Scott Boehmer

Author: Scott Boehmer

  • 2024 NC Elections Finally Over

    After spending over six months vigorously contesting his narrow loss in the 2024 North Carolina Supreme Court election, Jefferson Griffin conceded the race on Wednesday following a federal judge’s ruling against him.

    Griffin, a Republican judge on the state Court of Appeals, lost the election to Democratic incumbent Allison Riggs by 734 votes. But he and the state Republican Party refused to accept the results, instead embarking on an unprecedented campaign to challenge over 65,000 votes in a legal battle that has roiled the state and drawn national rebuke.

    Earlier this week, Chief U.S. District Judge Richard E. Myers, an appointee of President Donald Trump, decisively ruled against Griffin’s efforts, saying that he sought to “change the rules of the game after it had been played.”

    Kyle Ingram

    Griffin concedes NC Supreme Court race, ending unprecedented effort to overturn election (The News & Observer)

  • Money, Money, Money

    Must be funny, in the rich man’s world

    ABBA

    Here’s another song I like: ABBA’s Money, Money, Money.

    ABBA – Money, Money, Money (Official Music Video) (ABBA – YouTube)

  • Cuts Threaten Climate Modeling

    Proposed cuts to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the agency whose weather and climate research touches almost every facet of American life, are targeting a 57-year-old partnership between Princeton University and the U.S. government that produces what many consider the world’s most advanced climate modeling and forecasting systems. NOAA’s work extends deep into the heart of the American economy — businesses use it to navigate risk and find opportunity — and it undergirds both American defense and geopolitical planning. The possible elimination of the lab, called the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, in concert with potential cuts to other NOAA operations, threatens irreparable harm not only to global understanding of climate change and long-range scenarios for the planet but to the country’s safety, competitiveness and national security.

    Abrahm Lustgarten

    White House Proposal Could Gut Climate Modeling the World Depends On (ProPublica)

  • Brendan Carr’s FCC

    In less than 100 days the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has been converted from a media and telecom watchdog into a bizarre, rights-trampling grievance machine built for one purpose: to coddle and protect the ego of President Donald J. Trump.

    Karl Bode

    Brendan Carr’s FCC is an anti-consumer, rights-trampling harassment machine (The Verge)

  • The Bathroom Bill is Back

    House Bill 2 is unquestionably one of the most infamous pieces of legislation in North Carolina state history. Passed by a Republican supermajority in less than 12 hours, HB 2 mandated that transgender individuals use the bathroom that matches the biological sex listed on their birth certificate, regardless of their gender identity.

    The law was widely criticized as discriminatory, unnecessary and cruel; its passage cost North Carolina billions of dollars and thousands of lost jobs; led to travel bans against North Carolina and an NCAA boycott; and made the state into a laughingstock of the nation. The fallout from the bill led to a partial (and for some, begrudging) repeal by moderate Republican lawmakers working with Democrats.

    It’s easy to forget, but even then-candidate Donald Trump criticized the bill: “You leave it the way it is… There have been very few complaints the way it is. People go, they use the bathroom that they feel is appropriate. There has been so little trouble.”

    Yet as the MAGA movement has embraced more and more extremely conservative politics, many Republican politicians today feel none of the regret their predecessors did nine years ago. Enter SB 516, a bathroom bill even more aggressive, cruel, and poorly planned than HB 2.

    Miles Kirkpatrick

    The Bathroom Bill is Back (Carolina Forward)

  • We Need To Talk About ICE

    A video from Kat Abughazaleh about the government’s usage of ICE as an intimidation tool without regard for due process.

    We Need To Talk About ICE (Kat Abughazaleh – YouTube)

  • Cherry Republic

    The Cherry Republic in Glen Arbor, Summer 2023

    I first visited the Cherry Republic in Glen Arbor, Michigan when I was in high school. One of my teachers, who was also my coach for cross country and the sponsor of adventure club, was the brother of Bob, Cherry Republic’s founder. I don’t remember whether that first visit was on a trip for a race or a stop on the way to backpacking, but either way, the Cherry Republic left an impression.

    Since moving out of Michigan after college, I don’t have the chance to get to Glen Arbor often. The last time I visited was during the summer a couple of years ago. Luckily though, the Cherry Republic now has more stores throughout the state, their products in gift shops (you can usually find some in DTW while waiting for a flight), and the option for ordering online. That’s allowed me to continue to enjoy sour cherry patches and other cherry treats whenever I get the craving.

    If you find yourself in the northern portion of Michigan’s lower peninsula, I recommend you make the time to visit the Glen Arbor store. And if you’re not in that area, you can always place an order. I’ve never had anything from them that I didn’t enjoy.

    Cherry Republic

  • Email Servers and Signal

    I thought this was a good look at how Pete Hegseth’s use of Signal differs from the email server that Hillary Clinton used while Secretary of State. The video is notably before more recent news stories about how Hegseth was also sharing military information in other Signal chats including his family members.

    Signal War Plans v.s. Hillary’s Emails (LegalEagle – YouTube)

    Hegseth had a second Signal chat where he shared details of Yemen strike (AP)

  • The Idea of Computer Generated Employees is Weird

    The very idea of having an “employee” that is just a large language model and a generated portrait seems bizarre to me. A boss immediately hitting on the large language model when he sees the generated portrait is even weirder. Let’s just not do this.

    On Monday, the co-founder of Business Insider Henry Blodget published a blog on his new Substack about a “native-AI newsroom.” Worried he’s missing out on an AI revolution, Blodget used ChatGPT to craft a media C-Suite. Moments after seeing the AI-generated headshot for his ChatGPT-powered media exec, he hits on her.

    Matthew Gault

    Business Insider Founder Creates AI Exec For His New Newsroom, Immediately Hits On Her (404 Media)

  • 20 Lessons on Tyranny

    A video of John Lithgow reading the 20 lessons about tyranny from Timothy Snyder’s 2017 book On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century.

    20 Lessons on Tyranny: by Timothy Snyder / read by John Lithgow (PoliticsGirl – YouTube)