubbornly spurning Nuclear energy in favor of wind and solar as well.  If we really want to make sure the grid is firm, increased nuclear energy is going to be a must.  

     

    3 minutes ago, YChang said:

    Micro nuclear reactors are coming soon and likely will become a part of the mix. Doesn’t address the joke that is our state regulatory agencies. 

    SMRs and the pilot plant in Seadrift are genuinely exciting for this usecase. But I REALLY don't like the idea of our current grid operators that love putting off maintenance in charge of nukes. Absolutely needs to be better stewardship of what we already have in addition to nuclear baseline capacity 

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    • Like 1
  10. 3 minutes ago, The Dog said:

    whole thread from threadreaderapp: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1780104944164446396.html?utm_campaign=topunroll

      Hide contents
    BREAKING NEWS: Early signs suggest that Trump’s Monday night bond filing *may* have again misled the court. It says Hankey now has a security interest of $175M in “DJT Trust”—but Hankey’s Axos Bank *already* has a $100M interest in DJT Trust. Is Trump double-dipping? @KatiePhang
    Image
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    1/ Some wondered why Trump went to Hankey’s Knight rather than Hankey’s Axos. It certainly *could* be to swindle the court into thinking him having $175M secured with Hankey is sufficient, when it fact he likely needs at least *$275M* in that Trust to not be misleading the court. 
    2/ And this is early research—Axos has lent to Trump multiple times, so we’ve no idea how many times he’s used DJT Trust as liquid collateral (including any double-dipping). We *do* know Trump has Bud Light stock in the Trust, which is why he now opposes his MAGAs’ boycott of it. 
    3/ The documents I posted are from the website of the New York Attorney General, by the way. 
    4/ We also need to know if Ivanka is now (or still) a trustee of DJT Trust, as Hankey’s Axos Bank *also* lends to her spousal unit—in the form of Jared—and so one wonders if any of Jared’s loan paperwork with Axos Bank includes Ivanka’s assets, which could be more double-dipping. 
    5/ Is it possible that the Trump Schwab account known as the “DJT [Revocable] Trust” has the $275M *minimum* Trump needs to be in it? Uh...sure. But you certainly would *not* think it does from this 2023 financial disclosure. The math is not mathing, here.
    6/ Here is the same document at the NYT. int.nyt.com/data/documentt…
    7/ Okay, so this is looking very bad for Donald Trump. He says in his Monday night filing that the Schwab account has $175.3 million *in total*, so *if* Axos Bank is depending on that same account for a (semi-)liquid $100M in collateral on another loan, this bond filing is DOA.
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    8/ You’ve got to be kidding me. The collateral Trump says he gave Hankey a security interest in...

    ...is the same fund he used to pay off Stormy Daniels. So the use of *that very funding source* is the subject of a *criminal trial* right now.

     

    Oh wow, how completely unforeseeable! Trump is using a firehose of fraud to slow down the court and continue to delay justice with seemingly zero penalty? UNPOSSIBIBBLE!!!

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  11. 2 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:

    I think there’s more than enough Republican votes in support of Ukraine to get it across the finishing line, but there’s also enough pro-Russia Republicans to stymy the floor debate.

    And the fact of the matter is, Johnson has straight up been refusing to bring those bills to the floor. The GOP doesn't want to govern. They want to rule. 

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  12. 10 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

    If this were somehow a little guy being prosecuted this way, people would be up in arms. 

    And if my aunt had a dick she'd be my uncle. Trump is not a little guy. He is a historical fucking aberration. He abused the office of the president to hide his petty pornstar payoff fraud, of which he illegally had the story buried. 

    I just don't understand the insistence on repeating the trumpco rhetoric of "just imagine this were happening to the little guy!" Trump. Is. Not. The. Little. Guy.

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  13. 2 minutes ago, Rimbo said:

    TwiceHorn's a defense attorney.

    I thought he was an IP attorney?

    3 minutes ago, Rimbo said:

    And the more you want a claim to be true, the healthier it is to be skeptical of any evidence in favor of it.

    Are you saying that trump did not get an in kind campaign contribution from the national enquirer to kill the story and then use campaign funds to pay hush money to the pornstar he banged? We have a fucking check with his signature on it lol. 

    What is there to be skeptical of here? That trump is the victim of a big ol mean conspiracy to UNFAIRLY prosecute him? 

  14. 1 minute ago, TwiceHorn said:

    Except he isn't actually charged with an election crime, and, as a federal crime, Bragg has no jurisdiction to prosecute it. 

    Cohen went to prison for crimes that he pled guilty to, and that trump aided and abetted as a co-conspirator. That is the federal campaign finance law violation that was prosecuted by SDNY in 2018.

    7 minutes ago, TwiceHorn said:

    But it is a scheme to conceal it. But the NY crime prompts the question from whom, because no one was looking at his books to try to prove it. 

    The concealment was part of the conspiracy to commit a campaign finance law violation.

     

    It really is remarkable how quickly you find a way to frame any attempt to prosecute trump as an overreach.

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  15. 24 minutes ago, 956 Worldwide said:

    GOP supplemental plan. Take it. Best we are gonna get.

     image.thumb.jpeg.efb082d4a6c1c7d0fc0e81c8d7554c59.jpeg

    We'll take it for now. It's a shit ton more for the  defense industry and restocking old munitions with fresh new ones. Unfortunate that this discussion needs to be kept in CR

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  16. 6 minutes ago, tbone_ said:

    Forget that this Trump for a minute. Why does a DA care if some guy pays some ho to shut the fuck up? I keep reading about “falsifying business records”. I get that he called the payment a legal fee but to who? Who were these business records certified to that falsifying them makes it a felony? I mean I can call my ho payments whatever I want in my Quicken app and the DA wouldn’t care.

    Don’t get me wrong, I detest this cunt as much as anyone. But this one has alway felt like a reach from a criminal legal perspective to me. What am I missing?

    One of the key facts is that he used this in kind contribution from the national enquirer to keep a critical story quiet at a critical moment of the election, and then covered up his tracks of doing so to hide it from the people that elected him. 

    "Separating trump" from the facts removes critically important context. Perhaps instead of "trump" you should mentally model it as "the sitting American President used fraud to hide crimes from before he was president"

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