Rocket Scientist

@Dapper_Det @GovWesMoore Margarita time with senator @ChrisVanHollen !!!

🚨BREAKING: Illegal Alien from El Salvador working as a ride-share driver arrested for kidnapping & assaulting a 12-year-old girl in MD. Oscar Bladimir Argueta Argueta had an immigration hold but it was ignored because of @GovWesMoore’s anti-ICE sanctuary laws.

Montgomery County, MD, also levies a between $40,000 and $70,000 "impact tax" on every new home, depending on type. The government "profit" per home is as much, or more than, the developer's. The Montgomery County politicians (all Ds, BTW) incessantly complain about housing being unaffordable yet refuse to cut their enormous profits that dramatically increase home prices.

If you really think rent control doesn't reduce supply, go spend time talking to apartment developers who build that supply -- and ask them why they're not building in St. Paul MN or Montgomery County MD and why they've frozen new projects in Massachusetts.

@MorosKostas We're still going to remind you about your Hillary! campaign stickers...

Man, it borders on the religious doesn't it? Accept the Democrat party as your lord and savior, fall in line with their dogma, and all your sins will be forgiven. And as Abby Phillip notes, there is no way this grace would ever be extended to a Republican no matter how clear it was they regretted their dabbles in Nazi fanboyism.

@johnpavlovitz Yes you absolutely can. It’s much harder to say you’re a democrat today without being overly emotional, ignorant, hypocritical and morally bankrupt.

@KenCuccinelli @billmaher @amrenewctr They're "the rich." How many expensive homes does the wealthy socialist, Bernie Sanders, own?

I'm not sure why this is happening, but I'm seeing more & more left-wingers questioning the long-traditional (on the left) 'tax the rich' mantra. theargumentmag.com/p/you-cant-red… Here's @BillMaher: x.com/RubinReportSho… Anyone have any idea why? @amrenewctr

@MayorBMScott @OurMayors Why are you happy to miserably fail Black children in the horrendous Baltimore school system? Don't even bring up "our rights" until you start to allow Baltimore children the right to a decent education.

We cannot afford to be silent when our democracy is under attack. We will continue to stand with the voters and advocates who are fighting to protect our rights in the courts, in legislatures, and at the ballot box.

@manetmori2 @Bob_Ehrlich Then why, based on the data, are so many wanting to get out of Maryland? And having a lot of federal government, and federal government related, jobs (high income/wealth) isn't something to brag about.

@Bob_Ehrlich 7th wealthiest state

National ratings reflect a sad state of affairs: Maryland ranks 2nd in cost to raise a family-7th in utility rates-7th in marginal tax burden-8th in gas tax-and we are now a top 10 state in outward migration. Md Dems call this “progress.”

@GovWesMoore You were able to take a break from raising taxes and fees on Marylanders in order to do other things?

𝗞𝗲𝘆 𝗕𝗿𝗶𝗱𝗴𝗲 𝗥𝗲𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱: 𝗣𝗵𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝟮 𝗨𝗽𝗱𝗮𝘁𝗲: As we prepare to enter Phase 2 of the rebuild, our team approached negotiations with our contractor with firm imperatives, but the contractor's proposed price and timeline for moving forward was unacceptable and not in the best interest of the people of Maryland and the American people. I’ve directed MDTA to conduct a new procurement and to deliver the best deal for taxpayers while ensuring that the project is delivered with the highest standards. To be absolutely clear: Work is NOT stopping. We are NOT slowing down. We are securing the right partners to complete this mission. The Key Bridge will be rebuilt safely, QUICKLY, and cost-efficiently – no exceptions.

Goes well with John MacArthur's devotional for today: "Blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are you when men cast insults at you, and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely, on account of Me" (Matt. 5:10-11). When you speak out for Christ, you can expect harassment, insults, and slander. gty.org/devotionals?ta…

Jesus wasn't afraid of being offensive. When his disciples worried that he'd offended the Pharisees, his response was basically: good. Let them be offended. Why? Because they were leading people to hell.

@iamwesmoore Exactly. Maryland state employees get rich via kickbacks from funding wasteful NGOs. No gambling is required.

I can’t speak for the federal government, but Maryland’s state employees won’t be using information they get from their position to get rich through gambling markets.

@ChrisMartzWX Just give me everything that I and my employer (instead of paying it to me in my paycheck) were forced to pay into SS up to now then leave me alone. I won't even demand interest on the money that was forcibly taken from me. Give me back my money.

I am going to go over this once again. Hopefully, this will be the last time I have to go over this, but I will likely have to do so in the future. Social Security is a de facto state-run Ponzi scheme. It is a tax. Even if you don't agree with that framing (in which case you are wrong), it is undeniable that Social Security it is economically unsustainable in its current form. You don't need to be an economist to see this; just take off your rose-colored glasses. First, retirement should be self-funded. There are no if's or but's about this. The federal government should not take your money, spend it on shit, then pay you later on with other people's money. The ideal way to plan your retirement is to save your own money. And, if that was our system and you decided to spend it all instead of saving it, putting it into a 401K, or investing it, oh well, too bad, that's on you. When the Social Security Act of 1935 was signed into law by socialist FDR (arguably one of the worst U.S. Presidents in history because he expanded the size of the government more than Woodrow Wilson did), the retirement age (i.e., minimum age requirement to be eligible for Social Security benefits) was set to 65. At the time, average life expectancy in the U.S. was 61. In other words, about half of the population would not live to be old enough to collect the benefits. 🔗ssa.gov/history/35act.… 🔗ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-e… And, because of that condition, it was economically sustainable. The revenue generated by payroll taxes could be used to pay seniors once they reached age 65. There were plenty of young people “contributing” to the pool such that the government didn't have to borrow (or in reality, print) a bunch of money. In 1960, for every retiree, there were 16 workers to support them. But because our World War II veterans came home, got frisky, and banged the shit out of their wives, spitting out tens of millions of children, and each subsequent generation has had fewer kids (mostly due to decreased demand for labor on farms and cultural shifts), we have unintentionally created a top-heavy population that is age 65+. So, as a result, there are now only about two or three workers per retiree. 🔗fixthedebt.org/securing-socia… Older generations received far more in benefits after retirement than many currently do. That's not always the case now, but the pool of money available to pay retirees has become smaller and smaller. Because of that and because there are fewer young people who contribute money via payroll taxes, the federal government has to “borrow” (in reality, print) money to pay out the rest. This increases the national debt, and printing leads to inflation, which is the biggest tax on all of us. This is economically unsustainable. You cannot debate this point at all. It's a mathematical fact. You may not like it, but this is nonetheless a fact. Another fact is that unless there are significant, and I mean MAJOR reforms to Social Security, such as raising the retirement age to 80 or privatizing it like George W. Bush wanted to in 2005, or abolishing it all together, we will go insolvent. My solutions? Pick one: 1⃣ Privatizing Social Security would guarantee that you get back what you directly paid into it (or perhaps more if it's invested), and it wouldn't force currently working people to pay for your retirement (which is immoral as it exists in its current form). 2⃣ Raising the retirement age to 80: It would make Social Security more sustainable because the average U.S. life expectancy has increased to 79. Recall, in 1935, it was 62 while retirement age was 65 (today, it is 67 for those born in or after 1960). Now, morally speaking, this would be problematic because, well, age-related physical disabilities can start to show up in your 60s, and by the age of 80, many people can't work, at least on tasks that are physically demanding, such as blue-collar jobs. But this would, in theory, prevent the need to privatize it. 3⃣ Allow people under the age of, say, 40, to opt out of payroll taxes + Social Security: The issue with this, though, is that it would balloon the debt even more, and that would cause unprecedented inflation. I don't think that this is a good idea, especially since it would blowback on the youth more than the current system does. 4⃣ Abolishing Social Security altogether: A hard-to-swallow pill is that although you may have paid hundreds of thousands of dollars into Social Security for the last few decades, you are not actually guaranteed returns should Congress decide to repeal the Social Security Act of 1935. In fact, the Supreme Court ruled in Helvering v. Davis (1937) that Social Security is essentially a tax because Congress can spend money for the “general welfare” under the U.S. Constitution. And, that's what Social Security is; they take money from new contributors (workers) and give it to older investors (retirees). Further, Flemming v. Nestor (1960) ruled that you are not legally entitled to Social Security benefits, even if you paid in. 🔗supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/… 🔗supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/… So, in reality, you aren't entitled to squat. 🤷‍♂️ But of course, doing this would cause mass outrage and potentially put tens of millions of seniors out on the streets because they rely on Social Security for their sole post-retirement income. It nonetheless is one of the biggest contributors to our national debt crisis. Republicans aren't going to talk about it. Democrats aren't going to talk about it. They won't touch it with a ten-foot pole because the one thing that they both can agree on is that it is political career suicide. But I am not running for office. I have no plans, much less desire to. So, I can be honest about it. It might make my followers mad. It might alienate some of you who love my work on climate + energy. But I do my best to speak truth on any topic I discuss, and I don't hold back punches. I don't blame boomer voters for this situation at all. They didn't vote for it. I do, however, blame FDR for his socialist policies and the gullible people in pre-boomer generations for believing Social Security was a retirement savings plan instead of a benefits program that required big government spending (it's now nearly a quarter of our budget). I also blame every Congress and President that has failed to do anything to reform it. It should have been done decades ago because it would have been much easier to do. Ronald Reagan wanted to, at least in his campaign, but only got minor reforms passed in 1983 (e.g., slightly raising the retirement age to 67). George W. Bush wanted to privatize it in 2005 but was opposed by both political parties. We have a uniparty in Congress and a bunch of gullible idiots spanning multiple generations who keep voting them back in one election cycle after the other because they prefer a familiar face they saw on FOX News or MSNBC instead of doing their homework on the cand And, yes, before you bite my head off, so is Medicare / Medicaid, and national defense. I support cuts there as well, particularly to private contractors that we use to enable the Military Industrial Complex. We spend more on national defense than the next 8–9 countries combined, which is unnecessary (in my opinion). Also, there is government waste and fraud in other areas (as DOGE, Nick Shirley, and Data Republican have found), but mathematically speaking, major cuts need to be made to “mandatory” spending. As one final point, I don't want to put seniors out on the street. I don't. I have two grandmothers that I love dearly. Both collect Social Security (albeit one does not need it at all; she is well-off). And, I don't blame any of you reading this for taking advantage of this system. I probably would too if I were 65+. But young people need to increasingly push for the abolition of this pyramid scheme, or at the very least (and perhaps most reasonable) some significant reforms. The status quo is unacceptable, especially if you are a real fiscal conservative or Libertarian. I rest my case. ---------------------------------------------------- * BTW, I will not just “stick to weather / climate.” This is my personal X page; I will talk about things I'm interested in. My lane is whichever lane I choose to be in. I like to talk about economics; country and rock music; culture war stuff; and TV shows, such as NCIS. Climate is boring right now in any case; there's nothing that interesting to talk about that I haven't covered before (when there is something in the news, you'll be the second to know).

So I actually gave this question from Rod (who I consider a friend tbc!) some thought. Why did Trump react so strongly to O'Donnell. And I think I can shed some light. Trump is clearly a tough type. He doesn't use assassination attempts to milk sympathy as you might expect from political figures who are not as tough and do this routinely. He instinctively (and I think rightly) feels that cashing in on such sympathy to score political points would be effeminate. That toughness though makes it easy to forget that the guy is human. He survived one VERY close call with a bullet. And has now survived two others that weren't quite as close. But it's going to shake anyone, no matter how to tough they are to recognize that there is a very large political movement that wants you dead. And those people, as we just saw, are never going to stop trying. And even in this moment, @NorahODonnell couldn't show a bit of human decency toward him. She took the leftist talking points the killer spewed in his manifesto, which are absolutely false, and asked him to defend himself against them. That's as vile as it gets. These people really do not see Trump as a person deserving of any fellow feeling. Does the expectation from him that he play nicely with the people who tried to take everything from him with political prosecutions sometimes bit him in the polls? Yes. He seems constitutionally incapable of faking it in the way we usually see from the Beltway class. But I think in some ways this is admirable. He won't respond with social niceties he doesn't feel to earn respectability points. Even though I often wish he would. Anyway, that's my take. The guy is a real person and the left is constantly calling for his death and trying to kill him. And when you're a tough guy and aren't going to feel sorry for yourself or try to make others feel sorry for you, you respond with just anger. O'Donnell could have chosen to be a decent person and ask the President how he feels knowing that he's once again survived being the target of a crazed would-be murderer. Instead, she asked him to defend himself against his would-be murderer's lies.

@Kohuoro @fourboxesdiner @WallStreetMav Interesting how you keep deflecting, discussing something that I didn't say, going back to junior engineers instead. Well, we won't get anywhere talking past each other so enjoy your day.

@Rocket_Scintst @fourboxesdiner @WallStreetMav Yes. As a rule traditional engineering undergrads are pretty useless for the first couple of years. Entirely different when you have a non-traditional student that graduates later in life with actual life experience under their belt. They rarely need babysitting.

The value of most college degrees is rapidly approaching $0.00. 80% of the degrees are completely useless. It doesn’t provide job training. It is barely educational. There are a few exceptions such as medicine, engineering, etc. It seems like 80% of universities should close. We have too many people who are wasting years of their life going into debt for worthless degrees.

@jongavin021 @GustDeLaMancha @HawkeyeKeller55 @Lapo13 @mtaibbi That you are English illiterate and retarded. You're welcome. "Hyper-sexualized @ a young age ... showers w/ my dad (probably not appropriate)." Rinsing sand off of yourself, clothed in your bathing suits, is not considered "not appropriate." At least you tried...

@Rocket_Scintst @GustDeLaMancha @HawkeyeKeller55 @Lapo13 @mtaibbi Thanks for proving my point.

Every reporter who’s sold the phony “pedophilia” story should think about where these manias lead:

@GovWesMoore You're delivering on higher taxes, higher fees, worse violent crime. People who can are fleeing Maryland.

There’s no passing the buck on this just because of federal inaction. Marylanders want action, and that’s what we’re delivering on.

@jongavin021 @GustDeLaMancha @HawkeyeKeller55 @Lapo13 @mtaibbi Ashley Biden's authenticated diary quote: "Hyper-sexualized @ a young age... I remember somewhat being sexualized with Caroline; I remember having sex with friends @ a young age; showers w/ my dad (probably not appropriate)."

@Rocket_Scintst @GustDeLaMancha @HawkeyeKeller55 @Lapo13 @mtaibbi She didn't write that

@Kohuoro @fourboxesdiner @WallStreetMav Interesting point about a subject that I didn't broach (junior engineers). I stand by "Few ... can come close to doing complex engineering without the fundamentals taught in engineering undergrad." You disagree with that?

@Rocket_Scintst @fourboxesdiner @WallStreetMav Few if any junior engineers can come close to doing complex engineering after graduating. Some of the best engineers I have worked with over the last 30 years had two year trade school degrees, not four plus year engineering degrees. FYI I have two engineering BS degrees.

@chrispapst Just wait until the capital gains exemption is doubled (appropriately, since it's been the same for many years). A lot more will flood out because they will afford be able to afford to.

More "LEAVING Maryland" emails: Is this one too harsh, or fair? "I know of 10 people looking to get out of Maryland in next year or 2. It's becoming an expensive dump to live in. Not safe, not beautiful, many crappy schools, and the leadership is fiscally irresponsible."

@z3r0_burn @fourboxesdiner @WallStreetMav You made up false narratives and accused me of bragging. I addressed them. Yes, you are an overly emotional one who acts on zir imagination. Pretty funny. 🤡 🤡 🤡 🤡 🤡 Have a great day - after you calm down, of course. 😃

@Rocket_Scintst @fourboxesdiner @WallStreetMav I hope you're not a Lockheed guy that crashed the satellite into Mars. You think I was emoting by asking what caused you to get in court? You're a fucking crybaby if that's your view of emoting... Asking legit questions. Your rockets must suck if you can't ask honest questions.

1) Nowhere did I say "all of the time." You're imagining things. 2) I sue over miscellaneous things, mostly land use decisions, and similar, having them overturned. In general, stopping corrupt/illegal government decisions from being implemented. That's what I "do" that gets me "in front of a judge often enough to brag you always win." Funny, the things that you emote, stating what I do is bragging, though. I also design satellites and rocket systems. Oh, dear... I'm stating facts (bragging) again.

@Rocket_Scintst @fourboxesdiner @WallStreetMav You're bragging that you represent yourself in court all the time? What do you do that gets you in front of a judge often enough to brag you always win?