Congress And AI

I have made it clear that I do not use AI and in truth I do not trust it….I prefer to do my own research and formulate my findings in my own words.

AI has wormed it’s way into just about all aspects of our lives from colleges to medicine to science to reporting and now it has a foothold in Congress.

Artificial intelligence (AI) has quietly wormed its way into drafting American laws, and the people responsible for getting bills right say it’s creating a mess.

According to Politico, congressional staffers and outside advocacy groups are increasingly turning to chatbots like Claude and ChatGPT to write legislative text, forcing the House Office of Legislative Counsel (OLC) to clean up after them.

“AI is good for a lot of stuff,” Daniel Schuman, executive director of the American Governance Institute, explained before warning, “But it’s not capable of drafting legislation that you would want to enact into law.”

One person who advises congressional offices said the OLC now spends “more time trying to fix AI-drafted legislation than it would take for them to draft it from scratch,” noting AI models reportedly stumble over fine legal distinctions, such as whether funding should be structured as “a tax credit, deduction, exclusion or grant.”

According to one congressional staffer tasked with doing a deep read of the proposed legislation, lawmakers have no idea what is coming down the road due to errors and citations that won’t hold up to scrutiny when conflicts arise.

“It’s absolutely terrifying, and no one is thinking about it yet,” they predicted.

The risks aren’t hypothetical, Politico is reporting. Case in point: In June, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna’s (R-FL) office published an amendment summary that still contained the unedited chatbot phrase “Claude responded.” Luna acknowledged on X that “my staff used AI to correct a draft text and didn’t edit,” which raised alarms at the time.

Ari Hershowitz, a lawyer and technologist who has worked with the office to integrate tech tools into the legislative process, admitted that without checks, it’s “a guaranteed way of introducing thousands of bugs into our legal system.”

(rawstory.com)

Just another attempt to not do their jobs…..allow AI to write the bills and then more time with the high dollar donors.

This is what our political system has become….and I find it disgusting and pathetic.

Anything to add?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

8 Million And Counting

What is the scoreboard for you might question….this is just to let the world know what Donny and those slugs that are in his employ are doing to the health of this nation.

The unprecedented healthcare cuts that President Donald Trump and the Republican Party enacted last summer have impacted people in all 50 US states, stripping insurance coverage from around 8 million Americans total and wreaking havoc on hospitals and other providers nationwide.

The advocacy group Protect Our Care on Tuesday released state-by-state fact sheets detailing how many people have lost Medicaid, Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), and Affordable Care Act coverage due to Republican policy decisions, including the party’s roughly $900 billion in cuts to Medicaid and decision to let enhanced ACA subsidies expire, sending premiums skyrocketing.

“Eight million Americans have lost their health care because Donald Trump and Republicans decided they would rather hand out tax breaks to billionaires than protect working families,” said Brad Woodhouse, the president of Protect Our Care. “Every day that healthcare becomes more expensive, a family is forced to make an impossible choice between putting food on the table and staying covered, a senior is forced to ration their medication, and an expectant mother has to travel farther to access maternity care.”

(commondreams.org)

I still say let’s give Medicare For All (M4A)…..what have we to lose?

To be honest I want to give you an opposing view….this is from the website Reason….keep in mind their slogan is “Free Minds and Free Markets”….so with that in mind they are basically on the side of for profit healthcare…

“Free healthcare is cool,” comedian Shane Gillis recently said on The Joe Rogan Experience. “We should have that.”

“You should treat the entire country like it’s a community,” Rogan replied. “If you had a community, would you want the sickest person to fucking die who could be very valuable if you could take care of them, and do you have the resources to take care of them?”

While support for “free” healthcare in the United States is not new—Harry Truman campaigned on universal health insurance in 1948, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I–Vt.) has popularized the “Medicare For All” slogan in recent years—the policy has received renewed interest of late. The Democratic Socialists of America have made universal healthcare “at no cost to individuals” a key component of their party’s expensive platform.

But it is not just political hopefuls who like the idea of universal healthcare; academics seem to as well. A recent study by the Yale School of Public Health claims that single-payer universal healthcare would save more than 100,000 lives a year, and would supposedly cost $1 trillion less than the system it would replace. The study, which has not been peer-reviewed yet, appears to come to its conclusions by modeling a scenario that assumes cheaper pharmaceutical prices, less administrative overhead, reduced fraud, and fewer emergency visits.

…

The U.S. healthcare system has plenty of problems. While the promise of “free stuff” may sound tempting, the experience of countries with universal healthcare should make Americans deeply skeptical of the idea that putting the government in charge of the entire system is a panacea.

https://reason.com/2026/08/19/universal-healthcare-sounds-great-heres-whats-happening-in-countries-that-have-it/

The part about long waits for treatment….when I needed a gastro doctor it took me 14 weeks to get an appointment….we have those long waits, maybe not as stark as others but they are there.

If they are against M4A then how about giving Americans the same coverage as Congress people?  It is free and their waits are shorter and their drugs are mostly free….how about that for a solution?

In case there are those that still do not know what M4A is….let me help….here are the basics….

Medicare for All would transform the program into a single-payer health insurance program that would provide all Americans with healthcare coverage.

Single-payer healthcare systems, also called universal healthcare, are currently in place in various countries worldwide. These healthcare systems can have differing elements, such as:

  • how the health insurance is paid for
  • how the healthcare is delivered
  • how the health facilities are owned and operated

So yes I support M4A and will do so as long as I kind breathe on my own.

How about you?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Let’s Blame The “America Hating” Media

When things blow up in Donny’s face he turns to his stand-by excuse….blame the media….and so it is with the problems on the USS Lincoln….

Over the past week, Pentagon officials launched a broadside against reports of dire conditions on the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, which has been deployed in the Middle East for more than eight months.

Less than 24 hours after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth first criticized reporting about the Lincoln as “completely misrepresented,” a seemingly coordinated messaging campaign spread across the Pentagon’s social media apparatus. At least six senior Pentagon and Navy officials and spokespeople, along with official department accounts, published or amplified substantially similar attacks on the reporting across X and Facebook.

Recent reporting by Military Times and Stars and Stripes has drawn significant national attention to alarming conditions aboard the USS Abraham Lincoln, the flagship of Carrier Strike Group 3 operating under the U.S. 5th Fleet.

Reporting by Natalie Oliverio, a Navy veteran and award-winning journalist, documented concerns from service members and their families about suicide attempts, inadequate food, shortages of basic hygiene products, and deteriorating sanitation conditions aboard the carrier.

The concerns have since drawn coverage from CNN, NPR and other national news organizations.

U.S. Central Command subsequently placed Oliverio’s reporting prominently in an infographic declaring that “multiple media outlets have reported several false claims” about the Lincoln. While five other reports displayed in the graphic were labeled “FALSE,” Oliverio’s reporting was labeled “MISINFORMED.”

On Aug. 14, Hegseth accused the “reckless & shameless ‘American’ media” of “completely & intentionally” misrepresenting the situation on the Lincoln, later referring to “fake, America-hating news.”

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/uss-abraham-lincoln-news/

That is their answer to any facts that puts them in the spotlight…..Donny and the slime ball Pistol Pete care nothing for the men and women that service and protect this nation.

The only shame is what these fools are doing to our troops….they deserve better than the morons that run their lives and the suck ups that command them.

I believe the horror stories….do you?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Women In Danger

This is a post on something I read the other day about women serving in the US Army.

When I was in the Army, 1967-1970, women were clerks, nurses and other non-combatants but in today’s Army they can do anything a man can do.

There is lots of disturbing reports about what goes on in the military between men and women but this report is just plain horrific.

Twenty-three-year-old Sarah Roque had been in the Army for just over four years when a man fatally shot her in the head.

Roque wasn’t in a war zone, and the killer wasn’t an enemy combatant. It was Wooster Rancy, a fellow soldier stationed at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri, who had gone to Walmart for trash bags on the last day Roque was seen alive in October 2024. The Army found her body in a dumpster behind the barracks.

“Even now, I still can’t believe it,” her mother, Ana Roque, told The Intercept. “That murderers could exist in one of the supposedly safest places in the country.”

A first-of-its-kind analysis by The Intercept found that in the Army, women are more likely to be killed by their fellow service members than by enemy combatants, in a reversal of the threat soldiers are trained to face. Between 2011 and August 2025, at least 41 women died by homicide in the Army — more than half of them at the hands of other service members or veterans. Using Defense Department manpower data to calculate per capita death rates, The Intercept found that active-duty Army women face a higher risk of homicide than male soldiers, the opposite of national and global trends

In many cases, women in the Army are killed by current or former romantic partners. Over 70 percent of victims had an intimate relationship with the perpetrator at one point, and the rate of homicides among women soldiers from intimate partner violence is at least three times higher than the national average. In others, like Roque’s case, it’s unclear how male soldiers chose their victims.

 

Women in the Army Are More Likely to Be Killed by Fellow Soldiers Than Enemy Combatants

What is it that fuels these acts?

Is it the culture of violence the military brings?

Or is it just a sign of the times?

Please if there are any thoughts  come forth and share.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The “Dirt Bag” Wing

With all the success that the DSA is having in the elections the propaganda wing of MAGA pulls out all the stops to trash what is happening.

I want to say that I do not support this type of bullshit reporting I offer it up as FYI and to show just how far the MAGA machine will go to misinform the public.

Most of this is LIES.

 

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2026/aug/5/beware-dsa-dirtbag-wing-democratic-party/

 

This goes to illustrate just how much afraid of the current trend in voting.

Anything you would like to say?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

 

 

Nukes Next Door

I admit it I am an anti-nuke person….why make all that discharge when there are so many better ways to generate energy–wind, solar, tidal, etc–

I bring this up because that idiot Donny has signed a new nuke waste thing that could well effect my state of Mississippi.

The Trump administration has quietly narrowed its search for new nuclear waste sites to five states. The Energy Department on Tuesday said it has struck preliminary agreements with Utah, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Idaho to study whether they could host long-term storage facilities—so-called “Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campuses”—for spent nuclear fuel “in exchange for federal help developing nuclear energy,” per the AP. Energy Secretary Chris Wright said the five were picked from 28 applications from 26 states, reports the Hill.

  • Nuclear power has enjoyed bipartisan backing, but a permanent answer for high-level waste has eluded Washington for decades, with the long-planned Yucca Mountain site in Nevada stalled amid fierce local resistance. (Indeed, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto hailed the news by saying, “I am glad to see the Trump administration take a step toward acknowledging what Nevadans have known for years: Yucca Mountain is dead.”)
  • More than 95,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel and radioactive waste is currently stored at nuclear plants and former nuclear sites nationwide. “The new storage sites would move the radioactive material away from population centers, fault lines, and flood plains,” per the AP.
  • In addition to the waste sites, the campuses would handle uranium enrichment, spent-fuel reprocessing, and fuel fabrication, and may also host advanced reactor deployment, power generation, and data centers.
  • The Energy Department estimates the campuses could generate as much as $10 billion in state and local tax revenues.

“Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campuses”–seriously?  Put a pleasingly neutral name to something that could devastate–it is what politicians do.

Some of the waste has a half life of 200+ years….so the states will be saddled with this crap forever…..

I do not think this is a good idea for any state.  Here is a better idea…..screw nuclear, stop wasting money on something this dangerous and spend the money where it will do the most good–in wind, solar, tidal, etc.

Just a thought

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Restore Oil Flow Without Hormuz

The big deal these days is Donny and his delusional idea for the Strait of Hormuz but none of them will restore the flow of oil….is there answer to some sort of restoration?

This article covers the possibilities and god knows oil companies do not want to go without their money maker….

The largest global oil shock on record has catapulted U.S. gasoline prices above $4 a gallon, rekindled inflation and set the stage for November’s midterm elections.

It all traces to fighting in a narrow strip of water thousands of miles away. Iran’s near-closure of the Strait of Hormuz choked off a trade route responsible for about 20% of global oil supply, or nearly 21 million barrels of oil each day, according to the U.S. Energy Information Agency. A U.S. blockade of Iranian ships deepened the crude shortage.

On-again, off-again negotiations have shown little sign of a breakthrough, encouraging oil producers and Gulf nations to seek out other trade routes, some of which are already transporting millions of barrels each day.

Those alternatives, in theory, could eventually restore most of the lost oil flow and provide relief at the pump, some analysts told ABC News, but construction would take several years and require major investment. Still, they said, the approach may offer a durable fix, heading off future flareups in the Strait.

“You’ve already got some projects in the works. I don’t see any turning back,” Tom Seng, a professor of energy finance at Texas Christian University, told ABC News. “Nobody wants to get stung without a solution again.”

Shipping traffic in the Strait has declined sharply since the outbreak of war in Iran, according to oil data company Kpler. An average of about 13 ships crossed the Strait each day last week, the firm said in a post on X, down from more than 100 ships per day before the recent conflict.

https://abcnews.com/Business/gas-prices-fall-companies-build-oil-routes-bypass/story

The pipeline idea is a fanciful one….it will go through some unstable areas to make it to market….and then how will they secure the pipeline from attacks that will stymie oil flow?

Let me guess….the US military will provide security for these operations, right?

I think this is a bad idea….and if instigated would come back to bite us in the ass.

What do you guys think of this ‘plan’?

On a side note….there is talk of after the war with Iran that US would draw down its presence in the region….

The US military is considering reducing its military presence in the Persian Gulf, The Washington Post reported on Tuesday, as many of its bases in the region have been badly damaged by Iranian attacks.

Many of the US bases in the Gulf had been evacuated before the US and Israel launched the bombing campaign against Iran on February 28 due to their vulnerability, and some have been essentially abandoned following heavy Iranian attacks.

The Post report said that the damage to US bases in the Gulf has “prompted a once-in-a-generation chance for the Pentagon to reconsider its presence in the region” and that the Pentagon had already signaled it may not rebuild its Gulf bases to how they were before.

Sources told the paper that Adm. Brad Cooper, the head of US Central Command (CENTCOM), has been involved in discussions about the future of the US military presence in the region and supports holding deliberations on potentially moving troops west from the Persian Gulf.

Notably, a pullback of US troops from the Persian Gulf has been one of Iran’s conditions for a deal to end the conflict. Iranian officials have frequently said that they believe this war will lead to a US “retreat” from the region.

(antiwar.com)

Does anyone think oil companies will allow this to take place?

I don’t.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Just Can’t Fix Stupid

As you already know I like using that term….can’t fix stupid at lot….but according to some there is more than one type of stupid.

Here is that breakdown for you….the 5 laws of stupid….

The most dangerous person in the room may not be the greediest, cruelest, or mentally wackiest. It’s the stupid people you always have to watch out for.

A selfish person usually wants something. Find the incentive, and you can often predict the behavior. The more dangerous person harms others without helping themselves — and may even suffer alongside their victims.

That’s one of the hallmarks of stupidity, as outlined in The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity, a satirical essay written in 1976 by economic historian Carlo M. Cipolla. He did not define stupidity through IQ, low education, or ignorance. He defined it through outcomes: Who gained, who lost, and whether the damage served any purpose.

Cipolla did not present these as literal scientific “laws”. He used satire and a simple payoff model to make a serious point: intelligence, education, and status do not prevent people from making decisions that harm both themselves and others. In his framework, stupidity is not a fixed trait. It is a pattern of behavior defined by its consequences.

–onto Law number one–

https://www.zmescience.com/science/news-science/5-laws-of-stupidity/

I believe that Number 5 is the most profound.

The current admin is proving #5 is spot on.

Anything to add?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Want To Save Lives?

If so then Medicare For All would be the road to travel….I have been a supporter of the idea since its inception….and now a new study has shown just how effective it could be….

Previous research has shown that shifting the United States to a Medicare for All system could save roughly 68,000 lives and $650 billion per year, but a new study by experts at Yale University suggests the savings would likely be even greater on both fronts.

In a Tuesday statement, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), lead sponsor of the Medicare for All Act in the Senate, highlighted the findings, published recently on medRxiv, a server for preprints, or research that hasn’t yet been peer reviewed.

…

“We estimate that such a system would reduce national health expenditure by $1,041 billion annually,” they explained. “Sources of savings include reductions in administrative overhead, pharmaceutical prices, fraudulent billing, and avoidable emergency care. Combined with the reversal of recent retractions, universal coverage would save over 114,000 lives annually.”

Specifically, as Sanders’ office detailed in a statement, Americans would save:

  • $377.5 billion by paying no more than other major countries for prescription drugs;
  • $286.3 billion by eliminating bureaucracy and waste;
  • $285.7 billion by curbing fraudulent billing;
  • $100 billion by preventing costly emergency room and hospital visits; and
  • $295.6 billion by reimbursing providers fairly for the care they provide.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/medicare-for-all-savings

I would say that is good news, right?

But not to worry….health insurance and other corporate donors will be fighting hard to defeat any chance of M4A having any success…

The investigative outlet Sludge published an analysis on Monday showing that the health insurance industry is among the corporate donors to Third Way, a think tank that is reportedly preparing to pour $15 million into an effort to combat the rise of candidates who support Medicare for All and other progressive policies.

Third Way, which has long been hostile to the progressive wing of the Democratic Party and Medicare for All in particular, does not publicly disclose its donors. But Sludge’s David Moore uncovered some of the group’s benefactors by examining corporate tax filings, which revealed that the private insurance industry group Better Solutions for Healthcare (BSFH) donated $50,000 to Third Way’s advocacy arm in 2024.

Among BSFH’s members are the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association and the health insurance industry trade group AHIP. Moore noted that BSFH is “run out of the offices of leading Republican digital and strategy firm Targeted Victory in Arlington” and was founded by GOP operative Alexander Schriver.

Sludge’s review of corporate tax filings showed other healthcare industry donors to Third Way, including CVS Health and Johnson & Johnson.

“Another corporate lobbying heavyweight, the Business Roundtable (BRT), gave $50,000 to Third Way in 2024, up from the $25,000 it gave in 2023 and down from the $75,000 it gave in 2022,” Moore reported. “Each year in 2019, 2020, and 2021, BRT gave $50,000 to Third Way. The CEO group’s health insurance members include the heads of UnitedHealth, Cigna, Elevance (formerly Anthem), CVS Health—all members of AHIP (formerly America’s Health Insurance Plans), save for UnitedHealth—as well as healthcare company Centene and many Big Pharma firms like Johnson & Johnson.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/third-way-medicare-for-all

Again not to worry the chance of getting good healthcare is small because the Congress is owned by the people that are fighting this attempt.

This is a little something for you to mull over while enjoying your morning coffee…..

Your medical records are private, right?  But for how long?

You might assume that what you tell a doctor stays between you, your physician and perhaps your insurer. But the reality is more complicated.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, the federal privacy law that governs health information and is commonly known as HIPAA, is narrower than its reputation suggests. It regulates hospitals, physicians, insurers and their business associates, but not the health data you generate everywhere else: not the period-tracking application on your phone, the internet search you ran about a diagnosis, the DNA you mailed to a genealogy company or the wearable that counts your heartbeats.

Even the records HIPAA does cover can be shared, sold or handed to the government in ways that might surprise you.

This gap in protection matters more than ever because the U.S. government is pushing hard to gather health data domestically and abroad. This is happening even as a growing body of research shows that the safeguard which these efforts to collect data lean on – anonymizing data by removing identifying information to make it difficult to trace back to an individual – is far weaker than officials claim.

https://theconversation.com/us-government-is-pushing-to-gain-unprecedented-access-to-your-medical-records-as-data-protections-are-weakening-287021

Americans need to wake up and smell the manure in the road.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

SCOTUS In The Crosshairs?

One can hope….but do not hold your breath.

Most of us see that the Supreme Court has become just an extension of far Right politics…..they are political hacks….and now the Dems step up and want to do something to correct the deficiency in the Court.

Democrats aren’t just venting about the Supreme Court’s conservative majority—they’re putting a menu of structural changes on the table. As Julian Mark reports in the Washington Post, recent bills from congressional Democrats would expand the court from nine to 13 justices, cap terms at 18 years, impose a binding ethics code, and rein in the court’s fast-moving “shadow docket.” The push—the story describes it as being at a “fever pitch”—comes after a string of major conservative rulings on voting rights, campaign finance, abortion, and presidential power, and amid polling that shows historically low public approval of the court.

Republicans and conservative legal advocates say the campaign is really about punishing a court that’s handing down decisions the left dislikes, and they argue the proposals are aimed at pressuring justices, not fixing legal flaws. Even Democrats acknowledge that most of these bills are going nowhere unless their party secures firm control of Congress and then scraps the filibuster, a combo seen as highly unlikely. The Post also spotlights legal scholars who warn that some reforms could further politicize the court—and float alternative ideas like a “balanced bench,” with an equal number of justices chosen by Democrats and Republicans.

Read the full story.

Seriously?

What are the chances of any of this actually happening?

This is a typical move by the Dems….an election approaches and they hit on an issue they think will sway voters….I think they are farting in the wind.

There has been lots of ‘ideas’ on how the Court can be fixed all depending on the Dems gaining control of the Congress….and when and if they do what do you suppose will happen?

Being the opinionated SOB that I am I have written about reforms….

Can SCOTUS Be Fixed?

Yes the Court needs a major overhaul…..yes term limits are needed….age restrictions needed….more justices are needed….etc…..but will these ‘reforms’ actually make the Court a more ethical organization?

I think it is a wonderful idea…..but also think that it is a waste of time at this point in our history.

Why am I crapping on the Dems?

I posted this on my other blog, Daily Agitator, and it is very much right on point with what I think about the Dems and their ideas….

Great Ideas But Sucky Execution

I do not see a future for this issue.

Anything you would like to add?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”