@Daojoan

I don't like writing this, but if you're talking about the US that may *actually not happen*. He could really last four years. We don't have England's system of Parliament. This is America. A President cannot be "sacked" by US Congress, unfortunately.

Congress had TWO chances to impeach the mofo. They abdicated or absconded on both counts. Republicans have sold out their country. Sen. Mitch McConnell was the recent, original champion of this low-balling effort before he finally stepped down, due to experiencing cognitive issues

The media keeps holding Trump to account, somehow more or less. Still, not a lot has changed, based on where I'm sitting.

We will have to wait 1 to 2 years for the courts to weigh in. They already have made the first move with issues such as the illegality of the President using the Alien Enemies Act against certain people living in the US. Despite our collective differences in understanding how the law is applied, we are now all on "legal time." What would normally take several months for the private sector to decide actually takes YEARS for the courts from the lower courts to the highest court to properly adjudicate. That's just how it is.

I dislike Trump with every fiber of my being. I'm Gen X. I've contributed to some software efforts in the past with regard to the overall direction of #OpenSource. The US system of governance is now (indirectly so) ruining everything good about private entrepreneurship. They're only making starting a business about who has the most control and the most money to spend. That's not the best entrepreneurship model, IMHO.

Trump's generation started this economic malaise. Ronald Reagan started this. My parents were Republicans and frequently behaved the same way. "Screw everyone else. We have what we need." I detested them quite a bit, too.

MAGA is a virus that must be purged from our system of governance over the long term. These times have turned me into a cynic but I do have some faith this nation will come around.

This is like the sixties or maybe the Watergate era all over again. Except that there's not a lot of recreational drug use to make things fun except in legal states and also there sure isn't a whole lot of love to go around. That's just my gut feeling right now.

@steelefortress As far as I understand it, analysts at RSA are like lobbyists in Washington, D.C. Corporate lobbyists influence the politicians often when those political folks are deciding on what bills to support. Consequently, analysts are probably being greatly influenced by widespread commercial corporate interest in AI. In other words, they are more or less getting paid to say it is great and it is fine. AI is not that great and the tech industry with its lackluster performance in JUST RETAINING JOBS is not fine.

We don't have a lot of guidance anymore because the mainstream news and especially the tech media are now so corporate that they will NOT report on the analysts' intents and motivations, here.

Do you know why the #OpenSource world does not care a whole lot about the progress of AI?

We've been dealing with one or another variation in the programmatic querying of computer languages for years. This is nothing new.

Many of us are in the camp who do not get credit for what we do. That is a far cry from getting paid for doing the work and maybe receiving some credit along the way.

It goes beyond having faith or being pragmatic. Do we know what we're talking about, collectively? How are Open Source's ideas better than ideas coming from all of these commercial conglomerates who infrequently and begrudgingly recognize the contributions of Open Source -- at large?

I don't like writing this... Elon Musk has heavily poisoned the well in this one area. He was supposed to assist in this area and... what do you know? Musk ended up being an absolute failure there and with his Doge getting into the US government's business. Why, I just saw a guy in public today out here in western Oregon wearing a shirt that boldly read: "Luigi Musk" !

What does that tell you about the state of AI today, @steelefortress? Sorry, I don't have a lot of optimism about where AI is going.

Yes, we all know AI has its uses! But for what? What more? How many times do we need to reinvent the wheel? And what the **** happened to software agents? Monopolies such as "Microshaft" didn't like that idea, one bit. Neither did Musk because the billionaires including Altman are sitting on ALL OF THAT while raking in money through stock buybacks and... selling the model out to China through Donald Trump's acquiescence or something like that. ^ I don't have to be 100% factual about this one part. I'm hitting it close to home. What we have going on now is, in fact, A TYPE OF BUSINESS MALAISE. And Republicans in Congress are to blame for not stopping Donald Trump from him imposing tariffs when they had the chance. The President had absolutely NO LEGAL RIGHT to impose tariffs in the first place.

But go ahead, Mr. Musk. Tell me how *I am wrong* in the economic, legal, and political sense. Tell us all about how #AI will "save all of us" or whatever tripe bullshit that that South African is now spewing from his vile lips. Here's an old saying: "From your lips to God's ears." Screw you, Big Money and screw all forms of unrestrained government. All of you rich #dilettantes who have way too much influence over people in power have made our lives a CONTINUING HELL to live in.

@thisismissem I use " Canon IJ Scan Utility lite " with my inkjet/scanner.

@steelefortress Just quickly following up once. I don't get much feedback from infosec people. They are highly insular and at times stuck in their worldviews.

There are new frontiers which can be sought after in software.

The old ways have become obsolete. Apple seems to have figured something out that works for them. Over almost two decades, Microsoft has kludged together .NET, Azure, and other Cloud-based API's to offer the pretense of a standard but they really have many standards used by developers.

Developers that use #AI really only want to use that AI to write code. They don't want to be told what to do by the AI, in an empirical sense.

To give an example in the area of Apple and specifically macOS -- they went from using Obj-C to adopting Swift during 2014. Apple's model has changed often and frequently enough that if someone from 20-25 years ago were to take a time machine to today (2025) they would not recognize or actually be able to tell exactly how Darwin currently works with #macOS and #iOS apps.

Links:

https://blog.timac.org/2023/1128-state-of-appkit-catalyst-swift-swiftui-mac/

https://thatthinginswift.com/the-history-and-evolution-of-the-swift-programming-language/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C

@steelefortress Just quickly following up once. I don't get much feedback from infosec people. They are highly insular and at times stuck in their worldviews.

There are new frontiers which can be sought after in software.

The old ways have become obsolete. Apple seems to have figured something out that works for them. Over almost two decades, Microsoft has kludged together .NET, Azure, and other Cloud-based API's to offer the pretense of a standard but they really have many standards used by developers.

Developers that use #AI really only want to use that AI to write code. They don't want to be told what to do by the AI, in an empirical sense.

To give an example in the area of Apple and specifically macOS -- they went from using Obj-C to adopting Swift during 2014. Apple's model has changed often and frequently enough that if someone from 20-25 years ago were to take a time machine to today (2025) they would not recognize or actually be able to tell exactly how Darwin currently works with #macOS and #iOS apps.

Links:

https://blog.timac.org/2023/1128-state-of-appkit-catalyst-swift-swiftui-mac/

https://thatthinginswift.com/the-history-and-evolution-of-the-swift-programming-language/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C

@steelefortress As far as I understand it, analysts at RSA are like lobbyists in Washington, D.C. Corporate lobbyists influence the politicians often when those political folks are deciding on what bills to support. Consequently, analysts are probably being greatly influenced by widespread commercial corporate interest in AI. In other words, they are more or less getting paid to say it is great and it is fine. AI is not that great and the tech industry with its lackluster performance in JUST RETAINING JOBS is not fine.

We don't have a lot of guidance anymore because the mainstream news and especially the tech media are now so corporate that they will NOT report on the analysts' intents and motivations, here.

Do you know why the #OpenSource world does not care a whole lot about the progress of AI?

We've been dealing with one or another variation in the programmatic querying of computer languages for years. This is nothing new.

Many of us are in the camp who do not get credit for what we do. That is a far cry from getting paid for doing the work and maybe receiving some credit along the way.

It goes beyond having faith or being pragmatic. Do we know what we're talking about, collectively? How are Open Source's ideas better than ideas coming from all of these commercial conglomerates who infrequently and begrudgingly recognize the contributions of Open Source -- at large?

I don't like writing this... Elon Musk has heavily poisoned the well in this one area. He was supposed to assist in this area and... what do you know? Musk ended up being an absolute failure there and with his Doge getting into the US government's business. Why, I just saw a guy in public today out here in western Oregon wearing a shirt that boldly read: "Luigi Musk" !

What does that tell you about the state of AI today, @steelefortress? Sorry, I don't have a lot of optimism about where AI is going.

Yes, we all know AI has its uses! But for what? What more? How many times do we need to reinvent the wheel? And what the **** happened to software agents? Monopolies such as "Microshaft" didn't like that idea, one bit. Neither did Musk because the billionaires including Altman are sitting on ALL OF THAT while raking in money through stock buybacks and... selling the model out to China through Donald Trump's acquiescence or something like that. ^ I don't have to be 100% factual about this one part. I'm hitting it close to home. What we have going on now is, in fact, A TYPE OF BUSINESS MALAISE. And Republicans in Congress are to blame for not stopping Donald Trump from him imposing tariffs when they had the chance. The President had absolutely NO LEGAL RIGHT to impose tariffs in the first place.

But go ahead, Mr. Musk. Tell me how *I am wrong* in the economic, legal, and political sense. Tell us all about how #AI will "save all of us" or whatever tripe bullshit that that South African is now spewing from his vile lips. Here's an old saying: "From your lips to God's ears." Screw you, Big Money and screw all forms of unrestrained government. All of you rich #dilettantes who have way too much influence over people in power have made our lives a CONTINUING HELL to live in.

First eight paragraphs check out. I do now understand why the author wrote this and where she is coming from:

https://www.the-independent.com/life-style/gen-z-porn-addiction-internet-b2742278.html?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Bluesky#Echobox=1746090396-2

Guess what I don't like about the mainstream media? They often forget where they're coming from. Nowhere is that more evident than in this shoddy opinion piece. I use the word shoddy for a reason. They need to try a little harder and PIN down exactly what this malaise is, which is not only gripping the US presidency pretty tightly, but has a grip on every major corporate boardroom.

This is about older white males such as #Trump, who often are Baby Boomers with male pattern baldness, calling most of the shots in society. This is unacceptable and it must change, whether through a peaceful transition or something else. Hopefully not the something else? Because in the past the "something else" is how we ended up with the broadly ineffectual Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon -- and over a decade of Viet-fucking-nam.

People have known for years that MAGA just wants to more or less torch the whole system down and replace anything that is left or what's left that is good with insular corporate fiefdoms run by the billionaires.

Who owns a majority share in the Washington Post, now? Answer: ultra billionaire Jeff Bezos.

I wonder why I still have a subscription to this garbage online publication? I generally don't give a shit what they take time to write about, anymore.

#WaPo

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/04/28/trump-second-term-struggles-bubble/

"The bubble that created Trump is the reason he’s stumbling"

The White House is now a bubble where loyalty, not ability, defines success.

Consider Defense Secretary Pete #Hegseth.

No one should be surprised that Hegseth is flailing in his new role, one of the most arduous and complicated in the U.S. government, if not the world. When Donald Trump proposed that Hegseth run the agency, the response was broadly unified: Hegseth lacked the experience needed to do the job effectively. You could debate the other controversies surrounding his bid for the role ad nauseam, but there was no way to reasonably argue that the Fox News talk-show host was prepared to run the Pentagon.

Hegseth was confirmed by the Republican-controlled Senate anyway because Trump and a universe of voices who support him insisted Hegseth was the best choice for the job — because he was Trump’s choice for the job. Republican senators who undoubtedly knew better went along, betting that things wouldn’t get so bad under Hegseth that it was worth stirring up the fury of that pro-Trump bubble.

It’s the same bet that prominent Republicans have been making on Trump himself since 2015. Now, as Trump too is flailing — polling and the data make clear that he is — it’s trivial to identify that insular chorus of cheerleaders and cynics as a root cause.

The president owes his political career to that same bubble. Over the past few decades, the fringe right and then Republicans more broadly embraced discussions of the world that were mostly devoid of nuance: left bad, right good. The internet allowed for the emergence of bespoke “news” organizations (and, later, social media accounts) catering to conspiracist partisan rhetoric — an alternative to traditional reporting unhampered by criticism or unpopular truths.

@Daojoan No doubt, Apple News is a problematic program on macOS. I think they do not lend it enough support through Apple's internal development.

When I've made technical recommendations to Cupertino; my suggestions for improvements go over a high wall, never to be heard from again.

When something such as Apple's own app development becomes too internalized, then not much improves over time.

I've had problems with the Apple News app taking over my iPhone, at times. It is actually not a standalone app, running from an icon that you tap on once when your phone starts up. One must "swipe left" to see this program which starts at boot time so you can see its news links.

To answer your question -- I don't know why you're seeing headlines from a blocked news source or channel. Might be a bug or a feature. It could also be that Cupertino is letting Apple Intelligence do something to the Apple News program, maybe?

@steelefortress The felon-in-chief already fired DIRNSA Timothy Haugh and his deputy director because they were somehow linked to General Mark Milley who was the Chair of JCS under President Biden. Milley is Trump's arch nemesis because the general called out Trump on the 45th President more or less hosting an actual insurrection at the nation's capitol. The firing of the NSA director probably affects CISA but they won't say exactly how since Cyber Command is and always will be highly secretive.

Also Trump illegitimately purged a red team at Cyber Command that was "proactive" in attacking Russia's electronic defenses. We all know Trump is friendly towards Putin -- that is exactly why he got rid of this area within US Cyber Command. Trump is quite known to be beholden to special interests. It's his entire M.O.

We just need to sue Donald Trump into oblivion. He is litigious but even the President can only withstand so much acrimony through the courts. His popularity is once again dropping like a rock, according to recent polls.

Have some faith, people. He can't last that long.

@deinol I went to the Stand Up For Science rally in Salem, Ore. about a month and a half ago. That was fun.

It's not either "necessary or appropriate" for you to remain in power for much longer, Justice #Alito. Step down, you black-robed bribe taker and hypocrite.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/20/us/politics/alito-supreme-court-dissent-alien-enemies-act.html

@briankrebs Please don't mistake me for being coldly analytical.

I think it's horrible what's happened to my country. Trump's power is pretty much unchecked until all of the courts get their act together and tell him to stop.

I living in a university town where 13 students and grad students just got their visas revoked and were sent home. Except for releasing a letter offering their condolences and also joining some lawsuit against Donald Trump, #OregonState University officials and provosts have done almost nothing else besides that. They can't, really. Everyone in this area who doesn't like authority figures wants to blame those officials a little and not just federal officials. They did let it happen, up to a point.

I thought I had it difficult! I cannot imagine what those ex-students are now going through. Their academic lives are over. Their future careers as professionals in the US are no more. Welcome to America. Love it or leave it... if you're Mexican, Middle Eastern, or Venezuelan.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/lawsuit-filed-against-trump-administration-after-oregon-state-student-s-visa-revoked/ar-AA1D7B8A

@briankrebs Before the borderline insane 2024 Supreme Court ruling last year declaring that a US president is immune from prosecution after leaving office for almost every official act performed while they served in office...

...The Office of Legal Counsel within the Dept. of Justice, back in the Nixon and Watergate era came out with a memo which I believe has not been altered since all of that time passed, which states a sitting president cannot (or "should not" -- from the OLC's own point of view) be prosecuted by any US court of law until they've finished their term.

Now -- they cannot prosecute Trump, period. It's less of a Constitutional crisis and more of a bonafide autocracy. The "A" word is something that the mainstream newspapers do not generally often write about. They usually avoid any topics concerning the goings-on of countries such as Hungary or Russia.

Of course, it depends on which legal scholar you talk to. Some only adhere to the baseline. They take all the legal news out there and round off their perception of pertinent info to "the nearest third." Those that do just this announce that we're in a Constitutional crisis. They're right, insofar as they're right about only that; up to this moment. Many professional lawyers refuse to make any type of projections other than sticking to known facts. This trait is known to others as lawyers who are unable to count high.

The ones that don't care but are smart don't even bother to try making projections about current events. I've tried myself to describe current legal events and terminology accurately and use only real lawyer's vernacular in order to make future projections. It is hard to do and it is hard to make any real predictions doing just that.

The legal system moves slow. Economic, political, and personal matters happen in minutes, days, weeks... However, courts are more "glacial" since their time frame regarding many matters of adjudication is closer to movement in how many *years* have passed.

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/key-facts-from-the-supreme-courts-immunity-ruling-and-how-it-affects-presidential-power

@TweekFawkes

This absolutely does highlight a fragile dependency. By almost cutting the entire MITRE #CVE program off, it means the rest of the world cannot really rely on DHS or CISA until President Donald Trump and DOGE are dealt with at the political level. They are now the ones causing this budget chaos within the US government. It does not help that the Supreme Court gave Donald Trump near-absolute immunity from prosecution for wrong-doing after he leaves political office. The President now feels emboldened. He believes he can do anything he wants to via DOGE and Elon Musk's appointment as an unofficial government representative.

I don't exactly know, but some of these government agencies such as DHS may be preemptively cutting some programs to avoid getting DOGE's attention. What I mean is that DOGE itself may not have snooped its way into DHS's actual accounting and payroll systems at all but rather DHS was already looking for extra programs to cut to get along with Trump's legally ambiguous presidential mandate (I'm referring to DOGE).

That's what I think.

@deinol I haven't read Red Harvest in ages!

For more details on this Commodore PET repair, see my blog post:
https://www.righto.com/2025/04/commodore-pet-repair.html
Thanks to @CuriousMarc
and @tubetime for their help with this project. Thanks to Mike Naberezny for providing the PET.

This is a hard one. I did not know much about this recent, #tariff-based history with President Joe Biden. I did not know until now that Biden upheld most of Trump's tariffs from President Trump's first term. It means that this protectionism is well on its way to being a long-term fixture within America's wide economic array of available services and products.

What this means is, going forward, that the US does not really know what it's doing here with regard to stabilizing our economy.

Why is there suddenly a wide disconnect between having a stable economy and getting a good-paying, decent job in most places in the US?

I thought that the one zone of trouble was within the tech sector where I worked for a few years in the early and mid 2000's. I knew that some revising or further development of the actual employment model itself -- or the construct of jobs themselves -- would help us dot-commies move forward a little toward a better future. Not a whole lot changed from 2005 to the present. The creation and administering of jobs is a highly centralized and bureaucratic enigma, made up mostly of college graduates who keep discriminating against all people who want a better society. There, I wrote it. That is, in essence, what is now taking place regardless of your preferred political stripe, chosen religion, or chosen profession.

Working has become a clusterfuck because we have two sides who are opposed to each other. There are the controlling people, such as mid-level managers who care too much and do things the wrong way just to make money at the end of the day. And we also have the types of people who just sit back and let everything get worse because they refuse to contribute anything, much less participate. That is not really sustainable no matter how you look at it.

https://wapo.st/4cvdNZ7

#Pennsylvania's remaining steel mills are consolidating with Nippon Steel to avoid the brunt of possible tariffs and also a moribund economy from putting them out of business:

https://nickwinlund.dev/~nick/pdf/What%20I%20learned%20about%20America%20First%20in%20a%20Pennsylvania%20steelmill.pdf

It won't get any more stupid for all of us than #Trump, believe me.

You Republicans do understand that, even if you do openly support Trump, you should also be advocates for #water conservation?

https://nickwinlund.dev/~nick/pdf/Trump%20Liberates%20Americas%20Showerheads.pdf

( https://www.wsj.com/opinion/donald-trump-shower-head-regulation-climate-environment-congress-9126a773 )

@deinol I'm personally worried about the bond markets or treasury yields.

I was talking with my uncle in California yesterday on the phone and he said this volatility reminded him of Black Monday in 1987 when he was selling stocks.

https://nickwinlund.dev/~nick/pdf/Treasury%20Yields%20See%20Biggest%20Weekly%20Jump%20Since%202001.pdf