My Jimmy Carter Story

So the POTUS had a directive and you and other members of the DeepState sabotaged it. Interesting.

Shooting (rattle)snakes with a pistol isn't always easy lol You really kinda need a headshot because body shots don't usually seal the deal. Snakeshot helps but it's pretty rare to have handy/already loaded when you need it--which means you end up firing multiple times until you Know it's dead 😀

Doesn't the implementation in the field have something to do with it, too, though? Instead of simply switching off the heating like headless goons, whoever was in charge of the implementation could have realized some refitting had to be done for the heating system to meet the required maximum temperature, while maintaining an acceptable minimal temperature?

This make much more sense. Our home is a constant 65° and very comfortable.

The reason he bizarrely supported them was that they were out of power (so done genociding) and feebly trying to fight the new Vietnam-installed Cambodian government. He did this to maintain relations with the Chinese, who hated the Vietnamese, though there was probably also US resentment of the Vietnamese for defeating them. The Reagan administration (along with the Thatcher government in Britain) was bigger on support for the Khmer Rouge, but that still didn't get anyone anywhere.

Idk, “no one could work” still sounds suspect when it’s federal employees claiming it.

Remember, this was back in the 1970s. At that time, a lot of people at Census, and this includes myself, worked very hard.

However, when I left the Census Bureau at the end of 1981, I never looked back. And some of the things I learned when working in Statistical Methods Division found their way into my gambling theory work. See the chapters on non-self-weighting strategies in my Gambling Theory book for an example.

We get it... you were basically throwing shade at an honorable man, someone who is probably more moral and just than all of us combined in here, shortly after his death.

Well played... very well played.

You sound like Elon.

Yeah, and the zoomers will be saying this 50 years from now.

Carter should have just fired the whole Census Bureau.

ChatGPT prompt: generate a fun story about a federal employee working during the carter administration

Title: "The Case of the Missing File"

It was 1978, and Sarah Jenkins was a diligent, if somewhat overlooked, federal employee working at the Department of Energy in Washington, D.C. The Carter Administration was in full swing, and as the country navigated a period of economic challenges and energy crises, Sarah’s job — buried in the labyrinthine corridors of the Energy Policy Division — was to manage a mountain of paperwork. Most people would have found it mundane, but Sarah had a knack for making it interesting. She was a lover of puzzles, and if you’ve ever worked in a bureaucracy, you know that navigating red tape and obscure regulations is the ultimate intellectual challenge.

One crisp autumn morning, Sarah was sipping a cup of coffee at her desk when her boss, Mr. Wheeler, a stout, no-nonsense type with a perpetually furrowed brow, strode into the room holding a yellowed manila folder. His glasses perched on the tip of his nose, he looked like he was on a mission. Sarah immediately knew something was off.

"Jenkins," he said, not bothering to sit. "We’ve got a bit of a situation."

She raised an eyebrow. "A situation?"

"The energy policy review for the Southern states," he said with a sigh. "The file’s gone missing."

Sarah set down her coffee. Missing? Files didn’t just go missing in a federal office. They were either buried in the endless stacks of paperwork or languishing on a desk somewhere under a pile of memos, but they did not disappear. At least, that’s what Sarah had believed until now.

"Who had it last?" Sarah asked, her mind already flipping through the mental index of her coworkers.

"That’s the thing," Mr. Wheeler said, tapping the folder. "It was on my desk last week. I remember it clearly. But now? Poof. Vanished."

"Have you checked under your desk?" Sarah asked, only half-joking. It was common knowledge that Mr. Wheeler’s desk was a notorious black hole for important documents. He would deny it, of course, but everyone knew he was more likely to find a pen than a report.

"I’ve checked every corner of this office, Jenkins. It's not there."

Sarah rolled up her sleeves. "Alright, I'll find it."

The first stop was the office of Charlie Jackson, the department’s resident archivist, who had a reputation for being an eccentric genius when it came to organizing files. He was hunched over a massive filing cabinet, muttering to himself in a way that could’ve been mistaken for madness.

“Charlie,” Sarah said, knocking on the doorframe.

He turned, his wild hair sticking out from under a faded Carter campaign cap. "Ah, Jenkins! Just the person I wanted to see. Have you heard? The solar panel initiative—Carter’s solar panels, you know? We’re going to have to file all the memos from the Cabinet on that. It’ll be a lifetime project."

"Yeah, but Charlie, I'm kind of in the middle of a case right now. Have you seen a missing file—energy policy review for the South?"

Charlie stroked his chin. "Hmm, no... but you know, the real question is why anyone even needs paper anymore. All this stuff... it’s just going to get shredded in the end, anyway."

Sarah couldn’t help but smile at his typical ramblings. "I know, Charlie. But right now, this file is important."

Charlie nodded sagely and pointed to a dusty stack of papers in the corner. “Could be in there. Or under the chair. I swear, the files have a mind of their own around here.”

With a roll of her eyes, Sarah sifted through the papers, but there was no sign of the missing document. She thanked Charlie, who was already deep into a passionate discussion about wind energy, and continued on her quest.

Hours passed, and Sarah's search grew more desperate. She had checked every filing cabinet, every closet, and even the break room (where no file in its right mind would ever willingly go). It was as if the file had vanished into thin air.

Then, just as she was about to give up, she remembered something. Mr. Wheeler had mentioned that the last time he had seen the file, it was on his desk—which could only mean one thing: someone had taken it. But who?

Her suspicions were confirmed when she found a peculiar sight in the office of Jennifer Lyle, a senior analyst who had a reputation for doing whatever it took to get ahead in the department. The file in question was neatly tucked under a pile of reports on Jennifer's desk, right next to her phone, where it had been hiding in plain sight.

"Jennifer," Sarah said, her voice laced with amusement. "What's this?"

Jennifer looked up with a feigned expression of surprise. "Oh! That? It must’ve been an accident. I... must’ve grabbed it by mistake."

Sarah didn’t buy it. "I’m sure you did. You know, Mr. Wheeler’s been looking for that everywhere. He's a bit upset."

Jennifer’s face faltered, but she quickly recovered. "Well, I’m sure it’s all fine now. I’ll just... return it."

As Jennifer handed over the file, Sarah felt a mix of relief and amusement. The "missing" file had been nothing more than a game of misplaced priorities, the kind of thing that always seemed to happen in the federal world.

By the time Sarah returned the file to Mr. Wheeler, the workday was nearly over. He looked up at her with a weary, but grateful smile. "Well, Jenkins, I don’t know how you did it, but I’m glad the file’s back. Maybe next time I should start locking things up."

Sarah chuckled. "Maybe. Or you could just keep it on your desk, where it belongs."

Mr. Wheeler gave her a look. "I’ll consider it. But for now, good job. You’ve saved the day."

Sarah smiled as she walked back to her desk, ready to tackle her next mountain of paperwork. For all the chaos of the Carter Administration, one thing was certain: in the federal government, you never knew what would happen next — or where the next file might disappear to.

And, for Sarah Jenkins, that was the best part of the job.

In 1979, President Jimmy Carter found himself in what might be the most bizarre wildlife encounter ever faced by a sitting U.S. president. While enjoying a quiet fishing trip near his home in Georgia, Carter spotted a rabbit swimming, yes, swimming toward his boat with what he later described as “beady, aggressive eyes.” This was no ordinary bunny; this was a determined, waterborne menace.

As it frantically paddled closer, Carter, caught off guard by the unexpected amphibious assault, grabbed a paddle and shooed it away. The rabbit, perhaps realizing it had challenged the leader of the free world, wisely retreated.

The real hilarity, however, came when Carter’s team mentioned the encounter to the press. Skeptical reporters couldn't believe a rabbit would swim toward a human with hostile intent, so the White House released a grainy photo of Carter, mid-paddle defense, as proof. The media, naturally, had a field day, dubbing it the “Killer Rabbit Incident.”

Political cartoonists had a blast portraying Carter as a warrior against deranged wildlife, and critics even spun it as a metaphor for his presidency, fending off relentless, ridiculous problems with limited tools. It remains one of the most wonderfully absurd footnotes in American presidential history.

?

Computers reduced the workload of census taking and statistics. It's one of the first projects computers were productively used at.

When I was working in my father's company, his 50-50 partner was stingy (and jewish, although he never appreciated my remarks about how he played to the stereotype), he was the austere half of the duo, my father would say yes to purchases and he would say no.

There's stories about how he would be negotiating for stuff like paper, and there was someone as stubborn on the other side, and the deadlock went on for days. Until it had come down to cents, and one of the secretaries that had been relaying messages outbursted that she would put in the difference herself to end it.

After gaining a bit of trust, I slowly started transitioning from being the target of these austerity measures, into being an accomplice of them, probably after his children showed disinterest in the business and considering how I might eventually inherit the business, he opened up on his strategies.

"It's not about just the money you save, it's about the message you send"

And I noticed that in myself and others, "if the company is in such a tight spot that it has to save on pens" I had thought", then I should surely be very weary of how I spend money on other stuff like mouses and keyboards (I was in charge of IT). I internalized the role and said no to employee requests on new hardware.

Still I never was fully exempt from the austerity measures, or let "in" on the management club, but someone immediately beneath him in the command line confided in me, let me in on "the secret" even more. There had been some server issue and I was looking at very cheap ways to solve it, replacing a broken component with off brand, used, or outlet components. She immediately knew where I was coming from "Sometimes he likes to paint the picture that there's no money", she ended up getting approved to buy a whole new server, probably on account that it was actually necessary and that she had (fervently) negotiated a preapproved budget of her own discretion.

I didn't ever do the calculations of how many pens the server cost, or know exactly what her budget was, but I did know know what the income and expenses was just by talking with my father, and it was a lot of pens.

You know the saying "take care of the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves."? in orgs it's not like the pennies take care of themselves, it's the employees who are trained to take care of them. And after they have been brainwashed enough, they will let the company fall to pieces until a more rebellious two faced middle manager has the political awareness to break into the heater room, and maintain the balance.