I don’t care if they are evil or incompetent or both. They’re decimating the federal workforce which will have long term consequences. Some of which will be fatal and not just for Americans.

Congress hasn’t passed a budget yet for the fiscal year, only a continuing resolution. The fiscal year started on Oct 1. So, Congress could include language that legalizes the buyout in the full budget, in theory*. There’s going to continue to be lawsuits against it before and after the budget becomes law. So, who knows what will happen in practice.

In any case, my take is anyone that took it will find that it won’t work out like they hoped. At a minimum they will have a stressful couple of months. At a maximum they will find that they screwed themselves.

*IANAL so apply appropriate skepticism to my Thursday evening quarterbacking.

I don’t know if I can give a straight answer. Agencies and their divisions, orgs, branches, teams have to do records management. There’s a federal law somewhere in the federal registrar. So a certain amount of historical knowledge is preserved. Where, how well, and how far back is a bunch of rabbits holes.

But what I think you might be getting at is tribal knowledge. Everything that’s passed around orally or by experience rather than being written down. There’s always that risk with people leaving and that knowledge going with them. But that impact can vary depending on agency practices, work culture, or even just the responsibilities of the person leaving.

The area I’m keeping an eye on are the people with decades of knowledge and experience that are also skilled enough to apply all that to their niche fields within an agency. They’re usually the ones in federal service for the long haul and are some of the more difficult people to get time with. If an agency is gutted and that living knowledge base is lost then the agency will struggle to fulfill the missions Congress has directed they must do as federal law.

Of the handful of people I know of, most were retiring anyway. They’re basically getting 7 months of paid leave. I wished one person a happy retirement last week and then “welcome back” this week. They’re working until the end of February.

Of the one person I know that isn’t eligible for retirement, they were planning on leaving anyway due to circumstances in their family.

What I’m interested in is how many of those people will be back by October as contractors. I’ve seen it before where someone retires and then a few months later they’re back working in a similar job. Just because someone leaves gov services doesn’t mean their skill sets aren’t in demand.

The people who voted for the authoritarian liar. They are equally shocked at the leopard knawing on their face.

Fukin hell, I’m in this meme. At least all my customers are engineers. So, less orcs that need slaying.

The Loophole

Yes, that’s in the post title.

Well this is interesting. Some background:

https://www.troyhunt.com/experimenting-with-stealer-logs-in-have-i-been-pwned/

You wouldn’t happen to have some malware on your computer or logged into an account from a compromised computer?

When I was digging into this stuff a few years ago, what appeared to matter most was transmission and immune evasion. Whether or not the host died was irrelevant if the virus was spreading before the host showed any symptoms. Which is what we saw in 2020 and 2021. High transmission rates and high mortality rates.

However, viruses evolve over time and our immune systems can adapt to new threats over time. With COVID, there’s an inverse relationship with transmission and immune evasion. As people’s immune systems were able to recognize the virus, the variants that evolved to avoided (or delay) an immune response were the successful ones. Because of that inverse relationship those variants were also less successful at transmission.

Other factors like the ability to damage the lungs, damage to the sense of smell, etc. are essentially irrelevant if they don’t improve a virus’s ability to replicate and transmit. If they aren’t being used then they will disappear over time.

Which appears to be what we are seeing now. A virus that has evolved to survive long enough in humans to replicate and transmit while evolution has culled the features that don’t improve survival.

Nope, pretty much all have a duty cycle. Like 30 seconds on, 10 seconds off, and they keep repeating that or similar for however long the cook time is. If you listen closely you can hear the magnetron kick on and off.

I believe Panasonic was the only company that sold an inverter microwave that lowered the power output.

Black plastic doesn’t yellow like white. Microwaves are pretty much a commoditized item. Unless they’re trying to make it a “smart device” and sell you a subscription.

The Antique Microwave Oven that’s Better than Yours

I’m curious about how something like this might have come to be?

Racism + money + a love of coffee.

Rough guess, it was produced between 1940s and 60s.

There are steep and release brewers like the Hario Switch and Clever Dripper. If you want to branch out.

“I decided to donate the equipment I acquired with my own resources to the chamber,” she said in statement on X, following a social media backlash.

“Obviously, neither I nor my advisers need a toilet.”

I think she really needs it because she is full of shit.

Primer because Primer. (Video warning and some spoilers for a bunch of different films.)

I don’t know if I would subscribe to it, but it is one of the more interesting ideas for time travel.

It doesn’t matter because it’s not his problem anymore.

According to preliminary information, Jabber, a U.S. citizen born in Texas, had a black flag affixed to the hitch of the pickup truck he allegedly drove into the crowd. Officials are investigating whether that flag is related to the terrorist group ISIS, two senior law enforcement officials said.

I’m going to make a prediction and say it’s self-radicalization. As for which group he self-radicalized to, I’ll wait until more information comes out. I have an obvious suspicion, but I’d rather wait.

A Shelter Full of Cats I’m a sucker for any game from Devcats.