Millionaires’ Tax $$$: After that 24-hour debate in the House this week, the Washington Senate gave the millionaires’ tax its final stamp of approval and sent it to Gov. Bob Ferguson for signature. He’s expected to sign. The 9.9 percent tax on income of more than $1 million per year would raise about $3-4 billion annually to fund schools and other state services. 

Trading Health for Healthcare: A third of Americans are skipping meals, stretching drug prescriptions, delaying education, putting off surgery and postponing vacations to pay their medical bills, according to two Gallup polls. All of these trade-offs can lead to a decline in physical and mental health.

Wind: High winds hit Western Washington last night. Seattle saw 45 mph gusts, which picked up to 60 mph in lowlands. Speeds peaked at Alpental Summit (124 mph) and Snoqualmie Pass (134 mph). One person died east of Monroe when a tree fell onto their vehicle. About 120,000 people lost power, and as of this morning, 30,000 still don’t have it. 

Talk About Waste, Fraud and Abuse: Remember when former Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem spent $220 million of our money on her weird cowgirl ad campaign encouraging immigrants to self-deport? So that budget surpassed several Best Picture nominees: Marty Supreme ($140-175 million), One Battle After Another ($200 million), and Frankenstein (about $120 million). Not F1, though. That movie spent $350 million (Brad Pitt is more in demand than Noem).

‘Try Being an Influencer For a Day’: Earlier this year, the state House declined to give press passes to conservative influencers Brandi Kruse, Jonathan Choe and radio host Ari Hoffman, saying they were activists and not real journalists. The trio asked the court for a temporary restraining order to force the House to give them passes, but on Tuesday, they lost their case.

No Medicaid for Trans Care in WV: The 4th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld West Virginia’s ban on Medicaid coverage for gender-affirming surgeries, overturning a district judge’s decision that the ban violated anti-discrimination protections. The 4th Circuit ruled that the law relates to procedures, not individuals, and therefore does not discriminate against transgender people. Riiiiiight.

MTG’s Replacement: The race to replace former Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene has advanced to an April 7 runoff between Republican Clay Fuller and Democrat Shawn Harris. Fuller is a district attorney and a pro-mass deportation, tough-on-crime, constitutional conservative. Harris, a former Marine and cattle producer, wants a farm bill, a stop to Medicaid cuts, and a “tough but compassionate immigration policy.” 

Domestic Workers Bill of Rights: Gov. Ferguson signed the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights on Monday, giving nannies, housekeepers, gardeners and other domestic workers new rights and protections.  Employers will have to pay a minimum wage and overtime, give advance notice of termination, and draft written agreements that state terms of employment. Workers will be able to file labor claims to the Department of Labor and Industries.

Sexual Abuse at Skykomish Schools: The Skykomish School District closed all its schools this week after a gym teacher was accused of abusing a student for nearly two years, mostly on school property. The teacher, Daniel Bubar, 62, was charged Wednesday with second- and third-degree rape of a child, communication with a child for immoral purposes. 

AI Takeover: In a terrible job market, white-collar workers are turning to AI-training, essentially helping to eliminate more jobs. Lawyers, writers, HR managers, scientists— data companies are siphoning their intelligence. A company called Mercors says about 30,000 professionals work on its platform each week. Scale AI claims to have more than 700,000. Surge AI says platinum recording artists and Supreme Court litigators work for them. It’s not scary at all.

On That Happy Note: I’m a little late to the new Hilary Duff album party. She released luck…or something a couple weeks ago.

GOLIKEHELLMACHINE has an interview series called Work is Four Letters he describes like this:

Most people think their jobs are boring or pointless or bullshit, but I don’t; if you look around you, everything you see was made by someone, somehow, and that’s really interesting to me. Work is Four Letters is an occasional series — edited for brevity and clarity — highlighting what people do for work and why they do it.

The conversations are informative and robust. The latest interview was with NYT columnist Jamelle Bouie and I found both his description of how he thinks about his job and the ways he DOES his job interesting. Also this nugget about our current experience:

I think the big thing that I’d like people to take away is an understanding that not everything we’re experiencing now has happened before — I reject that. The past is truly a different country. Although you can find historical analogies, they’re just that: analogies. They aren’t one-for-one equivalents. But what you can say is that past generations of Americans have had to sort out their own struggles, and have faced similar questions that we face today, similar questions about the nature of our country, the nature of who belongs here, etc., etc.

Tags: interviews · Jamelle Bouie

The 50 Most Underappreciated Movies of the 21st Century. I’ve only seen a few of these; I’ve added a bunch to my to-see list. Any particular faves? Or additions to the list?

Last week, Nine Inch Nails released an album of remixes and unreleased session music from their Tron: Ares score called Tron Ares: Divergence. I’m listening to it now; pretty good so far.

Tags: movies · music · Nine Inch Nails · Tron · video

• The compact Ford Maverick earns the Edmunds Top Rated Truck award.
• The Maverick is available with an efficient hybrid powertrain and there's a street truck Lobo variant too.
• Ford sweeps this category: Our highly recommended runners-up are the F-150 and Ranger.

"The Maverick does exactly what you want a compact truck to do. It's easy to drive and park, and it hauls and tows more than its fair share. When equipped with its hybrid powertrain, it achieves surprisingly good gas mileage too."

— Kurt Niebuhr, manager, vehicle testing

Why did the Maverick win?

You don't need as much truck as you think, and the Ford Maverick proves it. Despite being the smallest pickup on sale, the Maverick packs capability, practicality, and utility into a package that fits anywhere. With an Edmunds Rating of 7.6 out of 10, it doesn't just acquit itself well in its class; it's great no matter how you slice it. Throw in an affordable starting price of $29,840 and the more than 40 mpg combined we've seen in our testing, and the Maverick becomes the consummate all-rounder that most pickup trucks aspire to be.

Highly Recommended

These are the Edmunds Top Rated 2026 honorable mentions we’d also recommend to our friends and family.

2026 Ford F-150

The Ford F-150 remains the best full-size pickup you can buy thanks to its sheer versatility. It offers a vast range of engine options, including a hybrid that adds both fuel efficiency and stunning performance. An optional onboard generator can power your major appliances in the event of an outage, the hardcore Raptor models are stunningly capable off-road, and the lower-level STX and XLT trims offer capability at an affordable price.

2026 Ford Ranger

The Ford Ranger offers great utility in a package that can be described as "right-sized" for most. If the F-150 is too big and you need to tow more than a Maverick can on a regular basis, the Ranger has you covered. Its starting price of $35,245 is downright affordable, it offers a great interior tech suite, and the Raptor model is guaranteed to put a smile on your face — whether you're off-road or not.

See the other Edmunds Top Rated 2026 award winners

• Edmunds Top Rated Car: Honda Civic Hybrid
• Edmunds Top Rated SUV: Hyundai Palisade Hybrid
• Edmunds Top Rated Electric Car: Tesla Model 3
• Edmunds Top Rated Electric SUV: Hyundai Ioniq 5
• Edmunds Top Rated Electric Truck: Rivian R1T
• Edmunds Top Rated Best of the Best: Hyundai Palisade Hybrid

"I made baseball as much fun as doing your taxes"

-- Bill James (MoneyBart)

As I discussed a few days ago (Part 1), there are two sides to the ABS Challenge coin:

• the direct run benefit of flipping the call
• the indirect cost of using up a challenge

Yesterday (Part 2), I went thru the calculations to establish the run value of an ABS Challenge given the base-out, ball-strike situations. And we determined the obvious: there is a huge benefit of getting an overturn on a 3-2 count, or when you can flip into/outof walk or strikeout, as the case may be. And first-pitch or second-pitch challenges, especially with bases empty, have little run potential.

Now, to complete our trilogy, we need to establish the breakeven point and to do that, we need to know about the cost.

Let's talk about something we are more used to, and that's the SB attempt. The typical runner situation will increase run potential of a SB by 0.20 runs and the cost of a CS by 0.45 runs. The breakeven point is 0.45/(0.45 + 0.20) ~= 70%. But in some situations, the cost of a CS jumps substantially, pushing the breakeven point to 85% or even 90%. In other situations, the cost of a CS reduces enough that the breakeven point goes down to only 60% if not lower. A smart baserunner will intuitively determine those breakeven points in their head based on experience.

The average umpire call will change the run expectancy by about 0.16 runs. A 2-0 call for example will turn the run potential of 0.094 runs into either 3-0 (0.202) or 2-1 (0.032). That's a range of 0.170 runs.

However, when a batter or catcher challenges a call, they are not going to challenge randomly, but rather strategically. And in 2025 AAA, the average run value of an overturned calls was about 0.20 runs. That is our target.

Naturally, when you have only one challenge remaining, the player will be even more careful with their challenge. As it turns out, that does not happen based on the game situation. The gain on the overturn calls is just 0.01 runs greater with one challenge remaining than with two.

And something similar happens with the inning of the challenge: the run value of the overturned call remains pretty flat throughout the game.

This really means that when a player challenges, they are more focused on the location of the pitch rather than focusing on when the pitch is happening. At least, that's what happens in AAA, and I'm quite sure things will change in MLB.

Anyway, with a fairly stable cost value of 0.20 runs, we can calculate our breakeven point by comparing the run impact of an overturned call to the base value of 0.20 runs. A bases loaded 3-2 count for example will impact the game by an astounding 1.8 runs. So the benefit to cost ratio is 9 to 1. And when you have those kinds of odds, you only need to be right 10% of the time to breakeven: 10% of +1.80 is balanced by 90% of -0.20. So you will find that any pitch that is close will get challenged at 3-2, bases loaded. It won't matter the inning and number of challenges remaining, since the benefit is huge. A close pitch is by definition a 50/50 call, so if the batter/catcher are as discerning as an umpire, they really have no choice but to challenge.

On the flip side is a bases empty, 2 outs, first-pitch call: in order to challenge that, the breakeven point is 88%. That means it has to be an egregiously obvious call in order to challenge. Even if you think you are pretty sure it was the wrong call, the player will not challenge it. Being 75% sure is not good enough. Even 80 or 85% is not good enough. You need to be 90% sure it was a bad call. That's because the difference between a 1-0 count (with bases empty, 2 outs) and an 0-1 count is the difference between 0.12 runs and 0.09 runs. With a difference of 0.03 runs, compared to our baseline of 0.20 runs, that's a ratio of 0.15 to 1. The odds are overwhelmingly against a challenge unless it's a sure thing.

Anyway, so that's how it works. If/when MLB players challenge more carefully with outs remaining and challenges remaining, I'll create an update breakeven chart to handle that nuance. Until then, here's the chart that every manager, catcher and batter is going to memorize (click to embiggen).

Pitchers are not going to bother because they think every close pitch they throw is a strike, and even their own catcher is going to fool them with Framing. Pitchers will have plenty on their minds already without needing to worry about their breakeven points of challenges. Luckily for them, they have a catcher who will know all this, 140 games a year. And the backup catcher? Well, they need to help their primary catcher, because this is a great way for them to show off their Challenge Awareness Skill.