Humanist, Rationalist, Libertarian, Capitalist, Industrialist, Entrepreneur, Investor, Patriot. In that order.

Joined February 2012
124 Photos and videos
Mark Buffington retweeted
Replying to @GTAthletics
⚾️ FOLLOW UP TO MY PREVIOUS POST: We have had such an overwhelming response to the post I sent last night! Over 230 people have expressed interest in being involved. And we are just getting started! Impressively, former players across 6 generations reached out and expressed support. Lifelong GT fans, alumni and even current students have also reached out to express support. I haven’t had time to respond to everybody who has sent me a DM, an email, a text, or a LinkedIn message, but I assure you that somebody involved with our initiative will reach out soon. We are preparing dates and meeting times for educational webinars. We will make an announcement on dates soon. Thank you all so much! It’s nice to know that so many people want to get behind @GTBaseball. Let’s build this together! I look forward to speaking with all of you soon! Go Jackets! 🐝
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Pete Bevacqua: “If you wanted to maximize media value around college football, I think you would take 24 to 30 teams, create unbelievably competitive scheduling where a team like Notre Dame would play Alabama, Georgia, Penn State, Ohio State, Michigan…”👀

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Mark Buffington retweeted
Would like to hear more, was at the last 2 games against Oklahoma and was tough to watch
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Yellow Jacket fans…pay attention to this. Perfectly put by someone who lived it, and is now going to continue (yes: continue) paying it forward. Thank you Mark.
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Mark I want in! Favorite ex neighbor here Lasco ❤️🐝
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Replying to @GTAthletics
Tough way to end the season, but hats off to Oklahoma. And congrats to our players and their families for a tremendous season… even though it stings now. Tomorrow, a large group of former @GTBaseball players and supporters of the program are launching a series of initiatives to get behind James Ramsey and @GTBaseball in a way that builds a lasting competitive advantage. Not a mild competitive advantage, but one that is almost impossible for other schools to match. It starts with having funds and strategies that will ensure @GTBaseball competes at the highest level… year in and year out. It culminates with 34 funded scholarships, over-the-cap funds for special projects and elite roster construction, and investments in advanced hitting and pitching technology. It also involves connecting our tremendous network of business executives and former and current professional baseball players in a way that no other school can. We have never really leveraged this network to drive athletic success, but we will going forward. We should have learned some lessons from this regional series. Although our lineup was superior, Oklahoma had at least 8 pitchers that threw 95 or above. And each of them had good command of one or two off speed pitches. At the end of the day, their pitching was the story of the tournament. They kept a generational lineup off balance just enough to scrap out enough runs to win two games. Our pitching was really good all season, but their pitching staff was elite, especially their bullpen. And that was the difference. We are going to come together to give James and @RGAlpert all the tools they need to consistently compete for National Championships. It’s easy to get mad and swear off GT athletics after another heart-breaking loss, but that is what losers do. Winners dust themselves off and get back to work the next day. That’s what we are going to do! If you are a GT graduate, former athlete or fan who wants to be a part of taking our program to a consistently elite level (inclusive of unique perks 😉), then please reach out to me to learn more. If you are a GT graduate, former athlete, or fan who wants to expand your network in a way that will advance your career and connect you to GT Athletics in an “inner circle” way, then please reach out to me. We are hosting a series of educational webinars over the next two months that should help explain how we are going to break through to elite status. We have tremendous momentum already. I hope you will consider being involved. Go Jackets! 🐝
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Mark Buffington retweeted
These are fair questions, and they’re exactly the questions we should be debating. I’m not opposed to tax relief. I’m opposed to skipping the hard part of the conversation. If we’re going to reduce property taxes, we need to know what replaces the revenue, who pays for existing debt backed by those taxes, what services get reduced if replacement revenue falls short, and how the system performs during the next recession. We should absolutely look for efficiencies in government. We should absolutely debate whether property taxes are the best way to fund local services. But before we tear down the current system, we need a clear plan for what comes next. Hope is not a fiscal strategy. We need data analysis with a starting point with agreement on outcomes we want.
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Jun 1
Property taxes tax ownership of assets already paid for, raising legitimate ethical questions about wealth taxation vs. income or consumption. States have constitutional authority, but alternatives like user fees better tie payments to benefits received. Renters pay indirectly via higher rents—landlords pass costs on. A transparent flat local service fee for all residents (police, fire, roads, etc.) could be fairer and reduce the property owner burden. Tax cuts without efficiency reforms invite revenue shifts or service cuts. Re-engineer delivery: competitive bidding, privatization of non-core functions, performance metrics, and zero-based budgeting should always accompany relief. Other revenue: expanded user fees, local sales tax options (mitigate regressivity via exemptions), tourism/hospitality taxes, state aid, or sin taxes. Florida's homestead-focused phase-out protects core services but requires local adaptation to avoid broad shifts.
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Responsible government!
The Florida budget for next fiscal year (after line-item vetoes) will spend less than in the current fiscal year. The budget for the current fiscal year spends less than the budget from the previous year, and that previous year’s budget spends less than the year before. Four straight years of spending reductions!
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Mark Buffington retweeted
May 27
**You're right on both counts.** Announcements like this are easy; delivering 200k new rent-stabilized units (plus preserving another 200k) in NYC faces massive real-world barriers—zoning, costs, labor, and bureaucracy. History shows similar pledges often underdeliver. On property seizure: Mamdani's plan pushes aggressive enforcement against "negligent" landlords, including liens, foreclosures, legal removals, and transfers to nonprofits/tenants/community land trusts. Eminent domain is constitutional for public purposes with just compensation (5th Amendment, Kelo precedent), but broad application to occupied private rentals would face serious Takings Clause challenges and likely litigation. It could also chill private investment in housing.
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Tennessee AD Danny White reaffirmed his support for the College Football Playoff to expand on Monday 🍊 “I think the percentage of teams with access to the postseason in football is low and I think we need more access,” White told reporters on Monday. White, who is in Destin, Florida for the SEC’s Spring Meetings, confirmed his recent position for the playoff to expand to a 24-team format. Tennessee has made one College Football Playoff (2024) since the field expanded to 12-teams. Do you agree with Danny?🤔 Video via: @TreyWallace
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Mark Buffington retweeted
May 23
Interesting proposal—10-game regular season objective RPI×Wins seeding would emphasize merit over subjectivity and protect the regular season's weight. Tiered 24/24 playoff (title flight NIT-style) with guaranteed games could boost access/revenue while ditching bowls. Big hurdles: existing TV contracts, revenue sharing, and FCS games that fund smaller programs. SEC insiders often cite the 9-game conference gauntlet as already plenty selective. How would conferences buy in without massive realignment?
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Replying to @PeterBurnsESPN
@grok can you list all SEC teams and then show a list of all of their regular season non-conference games in 2026? How many FBS teams does each SEC team play?
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Mark Buffington retweeted
3. ESPN owns the post season. If it expands they have to share it. BUT that actually be incredibly healthy for the sport as a whole. No more conspiracy theories about why analysts are campaigning for certain teams or that ESPN is influencing the committee
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Mark Buffington retweeted
Tech 🤝 Tek Thanks to #ProJacket Jason Varitek for making it out to the game tonight! #StingEm🐝 x #WreckHavoc
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Mark Buffington retweeted
🚨 JUST IN: A QATARI Liquefied Natural Gas tanker has TRAVERSED the Strait of Hormuz successfully, now "OUTBOUND" "A Qatari LNG carrier is outbound from the Strait. That would be the FIRST time a Qatari ship made it out since the start of the war. You gotta start somewhere!" Trump is keeping the pressure up, awaiting an Iranian response to the deal 👀 KEEP PUSHING, 47! 🇺🇸
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Mark Buffington retweeted
May 8
**No, not exactly as claimed.** The video is from the MN House (May 6, 2026) on HF4240 Amendment A11. It required *full deletion* of deceased voters from the statewide registration system (not just marking them inactive). It failed 67-67 on a party-line tie—Democrats voted no, Republicans yes. Deceased voters are already flagged “deceased” in MN’s system and blocked from voting. The fight was over deleting the full record vs. keeping a marked historical one. No evidence shows dead people are casting ballots. The “rigging” framing is exaggerated.
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Mark Buffington retweeted
May 7
Property taxes in the US are based on the property's assessed value, not the owner's income or net worth. No major examples exist of higher rates scaled to owner income/net worth (that's more like a separate wealth tax). Income-based adjustments are usually relief only—e.g., circuit breakers or homestead exemptions in 30 states that lower bills for low-income owners, seniors, or disabled. Constitutional hurdles: Likely challenges under the 14th Amendment's Equal Protection Clause and state uniformity clauses, which require consistent treatment within property classes. Differentiating identical properties by owner wealth would need a strong rational basis and could fail as arbitrary.
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Mark Buffington retweeted
May 5
That's a sharp pun on the $250M Feeding Our Future fraud. Under the False Claims Act, whistleblowers can claim 15-30% of the government's recovery (treble damages penalties), so the numbers get big fast if DOJ pursues civil action on top of the criminal convictions. Potential to literally "feed" a future or two through legal recovery.
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Mark Buffington retweeted
May 5
Under the False Claims Act (which applies to federal fund fraud like Feeding Our Future), a whistleblower in a successful qui tam suit gets 15-25% of the government's total recovery (treble damages penalties) if DOJ intervenes, or 25-30% if they proceed alone. Exact share depends on the case specifics and contribution.
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