Brenden Beck

A.I. Isn't People How many Reddit posts does it take to learn to read?

The @rusty.todayintabs.com essay about the New Yorker essay about AI is good: todayintabs.com/p/a-i-isn-t-people

How the City’s Mental Health System Failed Jabez Chakraborty In the weeks before their son was shot by NYPD officers, the Chakraborty family did everything they could to get him treatment. They were forsaken at every turn.

Such a sad story. If NYC hospitals and mental health services had the capacity, it would have avoided a police shooting.
thecity.nyc/2026/02/23/police-mental-health-system-failed-jabez-chakraborty

Why do I have to pretend that I'm going to print something in order to save it as a PDF. Why do I have to engage in a little ruse.

I imagine it was extremely disturbing

Maybe it's time for me to pay up

Thanks!

Thanks. Claude code or regular Claude? I haven't found regular Claude to be any better than Gemini, and I alas do know know enough programming to use CC.

. The geoid Precision Problem (Critical) In your 2000 and 1990 blocks, you use: destring strgeoid, gen(geoid) The Problem: Stata's default numeric type is float. An 11-digit GEOID (e.g., 36001300100) is too large for a float to hold precisely; it will round the last few digits, turning different tracts into the same number.

float specifies that any new numeric variables be created initially as type float. The default is type double; see [D] Data types. destring attempts automatically to compress each new numeric variable after creation.

I am having Google Gemini double check some of my syntax for a data management project, and maybe Claude Code or the premium versions of these LLMs are great, but Gemini is making mistakes. Here it is telling me Stata's default variable type is float when the Stata documentation says the opposite.

There's a great new report out from @prisonpolicy.org tracking changes in criminal justice system spending. More money for policing and immigration enforcement, less for prisons and courts since 2017. @jkangbrown.bsky.social www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/mone...

This new dataset could be great for studies of suburbanization or gentrification.

The US immigrant population generated more in taxes than they received in benefits from all levels of government every year from 1994 to 2023.

The Cato study provides the first-ever 30-year analysis of the fiscal effects of immigration on government budgets.

https://ow.ly/jy8a50Y8kM3

Take me down to the Parallax city where the far moves slow and the near moves quickly

The amount of money the US government spent on troops in DC in 2025 ($223m) would have been enough to give the city's ~5,100 homeless residents each $43,000. Instead, federal troops destroyed their meager encampments.

It’s genuinely wild that the United States spent decades building an elaborate rules-based international order which de facto cemented its permanent status as the dominant global hegemon, sustained by ideology rather than might, and now is just blowing it all up for literally no reason

Blue Power cover, with blue and red letters for title, and phalanx of police with backs turned to viewer, walking away

Hey folks, you can preorder my new book Blue Power: How Police Organized to Protect and Serve Themselves at a 25% discount right now from @basicbooksgroup.bsky.social: www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/stuar... (and it's also discounted at bookshop.org, if you prefer that!). Published in April!

Supreme Court Increasingly Favors the Rich, Economists Say

A new study found that the court’s Republican appointees voted for the wealthier side in cases 70 percent of the time in 2022, up from 45 percent in 1953. Via @adamliptak.bsky.social

www.nytimes.com/2026/01/05/u...

Opinion | The Way to Pay for Free Buses Is to End Free Parking Free buses would be transformative not only for riders, but for the ecosystem of the city as a whole.

“Pairing free buses with paid parking says we value people in motion more than cars at rest,” writes Nicolas Rohatyn.

that the Whos celebrate Christmas suggests some knowledge of Christ, but whether this is our anthropic Christ or a distinctive Who-Christ remains obscure; some have argued Christianity was introduced to them during their refuge with Horton, which of course turns us to the matter of Elephant Religion

insanely good thing to say when you enter a room

Traffic enforcement camera in New York City. Stock photo.

Automated speed cameras, which detect and fine speeding motorists, reduced total collisions by around 30% and injuries by around 16%, on average, within 900 feet of intersections in the first 7 months of deployment in New York City. In PNAS: https://ow.ly/CHq550XHyla

Line graphic showing increasing ICE arrests using government data processed by the Deportation Data Project and analyzed by the Prison Policy Initiative. Throughout 2025, local jails were sites of escalating ICE arrests. Jails collaborating with ICE are still enabling many more arrests than before, even as ICE arrests have spiked in courts, homes, streets, and workplaces in late January, late May, and September.

From @prisonpolicy.org: New analysis of government data from ICE via the Deportation Data Project shows federal agents reliant on local jails and police to reach their arrest numbers.

After NYC installed 2,000 speed cameras, crashes fell 30% and injuries 16%.

doi.org/10.1073/pnas...

Do those pesky speed cameras work? New research from me, @astagoff.bsky.social, and @jbenmenachem.com finds they reduce collisions and injuries. Read thread or article for more. DM me for article if you can't scale the paywall.

NJ leaders who hated on congestion pricing notably silent on PATH fare hikes The PATH fare is set to rise from $3 to $4 over the next four years.

“The contrasting responses serve as a reminder of car culture’s dominance in the Garden State. An estimated 92,000 drivers entered the congestion zone from New Jersey every day,... That’s less than half the daily ridership on the PATH train.” gothamist.com/news/nj-lead...

AirBnB implies the existence of EarthBnB, WaterBnB, and FireBnB.

This is great! Will be showing to my research methods students.

Any public safety benefits of increased policing are often short lived.

Tuesday’s episode of The Daily about automation at Amazon included the line: “At its core, Amazon’s reason for being isn’t as an employer, it is a customer-centric company.” Incorrect! Amazon does not exist to serve consumers *or* workers, it exists to create value for its shareholders.

As the face of the “progressive prosecutor” movement steamrolls to a 3rd term, let me be the millionth person to note that when that movement loses elections it’s billed in national media as a crisis for the left, while the movement’s high points, of which there have been many, are largely ignored.

Flying Squirrel Loves It Every Time

Flying Squirrel Loves It Every Time