Chris Struble Writes

Tonight I finished the final presentation and video for my paper "Generator-based Testing: A State by State Approach" for the 2020 PNSQC conference. Learning to record and edit a video from home was a challenge. I already had a small audio box with a condenser microphone that I have used to record music. I had to get that running with my computer, and with software that would display a presentation from my computer and record from a webcam and microphone in real time.  I used ScreenCastify, a Chrome extension which was simple to use and had enough editing tools for what I wanted to do. It is free but only for videos up to 5 minutes long. I had to buy the commercial license, but it was worth it to get this done. I am relieved and immensely proud of this accomplishment.

This morning I want to give a shout out to energy utility workers everywhere. These folks work hard every day to keep the lights on, literally, every day, often in the worst weather. Last night, on the hottest day of the year so far, we lost power in the early evening, along with over a hundred people in our neighborhood. Within ninety minutes several utility trucks from Puget Sound Energy came to our street, along with a fire truck from Renton Fire Authority that blocked off the end of the street so the utility workers had room to work. An hour later power was restored and our house began to cool down. Thank you energy utility workers for keeping the lights on, and firefighters for everything you do to keep people safe.

As I have been following the news in recent months, I have been listening to the voices calling for the protection of black lives, and for police accountability. I support the end of qualified immunity for police officers. Qualified immunity grants government officials immunity from civil lawsuits for their actions while doing their jobs. It is not a constitutional principle. It was a doctrine created in 1967 by the Supreme Court. Since 2005, courts have applied the doctrine even in cases of excessive force or police brutality. An incident that happened yesterday illustrates for me why police must be held personally accountable. It is why I am compelled to speak out now. A mom and her four daughters were sitting in their SUV in a parking lot in Aurora Colorado. Police officers approached with guns drawn, handcuffed the entire family, including the six-year old daughter, and made them lay face down on hot concrete. The officers approached the vehicle because their records showed it as s...