Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

They don’t have outfits that big. nor codpieces that small.

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

It’s a good piece. click on over. but then come back!!

Since we are repeating ourselves, let me just say fuck that.

We’re watching the self-immolation of the leading world power on a level unprecedented in human history.

I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.

Republicans don’t lie to be believed, they lie to be repeated.

Consistently wrong since 2002

They think we are photo bombing their nice little lives.

People are weird.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

“But what about the lurkers?”

Good lord, these people are nuts.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Our messy unity will be our strength.

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War for Ukraine Day 1,082: More Drone Swarms Over Northern Ukraine

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Painting by NEIVANMADE. It has a white background an in the center are Soldiers in green doing air defense by firing at incoming Russian missiles in the upper right. The missiles are red and yellow. In the upper left, written in green, is the text: "SAVE THE BRAVEST PEOPLE IN THE WORLD!" Below the Soldiers, also written in green, is "SUPPORT FOR KHARKIV"

(Image by NEIVANMADE)

At 9:55 PM EST/4:55 AM local time in Ukraine all of north central and southeastern Ukraine are under air raid alerts. Drone swarm alerts are up for the north central oblasts.

From an hour ago:

Russian planes are in the air and likely on their way to bomb Ukraine‼️
Yet another sleepless night ahead waiting for the missiles and hoping for the best.

— Kate from Kharkiv (@kateinkharkiv.bsky.social) February 10, 2025 at 8:38 PM

As of 10:20 PM EST/5:20 AM local time in Ukraine all of eastern and central Ukraine is now under air raid alert as Russia once again increases its attack tempo just before dawn.

Here is President Zelenskyy’s address from earlier today. Video below, English transcript after the jump.

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Monday Evening Open Thread: Counterargument – Don’t Panic, Yet

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This isn’t timidity. This is Schumer focusing all the blame on Repubs when it happens.

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— Dana Houle (@danahoule.bsky.social) February 10, 2025 at 1:35 PM

Because somebody has to defend our team: Yes, it would be much more satisfactory if Chuck Schumer was standing in front of the Washington Monument with a tiki torch and a mob of angry college kids, but would it be more effective? A dispiriting percentage of our fellow Voter-Americans are only vaguely aware (if at all) that President Trump has made Elon Musk his Grand Vizier (or vice versa), ergo for them, Bipartisanship is still the best & highest goal. Dems vs Repubs, Eagles vs Chief, it’s all a good old-fashioned All-American game, amiright, gang? But when the gubmint checks don’t show up, or the only hospital within an hour’s drive shuts down… that’s when we have the mules’ attention.

Everybody needs to take their xanax and understand that the Democrats are not going to say "We want to shut down the government to stick it to the president" in any interview they give for the next two years. They're going to say they want to be bipartisan and centrist, as they should.

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— Damned Robot (@supremerobo.bsky.social) February 10, 2025 at 1:41 PM

No, I am not saying they should be bipartisan and centrist. I am saying they should be ruthlessly partisan and say publicly that they're bipartisan and centrist

— Damned Robot (@supremerobo.bsky.social) February 10, 2025 at 1:43 PM

Very different message here from Politico after reframing the article. This is a lesson that complaining about bad headlines (presumably from Schumer’s office) can actually improve them!

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— Craig Harrington (@craigipedia.bsky.social) February 10, 2025 at 7:08 PM

Senate Democrats are detailing how they plan to fight back against President Donald Trump’s administration — and warning Republicans against a go-it-alone approach on government funding.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer sent a “Dear Colleague” letter to his caucus on Monday that detailed four strategies to counter Trump: investigations, litigation through the courts, legislation and party messaging. Unlike other Democrats, who have recently warned that that GOP can’t count on their votes to avert a shutdown, Schumer isn’t going there yet.

Instead, while Schumer made clear that his party would support a bipartisan government funding deal, he also put the onus on Republicans to negotiate with them. Republicans had accused Democrats of walking out on talks last week, though a person with the private talks said late last week that House and Senate Republicans are still not aligned on their topline offer.

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Exciting personal update

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Look what we made with the power of science!

Exciting personal update

Her name is Camille and she is perfect. Even the doctor says so.

As you can imagine, this took a bit of doing for two men, but we did it. It feels like we stole fire from the gods. I wish she could have come into the world at a more auspicious time, but at least we got in under the wire for the year of the dragon. More importantly, we got in under the wire for any legal or administrative changes that might have made modifying the birth certificate difficult or impossible (and there was already the looming threat of DeSantis pulling a Meloni, since our surrogate lives in Florida). I guess we should get a move on acquiring a social security card and maybe a passport before those offices get nuked…

I don’t really feel that much different. Got all my youthful goals out of the way a while ago. And, since this took several years, I guess I was already sort of in dad mode–getting a house, moving near family, gardening, birdwatching… already I hear the siren’s call of learning about the revolutionary and civil wars…

Happy to answer questions people might have in the comments, within reason of course :)

I’m pretty bad at writing about this, but anyway, this and the video game are pretty much what I’ve been up to. Cheers!

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Please RSVP for the Saturday Zoom with Elle Reeve (Open Thread)

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I’m not sure what happened, but I only have 5 RSVPs for the zoom with Elle Reeve on Saturday.  I know there was more interest than that, so just 5 RSVPs  can’t be right.

Please RSVP to me by email, even if you previously sent an RSVP.

my nym @ balloon-juice.com

Link to previous post in case you missed it or you have slept since then. :-)

Open Thread.

 

 

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Abnormal Psychology (Open Thread)

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To adapt to the Horrors,* I’m oscillating between two media consumption poles. I tune everything out completely for a while and spend most of my free time on the porch or in the yard, observing the waterfowl and other critters or reading escapist books. Then I’ll dive in and read about the Horrors or listen to podcasts outlining the carnage until I’m too horrified to continue, so I revert to a media blackout again.

Over the weekend, I read and heard some speculation in the vein of why Trump is doing A and what motivates Musk to do B and why Vance is gobbling knob C, etc. It occurred to me that I’m sick and fucking tired of plumbing the depths of those sociopaths’ abnormal psychology to try to figure out how to anticipate and prepare for further Horrors. It’s a small thing, my personal weariness of the spectacle, but I’ve never been more over anything in my entire goddamn life. And we’re only three weeks in.

Sigh.

Open thread.

*Thanks, Rose!

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Let’s talk NIH Grants

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I’m the lead scientist (known as a Principal Investigator/PI) for a small R03 grant application going to the National Institutes of Health (NIH).  I want to look at how people make choices when premiums don’t matter.  I’m just finished reviewing the final pages. I sent the document to my pre-award grant administrator.  She’ll review everything for format and then send the files to the main University level review/grant administration team.  They’ll give a thumbs up and submit the entire grant  for the February cycle sometime this afternoon.

It has a cost cap of $100,000 in total expenses over 2 years.  Costs are split between direct and indirect costs.  Direct costs are my salary and other costs of my employment (health insurance, 401K etc and the stipend for the graduate student who I want to hire)   The University of South Carolina receives a 49% indirect rate for federal grants.  Basically every $2 of direct research costs leads to $1 of federal support for the USC research infrastructure.    Those research infrastructure costs are wide and varied but they include paying for the library and a lot of IT support as well as maintaining the buildings where the research happens plus the ethics and administrative supports that the feds (rightly) require.

I am extremely unlikely to be awarded these funds in this round.  That statement is true in this factual universe, it is true in a counterfactual Harris or Biden presidency universe, and it is true in a universe where NIH is acting as it was from 2017-2020. It is a true statement because it is the first submission of an idea by a new PI.  The typical R03 goes back and forth for review and revision between the PI and NIH multiple times if it will ever be funded. First submission funding is WEIRD!

My objective for this round is to get good feedback that I can incorporate into a second round in the Fall.

Once the grant application goes to NIH, it is screened to make sure it is administratively sound.  Is it the right budget for the grant mechanism?  R01s are big budgets (~$2 million for 4 or 5 years, R03s are tiny, and R21s are in-between).  Is it an application with a clinical trial component going to a non-trial grant mechanism?  Does it have all the appropriate signatures?  Once it is administratively clear it is assigned a “study section.”

The study section is a group of respected researchers with skills in the broad area of a bunch of common applications.  My grant will be in a study section of health economics/behavioral social sciences grants.  Over the next couple of months, at least three members of the study section will read the entire application and grade it on two key criteria — is the proposed research Important and is the proposed project Doable?  Every grant application is graded.  The grades are then collected for all grants and the top half of the grants advance to the next review round.  The entire panel meets either in-person or virtually.  Here each of the top 50% proposals is discussed for 10-15 minutes and the entire study section scores and ranks each grant.

Each study section sends its scores to “Council” which is run by NIH and most of the recommended grants get funded and some grants that did not score high but covered really important topics might receive funding too.  All the other grants are then sent feedback from each of the three reviewers.

Assuming I was to be funded on this grant, I would receive a Notice of Award (NOA).  The NOA would tell me when the money would arrive and kick off a bunch of new administrative tasks.  I would likely start the research that I want to do in September or October.  I would have funds to cover six or seven weeks of my salary per year for two years and I would be able to hire/fund a PhD student for a good chunk of their time during the grant period.

The most likely case is that I get good feedback this cycle so I could revise the application.  I might have a decent chance of funding for the Fall submission window so the money would likely arrive at this time next year.

This is the short and straightforward/hopeful version of the academic grant writing and funding cycle.

 

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Breaking the Ceiling

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This is the next move:

(Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday said his administration was examining U.S. Treasury debt payments for possible fraud and suggested that the country’s $36 trillion debt load might not be that high.

Speaking to reporters aboard Air Force One, Trump said administration officials who have been combing through payment records in an effort to identify wasteful spending have turned their attention to the debt payments that play a central role in the global financial system.

“We’re even looking at Treasuries,” Trump said. “There could be a problem – you’ve been reading about that, with Treasuries and that could be an interesting problem.”

He added: “It could be that a lot of those things don’t count. In other words, that some of that stuff that we’re finding is very fraudulent, therefore maybe we have less debt than we thought.”

The lawbreaking self-appointed King pulling the strings, and the guy who regularly stiffs contractors, are trying to find a way to get around the debt ceiling.  If that means not paying debts, it could be catastrophic.

For those not familiar with how financial markets work, US Treasuries are the ultimate safe asset, used as collateral for everything. Even a hint that some Treasuries might not be honored could bring everything to a screeching halt 1/

— Paul Krugman (@pkrugman.bsky.social) February 9, 2025 at 5:48 PM

Musk and Trump are both in the habit of stiffing people they owe money. If markets even suspect that this habit will extend to Treasuries, God help us 2/

— Paul Krugman (@pkrugman.bsky.social) February 9, 2025 at 5:48 PM

If you’re inclined to be calling your Senators and Rep, and if they’re Republican, you might want to ask them if they’re on board with Trump’s view that backing Treasuries is optional.

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