Your Bag of Nothing for Thursday, January 22, 2025

  • The inauguration was only four days ago. This week has felt like a month already. The new administration is going to age all of at a faster rate than normal.
  • And so it starts: A House Republican on Thursday introduced a proposed change to the Constitution that would allow President Trump to seek a third term in office.

    The amendment has virtually no chance of becoming ratified but it is a marker of the depths of fealty the new president enjoys within the House GOP.

    • Republican House members have rushed to introduce bills that would codify Trump’s vision for expanding the U.S. borders by acquiring Greenland and the Panama Canal,
    • The measure is an extreme long-shot: It would need a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress and be ratified by 38 states to be added to the Constitution.
    • Ogles’ amendment would allow any president to serve a third term if their first two terms were non-consecutive.
    • The text of the amendment would still prohibit a third term if the first two were consecutive — prohibiting former Presidents Bush, Obama, and Clinton from running again — or a third full term for anyone who has served more than two years of someone else’s term.
  • Less than half of Fort Worth ISD students can read at grade level, district reveals
  • Aide to House Speaker Johnson advised against subpoena of Jan. 6 witness over concerns about ‘sexual texts’ from lawmakers
    • An aide to House Speaker Mike Johnson advised Republican colleagues against subpoenaing former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson as part of their investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021, attack in an effort to prevent the release of sexually explicit texts that lawmakers sent her, according to written correspondence reviewed by The Washington Post and a person familiar with the effort.
  • From The Wall Street Journal (paywall): How Much Is Your College Football Team Worth?
    • The Ohio State Buckeyes were just crowned the best team in the country. According to an analysis of what each team would be worth on the open market, they’re also the most valuable program in the sport.
    • The valuation considers factors such as revenue, growth, cash flow, and sustainability, and accounts for the recent changes in college sports, including the introduction of player compensation.

  • David Byrne and Choir! Choir! Choir! singing David Bowie’s Heroes is exactly what I needed to hear tonight
    youtu.be/w7HJZPlJn_U?…

    [image or embed]

    — Eric Stangel (@ericstangel.bsky.social) January 23, 2025 at 9:17 PM

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Your Bag of Randomness for Wednesday, January 21, 2025

  • Yup, Billy Crystal and Meg Ryan had a little get-together and posted this photo and, I guess, teasing a When Harry Met Sally Super Bowl commercial. She’s 63, he’s 76. I didn’t realize they were that far apart in age.
    • “It’s finally happening, we’re reuniting for something iconic. Can’t wait to show you all soon,” Ryan captioned the joint post.
  • Allegedly, Twitter is full of bots that defend Jerry Jones.
  • Everyone familiar with the Terminator franchise felt uneasy reading this and immediately thought of Skynet.
    • Trump said the investment will create a new company, called Stargate, to grow artificial intelligence infrastructure in the United States. The leaders of SoftBank, OpenAI and Oracle stood alongside Trump during the announcement. Their respective companies will invest $100 billion in total for the project to start, with plans to pour up to $500 billion into Stargate in the coming years. 
    • My initial thought is that this is a very good thing for the United States to set itself up as the AI leader. AI is the next big thing. However, the potential of AI scares me, and this comes from a guy who has numerous paid subscriptions to AI services. Not to mention, I don’t have a lot of faith in the Trump administration to manage something like this.
    • I thought only U.S. companies would be involved, but SoftBank is a Japanese company.
    • MGX is also a big player and another foreign company.
      • It was reported in June that the UAE, with roughly $2 trillion in sovereign wealth funds, aims to reduce its dependence on oil by establishing itself as a world center for AI. This goal led to the creation of MGX.
    • The article says the first data center will be in Texas. Curious, I researched, thinking it would probably be Austin, near Elon’s home. DFW is home to a lot of data centers, or maybe one of the other major cities like Houston or San Antonio. Nope. The first data center will be in Abilene. The data center in Abilene, Texas, is being constructed within the Lancium Clean Compute Campus, which spans approximately 800 acres northwest and just outside the city limits. That creates enormous opportunities for their three universities: ACU, Hardin-Simmons, and McMurry. I’m thinking that having internship possibilities at the data center would be a huge recruiting tool for college students interested in a technology career.
  • These Texas pastors believe God sent Trump to save America from sin
  • Today is Norah O’Donnell’s as anchor of the CBS Evening News, which is my preferred network because I like most of their correspondents. Thank goodness. She’s equal parts histrionic and egotistical. I’m looking forward to John Dickerson, who’s dry but he is full of substance. He really knows his stuff. But he’s sharing the duties with Maurice DuBois who I don’t know much about but feel he’s a bit posh. But I will give O’Donnell credit for moving the headquarters from NYC to DC since that’s where most of the news is made and the people in power are.
  • For some reason, I started to research jobs in meteorology. I’ve noticed several people have used it as a second career, and those on television are just a tiny segment of the job market. However, per weather.com (PDF):
    • The number of new, traditional, entry-level positions has not been increasing along with the number of meteorologists entering the workforce, nor is it expected to in the next few years. Trends suggest there will be an increasing oversupply of meteorology graduates in the coming years, and that some meteorologists will have a difficult time finding a traditional weather-related job.
  • I reflected on the JFK: What the Doctors Saw (2023) documentary I watched during the winter break about the doctors at Parkland Hospital who worked on the slain president and the priest who administered the last rights. Hearing news of the event, Father Oscar Huber and a few others drove to the hospital since Parkland was in his parish. They were stopped by officials twice but waved by when they said they were clergy and told where to park, where he was led straight to the ER. He walked in and uncovered the white sheet over President Kennedy’s face, giving him the last rights. When Jackie asked the priest about the last rights, he told her he had given conditional absolution, causing her to grimace. Conditional absolution is a form of last rites given when a priest is unsure if the recipient is still alive but administers the sacrament in case the soul can benefit from it. Jackie felt conditional absolution underscored the tragic and chaotic circumstances of his death, and above all, he was obviously dead. He attempted to console Jackie, assuring her that her husband’s spirit had not yet left his body. I later read in an interview (JFK Library PDF) that he leaned into the thought that the spirit lingers in the body for a bit after physical death but is not sure for how long, so in his view, he couldn’t be sure the president was dead despite the head wound, blood everywhere, and brain matter on the floor. Outside—and despite Secret Service warnings to keep quiet—Huber became among the first unofficial sources to reveal that JFK had indeed died. Though Huber denied it afterward, Time Magazine’s Hugh Sidey reported Huber responding, “He’s dead all right” to a question about the president’s condition.
  • Just an ordinary day in Australia.

     

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Your Bag of Randomness for Tuesday, January 21, 2025

  • I listened to a 10-minute podcast focused on four habits as soon you wake up to start your day to get you started for the day and help set you up for success. I found them to be insightful and like that it’s simple. So I thought I’d share:
    • A deep breath sends a signal to the brain that all is well. The best way to do this is to breathe in with the nostrils to the point your diaphragm is full, then exhale twice as long as the breath you took in. So, if your inhale took four seconds, exhale through your nostrils for eight seconds.
    • One thought of gratitude. Start with one thing and focus intensely on it.
    • Create one intention, an action to carry out in the future. Use your imagination to see yourself doing something successful that day. Pick a word that describes how you want to be, and then focus on yourself acting on that one word.
    • Be present. Get out of bed and take a moment to just be where you body is. Your mind and body are in the same place at the same time. Don’t think about the past or the future. Just line up your mind on the present.
  • If you’ve integrated ChatGPT into your life as I have, here is a fun prompt to try, “Based on our interactions so far, what fictional character do I share the most personality traits with?” Apparently, I’m like Ted Lasso.

  • I think he knew exactly what he was doing, but just being a troll and not an actual Nazi.

  • Florida already using ‘Gulf of America’ in official documents
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Your Bag of Randomness for Tuesday, January 21, 2025

  • It was odd for President Trump to take the oath without putting his hand on that stack of Bibles his wife was holding. The night before, Lee Greenwood stated in an interview that it might be a special inaugural edition of the Trump Bible that was being sold. Can you imagine how much Conservatives would flip out if a Democrat did that?
    But I thought The Onion had a good take on it.
  • It was a good thing Melania Trump wore that hat to keep the sun out of her eyes inside the Rotunda of the Capitol. Madam First Lady, you do you. The outfit you wore at your husband’s first inauguration was exquisite. That outfit yesterday was a costume. Ivanka Trump’s daughter, Arabella Kushner, wore an impressive outfit. I mean this as a compliment: if her outfit were white it would look like something Princess Leia or Padmé Amidala would wear. Of course, Senator Fetterman was an embarrassment.

  • When I checked the White House’s webpage at noon Eastern, it started with a video welcoming back President Trump.
  • Elon Musk Is on Track to Become a Trillionaire in Two Years
    • As the wealth of the world’s richest people accelerates at a faster pace than previously predicted, the global charity expects to see at least five trillionaires within a decade.
  • Half the College Football Championship audience in the stands wore a noticeable green that neither team wore on the field. Notre Dame is funny like that.
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