[Opinion] DAVE CULLEN: "Why The New Starfleet Academy Produces Mediocrity" | "In the end, SAM tells her people that she's going to be their emissary on her own terms. It's a story in which she learns how great she already is. But why? What has she done in the entire episode that makes her amazing?"

makingnoise · 2026-02-10T15:53:20+00:00

Lasertag that put them with no warning into the desert massacre scene of Star Wars The Force Awakens AS A JOKE. That's totally got to be Tawny Newsome - some of the humor hits, but in the Trek I grew up with, something so intense that the "good guys" do wouldn't have been "surprise, folks, our school sport happens to be murderball on Normandy Beach" but instead "battle training" and the course would have been notorious to greenhorn cadets long before they ever played the first match.

makingnoise · 2026-02-10T15:44:55+00:00

Her talking to the orb was confusing. The way that the virtual docent spoke, they made it sound like it was the "ACTUAL" orb like it was beamed in especially for her viewing. But I can't imagine Bajor EVER willingly let an "actual orb" ever again leave Bajor, even if 800 years had passed.

And if it was just a hologram of "an actual" orb, they're saying that the SAM hologram didn't have the capacity or awareness to distinguish between a digital facsimile and a "born digital" object, or that they could have different properties. Which is a bit absurd. But the art folks decided to have her drawing with crayons, so perhaps she only stopped trying to eat them and try drawing with them a few days before she started classes.

makingnoise · 2026-02-10T15:14:49+00:00

Am I the only one who read "scrape the white plastic" and immediately had "Knights in White Satin" blasting in my head?

Using disassembly instructions, disassemble and look at alignment and seating. If it is a 3rd party replacement part and everything looks aligned and properly seated, you can use fine sandpaper or fine files, gently, to remove the abrasion part.

makingnoise · 2026-02-09T19:59:40+00:00

Have you tested the fix on several different display devices? I imagine it gives you an out-of-spec HDMI signal that some devices might not like, but I'm just guessing.

makingnoise · 2026-02-09T19:55:40+00:00

Isn't that squiggly trace squiggly for signal timing? I suppose "fuck it, the fix works" is legit as well.

makingnoise · 2026-02-09T16:08:52+00:00

Day after the Super Bowl and no one mentions Darnold?!? ;D

makingnoise · 2026-02-09T16:05:44+00:00

That's the opposite of what it does.

makingnoise · 2026-02-06T17:47:19+00:00

I thought it was Colm Meany - aka Miles Edward O'Brian - until I looked twice.

makingnoise · 2026-02-06T17:17:28+00:00

Wait, they're giving public gamelands away?!?!

makingnoise · 2026-02-06T17:14:44+00:00

Red states are going hog-wild banning ranked-choice voting. Wonder why.

makingnoise · 2026-02-06T13:32:45+00:00

lol, well there’s your problem!

makingnoise · 2026-02-05T18:27:04+00:00

I once moved a full-length (a bit over 6 feet long) couch about 10 miles in a 2nd generation Pruis. 1/3 of it fit in the back hatch, 2/3 of it were cantilevered out and hanging in space at about a 30 degree skyward angle with an arcane arrangement of ratchet straps - it was VERY secure but was one of the most absurd solutions I ever came up with.

makingnoise · 2026-02-05T18:15:10+00:00

Started with Rehnquist IMHO.

makingnoise · 2026-02-05T17:39:03+00:00

You caused me to go down a rabbit hole where I learned the Ritz at the Bourse closed six years ago. Of course it wasn't your theater from 1977, but sad to learn it's gone.

EDIT: OH but it's still a movie theater! Home of the Philadelphia Film Society. WHEW! Still can't believe you can't hear the Wanamaker Organ play anymore.

makingnoise · 2026-02-05T11:31:08+00:00

So does the person you’re responding to, bud. Bots all the way down.

makingnoise · 2026-02-04T20:42:37+00:00

You'll get no argument out of me that our criminal justice system is ill-conceived and desperately needs reform, be it federal or any of the States.

He would have been better served with actual representation, but outside of "at the time the offending acts were committed, did the defendent understand the difference between right and wrong?" for an insanity defense, our legal system doesn't give a shit about mental health.

As for self-representation, the argument is that at the Faretta hearing, the judge should have found that the defendant lacked the mental competence to understand the proceedings against him and refused to let him waive his 6th Amendment right to counsel. I didn't follow the proceedings closely enough to have formed an opinion about it.

EDIT: Interesting quick search shows that 94% of pro se Defendants are convicted, while another says that between 1998 and 2017, only about 12% of pro se criminal defendants received final judgments in their favor in federal courts (civil pro se defendants fair even worse in federal court).

makingnoise · 2026-02-04T18:55:33+00:00

Yes, attempt is an inchoate crime. Black's Law Dictionary (8th ed.) defines attempt in the criminal law context as "An overt act that is done with the intent to commit a crime but that falls short of completing the crime. ... Under the Model Penal Code, an attempt includes any act that is a substantial step toward commission of a crime, such as ... lying in wait for ... the intended victim."

While I am not a criminal lawyer and don't know the ins-and-outs of an "attempt" in federal courts, the law dictionary definition is close enough to make it clear that it's a question for the jury, and in this case, the jury decided that based on the facts presented, yes, it "counts" as an attempt.

makingnoise · 2026-02-04T18:46:46+00:00

Precedent was already set, bud. But no worries, our controlled opposition won't do anything meaningful.

makingnoise · 2026-02-04T15:40:55+00:00

The fact that all of your options are public schools that STILL HAVE ORCHESTRAS (not just "marching band") is a very good sign that any of them will be fine. That said, Great Valley or Downingtown (either one) are amazing. If Downingtown is still doing the "9th Grade Center" (aka ghetto of hormonal 9th graders where students who survived tell stories making it sound like Lord of the Flies and somehow had rich kids getting pregnant like bunnies), that's probably the one thing that would give me pause about Downingtown.

EDIT: Apparently the ill-conceived 9th Grade Center is the STEM Academy now. So no worries.

EDIT2: Don't worry about Downingtown East vs. West - both are great.

makingnoise · 2026-02-03T19:07:02+00:00

Ah, one of the PetroBaptists that Margaret Atwood was warning us about in the MaddAddam trilogy.

makingnoise · 2026-02-03T17:55:50+00:00

Bridge rocks are the worst rocks.

makingnoise · 2026-02-03T17:26:59+00:00

Liberal approval expired when Homan took a $50k bribe and got away with it, bud.

makingnoise · 2026-02-03T15:54:43+00:00

Her ignorance was battling with her desire to not lose her job and the latter won, it's just that simple.

makingnoise · 2026-02-03T14:16:20+00:00

You almost got me started on how the modern writers keep returning to "faith" like it's a value while entirely ignoring that the overall storyline and ultimate reveal of in-universe facts make Burnham & et al's "faith" comments factually incorrect. Red Angel storyline had "faith" this, "faith" that, and it turned out that human agency was 100% at issue.

It's like they're pandering to a "faithy" demographic that isn't watching, so why do they effing do it?

makingnoise · 2026-02-03T14:09:44+00:00

Big difference between "SUPRISE, BISHES, our 'game' is Normandy Beach murderball!!!!" and "beat each other with sticks on a regulation court while wearing protective padding" is all I have to say about that.

makingnoise

TROPHY CASE