Being Trump this has to be a grift. Gotta point out that Vogtle Unit 4, also an AP1000, cost 34 billion to complete. Yeah, that's right. Trump's $17.5 billion buys a half of an AP1000. It's really good money for a grift, but chicken feed for building city-scale nuclear reactors.
Read an article in Wired that made me hopeful and sad. Said article discussed the Chinese building data centers under water, so need to suck up ground water for cooling. And the Chinese data centers will be powered by wind turbines. Iʻm happy that somebodyʻs thinking and doing things that are environmentally responsible but sad that itʻs not us.
I remember when my first cat brought me a dead mouse. I shrieked and (I was just a kid) got my mother to deal with it.The cat appeared very offended by my refusal of its gracious offer of lunch, but it turned out it was just cogitating in its little cat brain and coming up with the totally wrong answer. The next day it cornered a *live* mouse in my room and meowed for me to come eat it, since I clearly preferred them fresh. This time, my mother shrieked and made me deal with it. The cat was very confused when I released the mouse outside.
Nope, sorry, this plan is worse than is being pointed out. For a pretty elementary reason.
Let's take a set of skills in short supply - how many people in America do you think there are with experience in engineering, construction and project management of large scale nuclear reactors? - and ratchet up the demand for that same set of skills by sloppily planning to do not 1 major construction project, but 10 - simultaneously.
Cannot be done without importing a bunch of foreign labour with experience. Which this administration, and any subsequent MAGA America-First bullshittery administrations will be dead set against admitting publicly.
Small Nuclear Reactors. of the type used to power aircraft carriers, supply more than ample power for data centers. They can also be powered by on site sun, wind and hydro plants. All Data centers should produce their own independent power. Using the grid is idiotic
Or, we could make useless wasteful data centers illegal, do wind and solar farms anyway and use that to replace the fossil fuel we are burning supplying everyday needs of working people.
Behemoth reactors are outdated technology, However, Trump and most of Congress are just as outdated, and over half of the voting population are even further behind. Try pointing that out to Sen Cornpone and you just get slapped in the head with a Bible.
Fucking monster data centers are stupid. If the AI people knew shit about software, they could do it all on a laptop. Which has about a million times the compute power that put people on the moon. You can get 70,000,000,000 floating operations per second for $1000. Less if you buy DSPs
Maybe Trump's favorite Dumbocrat John Fetterman will push to have one of the new plants located in his home state at Three Mile Island. "What're the odds of lightning striking twice?", he asked. Of course, for marketing purposes they'll have to change the name. I modestly propose Six Finger Island.
OT: Can't stop wondering how Amy Boney Carrot explains her vote last week to her two adopted Haitian children. Especially given the ferocious dissent. Maybe she hasn't let them learn to read.
I did a substack today - I spent a couple of hours in a fine old formal garden in what used to be the fine old formal end of town. The gardens look great, the end of town, not so much. The colors are at their peak.
Thank you for sharing this. Jeff Sharlet has been shouting from the rooftops and firing warning flares for so long Netflix even made a documentary (back in the Before Times/2018).
This is why people are ignoring the DCCC and the establishment dems. The establishment dems and the DCCC will drive their trolley over anyone they think is in the way, but it we do our bit together we can pull up the rails.
In the vein of “not following the establishment”, I hope you’ve been following this discussion also —
In the spirit of cautious optimism - I would like to think that this thing that has come out in the comparative open, when it has stayed buried for years and has been unaddressable thereby, if we get it successfully wrangled with perhaps it will stay “wrangled” for long enough for the country (and, really, the world) to make some actual progress.
On the “what Black people don’t owe” subtopic Kenny raised – which always seems to raise hackles – I would like to also insert a couple of TILs that flip the script on what’s “owed” and to whom, bc I didn’t know the extent to which without the contributions of Black Congresspeople elected post-Reconstruction, public education as traditionally constructed in the United State would not exist
I'm really enjoying the joy and warmth that FIFA has has brought to the United States. I was not expecting the joy that all the teams and fans would bring to our benighted shores, but HOLY SHIT it's great to see friends in good spirits!
We're not all terrible here, and it's so, so heartening to see our awkward enthusiasm and hospitality on display, in spite of our shitty authoritarian assholes, and abysmal understanding of geography.
Being Trump this has to be a grift. Gotta point out that Vogtle Unit 4, also an AP1000, cost 34 billion to complete. Yeah, that's right. Trump's $17.5 billion buys a half of an AP1000. It's really good money for a grift, but chicken feed for building city-scale nuclear reactors.
Read an article in Wired that made me hopeful and sad. Said article discussed the Chinese building data centers under water, so need to suck up ground water for cooling. And the Chinese data centers will be powered by wind turbines. Iʻm happy that somebodyʻs thinking and doing things that are environmentally responsible but sad that itʻs not us.
I remember when my first cat brought me a dead mouse. I shrieked and (I was just a kid) got my mother to deal with it.The cat appeared very offended by my refusal of its gracious offer of lunch, but it turned out it was just cogitating in its little cat brain and coming up with the totally wrong answer. The next day it cornered a *live* mouse in my room and meowed for me to come eat it, since I clearly preferred them fresh. This time, my mother shrieked and made me deal with it. The cat was very confused when I released the mouse outside.
Nope, sorry, this plan is worse than is being pointed out. For a pretty elementary reason.
Let's take a set of skills in short supply - how many people in America do you think there are with experience in engineering, construction and project management of large scale nuclear reactors? - and ratchet up the demand for that same set of skills by sloppily planning to do not 1 major construction project, but 10 - simultaneously.
Cannot be done without importing a bunch of foreign labour with experience. Which this administration, and any subsequent MAGA America-First bullshittery administrations will be dead set against admitting publicly.
40,000 acres. That is over two and a half times the size of the island of Manhattan.....
half the size of the entire city of Las Vegas.
that is a honking big super computer.
Small Nuclear Reactors. of the type used to power aircraft carriers, supply more than ample power for data centers. They can also be powered by on site sun, wind and hydro plants. All Data centers should produce their own independent power. Using the grid is idiotic
Or, we could make useless wasteful data centers illegal, do wind and solar farms anyway and use that to replace the fossil fuel we are burning supplying everyday needs of working people.
Behemoth reactors are outdated technology, However, Trump and most of Congress are just as outdated, and over half of the voting population are even further behind. Try pointing that out to Sen Cornpone and you just get slapped in the head with a Bible.
Fucking monster data centers are stupid. If the AI people knew shit about software, they could do it all on a laptop. Which has about a million times the compute power that put people on the moon. You can get 70,000,000,000 floating operations per second for $1000. Less if you buy DSPs
They know all if that, Data centers are just immensely profitable both to build and operate not to mention obscene grifting potential
Maybe Trump's favorite Dumbocrat John Fetterman will push to have one of the new plants located in his home state at Three Mile Island. "What're the odds of lightning striking twice?", he asked. Of course, for marketing purposes they'll have to change the name. I modestly propose Six Finger Island.
"Blinky's Fish Hatchery and Nuclear Power Plant"
TMI is set to reopen to power Microsoft's data centers, in 2028. Gates is going into the nuclear power business He's also financing one in WY
OT: Can't stop wondering how Amy Boney Carrot explains her vote last week to her two adopted Haitian children. Especially given the ferocious dissent. Maybe she hasn't let them learn to read.
According to Cameco corp, a partner in Trump admin scheme for more nuclear power, to power Ai data centres, there is an $80b deal. Do we add the $17.5 B loans to this? https://www.cameco.com/media/news/united-states-government-brookfield-and-cameco-announce-transformational-partnership
I did a substack today - I spent a couple of hours in a fine old formal garden in what used to be the fine old formal end of town. The gardens look great, the end of town, not so much. The colors are at their peak.
You should go look !
https://brawlatthepoetscafe.substack.com/p/ive-sent-my-empty-pot-again-to-beg?r=insr&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Gotta go post this on the movie post, so everyone can see it this morning.
So beautiful. Those begonias!
OHJB calls Tangerini "a loser":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSdrUvJIoJc
That's a great speech. I wish he'd given it in 2024.
Jamelle Bouie thinks Elon Musk already knows he will go down as one of history's villains
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4nnoWLH2xs
Peter Thiel has moved to Argentina like a second-generation Nazi criminal and he is STILL sticking his dirty, sticky fingers in American pies
https://readsludge.com/2026/06/22/palantir-goes-on-a-democratic-lobbyist-hiring-spree/
Not great, guys
Brought to us by Jeff Sharlet
https://bsky.app/profile/jeffsharlet.bsky.social/post/3mpceqnncpk2b
Thank you for sharing this. Jeff Sharlet has been shouting from the rooftops and firing warning flares for so long Netflix even made a documentary (back in the Before Times/2018).
This is why people are ignoring the DCCC and the establishment dems. The establishment dems and the DCCC will drive their trolley over anyone they think is in the way, but it we do our bit together we can pull up the rails.
In the vein of “not following the establishment”, I hope you’ve been following this discussion also —
In the spirit of cautious optimism - I would like to think that this thing that has come out in the comparative open, when it has stayed buried for years and has been unaddressable thereby, if we get it successfully wrangled with perhaps it will stay “wrangled” for long enough for the country (and, really, the world) to make some actual progress.
The hot take, from JSC (replete with facts)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMnPqXkqLtY
The short take, from Kenny (also replete with facts)
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/UGDlddXY1x8
The “talking amongst ourselves” take from Rev Kiera, for those with ears to hear
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6eT9DH142VY
On the “what Black people don’t owe” subtopic Kenny raised – which always seems to raise hackles – I would like to also insert a couple of TILs that flip the script on what’s “owed” and to whom, bc I didn’t know the extent to which without the contributions of Black Congresspeople elected post-Reconstruction, public education as traditionally constructed in the United State would not exist
How Reconstruction Created Public Education
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/12/reconstruction-education-black-students-public-schools/675816/
Public Schools Were Not Inevitable
https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2023/11/reconstruction-public-schools/676015/
and I subscribe to the magazine
I'm really enjoying the joy and warmth that FIFA has has brought to the United States. I was not expecting the joy that all the teams and fans would bring to our benighted shores, but HOLY SHIT it's great to see friends in good spirits!
We're not all terrible here, and it's so, so heartening to see our awkward enthusiasm and hospitality on display, in spite of our shitty authoritarian assholes, and abysmal understanding of geography.