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Cake day: June 11th, 2023

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  • I don’t know why everybody focuses so much on the top of the wing. Relative to ambient air, the pressure above the wing is slightly reduced, but the pressure below the wing is massively increased. That massive increase is far more important than the slight reduction above.

    We know this, because simple, flat airfoils are capable of flight. Think: paper airplanes, simple balsa models, etc.

    The shape of the airfoil is not actually very important for lift. You can make a brick produce plenty enough lift to maintain its altitude, if you can provide sufficient thrust and control it’s attitude.

    The specific shape of the airfoil is primarily important for minimizing drag across a variety of speeds and angles of attack at various loadings. This is where the top surface of the wing becomes important. By maintaining the flow over the wing, drag is reduced, and controllability is maintained.








  • even then you don’t need this recurring manual registration mess.

    There is no recurring manual registration. You only need to register once in your lifetime.

    If you move, you have to update your ID within 60 days, and every time you update your ID, they update your voter registration automatically. (unless you decline).

    That has been federal law since 1993, and is pretty much equivalent to European standards.

    You really have to go out of your way to not be registered to vote.


  • Just for another angle on the problem: baseload generation (nuclear) is most efficient at its highest possible output, but it has to maintain that output 24/7. It can’t ramp up and down fast enough to match the demand curve, and it can’t be ramped up above the minimum overnight demand.

    To increase its efficiency, utilities push large scale consumers like steel mills and aluminum smelters to overnight shifts. This artificially increases the overnight demand, allowing the baseload generators to ramp up their relatively efficient production. This reduces the need for less-efficient peaker plants during the day.

    That overnight demand can’t be met with solar, and wind generation tends to fall overnight as well.

    What nuclear can do is help level out seasonal variation, between the short days of winter and long days of summer. If you want to contemplate a truly pie-in-the-sky scenario, there are provisions for tying large ships, (like aircraft carriers and hospital ships) to shore power, and backfeeding the local grid to support disaster relief efforts.

    Imagine a fleet of nuclear generation ships, sailing to northern-hemisphere ports from November to April, and to southern-hemisphere ports from May to October.

    Pumped storage is also essential, but extraordinarily limited. We can probably run essential overnight loads on pumped storage, but it does not make sense to keep an overnight load on pumped-storage that can be shifted to solar/wind directly.

    We need to take a look at demand shaping rather than supply shaping. We need to shift load to times we can produce, rather than shift production to times of demand.


  • Rivalarrival@lemmy.todaytoMildly Infuriating@lemmy.worldGoddammit Texas!
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    1 month ago

    But it’s very difficult for a lot of people.

    It is, indeed, but the proper solution here is to lift them up to the bar, not lower the bar down to them.

    Lack of ID prevents you from getting and keeping a job, attending school, accessing the banking system, getting a PO box, getting licenses. Being unable to vote is the least of your problems.

    The proper solution is not to figure out how to make voting accessible to those without an ID. The proper solution is to get them an ID.


  • Yes, there are people who can’t obtain an ID card, for whatever reason. A European citizen who couldn’t obtain an ID card would have the exact same problems voting that an American citizen does. I don’t have a systemic solution for that. This would seem to be something that would need to be handled on a case-by-case basis, possibly involving the judicial system and a court order. It also doesn’t seem to be a particularly common problem. I’d bet all the money in my pockets that OP does, indeed, have some sort of ID card.

    We have a remedy for this: Provisional ballots. Cast your vote now, and resolve any clusterfuck with registration later.


  • Rivalarrival@lemmy.todaytoMildly Infuriating@lemmy.worldGoddammit Texas!
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    1 month ago

    That’s called privilege. You literally don’t realize what a burden it is for some people to comply with voter registration requirements, because your life is such that it’s easy for you.

    The “privilege” you are talking about is the exact same privilege the parent comment assumed:

    I just have to show up with my ID, doesn’t matter if it’s for the EU parliament or the local city senate.

    The “privilege” you are talking about is “having an ID card”. Every time you obtain, renew, replace, update, or otherwise contact the state bureau handling ID cards (usually, the DMV), they are required, under federal law, to update your voter registration unless you specifically decline.

    The European standard is “get an ID card, show up and vote”. We implemented the European standard back in 1993.


  • Rivalarrival@lemmy.todaytoMildly Infuriating@lemmy.worldGoddammit Texas!
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    1 month ago

    What I’m describing has been federal law for over 30 years. The European criticism about ID cards is nonsensical. Every time you obtain, renew, or amend your drivers license or ID, you update your voter registration.

    Remember the context of my comment: I am replying to European criticism of registration. The European approach is for everyone to obtain a government issued ID card and present it at the polling station. The NVRA already does this. We have already adopted the European solution to this problem.


  • Rivalarrival@lemmy.todaytoMildly Infuriating@lemmy.worldGoddammit Texas!
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    1 month ago

    It’s overblown. It’s mostly propaganda.

    I just have to show up with my ID

    My ID is good for 5 years, and I am required to update it within 60 days of changing residences. Every time I’ve renewed or updated it, they have asked me if I wanted to register or update my voter registration. My registration is updated every time I vote, and I don’t get de-registered unless I skip voting for about a decade straight, without re-registering when I renew my ID card.

    ALL of the problems with voter registration are about people who either can’t or won’t get or renew their ID card. Every time you read about voter registration issues in the US, you should imagine going to your polling station without a current ID card.