Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The arc of the moral universe doesn’t bend itself. it’s up to us.

The US Supreme Court is on the ballot in november.

People are weird.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Every day Vance writes another chapter in the book called “Worst VP Pick Ever”.

T R E 4 5 O N

It’s not hopeless, and we’re not helpless.

Republicans firmly believe having an abortion is a very personal, very private decision between a woman and J.D. Vance.

Wake up. Grow up. Get in the fight.

“woke” is the new caravan.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

Bark louder, little dog.

There are a lot more evil idiots than evil geniuses.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

The fight for our country is always worth it. ~Kamala Harris

with the Kraken taking a plea, the Cheese stands alone.

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you don’t.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

I am pretty sure Katy Tur wasn’t always such a bootlicking sycophant.

Meanwhile over at truth Social, the former president is busy confessing to crimes.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Late Night Open Thread: *Near-Infinite* Mass!

Late Night Open Thread: *Near-Infinite* Mass!

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Katie Mack, ‘connoisseur of cosmic catastrophes’…

Everybody’s a critic!

… Musk is inextricably tied to Tesla’s past, present and future. Those with a financial stake in Tesla—those who trust in Musk because he has delivered value in the past—are increasingly and vocally fed up, begging the CEO to turn his attention to the car company whose stock price remains his primary source of wealth. 

“It’s losers across the board,” Dan Ives, a tech analyst at Wedbush Securities, told The Verge last week. While Ives remains optimistic about Tesla’s stock price long-term, he has emerged as a vocal critic of the Twitter deal…

Realistically, Tesla is in the middle of a rough moment. For now, it’s just a moment. But other car companies, not Twitter, will bring Tesla its biggest headaches in 2023.

For the first time, Tesla faces real competition. Volkswagen, Hyundai, Kia, Mercedes-Benz and almost every legacy company in between are gunning for would-be Tesla buyers. And Musk’s Extremely Online antics seem poised to send customers into the arms of competitors whose chief executives aren’t as eager to air grievances about people’s pronouns on social media… 

Reader Interactions

121Comments

  1. 1.

    MattF

    Towing a super-whooper-duper massive black hole, I suppose. But to where?

    ETA: I’m going back to bed.

  2. 2.

    Calouste

    Ford has already sold all the electric trucks they can produce in 2023. If the Vaportruck ever comes to market, most people who are interested in an electric truck will already own one, except for some Tesla fanboys.

  3. 3.

    Michael Bersin

    President Joe Biden’s trip to the border has apparently set off right wingnuts in Congress. The social media accounts of some House members-elect are all atwitter, apparently posted to between/during ballots.

    Jason Smith (r), from Missouri’s 8th Congressional District – one of the poorest in the nation:

    Doing nothing much on a Thursday evening

    Because priorities.

  4. 4.

    NotMax

    Not a bad read.

    …the thing I can’t stop thinking about is that all this could have been achieved with relative privacy. That’s been his way up until now, anyway; Musk has a long, long record of being a terrible employer, but you might not have heard much about it until recently. Because now, Musk wants attention. He has rebranded as an extremely public troll. That is noteworthy.
    [snip]
    My colleague Laura Miller argued that there is one simple way to handle all of this: Musk ought to be ignored on the grounds that Twitter is—despite its outsize influence in media and some other areas—so niche in the large scheme of things that owning it amounts to becoming the king of, say, Luxembourg. Source

    Last time I checked, Twitter when purchased was the #14 social media service globally. Doubtless has slipped several notches downward more since.

  5. 5.

    eclare

    @Calouste:   I worked in an office with a bunch of guys when Ford unveiled its electric truck.  These guys were definitely the target market (lots of hunters, lots of tailgaters) and they were all drooling over it and everything it could power.

  8. 8.

    Amir Khalid

    How do you fix a dent in a stainless steel body? Do you have to change out an entire body panel?

  13. 13.

    DMcK

    “Cybertruck” sounds like a failed TV pilot circa 1992, so at least its design aesthetic is spot-on.

  14. 14.

    Betty Cracker

    Speaking of eccentric people, Rep. Clay Higgins, R-Louisiana 3rd, who may actually use the Cloak Room to store his cloak, produced a tweet about the ongoing House drama a couple of days ago:

    I suspect, to my horror, that there may well be some Frankenstein coalition created from this impasse, an abhorrent manifestation of House rule that America has never witnessed and the American people have never authorized.

    Well then!

    Can’t say I disagree with the sentiment, though in practice I suspect Higgins and I would not attach the “abhorrent” label to the same manifestations.  Anyhoo, The Defector crew had fun reading the quote in Benoit Blanc-style Southern accents here.

  16. 16.

    sab

    @Betty Cracker: That sounds like how Ohio choses its House Speaker. The Republicans decide on a prospective Speaker but don’t have quite enough votes, so a rival goes to the Democrats and agrees to not be a complete asshole ( i.e. no Hastert Rule.) That’s how we got Householder last time, and how we got the new guy (Stephens) with 1/3 of the Republican vote and all of the Democrats.

  18. 18.

    oldster

    People have wondered whether some of tfg’s spelling and grammar errors were intentional bait for elite scorn. This feels similar: “maybe we can get people talking about our product launch if we say something so stupid that it’s hard not to point and laugh.”

  20. 20.

    p.a.

    Weren’t DeLoreans stainless?  Were any jackals owners?  Are any jackals willing to admit being owners?

     

    I’ve done some VERY BASIC research on all-elec vehicles in cold climates, and battery life decreases by at least 10%, prolly more because heating the vehicle is energy hungry.  Also AWD/ 4WD can be an issue: you can spin wheels (with caution) with a gas engine in traction-bad terrain and not do damage, regaining traction, but IIRC the article said electric-drive is designed to shut down in these circumsrances: elec motors will burn out from excess spin.

    (From what I could see the articles I read were car & engineering sites, not overtly pro-fossil fuel ideologues.)

  21. 21.

    oldster

    @Baud:

    Agreed, when selling to an ordinary market. But tesla-bros long ago revealed that they don’t mind being lied to forever. They’ve been buying vaporware off this guy for many years, and still raving about how good it will be someday.

    But, yeah — for the rest of the world this thing is going to flop, big.

  22. 22.

    lowtechcyclist

    “The ability to pull near infinite mass,” huh?

    I guess that would be handy if you’re planning on towing a load while driving the Cybertruck at velocities approaching light speed.

  23. 23.

    Baud

    @oldster:

    Huh? I thought Tesla’s were mostly bought by liberals before they realized what a douche Musk was.  Are bros a big enough market to sustain the company?

  24. 24.

    Robert Sneddon

    @p.a.: Electric motors provide full torque at zero revs, pretty much. Electric cars don’t need to spin the wheels to gain traction whereas an internal combustion engine has to be running at a significant speed to operate at all. It’s why electric cars are the tops in terms of road acceleration compared to their captive-cannonball-engined predecessors.

  26. 26.

    Gregory

    That thing is the ugliest car I’ve ever seen.  It looks like a cheap special effect from an old episode of Doctor Who.  At least then the cheap effects were part of the charm; this thing has none.

  28. 28.

    Shalimar

    @Baud: Yes, bros are a big enough market to sustain Tesla.   Not by themselves, but they are basically the free marketing arm of the company.  And they are mostly libertarian assholes, which means Musk’s shift into “free speech” conservatism gives them a whole new group of potential customers to market to, people who are easier for them to connect with.

    Will that be enough to continue growing at the pace Tesla has been growing the last couple years?  I doubt it.  I suspect sales will actually go down this year as most of their sales backlog has evaporated.  But the company should at least survive.

  29. 29.

    lowtechcyclist

    It’s January 6th.

    This morning two years ago, I was elated over the results from Georgia.

    And as I told my wife early that morning, I wasn’t worried about the protests that were going to happen at the Capitol, because I fully expected a force like this on hand to be waiting for them when they showed up.

    Like I’ve said, my predictometer has been busted ever since 2016. But it still boggles my mind how thinly the Capitol was protected that day.

  30. 30.

    Ivan X

    @p.a.: Yep, my dad had one. I was 12, so I thought it was pretty badass. And yes, stainless steel, though some models were also painted.

  33. 33.

    SFAW

    @DMcK: ​
     

    “Cybertruck” sounds like a failed TV pilot circa 1992, so at least its design aesthetic is spot-on.

    William Daniels is still alive (albeit 95, bless him), maybe he can do the voice?

  34. 34.

    Betty Cracker

    @Shalimar: I’ve never seen any relevant marketing research, but if I had to hazard a guess, I’d say the tech bro-libertarian segment is too niche to sustain a car brand long term. Anecdotally, the Tesla drivers I know are all affluent, environmentally conscious liberals. I don’t imagine they’re happy about their status symbol vehicle now being associated with a reactionary douchebag.

  35. 35.

    Gvg

    @p.a.: All Subarus are 4wheel drive and don’t have problems. Other 4 wheels are less reliable but Subaru apparently figured out some better engineering. Eventually the others will too. I am pretty sure electric can deal with 4 wheel, partly because of luck of timing.

    Heat and cold loss need better insulation on the vehicles. Old style engines produced heat as a byproduct so they always found heaters to be easier and new electric will have to figure something new. Cooling should be about the same and better efficiency and insulation is desirable for both kinds of cars. Really cars are still not very efficient on heat or cooling compared to say houses. Glass and metal don’t hold in heat or air conditioning.

  36. 36.

    SFAW

    As p.a. has noted, DeLoreans were also stainless. So is Melon Husk aiming for the time-travel market? I guess having the ability to pull “infinite mass” gets it part-way there.

    And remember, you can’t spel “John Skum DeLorean” without “Elon Musk.”

  37. 37.

    SFAW

    @Gvg:

    All Subarus are 4wheel drive

    Isn’t it all-wheel drive? There is a difference, although I’m not able to explain what it is.

  39. 39.

    M31

    @Gregory: It looks like a cheap special effect from an old episode of Doctor Who.

    swipe the center console, navigate down a few menus and select the 3rd option, agree to the EULA terms and the $499.99 fee, and a toilet plunger and a kitchen whisk pop out the front and a voice shouts “EXTERMINATE” over and over

  40. 40.

    Matt McIrvin

    @SFAW: It’s a silly terminological difference, but I think “4WD” usually refers to systems that are heavier-duty and more manually controlled, and sometimes it’s possible to lock the differentials, which helps get through really soft material. “AWD” systems are more like automatic traction control extended to all four wheels, in which power gets shifted to them as needed according to an automated gadget.

  43. 43.

    Shalimar

    @Betty Cracker: I don’t think the bros are big enough by themselves, nor do i think the vast majority of them have the resources to lease or buy a Tesla.  What I am assuming is they have enough contacts with affluent conservative friends and family to make Musk cool to those people.  Not nearly enough people to offset the markets Musk has alienated.  Their long-term growth is dead now.  But enough new sales to sustain the company.

  44. 44.

    Chris Johnson

    @Robert Sneddon: This, beat me to it.

    All electric vehicles will pull near-infinite mass because they can deliver torque at zero RPM. He never said this pulling would DO anything, but the truck will legit be pulling as hard as it can. Thing is, so will the electric F-150 and everything else in the category.

  45. 45.

    Buskertype

    Has anybody pointed out that an ant is just as near to infinite mass as a loaded freight train? Wtf is “near infinite” anything?

  46. 46.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    The ability to pull near infinite mass and towing capability of 14,000 pounds,,,

    Apparently Musk has mastered Trump’s ability to contradict himself in the same sentence.

    I also find it interesting that the Cyber Truck (coming soon from Tesla) is shown towing a Cyber Trailer (also coming soon from Tesla) and not something a normal person would tow with their truck, like a boat.  Want to bet it ends up the Cyber Truck can only tow Tesla made trailers, for reasons.

  48. 48.

    Jay

    @p.a.:

    the “traction control” in your modern AWD/4WD, has sensors that detect wheel slip. the onboard computer then slightly engages the brake on the slipping wheel, which because of the nature of an “open” differential, retards the wheel, sending greater torque to the wheel that has traction.

    In electric vehicles, hub drive or central drive, this is even easier to copy.

    AWD is all wheel drive, (all wheels are “driven” at all times),

    4WD allows the driver the option of 2 wheel drive, ( rear) or all 4 wheels drive, with a 4LOW option to increase torque when 4WD is engaged.

    With out traction control, torque transfer devices like lockers or limited slip clutches, on a 4WD vehicle, one wheel slipping on a differential path, causes all “power” to go to the spinning wheel, negating that “axel”. So, in 4WD, if one wheel is spinning at the front, and one at the rear, you arn’t going anywhere. With AWD, if one wheel is spinning, you arn’t going anywhere.

    The simple fix’s are to have limited slip differentials, a central limited slip in the transmission, or Automatic Traction Control, which most modern 4WD/AWD have.

  50. 50.

    Gin & Tonic

    In a waiting room, where the CNN chyron says “chaos intensifies as US government frozen without a speaker.” I was unaware that the executive branch couldn’t function without a speaker of the house. Learn something new every day.

  54. 54.

    kalakal

    The ability to pull near infinite mass

    And it can do it perpetually!

    Drivel can neither be created nor destroyed, only transformed from one form of drivel into another

  55. 55.

    Jay

    Trucks are one of the markets where “brand loyalty” is rather intense. Tesla cars will not have made any impact, ( and in some cases, had a negative effect) on many truck owners “brand loyalty”.

    The logical entry point for a non-truck maker, to enter the truck market, would be “fleet service/commercial”, not vanity projects where the entire vehicle is the equivalent of “truck balls”.

  56. 56.

    Geminid

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: It looks scary, which may be part of its attraction. I don’t expect to see many on the road though, and I’ll be very surprised if I ever see one towing anything.

    As others have pointed out, these trucks look like the old El Caminos, and they never really caught on.

    I guess Tesla will be in business 10 years from now, but I sometimes wonder if they’ll fade away like the BlackBerry phone instead.

  57. 57.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    In other news, Conservative activist is accused of same sex rape of a Congressional Staffer

    EXCLUSIVE: A staffer for Herschel Walker’s Senate campaign has alleged to The Daily Beast that longtime Republican activist Matt Schlapp made “sustained and unwanted and unsolicited” sexual contact with him while driving Schlapp back from a bar in October.

    The only thing surprising about this is the guy Schlapp was forcing himself on wasn’t underage.  But otherwise this is totally predictable the way the Right goes on about how all gays are sexual predators.

  60. 60.

    jonas

    @Michael Bersin: A Fox News article in my feed this morning was breathlessly reporting how in his immigration speech, Biden was acting all senile, stumbling over words, mislabeling government agencies, etc.

    In response to a reporter’s question, he called the CBP “Customs and Border Patrol” instead of its new name (which no-one else knows, either), Customs and Border *Protection*. Ok, whatever grandpa!

    Seriously, that was it. He said Border Patrol instead of Protection, so he’s clearly in the advanced throes of dementia. What clowns.

  61. 61.

    Baud

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: This is the problem.

    1. A large number of conservative men are sexual predators.
    2. Conservative dogma says that liberals are morally worse than conservatives.
    3. Therefore, conservatives believe that their lies about liberal “groomers” and other sexual predators must be true.
  63. 63.

    jonas

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques: ​
      Yeah, but I’m sure Schlapp considers himself a Roy Cohn-style gay*, which is to say he has sex with men, but isn’t some filthy homosexual.

    *I’m thinking of Cohn’s (Al Pacino) bitter exchange with his doctor, played by James Cromwell, in the film version of Angels in America.

  65. 65.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @jonas: his wife is a notorious gay basher.  So my prediction this will be dismissed as a youthful indiscretion.

  66. 66.

    sdhays

    @lowtechcyclist: Same. There were reports of the DC police arresting someone with guns trying to come into DC in the days before January 6, 2021, which I assumed would trigger extra security plans. Nope.

  67. 67.

    Other MJS

    Um, does the vehicle he’s posing with have a couple of bullet holes in the windows? Maybe its a reflection of something, but I can’t imagine what.

  69. 69.

    Soprano2

    @Gin & Tonic: I was thinking about that. We can still confirm judges and executive branch appointees, and the president can still do things. The only thing we need the House for is to pass actual laws, and it’ll be awhile before they’re doing that. All this does is reduce the number of days they can try to impeach Biden, hold hearings about Hunter Biden, and yell at Dr. Fauci that he deliberately unleashed Covid on the world for some unknown reason.

  72. 72.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    But otherwise this is totally predictable the way the Right goes on about how all gays are sexual predators.

    Because all of their gays are sexual predators.

    So are all of their straight men.  Most notably a certain orange dude.

  74. 74.

    lowtechcyclist

    @Geo Wilcox:

    Feature not a bug, The thinness of the policing was done on purpose. Anyone could see that if they looked hard enough, specially in hindsight.

    In which case the people who ensured that the Capitol would be way underprotected were part of a conspiracy to overthrow the government, and should be indicted and prosecuted.

  75. 75.

    Betty Cracker

    @Soprano2: No matter who becomes speaker, I don’t see how these clowns don’t tank the global economy when the debt ceiling issue comes up next time. Not sure when that will be.

  76. 76.

    Matt McIrvin

    @jonas: The only reason I know that is that I’ve had occasion to go through customs recently, which I don’t suppose the President has to do.

    But interpreting Biden’s long-running stuttering issues as dementia is a common right-wing tactic and it sounds like this is mostly that.

  77. 77.

    bbleh

    “It’s losers across the board”

    I swear to dog when I first saw that I thought he was talking about the customer base.

  79. 79.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Buskertype: Treating big quantities as if they were infinite (which can simplify some mathematical expressions) is a common approximation technique in physics, but you can’t do it unless you know what the scales of interest are. “Nearly infinite” would just mean “very big” but the obvious question is “very big compared to what?”

  80. 80.

    Soprano2

    @Betty Cracker: I am worried about that. What kind of idiots demand that you agree to say that the U.S. won’t pay its bills as a condition of them voting for you? Yet that’s what these crazies are demanding.

    It drives me crazy that the press is calling these 20 people “conservatives”. They are not “conservatives”, they’re radical crazy people.

  81. 81.

    Geminid

    @Betty Cracker: From what I’ve read, the debt ceiling question will become acute towards the end of summer.

    As for how the radicals in the Republican caucus don’t tank the economy, one possibility is that this will be resolved by enough Republicans defecting from their caucus to reorganize the House, either under a Democratic Speaker or a under a former Republican member like Tom Reed (NY) or Charlie Dent (PA).

    The latter would be a sort of caretaker speakership that would enable critical legislation to pass with votes from Democrats and a small group of “Independent Republicans.” That would salvage this Congress and mitigate damage until Democrats enter 2025 with what I believe will be a 15 to 35 seat majority in the next Congress.

  82. 82.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Soprano2: These twenty are media personalities like Trump, the only thing they give a shit about is hogging the camera for as long as possible.

    That’s the reason why Gaetz swore to resign from Congress if there is a deal cut between the Republicans and Dems to get a speaker, he knows he will permanently bypassed and that’s bad for his brand.

  83. 83.

    Michael Bersin

    In Missouri this morning Lucas Kunce (D), a primary candidate in the 2022 open seat Senate race, has released a video announcing that he’s running in 2024 for the seat currently occupied by Josh Hawley (r). After his unsuccesful primary run, he spent time campaigning for Democratic Party candidates across the state, including for Trudy Busch Valentine.

    The announcement video effectively targets Josh Hawly (r-The Third Senator from Virginia).

    Lucas Kunce (D) is running for the U.S. Senate in 2024

  85. 85.

    Geminid

    @Michael Bersin: I thought Lucas Kuntz was a dynamic candidate with a lot of potential. He is certainly a hard worker. Missouri is a steep hill to climb for a Democrat but Kunce could give Hawley a run for his money.

    Kunce was featured in a long Politico Magazine article last November. The reporter was a Missourian, and they provided a good review of the course of Missouri politics since the 1970s. Those interested can easily find this article, I think.

  86. 86.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Geminid: There is also the possibility that the House will reorganize as various GOP members are indicted.

    ETA: Um, I meant to say “decide to spend more time with their families.”

  87. 87.

    Betty Cracker

    @Soprano2: You are right; they are radical nutjobs, but the weird thing is the opposition to McCarthy doesn’t break down along radical nutjob lines since barking mad people like MTG and Jordan are among the McCarthy backers. I don’t think McCarthy would shrink from devaluing the dollar and plunging the world into an economic crisis either. They’re all nuts as far as I can tell.

    @Geminid: Do you think there are a sufficient number of sane GOP House members to make something like that happen?

  88. 88.

    Ella in New Mexico

    Looking at this fucking monstrosity it has absolutely NO appeal whatsoever to people who really use these things in the natural world.  No, not now, not ever even if you gave it to me. it’s a toy for rich people, a trinket, an anomaly.

    We rough camp in the boonies during the summer all over in NM and Southern Colorado mountains.  For going on 35 years we’ve almost always done it without trailers or campers (rented a pop up a few times when the 4 kids were little) and managing to pack everything in whatever vehicle we’ve owned to do it, from a 1968 Volvo station wagon to our current 2017 Honda Ridgeline .Over time “everything” has gotten to be a ton of bulky stuff like tables, tents, chairs, coolers and dry goods in bear proof boxes that takes 2 hours to efficiently pack and about that long to unpack–backbreaking at worst, petty marital argument-inciting at best. :-D Plus there’s less and less room for the pets in the cabin which is pretty big, but we need every square inch for a week long camping trip.

    But now that we’re older, it’d be nice to have something ready to go so we’re considering towing a lightweight that is a little easier to pack, set up etc. and will definitely need a decent 4WD truck/vehicle to do it. Even so, NONE of them so far can go long enough between charges–especially towing a load and definitely not in the literal wilderness.  An electric vehicle  in the future may be an option, but not until there are charging stations within driving range of the wilderness or until batteries self charge enough we can to more than 300 miles pulling a heavy load.

  89. 89.

    prostratedragon

    Alas, poor Emu! I knew him, Horatio; a fellow of infinite mass, of most arrant fancy; he hath borne me on his back a thousand times; and now, how abhorred in my imagination it is!

  90. 90.

    Geminid

    @Omnes Omnibus: Yes, attrition in Republican ranks could change things (but probably not in time to resolve the debt issue this summer).

    Indictments won’t neccesarily do it though. I don’t expect anyone will resign their seat until convicted, if then. Expulsion is a possibility but would not be certain, especially if the Republican in question represents a district where a Democrat might win a special election. George Santos may provide the first test of this scenario..

  93. 93.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Betty Cracker: Like I said, the small contingent of nutjobs opposing McCarthy CANNOT tank the economy through the debt ceiling by themselves. The rest of the Republicans have to effectively cooperate with them to do it.

    The Republican caucus should not be allowed to get away with blaming such a catastrophe on anyone else. They especially should not be allowed to get away with blaming in on Democrats. “Ooh, they wouldn’t accept our ‘make Donald Trump King’ rider, it’s on them.”

    If I’m Joe Biden or Hakeem Jeffries, I’m already thinking about this and how I will play it. A lot.

    The thing is, I’m sure they are.

  94. 94.

    Baud

    @Matt McIrvin:

    Whether they get away with it is beyond our control.  What we can control is whether tolerate people supposedly on our side who blame Democrats for Republican actions.

  95. 95.

    Frankensteinbeck

    The cybertruck is one of Musk’s narcissistic fantasies that he can make science fiction reality.  Its resemblance to a Delorean is probably deliberate (Back To The Future).  Since that makes it a project he’s closely involved with, every aspect is a shit show.  The name, the poorly thought out design, the fact it doesn’t do the things it’s meant to do…

    Tech CEOs who think they can make their favorite movies real by snapping their fingers because no one can tell them No is a whole thing right now.  Amazon’s robot buddy, Meta, all the cool kids are failing it.

    @lowtechcyclist:

    it still boggles my mind how thinly the Capitol was protected that day.

    That fact is and has been the key to the entire event.  The mob broke in because they thought the keys had been handed to them.  They’re too fucking chickenshit to fight unless they feel they face no risk and no consequences, which has been a theme in their shock that they’re being prosecuted.  So… did the committee find out why the Capitol was under protected?

    @Baud:

    1. A large number of conservative men are sexual predators.

    Conservative thinking consistently takes it as assumed that men are sexual predators.  It’s everywhere.  It’s a major confession of who they are.

    @Betty Cracker:

    I don’t see how these clowns don’t tank the global economy when the debt ceiling issue comes up next time.

    I don’t see how they stop the debt ceiling from being raised.  More than enough Rs will vote with the Dems to raise it.  No vote would have to be written into the rules, and I don’t see how they get that.  The non-tantrum caucus has already said they don’t plan on voting for some of the most extreme shit the tantrum crew are demanding.  McCarthy can promise whatever he likes.  The Speaker doesn’t set the rules.  It has to actually be voted on.

  96. 96.

    gene108

    @Betty Cracker:

    You are right; they are radical nutjobs, but the weird thing is the opposition to McCarthy doesn’t break down along radical nutjob lines since barking mad people like MTG and Jordan are among the McCarthy backers. I don’t think McCarthy would shrink from devaluing the dollar and plunging the world into an economic crisis either. They’re all nuts as far as I can tell.

    I think the dividing line is whether or not they’d be willing to allow a floor vote on raising the debt ceiling or not, if all their demands are not went.

    The 20 seem to not want to vote on raising the debt ceiling, if all their demands aren’t met. The rest of the 200 seem to be okay with how they got by in the past, with the debt ceiling getting a floor vote, and passing with Democratic votes and a small minority of Republican votes.

  97. 97.

    Montanareddog

    @Soprano2:

     

    It drives me crazy that the press is calling these 20 people “conservatives”. They are not “conservatives”, they’re radical crazy people.

    There was some tweet or quote in an earlier thread where aone of these nutbars claimed to be against “status quo conservatism”.

    Isn’t status quo conservatism a tautology? And if you are agin it, then you cannot be a conservative, by definition. They are, indeed, radical nihilists, not conservatives at all.

  98. 98.

    Tony Gerace

    “Near infinite mass”. This is Elon effectively telling his potential customers that they would be idiots for buying his truck. A significant number of idiots will buy the thing anyway.

  99. 99.

    Betty Cracker

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    More than enough Rs will vote with the Dems to raise it.

    I hope you’re right.

    @gene108: It’s not clear to me that willingness to default on the national debt is the line of demarcation here. The demands are all over the place, and from quotes I’ve seen from some of the nutjobs, they don’t even understand what’s at stake.

  100. 100.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Frankensteinbeck: My theory, which is mine, about SpaceX is that Starship is the “Elon Musk’s absurd play toy” program to keep him from meddling with Falcon/Dragon.

    Which, if true, is a bit problematic where it intersects with the government’s Artemis project.

  101. 101.

    Geminid

    @Omnes Omnibus:

     

    @Betty Cracker: I can count three right now: Bacon (NE), Valadeo (CA), and Newhouse (WA). Bacon’s ready to retire (he already retired once ten years ago, as an Air Force general). Valadeo and Newhouse already won reelection despite voting for impeachment. They are in jungle primary states and running as independents next cycle would not hurt them and could actually help.

    For the others, I would look at the rest of the twenty Republicans who broke ranks in the last Congress and voted for the Infrastucture and CHIPS+ Bills, especially the older ones who may plan to retire. The dynamic around the debt ceiling issue would be similar to that around those two bills, but more intense.

  102. 102.

    Another Scott

    @p.a.: Batteries are (reversible) chemistry – chemical reactions slow down as the temperature drops.  That the main reason why range is (substantially) less in the cold.

    Of course, batteries don’t like excessive heat either…

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  103. 103.

    Geminid

    @Ella in New Mexico: I think hybrids vehicles are a good alternative to EV’s. Toyota seems to be emphasizing them in their prospective product line and they’ll be offered by other auto makers for the next ten years at least.

  104. 104.

    Another Scott

    The ad text has no hyphen, so they have an out.

    It’s an eats shoots and leaves example….

    “We didn’t say you could move an infinite mass, silly, we said it could pull nearby…”

    (groucho-roll-eyes.gif)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  105. 105.

    StringOnAStick

    @p.a.: A guy who graduated from my major a year before I did bought a Delorean and paid me to do a photo shoot showing how cool he and his car were.  It was kind of pathetic; he lived with his parents in their out of business old hotel and he had a definite heavy overcompensation vibe going.  Then 6 months later the oil and gas industry he worked in collapsed, as did the local economy (anyone remember the oil shale boom and bust in western Colorado?).  I graduated into a local economy so busted that I couldn’t even get a job busing tables.  I think he would have been better off saving with his first job since college instead of buying a novelty car, but his ego and beaten down teen years demanded it I guess.

  106. 106.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Geminid: I thought about getting an EV when my beloved Honda Fit finally crapped out, but the practical obstacles in my case meant I went with a Hyundai Sonata hybrid instead. So far it’s been a great choice–I lost it for half a year because it got rear-ended by an F-150 and the supply chain was too b0rked to get it the needed replacement parts, but that’s not its fault.

    But I do notice that the fuel economy varies tremendously with weather, as one would expect from a partially electric vehicle that has been somewhat optimized for efficiency: it gets around 50 MPG in the warm months, but that can go down to around 40 when it’s cold, and there’s also a noticeable hit from running the A/C in extreme heat waves.

    It is not a plug-in hybrid; functionally it’s an entirely gasoline-powered car, just a relatively efficient one. I get the impression that plug-ins are designed differently inside, with a powertrain that is closer to an actual EV, bigger batteries and motors and such.

    I could have gotten better fuel efficiency than that just by buying a smaller car, like the hybrid Corolla I nearly bought (someone else snapped up the last one on the lot before I made my move). The Sonata is actually on the large end of the range I’d consider owning, and the length of the car makes it harder to maneuver in tight spaces than I was used to. But I have a teenage kid and legroom in the back is a good thing–my wife has a small car so I figured I’d get the family road-trip cruiser.

  107. 107.

    StringOnAStick

    @Betty Cracker: We have friends who are in that position, and being a gay couple with a Tesla is really irritating them right now.  The damned thing is pretty new so selling it into a declining used market is going to sting but I bet they do it as soon as they find a replacement EV.

  109. 109.

    SFAW

    @Geminid: ​
     

    but Kunce could give Hawley a run for his money.

    That’ll be tough — Hawley’s been running (away) since 1/6/21, so he has a two-year head start.

  110. 110.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Gvg: Most modern EVs have a heat pump in them for heating the cabin. That’s certainly far more efficient than just using a coil like an electric space heater.

    I’m pretty sure most hybrids don’t–I guess the calculation is that the ICE is going to kick in sooner or later and you’ll have some of that copious waste heat to use, if not as much as in a conventional powertrain. Mine can be pretty chilly inside when you first start it up. It’s got electric seat heaters in front, which are a nice extravagance.

  111. 111.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Jay: Tesla has a semi truck design that it trumpeted a while back. And got a lot of flak from knowledgeable people because, as a commercial semi design, it apparently sucks as much as the Cybertruck.

  114. 114.

    Paul in KY

    @Shalimar: I think he’s trying to capture the ‘MAGA Market’. He feels he’s exhausted the libs, so lets move to a new demographic.

  118. 118.

    Paul in KY

    @Geminid: The ‘truck’ has to have the bed disassociated from the rest of it, else it is a fake truck, ala that Nissan thing and the El Camino.

  121. 121.

    SteverinoCT

    @Matt McIrvin:

    But I do notice that the fuel economy varies tremendously with weather, as one would expect from a partially electric vehicle that has been somewhat optimized for efficiency: it gets around 50 MPG in the warm months, but that can go down to around 40 when it’s cold, and there’s also a noticeable hit from running the A/C in extreme heat waves.

    You’re going to see a noticeable variation just due to the different summer/winter gasoline formulations. My Civic’s highway mileage goes from 45 to 38 -ish in the winter (1.5l turbo). A/C used to be an issue, but these days at highway speeds it’s supposedly more efficient to run the air than to disrupt the aerodynamics by opening windows.

    I still remember helping a friend replace his Corvette’s compressor; he got the used part from a Chevette. Man, that little car must have come to a halt whenever the compressor kicked in.

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