I hate it when Republicans do this; I might hate it more when Democrats do it

Governor Josh Shapiro of Pennsylvania has decided what kids in his state need to learn. It’s cursive handwriting.

Letting our kids be kids also means getting back to the basics. That’s why, earlier this year, | signed into law a bipartisan bill that requires cursive handwriting to be taught in Pennsylvania schools.
It may seem strange, but cursive handwriting is a fundamental skill that all of our kids should learn. They may not get why now, but that’s how they’ll sign their very first check — or maybe even someday, a bill that gets to the Governor’s desk (trust me, you’ll want good penmanship for that).

Nope. It’s not an essential skill anymore. You can sign a check with a barely legible scrawl…it’s still accepted. The President of the US can sign bills with a peculiar string of pointy squiggles that is completely illegible…it still works, unfortunately. When I have to sign a series of papers, it starts out OK, but I use a kind of sloppy block printing, and by the time I’m done the “yers” in my last name has eroded down into a kind of uneven flood plain. That’s a really stupid reason to force kids to write in cursive.

Also, Shapiro has a law degree, not an education degree. He is not qualified to tell people what educational initiatives are “fundamental”. Leave that to educators.

It reminds me of my early disaffection with Bill Gates. He was doing all this philanthropy, and one of his pet projects was reforming US education…by taking it out of the hands of teachers and promoting charter schools. Like Bill Gates, Shapiro is meddling in subjects in which he has no authority and is going to end up doing more harm to education.

Imagine having a robot to teach your kids Greek and Latin

Which one is the robot?

“Bizarre” is the right word — apparently, there was an event at the White House to bless a future of AI humanoid slaves taking over all of our menial jobs, like, you know, teaching.

At a bizarre White House event on Wednesday, first lady Melania Trump walked side by side with an artificial-intelligence-powered robot before spelling out a vision of the future in which children are taught by a “humanoid educator.”

Trump was hosting an international summit on technology and education in the East Room and arrived accompanied by a white-and-black robot that matched her stride, at points unsteadily.

It looks more like a PR event for a tech company called Figure, or a demo of their current model of robot, called Figure 03. I looked up their robot, and the technical details are sparse. They claim it “takes care of household tasks like laundry, cleaning, and doing dishes, all autonomously” — you mean, it’s a glorified autoloader for the dishwasher and washing machine? I do all that already, and don’t need a robot to do it. Cleaning is a more complex task, but I don’t see how a robot is managing dusting, sweeping, mopping, cleaning up cat vomit, picking up the books I leave scattered all over the place and putting them back on the shelf correctly, or just generally tidying up after my sloppy self. They have videos of the robot in action, but they make it look like their most important task is walking slowly carrying a tray to serve champagne to wealthy venture capitalists at parties in your multi-million dollar home. A very important function to some people, I’m sure, but not something I’m at all concerned about.

You can buy your very own champagne-server and dishwasher loader for the low, low price of $30,000-$50,000, available in white, light gray, or soft blue.

Melania talked about how a humanoid robot could take over the task of teaching your children. Please note the very important word in the first sentence of this quote.

Addressing delegates at the two-day Fostering the Future Together summit, the president’s wife proceeded to speak glowingly about an imaginary robot teacher named Plato, an allusion to the philosopher in ancient Greece.

She envisioned the tech-fueled guide having a deep understanding of every major subject, including classical studies, and being available “in the comfort of your home.”

Arguing that AI will be “formed in the shape of humans,” she said the robotic Plato would “provide a personalized experience adoptive to the needs of each student.”

This “teacher” does not exist, and it specifically is not Figure 03, which looks like it’s straining its mighty brain just to walk across a room without falling over. She’s just “envisioning” things, you know. Maybe someday we can replace all those human classics teachers with machines that will also serve champagne. The techbros are all just waiting for mechanical Plato to walk into their house and teach them impressive-sounding stuff. Finally, an excuse to learn Latin, without the fuss of a human instructor!

Melania Trump is the perfect humanoid to promote this important cause.

But Trump didn’t linger. She was in the room for seven minutes for her introductory remarks, departing before a panel discussion on artificial intelligence in education and skipping the networking and relationship-building she encouraged her fellow spouses to take advantage of during Tuesday’s event.

Maybe she could have her personal humanoid robot do all those tiresome activities?

Bassem Youssef knows how to use a needle

Alan Dershowitz wants to sue Bassem Youssef — actually, he kinda wants to sue everyone. Alan doesn’t seem very smart, though, because with his ugly history he should avoid the public eye. He should especially avoid targeting skilled comics and satirists.

That was satisfying, and I learned many new things about Dershowitz. He seems to have made a career of rushing to the aid of high profile, wealthy sleazebags.

Oh no! I have to agree with a Catholic!

And it’s the Pope, no less!

Pope Leo made a plea on Wednesday for countries to offer their ​citizens universal healthcare, calling it a “moral imperative” that ‌people have access to the health services they need.
Previous popes have called for countries to offer universal healthcare, but calling ​an issue a “moral imperative” is an unusually strong ​term for a pope to use, indicating that ⁠something is required by Catholic teaching.

Wow. I do agree completely with that — universal healthcare is one of the basic things a government should provide for its people. Otherwise, what is the point of the government? We form a community to provide mutual aid and give us all better healthcare, better education, better defense, better food, clean water, clean air…I could go on.

Thank you, Pope Leo XIV, for wielding your religious influence for a good cause.

Now I’m worried, though. What is JD Vance, our Catholic vice-president, going to do? He’s already killed one pope, is he getting a death squad together to dispatch to the Vatican? I would also ask if our very Catholic Supreme Court is going to recognize their moral imperative now.

The queen of incompetent bigotry is “winning,” big time

Bari Weiss has made a lot of bad decisions since being put in charge of the news division at CBS. One of her most amusing was promoting Tony “Two-Cuts” Dokoupil to be the head newscaster for the evening news. It seems the primary motivation for promoting him was his love of Israel and Judaism — he earned his nickname because he was so devoted to his version of Judaism that, despite already being circumcised, he got a second circumcision because his rabbi said the first one wasn’t good enough.

That’s one of the defining characteristics of the Weiss regime: a fervent dedication to Zionism and Israel that she’s using to shape the news program.

Dokoupil is no Walter Cronkite, the anchorman I grew up listening to in the 60s and 70s. That era is definitely over now, and Weiss is accelerating its decline. The facts and figures are in, and CBS is in trouble.

CBS Evening News has struggled to gain a foothold since relaunching with new anchor Tony Dokoupil in January.

Ahead of the end of the first quarter later this week, the news program is on track for its lowest-rated first quarter this century, across both total viewers and the crucial 25-54 demographic, Status reports, citing preliminary Nielsen ratings. The program is currently averaging 4.3 million viewers; in the 25-54 demographic, ratings are down by 18 percent at just 541,000 viewers.

To make matters worse, the network’s morning show—of which Dokoupil, 45, used to be co-host—is also failing to attract viewers, with CBS Mornings experiencing its lowest-rated quarter on record, averaging 1.8 million total viewers, down from 13 percent in the same quarter last year.

The disastrous ratings are a blow to Weiss, 41, who was installed as editor-in-chief after billionaire nepo baby and Paramount Skydance owner David Ellison acquired her outlet, The Free Press, for $150 million in October. She had no experience in broadcast journalism and reports directly to Ellison.

You should never put billionaires in charge of anything — they’re all incompetent. Disastrous ratings don’t actually matter to Weiss. She got her $150 million. The network can go into a death spiral, but she got hers.

“It’s pretty terrible. Once you’re under 4 million, you’ve got to be worried that you’re in a death spiral,” another CBS insider said. “If they can’t retain an audience in the middle of a war, God help you when the war ends.”

Other industry insiders concurred, with a TV news veteran telling Status on Saturday, “The first rule of television medicine is do no harm—and Bari has done so much harm.”

Go anti-woke, go broke, but they’ll never figure that out because once you’re rich enough, consequences don’t matter anymore.

I must be doing something right

Ed Brayton and I set up freethoughtblogs as a cooperative venture. Although we did try running ads to bring in some revenue, ads proved to be intrusive and obnoxious — blog ads tend to play all kinds of stupid games to get your attention — so we gave up on that. So right now the site runs in the red, just a little bit, and that’s OK. My Patreon account covers the server cost just fine, and I’m not interested in profit.

By comparison, take a look at the financials for Truth Social.

Trump Media & Technology Group burned through a staggering $712 million last year while bringing in a mere $3.7 million in revenue, a ratio as upside-down as Trump has turned the country.

There’s no actual business here, just a megaphone for a doddering old man.

To be fair, you could also call Pharyngula “a megaphone for a doddering old man,” but at least I’m not blowing $700 million to keep it running. I suspect there’s an interesting leak in the money pipeline that is diverting donations from billionaires to inflate that budget, and that leak is spilling money into Trump’s pocket, so it’s not a real loss to him.

I’m going to have to get a few more patreon followers if it costs hundreds of millions to run a website.

We need to topple a wanna-be king

It’s happening again this weekend. NO KINGS. Protest on Saturday.

I signed up to participate in the march in Morris at 1:00 Saturday afternoon. Then I saw there’s another march in Cyrus, less than 10 miles away, at 2:30, so I signed up for that one, too. I only regret that the constraints of space and time forbid me from participating in every protest march everywhere on that day.

Down with Trump!

Hell is an American airport

Today is the day the Trump administration is sending ICE into our airports, to help reduce long lines. Does anyone actually believe that?

Donald Trump and his border czar, Tom Homan, have followed through on promises from the president’s administration to send in Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to US airports beginning on Monday to assist with security amid extremely long lines – and to help airport security agents who have been working without pay since 14 February because of a partial government shutdown.

I fail to see how adding more overbearing security to a system that is already packed with pointless security theater will help the lines. I also wonder if these ICE goons will be armed and masked? It sounds like a recipe for greater chaos and inefficiency to me, and that it’s really a strategy for increasing fear and tension.

Take a look at the current situation. Will ICE actually help?

To amplify the problem, check out this video on Bluesky.

Incredible scene: Travelers wait on hours-long security line at George Bush International Airport in Houston while Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the USA” blasts through the speakers.

Yeah. Long lines plus Lee Greenwood? This is precisely what Hell would look like.

My experience with air travel in the last few years has been absolutely miserable and convinced me that I never want to fly anywhere ever again…and it’s gotten even worse.

Madman at the wheel

On Friday, we got one confusing message from our president.

“I don’t want to do a ceasefire. You know you don’t do a ceasefire when you’re literally obliterating the other side,” he told journalists at the White House.

However, later on Friday night, he wrote on his Truth Social platform that the US was considering “winding down” military operations in Iran. “We are getting very close to meeting our objectives as we consider winding down our great Military efforts in the Middle East with respect to the Terrorist Regime of Iran,” he wrote.

The reports that Washington is considering plans to occupy or blockade Kharg Island come despite earlier suggestions by Trump that he was not leaning towards putting “boots on the ground”.

I approve of the “winding down” idea, and in fact favor apologizing, offering reparations, and skedaddling out of the region. Unfortunately, those two words mean something different to the lunatic who started this whole mess.

Donald Trump said he was considering “winding down” military operations in the Middle East even as the US is reportedly sending three more amphibious assault ships and roughly 2,500 additional marines to the region.

Sending in more assault ships and marines doesn’t sound much like a “winding down.” That sounds more like escalating and threatening greater engagement. Especially since he has now delivered an ultimatum.

Donald Trump has given Iran 48 hours to reopen the strait of Hormuz to shipping or face the destruction of its energy infrastructure, as Tehran launched its most destructive attack yet on Israel.

The ultimatum, made just a day after the US president said he was considering “winding down” military operations after three weeks of war, came as the key oil passage remained effectively closed and thousands more US Marines headed to the Middle East.

Trump wrote on Truth Social that the US would “hit and obliterate” Iranian power plants – “starting with the biggest one first” – if Tehran did not fully reopen the strait within 48 hours, or 23:44 GMT on Monday according to the time of his post.

I think the “winding down” comment was nothing but TACO’s instincts coming to the fore — I suspect he’s sweating over the fact that a disastrous decision is coming back to bite him in the butt, and he’d like to chicken out if he could find a way to save face while doing so. I doubt that Iran will give him a way, and so…get ready for a half-assed, stupidly managed attack on Kharg Island that will leave a lot of American soldiers dead. He’s just going to vacillate for a bit before committing to an even bigger blunder.

Breaking news: TRUMP ALWAYS CHICKENS OUT.

I AM PLEASE TO REPORT THAT THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, AND THE COUNTRY OF IRAN, HAVE HAD, OVER THE LAST TWO DAYS, VERY GOOD AND PRODUCTIVE CONVERSATIONS REGARDING A COMPLETE AND TOTAL RESOLUTION OF OUR HOSTILITIES IN THE MIDDLE EAST. BASED ON THE TENOR AND TONE OF THESE IN DEPTH, DETAILED, AND CONSTRUCTIVE CONVERSATIONS, WITCH WILL CONTINUE THROUGHOUT THE WEEK, I HAVE INSTRUCTED THE DEPARTMENT OF WAR TO POSTPONE ANY AND ALL MILITARY STRIKES AGAINST IRANIAN POWER PLANTS AND ENERGY INFRASTRUCTURE FOR A FIVE DAY PERIOD.

So what’s happening with all the assault ships and marines heading to the Strait of Hormuz? It sounds now like he’s calling the whole thing off.

Good.