Maritime feeling in the #Tulsa air today. A brisk, cool breeze, moist air but not muggy, is something I associate with the seashore, not landlocked Oklahoma.
Taking a walk in McClure Park and thinking that the paths, the channelization of Mill Creek, the stormwater basins that serve as soccer, softball, and tennis courts, must be over 30 years old now. They were built when I worked nearby and would bring lunch to the park.
In the '70s we would sometimes come to McClure Park to swim in their Olympic-length pool. It was the nearest public pool to far east #Tulsa. Sometimes we'd go a bit farther to the city pool on the west side of Claremore. We swam at the Blue Whale when it was open.
The old rec center was still home to basketball leagues in the '90s and it had a couple of racquetball courts too. Now it's entirely devoted to the Tulsa Glassblowing School.
The squirrels are too chubby or too focused on acorns to get away quickly.
I would drive thru Lee's Chicken, park under a shade tree, listen to Paul Harvey on KGGF, read the paper (before 1992), and sometimes nap. A few more McClure Park photos:
The back of the mid-century modern Rose Bowl, once a bowling alley on Route 66, now a ministry center.
Not remotely as scenic and historical as one of @Towler's West Country photo walks, but hope you enjoyed it just the same.
The heart of the dispute in Reform: Nigel Farage watched UKIP disintegrate after the referendum as leaders raised other issues in ways that made them look like a party of crackpots. He is terrified of going beyond the Overton window with the voters. 1/
Farage felt he needed a new, highly disciplined and focused single-issue party to carry the 2019 Euro elections and get Brexit done. It worked! Now he seems to believe deportations are too extreme for the voters. He also clearly does not want the party to appear anti-Islamic. 2/
Fatage does not want Reform to follow UKIP's path to irrelevance. I think those fears explain the aversion to Tommy Robinson and the reluctance to focus on grooming gangs, as well as his reluctance to yield any control over Reform's direction. 3/
The aim of Daylight Saving Time is a more reasonable distribution of daylight around work hours. 🧵
Most of us prefer to have as much daylight as possible after the work day is over, but enough before work/school so we're not driving in the dark, and kids aren't waiting for the school bus in the dark. Enough time for a brisk walk or a run as the sun is coming up.
I've spent a couple of Novembers in Queensland, which doesn't have DST. Australia has West, Central, and East timezones, but Oct - April, South Australia, NSW, ACT, & Tasmania go on DST, while Western Australia, Northern Territory, & Queensland remain on standard time.
From @SAICindyByrd @TulsaSchools audit: "Sixteen of the 40 bonus payments, totaling $221,000, were issued to Broad Center – Yale School of Management fellows. Only one of the 16 Broad alumni remains with the District." Kudos to @OklahomaDOGE (aka Tulsa Parents Voice)
TPS audit p. 25: "TPS hosted events... where Broad Cohorts from across the nation attended meetings in Tulsa.... Broad Cohorts participated in multiple sessions and programing which included a Child Equity Index Exercise, and an event titled 'DEI at Night.'"
TPS audit p.26: "During the two years the program was in existence prior to its approval through official legislation, the Teacher Corps participants did not meet statutory requirements for teaching in the classroom...."
@ConceptualJames The 1960s Warren Court dismantled the generic Protestantism that served as a kind of civic religion across America. The Left turned public education into a missionary endeavor to alienate children from their parents and their parents' values.
@ConceptualJames Around the same time, Hollywood and the music industry threw off any self-censorship, any sense of responsibility for the culture they were building. They preached the Sexual Revolution, not the self-control and continence that is required for a stable society.
@ConceptualJames Government's social safety net then became the non-judgmental enabler of all the social dysfunction hyped by pop culture. None of that is worth conserving.
🧵A #Tulsa mayoral questionnaire for @Monichols and #KarenKeith. I emailed it to their campaign and elected official email addresses, and I've posted it at BatesLine, but I'm posting it here to make sure it doesn't get missed.
@Monichols (Someone will have to let Karen know this is here, since she isn't on Twitter/X.)
My college fraternity used instant runoff voting (IRV aka alternative vote); it's straightforward. Australia has used IRV for a century in the House of Representatives & single-transferable vote (STV) for Senate elections. Ireland has STV for parliament & IRV for president.
In all these cases, the ballots are hand-counted in public.
Ranked-choice voting only specifies the manner of marking the ballots, but you also need to specify the manner of counting the ballots. Is the goal one winner with majority support? Use IRV. Is the aim proportional representation in a multi-member seat? Use STV.