Friday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Friday, July 18, 2025
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37 comments
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About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
Follow Steven on
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BlueSky.
Nice long article on the directions the next British stealth fighter may be going:
This Is What The UK’s New Stealth Fighter Demonstrator Will Look Like
There is still a big push for manned fighter aircraft even though it it well recognized that putting a human in the loop adds a lot of cost and a loss of capability.
1.7 million Texans could lose health coverage under expiring tax credits, ACA changes in GOP megabill
Not that our elected officials care.
@Scott: In addition.
Individual market insurers requesting largest premium increases in more than 5 years
But at least the wealthiest among us have tax cuts.
@Scott:
There’s a reasonable case to be made that the recent IDF F-35 operations show that having a human in the mix is rather effective.
The UK FCAS project of which the Tempest is just one element seems to envisage the Tempest as “director” for a flock of super-drones.
I’m inclined to think in that case a two-seater Tempest might be the better option; unless it’s expected that drone AI will be good enough to not require so much oversight.
He has bone spurs that are disabling.
He is 6’3” and weighs 215 lbs and is in perfect health.
He has chronic venous insufficiency which is inconsequential.
I am doubtful about all of those claims. He has not earned my suspension of disbelief.
@JohnSF: Agree. There is a lot of activity for the Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCAs).
As CCAs make international debut, companies pitch European co-production
I guess my question is whether we are going to get an incredibly expensive gold plated, jack of all trades fighter jet produced in traditional quantities or a smaller number of “director” jets. And most important to the fighter jocks: a gun system.
There’s a new book out that’s getting a fair bit of attention. Me, But Better by Olga Khazan. It strikes me as obliquely relevant to some of the perennial debates (consensus opinion?) here, especially around whether Trump supporters/apologists can change.
The book’s premise is that personality traits (eg, openness, agreeableness, etc.) aren’t fixed. Khazan tries to shift her own traits by pushing herself into uncomfortable situations. Doing improv to become more extroverted, taking sailing lessons to become more conscientious, stuff like that.
Her story highlights something that is well-known in psychological science but not so much amongst the public at large: personality is not fixed, it is malleable to a significant degree.
What might this mean for how we think about Trump supporters/apologists? A lot of OTB commenters view them as lost causes. I agree that some probably are. But if people can change core personality traits over time, maybe it’s worth reconsidering the idea that all Trump supporters/apologists are permanently unreachable.
(For non-Trump examples of change, see the stories of Megan Phelps-Roper, Daryl Davis, and many others)
I think I’ve come to the conclusion that admitting to the chronic venous insufficiency was an attempt to steer the conversation away from the WSJ “birthday book” report.
As expected, it did not work.
Brazil can give lessons on how to handle destructive politicians out to wreck the country.
Over the billions of years the Solar System has been in existence, now and then an energetic asteroid or comet collision knocks material lose from planets and satellites, and sends these pieces wondering into space. Dome of these fragments in turn crash into other planets or satellites. Thus we know for certain a handful of meteorites found on Earth used to be part of the Moon or Mars, and there’s suspicion a couple might have once formed Mercury.
We can tell because we know the general composition of Lunar and Martian rocks, and they are somewhat different from Earth and asteroid rocks. the doubt over the possible Mercury meteorites comes from lack of knowledge about Mercury’s composition (few probes have visited and none have landed.
So, might there be Venusian meteorites on Earth? This seems harder because Venus’ incredibly thick atmosphere would 1) absorb more energy from an impacting asteroid or comet, and 2) also slow down any ejected material. Probes, mostly Soviet, have landed on Venus. but their operating lifetime was measured in minutes, given the high pressure and temperature of the planet. None have carried out significant geological work. Not compared to several landers and rovers on Mars, and less compared to actual lunar samples studied in all kinds of labs on Earth for decades. So, we don’t know.
Rocks from the giant planets’ satellites face similar difficulties, in the form of being so close to the deepest planetary gravity wells.
Earth, though, has a relatively thin atmosphere (compared to Venus*), and its gravity well isn’t that deep (compared to the giant planets). Therefore there must be Earth meteorites on Mars, the Moon, and elsewhere.
*If any Venusians existed, they’d be amazed we manage to exist in what is, to them, near vacuum.
@Kathy:
South Korea, too.
https://www.lokmattimes.com/international/south-korea-court-dismisses-ex-president-yoons-petition-against-arrest/
Death will have no trouble finding you in due time. There’s no need to court it. If you do, odds are it will find you earlier.
@Kathy: Typically the most catastrophic stunt mishaps have been the less sensational ones, as those are the ones the stuntpeople aren’t putting extra caution into. In the ’80s Dar Robinson pioneered an absolutely insane method of falling from a building without an air bag, using cables attached to his legs; that one went without a hitch. Then he died in a routine motorcycle stunt. (The first Lethal Weapon includes a dedication to him in the credits.)
Has anyone else noticed former MAGA rock star, Michelle Bachman, doing Car Shield (car repair insurance) ads???
Oh, how far the mighty (lol) have fallen.
Congratulations to President Trump!
The combination of his squawking about the issue, and the WSJ reports, get the Trump-Epstein connection into being the lead story on the BBC evening news.
Which had entirely ignored it up till now.
Granted, BBC 6 o’clock news is not prime viewing in the US; but it shows this story is beginning to gain serious traction
Notes on recent time spent in airports:
1) A 71 year-old man and a 68 year-old woman with two titanium hips should not be the fastest-moving people in an airport. Also, if you believe you can walk and scroll at the same time, no, you can’t. Most Americans struggle to walk in a straight line unencumbered, they move like cattle, and TikTok is not helping.
2) On escalators and moving walkways: stand on the right, pass on the left. Why is this so hard for people to grasp? It’s just like driving on a freeway. . . which Americans also don’t get.
3) At the end of either an escalator or a moving walkway keep moving until you are the fuck out of the way. If there are ten people behind you being propelled forward mechanically and you stop, what do you think is going to happen? How do you grow up on planet Earth and not figure this out?
4) Let’s have an international contest to choose the best form of airport signage and then require every airport to follow that model.
5) Can we cut the b.s. with early boarding for military? We are not at war and this is not 19th century Prussia.
6) All airport lounges: one set of criteria for access. Figure it out, make it so.
7) If your airplane holds 200 people, how many seats do you think you should have in boarding? Hint: it’s not 40. No, not 60, either though you’re getting warmer.
8) Don’t be an asshole who pushes carry-on beyond reasonable limits. You don’t get your space and half of mine. Less than 1% of luggage is lost even temporarily, and that’s largely down to too tight transfer times. If you’re flying you can afford an AirTag.
9) If it takes me half an hour and a dozen tries to get on to your inflight WiFi, you don’t have in-flight WiFi. Stop pretending you do.
10) And finally a question: who is buying Brooks Brothers suits at an airport?
@JohnSF:
We can’t rename it the Taco Effect. That’s already taken for something even more humiliating.
@Michael Reynolds:
2) Today someone passed me on the right, then cut across three lanes to the left to take their exit.
3) Escalators are not dangerous per se, but when something goes wrong it’s gruesome and ends in either maiming or death. IMO, if a circular wood saw can be designed to tell when a finger touches it and to stop the blade in an instant, the same could be done with escalators and moving walkways (BTW many airports are removing them, because they don’t speed up transfer times and cost money to maintain)
10) I’ve wondered the same thing when I see high end clothing stores at airports.
@Michael Reynolds:
First, please co-sign my name to ALL of this.
Second,
Someone who is on their way to an interview or important meeting and had something dumped on them, either on the plane or in transit. Also, bored people. And people who got stuck at the airport without their luggage, and people who forgot to pack something important. I’ve known people in all of those scenarios.
(Sidebar, are the clothes also duty-free, or is that just booze, makeup, and tobacco?)
@JohnSF:
Have you designed any cool patches from scratch in VCV rack?
Or are you like George Harrison was when he bought the first Moog? I read a story that at first Harrison would just spend hours un/plugging cables with no idea what any of the patch points did. It was like a pastime for him, I guess.
I recently sold my M32. For what I have been doing, it didn’t fit. I am so busy learning other hardware and increasing my knowledge of music theory, that it was unlikely that I would be able to learn it well enough to make useful.
And anything I could do without other semi-mods to patch, I could likely approximate with Moog’s Model D app. And some of the stock soft-synth plugins in the MPC hardware are actually quite good as well.
@Michael Reynolds:
I feel your pain. I live in a place where the are so many Publix locations, that every resident of any given community all shop at the same store.
It must be part of the HOA rules that they stop in the doorway to chat with each other. And for some reason, they are compelled to follow those damn rules in places that are outside the gates.
I have to suppress the urge to quote Ludacris at least six times a day.
I have a very different timeline than Hollywood does. I write something, I sell it, it comes out and it all happens, start to finish within about a year. Within 18 months I’ve already pissed the money away.
But out of nowhere I learn that a Very Big Deal producer/director is interested in a book series of mine that Hollywood has looked at repeatedly and said, ‘Nah.’ Then, literally simultaneously a producer friend of mine is rushing to create an AI pitch deck for my one and only screenplay for an A-/B+ action star who is vaguely interested. And another producer I know (dude has a very hot hand right now) has been summoned to meet with yet another producer I previously severely annoyed, about yet another book series.
If I’ve learned anything (and I think @wr will back me on this) the odds of anything actually happening are non-zero, but very close to zero. But these are three properties I’d written off as having any development potential because I have moved on. One of these properties is about 25 years old, another is 15 years old, and the other is actually only a year old, but still, all from the past.
I am not about the past, I have no nostalgia, but OTOH I do quite like money. And I have no objection to being paid for work I’ve already done. But I will not cross my fingers. I’m not Charlie Brown, I’m not going to try to kick that ball again. OK, that’s b.s., I will.
Things never seem to quite die in Hollywood. Not that they spring to life, but they’re never quite completely and absolutely, dead.
@Kurtz:
Move bitch, get out the way! Thanks for that, I just added it to my playlist.
@Michael Reynolds:
@Kathy:
Outside of airports, or at least more common outside of airports:
1) Let the people in the elevator or subway get off before you try to get in. Two bodies cannot occupy the same space at the same time, no matter how much in a hurry you are.
2) A driver is a pedestrian looking for a parking spot. Remember that when you don’t stop or slow down to let pedestrians cross the road at a crosswalk, especially when it’s raining.
3) If you see someone is coming up behind you, there’s no obligation to hold the door open. But it’s rude to close it.
4) There is far more non-doorway than doorway real estate in the world. Surely there’s a better spot to have a conversation.
5) Do not EVER obstruct access to the coffee maker.
@Kurtz:
At the moment I’m still on baby steps.
Using a combination of some videos (shout out to Omri Cohen) and working through Devarahi’s “Complete Guide” plus the old ARP sequencer patchbook, I’m starting to sort some things out.
I’m not quite as puzzled as George, because of previous experience, and perhaps a more methodical mind-set.
ocscillators > filters > amplitude > envelopes + modulators and you’re cooking. 😉
Next step is to plug them into Bitwig and sync them up and run diffrent patterns against each other, and some drum patterns in Bitwig, and to set up MIDI controllers to muck about with them in real time.
Some serious head-scratching occurs, but it’s FUN!
My main goal is sort of trying to cross-over early “Berlin School” with ambient dub/ambient techno stuff.
Also, I want to plug the guitar in! lol
Little Axe for the win!
I really wish I hadn’t lost track of a lot of friends who were into this stuff years back.
I sort of lost interest for years after my father died, becuase reasons, y’know?
More than a decade of lost time.
As to music theory: yeah.
Currently trying to wrap my head around what exactly are the scales, keys and cadences relationships.
And not even attempting counterpoint!
I have a bit of a tendency to just give up and listen to Coltrane, or Bach.
otoh, listening to Coltrane or Bach is never a bad thing.
I remember a good guitarist I knew who said: “If you can attempt to play a Coltrane sax solo on the guitar, you’re getting there.”
@JohnSF:
I mean, I know what a key is, and a conventional scale, and the circle of fifhs, and the good old Blues progression.
But the tricky part is combining that with modes.
Modes are really really puzzling me.
But they’re crucial to a lot of modern innovatory music.
Combine that with actually understanding polyrhythms and I may be getting somewhere. 🙂
Though counterpoint may have to bugger off and wait in the lobby.
@Kurtz:
I’m running purely on PC.
Becuase my current PC is a beast.
Though, had I space I’d definitely go for a Behringer based eurorack, becuase then you get to easily twiddle the knobs in real time (*ooh, er, missus*).
But there seem to be possibilities for MIDI control surfaces to do similar.
My next experiments are going to be using my Keylab to do that; but full on control is likely to need something more like a Novation Launch Control
@Michael Reynolds:
Odd thing: stand on the right, pass on the left is protocol in the London Underground also.
You might think it would be other way round, given our road rules, lol.
I recall when I lived in London, obvious Londoners cursing at out-of-towners standing on the left in the way of people in a hurry.
lol
I suspect New York may be the same; perhaps more vehemently, though?
@Kurtz:
I wouldn’t mind having a play with the Moog D but it’s Mac/iOS only.
I have an iPad, but can’t see much point using it for a Moog D if I can’t run it into my PC and its audio interface synced up, which seems to be a bit tricky.
The Birmingham Conservatoire (which is semi-attached to my workplace) has a total love affair with Max/MSP and its own Integra.
Modern classical musicains: we just have to be different. lol
Though, tbf, Integra is very good for complex live performances, as long as you can figure out what the beastie is supposed to be doing.
Most dj’s (including rather experimental ones) I’ve pointed it out to just scream and run. 😉
I don’t know. In normal times, blatantly false delusions would not serve as a basis for an investigation, much less indictment or prosecution.
These days, the fixer court would eventually rule Obama et al guiltier than guilt for reasons Roberts would pull out of his ass.
As to the patently ridiculous lawsuit against Prince Ruppert and the WSJ, I never thought I’d say this to the Prince of Darkness: I wish him good luck.
@JohnSF:
Okay, first of all, what in the holy hell is that???
But back to the D. I had the same problem. I have an iPhone, but a PC. I could use various workarounds, use GarageBand or one of the iOS multi/auto sampling apps to record every note of a patch, export, then load them onto the SD card for my MPC one+. In reality, one doesn’t even need to sample every note, because the built-in algorithm in the hardware can change the pitch quite a few intervals without changing the tempo or distortion. But it’s still a hassle.
Or get a usb hub with an 3.5mm aux jack —> 3.5mm to 6.35mm TRS y split into the MPC or non splitter into audio interface on pc. I suppose one could use a usb to aux, but I question whether the signal degrades too much.
Instead, I used the proceeds from selling the M32 on an SP-404 mkii. Some people may argue it is redundant with the MPC, as they are both samplers. But the MPC can do end-to-end workflow. The SP can’t and has a pretty poor sequencer. On the upside, it has its own signature FX—even the ones that overlap with the ones available on MPC are different enough. And can mangle samples in unique ways as well. And out of the box, the SP can run on batteries.
But the key is that I can plug my phone into the SP with USB-C and sample anything into it, or use it as a pass through to directly sample into the big boy. That includes any iOS softsynths, iTunes, Apple Music. Whatever. It also handles a microphone or guitar seamlessly.
@Kathy:..5)…
The Panera I frequent has an island not far from the cash registers that is home to 4 coffee tanks (Dark Roast Light Roast Decaf and Hazelnut) and a tank of hot water for tea. Don’t know how many times that I have procured my coffee cup at the cash register, turned around only to see people leaning against the island with their backs to the tanks.
I am not polite about it at all: “You’re blocking the coffee!”
As startled as they often react it is clear that they don’t realize the serious violation they have committed.
@Kurtz:
You mean Integra?
lol
It’s a mind bender.
But our Conservatoire folks have used it for live multimedia performances, and it works.
If you like “modernist classical academic multimedia” stuff, at any rate.
ymmv
Mine certainly does. Not really my thing. I love our cuddly little modern composition students, but they do tend to value theory over tune.
Or perhaps, rather, their tutors do?
My issue with the Moog D on iOS would be, if you can’t use it real time with the other stuff on the PC, it’s fun, but …
What is interesting me is a either an Ableton Push, with scripts for Bitwig, or the Novation Launch Control.
Real time control of virtualised analog sequencers, plus clip launching.
I’ve seen some interesting stuff done similarly with Ableton Live, but for some reason I prefer Bitwig to Live.
Perhaps because its closer to my old love, Cakewalk Project5? lol
The ideal would be a full on analog eurorack, but I just don’t have the space, or the money.
So I default to just PC DAW and virtual stuff, plus a rather basic audio interface: mic and line and MIDI inputs, and that’s it.
The Conservatoire has some kit that makes my fingers itch, but I don’t have the fiddling-about rights, not being on that side of the institution.
@Gregory Lawrence Brown:
Such people deserve the full Capt. Sisko treatment (poor quality video, but it gets the point across)
Unfortunately applying it to anyone not Klingon would result in an assault conviction.
@JohnSF:
Yeah, I work mostly with samples outside of noodling in the guitar. But I also didn’t like working within a DAW exclusively. Even with a midi keyboard. I much prefer the tactile feel of the pads.
Although, with a midi host, You could probably use something like the ableton push to trigger whatever you want on your iPad.
Just a thought. There is a good subreddit for iPad music producers. You can probably find whatever info there.
@JohnSF: “I suspect New York may be the same; perhaps more vehemently, though?”
In terms of people walking far too slowly or stopping in the middle of a sidewalk to answer a text or walking with their entire family/group spread out to take up every inch of sidewalk or simply stopping dead as they notice that, hey, they got some real big buildings here, Marge, yeah, we’re the same.
But as for the locals cursing at them, shockingly no. The vibe here is entirely different. We just walk around them or ignore them to the greatest extent possible. It’s like New Yorkers simply refuse to acknowledge their existence…
@JohnSF:
What are the specs of your pc?
@Kurtz:
Windows 11 Pro
(with a Linux virtual machine for the lols)
Z790-P motherboard
Intel i7-13700KF 3.4 Ghz processor
32 GB RAM
3 x 2 TB SSD
8 TB hard disk
NVIDIA GeForce TRX 4070 graphic card
Arturia Minifuse2 USB audio interface.
Not exactly top of the line, but still pretty effective. 🙂
I also have a older, but still fairly capable, PC running Windows 7, because reasons. 😉