Mastodawn

“In 2003, Missouri was ranked 14th out of 50 states in NAEP fourth-grade reading scores,” [GOP State Sen.] Hudson said. “By 2024, however, Missouri was ranked 38th.”

Coincidentally, 2003 was when the GOP took majority control of the state legislature, which they've had ever since.

https://missouriindependent.com/briefs/missouri-senate-looks-to-fully-ban-controversial-reading-instruction-system/

Missouri Senate looks to fully ban controversial reading instruction system • Missouri Independent

A bill that would ban three-cueing and establish new reading assessments was discussed in the Senate Education Committee on Wednesday. After legislation prohibiting three-cueing as a primary instructional method passed last year, legislators are now aiming for an outright ban. Three-cueing, also known as the Meaning Structure Visual system, teaches kids to read by using […]

Missouri Independent

WesDym 8h ago

Question for anyone who cares to answer it:

What's something actually valuable you learned from fiction?

I'll offer two:

1) From a Bogart film (forget which), I learned, "Always cut AWAY from you" (to avoid accidentally cutting yoursefl).

2) From 'Personal Best' (1982), I learned that cannabis can mitigate the symptoms of some stomach ailments.

WesDym 8h ago

New England is angry at government over-reach involving caffeinated drinks.

Does anyone know what followed the last time that happened?

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WesDym 20h ago

It's not really worth discussing the top scorers, though, which are all intentionally exploitative. Scarface did lampshade its own profusion of profanity in one line, but it's still a serious drama that's not ABOUT profanity, merely about profane people.

WesDym 20h ago

Someone made an edit of 'Total Recall' just of Arnie's grunts. It reminded me of an edit of 'Scarface' that's just every occurence of 'fuck'.

The difference is this: In the first, it's a whole minute, which seems impressive. But in the latter, you get to see much of the whole film. The word or versions of it occurs well over 200 times in less than 2 hours.

By total count, though, Scarface is well behind over 100 other films, and by rate much lower, at #250.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_films_that_most_frequently_use_the_word_fuck

List of films that most frequently use the word fuck - Wikipedia

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WesDym 22h ago

3/ I gradually realized some complications with this concept, though. Plenty of them technical, but the biggest one is cultural: You won't be able to sell this idea to a society that believes "cell phone towers" make them sick. Even if you set it up, you'll have mobs wailing about it, setting places on fire, even shooting at people.

Humanity, on average, is still too ignorant and immature to accept this.

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WesDym 22h ago

2/ We already do this a lot, at small scale. If you've got a charging pad or box for your phone instead of plugging it in, that's an example. So people are familiar with the general concept.

Extending from a concept originally offered by Nikola Tesla, wipi would operate at larger scale. If you bring your tablet to a café, the café would supply power to it the same way it supplies wifi to it. Portable, low-power gadgets would charge at home just by being in your house, or in a certain room.

WesDym 22h ago

Many years ago, I proposed the idea of 'wipi' -- WIreless Power by Induction. The electro-magnetic principle is simple, and was well understood and already in use by the late 19th century.

(People who lived near electric rails figured out how to steal power from them through induction during the Depression, for example. Induction is why parallel phone lines need to be shielded from each other, why e-car makers don't want their cars to have AM radio, and so on.)

WesDym 1d ago

You may have seen a story saying that troops are being told they're fighting a holy war. You might have shared it. I did, though I later took it down. Here's why.

https://www.friendlyatheist.com/p/before-you-share-that-story-about

Before you share that story about how troops were told the Iran War is for "Armageddon," read this

The narrative is dramatic. The sourcing is thin. And skepticism matters, especially on something this serious.

Friendly Atheist

WesDym 1d ago

The Stepford Veep believes he can predict the future -- despite already proving how very bad he is at that.

https://www.cnn.com/2026/03/04/politics/video/war-iran-donald-trump-mike-pence-kaitlan-collins-president-military-ayatollah

Mike Pence: History will record Trump ‘made the right call’ | CNN Politics

Former Vice President Mike Pence tells Kaitlan Collins he believes President Trump “made the right call” in his decision to go to war with Iran.

CNN