I still watch and enjoy new episodes of the Simpsons.

Yes, the golden era was the first dozen seasons (plus or minus some number of seasons, argue as needed).

However there are plenty of great episodes after the golden era. Any Treehouse of Horror is usually a solid episode. Last seasons season opener, Bart’s Birthday was great, I’ve enjoyed the Disney+ exclusive episodes, and a handful more if I dig further.

I’ve watched and enjoyed The Simpsons for 37 seasons so far, and I’ll probably keep watching until the show comes to an end. Is it compulsory? Maybe. Am I enjoying it? Yes.

Liu hits back at the wave of criticism that’s been hurled at superhero movies. “It’s kind of fashionable now to hate on it,” he says. “I think there are valid critiques of the way that movies are made, the way that production budgets are handled, I think that there are a lot of valid things to say, but this idea of shitting on superhero movies as a genre, I don’t know. I don’t know I because I am speaking as somebody who just absolutely loved watching them as a kid.”

This is why I’m a big Simu Liu fan.

Every Democrat should just stand up and declare, “I am a Republican and immune from investigation.”

Let’s not and say we did, hm?

Correct!

I think this was a proof of concept, so you don’t need to have a profitable business model just yet.

I expect the next version will create a complete individual with video of them “playing at bars” or “small concerts”.

The goal will be to not be AI, but a real person.

Heck they may even sell it as a service. If you pay me $10,000 you can be a country music star.

Rebecca Black’s parents paid $4,000 to make a music video. I don’t think they intended it to become this popular thing, but it did.

Would you (or could you imagine someone might) pay a little more to be a guaranteed success?

But wouldn’t allowing someone to leave the collective cause that individual stress? They use the example of a person drowning in a river and throwing them a life preserver. So they can’t just throw someone into the river.

But then we also have the example of releasing all the zoo animals. Clearly “they” knew that some of them would die when they released the animals. But also some of those zoo animals probably wouldn’t survive without assistance. So are they also helping them the same way they help Carol?

But also they sped up their infection/activation plan after the military found out about “them”. So they have a sense of preservation.

It just doesn’t quite add up.

“We” has all of human memories.

Which is why I found it funny that they made a mistake and turned off Carol’s power. “They” also seem to have perfect recall of events, which means no one actually knew how the power system worked.

I appreciated the clarification in this episode, for Carol her life is her own, until it isn’t. It’s a biological imperative.

But also… They’d give her an atom bomb.

So biologically speaking they must “infect” Carol. But logically speaking they’re ok risking not being able to “infect” Carol.

A live grenade isn’t a threat. A bazooka isn’t a threat. A tank isn’t a threat. An atom bomb isn’t a threat.

But “they” can feel threatened, because they previously accelerated their infection plan.

So I can only guess that they know Carol wouldn’t actually do anything that dangerous… But they either genuinely didn’t understand the sarcasm when she first asked (sarcastically) for a grenade or they’re toying with her in some way. But that in theory would make Carol feel bad so they wouldn’t do that.

They previously said that they couldn’t protect those outside of the hive mind from others also not in the hive mind. So if Carol directly threatened one of the non-hive mind people, would they stop it? Would they provide the tools?

I know we’re only four days in but Carol has asked far too few question.

I’m having trouble finding the exact quote, but when Gunn posted the screenplay for “Man of Tomorrow” and the cover had a giant cross section of a brain, he said something like, “I’m aware of the reaction such a post would receive.”

So mayyyyyyyybe it wasn’t going to be Brainiac… But the implication was that we should expect Brainiac. If it wasn’t Brainiac, it was going to be a twist on Brainiac (similar to how “Ultraman” is going to become Bizarro).

Chop chop.

He discovered electricity and used it to torture small animals and green mountain men.

Correct! That’s the scene!

What’s the episode?

(Also in hindsight I see King’s name on the smaller book.)

Mr. Simpson, I’m trying to teach.

Correct!

I mean the dollar coin never caught on. I know we still printed the dollar bill, so maybe you could force it by halting the dollar bill. But overall I don’t think new coins are the answer.

Based on one source, Cash is only ~20% of transactions. Maybe it will always be 20% or maybe it will be smaller and smaller as time goes on.

I think you’re better off eliminating current coins.

I’ve read similar that it is per subpoena, but I haven’t found an article with a more detailed analysis yet.

Now technically in the article I linked Speaker Johnson says he’ll hold a vote to remove that clause, but even if he’s being genuine I’m guessing it won’t pass in the Senate or will be vetoed by Trump.

The whole this just kicking someone (the United States) while they’re down. Longest shutdown. SNAP benefits halted. ACA subsidies expired. Hemp outlawed. Senator payouts… And this current “victory” only lasts until the end of January. Just long enough for the wounds to start healing before we all get kicked down again.

Also,

According to the bill text, senators may seek up to $500,000 in statutory damages if their phone records are subpoenaed without their knowledge.

The language is inside one of the three full-year spending bills that the Senate included in its government funding package.

“Any Senator whose Senate data, or the Senate data of whose Senate office, has been acquired, subpoenaed, searched, accessed, or disclosed in violation of this section may bring a civil action against the United States if the violation was committed by an officer, employee, or agent of the United States or of any Federal department or agency,” the bill reads.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/provision-government-funding-bill-allows-senators-sue-secretly/story?id=127429007

So 8 Senators who had their phone records subpoenaed as part of the Jan 6 investigation get a $500,000+ payout.

Logically I completely agree. I just don’t think you could convince the US as a whole that’s the way to go.

Just dimes would probably work logically, but it would feel too weird. If you’re going just dimes, you probably just want to go all in and say no coins.

So I don’t know the term for it, maybe it’s just propaganda, but a quarter feels like it has value.

The penny however doesn’t have that feeling. Vending machines often say “No Pennies” and toll booths say “No Pennies”, even though the Penny exists everyone sorta already agreed the Penny wasn’t worth the hassle.

I think you could probably convince people the same is true for the nickel. Although eliminating just the nickel is tricky since you’d keep the dime and quarter and that divides weirdly. So you should also remove the dime but that now really starts to feel like it had value.

But the quarter. That would be a hard sell. You’re basically eliminating all coins at that point. Unless you plan on making the half dollar wayyy more popular.

I can only assume she doesn’t. The only person she had was her partner/publicist who died (I’m guessing not wife since it seemed like she was keeping her relationship a secret in order to sell more books.)

When “they” send Pirate Lady they picked someone who they thought Carol could relate to or would be at ease with. Since they didn’t pick parents, siblings or other friends they must not exist, or must not be someone Carol would want to talk with.

Although if Carol is living in Albuquerque you would think she would have one other, at least somewhat, of a friend. An editor or someone she works with even a little bit that she would be on good terms with. Or even a friend from when she was younger. Almost anyone would be better than a complete stranger, I would assume.

Next it goes to the senate. Which will need 60 votes. We know that’s not happening.

Procedurally and realistically you’re correct. However technically the “nuclear option” exists to reduce that to a simple majority. There is a 0% chance that will happen, since it didn’t happen to end the 40+ day shutdown, no one is going to use it here.

Plus even if you did, Trump would veto it and it would all be for nothing, as you said.