They did this because they knew that Congress isn’t always in session & a president surrounded by sycophants would be a danger to the Republic. GOP Senators rolling over & confirming unqualified & dangerous nominees like Kennedy, Gabbard, & Hegseth are betraying their Constitutional obligations. /2

And it is now ridiculously easy to order whatever you want and have it delivered to your door. DoorDash/Grub Hub During Covid a restaurant’s survival meant delivery & customers came to love the convenience. It’s why we order out at least once a week. It’s the night no one complains about dinner.

In my early 20s a typical meal for me was a box of generic rice-a-roni served over a bed of crumbled generic crackers. It was $0.75 per meal. That’s roughly a $1.75 today. There was a variety flavors & boy was it filling.

We have a family of four. Ordering dinner out, which we do at least once a week, costs as much as a week’s worth of groceries. Unless all you do is order bad pizza, it ain’t cheaper to order out.

Think about how long that lap portion of the belt would be if not stretched around the lap. You can buckle it and just let the buckle flop down on the side of the seat. No need to sit on it.

I think those things go hand in hand. In the 1960s over 40% of Americans smoked. It’s now less than 12%. Smoking bans & public information campaigns absolutely played a major role in that decline over time because they resulted in people having a better understanding of the danger.

By 1997, seatbelt use was at 72% and kept rising to 90% by 2017. There's really no question but that the laws and the aggressive ad campaigns were the reasons that people began to wear seat belt. Disabling the beep was a simple matter of buckling the seat belt, but not wearing it. /2

The warning bells appeared in 1972. By 1984 only 14% of folks used their seatbelt. That year, New York became the first state mandate that occupants wear belts. In 1985, use grew to 21%. By 1992, 62% wore belts. In 1993, the NHTSA launched Click-It or Ticket & in 1995 all states mandated it. /1

Republicans raised holly hell over the breach of regular order and the refusal to close the vote. Everyone supports a "return to regular order" until regular order undermines their plans and path to victory. /2

Second Skin

Essentially, publishers no longer want to be responsible for promoting the the stuff they publish. As self-publishing becomes easier & easier, folks w/ a following will just bypass the publishing houses. So these folks are making themselves obsolete.