Current State of Political Livestream Watchers:

For anyone unfamiliar, the eponymous "crises" in the title are NOT about the evil orange man who is bad - Notes on the Crises is a political economy newsletter started a few years ago by Nathan Tankus to comment on the intersecting global economic disasters triggered by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Nathan is a @TracingWoodgrains style "truth neurodivergent" not a wingcucked political hack. He's just a big giant dork who does things like FOIA request the minutes from all US Federal Reserve Board meetings from 1967-1973

Nathan looks like this, and I would believe almost anything that he writes, because it is backed by powerful neurodivergent spirits.

When he writes about the COBOL code in the treasury department, I'm confident he's talking to beardy old men who write and maintain that code.

I would also like to clarify some confusion on social media. The issue with understanding and grasping a COBOL system is not knowing COBOL, as a programming language, in the abstract. Nor is it, god help me, something that AI can "do" because you fired one of these chatbots up and got some code that could compile when you asked "write me some COBOL code". The issue is understanding the specific physical limitations of the system, the way that it interacts with the "Business Logic" of the code and a million other contextual factors.

There is specific code which tells you where to direct specific payments in specific ways and the structures, and why they are structured the way they are, requires deep contextual knowledge. This is "business logic". The entire issue with COBOL and why it has been such a struggle to maintain it is that COBOL systems (both private and public) developed for decades with very little documentation, have a million different path dependent coding choices. Mar Hicks 2020 article in Logic Magazine "Built to Last" is worth a read on this topic.

This is what I meant yesterday when I referenced that 30 different COBOL systems at Treasury had developed their own "dialects" and they launched Payment Application Modernization (PAM), which among other things, unified them. What they unified was the business logic of those systems (as well as likely other factors, most notably the physical architecture of the systems they ran on). Part of me wishes they didn't modernize with PAM because those 30 different and distinct systems would have been more secure from their infiltration. PAM processed 4.7 trillion dollars of payments in 2024.

It's also true that some similar issues can emerge with other more recent programming languages and the way "business logic" emerges if a mission critical IT system developed using a more recent programming language. But COBOL is unique; after all it's literally "common business-oriented language". So while knowing the COBOL programming language is better than not knowing it, it does not make that much of a difference with these young Musk programmers mucking about.

So my wife (29f) and i (28m) have been together with the exception of a long break when we were 18 and 19 for 10 years. (She left me for another guy) and every year or two since we've been back together i keep finding things on her phone. The first was a fetlife account where she was chatting with multiple men. The second was a coworker she was speaking explicitly with. Third she asked a random neighbor out for coffee in our apartment complex in a flirting manner. And finally this. I found nudes of her that I'd never seen before, and looked in the deleted pictures on her phone and found pictures of another man's nudes.

We've had some rough patched with my finances and depression as well as hers. I must admit I was feeling sexually frustrated last year and went to a "massage parlor" but didn't go through with the end part. And she found out. She's insists that nothing has become physical any of these times and would leave if she were going to go through with it, because she did when thats what she wanted.

Our relationship is great except for this horrible bi annual ritual of her seeking attention. She makes the money In the relationship and I'm very limited in my capacity to support myself for any sort of trial separation. I don't want to leave. I love her. But I feel I need to advocate for myself despite my own wrongdoings. I feel so trapped and hopeless.

Came across this amazing post. But what's even funnier is if you visit his profile and see the only other post he's made:

This might be the dumbest man on Earth.

Oh, he's from Portland? She's not cheating on him; he's just unknowingly in a poly relationship.

!burgers !dramatards

Rust is C++ minus jank. It's beautiful, it's a better language in every imaginable way. Yeah its full of but if chuds have a problem with that, maybe try making a better language?

Total victory btw.

Belligerents:

/u/OkBuddyLiberals - a centrist/neurodivergent neoliberal who's got a custom Manchin flair.

/u/l00gie - a gay Asian progressoid who's basically an embodiment of the reason dRumph won.

slap fight #1 OkBuddyLiberal's longpost about how the Dems really should punch left if they want to win.

Slap fight #2 l00gie's gaslamp/gatekeep/gayboss way to lose the hearts and minds of the American public.

This subreddit used to be nice, now it's just constant sneeding at nitpicks about anything slightly republican (like the recent soying over the CEO of Proton being a chud).

MISINFORMATION!

ENCRYPTION FIXES THIS!

Literally any company can do this, that's why we need DIVERSITY (the good one) in emergency options. Redditors want to stay as cavemen because a chud made something nice. Currently satellite connectivity (provided by globalstar) requires a special chip + proper positioning + has limited data + is expensive to transfer over. Starlink will allow for LTE speeds anywhere in the world on any device without needing to point your phone towards the sky like an r-slur.

LOL

We finally get ONE rational redditor!

Elon is out to r*pe you. Hide NOW.

DeepSeek, the explosive new artificial intelligence tool that took the world by storm, has code hidden in its programming which has the built-in capability of sending user data directly to the Chinese government, experts told @ABC News. https://t.co/aqxyeO5kmw

— ABC News (@ABC) February 5, 2025

In case you aren't familar with them (a good thing), Hasan Piker and Ethan Klein (H3H3) are leftist content creators that for awhile collabed together and even had a podcast. That all changed after the Oct 7th incident as Hasan went full r-slur with pro-Palestine rhetoric while Ethan and his wife, who served in the IDF, naturally disagree with a lot of it. That relationship fell apart quickly and Ethan recently came out with a HECKING CONTENT NUKE!!!!!

A near goddarn 2 hour video about Hasan that didn't add anything new that Hasan's biggest haters (Destiny fans) didn't already know. Now apparently he's got a second video cooking up that apparently will accuse Hasan of solicting fans for nudes. Considering Destiny fans have made it their life's work to bring down Hasan, I find it hard to believe something that could cancel Hasan from more than just the Minecraft community would have not gotten picked up from those weaponized neurodivergents.

The LSF thread itself is filled with redditors thinking it will be a nothingburger like the last one. Destiny fans ing when anyone brings up his male feminist stuff.

There was 0 care when Elon gave his three word reply to a tweet about redditors wanting to kill him and his zoomer concubines :soysnooseethetalkingtyping: and the sub just went down at a snap of the finger.

We all know it's because of them needing to janny it up so he can't find anything more, but does he even have any power to potentially bring the entire site down?

He always replies to longposts about shit nobody cares about so could it be possible to compile a large list of Reddit wrongs , threadify them for twitter , then send it straight to him and see where this goes?

I kinda hate rationalists but I haven't heard a convincing counter argument on AI doom.

Most Based Comments

Basedness: 🔥🔥🔥🔘🔘

I read through the article quickly. What has Elon Musk done about Reddit exactly? Sounds like he just said "This is insane". Maybe I missed something? (9318)

Nope just posted that too lol that is him taking aim at reddit (78)

Basedness: 🔥🔥🔘🔘🔘

of course not, this is TECHNOLOGY forum.technology is an interest of the educated.no magas to be seen. (48)

They find their way in. (35)

Basedness: 🔥🔘🔘🔘🔘

FU Elon and all of his Republican Nazis. The whole Republican party is full of nothing but traitors. Hopefully Democrats take back this country in four years. Then expose everyone of these traitors. (-26)

Angriest Comments

Angriness: 😡😡😡😡😡

What values of liberals do you not like? Keep in mind I said values, not talking points. (2)

Basically everything they say, like, or do is the opposite of what I say, like, or do. It's impossible to speak to them because the moment there is any disagreement, they go batshit crazy on you for having your own opinion and calling you all the worst words you can think of. Here is the list of shit I hate about liberals: They like it when criminals enter the country illegally and go on crime sprees while receiving benefits which are paid by us tax payers, I don't like that. They like infringing on our first amendment right to say whatever the frick we want on the internet. I don't like that. They like it when mothers kill their babies because they opened their legs and aren't ready to raise a child. I despise that. Liberals love to assault, scream, and spit at you for wearing a red hat (again, infringing on 1st amendment right). Liberals love to protest about literally everything. All the power to them, but it's annoying as frick. Liberals vote blue no matter who, which is shameful.... (0)

Angriness: 😡😡😡😡😡

Boycotts work. It's the only way to get the attention of shithead billionaires who think they own your minds and actions. Frick Musk, Frick Nazi's. He knows what he's doing and frick anyone who doesn't think he's a Nazi/Fascist and that his platform exists to promote those ideas going forward. Everyone will look back on these times at some point and realize more could have been done to shut down shithead billionaires and nazi's from doing harm to the country for their own enrichment, and I swear to frick if reddit tries to mass un-ban twitter by force it'll kill reddit -and- twitter at the same time. (8)

Angriness: 😡😡😡😡😡

Tell Musk to take himself, his pro-Nazi white supremacist BS and all of the racist shit that he allows to run rampant all over X to go to the 10th level of Heck and complain all he wants THERE!🤮💩💩💩👺👹👹👹👿👿👿 (3)

Biggest Lolcow: /u/Defiant-Witness-8742

Score: 🐮🐮🔘🔘🔘

Number of comments: 5

Average angriness: 🔘🔘🔘🔘🔘

Maximum angriness: 😡😡🔘🔘🔘

Minimum angriness: 🔘🔘🔘🔘🔘

NEW: Subscribe to /h/miners to see untapped drama veins, ripe for mining!

autodrama: automating away the jobs of dramneurodivergents. Ping HeyMoon if there are any problems or you have a suggestion

Technology? !chuds !nooticers !trump2024

https://old.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1igv0jp/national_50_states_antitrump_protest_planned_for/

https://old.reddit.com/r/50501/comments/1iguth2/newsweek_national_50_states_antitrump_protest/

https://old.reddit.com/r/technology/duplicates/1ihh63h/online_movement_50501_calls_for_national_50/

https://old.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/1igv0jp/national_50_states_antitrump_protest_planned_for/marvo4v/?context=8

it begins anew!

pic.twitter.com/T2uZMi8Rg1

— Chicago Bears (@ChicagoBears) February 6, 2025

The Bears will still suck

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I had a small role in recruiting this man. He'd spent the last ten years leading engineering teams on a consumer product you've probably used, and he's just arrived in DC to work with the federal government. He started on Monday, and it's now Thursday night. I run into him at an event. He arrives late, and looks shellshocked.

How's it going? He's struggling to put words together. I'm worried. "I just left the office. I think everything's going to be okay." What is he talking about? "For the first day and a half, nothing. Then it was 'go to this agency and help them with this thing. It needs to go live on Thursday and there's a problem.' Yes, there was a problem. The data the service relied on….I've never seen a database like that. Ever." What do you mean? "1993. The guy couldn't find any other way to make it work. The vendors would have taken too long even if someone could justify the budget. So he just hacked it at nights and over weekends. Used whatever he could find and taught himself how to use it. The machine is ancient. The software has just been running since then. I'm amazed he managed to keep it running this long. It's a miracle. Either no one knew, or no one cared — my guess is that they were just happy to have something that worked at all. The guy's been keeping this going like this…I mean…I had no idea…I've never seen…." He's shaking his head and looking past me.

What happened? "First we just had to make sure we could get the data out somehow, make sure we had a copy. I mean, these records…they're the only copy. The whole system relies on this. People rely on this. To help real people. People who need help. If it had failed…" He really is in shock.

"I'd just never seen anything like this. I was afraid if I even touched it, it would all go poof. We got it out. It's okay…. It's okay now…But this guy…He's been keeping this together for 23 years…"

For a minute, I worry that he's angry. And that he might be angry at me for encouraging him to take this job. But I look in his eyes and it's not anger, it's awe. Respect. Admiration and gratitude for a public servant who has achieved the impossible. Made things work in spite of the rules, not because of them. "He made it work. He's the only guy who can run it. He knows it wouldn't work without him so he's deferred his retirement. I mean…he's extraordinary."

Extraordinary. A Silicon Valley technologist, the kind of person we champion as a savior of government, thinks that a career civil servant beyond retirement age with sorely outdated technical skills is extraordinary.

That career civil servant's name is Jed. The system he started building in the 1980s and maintained for decades before my friend came along was called VACOLS, the Veterans Appeals Control and Locator System. It started out serving just 400 users, and expanded to 17,000 across multiple parts of the VA system. Logic Magazine later interviewed him, and the backstory is well worth a read.

A taxi driver in Kawasaki has been arrested for killing a pigeon.

He wore a PIGEON MASK while taking videos of the killing, which he then uploaded to Twitter. Police have found the mask. https://t.co/nOmzfOZSda

— Gearoid Reidy リーディー・ガロウド (@GearoidReidy) February 6, 2025

He's me fr fr

As part of my Banlog, I am somewhat inclined to give @BIGBILLYKONGDONG a serious ban for the outrageous boomerphilia on display.

As a work of ironic praise for a 78 year old man's fantasy, it's a solid piece. Truly let us celebrate that we are all collectively engaged in a public arts project to facilitate the transition of boomers out of public life.

It's truly funny that we are all pretending that this old man is a president. That he is mentally capable, and not just lashing out with random whims with other aged decrepit men. The elaborate practical joke we're pulling on our elderly is a riot of laffs.

But:

For me the choice is easy.

Subway just released a footlong Oreo cookie. pic.twitter.com/cPI17yULLH

— FearBuck (@FearedBuck) February 4, 2025