Catherine Hessian

The story behind the New York Times’ 1903 claim that human flight was between one and ten million years away is even worse than it looks. Once you understand the backstory, you realize that the New York Times story is not really about flight at all but about how elites and credentialed “experts” mistake their own failures for the boundaries of possibility. The New York Times did not dismiss the possibility of powered flight at random. There was a very specific reason behind it. At the time, America’s most prominent scientific authority, Smithsonian Secretary Samuel Langley, had been showered with large amounts of taxpayer funding to build an aircraft, the Langley Aerodrome. Despite all the money, institutional backing, and elite prestige, Langley and his team could not get it to fly, culminating in a series of very public failures, the last on December 8, 1903. So when the New York Times declared that flight was millions of years away, what it was really saying was that if the most credentialed and well-funded “experts” cannot do it, then it cannot be done. A mere nine days later, the elites’ proclamation of impossibility lay in ruins. Two totally unknown bicycle mechanics from Ohio achieved the first powered flight using improvised parts, a few hundred dollars of their own money, and sheer persistence. The story of flight is, at its core, a story of the triumph of American individualism over elite credentialism. The fact that it was the New York Times that inadvertently delivered the proof is the most fitting conclusion imaginable.

@BrivaelFr 100%

Je crois qu'on ne mesure pas ce qu'Elon Musk est en train de construire avec X. Tous les médias de l'histoire ont été couplés à une culture, une langue, une bulle géographique. Le Monde parle aux Français. Le NYT parle aux Américains. NHK parle aux Japonais. Chaque média filtre le réel à travers le prisme de sa culture locale. X est en train de devenir le premier média de l'humanité. Pas d'un pays. De l'espèce. Je le vis en temps réel. Mes posts en français se font RT par des Japonais, répondre par des Brésiliens, citer par des Américains. Des conversations qui n'auraient jamais existé il y a 5 ans. Un libertarien français qui débat avec un ingénieur de Tokyo et un entrepreneur de Sao Paulo sous le même tweet. Pas traduit par un éditeur. Traduit instantanément par l'IA, en un clic. Les bulles de filtre culturelles sont en train d'exploser. Et je pense qu'on sous-estime massivement les effets composés de ça. Quand une idée peut traverser un océan en 3 secondes, quand un argument sourcé posté à Paris peut être vérifié par un économiste à Singapour et amplifié par un développeur à Austin dans la même heure, le coût de propagation d'une bonne idée tend vers zéro. Et c'est catastrophique pour un type d'acteur très précis : les médias qui ont construit leur business model sur le monopole de l'information locale. Ceux qui pouvaient raconter n'importe quoi sur "ce qui se passe ailleurs" parce que personne ne pouvait vérifier. Quand un journaliste français écrit que "le modèle américain ne marche pas", maintenant il y a 50 Américains dans les réponses avec des sources. Quand un éditorialiste dit que "le Danemark prouve que le socialisme fonctionne", il y a un Danois qui explique que le Danemark est 10e en liberté économique mondiale. Le fact-checking n'est plus un département. C'est un effet réseau. Les médias honnêtes n'ont rien à craindre de ça. Les médias qui vendaient une narration protégée par l'ignorance géographique de leur audience vont avoir un problème existentiel. Parce qu'on ne peut plus mentir à l'échelle locale quand le monde entier regarde.

@boriquagato The line of reasoning is simple: “We have to cast this in some sort of negative light in order to take this win away from Trump. I know, let’s talk about imaginary scenarios instead of what actually happened.”

i am finding this whole line of reasoning around "almost failed" and "why did they put more lives and equipment at risk to save one person?" baffling. do people really not understand that this is what drives a whole military and makes it work, what gives it confidence and morale? one day, it might be you. and we will not leave you behind. we will come for you. we do not count costs, we get our people back. and everyone in the service knows this. do people not understand why that's important, how it keeps us coherent and brave and unified? that seems a wild and egregious lapse in comprehension. it also seems like a weirdly situational cricicism. we routinely applaud 8 firefighters entering a burning house to save one person. we do not fret about it or cry about damage to a firetruck. we laud the bravery and the nobility of the action. we take comfort that if it were ever us, someone would come. "firefighter lives needlessly endangered saving kitten from tree" would be a churlish and bereft headline yet it seems to be a popular one here. and i really don't get it. it's either some deep, fundamental failure of comprehension or it's just such political derangement that people are forgetting that one can oppose a war or a president and not need to invert every single issue every single time even and especially when it makes one immoral and wrong. if you want to oppose a war, oppose a war, but to cast soldiers rescuing their own as some sort of ill-conceived notion is simply base.

@WayneMathison It’s a mistake if the well-being of Canadians is your goal. But it’s pretty obvious that Carney and his handlers have a completely different goal so no it’s not a mistake.

About 77% of Canada’s exports go to the United States. Roughly 3.9% go to China. Yet Ottawa keeps acting like irritating Washington and leaning toward Beijing is some clever strategy. It isn’t. Whatever headaches come with the US, tying Canada closer to the CCP is a long-term structural mistake.

@jodiecongirl Yes it is correct. It makes you not care about eating. That’s it.

not to step into this hornet's nest, and I have no opinion on GLP-1s, but is this actually true? in other words, are the drugs just an appetite tool (affecting calories in) or are they also affecting metabolic processes (changing calories out)?

“Poilievre's main stated objection to the project is that it will require extensive expropriations of private property across Ontario and Quebec. “The Carney Liberals will confiscate farmland and private property,” he told a press conference at a rural location in Peterborough, Ont., this week.” @PierrePoilievre The high-speed rail project between Quebec City and Toronto must be abandoned because we are broke. That's the only reason.

A lot of people, including some so-called conservatives, act like Trump is the reason things are the way they are, but that is completely backwards. Iran has been a terrorist state since 1979, illegal immigration has been a persistent problem for decades, the media has been corrupt and fraudulent since time immemorial, NATO has been freeloading on U.S. security guarantees since 1949, Europe’s energy problems started long before 2016, Ukraine and Russia have been at war since 2014, Xi has been running the CCP since 2012, and the list goes on. Trump did not create any of this, he just pointed it out, forced everyone to see it, and has been trying to confront it head on.

@FluxState_DAO This! Carney has been installed by the moneyed elite, to use Canada as their own piggy bank. In order to ensure continued money laundering, and remove any challenge to his power, he is turning Canada into China.

Il y a seulement un an, Justin Trudeau était probablement ressenti par beaucoup, le premier ministre le plus socialiste et le plus communiste que le Canada ait jamais connu. Mark Carney arrive. L'homme que les Canadiens ont appris était derrière le rideau pour Justin Trudeau et Chrystia Freeland « conseillant » sur la direction que le Canada devrait prendre. Mark Carney est toutefois un type différent de socialiste et communiste penché. Il ne porte pas de chaussettes de couleur. Il n'a pas fait visage noir. Il ne va pas surfer à Tofino. Il ne dit pas que le "budget va s'équilibrer". Il est "Le banquier" devenu politique. Il est en fait bien pire. En 12 mois, nous avons appris que Mark Carney avait un mépris total du processus démocratique et qu'il mène littéralement un coup d'État communiste qui contrecarre notre institution démocratique fondamentale, le gouvernement fédéral du Canada. Les liens de Carney avec Brookfield, plus que nous ne pouvons le comprendre, ce qui compromet absolument ses soi-disant "deals" qu'il fait en tant que PM lors de ses tournées mondiales. Sa relation d'amour avec la Chine. Qu'y avait-il exactement dans le mémorandum d'entente avec la Chine Les Canadiens ne connaissent toujours pas toute l'histoire. Carney ne veut pas le libérer. Un homme qui assiste rarement à la période des questions parce qu'il est trop occupé à faire le tour du monde en faisant des réunions, pour s'assurer qu'à l'avenir il aura une réunion pour discuter d'un dialogue plus approfondi. C'est un théâtre complet avec aucune substance et aucun résultat pour les Canadiens désespérés. Dettes ? Trudeau était le pire ! Pas si, pas quand le banquier arrive en ville. Bâtir le Canada fort ou construire Brookfield et la Chine? On dirait bien. Ne vous inquiétez pas, nous voterons pour les prochaines élections libéraux. Pas si vite Carney dit, Chris D'Eentremont, Michael Ma, Matt Jeneroux et maintenant la députée du NPD Lori Idlout rejoint la liste. Comme l'a dit le leader conservateur Pierre Poilievre, Carney tente d'obtenir un gouvernement majoritaire à travers des accords louches. Ce n'est pas la démocratie, c'est le socialisme, c'est communiste et Mark Carney s'en fiche. Le Parti libéral formellement démocratique du Canada n'existe plus. C'est communiste au pire et socialiste au mieux et Mark Carney est en tête de la charge. Que Dieu restaure et garde notre terre glorieuse et libre. Marty Votary Magnifique Canada

@NotGodLikeYet @NAMEANDNUMBAS @TalbotLionel2 Ikr? Carney seems like a psychopath to me but people are happy to vote for him. Same with Trudeau. Same with Biden.

@NAMEANDNUMBAS @cathinott @TalbotLionel2 Explain how that’s different from any other politician? Yet, I have never seen this sort of hate for any other politician - ever.

I wrote a piece yesterday (in French) addressing the reasons that motivated Carney to become Prime Minister of Canada. They were mostly personal (Brookfield). This was one of the comments I received: “I don’t care why, but just the fact that he stands up to Trump and that this orange madman is angry with Carney, I’m satisfied.” Unfortunately, this is how the majority of Canadians feel. If Trump was the evil person the media depicted him to be, how did he win a convincing majority even though 90% of media coverage on him was negative while 85% on Kamala was positive? Don’t give me the “Americans are stupid” bullshit. Libtards still haven’t figured this out, proof that TDS actually exists. People need to stop blaming Trump. The day Canadians realize Trump isn’t the villain he’s portrayed as will mark the beginning of the end for Carney and the Liberals. Canada’s emotional rage toward Trump and his allies isn’t good for the country, but it has benefited the Liberal Party. The Liberals knew they couldn’t campaign on a decade of failures, corruption, and economic decline. With the help of subsidized media, they focused instead on Trump and his team. The country is plunging into recession, but that doesn’t matter. Canadians would follow Carney off a cliff if they thought it would give Trump the finger. The Liberals have made hatred of Donald Trump their entire personality. Canadians are easily manipulated and haven’t yet woken up to reality. If they devoted even a fraction of their rage against Trump to demanding competence from their own government, this country would be in far better shape. I’m most concerned about the bill that future generations—my children and grandchildren—will have to pay for the legacy we boomers are leaving them.

@TWilsonOttawa I wonder how they perceived such a thing? His past doesn’t give that impression. I didn’t perceive it. Oh wait I know, the media perceived it.

A year ago, Canadians elected Mark Carney based on his perceived ability to navigate Trump and his tariffs. A year later they’re still in place and our debt has skyrocketed 🇨🇦 Congrats

@mobinfiltrator Great analogy!

My 12-year-old depends on me financially. Spends everything I earn. Credit card maxed out. 🤷‍♂️ Now she wants to build a high-speed railway 🚂 from her bedroom to the kitchen. She’s said she’s going to pay her friends to build it to save money, and there’s a good chance she’ll get some of that money back off her friends, but she will probably keep that to herself. I said we can’t afford it, and even though the idea is nice there’s five of us living in the house and she’s the only one who’ll be able to use it. So even though I said “no” she’s going to the bank 🏦 , borrowing in my name, and telling me I’ll have to pay it off later. And apparently I don’t get a say. Sound familiar? #cdnpoli #onpoli #canada

I was born and raised in China and lived there for over 20 years. China is a communist totalitarian state under the absolute control of one man — first Mao Zedong, then Deng Xiaoping and his successors, and now Xi Jinping. There is no real freedom — not in speech, not in thought, not in daily life. The majority of Chinese people support the government because they have been fed a nonstop diet of lies and propaganda since the age of three. They defend the CCP with absolute certainty, never questioning, never challenging — they simply swallow the official narrative and memorize it. That is why China produces so few genuine inventions of its own and instead relies on stealing technology from the United States and the West. Under this system, ordinary Chinese people have neither the freedom nor the ability to think independently. Everything glamorous you see about China — the glittering cities, the high-speed trains, the perfectly staged spectacles — is carefully fabricated propaganda for foreign consumption. Behind that facade lies the real China: the everyday lives of ordinary people, especially those in the countryside and villages, which most Westerners cannot even begin to imagine. The poverty, the surveillance, the fear, the grinding control — that is the truth the CCP desperately hides from the world. This is not exaggeration. This is lived experience. The Western world needs to stop believing the China regime’s lies. China is the biggest external enemy to the West. China sends spies to the West to corrupt your politicians such as Democratic Party and Labor Party and to cause turmoils and chaos from within.

@QuickDickMcDick Genius!

Hear me out here - MULTIPLE high speed rail lines. Have them running to East/West coasts. But make them underground. And shape them like a tube. And don't put trains or people in them - put crude and nat gas in the fucking things

@Smileyyeg Then they can get a GoFundMe going and raise the money. They can’t use my taxes. The nerve of those people.

Wanting a train so bad that you literally don't even care where it is? Unimaginably stupid.

It’s important to vote but it’s also important for the voters to be informed voters. Unfortunately we have a media industry that is owned by the government and only shows government/Liberal propaganda. The alternatives have to fight tooth and nail to get any media coverage at all, and then it’s most likely going to be negative. So when people vote, they have a one-sided view of who they’re voting for.

One reason we’re in the mess we’re in, is because conservatives and other sane, rational people rarely choose to be involved in politics. Good people want to build. To develop. To produce. To serve others with the best products and services at the best price. Bad people want to control. To regulate. To tell productive people what to do. To suffocate development and productivity in red tape and endless, illogical regulations. Bad people love politics because they get to live like parasites off the hard work of good people. They get to enjoy the fruit of our labour even as they deny us the enjoyment of the full fruit of our own labour. The trouble is, when good people avoid politics and jobs in the bureaucracy, this leaves the field to the bad people. And in the end, the productive citizens are subjugated and crushed by the insane tax and regulatory burden of the Ottoman level bureaucratic state which develops. What’s the solution? We need to get involved. We need good people to run for city council. For school trustee and library committee positions For the provincial and federal legislatures. We need to purge the government and institutions of all the insane ideologues who have captured them and control them. It starts with voting. A huge number of ordinary, rational citizens simply don’t bother to vote. That has to change. Not voting for sanity is the same as voting for insanity. Do you vote? Are you involved? Can you build a network of like minded reasonable, rational citizens to get involved, vote for the best candidates, take back public offices, and begin the great Restoration?

Whether or not anyone thinks that there was a reduction in CO2 emissions resulting from Covid, there was no detectable change in the upward path of measured CO2 levels in the atmosphere. Covid did not move the needle, which shows the pointlessness of trying to change CO2 by constricting human activities. [1/2]

Yep. China owns Canada.

@liam_out_loud Perfect description of the money laundering of tax dollars.

Pierre Poilievre opposing the $90 billion Liberal high-speed rail project has caused quite the controversy. Likely because the Laurentian Elite who loot Canadian taxpayers stand to gain BILLIONS and they want major backlash against anyone who threatens their impending goldmine of corruption. Let's do the math they don't want you to see.... The Base Cost: According to Joe Carson's "Diagnosis Red Tape," for every dollar paid in federal taxes, 26.72% never re-enters the private economy. It's consumed by bureaucracy. That means a $90B public project carries roughly $24B in administrative overhead. True taxpayer burden: ~$114B. There are roughly 20 million taxpayers in Canada. That's ~$5,700 per taxpayer, so that 12 million people in the Toronto-Ottawa-Montreal corridor can have access to rail. EXCEPT THINGS NEVER GO ACCORDING TO PLAN Bent Flyvbjerg's database of 16,000+ megaprojects across 136 countries finds that 91.5% go over budget, over schedule, or both. The mean cost overrun is 62%. Rail projects specifically (according to Liberal friends McKinsey & Company) go over budget by an average of 44.7%, and their demand is overestimated by 51.4%. Applied to Alto: $114B × 1.447 = ~$165B. That's ~$8,250 per taxpayer. Meanwhile, the Liberals' projected $35B yearly GDP increase? If demand is overestimated by half, that's closer to $17B. Now, consider the recent Eglinton subway line in Toronto. The Eglinton Crosstown LRT was originally projected at ~$5B. Final cost: $13B and it took 15 years. The Eglinton Crosstown is 19km long. Alto is ~1,000km. That's 53× longer. The Eglinton Crosstown cost $684M per kilometre. If Alto hit a similar per-km cost, you'd be looking at $684B. That's obviously absurd but the point stands: Canada just proved it cannot build 19km of light rail on time or on budget. The answer is to build 1,000km of high-speed rail? The Eglinton's cost multiplied by 2.6×. Apply that same factor to Alto: $114B × 2.6 = ~$296B. That's ~$14,800 per taxpayer. But it gets EVEN WORSE. Now add corruption... The Charbonneau Commission established that mafia-linked cartels inflated Montreal public contract prices by up to 30%. A whistleblower told the Globe and Mail in 2009 that the Mafia controlled roughly 80% of road contracts, with prices inflated up to 35%. Then there's the "Green Slush Fund" scandal: the Auditor General found 186 conflicts of interest at SDTC, with an estimated $150-390M in misappropriated funds. That's roughly 17-45% of the fund's total approvals funnelled to insiders. Applied to Alto's $90B base: $15-40B in corruption. Applied to the Eglinton-style $296B scenario: $50-133B in corruption. Let's summarize, shall we? Best case (on budget, on time... which never happens): ~$114B total. ~$5,700 per taxpayer. Realistic case (Flyvbjerg's average rail overrun): ~$165B total. ~$8,250 per taxpayer. With half the promised GDP benefit. Eglinton case (2.6× cost escalation): ~$296B total. ~$14,800 per taxpayer. With corruption layered on top: $15-133B more (depending on the scenario) vanishing into the pockets of the politically connected. Also, don't forget: VIA Rail, the organization that would operate this system, currently can't run its existing trains on time. And that, my friends, is how you market corruption and economic insanity as "infrastructure investment."