Matisyahu's Blog

I woke up this morning at 9:30 am and the weather was good enough that I was able to go for a brisk 9km walk. I came back home and felt refreshed, I then had a protein bar and an Up and Go for breakfast. I watched some news then had a shower and got ready for another day at work and to make things a little exciting I wore my Snoopy hoodie which kept me warm. I’m happy I didn’t have to go into the office because I would like to avoid getting sick too often this winter along with the fact that I don’t have to deal with the cold weather when I finish late at night then having to get the train home. At the end of the night for my last 15 minute break I had a cup of soup – something that is warm and tasty when I’m not in the mood for miso soup or a coffee.

To my surprise uBlock Origin Lite 2026.819.1210 was released and made available in the Chrome web extensions store within a few hours – maybe my constant whinging and whining on my blog has reached an n ivory tower somewhere in Google resulting in something being done (I wish I had that much influence over how the universe operates). I also had a check over on the Ubiquiti release page and they have made available a release candidate of UniFi OS 5.1.31 for Dream Routers – will be interesting to see whether we’ll see the final version released next week. Apple also made available a release candidate of 26.7 which is kind of unusual because there hasn’t been any beta releases they normally do before moving to a release candidate. The lack of a beta testing cycle is probably an indication that it is just compatibility for new devices along with low risk bug fixes that don’t need exhaustive testing.

I’ve been watching videos online about Trump and the MAGA movement and how it is gradually collapsing and although I’m not a fan of cancel culture and I wish to give people a second chance I do have my limits. It is difficult to ignore the fact that the for many of these people leaving Trump and MAGA it has less to do with having an epiphany and realising that Trump and his ideology of MAGA Is bad but instead leaving because bad things are happening to them. I’m sorry but it doesn’t make you a good person to leave Trump and MAGA only when bad things are happening to you but you were happy to allow bad things to happen to other people.

When it comes to politics my underlying philosophy is what guides me through life and informs me of the sort of politics I embrace. This is the reason why I advocate for things even if I don’t directly benefit for it – I’m not trying to play the moral high ground but holy heck the behaviour of Trump supporters and MAGA make me look good which demonstrates the fact that bar is so low that it is subterranean at this point.

This is why it is difficult to give former Trump supporters and MAGA a second chance because these are the same people who backed every political vibe from Reagan to Bush senior to George W Bush then to the Tea Party and now Trump/MAGA is the latest vibe they’ve jumped onto. How do we know it is all a vibe? because time and time again you see them being asked about substantive policy and all you get is a response like one of those toys where you pull the string and they blurt out a recorded line – “he’s going to make America great again” with a gormless smug express like someone convincing themself that it was their own original thought (when it clearly wasn’t).

When it comes to second chances, I generally want to see firstly the person is taking responsibility for their decision – no buck passing but taking ownership of what they did and understanding the harm they did to other people as being the reason why they changed and not just because of the problems that it caused for themselves. There also needs to be some self reflection and deconstructing their world view as to how they rationalised it to themselves. Then there is demonstrating contricion by doing your penance – repairing the damage you have done and through that process of confronting those who you’ve harmed it should hopefully result in a greater understanding of how your actions can negatively impact others.