The article says Texas bought $5 Million in btc. The annual state budget of Texas is north of $330 Billion. $5 million is a rounding error. Unless Texas increases its BTC investment by 50-100 times, the fund could collapse and Texas wouldn't even notice. The fund likely also bought some hedges to protect against loss of its BTC investment, too (at least a smart investment manager would).

Personally, I wouldn't invest anything you can't afford to lose in crypto. It looks like, so far, Texas agrees with me.

You can trade-in iPhone 13 right now for $180 toward a iPhone 17. Given that there is no trade-in value for an iPhone 12, I suspect this is the last fall season where you'll be able to get a trade-in value for iPhone 13, at least direct from Apple (3rd party buyers might still offer rebates and cash on trade-ins). That incentive is enough to push some users to upgrade.

Feature-wise, battery life is much better on the 17 than the 13 (especially an old one), the camera is much, much better (especially for the Instagram crowd) and overall speed. But if the 13 works for you, that's great, keep it as long as possible. It keeps more junk out of the landfill.

Between, or maybe above the existing interstate highway system? A few tunnels here and there seem like they could be a big challenge.

And even if they used the existing highway system, the infrastructure cost would be enormous. We'll see full-on self-driving cars and busses in the U.S. before we see significant amounts of high-speed rail. Just not going to happen in a significant way in the U.S.

Sheesh, so many misrepresentations of facts in your post, hard to know where to start.

More than half of teachers identify as Republicans or Independents (https://www.edweek.org/leadership/survey-educators-political-leanings-who-they-voted-for-where-they-stand-on-key-issues/2017/12). 40% of teachers identified as Democrats.

This is laughably false. If you have "study after study" that shows this, then link to one rigorous study that shows this. Just one rigorous study.

And if money doesn't matter in education, then why do rich families send their children to schools that spend more per student than poor families? Do rich people love throwing away money on education if it really makes no difference?

I don't know what NAEP data you are looking at, but the data I see (https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/profiles/stateprofile?sfj=NP&chort=2&sub=RED&sj=&st=MN&year=2024R3). For example, in 2024, California outperformed Florida, Texas, Alabama, Mississippi, SC, Oklahoma, and New Mexico on 8th grade reading, but did somewhat worse than national average on 8th grade math (Florida was also below the national average on 8th grade math). In terms of average spending per pupil at the state level (which is a stupid measure of spending because it is hugely variable by district), the states that spend the most - New York, Vermont, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Massachusetts, (https://www.datapandas.org/ranking/per-pupil-spending-by-state) were often near the top in the NAEP rankings.

In any case, a state-level analysis misses the point because every state has fantastic, amazing, wonderful, community-supported schools, and every state has horrible, underfunded, overcrowded schools. Analyzing state averages and average performance ignores the reality of the vast difference between the education the rich get in the U.S. and the education everyone else gets in the U.S.

Republicans have abandoned public education, which has driven teachers to the Democrats. Even Republican teachers do not trust Republican politicians to invest in public education. Only 1 in 10 teachers say they trust Republicans to ensure "adequate funding for schools, adequate pay and benefits for teachers, and equal access to high quality K-12 education for students." (https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2024/04/04/teachers-views-on-the-state-of-public-k-12-education/#k-12-education-and-political-parties).

Yes, I watched my kids' elementary school classrooms during online school. What they received in school was WAY better than what I got. AND the school is way more diverse economically and socially than my school ever was.

You can't make someone be trans. And you can't make someone not be trans. And no matter your view on "trans," the reality is that there are trans people in our communities and our children interact with people who are trans either right now (as part of their own families) or in future years as co-workers, neighbors, colleagues, friends, etc. Should schools pretend that trans people do not exist?

There are something like 50 million children enrolled in school. I don't doubt that, somewhere, in some school, some teacher (or maybe a sub or an unprepared babysitter) said something about sex to children that they should not have said. And this happens across all portions of the political spectrum (like how some teachers celebrated Trump's election openly in their classrooms and laughed and mocked their brown students who were terrified that their parents would be deported while they were at school). Schools are widely diverse places and teachers should be held accountable for inappropriate behavior. But schools should also be a place for information, and children have a right to know age-appropriate information about their bodies and about sex.

If you look at opinion polls, on most issues (abortion, gay marriage, tax policy, etc.) the majority of the U.S. population is liberal.

Sure, some homeschools are great, but there are many situations where "homeschool" is simply an excuse by the parents to exploit their children's labor (by making them do chores at home or on the farm all day) or to cover ongoing abuse (teachers can't report abuse if the children don't come to school). In general I am fine if some families want to home school, but states need to do WAY more to ensure home schools are not about abuse and exploitation, and that they are actually providing children with a good education.

Sorry you had a bad experience with school. Too many schools are underfunded and too many teachers are overwhelmed with large class sizes, behavioral and disciplinary challenges, lack of administrative support and in-class assistance, and disinterested, unhelpful parents (who are working 2-3 jobs, often at night, and are themselves exhausted and burned out).

For most people the solution will not be "more homeschooling," because that is a pipe dream for most who are struggling to get by. The solution is a much bigger investment in good schools that work for everyone.

Do you want educated neighbors? Who you can hire for your business? Who will have enough income to purchase your product? Who will be employed and can adapt their skills to a rapidly changing environment? Who will know how to make healthy choices for themselves and for their neighbors (you)? Who will carefully consider and thinking critically about public issues and use that knowledge when they vote?

If you want these things, then you will pay for a good public education.

I never once said the North and South were morally equivalent, or that both sides were equally bad.

I am pointing out that history is complicated and the "heroes" of the past often did despicable, horrible things, and that their motivations were not always holy and pure. And that means we are all capable of despicable, horrible things; and therefore we should not see the world as "us = good," and "them = bad," but instead we must figure out, not through secession and sending "them" away, but rather, by working together, on how we can create a world that is more just and fair and meets the human rights and needs of everyone.

"Broadly speaking, our Constitution says that the police should only be able to invade a person’s rights to privacy, property, or liberty if they have a specific reason to think that the suspect has done something wrong." (https://constitutioncenter.org/education/classroom-resources-by-topic/fourth-amendment-search-and-seizure)

Seizing data on my airline travel activities, and searching it to look for evidence of criminal wrong doing, seems to me a pretty obvious example of a violation of the fourth amendment of the Constitution.

We have HIPAA for health information and FERPA for educational records; it's probably time for a broader privacy law that explicitly describes these limits and protects our privacy and liberty in other areas of life, too.

Where I go and where I travel is a key component of my personal liberty, and collection by the government of those data to inform possible criminal actions against me is clearly an unreasonable search.

You do know that it is the CHILDREN of anti-vaxxers who are suffering and dying, not the stupid, manipulated parents, right?

The Civil War was because of slavery but it wasn't about slavery, if that makes sense. Lincoln didn't want to make the war about ending slavery because there were too many racists in the North who would not have been interested in going to war to stop slavery. Specifically, Lincoln didn't even emancipate the slaves until midway through the war, after he changed his mind about the issue of slavery and saw it as a way to end the war more quickly. The North also engaged in all sorts of racist actions against black people throughout the war, even those who signed up to fight for the North (such as paying them much less, giving them leftover / used equipment, being led often by white officers who weren't "good enough" to lead white soldiers, etc.).

In general, the notion that we can resolve our differences through secession ought to be eradicated (much like we need to eradicate measles). Instead, we need to reform our political system (and especially get the rich and corporations out of our politics) so that the minority does not continue to control all three branches of government with no need to compromise or listen to science and facts.

The Fourth Amendment is pretty clear, no?

https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/amdt4-6-4-1/ALDE_00000793/
br>"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Having, for example, a relatively low AGI while taking an expensive trip, in my view, should not be considered probable cause to issue a search warrant. So why should the IRS be able to collect and use such data to sift through data to try to find evidence to charge people with tax fraud? This seems to be a textbook case of the violation of the Fourth Amendment.

Just spitballing here, but, the Constitution might have something to say about it?