iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 29/09/2026

Many places make recommenders answer several institution-specific questions rather than submitting a general-purpose letter of rec. Well does it work? Does it give them any extra information? No, never. I mean they somehow delude themselves into thinking it might, but…

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 22/09/2026

IBM 5155. It was “portable.” (Or, at 30lb, more accurately “luggable.”)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 06/09/2026

www.espn.com/college-foot...

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/09/2026

Today's amusement is providing a different answer to everyone who asks what is in the extremely long box I have outside my office. 1) Fishing pole.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 14/07/2026

I do enjoy adding a bit of poetry to my Concur expense reports--especially when I am subjected to the indignity of filing a full report (date, expense type, receipts, everything) for a charge that was reversed and nets to $0.00

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 11/07/2026

Yes, because of what those words mean.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

(Missed my screenshot of the ending of the opinion.)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

In several places, the opinion draws out the untenable implications of the alternative views.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

The opinion avoids interpretive alchemy. It asks us to read the plain text of the Constitution and take the words at face value. This is not hard! (In contrast, see Trump v. United States.)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

The opinion correctly conceptualizes the 14th Amendment's very purpose as being to end the conversation. As it mostly did for more than a century.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

The opinion correctly contextualizes the 14A as a repudiation for the Dred Scott decision, the Southern rebellion, and the racist logic they sought to instill.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/07/2026

First, the opinion, through and through, focuses on the 14th Amendment---not (as Kavanaugh would have had it) on a statute. This makes the opinion weightier and harder to overturn.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 01/04/2026

… But how is he going to reach a thoroughly considered opinion on the matter without both sides having a fulsome opportunity to present the merits of their positions??

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 28/03/2026

“House rejects” would make you think, you know, that the House voted on the proposal and it was defeated. But no. If it went to the floor, it would probably get 300 votes. This just seems to mean like 5 guys on the Rules Committee won’t bring it for a vote.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 21/02/2026

I just hope both teams have fun.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 18/11/2025

Careful, folks. ChatGPT appears to be daydreaming today.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 21/10/2025

And the award for journalistic understatement of the year goes to…

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

Neat! Here is a history of my relative, written by someone in the National Archives, many years ago.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 02/10/2025

AI tools helped me finish a replica of the regimental flag that my 3x great grandfather fought (and died) under during the Civil War. It's based on a photo of the deteriorated flag that I got from the New Jersey State Museum. I like how it came out! And what it symbolizes.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 01/09/2025

This is true, but the number of districts that are way out of whack is quite small. (See below.)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 26/08/2025

The surprising thing? It turns out that couples that last always select on the dependent variable.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 25/07/2025

Neat image from Gemini, when I asked it to generate an image for my Intro American course landing page--one that was sober, reflective, analytical, and philosophical. And having some Americana--but without being heavy-handed (with soaring eagles and so forth). (GPT did not deliver as well.)

Desk with feather pens, old documents, and a tablet.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 22/05/2025

If you count on the “deficit hawks” to disappoint you, you will never be disappointed.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 28/04/2025

Caveat emptor, I find GPT to be extremely obsequious toward me. Not sure what that says about me!

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 24/04/2025

Not a lawyer, but this actually seems like a pretty strong argument. (And insulated from Trumpian influence, by being a state rather than federal crime.)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 17/04/2025

like the highlighted passage. (Also a few typos, which in a way add their own charm.)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 16/04/2025

Experts on Rule 42 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure are about to be in high demand.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 04/04/2025

It's bad, but things can always be worse. One very plausible way things could quite quickly be *much* worse is if central bank independence were obliterated. (What politics is Powell, a Trump appointee, playing exactly?)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 03/04/2025

Funny what appeared in my feed right below your post.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 14/03/2025

I generally agree with MY that Dems had no cards to play. Point 16 is funny bc Sen Dems actually *can* do what House Dems did. You can vote yes on cloture and no on the bill. Or just not filibuster in the 1st place. I'm old enough to remember when a supermajority req was the exception not the rule.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 25/01/2025

Say what you want about the Times. But this story mentions the illegality in the first sentence of the second graf.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 25/01/2025

All the more dispiriting, boy is it hard to look at the right-hand column here and count to four.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 31/12/2024

The best one is 272 why are we even talking about this?

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 30/07/2024

This controversy is a rope-a-dope that Trump has savvily been playing since 2016. Any ambiguity about whether he respects democracy ended on 1/6/21. Why is this being treated like a live question? Trump benefits from such, since it means we are *not* talking about his v. unpopular policy proposals.

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 01/07/2024

You'll be relieved to learn that there is a plan. www.nytimes.com/2024/06/30/u...

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 27/06/2024

Seriously, the guy's name is Jefferson Davis? (Very unsettling set of developments.)

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 26/04/2024

Up is down. Left is right. Black is white. Or as Carmella Soprano would put it in a retort that I saw as a perfect expression of incredulity, "Would you listen to yourself?"

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Timothy Ryan @tjryan02.bsky.social · 01/12/2023

Majority party got rolled! 😲

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