DirtyWaterHotDog
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User ID: 625
DirtyWaterHotDog
6d ago
Football player Tyreek Hill
That's a gross mischaracterization. He was Miami's MVP of 2022. It's like not recognizing Zlatan in Sweden.
which isn’t a given
He was in a mclaren. That's a $400k car. So, the officers should've at least known that he was rich.
In Florida, officers have the right to command you to keep the window low enough for (1) communication and (2) officer safety
The officer asked him to keep his window down. And within the next few seconds, he did. The officer had no reason to escalate, drag him down and cuff him with the aggressiveness that they did. The stats for police officers shot from a McLaren is zero, and will stay zero. He puts his window down, then unlocks the car and is stepping out. The office still drags a clearly cooperating suspect onto the floor for no freaking reason. If the officer's life was at risk, then the suspect (Tyreek) would not have unlocked the car, had both hands up and let them grab him.
He is entitled. Yes. But, he was cooperating.
They would have every reason to treat him with precaution because of his domestic violence and assault record, meaning that a concern for officer safety is legitimate despite the subject’s fame
Officers don't have a person's record available off the top of their head.
We don’t want to do that, right? We should treat everyone the same.
Yeah. We don't want random people to be dragged out of their car if they're cooperating. Why did they double jump on him at minute 2:00 ?
Let's not pretend like people are going to be treated the same, ever. Old money families have multiple hit-n-run deaths on their hands. The police politely go to their houses and ring bells. So if you're rich, the system clearly treats you better. Set the money aside, and this is still baffling. I was poor and I have been stopped a couple of times for suspected speeding. I am not white, but the police were always nice. They took my license. Did the math. Realized I wasn't really speeding by enough and let me go on a warning. A normal human-human interaction.
Miami is not Baltimore. The police offers are not fighting gangs to death on the daily. Why so much hostility ?
The arrest is fine. That manner of it is, really odd.
that would never be afforded to a white CEO
Are white Americans that blind to how they're treated in the US ? Upper class whites (admittedly coastal) are treated like kings. Their usual attire, demeanor and tone signals authority. And white / coloreds alike fall in line.
I want to avoid making this about race. I'd rather talk about policing at large.
American police aren't dying in the line of action. It is a safe & boring blue collar job; traffic policing in coastal cities is doubly so.
Why so twitchy ?
DirtyWaterHotDog
6d ago
How do improve at writing ?
I ramble. My sentences are long. My claims are laid with qualifications. In person I modulate. So sentences don't feel long. Works for impromptu speeches, but is cumbersome in writing.
I've come to hate my writing. My elevator pitches lack punch. The sharp edge of a well-made point gets lost in verbose filler.
I want to improve at conciseness. Where I can start ?
Thanks. I tried.
It's a little jerky, but is much improved.
DirtyWaterHotDog
6d ago
This perfectly captures it !
DirtyWaterHotDog
6d ago
Helmets don't reduce bike injuries either. Stats show that people drive riskier around cyclists with helmets than they do with ones without. Cyclists also ride riskier when they have helmets on. You can call it 'induced recklessness'.
Recklessness gets calibrated to perceived risk. If I know that falling off a trampoline means broken bones, I'm not going to be jumping as high.
IMO, the riskiest activities are ones that offer the optics of safety without any material gains. Large cars and soft suspensions are a classic example. Jumping into water from great heights is another. Free soloists (people who climb mountains without ropes) are renowned for dying young. Ironically, most of them die from non-free-solo activities. It's because they're willing to try activities with higher odds of failure than free soloing, if they think failure doesn't mean death. But, 1 badly clipped bolt when leading or a gust of wind in a wingsuit.....and you're just as dead.
DirtyWaterHotDog
6d ago
How do you become a better writer ?
I think and speak in a casual rambly manner. It is good for story telling in person. I'm animated and do quite a lot of voice modulation, so long sentences don't feel as bad. It's allowed me be quick on my feet and can give an impromptu speech with zero notice.
But, in professional settings, it feels cumbersome. I hate reading my own writing back to myself and my elevator pitches feel lacking. The sharp edge of a well-made point gets lost in the layers of qualification and verbose filler.
I want to get better at being concise and pointed. Any suggestions for where I can start ?
DirtyWaterHotDog
10d ago
I prefer Occam's razor.
Trump is a rich american man, holding the world's most powerful position, with none of his assets tied up with Russia. He isnt in Putin's pocket, because Putin has no leverage.
Even sexploitation is not useful anymore. Niether the stormy daniels nor hunter biden stories could sink either campaigns.
No one wakes up to having been compromised overnight. It is a decades long process of conceding leverage to a foreign authority. There are breadcrumbs everywhere and clear narratives emerge.
I cant imagine a single scenario or natrative where any sitting US president can be compromised by a foreign Govt. Trump or otherwise.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
Unfortunate, but fair. The west city crime/homelessness problem is the biggest self-own. LA, SF, Portland and Seattle stand out. But there is no crime problem on the east coast. Urban areas of DC, Boston and NYC are very safe. Safer than most nice suburbs in the US. Not much homelessness either.
I haven't been to non-coastal American cities....so won't offer my opinion there.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
I'll keep the conversation to urban areas, with dense urban cores. So.....Tokyo. I don't care much about towns or rural places.
Among developed cities, Tokyo has the lowest car use in the world. About 12% of trips are completed with a car,
In Tokyo, the majority does not drive cars.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
The most miserable cities to get around are also the ones with the most car infrastructure (LA, Houston, Atlanta).
This isn't rocket science. Transit is a win-win for car lovers and transit lovers alike.
Cities have finite amount of people. These people have to get to places. Cars occupy the most space per person and transit is more compact. If those people use bikes, buses, trains and footpaths, then they occupy less space. So yes, when car lanes are converted to transit/bike corridors, traffic still goes down. No one benefits from transit as much as those who 'need' to use cars. We have the numbers to prove it. The bike-pilled Dutch happen to have a great driving experience.
Now, transit & biking in most American cities sucks balls. If that's your experience with it, I can understand why it feels horrible.
But, isn't it even a little bit curious that North America is the place where this car-only idea has any uptake ? Everyone else agrees that transit and bikes are good.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
I didn't see the thread, but car ownership in Japan doesn't save time by getting you to a place quickly. It saves time by allowing the wealthy attend to their chores in the 'back seat' of a car. Because the wealthy don't drive their own cars. They have drivers.
If you don't have to drive, walk to parking, find your own parking or maintain the car......then yes, car ownership is cheap.
You prove my point. There isn't a revealed preference for cars. There is a revealed preference for being chauffeured. It is a revealed preference for having a Butler.
SF is nicer, but yes, I only attempt this in places where I'm surrounded by softer liberals. Well, I wouldn't live in places with aggressive bastards in the first place......so I self-select.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
Yeah, I'd put them all together as 'impaired' driving. It sucks that it isn't easy to instantly detect how high someone is.
Still think an eye tracker will help with catching pot smokers.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
The residential side streets in my area are wider and in fact have higher speed limits than that.
Yes, and yes. For instance recently I made it from Northern New Jersey to the Ithaca, NY area, a distance of over 220 miles, in less than 4 hours, in air conditioned comfort.
I don't think anyone here is against cars for long distance travel.
I am not against car ownership. Mostly just use of cars for urban transport. I have done that drive too; Niagara falls to NYC.
I think they're going to need several more lanes
yeah............sigh. You know that's what they thought when they had 20 lanes right ?
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
“A developed country is not a place where the poor have cars. It’s where the rich use public transportation,”
Japan & Western Europe would be the obvious answers.
From the cities I've visited, it applies to - Paris, Geneva, Barcelona, Madrid & Zurich.
Manhattan, Brooklyn & Boston (before MBTA crumbled) do pretty well too.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
I empathize. America's urban problems need to be addressed whole sale. Generally, a large parking lot is easy to secure. A few cameras + security and you're set.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
That's what park and rides are for. Everyone parks at the outside of an urban core. Then walk, commute, bike into the urban core.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
since you can't totally segregate car and bike traffic
Is that true ? If a large number of people start cycling, fewer people will use cars. So you can add traffic calming measures to make cars go slowly.
Grade separated bike lanes keep cars and humans separate everywhere except intersections. At intersections, they're no different than pedestrians.
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
cyclists are suicidal, law-breaking, moving hazards and that most of them are far too stupid and/or arrogant to be allowed on the road. Ever.
In small town America, 100% of adult cyclists have car licenses. What you're observing is that most people are 'suicidal, law-breaking, moving hazards'.
Only in the case of cyclists, they can't use this 'stupidity' to kill a dozen people with simple twist of their arms.
And that sort of thing is why a lot of motorists hate bicyclists. They're trying to get somewhere, and they're blocked by someone doing half the speed limit in a place where they can't be passed.
25 mph is a residential side street. You are getting blocked by signals and stop signs more than you're by a cyclist. I see car drivers zoom past past me everyday, only to have to stop by the immediate next stop sign or signal 1 block after.
On any arterial or multi-lane street, you and I both would rather have the bike be in its own lane.
As for speeding, the purpose of a car is to get from point A, to point B, quickly and in comfort.
Is it? Has it ever succeeded? Can you give me 1 reason why the 'just 1 more lane bro' (fixed link) meme is not valid criticism of car infrastructure ?
It is a national disgrace that we don't have routine travel speeds north of 100mph
You're saying that a country with the highest per-capita road deaths in the developed world ? You think people are responsible enough for that ?
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
This is why drivers are resentful of cyclists, at any rate. They're the favoured children at the moment.
Sigh. This is 101 golden-child behavior. If cyclists got 1% of the attention that cars do, you'd have the utopia meme in real life.
separate network of cycle paths
I agree. This + single lane neighborhood streets are the best.
that most people just don't want to arrive at their destination sweaty and/or weather-beaten with helmet hair.
Given the rates of car accidents, helmets are more useful if you're driving than on a bike. I maintain my anti-helmet stance on bikes. Good for kids and long weekend bike-athons. disqualifying for commuting.
want to arrive at their destination sweaty
I bike for a leisurely 5 miles to work everyday. It is no more sweaty than a 1 mile walk. You don't get sweaty unless you live in a swamp. Biking for commutes is interspersed with transit. Even in biking utopias, the majority never bikes more than 5 miles per trip. And I'm not even fit.
This is why drivers are resentful of cyclists, at any rate
Good. I've tried to make drivers see the total win-win that transit + bikes are for drivers and bikers alike. But I'm spent. Our lot are officially at war.
may thy
knifedifferential chip and shatter
DirtyWaterHotDog
16d ago
I tell my friends that the first priority as a cyclist is to survive
This is my primary motto as a cyclist. Taking over footpaths, taking the full lane, using industrial parking lots, driving in the wrong direction on a residential street, rather than the right way on the main road.....what have you. If it is illegal, go sue me. My life matters more. I love grade separated bike lanes as much as the next guy. When the system enables it, I am every bit a law abiding (non) citizen. But drawing some ink to separate me and massive cars is not enough. In such a case, I'm going to do what I must to survive.
Half-assed efforts towards bike lanes are more dangerous than not having them. It creates a false sense of security. The scariest are right turns where the bike lane abruptly ends and turns into a lane for cars. I also dislike fake bollards, which are merely cosmetic. If you're going to erect a pole, I want it to be solid metal. This is my experience in SF. Lots of bike lanes, but too exposed to multi-lane traffic. Narrow single lane 25 mph streets are my favorite. Don't need a bike lane. I'll do my normal 12-15 mph and the cars can follow behind. Traffic calming measures work better than bike lanes or helmets.
killed by a drunk driver
More than lack of bikes, this is North America's biggest problem.
Bikers, public transit & pedestrians all suffer equally, as US & Canada coddle car drivers beyond every reasonable limit. Drunk driving is still the best way to kill someone in the US. No punishment. Blind old people get licenses. 17% of the US has substance abuse issues, and all of them are driving 24x7. The US has no way for drunk people to get home other than spend $50 taking an uber back. So instead, people roll the dice.
Speed limits are 65 mph, but family cars can accelerate to in 4 seconds. Why? You can cross 200 mph in family cars. Why ? It's the only country in the world where motor vehicle deaths are going up, even as cars get overwhelmingly safer. Why ? Pedestrian death numbers look like a genocide is going on. WTF ?
The government tries to hide the 2 types of deaths they're most ashamed of (drug abuse and car crashes) into 1 category : "Unintentional injuries". A category that covers more deaths than almost all the other categories COMBINED.
The US spends $400b/yr on heart disease & cancer treatment, just to increase the lifespan of geriatrics by a few years. But, the majority of accidental deaths (I consider drug related deaths to be self inflicted) among the not-old (under age 50) are caused by cars. By far, cars steal the most years of anyone's lives in the US. More than cancer or heart disease, combined.
Now, you could eliminate 50% of those deaths, by just doing a half-as-good job as Europe. Yeah, that's how much safer Europe is than the US.
How much would you need to spend ? Let's start with a sensible number. How about as much as we spend on the next 2 diseases : heart disease and cancer : about $200b/yr. Sounds like a large number. But, you could literally stop treating heart disease and spend all that money on reducing car related deaths.....and more Americans would be alive at the end of the year.
But, before we even spend a single dollar on road safety, can we start with the low hanging fruit ? Things we can get for free. I have 3 suggestions:
Qualifier - My suggestions will make some pure blooded Americans angry, but none of these are in violation of the constitution, so there is that.
Speeding - speeding was a factor in 29% of motor vehicle crash deaths
Why can you drive faster than the speed limit ? You have google auto / car play. They know the speed limit. So does the car. Why allow the person to go faster ? Sure, there might be an emergency that warrants it. But if you don't wear your seatbelt, a loud alarm goes off. Let's start there. If you go above the speed limit, then a massive alarm start blaring. Yeah, if your wife is in labor or gangs are chasing you, you can go faster. Surely, the blaring alarm is the least of your worries in this situation.
Same for the upper limit. The national speed limit is 75 mph. Why allow a car to go faster than 90 mph, ever ?
In 2022, 3,308 people lost their lives in crashes involving distracted drivers, and nearly 290,000 people were injured. NHTSA estimates that in 2017, 91,000 police-reported crashes involved drowsy drivers. These crashes led to an estimated 50,000 people injured and nearly 800 deaths.
Gaze tracking is trivial to implement. Why do we allow distracted driving at all ? A simple gaze tracker than tell when a person has zoned out, is using their phone or almost asleep.
About 32% of all traffic crash fatalities in the United States involve drunk drivers (with BACs of .08 g/dL or higher). In 2022, there were 13,524 people killed in these preventable crashes. In fact, on average over the 10-year period from 2013-2022, about 11,000 people died every year in drunk-driving crashes.
I leave the best for last. Drunk drivers are the biggest nuisance, but they have zero repercussions. Why not take away their driving license for a very long time (~5 years) unless they install expensive tracking. "They are poor and can't afford this. They wouldn't be able to work without a car.".....well, that's better than them killing a person. Let's start with getting their cars installed with a permanent dashcam and breathalyzer. Car doesn't start unless you breathe into it and register sober. A simple dashcam is good enough to make it hard to game.
That's it. With these 3 changes, American roads would already be a lot safer. Not just for cyclists, but also pedestrians, other cars and the drunk drivers themselves.
Bicycle lanes are the lowest of the low hanging fruit for many cities. They are cheap, simple, ways to reduce traffic congestion, promote healthy and active living, and protect the lives of cyclists. It is so incredibly frustrating how much of an uphill battle it is to get them built.
I am fully black (orange?) pilled on the matter. Decent public transit, bike infrastructure & pedestrian safety should be table stakes for a functioning urban society. If the government can't make progress on these amenities, then it is a sign of an unserious society.
sufficiently advanced incompetence is indistinguishable from malice.
To me, that's the US traffic agencies right now.
Zoning out a little bit, the rethinking of urban infrastructure is going to be unifying issue for this generation. NIMBYism and cars will be the 2 sacred goats that the youth will try to slay.
Personally, I welcome it. I hate car brained urban Americans and I hate NIMBYs.
Yes, I mean it as a blanket statement with no qualification.
DirtyWaterHotDog
18d ago
Last week was insanely productive. Had to get an application in for an accelerator. I have the end2end demo hosted and working.
Still building my 'AI moderator'. It is pretty close to ready. I'd be happy to offer it pro-bono for people on TheMotte. (Btw, does TheMotte have a moderation endpoint?)
Learnt JS and React and got my first really 'professional' looking website up and running. Lowkey, frontend development is rather straight forward in framework land. Claude helped a lot, but also, React has templates for everything. Love it. I'm surprised by how easy deployment has become. Firebase and similar tools give you fully working solutions for DB, auth, hosting, CI/CD straight out of the box with generous free tiers. Didn't try cursor, but upload your whole codebase to Claude is working remarkably well. I've lived in ML land for too long.
For the first time, I feel like I could run a 1 person company and perform every part of the job - Sales, BD, Design, FE, BE, ML, Deployment. Ofc, 24 hours is too little time in a day to do everything.....but the fact that it is possible to do by one person is a huge unlock.
DirtyWaterHotDog
19d ago
Have you never met a politician. Overplaying their story & creating myths is in the job description. People in the wild are humble because they don't have to sell themselves to a full country.
I work at a tech company. The humble engineer is never picked to do public demos, because public demos are the place to be shamelessly self promoting.
Politics is this phenomenon at its peak.
DirtyWaterHotDog
20d ago
There is no world where Ukraine wins decisively. Both sides are tired and maintaining stalemates.
With the impending Russian winter, it is too late to start a fresh invasion. There isn't enough time to establish control of newly captured outpost and establish supply chains before the country freezes over.
These are golden. I'll try internalizing them in my future writing.
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