The surprisingly complicated physics of why cats always land on their feet ars technica (David L)
Giant Set of Dinosaur Tracks in Alaska Is So Big It’s Called ‘The Coliseum’ ScienceAlert (furzy)
NASA telescope spots cosmic question mark in deep space CNN (ma)
Complexity Theory’s 50-Year Journey to the Limits of Knowledge Quanta (David L)
The Rise And Fall Of The Would-Be Superconductor That Transfixed The Internet Forbes (Kevin W)
Polymer nanoparticles deliver mRNA to the lung for mucosal vaccination Science (ma)
Gesture is a uniquely powerful tool. Here’s how to make the most of it New Scientist (Dr. Kevin)
Examining how breast size affects women’s attitudes to exercise MedicalXPress (Dr. Kevin)
WHO Aspartame Safety Panel Linked To Alleged Coca-Cola Front Group Guardian
Neuroscientists successfully test theory that forgetting is actually a form of learning Trinity College Dublin (Dr. Kevin)
#COVID-19
New Covid variant BA.2.86 with more than 30 mutations detected in London causing concern among scientist Guardian (Dr. Kevin)
Health officials warn of new, highly mutated COVID strain BA.2.86 Seattle Times (furzy)
1/ The Model State Indoor Air Quality Act #MSIAQA has been released today. Developed by the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security @JHSPH_CHS, with advice from an extensive group of experts, led by @polsiewski et al.https://t.co/Bhq3Oknq7m
— Prof. Jose-Luis Jimenez (@jljcolorado) August 17, 2023
Climate/Environment
Tracing the destruction from Maui’s deadly fires ABC Australia. Kevin W: “Check out the before/After images.”
President Joe Biden hasn’t launched a Maui fire investigation. Here’s why. Politico
China?
Global Stock Managers on Guard as China Pain Set to Spread Bloomberg
China’s Fertility Rate Drops To Record Low Reuters
Degrowing China—By Collapse, Redistribution, or Planning? Monthly Review (Anthony L). Important.
Biden to sign strategic partnership deal with Vietnam in latest bid to counter China in the region Politico
"Beijing’s top diplomat made a direct appeal to Vietnam’s shared ideology with China as he urged Hanoi to prepare for a summit and prevent “interference” by external forces." A classic example of China's wedge strategy towards the Vietnam-US partnership. https://t.co/1Gm4zsarKX
— Khang Vu (@KhangXVu) August 18, 2023
Niger
West African bloc says day set for possible military intervention in Niger Anadolu Agency
Niger: West African military force ‘ready to go’ DW. Lead story.
Bank of Ireland unsure when services will be restored Irish Examiner (BC). From a few days ago, but noteworthy that it happened.
New Not-So-Cold War
🇺🇦Ukraine to once again pass laws prohibiting peace talks.
The Verkhovna Rada proposed to legally prohibit the cession of land in resolving the conflict with Russia.
The deputies also pointed out the need for a complete withdrawal of Russian troops "from the entire territory… pic.twitter.com/yRaqjCZjyh
— DD Geopolitics (@DD_Geopolitics) August 19, 2023
Netherlands says US has approved delivery of F-16s to Ukraine Aljazeera (Li)
Lukashenko; 250K reserves, Russia south, Poland west. WaPo, grim UKR results. Blinken Pakistan. Alex Christaforu, YouTube. Note the opening section, where Christaforu discusses an interview with Lukashenko at some length.
1/8 In interview with Ukrainian journalist, Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko: "We (he & Putin) touched on the situation again the last time we met. We conversed for a long time and he would say: ‘It's bad that we, the two peoples, clashed… We are Slavic peoples’.
— M. K. Bhadrakumar (@BhadraPunchline) August 18, 2023
Ukraine war: US allows transfer of Danish and Dutch F-16 war planes to Kyiv BBC. Kevin W: “And to replace them, the danish and the Dutch will have to purchase much more expensive F-35s.”
Major Russian OFFENSIVE on Strategic KUPYANSK HistoryLegends, YouTube. From a couple of days ago, but entertaining and informative on tactics and Russian options as its campaign in Kharkiv progresses.
EU hits gas storage target before November deadline Financial Times
We will also examine this question:
Who gave Bill Kristol $2 million for a new fraudulent "Republicans for Ukraine" group designed to run ads during the Fox GOP debate to convince Republicans to cease turning against Biden's war policies in Ukraine? https://t.co/h1DqDqMf4J
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) August 18, 2023
It is like a concentration camp’: The forgotten crisis on Europe’s doorstep Defend Democracy. Nagorno-Karabakh.
Syraqistan
Afghans fled for a better future but 2 years later, it’s a dream for most Aljazeera (ma)
Here’s that full U.K. government statement on the imprisonment of Imran Khan pic.twitter.com/3zbMu190Ke
— Mark Curtis (@markcurtis30) August 19, 2023
U.S. Sanctions Syrian ‘Moderate Rebels’ It Had Previously Armed Moon of Alabama (Kevin W). “To be America’s friend is fatal.”
Imperial Collapse Watch
California’s Weapons of Math Destruction Wall Street Journal. BC: “This is insanity.”
I can't imagine living in a country like that… pic.twitter.com/oI4TMxHmzX
— Alan MacLeod (@AlanRMacLeod) August 18, 2023
The Decline of America’s Military Reflects the Overall Decline of America Itself Brian Berletic, YouTube
The Horrors of Ukraine and Maui Made Possible by Government incompetence Larry Johnson (Anthony L)
Trump
Georgia Indicts Millions Of Voters For Conspiring To Elect Trump Babylon Bee (Li)
Trump’s indictments and the perils of ‘dual sovereignty’ Financial Times (BC)
Biden
Joe Rogan claims Democrats are leaking scandals about Joe Biden on PURPOSE to try to get rid of 80 year-old president before 2024 election Daily Mail (Li). Readers have been speculating along these lines for a while…
Midwestern cities become transgender health sanctuaries amid GOP legislative threats The Hill
Our No Longer Free Press
YouTube, Censorship, and the American Way of Life Scott Ritter (Micael T)
AI
AI-Generated Art Lacks Copyright Protection, D.C. Court Says Bloomberg (David L)
The sceptical case on generative AI Financial Times (David L)
The dark secret behind those cute AI-generated animal images MIT Technology Review (furzy)
Microsoft pulls AI-written article telling tourists to visit the Ottawa Food Bank The Verge (Dr. Kevin)
Inflation
Consumers’ Perspectives on the Recent Movements in Inflation Liberty Street Economics. UserFriendly: “I love how expectations are so important for consumers’ magical ability to control inflation but widespread publicity of greedflation couldn’t have played a role in CEO’s dialing it down.”
No, the Federal Reserve Hasn’t Brought Inflation Down Jacobin
A Big Health Insurer Is Ripping Up the Playbook on Drug Pricing Wall Street Journal. At best, Godzilla v. Mothra. Article hides the ball by implying that Mark Cuban’s Cost Plus Drug Company will fill scrips, when Cost Plus has only generic drugs, and then far from all (I take hardly any meds and one of my generics is not available there). So this will be largely an Amazon venture.
Pension funds in their best shape since just before the last two stock-market crashes MarketWatch (ma). Somehow the implication of the headline seems lost on the writers…
Loading the DICE Against Pensions CarbonTracker (Micael T)
The Bezzle
‘Don’t You Remember Me?’ The Crypto Hell on the Other Side of a Spam Text Bloomberg
I'm beginning to seriously doubt Musk's sanity. https://t.co/ZmRsTZ4Lf5
— Bruce Bartlett (@BruceBartlett) August 18, 2023
Class Warfare
Meta threatens to fire workers for return-to-office infractions in leaked memo SFGate (Kevin W)
All-out propaganda blitz by Teamsters bureaucrats in final days of UPS vote WSWS
Antidote du jour (Duncan H):
And a bonus:
Mission impossible.. 😅 pic.twitter.com/UvW9ssPBZY
— Buitengebieden (@buitengebieden) August 19, 2023
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
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Dutch and Danish F-16 were delivered in late 1970’s early 1980’s.
They are on the re-sale list, going to countries like USA who want target drones.
Have they been kept up to newer flight management systems, newer weapons, newer self defenses?
They most likely have the original F100 Pratt and Whitney engine which in the 1980’s caused USAF to reinvent the GE F110. A unit will not mix engines, too different to support. Those engines have been updated when they go in to “depot”?
The two countries were retiring those F-16 for the even less useful F-35!
How much “work” is needed to make them combat ready and where do the parts, tools and techs come from? Wil they be upgraded for intercept AIM 120?
If they do close air support where they get aerial refuelers to get them over target?
Or they try and do ‘MiG sweeps’ ala North Vietnam?
How do they stand up to S300 and supports?
also need flawless (debris-free) runways for the F-16 as it only has an air intake on the bottom of its fuselage (versus having an second, alternate air intake on top)
F-16 = a great plane for bombing radicals in sandals, will make zero impact in Ukraine—even if one can find and send 300.
Doesn’t the Air Force have hundreds of surplus f-16’s in storage? Google claims 4600 of them were built.
It does but there is another factor involved. If the US sends them surplus F-16s and they get shot down, there is no real loss for the US and the amount spent is a rounding error. But if a foreign country sends the Ukraine a couple of their own F-16s and they get shot down, that is when the sugar starts to flow. Those countries will have to replace those planes as fighters are so expensive that you just don’t buy a whole stack of them so that you have a few spares laying around.Those countries will be looking to buy replacements and at that point the US will step in and offer them those super expensive F-35s for them to buy. That and twenty or thirty years of service contracts. Ka-ching!
I think F-16s needs 16-17 maintenance hours per flight hour and the F-35 need 5-8 maintenance hours per flight hour. (Hard to get a solid number on the F-35 since there are variants)
So…. it’s entirely possible those F-16s will be down for maintenance often.
Not singing the praises of the F-35 just noting that older aircraft needs lots of maintenance too.
Wait, you still need to maintain an aircraft that’s been shot down?
Why of course, if you want it to make it to the museum in Moscow!
There could be a selection bias in the F-35 numbers, since about 2/3 of them are waiting for spares with half of those grounded. The maintenence clock is not running for planes that can’t be fixed until the spares arrive.
Otherwise it would be weeks of maintenence per flight hour for F-35.
Or wait for a technician to come over from USA to have a look…
Correct. A reason F-35 is not into/through OT&E is what you observe, even though there are enough unit achieved flight hours, they have not met the ‘requirements document’!
Per GAO-22-105995,
Not mission capable for maintenance in F-35 was running mid teens 14 to 16% (’20, ’21) of the possessed aircraft at unit level, total hours unit aircraft in maintenance status in month divided by total aircraft possessed x 24 x 30 days.
The observed causes: technical manuals incomplete to fault isolate to a corrective action (some hindrance from the automated logistics system on the aircraft as well) and lack of peculiar support equipment to make the diagnosis and/or repair.
Other issues as you point out are not mission capable due to spare parts on order, and big issues with F-35 aircraft with no engines. That suggests spare engines are unavailable.
Engines are failing more frequently, depot turn around is not equal the higher returns, and the engines seem to need better ‘thermal management’ iow run too hot.
Generally F-35 does not demonstrate success in meeting many reliability and maintainability requirements.
This means that ‘at budget’ F-35 will not meet readiness requirements similar to most US tactical aircraft. Why DOT&E putting test off (?).
I (am retired!) have no idea where maintenance hours (expended, while not in supply status) per flying hour stand for either the F-16 or the F-35.
Mean Down Time is determined by the sum of Mean Preventative Maintenance Time, Mean Corrective Maintenance Time and Mean Logistics Delay Time.
Perhaps they should buy drones?!
Generals fighting the last war…
Still ka-ching
I don’t see the need to buy any planes. Go to the basics and start thinking first on air defences other than PATRIOT. Something to protect from drones a different thing for misiles and electronic warfare capabilities. If you still feel a few planes are needed there may be less expensive options too. You buy a few F-35s and you are still at the starting point: defenceless but poorer. VDL will come to tell you to cut spending ASAP. No need to be posh on weapons.
But McDonnel-Douglas?!
Then again, the Pentagon doesn’t really exist in a place where they need to consider defense of borders.
Do wonder how well NASAMS is actually doing in Ukraine.
Only about half of those are still operational. It is 50 years old design, and airframes do wear out, especially fighter airframes.
I assume Ukraine wants F-16 because it would allow them to use all air weapons in Western inventory, instead of scraping the bottom of the Soviet barrel or trying to reprogram Soviet era fighter to handle western weapons.
And naturally, even older generation AIM-120s would be an improvement on what they have now, but given that F-16 radar range is limited and they are still forced to fly nap-of-the-earth, they would be seriously outgunned by almost anything in Russian arsenal.
We already have confirmed kills by S-300, S-400 and R-37M way beyond the kill range an Ukrainian F-16 could achieve even if it was flying high and really fast – the only way to get the max. range out of missiles.
zero impact
Years back I watched an f 18 crash in san diego and it definitely left a mark…
not sure whether my comment is snark, or not…
Look it’s just basic marketing, and we need to push these f 35’s out the door!
(Not that is snark… :)
I had a similar experience while driving along Hwy95 adjacent to Walker Lake,NV. The terminal lake is about 40 nautical miles due south of the Fallon Naval Air Station (current Top Gun training station). Through my windshield I could see a singular FA-18 Hornet doing air stunts and super low elevation skims above the lake. The pilot likely spotted my lone car (state vehicle) on the highway and performed some “attack manuevers” toward me. I reflexively ducked down as he passed over. The manuever left him at very low elevation and approaching steep mountainous terrain (Bald Mtn.) with liitle time/space to elevate over the peak (10’000’+).
On returning to the state Capitol later that day I saw two Navy helicopters flying up the same canyon to Bald Mtn. I stopped to look, but all I could see was a dark spot (zero impact) on a ridge near the peak. Later I learned from a friend in the Nevada Air Guard that the FA-18 had a newbie (to the NAS) pilot who was unaware of the intense down drafts created on the east side of Bald Mtn. The FA-18 hit below the ridge and the result was complete immolation/destruction of the aircraft…and pilot.
Could it be that Ukraine is looking to use those old F-16s as super-drones? Loaded with fuel and bombs they could do a lot of damage.
That may be tried, but these fighter jets are unstable without a pilot. I’m sure the AA S-300 missiles will take down any F-16 well before reaching its destination.
Someone who know about aviation noted that the most updated MiG21’s, the Chinese F7G, is on par with early F16s like what the Dutch and Danes have at a fraction of the cost. (Of course, F16’s Drew inspiration from MiG 21–the original idea was to have an inexpensive, fairly low tech fighter with maximum performance for air to air combat, like what MiG21 was seen to be over Vietnam.). High tech, they are not, and doubtful they’ll come with the actual game changer–piloted by thinly disguised NATO pilots operating openly from NATO bases outside Ukraine–no NATO pilot will dare try that stunt in those rustbuckets….
a couple of MiG-23 jets crashed due to engine failure at an airshow in Ypsilanti MI last week
One crashed, pilot and passenger ejected safely. The airplane was privately owned and kept at Willow Run airport.
Or are you using Western math on Russian equipment losses? /s
good one and thank you for the correction
Maybe they were doing an authentic simulation of USSR aircraft at The Paris Airshow. (More sarcasm) In the past Soviet engines tended to puke the hot section out of the tailpipe. Supposedly US engines get about twice as many cycles before the parts come out through the exhaust nozzle.
The only engines I have cycle life knowledge of are airliner engines. I’d love to see a table of cycle life of military engines, but consider this would be like comparing racing car engines to dump truck engines as far as operating conditions.
That handful (is it 20?) of Ukrainian pilots currently being trained will not last very long in first-gen F-16s, and how much money is going to take to entice Western pilots to climb into those things?
The flaks who think that 40+ year-old light fighters are going to be a paradigm shift in the war need to get a grip. I don’t know what they think those planes are actually going to do.
” I don’t know what they think those planes are actually going to do.”
The F-16 is capable of delivering nuclear weapons. This is a big Neo-con gamble.
I would not be a bit surprised to see the American Neo-con establishment starting an atomic war in the mistaken belief that they can win one.
Even twenty years ago I would have dismissed that cheery thought. Now our elites, neo con and liberal, are so delusional and so divorced from reality I can believe that they not only think that but they also believe that it will aid in their current campaign to rid themselves of the troublesome and the unworthy.
There’s always that, and if the West declares they’re supplying nuclear weapons to Ukraine, that’s game, right there. But since Ukraine is known to not possess nuclear weapons right now, it would not be deniable for the West if Sevastopol or Rostov suddenly went up. I’m sure Russia takes the nuclear capability seriously, but this all seems theatrical.
Assuming the war party’s end game isn’t tactical nukes delivered by F-16, I think it’s more likely spoiling for escalation when said jets begin flying missions from, or loitering in, NATO airspace.
If the west were actually thinking of giving the Ukrainians tactical nukes, Moscow would have to come out with a statement that any use of a tactical nuke in the Ukraine would be considered as coming from the US and which would require a full nuclear response at that country.
That might be the only plausible way to stop the idiots in DC.
The problem as I understand it is that there is no way of knowing if the f16’s in flight are carrying nukes or not until that first one is fired. I hope someone will correct me if that is wrong. But if correct, it is not acceptable to Russia. I have no idea how they are going to deal with it, but as everyone knows on NC, Russia knows they can never again trust the US or NATO for anything and so they may have to make a declaration of nuke assumption before the first f16 fires in flight and that they reserve right of full self preservation (nukes in return before finding out) in response.
It’s possible that Russia has intel they could count on that would warn them if nukes were being made available (say by the US) subsequent to their delivery by the Netherlands to Ukraine. That would at least give the Russians time to make full warning (again) explicit to the West, not that it would matter much to the idiot/psychos running our country. Nuland… sweet Jesus.
Hope I’m wrong or that it couldn’t be the case here.
I meant to say, “nukes delivered by the US subsequent to the delivery of the f16’s by the Netherlands to Ukraine.”
The F-16s are basically a political issue. Ukraine is losing the war and, when it does, few politicians want to be on record as having voted against these aircraft and risk charges of having helped Putin defeat Ukraine.
Even if these F-16s were brand new, or you provide F-35s, aircraft have broad requirements. You have a chance of hiding a tank in the woods but it’s difficult to hide an airport. Plus, you need jet fuel, fuel trucks and/or fuel storage tanks, storage for bombs, spare parts, mechanics, and other ground support equipment, all of which are vulnerable to Russian attack because I doubt Ukraine has a truly secure airport anywhere in the country.
The F-35 is fancy and stealthy, and it’s designed to minimize its heat signature compared to the F-16, but its not zero. How good is Russia’s infrared sensor technology and its ability to identify and target these aircraft, nobody knows for certain, and who wants to risk finding out?
‘🇺🇦Ukraine to once again pass laws prohibiting peace talks.’
And while they will be doing it, they will also pass laws to legalize pron in the Ukraine because priorities!
‘Lawmakers in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine announced on Friday that they have collected enough signatures for a bill that would decriminalize the production of pornography. Lead sponsor of the proposal, Yaroslav Zheleznyak, has argued that the current laws encourage corruption and that legalizing porn could help raise funds for the military.
Thousands of Ukrainians are actively employed in the production of pornography. According to Zheleznyak, the state received over 34 million hryvnia ($920,000) in taxes in the first half of 2023 from sites such as OnlyFans, whose majority owner is Ukrainian-American businessman Leonid Radvinsky.’
https://www.rt.com/russia/581488-ukraine-bill-legalize-porn/
In my own humble opinion, the later law will be much less obscene than the former.
Given the chaos in Ukraine, I’m sure there are plenty of young, desperate women and men who are lining up to be used and then cast aside by the pron industry.
I’m thinking of those Ukrainian widows who cannot get any benefits as the Ukrainian Army is keeping their husbands alive on the books so that the officers can keep on collecting the guy’s wages.
Let’s run it over the guardrail and consider the cheery outlook for amputee fetishists.
Fair maidens are one of Ukraine’s historic staple crops. On YouTube, where I watch electronics stuff and some music, I’ve been seeing lots of sidebar ads for “Ukrainian Dating” mixed about half-and-half with natural health factoids (“Do This to Get Hard”). I’m sure there is no overarching MARRY AND REPRODUCE narrative here.
“…plenty of young….lining up to be used and then…” sent to the front lines. 2fer!
I agree–the correct approach is to make the military illegal so that we can raise (no pun intended) the needed talent pool for the Ukrainian porn industry. Of course, most of the men have been killed, maimed, or fled, so I suppose that the industry would have to focus in on specific market segments to succeed. Make love, not war!
Re: Rogan claim
Neera is in the inner circle, but her real loyalty is to Mother. Hillary isn’t doing anything.
‘Here’s that full U.K. government statement on the imprisonment of Imran Khan’
Obviously written in blank verse. Could it be that the UK has never forgiven Imran Khan for captaining the Pakistan team that beat the England team by 22 runs in the 1992 Cricket World Cup final?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4m_jTOCSfQ (11:22 mins)
I’m eternally bemused by the neocolonialist assumptions of pundits like Curtis, who clearly thinks that a public clearing of throat by the former imperial power will be enough to bring little brown men in Islamabad back into line. If the British government has concerns, which they probably have, they’ll be expressing them privately, rather than engaging in performative hand-waving: not that the British would have that much influence in the first place. I’ve long argued that it would be better if the West didn’t feel obliged to sound off incessantly about the doings of non-westerners, and give them moral lessons.
Yes. They’d wonder why the British didn’t try that in 1946! (/S)
I don’t see him assuming that, just that their public stance shows lack of concern. If this actually were part of a trend towards the UK keeping its mouth shut about the domestic issues of other countries, then it could be seen as one more data point showing that amazing change of attitude.
But that is not the context. This silence occurs at a time when British officials blather on publicly about how everybody from Russia to South Africa to the Solomon Islands should be ordering their affairs. Indeed, their diplomacy seems to be in love with performative hand waving. And that being the context, the silence easily reads as tacit approval.
I think your examples prove my point: Russia is a punchbag and nothing is lost by attacking them, as every other western state is doing. The Solomon Islands is small enough to push around. But Pakistan is a significant state in all sorts of ways, and there’s no point in getting into a public argument with them, whatever may be said privately. All states tend to lecture others when they can, but this is often for domestic reasons (eg the Algerians publicly criticising the French over the riots) rather than in the hope of anything to be gained, or to try to claim some kind of interest and even role. But the reverse is also true: governments (and international organisations) are faced with never-ending demands to “say something” about virtually everything that happens in the world. Often, they are wise enough to say as little as possible, but then the media will angrily accuse them of “failing to condemn” something, or even “being an accessory” to something. It’s a game that’s been going on for as long as the modern mass media have existed.
He also married into anglo ‘society’ in the form of a daughter of arch asset stripper James Goldsmith.
Now that’s a ghost from the past…
Correct Meta “return to office” link :
https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/meta-threatens-return-to-office-layoffs-18303435.php
It looks like the only outfits doing this sort of misguided, ‘return to the past” fear-based stuff are big tech.
Small and medium tech cos. are more interested in getting the best talent than bailing out their bad real estate bets.
Most tech workers are in small/medium tech, I would imagine. If I had more time to look at charts, I would short META into the stone age. For now, I’ll just avoid it as much as possible, it’s toxic anyways.
> It looks like the only outfits doing this sort of misguided, ‘return to the past” fear-based stuff are big tech.
As always, fellow Chris … follow the money:
“Tax Breaks Threaten Remote Work If Cities Start Enforcing Them” (via Bloomberg)
Excerpt:
Yes, and this brings up an aspect of big corporations that has always bothered me.
They love to get in bed with local politicians. Isn’t that essentially fascism?
A point made by Chris Matthews, yet another Chris, was that politicians like to do things that are visible. Ribbon-cutting ceremonies to break ground on a new project, for example. As a way to say to Mr. or Ms. Voter, “look at me, I’m creating jobz for you serfs!”
Here in GA, it is no different. Tax breaks for office buildings, hotels, stadiums, you name it. They even handed out a tax break for a local Kroger to move about 1/4 mile down the street and build a bigger grocery store. Typically, such deals also involve bond financing to give the corporate overlords under market interest rates, vs. what they would have to pay in the regular corporate bond market.
So, it would not surprise me if Meta, Microsoft, Google, and the other “Magnificent Seven” have been sucking off the government teat as well, and getting tax breaks or sweetheart bond deals to build their white elephant offices. Government-backed revenue or general fund bonds may have been issued to help. If those white elephants stay empty, not only does it look bad, it might break some covenants as in the example you gave.
So it’s back to the office for you, serf, to save you local politician’s sorry behind! We wouldn’t want to embarrass them.
From the article:
Meta laid out its plan to hold workers to a stricter in-office regimen in a Thursday note. HR reportedly told employees that their managers would receive their badge data and that repeated violations of the new three-day-a-week requirement could cause workers to lose their jobs.
In June, announced its plan to require that most employees work from an office at least three days each week — it goes into effect Sept. 5.
If the “small and medium tech companies” referrenced in a comment above start trying to do things like creating and founding and launching a Cricket or a We Cast or a Shinola Search and Social or other better platforms than what the big “back to the office with you” companies are doing, they might eventually be able to start poaching people from these big companies, and then ransacking these big companies for whole rafts of people.
( A “raft” is a flock of thousands of eider ducks resting on the cold ocean near shore.)
https://www.bangordailynews.com/2022/02/18/outdoors/hundreds-of-eider-ducks-flock-together-to-form-a-raft-on-the-taunton-river-n6hjn1me0n/
It’s Rogan so hardly reliable on the topic, but if the Dem elite want Biden gone what’s the timeline? They certainly don’t want it to be Kennedy or Williamson. If Biden isn’t pushed out soon the primary season would be chaotic, if they wait until well into 2024 it will be even more chaotic. Handing it to Harris seems too dumb even for the Dem elite. Would it be an attempt to hand the WH to Clinton? They do seem dumb enough to try that again and if anyone has the chips to lose to a convicted felon (presumably), it’s Hillary Clinton.
Newsom.
amazing how both parties have an incredibly thin bench of viable “presidential” politicans.
Newsom and DeSantis are the proverbial one-eyed men, and both have serious flaws.
I seriously think a lottery would produce better results.
Isaac Asimov had a short story years ago about “The Voter of the Year.” A computer determined who the “most average” American was and they became The Elector.
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franchise_(short_story)
Ironic that there is a now a voting system that explicitly encourages the candidate closest to the median to win (most-least voting). In essence you must not annoy a large minority… This tends to promote an outcome where the person who has the perfect most-minus-least score wins.
That story reminds me of a comedy film made back in the 40s with maybe Jimmy Stewart in it. There was a competition to choose the most average American and this one ordinary guy was chosen. Comedy ensues when it is realized that he is so average that if he chooses to start eating jam instead of peanut butter for breakfast as an example, that trend is a repeat of a sudden trend for the whole country. Advertising agencies now have their own barometer of what will sell or not.
Louis F: Newsom and DeSantis are the proverbial one-eyed men, and both have serious flaws.
Newsom is severely dyslexic.
Gavin Newsom describes struggling with dyslexia as he governs California through crisis
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-12-18/gavin-newsom-childhood-struggle-to-read-shaped-his-life-and-career
Ridiculous, really. Perhaps dyslexia is better than Biden’s raving, corrupt senility. But by comparison with a figure like Putin whose initial rise in 90s Russia under Yeltsin would have been largely due to his ability as a champion briefer — and we’ve all since seen Putin’s annual face-the-nation marathons — it’s pitiful, not even rising to the level of incompetence.
IMO, Hillary has a better chance. His big National hook is Governor of California, which has an even worse flyover reputation than NY. Add that mainstream news coverage of conditions in California have not been glowing for the last few years. Even if they stop reporting such things, Newsome has only slightly more charm than DiSantis.
If Newsome honestly had a popular political agenda he might have a shot. But he doesn’t, he doesn’t represent change so that isn’t going to work, and he doesn’t have the Obama nostalgia, faux working class stick that worked for Biden. He is yet another Not Trump.
Ugh.
Or maybe Harris ( first Black Woman President) and Newsome for VP.
I can’t believe the Wall Street Democrat Party would remove Harris after working so hard to make her VP to begin with in order to have her in the Oval Office to pull an Obama when Wall Street engineers the next Great Financial Crash. After all, she proved she will do that by pulling a junior-Obama on Steve Mnuchin’s behalf when she was Attorney General of California. I continue to think that was a major reason she was put into the VP position, to have a Financial Crime Supporter as President when the next Great Financial CrimeWave is brought to fruition, harvest and collapse.
I think that typically veeps are weak candidates, who needs the competition, dan quayle, spiro, al gore… this is the group the current veep belongs to. HW and Darth were outliers, very powerful but more like puppetmasters who que mala can’t hold a candle to. Biden imo was the culmination of corruption in the dem party. Now the wind is blowing the curtain and whats behind it is a bunch of reaganites calling themselves dems.
It’s trickle all the way down.
Obama is a Reaganite. HRC is a proud Goldwater Girl.
funny you should mention when the next Great Financial CrimeWave is brought to fruition, harvest and collapse – Michael Burry would agree with you, he’s going all in – he called the 2008 crash and made a big bundle shorting the banks – the movie “The Big Short” is about it –
https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/15/investing/michael-burry-stock-market-crash/index.html
Jaburai B.: …funny you should mention when the next Great Financial CrimeWave is brought to fruition, harvest and collapse – Michael Burry would agree with you, he’s going all in
Nah. If you read your CNN article a little more closely, Burry actually isn’t going all in.
And as far as his call on the 2008 crash, that was something obvious to an investor with sufficient perspective.* As is Burry’s current long-term project: investing in water supplies —
https://www.killik.com/the-edit/why-michael-burry-is-investing-in-water/
By 2025, it is estimated that 66% of the world will live in water-stressed areas according to the World Resources Institute. We’re not just talking the usual headliners of California, North India (whose groundwater loss can be seen from space) or the Arabian Peninsula either, but a worldwide mismatch that will see a 40% gap between demand and supply emerge over the next 15 years
The coming water crisis is absolutely where the overall climate change/global overpopulation is going to hit first, unless there’s a black swan methane release before that. So Burry’s right about that.
*As indeed it was obvious to the smarter banks themselves. Obama received more money from them than any previous presidential candidate in US history precisely so as to avert any Franklin Roosevelt/New Deal replay.
I can see the Water Wars really getting into gear. A lot of past Israeli military campaigns have really been about stealing water supplies such as the invasion of Lebanon back in 2007. But going forward, you will be having more and more of these type of wars.
I read about that theory. It was supposed that Israel would try and divert all or part of the Litani River into North Israel. The distance looks small on a map.
But on the ground there are/were several miles of hard rock hills and mountains between the Litani and North Israel. How, in this scenario, was Israel going to blast through all that rock to build a miles-long canal or tunnel or whatever? And anyway, they are gone from South Lebanon now, and without any of the water from the Litani.
Here’s a movable map of the Litani River and all the countries right around the critical-according-to-this-theory ” L ” bend of the Litani River.
https://mapcarta.com/12889856
( By the way, not to change the subject or anything, but here is a map of the Great Bend of the Brahmaputra River, a sweet spot-zone over which dam building engineers love to drool.)
https://www.dawn.com/news/1289049
I suspect that the Israelis were thinking about using the water from the Litani river to support their new settlements – in what is southern Lebanon. Remember, they were there before until Hezbollah kicked them out back in 2000-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israeli_occupation_of_Southern_Lebanon
Israel’s occupation of the Shebaa Farms is also supposed to be about them tapping water supplies.
Lebanon and Syria have created a Gordian Knot situation for Israel regarding the Shebaa Farms. Lebanon says it is Lebanese territory. Syria says it is Syrian territory and that the SyriaGov will be extremely angry at Israel ( angrier than now?) if Israel allows Lebanon to have it as part of a settlement with Lebanon. ( I think Hezbollah shares the belief with the rest of Lebanon that Shebaa Farms belongs to Lebanon).
Here is how Israel could cut that Gordian Knot . . . . make stealth plans to abandon it in secret and let Lebanon and Syria discover that it has quietly been abandoned and de-occupied. And then let Lebanon and Syria discuss it between eachother, or fight for it, or whatever Lebanon and Syria decide to do. ( And let Hezbollah and Syria have their parallel discussion about the quietly abandoned Shebaa Farms, if Israel were wise enough to silently stealth-abandon it).
Israel has options when it comes to water — the only state in the region that does, as a result of long-term state policies that include building a massively expensive nuclear desalination plant. No neoliberal ‘let the market decide’ nonsense when survival is at stake.
One of the driest countries on Earth now makes more freshwater than it needs
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/israel-proves-the-desalination-era-is-here/
Israel uses desalination prowess to refill the Sea of Galilee
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wv2kwTzAaU4
How Israel Created the First Water Surplus in the Region | Insights: Israel & the Middle East
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EzdzK4DTG_0
@ Michaelmas
Yes, Israel has options like you mentioned. And yet they continue to try to steal other country’s water. In Israel itself, the settlers continuously steal water sources from Palestinians and just a coupla days ago it was linked here on NC how they went in and filled a Palestinian water source with liquid cement, all under the protection of the Israeli army. So the question that arises is this. If Israel can make their own water, then why do they keep on stealing water sources from others?
Rev kev: If Israel can make their own water, then why do they keep on stealing water sources from others?
Because they’re the regional hegemon and bully. In their own minds, at least.
I’m not defending it and I think Israelis are delusional — given that they can find common cause with MBS and Saudi Arabia — not trying to make nice with Iran, a much bigger country and people that were civilized back in the days when the Jews’ Roman conquerors were writing letters home full of contempt about what a grubby, backward people the Jews were with their constant animal sacrifices.
Doesn’t mean the Israelis can’t do other things right.
M your point is well taken, but you must admit that $1.6 billion is a pretty large bet to make on a couple of puts – and the almond farms in Cali are taking a hit, first from the drought and then too much water – but the nuts trees will still produce, maybe less which will drive up prices and i guess profits for Burry’s investments there if he still has them – the article at the link you share isn’t specific about when it was released or how much he is investing and what water related investments he is making besides the almonds – the interview with Burry referred to in article is from 2015, so a bit dated and the article i shared is 2023 – and there is the economic disruption in China which may ripple – which may be why he is selling his shares of JD.com (JD) and Alibaba (BABA) – his investments in CVS, which is a whole lot more than a drugstore, and Cigna will probably play out given the lock on healthcare by the monopolies – not sure about travel/vacations if pandemics pop again with a new virulent strain of covid or some other disease, and folks pocketbooks aren’t too fat these days – but Scions annualized returns of 56% are pretty fat and those big put bets aren’t something to dismiss easily with what appear to be chump change in his other investments (which he can buy insurance by buying puts on them) – just sayin’ –
and yes Obama was as corrupt as the rest of the grifter presidents – Iceland jailed the bankers O gave them a pass and they rewarded him with the most contributions to any president – and O certainly didn’t come through on any campaign promises even though the dems had a lock on the house and senate – it did avert him being like that Time cover portraying him as the new FDR – he was a criminal disgrace continuing the war and Gitmo and don’t get me started on his extrajudicial murder by drone –
water is a big issue, has been, IIRC one of the investments John Perkins was making as an economic hitman was water systems in foreign countries – and when it comes to the convergence of the environmental degradation and greed driven by the finacialization of everything, we are creating an overwhelmingly bearish tipping point on many fronts – just my humble and uninformed opinion – thank you for your comment, it made me think a bit more about this whole clusterf#@k that seems to be looming – damn glass is half empty again will go pet the pooch to get a smile –
the interview with Burry referred to in article is from 2015, so a bit dated and the article i shared is 2023
Just the first link that came up. Sorry.
But yeah, water was and is going to be first up on the string of ‘natural disaster’ episodes of the Polycrisis, unless there’s a Black Swan event (e.g. abrupt methane clathrate release, plague pandemic, like that).
the last company i worked for sold high-end water filtration devices – an ultra-filtration device and a large two-step RO – i visited CAFO’s, food processors, chemical processors, landfills, etc and know first hand the absolute crisis which is at hand regarding water – the primary solution has been dilution and fuhgettaboutit – the chickens are coming home to roost on a lot of fronts – i think it was Einstein who mentioned everything alive needs air and water – and he also mentioned that without bees there is no food – i’ve even been to very very large commercial greenhouse type grow operations, football field size buildings – never saw any bees in the tomato ones and tomatoes have flowers….not a botanist but maybe they don’t need bees – anyway, want to keep my glass half full today so won’t dive in – thanks again – the back and forth of comments by intelligent people is always appreciated – thanks again
Polycrisis….i like that word – good one – and let’s include CME’s and maybe a large comet like the one the dinos weren’t happy about – definitely a Polycrisis –
Just an FYI. There is no ending “e” in Newsom.
Some biz-speak job titles brewing here, e.g. CFCO = Chief Financial Crime Officer.
If it’s a race between the bench warmers, I bet DeSantis would beat Newsom.
It’s a horrifying thought of course, because they are both crap. Pick your demagog…
California’s homeless disaster, $20 billion blown so far, attracting half of America’s homeless, the fiscal disaster, fires, power outages, Newsom’s corruption–his wife and he have sucked over $700,000 out of PG&E which is regulated by the entirely Newsom appointed PUC…sheesh, at Least Huey Long built some bridges.
What has Newsom ever created, except a massive deficit and cities that look like Calcutta? Remember, he was mayor of San Francisco when the worst of it started.
I’m always a little surprised when people say Que Mala Harris would be that much worse than Biden — yeah, she’s day drunk by 10am and appears xanned out of her mind as she relates to audiences how much she likes “Venn diagrams” — but our current nursing home patient in chief isn’t much better. They trot him out of storage to do his Mr. Magoo bit, fall on his stupid face and then, shake hands with The Man Who Wasn’t There and wander off aimlessly, looking vaguely frightened and confused.
I think one thing Biden does have that never gets mentioned is he’s such a black hole of banality (he even looks banal, like a “no man”), so no one really loves or hates the guy very much, he just sucks all political energy and protest into himself and harmlessly disperses it.
Something else — if this is really The Most Important Election of our Blah Blah Blah™, would they really be insisting on running either of those people? A second’s thought and you can’t take them seriously.
I’m still of the mind we’d be better off if everyone in government was replaced by a random Joe and Jane off the street.
On Biden’s looks, Neera Beera would earn her salary by getting him out sunning on a WH balcony for a few minutes each day. He looks white as a sheet.
This is a good point. I get the impression the DNC control tower has placed Biden in a holding pattern while plans are being formalized for his replacement. So, it’s not necessary to get him any sun, improve his appearance, performance, etc. or do much beyond the most basic gaff damage control.
In this way, if a replacement is finalized and then announced, all the normies will suddenly pivot and say to each other: “oh, yeahhh, he WAS so old, wasn’t he? Looked white as a sheet. Frail. Terrible. Ummhmm. Kamala really is MUCH better.”
Is there a Vegas betting pool on the over/under for the official “Hillary 2024” announcement?
Ironically, it could come in the same year as Hurricane Hillary.
Let’s do it again, once more but this time with feeling ! BTW, Robby Mook will be nowhere in sight of this campaign. One last hurrah for the Clinton wing of the party, and take Donna Brazile with you when you run. Who knows, will the raging cajun and mouth of the south, Jimmy Carville, be available if LSU football doesn’t pose a conflict on scheduling?
With inflation since 2021, instead of his quote about dragging a $100 bill through a trailer park one would need to increase the dollar amount considerably.
Given how unequally the income is distributed now, that $100 USD would still look worthwhile to a trailer park denizen. It’s in the “upper echelons” that the bribe amount would need to be increased.
Speaking of Hurricane Hilary . . .
LOL
LOL too.
Gavin “Boy Wonder” Newsome or Mayo Pete.
Hell, a version of ChatGPT that can cash checks and parrot Team D talking points would suit the DNC just fine.
That would be Mayo Pete, who (in my opinion) crawled right out of the Uncanny Valley.
This comment wins.
Newsom can call on family money, but the wealthiest office holder in America has his own billions.
Pritzker’s quiet, but much like DeSantis, he’s quickly ticking off boxes beloved by his base.
Aw man, gotta confess that the view from Pritzker land is indeed quiet … him entering the race would be the ultimate ninja move IMO.
It could be that being a super rich person won’t help whatever dem pops out of the cake
Kunstler on Kamala:
“The Ukraine War will then be Kamala Harris’s to lose — depend on it — though nobody will care. I have a feeling that Barack Obama will not be able to… how shall we say… work with her. All that cackling must conceal an inner vacancy so vast that Judge Crater, DB Cooper, and the brigantine Mary Celeste might be roaming around in there, along with Amelia Earhart, Jimmy Hoffa, and the Lost Colony of Roanoke. And I cringe to imagine the meetings with Kamala where Susan Rice, Lisa Monaco, and Torie Nuland try to tell the poor simp what to do. It will look like one of those girlie beat-downs on an Oakland street-corner.”
When I read Friday’s Kunstler I couldn’t help but think that he’s getting that one wrong and then Lambert reinforced that thought up above by noting that D insiders may be leaking damaging kompromat on Biden so as to hasten his departure and clear the field for a stronger contender in 2024. You don’t stop RFK Jr with Joe Biden and I think we might see some kind of outsider synergy between him and Vivek that would appeal to everyone who ever voted for Perot, Nader, Ron Paul or Bernie .
Biden is going to be scapegoated to the point where people might start to feel sorry for him but someone NOT Obama and NOT Clinton must be held accountable for the horrorshow of revelations yet to come about foreign policy, healthcare and domestic corruption. Dems need to move fast. Just free associating here but what’s the avg NC reader’s gut reaction to a third party ticket of Kennedy-Ramaswamy in 2024? (KR24? sounds like some kind of solvent, maybe not the worst meme…)
Given the present state of the Nation, I’m thinking that a classic “populist strongman” candidate is in the offing. If Trump is kneecapped, look to what he does. He could anoint a stronger, more efficient fascist candidate to run as his proxy. Someone we haven’t considered before. Perhaps even a non-politician.
RFK Jr. has a bit of political baggage, and might be viewed as too well ‘invested’ in the political status quo. Sr. VR comes from the tech sector, and that group has been piling up a large amount of negative public attitudes.
Remember that Nader is a Muckraker par excellance, not a Politico. Perot was a self made businessman, not a Politico. Paul and Saunders are both ‘outside the box’ Politicos.
We live in interesting times.
2 bits on Hillary, another 2 bits on Michele.
i’ll never vote for either of them, of course….but i would prefer to see Hillary lose, one more time.
as an added feature, the local Rightists…those plugged into righty socmed, at least…will erupt with chants of porch monkey and the like, and it will feel like old times.(i grew up in east texas during the 80’s…klan was underneath everything)
better,perhaps…and from a decidedly strategic perspective….since with Hillary, she’ll get called Far Left, Socialist and Communist every day, all day…further diminishing the use-value of those words.
i see nobody in the wings or the back bench that i would ever consider giving my vote to.
if i vote, at all…im considering continuing my abstention….itll be for rfk in the demprimary, and cornell in the general.
neither will win, of course.
i remain unrepresented.
Maybe Steve Bannon.
i could see arguing with him around the fire at the wilderness bar…
hell, even max boot has a standing invite for that.
but no.
odious.
working at golden sacks, given his personality profile, near as i can determine…likely broke his mind.
id prolly end up running him though with the Bar Sword.
(yes, we have a House Sword,lol..because of course we do)
Mary Harrington has a standing invite(actually emailed her and roos douthat with that express intent…as well as to plead that they stop using “Left” to describe the Woke Thing.)
I could argue with this woman:
https://unherd.com/2023/07/the-conservative-case-for-revolution/
I remember some clever person made up a slogan back in the 60s;
> but if the Dem elite want Biden gone what’s the timeline?
Good question … and one, the answer to which is crucial for all the aspirants here. Perhaps the key lies in Kalorama (via NC). C’mon Mr. (Too Tall) Jones! Do what you gotta do!
Re the article on inflation. It seems like these writers are living on a completely different planet. In the real world, for me, Inflation continues to rage out of control in everything I normally have to buy such as food, healthcare, household supplies and repairs, car maintenance and now insurance. Just got my AAA car insurance renewal and it is up 50% and this is after a 40% rise in my house insurance at the beginning of the year. (I have no accidents nor tickets on my record.) My agent claims I can ‘reduce my coverage’ to reduce the increase. Time to start shopping around though I’m not sure it will help.
It makes me think the numbers the government comes up with are just completely made up to fit the narrative our leaders are trying to sell us.
“makes me think the numbers the government comes up with are just completely made up to fit the narrative our leaders are trying to sell”
There have been pundits saying that for decades, irrespective of which party is in power.
The heart of it is that the top 5% have taken most of the income and asset growth in the past 40 years.
Short and nicely explained. Good job LF.
And I’ve noticed as well that the increasing price of things gets an amen from conversations with family, friends, and strangers.
It’s the conversation piece everyone can engage in.
Adam – Give careful consideration to the insured value of your home, so you aren’t over-insured.
A few years ago I realized that the insurance company was increasing the stated value of my home each year regardless of the local housing market. But the time I noticed, the coverage was nearly double of the actual value of my home. I lowered it to a more realistic figure and saved a nice bit of money.
I recommend that you do some research looking at the prices of homes for sale in your neighborhood and talking to a contractor about the cost of rebuilding your home. These should give you a good idea of how much insurance you actually need.
Good luck and stay safe.
I got this advice from Clark Howard – clark(dot)com.
If you have had the same insurance broker for more than 5 years, especially one of the big ones, be sure to shop for a better deal with independent brokers in your area. You will get better rates and service, likely. In particular ask for a quote from West Bend out of Wisconsin. Hope that helps.
Yes, the answer is always to concentrate more power in the bureaucrats who contributed most to the problem.
FEMA has been a stellar performer. right? riiightt??? / ;)
(How are things going in East Palestine?)
Still doing heckuvajob, to quote W.
Heckuva job, Feds.
Each new conflagration is another opportunity in the eyes of PMC lackeys.
Those best and brightest never really went away after McNamara and his type left.
They just decided that the world really, really needs their unique insights and directives.
Voters are left scrambling as their kitchen table conversations take place on the road or in latter-day Displaced Person Camps. Who speaks for them?
If they get rid of Biden and try to install someone like newsom, then it is going to be hard to keep RFK Jr off the debate stage. Well, maybe not hard, but it will be an obvious machination.
So is the machination to get rid of Trump but they are doing it anyway. Once he is gone, they will be coming for RFK jr for sure.
It is entirely conceivable that Trump being “behind bars” will boost his electability. The obvious suppression of the “Deplorable Candidate” will bring the ‘useless eaters’ out of the ‘camps in the woods’ to vote en masse. They will view an obvious ‘suppression’ of Trump as an attack upon them. Therein lies the strength of Trump Populism, (even if he did run a bog standard old style Republican Administration.) Trump did at least give the people something, the Pandemic support payments, the vaccine warp speed project etc. What has Biden and his PMC supporters given the people, besides an extremely unpopular foreign “adventure?”
If Trump is ‘suppressed,’ whoever wins in 2024 will be viewed by a half of the country as an “illegitimate” President. The PMCs can triangulate and network as much as they like, they will be de facto a rump Elite. Imagine a country where a half of the population refuses to “cooperate” with the Authorities.
Stay safe. Welcome to Hard Times.
I am starting to think this election may be the one that really starts to destabilize things. I know all recent elections have been hyped as special in their potential consequences, but this one might be a real history changer.
I’m starting to think there will not be an election. It will be deemed too dangerous given the current vitriol. Once thing are sorted out, elections can resume (not).
Kunstler seems to agree with you in his latest:
https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/a-bumpy-ride/
This is where I have been for a while. Escalate things with Russia and China, declare martial law and “postpone” the election. There is no way Biden is electable, it’s the only way.
The Blob believes the troops can bring in the harvest and run the food processing plants even if there’s a general strike. And that the deaths from critical shortages impacting metro areas would be a plus (the more lawless the better for when order is restored).
At least I’d like to think that they’ve thought that far ahead.
In order to prevent trump from being a dictator we have to make biden a dictator…, then biden perishes and hunter ascends and then he can pardon himself for all crimes real or imagined.
Glen Greenwald on System Update was talking the other day about the dangers of a Trump conviction. He noted that Trump supporters will not stand idly by while they see their hero taken down for things that liberal elites do all day long. For example, taking home secure documents. He believes that if Trump is convicted and his campaign derailed we will see acts of violence worse than the theatrics of Jan. 6th…
“Terrible Consequences,” Anti-Trump Lawyer Warns of Indictment Dangers | SYSTEM UPDATE
https://youtu.be/kF59Fagncek
When liberal elites like Biden and Pence were discovered to have taken home secure documents, they pretended to apologise and gave the documents back to the government.
Whereas Trump spent over a year sneering at the government and shouting ” My documents! All mine! Mine! Mine! Mine!” for over a year. ( That’s what the phrase ” willful retention” means). Therein lies the difference, for all the effort and energy of Trump apologists and the Democrat Derangement Syndrome afflicted to pretend that difference is not there.
However, no amount of convictions for anything will derail Trump’s campaign. The more convictions Trump gathers, the bigger his base will grow. So there is that . . .
When liberal elites like Biden and Pence were discovered
The problem with this framing is that as I recall both biden and pence returned their documents after the hullabaloo over trump, so easily to be seen as a covering action. Let’s see a map of how the returned documents were gone over by biden/pences lawyers ala hillarys lawyers oh so many unfortunate years ago, and how they wound up in the garage or whatever/wherever they were when turned over to the authorities. It’s another stick to beat a dog
You could be right. Still and all, Pence and Biden did return them.
They did not spend a year trying to willfully retentionize them by various which-shell-is-the-pea-under sleight-of-hand bait-and-switcheroo games.
An interesting point but I don’t think such nuances will fly with the MAGA and MAGA-adjacent crowd, which was the reason Greenwald mentioned the documents.
Trump had his documents in a secure room in a house protected by the Secret Security. Biden? Well he had some in his house, some in his garage, some in some university think tank of his and who knows where else. Pretty sure that the later was not protected by the Secret Service.
Say, do you remember when the government send a team crashing into Biden’s home and that uni to grab those documents back again? No. Me neither because it never happened.
Trump also had boxes of documents in various other rooms in his FL house-office-resort, and some at his NJ golf club, places where lots of people – family, resort guests, workers – have legitimate access to the property. The SS protects the former president. There’s been no indication that they were or should have been responsible for monitoring access to those boxes.
Trump continued to retain documents after negotiations with NARA, a subpoena, and a statement from his lawyer that all documents covered by the subpoena had been returned.
This isn’t an argument that Biden would at some point have looked for documents he shouldn’t have had and/or acknowledged that he knowingly had them if the spotlight wasn’t on this issue. However, unlike Trump, he chose to take advantage of an opportunity to return the documents.
“This isn’t an argument that Biden…”
Yes, it is, because if it wasn’t you wouldn’t have had to say it isn’t.
Because Biden didn’t refuse to hand them back, and then didn’t say he had handed them all back while keeping some.
Condemning Biden for Biden’s condemnables need not require apologetics on behalf of Trump for Trump’s own condemnables.
Trump will likely die of old age before all the appeals can wind their way through the courts.
Ways may be found to keep him off the ballot in a few key states and drag out the overturn process until post-election. Writing him in wouldn’t win. Greenwald + others say the ridiculously broad/vague Georgia RICO law is the real threat to him, until it eventually hits the Supremes.
> Georgia RICO law is the real threat to him, until it eventually hits the Supremes.
{Emphasis Mine]
… and The Supremes are basically Trump-leaning ideologues. So basically Trump knows that they can take his appeal(s) to the highest court in the land and have a better than average shot of winning.
Dude ain’t worried. At. All. America’s gonna have an indicted president … LOL
It’s just a crying shame it wasn’t Eugene Debs!
I don’t know that the Supremes are Trump-leaning ideologues. They are Federalist Society ideologues and some of them are Opus Dei-type Catholic Reactionary ideologues.
But Trump has served his purpose for them. There is nothing more he can possibly do for them and there is no price he can make them pay if they decide to discard him like some used toilet paper now that they have no further use for him.
So I don’t know if we can really predict what Leaonard Leo’s Opus Dei justices will do if this Trump case reaches them.
> I don’t know that the Supremes are Trump-leaning ideologues. They are Federalist Society ideologues and some of them are Opus Dei-type Catholic Reactionary ideologues.
Yes, a better assessment than mine, which was off-the-cuff as it were …
> But Trump has served his purpose for them. There is nothing more he can possibly do for them and there is no price he can make them pay if they decide to discard him like some used toilet paper now that they have no further use for him.
Well, within those spheres of influence where gambling debts and RVs get paid for, maybe there is some sense of “doing the right thing” if one wants the gravy train to keep running. Don’t completely discount network effects when dealing with morally compromised people.
> So I don’t know if we can really predict what Leaonard Leo’s Opus Dei justices will do if this Trump case reaches them.
“Always in motion … is the future” – Yoda … ;-)
Cheers.
> Re: Trump giving the people something
There are a few important things for which he deserves credit (no TPP, no new war), but as far as pandemic support, he “gave” them the CARES act that was passed almost unanimously by the House (54% majority Dem) and Senate (53% majority R). His supporters opposed the vaccines and masks (and members of the working class who asked them to wear one); he didn’t wear a mask and held what would be called super-spreader events when PCMDems do it.
Of course. The message is very strong: “They aren’t coming for me; they’re coming for you. I’m just standing in their way.”
The delicious irony of this being the mirror image of Obama facing Wall Street after the GFC and saying “I’m the only thing standing between you and the pitchforks.” (Stoller, via X/Twitter with the receipts!)
But … Trump, despite all his faults, at least facing the right direction (to the people).
More than 1,000 people have already been charged, and more than 600 convicted for the Capitol riot. He didn’t stand in the way.
Whether Trump is facing toward them or not, his supporters are a subset of the people, one which is often pretty clear about what they think of the rest of the people.
“He didn’t stand in the way.”
What could he do? This has already reached the dimensions of a Witch Hunt. The DOJ Apparatchiks doing the prosecutions against Trump have entered the land of “Is she a Witch? How do you tell?”
Monty Python, as usual, ahead of the curve: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yp_l5ntikaU
If he is elected, he can pardon all the Jan/6 “felons.” He might even be able to do it from his own prison cell.
Frankly, all of the sub-sets of “The People” have varying views of the other sub-sets. It’s called Tribalism and is not unique to any group.
Stay safe.
It wouldn’t be surprising if he does pardon them if he’s elected. In the meantime he’s making speeches as if he’s a great martyr to their cause, when the opposite is the case.
hmmm… I suppose the B admin could always go into a health emergency lockdown next year, wherein voting will again be by mail-in ballots. / ;)
Although… with so many big tech and big Wall St. companies insisting people come into the offices to work, not sure how a second lockdown would go over with the “important people.”
Sure they can. “Because reasons, because we can!”
The MSM will chorus as one that The Voice Of Democracy Has Spoken!
That sounds about right.
Newsflash – Biden has just died of a heart attack and there is a photo of Kamala Harris with one hand on a bible and the other in the air. Nah, just kidding. But you know that it could happen at any time.
I don’t think Biden will have a sudden heart attack. He will just slowly wind down to a silent stop, like an old grandfather clock.
WHAT IF Biden has a health crisis, the 25th Amendment is invoked but they hold out hope for full recovery so Harris is only a temp-POTUS and Biden gets to campaign from his hospital bed?
I keep picturing him lasting until he’s like 130, wandering around on some lawn with a cane, saying “I can…walk. I can still wa-alk!”
And then some little eight-year-old launches a paper airplane that errantly loop-de-loops and hits old Joe in the shoulder, whereupon the former president just goes down like a sack of potatoes, dead.
First president assassinated by accident
First president assassinated by a child
First president assassinated by a piece of paper
Alternately, Biden dies quietly in his sleep…
And then a WH spokesperson says: “The pillow was against the headboard.”
We’re in Land of Confusion territory, using the original by the band Genesis and the excellent video. That video featured Ron and Nancy so this comment is dating me for when MTV played,get this, music videos non-stop.
Oh superman where are you now…when everything has gone wrong “somehow”…men of steel men of power, losing control by the hour…
Re: the hypothesis that D insiders are leaking inconvenient information regarding POTUS family dealings, …
I don’t understand why they would want to be rid of him. Come on, man! … he isn’t Trump and, even more importantly, he isn’t Sanders.
What more do they want?
Somebody who could beat a jailed Trump. Unfortunately there isn’t anyone acceptable, only shots are the clearly unacceptable Sanders or possibly RFK jr
This.
The dems have no one.
Something about how americans standard of living must fall because it’s a law of nature that the rich get richer.
The questions “beat a jailed Trump” bring to my mind are, Will the Republican Convention nominate a convicted Trump? Will the Supreme Court overrule any conviction? All convictions? Will the RNC nominate a jailed Trump? Can the Party Elders control the convention?
Pass the popcorn…
Will there be two Republican Party conventions?
This could be similar to the splitting up of the Whig party in 1854. The present day Republican Party was a direct descendant of that Whig Party break up.
See: https://www.history.com/news/whig-party-collapse
Looking back at 1852, Fillmore was the only non-WINO president. He wasn’t going to run for nomination, but then changed (or was convinced to change ) his mind, but was effectively blocked by Webster. That resulted in another military WINO (Scott) getting the nomination. That gave a boost to the downfall of the party, though certainly Kansas/Nebraska and the Lecompton Constitution played big roles. Dems of course had two conventions in 1860, and Lincoln had his own convention (as the “National Union Party”) separate from the Repubs in 1864 that dumped Radical Hamlin in favor of Dem Johnson as VP.
“Pass the popcorn…”
And a flak vest…
The Republicans don’t rig their primaries the way the Democrats do. So such things could happen over on the Republican side.
I think we need a new category for articles on elite/managerial incompetence with a day of the week dedicated to covering it, maybe we can call it “Technical Ignorance Tuesdays”.
hey all – early this morning “some guy” posted this on yesterdays links comment – and i guess i don’t know enough about the electoral college – is it an antiquated tool from an time when the agricultural part of the country wanted to have an equal voice? – here is part of what “some guy” wrote and sounds interesting to me –
“Maybe West and the Greens should figure out which few states they could win in theory which would delete enough electoral votes from the overall total such that neither brand name candidate could get enough electoral votes to win the election. If West and the Greens could achieve that, and force the House of Reps to vote on who becomes President, they could dare the Reps from the states whose electoral votes they had just won to vote for anyone other than West in that scenario.”
btw thank you ‘some guy’ for posing this question……glass half full again RK…with cognac to start the day – staying away from those electrodes and biting on wood –
and out come the knives
https://www.newsnationnow.com/politics/2024-election/green-party-candidate-cornel-west-50k-taxes/
The way for candidates to be immunised against morals-charges blackmail and purging is for agenda-seeking citizen-voters to pre-decide that they will not be deterred or put off from a candidate by manners-and-morals charges and blackmail.
That is a decision that the citizen-voters will have to make, because every potential social-improvement candidate will always have something findable in the manners-and-morals department.
At some point it becomes the average citizens’ own fault for choosing to care about such things.
LOL … Yup! Right on time ..
They did this to Randy “Ironstache” Bryce as well. After grooming him as a Bernie labor guy to run, once momentum started building they kneecapped him by leaking that his child support was in arrears (same people who leaked it were probably same people who recruited him and then didn’t clean up his child support issues).
Once The Blob reviewed West’s taxes, they probably started greasing the skids to use him to take out the Green Party. This is how they think. Chris Hedges just unloaded on RFK Jr and anyone wanna bet on whether or not someone in his circle egged him into doing it?
On the plus side, I think the Trump Exemption applies here. “Who gives a shi†? Let’s talk the serious issues.” This would be a good time for taking on a more forgiving attitude towards venal sins of which everyone has some. It’s too far out from the election to be canceling candidates.
I don’t know my own Constitution the way I should, but the Electoral College system was one of several key compromises extorted by one or another interested groups of States among the Original Thirteen States for even considering voting to ratify the proposed constitution.
In the case of the Electoral College, it was about several small and tiny states wanting to retain some measure of defensive power against the big and mighty states. Little Rhode Island and Connecticut against the mighty New York and Virginia. Plus stuff in general about this being a Federal Republic made up of States coming together to function as a Country. It can function as more urban versus rural nowadays, I suppose.
Still, it does offer a way for a determined Third Party combined with a determined electorate ( if there is one) to jam the Two Brand Name Parties up eachothers’ adzehulls. IF! that Third Party can win just enough electoral-vote-rich states to make sure neither Brand Name party can get enough of the States remaining to get an electoral vote victory. That was going to be George Wallace’s strategy during one of his campaigns ( I forget which one).
so it’s not a majority of electoral votes but a fixed number of electoral votes? actually sounds like a good plan for the Greens to pursue – anything to disrupt the uniparty of the oligarchy – still ain’t majority vote gives us the winner in the general election – and imho they should have paper ballots and a hand count – but ain’t holding my breath on that one – as mentioned previously, if there is a dem primary will vote for RFK Jr to mess with the dems but will vote for Cornel in the general – Cornel oughta get that Oliver Anthony guy to sing his rich men north of richmond for his campaign stops – would make it really interesting – just spitballing here – believe you’re thinking of Wallace’s ’72 campaign for prez –
Well, we can always look back at 1824, the “corrupt bargain”, and subsequent populist rise of Jackson, though worth remembering in 1824 only 18 states used popular vote for appointing electors.
If there were only two prez candidates dividing all the electoral votes between them, I think it would be a majority of those votes as added up state by state. But I don’t know that for sure. I believe if the voters of any one state vote for one candidate over the other by 50% plus one vote, then all the electoral votes of that state go to the candidate who won by 50% plus one. ( Are some states now experimenting or considering experimenting with dividing their assigned number of electoral votes proportionally between the candidates according to what percent of votes the candidates got within those “some” states? Does anyone know about this?)
But if a Third Party candidate were able to win within a state, that Third Party candidate would get all that state’s electoral votes. If a Third Party is actually able to get a stateload of electoral votes, then a Brand Name candidate would have to get an actual threshhold number of electoral votes to win . . . . I think.
It is based on that thinking . . . I think . . . . that I think that a brilliantly strategic Third Party candidate which could also execute all the right plans and tactics brilliantly in order to actually achieve all the strategic aims . . . . namely enough electoral votes to prevent either Brand Name candidate from getting to the thresh-hold number of electoral votes from among the remaining states . . . . could actually force the election into the House of Representatives.
Which would give that candidate’s supporters several months to torture and terrorise every Representative from the States won by the Third Party candidate into voting the way that State’s electoral votes were assigned. The Reps would not be constitutionally required to do that. They would still be free to vote for one of the Brand Name candidates. But perhaps they could be tortured and terrorized into all voting for the Third Party candidate which won in their states.
If all the other Reps kept voting for the Brand Name candidates while the suitably tortured and terrorised Reps from the Third Party electoral-sweepstakes states kept voting for the Third Party candidate, the House of Reps could keep voting and voting and voting . . . and never be able to elect a President. In which case, then what? Well . . . I don’t know.
But as The Joker once said . . . ” Some men just want to watch the Two Parties burn.” And the people who would have voted for the Third Party candidate in this scenario would be in a deeply Jokeristic mood and would not tolerate any defections by their Reps to one of the Brand Name candidates in the House of Reps votes.
Yes, it’s known as the Connecticut Compromise of the Constitutional Convention of 1787. It gave all states equal representation in the Senate (2 senators). This currently gives California and Wyoming the same influence for Advise & Consent of Executive (President) appointees and Supreme Court judges. As well as the ability to block all manner of House legislation.(California (40M) and Wyoming (1M) were not part of the Union until later)
Coupled with the current Senate filibuster rules the Compromise is an undemocratic perversion.
Article II Section 1 of the Constitution states that if the decision on the president goes before the House of Representatives the members do not vote as individuals. Each state gets one vote. How that vote goes in most cases we’ll be determined by which party has the majority of the members of the delegation from that state. In recent years the Republicans have tended to dominate the delegations from smaller states, whereas the Democrats have held sway in the fewer large states. Thus Republicans are likely to have the advantage if the selection of the president goes to the House.
Then a Third Party candidate would have to win enough Republican-leaning states, and be able to torture and terrorise the delegations of those states into voting for the Third Party winner of the election within those states . . . . to deny the Republicans that “more small states advantage” in order to prevent the States House of Reps delegations from conspiring together to elect a Brand Name candidate.
Shut the system down. Make the system scream. Make it keep screaming until supporters of Mr/Ms. Third Party are able to torture and terrorise enough Brand Name State Delegations into voting for the Third Party candidate to get that candidate elected. Or to prevent a President from being elected in the House at all.
Some men just want to watch the two parties burn.
There is a bill floating around the states that if enough states pass the bill the electoral college would become moot. The way the legislation works is regardless of the states popular presidential vote that state would cast it’s vote in the EC for the national winner of the popular vote. Remember a state sets the criteria on how to cast it’s votes in the EC. If I remember correctly the magic number is the 17 largest states would need to pass the legislation in order for this to take affect. The legislation, if passed, would only affect the states where the bill became the law.
A number of states have already passed the legislation so there is hope.
Well, that would allow the 17 largest states to all conspire together to persecute, oppress, exploit and colonize the other 34 states, which would open a new pathway to a Spanish Civil War type of Civil War.
The Spanish Civil War was not a war of attempted secession and suppression of that secession. It was a winner take all war about which side would run the entire country for that side’s own benefit.
This is where Section 2 of the 14th Amendment comes in. And the Green Party is arguably a step or two ahead on this — see this from 2004:
US Constitution Mandates Penalties for States Where Votes are Obstructed
Combine this revelation with the one-person-one-vote cases of the 1960s and the holding that diluting a group’s voting power (ability to get its preferred candidates elected) denies their voting rights . . . and any state that doesn’t allocate its “House-based” electoral votes proportionally is arguably violating the Constitution!
Teaching math the new way in California, call it the new new math ? Wait til this nonsense takes hold in teaching medicine. Oh wait, it already has. From The Atlantic, 2021.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/leftist-language-policing-wont-fix-health-disparities/620695/
I’ve got a bad feeling about this.
I saw a chart the other day about the number of STEM students that countries were producing and if I remember correctly, Russia and China were ahead and the gap was widening. But if you have all this trendy stuff being crammed into studies like maths and other subjects, then qualitatively US students will be much more inferior in the international market. And I have heard Andrei Martyanov make this same point as well. And it is not just the US but other countries that are declining in standards. A day or two ago I read that how ‘thousands fewer students in England awarded top A-level grades’-
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/aug/17/a-level-results-in-england-show-biggest-drop-on-record
This at a time when the west will need as many highly educated people as they can get just to tread water.
I’m coming to the conclusion the US needs to get rid of the current grant funding process in higher education. Stay with me here. The grant funders’ committees choose grant recipients based largely on their (the committees’) dominant belief system. Unis are desperate for grant moneys. If social justice, or belief the world rests on the back of a giant turtle, or whatever is a dominant belief system in the granting agencies, then that’s the sort of work and research the agencies award grants to.
So we don’t get many breakthroughs in science, or expansion of ideas in philosophy or the arts anymore. What we get is “The Science” and “Consensus Science”. We get new descriptions of how to butter bread instead of more bread and butter. etc. We get more and more things to find “oppression” in and new ways to fight said newly found oppression, even when it makes no sense in context. etc.
Alternative Math. utube ~9 minutes. / ;)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zh3Yz3PiXZw
so how does that explain China and Russia being on board with the consensus science on global warming? is it their grant system?
Anecdote but based on easily verifiable data. At “A level” (final secondary school year before university), two of my subjects in early 1990s were “maths” (aka “single maths” – typically required to do STEM subject at UK university) and “further maths” (much more technical, catering to pupils who were pretty sure they wanted to pursue something in advanced physics/economics/maths).
To prepare, we did past papers. Notoriously, past papers from pre-1975ish for our FURTHER maths preparation were real A level papers from SINGLE maths. That’s how I know my maths skills are less than those of pupils 16 years my senior.
Woe betide anyone who accuses a current student with A level maths of having an insufficiently broad knowledge, however. I taught medical students around 2000. Their maths was frankly not good enough to make me confident any could judge things like sensitivity/specificity of a test.
Ha! Same here! My southern Caribbean high school had a “Maths Group” for A-Levels. If you were in “Maths Group” for Lower and Upper VI, you did Physics, Maths and Further Maths. And yes, we finished the entire syllabus in Lower VI and Upper VI was all past papers!
When I came to the US for my engineering degree, I hardly saw Math or Physics material that was not covered in FormVI/A-Levels – notable exception Linear Algebra.
We live in a liberal Virginia county – that of Charlottesville. The middle schools will be teaching math only on alternative days next year.
https://www.crozetgazette.com/2023/08/05/county-middle-schools-trade-core-instructional-time-for-electives/
Read down to the fifth paragraph where the explanation is that kids just want to have fun and experiences.
“[When] we’re double-blocking English and double-blocking math, the kids have no choice in their schedule. They say, ‘you’re pulling away the fun parts of my day.’”
I read the fifth paragraph as you advised. I was not mentally prepared for this statement at all. God help those kids.
I put “21st century learner” in the same category as Lambert’s “smart”. I hold on to my kids and my wallet tightly whenever I hear it.
The skills needed in the 21st century are based on fundamentals from the last 10 centuries. There are questions to be asked and answered about how to develop and deliver a curriculum in a society with unequal access to resources. The schools around us are asking whether they’re supposed to be a system of schools or a school system. They’ve decided they’re a school system. So there can’t be large differences in instruction or content between the schools. Which means there is a lot of difference in student progress because plenty of kids can burn through in weeks what was intended for an entire semester. Because when you come to school healthy, well fed, in nice clothes, with all the tools and resources you want, and parents who read to you at home, it’s not so hard to progress through material quickly.
What the approach in that Charlottesville article is going to do is further push wealthy families and high achieving kids out of the public school system. It will also hurt the students who stay behind.
They are deliberately setting up those kids for failure as in on purpose. When those kids graduate and can’t get a job because they can’t do maths, at least they will be able to sit around and swap stories of their fun times in school – the high point of their lives (Picard face palm)
How did CA go full circle from the movie “Stand and Deliver” to today?
The California Republican Party became crazy, which allowed the California Democratic Party to get a supermajority and make California effectively a one party state; the Republicans went from crazy to just insane while the Democrats are going through a similar process because both parties only answer to the most extreme partisans of their base. I would guess we have ten percent at most of the population dictating policy for the other ninety percent.
There is a similar process in all the other one party states as not only are the calibre of politicians already poor, the incoming ones decide to listen to only the more energetic, and nowadays the most extreme or crazy, party members if they listen to anyone without money.
As a final touch, most people of the current political system do not want to govern or make decision as that opens them to criticism. Often in a crisis making a decision, any decision, is what is necessary, but if you don’t want to govern and only listen to the most energetic and extreme people, this is what we get.
so california is not a socialist paradise?
im in texas…we enjoy the extreme other side of the burning tire pile.
repub only state…lending itself to them competing for which of them can be more batshit.
while the spineless dems do their carpet impressions to great applause and wonder among their tiny tribe.
“Examining how breast size affects women’s attitudes to exercise”
I’d rate this article as a DD. It puts in several plugs for women to go under a knife and reduce boob size as an answer to wanting to exercise more. Not a fan myself of having surgeries on people’s bodies to make minor – and maybe temporary – problems go away. Look, OK, I am a guy and I get it. It’s all that extra 3-dimension activity making things more difficult when exercising. Women with bigger boobs may have trouble exercising but surely it is a matter of choosing sports where it may not be a factor – like swimming or bicycling. Or – stay with me here – maybe wearing a sports bra? And so as a public service-
https://www.runnersworld.com/gear/a21731269/best-sports-bras/
Hmmm… a good sports bra or surgery? what to do, what to do? / ;)
Don’t even get me going on silicone breast implants. One of the sisters-in-law had “the procedure” done twenty years ago. Five years ago she has ‘them’ taken out. Phyl says that her sister says she feels a lot more ‘body comfortable’ now. Whatever the motivations, more power to her.
I have been told that bras in general are mainly designed to counteract natural stretching of the tissues that support the breasts. So, anti-sagging units.
It’s a women’s issue and just ignore the issues of “men’s gaze.”
Stay safe!
‘just ignore the issues of “men’s gaze.”
It might be a bigger issue if men weren’t gazing for some. :)
wife’s hot cousin is thusly well endowed(never understood bra sizes…nor cared, as my main concern was with the damned fasteners)
shrunk a little since she had twins…she admits that its better for her back, long term(them thangs can be heavy)
when she was just starting out, we went to see her in san antone…take her to lunch etc.
im driving, shes in the front passenger seat.
we stop at a store so i can gas up…and when i return, get in the car…she says…”i dont know why all these people are staring at me…”
i stopped and…very over the top obviously…looked down into that deep, deep cleavage, and the tops sticking out all over…and then looked her in the eye.
and cocked my eyebrow.
she obviously…if amazingly…didnt seem to have considered that displaying such ample bosoms in such a literally in your face manner…might attract a lil Male Gaze.
i at least have the decency to wear my fishing glasses if im gonna leer,lol…but it is to be expected, dern it.
ive noticed the same thing at the beach…of all places…
“why are they looking at me?”…while wearing string.
if i wore string at the beach, folks would look at me,too…just less favorably, perhaps, than they would look at Prima in her strings.
end rant,lol.
im triggered….and without any bosom-havers.
Breasts are only a partial reason I hate running. And I spent lots of money on one of the best bras just for a cardio class only to have the breast still hurt and it be massively uncomfortable on top of that. It was years ago, so maybe they have better engineered the weight distribution since then.
But I have a different solution, maybe we should put more emphasis on walking. But there is no money in that.
Back in the 70s a big thing was running and nearly everybody could do it – and many people did. You didn’t need to pay an instructor or do expensive lessons, you didn’t need to pay gym fees or to attend some studio or anything like that. Just slap on a pair of runners and go-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Running_boom_of_the_1970s
But agreed about walking – and for all the same reasons as above.
You might like this Guardian article about walking.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/jun/19/im-not-just-faster-but-taller-how-i-learned-to-walk-properly-and-changed-my-pace-posture-and-perspective
Never a runner nor frequenter of gyms, I did engage in a lot of sporting activities when younger. My general rule of thumb regarding physical exertion being that it should either be fun or I should get paid for it. But now, given my age and degree of decrepitude, walking has become my principal form of daily exercise. It does a body and mind good.
I choose not to run in 2024…
Most of the long time runners I know that ply their traits on concrete or asphalt have jacked up bodies, despite being really fit
Is that your Sherman Statement or your Peabody Statement?
Horrors! You hang out with a bunch or Free Jacks?
Hunker down and prepare for the Deluge up there. Take some pictures of the river after the ‘rain’ falls. Also, will the road on up to the Heights wash away again?
Be careful and, as always, stay safe.
I believe the current thinking regarding our hunter-gatherer ancestors is that they less often ran prey down than they walked the critters to death. Long, slow-speed chases were the rule.
I hate running. I could picture having surgery that allowed me not to run.
i havent been able to run since that wreck in 1990.
tried it without thinking a couple of times, in the heat of it(toddler youngest leg caught in tree house ladder hanging upside down, loping to close a gate on a momma sheep and her lamb just the other day)…all attempts do me in for a day or so.
i’ll stick to plodding, staggering and lurching, thank you.
This is one reason my wife has always been a lap swimmer. And bikes.
I had a friend in high school who was a dancer and who had professional aspirations. She was in great shape, but definitely had much bigger breasts than you would expect. She had breast reduction surgery in college and seemed to be happy with it. However, one of the issues at the time was that she would never be able to breast feed any future children since they had to move her nipples and disconnect them from the duct system. Either the surgery has changed or this issue wasn’t deemed significant enough to mention in the article.
“Degrowing China—By Collapse, Redistribution, or Planning?”
I couldn’t get into the article.
If they were to talk about the challenges with “sustainability” in rentier/fascists economies and authoritatian socio-economic systems, it would bear more resemblance to the actual lived experience within the current global economic order.
I think not addressing from the starting point of where one actually is (not the theory of where or what they are or have been) prevents commumities, nations, etc
from solving problems.
China has a One Party State and a One Party Army. If any country can achieve sustainable survival through planned degrowth, it will be China. So perhaps this article was simply imagining ways that the Chinese PartyState Govermnent might do that.
Part of degrowth will be extensive de-mechanization and extensive re- handlaborization. If that isn’t applied first and hardest against the very richest and best off members of the society and only then begin working its way down the social class and status ladder, it will be very badly received.
Granted, Chinese civilians don’t have the numbers of private citizen/subject guns that American civilians have. But Chinese do know how to throw a good riot.
Even if the Communist Party were violently overthrow, what would take it’s place after the chaos would be just as if not more authoritarian.
With the probably unavoidable era of de-growth, planned or enforced by circumstances that get out of everyone’s control, and with the population collapse that almost certainly will go along with it around the world, and the in all likelihood also unavoidable, collapse enforced de-mechanisation (or even the planned variety) they might just as well restore the Empire in some form.
That model after all worked pretty well in many ways for a pre-industrial society, for a very long time.
California facing doom and gloom, and potentially wet destruction, from an incoming hurricane most likely to make landfall in the coming days. Based on the tracking shown this morning, looks like it would / could downgrade to a tropical storm once the system has moved that far inland from ocean or gulf water. Wind is not your friend either. As a young person from eastern North Carolina y’all have our sympathies. However, so we’re clear, my native state would like a word. Hold our beer. I can recall 30 years ago, being evacuated from my summer job in the Manteo / Nags Head area. Just one example out of a couple examples to cite.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_Carolina_hurricanes
Sounds like Wukchumni did the right thing by cancelling his little trip to go car camping right now at a beach. For years now we have been hearing about the warnings of climate change and so maybe this is it, or maybe the start. Hardly a week goes by when you don’t get stories of massive fires in Canada, a hurricane closing in on California, floods in China, heat waves in Europe and America, red skies like it was Mars, etc. It is just one natural catastrophe after another and seemingly without end. With all this going on, it is like being trapped in the Hotel California.
You can check out anytime you’d like but can never leave…
Seeing as this is such an odd occurrence, you get the feeling people aren’t hep to the danger of something wicked this way comes, and we’re leaving the beach today, but honestly its a beautiful day and if you didn’t know better, you’d have no idea the danger lurking a day out.
Its getting weird and the hurricane has gone woke, now named Harry after transforming itself into an angry white male who usually rages against the right coast, but not this time.
Lotsa dangers for backpackers in the High Sierra, you’d have no idea whats coming if you were on the JMT, which has kind of a bullseye course, currently.
Are there any studies that anyone is aware of concerning how much smoke the atmosphere can hold before it no longer is a viable source of life support?
If you haven’t done so, you can check out projections of the storm’s path on Ventusky. After crossing the U.S. border, in spite of any walls or fences, it appears to follow the Sierras all the way up into Oregon.
Just a friendly reminder that floods cause much more damage than wind, by any and every metric.
True indeed. I recall two hurricane events pretty well, Fran in 1996 blasted through the Wilmington area and then sped into the Durham Chapel Hill region leaving a lot of damage, downed trees and power lines and yes flooding in specific locations. Then in 1999, there was the near-biblical flooding from Floyd in the eastern portions of NC. Dead pigs floating downstream wouldn’t you know it, could not transfer that much livestock to higher ground. And then there was also the downstream fish kills, if memory serves, in the Neuse River. Greenville, NC, had epic flood stages and the associated impacts from the Tar River.
Concerning the Maui fire, check out this video from there after the fire. The videographer speaks with a local character, (what else to expect from there?) about the fire. Spoiler: He states that the line of automobiles along the beachfront that was burned to a crisp was being kept there by a police unit. With people inside the vehicles, just before the fire caught up with them.
Stupidity knows no bounds.
For those who might doubt the man’s veracity, do consider that, even if he were “incorrect” in his statements, the fact alone that such charges would arise says something not good about the relationship between the Maui public and the local police and “Emergency Managers.”
See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jVDTfp7gFc
The story is in the first three minutes.
I can well believe that guy’s testimony. Remember how on 9/11 the people in the second building were told to return to their desks? Or how during the 2017 UK Grenfell tower fire all those people were ordered to “stay in place” and just wait? Or how parents were being held back and threatened with arrest if they tried to get their kids out of that school shooting in Uvalda back in ’22? All the results of some professional managerialship from somewhere up the line. As Hawaii is a solid Democrat State, I would expect the Biden White House to give them all the cover that they can to make this problem go away. I am not saying that that video will be deleted by YouTube for “spreading misinformation” but these days you just never know.
That would depend on what “Democrat” means at the State of Hawaii level.
I remember once attending a fundraising bean dinner given by my very local branch of Michigan’s Democratic Party. When they asked for a donation beyond the low price of the dinner itself, I asked
if they had a way to give money strictly to the Michigan State Democratic Party with none of it going to the National Pelosicratic Party leadership. They said they did. I chose to believe them. Pelosi is somewhat of a hate-figure among Michigan Democrats for her pro NAFTA work in Congress.
So . . . do the Hawaii Democrats have their own State-specific features? I have never been there so of course I don’t know. Their response to this fire situation will reveal whether they have their own level of Separate Hawaiicratic identity-and-concerns matrix or whether they are indeed just a trojan horse party full of Clintonites and Obamazoids.
Meanwhile, the Native Hawaiians may be ever more and more thinking to themselves: ” Welcome to Hawaii. America’s Baltic State.”
Who is the Police chief? This guy.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/no-stranger-to-tragedy-maui-police-chief-john-pelletier-led-response-to-2017-vegas-massacre/ar-AA1fjgBH
Lots of stories coming out now about people evacuating by car and police closed the main road escape routes. I would normally doubt this, but there’s video. Start at about the 3 minute mark.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Z0beYjT6ko
An update from the same guy about important important info for fire survivors.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiM7ujJfy3E
Turns out that Hawaii just enacted a new special governor special powers for 2 months to lift the laws about building codes and restrictions in the reconstruction process after a natural disaster. Starts at the 7 minute mark
That’s going to be a problem, as the Stafford Disaster Relief Act will only provide funds (75% of the cost of reconstruction for va declared disaster) to reconstruct things to the building code at the time of the disaster.
Just heard this Fox reporter rail at Biden because he offered $700 per household for those fire victims and which he said worked out to less that $2 million all told. This at the same time he wants another $24 billion for the Ukraine. This will not age well-
https://twitter.com/MyLordBebo/status/1692306302762914289
RE: Biden to sign strategic partnership deal with Vietnam in latest bid to counter China in the region Politico
As in this country, I’m sure there are at least a few Vietnamese still around who remember the halcyon days of agent orange and “kill anything that moves.” Under the circumstances, not sure letting “bygones be bygones” is gonna be a winning approach.
I guess biden could always counter with, “Don’t blame me, I wasn’t even there. I had asthma and I stuttered.”
Or maybe he could offer to make a geographical exception, and dangle a nato membership in front of their faces. Being in close proximity to a superpower the u.s. wants to start a war with really worked out for ukraine.
There are, and they do. But they probably also remember the more-recent Chinese invasion attempt during the Pol Pot period.
And they have a historical memory of several hundred unbroken years of Chinese war against Vietnam from longer ago.
So the Vietnamese leadership will probably make its own long-range decisions about things and stuff regardless of who offers what alliance or deal or whatever.
Poymer nanoparticles.
Microplastics, Benjamin! Lemons into lemonade.
Ah, but now Young Ben runs away with Mrs. Robinson. Poor Elaine, her mirror is cracked, along with the rest of the world around her.
‘Don’t You Remember Me?’ The Crypto Hell on the Other Side of a Spam Text” Bloomberg
This reminds me. If you don’t live with the relative, don’t affirm one bit of information from any unknown callers.
Had some call the other day from an anonymous number. I only answered because I was expecting a service call.
I pick up, say hello, and their first words are my father’s name in the form of a question? As if the call had to with some biz concerning him. He lives thousands of miles away from me.
I didn’t say that’s my father, he doesn’t live here. I didn’t say anything but “wrong number” and hung up.
No call back.
A lot of these scammers have just bought bits of information on people and have to piece it together from more bits to develop a target.
Even better, say nothing when you pick up. Listen for a click, that’s their machine routing you to a live person so hang up. If you hear breathing wait for them to talk, and if it’s at all sketchy hang up.
I use to be able to tell some scammers straight away by a sound that was heard before anybody spoke. It sounded exactly like – I kid you not – a one second, sound effect from the old Duke Nukem video game. I do not know what it was but it was a dead give away.
Re; President Joe Biden hasn’t launched a Maui fire investigation. Here’s why.
People need to be in jail. Now.
“West African bloc says day set for possible military intervention in Niger”
A political spokesman from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) stated that any military invasion would be done to restore freedom – there is that word again – and to restore the former Arabic leader of Niger and that this was being done by their own decision-making process. That they are not doing so to do the dirty work of the west and taking all the risks and casualties but are doing so under their own cognizance.
And they have Macron’s permission to say so.
Is Niger majority-Arabic? Or majority-African?
If it is majority-African, what about the Army itself? Is it majority-African? If so, how tenable will a minority-Arab ruler, no matter how “civilian”, ever be in a majority-African Niger with a majority-African Army today or tomorrow or next week or next century?
Majority African but the Boys at The Duran were saying how the deposed Mohamed Bazoum is from a Arab minority that apparently is used to keep a lid on Niger-
‘Bazoum is a member of the Ouled Slimane people, an Arab tribe originally from the Fezzan region of Libya who constitute a small minority within both Niger and the larger Nigerien Arab population’
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohamed_Bazoum#Early_life_and_career
Meanwhile Mali and Burkina Faso have deployed Super Tucano ground attack planes and an attack helicopter to Niamey in support of Niger. I wonder is this is just moves to avoid the kinetic confrontation or the first steps towrds one?
For those countries, the Super Tucanos are quite up to the task. With good pilots, they can evade most anti-air resources. Their main strength here would be as logistics interdiction units against whoever ‘invades.’
The real ‘spoilers’ here are the American and French military bases within Niger. Given how the American surveillance assets are being used to ‘help’ the Ukraine in targeting Russian forces and infrastructure, any half decent Niger military staff would have to prioritize the “neutralization” of those bases.
One way or another, NATO is going to get involved.
Re:Bartlett on Twitter doubting Musk’s sanity
He’s not crazy. He has trouble recognizing and respecting people’s boundaries. A condition…
And I read something about those blocks affecting ad dollars. People can block advertisers.
That is what I’ve been doing since I joined twitter. And lately I get an ad every 3 posts and they are annoying as all get out. If Musk removes the block function I will still mute them.
About You Tube and censorship . . . maybe the time is coming when clever digital engineers could reverse-engineer a You Tube emulator program just different enough from You Tube to be defendable against the inevitable LawFare Assaults which Alphabet would launch against such a You Tube emulator program or platform or whatever its called.
If somebody did that, they could call it We Cast or We Load or We Upload or some such thing, and it could be free of the kind of political censorship that Alphabet’s You Tube is now practicing. It could also be free of You Tube’s toxic algorithmic attention-driving and attention-siloing. Every submission could be indexed by category and the We Cast searchers-viewers could look up everything in the category they want to find something in.
Or they could even be presented with a choice they would be free to make every time they sign on. They could choose between hunting for something by indexed category, or they could choose to see whatever silo-load of similar We Casts get picked by toxic brain-driving algorithm.
Just as the time is coming when Cricket and its Chirps could become a real business, once Elon Stench has turned TwitterX into the radioactive sewage lagoon of his dreams. And Zuckertwit or TwitterZuck or whatever Mr. Sugarmountain calls his Twitter emulator will just keep stumbling and bumbling. A new emerging Cricket would have nothing to fear from Zuckerphuq’s TwitterFace.
It just occurred to me that instead of typing the clunky ” silo-load”, I coulda shoulda typed ” siload” in my comment just above. So now I have.
Re; China
In other news, China will allow eVTOL/Air Taxis to begin commercial operations soon.
The USA is several years behind.
http://www.caacnews.com.cn/thpd/202308/t20230818_1369769_wap.html
The Jetsons have become reality, and China has made it happen.
Stay tuned.
But how energy intensive will these vehicles be? Somehow, absent a major breakthrough in energy production and/or storage, I do not see this as being available even to the middle middle classes.
Lotus built a proof of concept “flying car” back in the 1970s. It used ducted fans for short ‘hops’ over obstacles, etc.
I have seen articles about it years ago, but it seems to have fallen off the edge of Google World today.
Oh well. “Onward and upward!”
Actually, this transport is very much geared, purposely designed, towards middle-class affordability– these air taxis are autonomous (no pilots) and are targeted, supported, with government subsidies, including the government picking up a large portion of the fare.
No, these aren’t toys geared to satisfy the appetites for bragging-rights of HNW individuals– they’re building VWs, not Ferraris… they’re communists, remember?
China is intent on developing their low-altitude airspace economy, and on being the first to do so. They are in particular focused on what is called Urban Air Mobility (UAM). It’s has multi-trillion dollar potential. And for them, they begin capitializing on this via the widespread commercial-use of drones in the next few weeks– not years from now (if ever) in the west.
https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s?__biz=MzU1MDA1MDA3OA==&mid=2247550729&idx=1&sn=0f267d877d8af95ce67cf26e2b457693&chksm=fba4c778ccd34e6e2ae09dfbb13650ecfcbc3197d8d80f5b2543dc68391664362683f8c8ed41#rd
In the next few weeks you will read much more about this in western media, although likely written with a derisive slant.
*note: battery-storage has moved, advanced, exponentially within the past year.
Thanks. We slight the Chinese to our peril.
I know crapification is a common theme here, and Lambert does occasionally post about issues with Apple products; I came across this after my own, ongoing, 40+ hour quest to get Airpods to work (once again) with a Mac Mini, having spoke with Apple support multiple times, to escalation, send in logs, ect, with the response ultimately that no one can investigate it at this time… So I did a full format and reinstall. Well, TimeMachine doesn’t backup like it used to. Anyway, came across:
Time Machine in Big Sur – Does it works differently? “Macintosh HD” gone, just “Macintosh HD – Data” showing
And Apple history:
And Apple’s move to iCloud:
Oh well.
Meanwhile, reinstalling mysteriously fixed hardware acceleration making Vivaldi page scrolling laggy; It has not fixed my iPhone WiFi music sync issue where it just disconnects, no dice, goodbye. Maybe I need to reinstall my phone as well?
Sigh. And this stuff costs thousands of dollars, lol.
That Windows 11 systems are even more garbage is not much consolation, honestly. And don’t get my started on GNU/Linux systems. I’d have already troubleshooted at least one annoying issue before breakfast today were I running Linux, having done so before.
Happy Saturday!
I tried Time Machine but it required a level of trust with Apple that I no longer had.
Just buy a cheap USB drive and copy everything to it. Then later buy another USB drive, copy everything to it and then give the first drive to your mom for safe keeping. If you’re worried about losing last night’s work, just get in the habit of backing up to flash drives before going to bed.
This has worked for me although I didn’t do the mom part and did lose some data so I strongly recommend always having a backup drive stashed somewhere other than where you live. [2 drives failed at the same time, what are the odds : (
Yeah, same issues. I just sync music with a cable because otherwise it doesn’t work, it seems the two ways don’t play well together. On the Bluetooth issue, I had to remove the airpods from my iPhone to listen with the Mac. Then re-add them when I want to go mobile again. I suppose you were getting the weird skips and dropouts. I bought a 2TB SSD for Time Machine and still use a regular HDD as a backup that I keep elsewhere. The new norm is having to do everything yourself. I’ve also got a Windows server. You can’t imagine how much fun that is to maintain.
These same air pods work on mbp and iPhone flawlessly, and previously on mini back and forth with mbp next to each other all day long. Only broke back in May. Can’t figure it out. Likely screwed. Gonna try brand new ones I guess with the free return policy, see what happens.
Meanwhile continuity camera doesn’t work on mbp, flawless on mini. What a mess. Gonna pair iPhone with mbp and then try WiFi sync. Only thing worse is Windows systems…
With COVID brain damage this will only get worse, and it was a problem before that. No one cares about good software, not even Apple anymore with Cook.
‘Mission impossible..’
I think that I understand that cat video now. Somebody has been going nuts trying to work out how their cat got on top of that tall wardrobe repeatedly requiring its rescue so just stood there waiting to see how the cat did it.
I just had a Chihuahua make it to the top of a kitchen island a few days ago, where she proceeded to eat a whole package of sausage rolls.
I am baffled.
Get ready to see a lot of My Dan since 2022. Goldman not only has his own money he has been a useful DNC apparatchik for years. He also understands both propaganda and social media. He generally comes off better in interviews than either Harris or Mayo Pete, unfortunately his diversity status is merely Jewish. He is still going to continue to advance rapidly in the party. I fully expect to see him become a go to when they need to distract from or advance some political agenda. He obviously has no trouble lying.
He may make my radar beep danger on high alert, but I am either very aware or highly paranoid.
This is interesting–a rightwinger looks back at Nixon and Disney.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/a-magic-kingdom/
One could suggest that the culture war that gets so much ink these days isn’t new at all and back in the seventies the great Pauline Kael’s remark about Nixon voters–“I can hear them out there in the dark, breathing”–could stand in for today’s PMC who think the same thing. Of course Kael grew up on a California chicken farm, never bothered to finish Berkley and was anything but a snob. So the culture war continues even as the culture becomes ever more shallow and brittle. But we are so very clever when it comes to technology.
Disney’s nostalgia was bogus as was Nixon’s anticommunism but today’s anti-nostalgia–determined to relive the civil rights era and cold war too–is equally bogus. Aren’t “progressives” ever willing to progress?
So I just realized, we no longer have any effective control groups for drug trials. Given the damage that COVID causes, there’s no longer any comparisons to be made between 2023 people and 2019 people. That’s gonna be fun. Granted, a lot of drug trials are questionable anyway. So this doesn’t present a practical problem for getting drugs onto the market, but it does, I think, for human health, were anyone in the Establishment to care about that.
Just saying upfront right now that even though I’m unvaccinated, never had COVID and am in good health, I smoke way too much pot to ever be a test subject. And no, you can’t have any of my blood, not even for a good cause.
Hmmm… could the cannabanols neutralize the spike protein?
As St. Fauci said; “My way or the high way.” I know which one I would choose.
MN only having recently legalized, I have had to import from the west coast w/hostile intervening states so my supply chain has always been at risk yet despite being circuitous and involving multiple parties, there was never an interruption due to COVID. Once a heart attack delayed a scheduled delivery, but that was pre-COVID/preVax.
Recreational is on the Ohio ballot this year. Designed like many states around here. 10% tax on top of state tax. Allowed to grow 6 plants,12 per household. I really have no idea how it will go.
Michigan has rec and I’m only an hour from the border. I know so many who make that trip. There are 4 just off the exit of the expressway, packed all the time, most sporting Ohio plates. They even have signs along the road “Ohio Welcome.”
If Ohio passes, they are toast.
I’m unvaccinated, have never had covid and I guess I’m in good health, and I’m considering donating blood for the first time in forever. I wasn’t allowed to because of travel in Britain during mad cow times, but that is no longer considered a problem. Now my constraint is my aversion to setting up an online account with the local blood donation center. Really, I don’t see why they have to know the name of my best friend from high school and the model of my first car. My medical history, okay, there is reason for that, but I am tired of these pointless intrusions. I have type O- and if they want it they can have it but only if they don’t make the process obnoxious.
It’s heartwarming to hear from The Hill that a number of midwestern cities are becoming sanctuaries for the trans industry and it’s victims. Here is the redoubtable Eliza Mondegreen at UnHerd sharing the delicate details of one gender “surgeon”:
“Peters chides his fellow surgeons for clinging to a “binary” mindset when it comes to gender surgery, turning away from the wider world of “non-binary” surgeries, which encompasses procedures like phallus-preserving vaginoplasty (this is exactly what it sounds like) or gender nullification surgery (“removing all external genitalia to create a smooth transition from the abdomen to the groin”).
and here is how you keep the raw materials flowing:
“New gender identities are always being declared. Fresh surgical techniques and new patient requests keep emerging. And everything can always be made more “inclusive”: there’s always some new marginalised group to bring in out of the cold, like self-identified asexuals who nonetheless enjoy sex. Or eunuchs, who crave the legitimacy inclusion in WPATH’s Standards of Care provides.”
https://unherd.com/thepost/gender-surgeon-promotes-bizarre-range-of-nonbinary-surgeries/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Here’s a medical school “professor” talking about how children’s gender identities can change faster than you may think:
“Ehrensaft made what some may consider fringe claims about gender ideology, including that kids can identify as “gender hybrids” which include a mythology-inspired creature called a “gender Minotaur,” and that kids can change their genders by season and can have different identities depending on their location.
https://www.foxnews.com/media/feminist-medical-school-professor-says-trans-kids-identifying-minotaurs-part-gender-revolution
There’s your gender-affirming “healthcare”: mangling the bodies of children, the mentally ill, and adult fetishists for profit while busily searching for the next gender jackpot. Doubtless The Hill will be following up their article with a deep-dive into the forces at work behind the sanctuaries and the oftentimes horrific results of such procedures…
That’s the first live Mondegreen I have encountered.
A “Mondegreen” is the mishearing of lyrics in a way that sort of makes sense, the classic example being hearing “Lady Mondegreen” when the actual lyrics are “And laid Him on the green”.
This runs counter to every single trans person I’ve met. I’m trans and am very grateful for the trans health care I’ve received in the midwest and elsewhere. There’s no evidence that people are ‘mangled’, quite the opposite, people are generally very happy with their treatment.
Calling trans people mentally ill (lol, I’m living a happy and loving life just fine thanks) reminds me of the countless other times people seek to pathologize behavior they don’t like. Frankly, pretty dumb
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drapetomania
“This runs counter to every single trans person I’ve met.”
Then you need to get out more. Here are a few countries
as well as individuals that have decided enough is enough. Plenty of mangling going on, my emphasis:
Sweden’s U-Turn on Trans Kids: The Trans Train (Part 1): The New Patient Group & Regretters
In May of 2021 Sweden announced a change of their policy regarding the medical and surgical transition of children. The change came in the wake of several bombshell documentaries which explored the issue of medicalization of children experiencing gender dysphoria in Sweden and Europe.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVEZ7gELcgY
National Academy of Medicine in France Advises Caution in Pediatric Gender Transition
The National Academy of Medicine in France has issued a press release in which it cautions medical practitioners that the growing cases of transgender identity in young people are often socially-mediated and that great caution in treatment is needed. The Academy draws attention to the fact that hormonal and surgical treatments carry health risks and have permanent effects, and that it is not possible to distinguish a durable trans identity from a passing phase of an adolescent’s development.
https://segm.org/France-cautions-regarding-puberty-blockers-and-cross-sex-hormones-for-youth
Surgical Transition: Underlying Issues, Ethics & Regret (Dutch Documentary – English Narration)
In many cases, these regretters originally presented with multiple complex underlying psychological issues – however the affirmation-only model of treating these individuals leads to their gender issues becoming the priority, rather than first addressing such co-morbid conditions as depression, PTSD, anxiety or body dysmorphic disorder among other considerations.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6LRPiEJCU5g
Explained: Why Tavistock gender clinic is to be ‘sued by 1,000 families’
The Tavistock’s gender clinic is facing a class action lawsuit from patients over treatments.
Barrister Thomas Goodhead, who leads the class action, says the case “is going to be one of the largest medical negligence scandals of all time”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TofQjUf6jtY
‘Hundreds’ of young trans people seeking help to return to original sex
Charlie Evans, who detransitioned in 2018, speaks to Sky News about the people who have undergone gender reassignment surgery but wish they hadn’t.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FRUDwDmkm0
As for mental illness, which you plucked from between children and fetishists in my comment above, well, gender dysphoria is a mental illness. It’s real and it’s a terrible burden for the sufferer. Most instances of it occur in young gay and lesbian kids who are struggling with their sexuality. But rather than looking for answers in counseling, treating the mental aspects of it, the trans industry is funneling people into drugs and surgery. $$$:
Who Are the Rich, White Men Institutionalizing Transgender Ideology?
I found exceedingly rich, white men with enormous cultural influence are funding the transgender lobby and various transgender organizations.
…
Most of these billionaires fund the transgender lobby and organizations through their own organizations, including corporations.
…
The massive medical and technological infrastructure expansion for a tiny (but growing) fraction of the population with gender dysphoria, along with the money being funneled to this project by those heavily invested in the medical and technology industries, seems to make sense only in the context of expanding markets for changing the human body.
https://thefederalist.com/2018/02/20/rich-white-men-institutionalizing-transgender-ideology/
and it’s a growth industry:
U.S. Sex Reassignment Surgery Market Size, Share & Trends Analysis Report By Gender Transition (Female-to-male, Male-to-female), By Procedure (Mastectomy, Vaginoplasty, Scrotoplasty, Hysterectomy, Phalloplasty), And Segment Forecasts, 2023 – 2030
The U.S. sex reassignment surgery market size was estimated at USD 2.1 billion in 2022 and is anticipated to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.25% from 2023 to 2030. The rising prevalence of gender dysphoria and the increasing number of individuals in the U.S. opting for gender affirmation surgeries are expected to boost market growth over the forecast period.
https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/us-sex-reassignment-surgery-market
If someone isn’t gender dysphoric, and they aren’t just an innocent child who has been groomed, then what possible other reason would they undergo these dangerous treatments? Boredom? The rush of undergoing expensive surgeries? Or the fetishization of pretending to be the opposite sex?
To be clear, I don’t care what adults do to their bodies. I’ll defend the right of an adult to undergo such procedures if that’s their cup o’ tea. Just stay off the woman’s soccer team and get the fu(k out of their bathrooms. It’s the fact that children are being treated as livestock that truly sickens me.
With you on this. Everybody needs to step away from the kids. If I had been my own decision-maker I would have enlisted in the Navy when I was twelve. Also when I was thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen and then suddenly all the news was doing a better job of explaining the Vietnam War and I wasn’t quite as interested in a military career.
Empowering children in this manner is wrong. And as you say, once adulthood hits, do as you please but if you retain your original equipment, keep using the same bathroom — preop transsexuals invading women’s spaces is what I most strongly object to.
For those that may have missed it, IM Doc’s comment from June relating his experiences with patients on this topic is worth revisiting.
>trans industry and its victims
Yeah, okay fox news.
More kids get breast implants and nose jobs than any kind of gender therapy but yeah it’s definitely the “trans industry” that is preying on children.
See above. And it’s fallacious to propose that because the predatory plastic surgery market for children is bigger, somehow the predatory trans industry isn’t a problem. But then, rigorous thinking isn’t a strong point in these circles…
I used to copy the link to a page that had a paywall and open archive.ph and paste it in and hit search and it would most always bing up the page. Now when I ask for archive.ph a notice comes up that says “Safari cannot open the page because the server cannot be found”. What the hell. I have used this many times and always worked and if not I would go to 12ft.io which still works. Is there any other websites that gets around the paywall?
My Firefox let me load and use archive.ph on the LA Times article.
Ah, I have been using Apple.
christoforou link goes to indian punchline for me
From ‘Don’t You Remember Me?’ The Crypto Hell on the Other Side of a Spam Text:
FYI, this woman’s photo has been littered throughout online dating on multiple apps since at least before the Pandemic; I figured it was part of a scam, because there’s no way this person has that many online dating accounts and lives in that many different cities in the US.
I also get random “Hi” text messages and WhatsApp messages on occasion.
This is good and the sort of thing Michael Hudson talks about–putting the “commons” in communism.
https://www.pressenza.com/2023/08/china-the-fascinating-flight-of-the-dragon/
Of course letting the state have such a large role in the capitalist machinery may be a problem here where grifting is the main order of business and bureaucrats live next to a revolving door.
Also Scheer now has the full version of latest Hersh with still more inside gossip.
https://scheerpost.com/2023/08/19/seymour-hersh-summer-of-the-hawks/
Thanks for the links. In the article on China, among many other well made points, the critique of the romanticism of the Western left (something I was guilty of in my misspent youth), and its failure to pose practicable alternatives to the neoliberal status quo was spot on.
Yes, thank you for these links! Enjoying the 1st one, especially.
Re: Maui — a community leader reports on a meeting had with Governor Josh Green claiming that the state is attempting to fast-track housing developments elsewhere and using the catastrophe as a means to justify rapid developments:
https://www.instagram.com/p/CwBOQA3IziK/?hl=en
I use Brave and it works for me. Perhaps Safari is censoring the site? Might be worth a try…
Apparently the Biden admin (or maybe Walrus Bolton?) decided to panic and take down SouthFront.org:
From SouthFront Telegram:
“Dear colleagues!
The international domain registrar has blocked (https://southfront.press/southfront-org-blocked-by-u-s-controlled-global-internet-supervisor/) our domain southfront.org without warning and in violation of international rules and its own procedures. For additional details and explanations you can contact the national Russian registrar reg.ru, which, apparently, is itself puzzled by what is happening.
Back in early 2021, our organisation fell under US sanctions, allegedly for “meddling in US elections”. In early 2022, we were again on the first US sanctions list since the start of the SMO. Now for “supporting the SMO and pro-Russian views”.
Let it all rest on their conscience.
We dealt with these challenges promptly. Now our website is fully restored on the southfront.press domain.
We, the SF team appeals to you for the information support. Please,help us spread the word about our new domain southfront.press and the blatant pressure on SouthFront by the US authorities.
I thought that this ICANN was a supposedly independent organization? An internet DNS registrar compromised by fascist elements of the US government is a ‘no bueno’ development, for sure.
Maybe I haven’t been paying enough attention, but isn’t this a first? A political take-down of a domain by elements of the US government? What threats were made at ICANN, I wonder?
I’m surprised you haven’t noticed that the USA has became a lawless Oligarchy with only the flimsiest pretext of “Democracy” ?
The Twitter files came out a while ago, why does it surprise anyone that the US Government is indulging in heavy handed censorship?
The Biden Administration has been reckless to the point of insanity in Ukraine and with all their corruption finally being publicised there is no telling what they will do.
They respect no Boundaries.
They are desperate and incompetent so it’s likely to be a lively Fall and Winter.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqSA-SY5Hro
24M views in 10 days. He’s on the record saying he turned down a $8M touring contract. He basically told them to family blog off.
He’s asking for my vote ; ).
26M views 11 days ago #1 on Trending for music
My first boss had a scar on his upper right leg where he was a little too fast practicing quick draw with his pistol, circa 1963.
The bullet went in and came out about 3 inches below.
Supposed to have been in the Gun Violence post, my bad.
San Clemente state beach campground looked like it got raptured, most everybody split except a few stalwarts in Coleman tents who confidently told us ‘we’re staying…’
My sister drove back down to SD, and her husband and every other San Diegan descended on Costco & Home Depot looking to get some gotten gains while the getting is good. He thought there was about 100 people in each line or thereabouts @ Costco, less at HD, but lengthy,
The sky was dark and foreboding full of sinister purpose from Bakersfield to Visalia, over recently rained on Hwy 99 which hadn’t seen a drenching rain in 4 months, giving it a certain oily sheen, with puddles forming in the emergency lane, and we’re just getting our feet wet in our acquaintance with Hilary.
Here’s the Danger Will Robinson! part:
I was out for a week in the High Sierra and we hit snow @ 10,000 feet on the west side and much of it was on north facing slopes which get a lot less sun, and thus melt off a lot slower.
My thought a fortnight ago was that it was likely a fair bit of that snow wouldn’t melt off before winter set in, i’ve never seen the Sierra Nevada like that in this time of year, but it is the winter of record for the past 125+ years, combined with what is an unprecedented weather event for the Sierra, wow.
So these north facing slopes on the western side of the Great Western Divide and the north facing slopes on the Whitney crest will be super vulnerable when the rain hits em’ and I just drove by Lake Kaweah and 110k acre feet full with a capacity of 185k, if we get hit with a shitlode of rain and it melts off those north facing slopes, 3 dams on the Kaweah, Tule & Kern Rivers will be tested like they never have before, with far too much water coming in to be able to let it out.
The emergency spillway @ Lake Kaweah dam has a dirt ramp, that’s not gonna last too long, and Visalia & environs is right in its path, same goes for Porterville for the Tule, and Bakersfield would be the worst hit, because Lake Isabella has the largest capacity of the trio and there’s a lot of snow on the north facing slopes of the Whitney crest.
Be safe out there! Thanks for this insight.
Found this on X/Twitter last night. Eleven years ago, some were opining that this type of weather event was outside the realm of possibility.
Observation: 289 Comments!
:) Well done everyone!