skeptical scientist

@NateSilver538 Given it’s so easy to pass ballot measures in California, would it be possible to do a ballot measure that 1) only ballots received by 11:59 pm Election Day count 2) if any race isn’t certified by 5 pm the next day, the Secretary of State must publicly account why not?

The fact that California elections often can't be resolved for weeks is kind of insane and not common in other electoral systems around the world.

@goaloa @mattyglesias Maybe I’ll like him as governor, but in terms of the primary vote, I pretty much ruled out the other options and he was what was left.

@skepsci @mattyglesias I preferred him initially because of his experience and reliability. The more deeply I dug into his story, and his character, the more I liked what I saw. I truly believe the moment has found the man.

Xavier Becerra’s rise is inspiring to those of us who appreciate a real political machine.

@ianbirrell @spectator Straw man. The claim is not that they caused it, but they made both the outbreak and the humanitarian response worse.

Ignore the claims of the self-serving aid industry and charities: Aid cuts did not cause this awful Ebola outbreak in DRC - my @spectator column spectator.com/article/aid-cu…

@goaloa @mattyglesias “Like” is a very strong word. He was the least bad of the realistic candidates.

@mattyglesias You are missing the part where regular Californians decided they actually like him.

@reason Learning from its mistakes would be good for the party, but bad for certain people who are influential in the party. It’s the principal-agent problem.

Democrats tried to bury its 2024 election autopsy report. Why is the party so dedicated to not learning from its mistakes? reason.com/2026/05/22/dem…

@mcdermott @kmanguward Neither dash appears on the keyboard, so normies just use hyphen/double-hyphen unless their software automatically replaces it.

The curse of being a formally trained print journalist is knowing the difference between an em dash (—), an en dash (–) and a hyphen (-) and having to see normies misuse all three, all of the time.

@BitPaine @mattyglesias @AlecMacGillis Which administration was she part of?

@mattyglesias @AlecMacGillis Nancy Pelosi would like you to hold her beer.

@Larry_SFP @mattyglesias Which administration was she part of?

@mattyglesias Nancy Pelosi. When Visa went public she was got the biggest swaths of a non board member during its IPO. The stock price doubled in a month. Don't think that was her only good deal.

@mattyglesias US politicians are legally allowed to trade stocks based on insider information they acquire as part of their official responsibilities. This is a well-known loophole in insider trading laws.

@havivrettiggur Unfollowing

Challenge accepted. Gefilte fish is a delicacy.

@NeverSinkDev It was pretty dumb to raise the level cap to 70 at the same time they removed all interesting decisions from the skill tree after level 40. They should have put the level cap back to 50 and then the period of leveling 40-70 wouldn’t have been so boring.

DIABLO 4 LOH - EARLY ENDGAME EXPERIENCES. This is my mini-review of the post-campaign up to torment ~2-3ish experience (still very early in the endgame progression). tl;dr: It's pretty damn good. The new loop is the old loop, but with a lot of the fat trimmed, pieces connected and customization added. THE GOOD - War Plans & Upgrades This is likely one of the two best features in the expansion (talismans being the other one) War Plans are HUGE. I love how they tie together a lot of different gameplay types and provide instant teleport/QOL. The trees also look great. I'm not far down the progression (2-3 points at most), but so far they're awesome. THE GOOD - A lot of activities. You have helltides, dungeons, pits, undercity runs, hordes and bosses and whisper-tree to tie them all together. Overall it's a great dopamine spiral. THE GOOD - Way better loot progression. You don't get flooded in legendaries, you work for your power early on, without it being too slow. Great balance by the devs. THE GOOD - A lot less open world grinding The rapport grinding and open world events were always some of the worst parts of the game. Thank god looking for lilith statues is not part of the new zone. THE MEH - Horadric cube. I may change my opinion later on, but while it offers a couple of handy options, it's not exactly very interesting. So far at least. THE MEH - A bit fidgety Every gear replacement means running around several NPCs doing a lot of tiny clicks. It's not a major issue, I don't have a solution, but it's not great. THE BAD - Skill Tree & Build Evolution This is controversial, but I'm not happy with the skilltree rework/paragon state. I find it really, REALLY boring. Since there are no passives, after level I ~40 was just dumping points. Any level after 55 pretty much didn't matter anymore in terms of skillpoints for my build. Since level 40, my build has barely evolved in terms of gameplay. Uniques changed it a bit, but overall everything is just a numbers go up game. Most warlock legendaries also just provided more damage instead of skill modifications. I'm crushing content, but the only realistic thing changing is numbers getting higher. Yes, the previous tree had its issues, but removing every single passive, including the ultimate passive is not an upgrade. Maybe I was not lucky with the legendaries/uniques. Maybe I'll feel differently in a day or two. I expect this will cause me to lose interest earlier. PERSONAL RATING - EARLY ENDGAME I'd give it a solid 8.5/10. I'm having a blast, the war plans are awesome and I can fully recommend it. I don't know how long this phase holds, but it's great! The fluent gameplay is very welcoming after the super clunky campaign (good story, good cinematics, terrible pacing). My main gripe remains that most of the build evolution stopped at level 40 for me. I'll make one final post in a couple of days, once I'm in high torment levels and am farming (empowered) bosses. What are your impressions? What do you think?

@mattyglesias Trigger warnings are good, but getting mad at people who didn’t include a trigger warning is bad.

@mattyglesias Anything past the paywall doesn’t count.

@mattyglesias Is that his goal? He’s ineligible for reelection, but has had a lot of impact on US institutions. People don’t get into politics to be popular, they get into it to reshape the country according to their views.

@CrookLockwood @KelleyKga Seems like mostly Sweden and private foundations.

@KelleyKga Annnnddd, where did the funding for this "important study" come from 🧐

Glad someone finally answered the age-old question of how much further a coked-up salmon can swim.

@KelleyKga Your tax dollars at work (if you’re Swedish).

@CBSNews Your tax dollars at work (if you’re Swedish).

Salmon exposed to cocaine in the water swim longer distances than those that go without, according to a study released this week. cbsn.ws/48ADVBt

@Sky18Sam @jonathanchait @JoshKraushaar @jewishinsider @melissaeweiss Anyone who can’t tell he’s being sarcastic is deliberately misinterpreting his comment for partisan reasons, because it’s blindingly obvious to everyone else.

@jonathanchait @JoshKraushaar @jewishinsider @melissaeweiss If you can’t tell, then it shouldn’t have been posted. By a sitting senator no less.

BREAKING @jewishinsider via @melissaeweiss: "Sen. Chris Murphy applauds Iranian ships against U.S. Navy" "The Connecticut senator responded ‘awesome’ to a report that 26 Iranian vessels evaded the U.S.’ maritime blockade" jewishinsider.com/2026/04/chris-…

@liron @mattyglesias @KelseyTuoc There was actual hunger in Gaza. Whether it was a “famine” or not is a politically charged semantic distinction that people are still fighting over, but the verifiable fact is that food prices rose by large multiples in summer 2025. Even Israel-aligned sources agree that is so.

@mattyglesias @KelseyTuoc There is a false perception of a Gaza “famine” or “genocide” that people cite as load-bearing to their anti-Israel beliefs. So one would need to argue why Israel’s actions are to blame for that factually false perception.

@mattyglesias There are no separate magisteria.