Artificial light lures migrating birds into cities, where they face a gauntlet of threats The Conversation
Views on the economy have shifted dramatically over the past year Sam Ro, TKer. Many charts.
The deals that show how lucrative private equity can be FT
How Pfizer Blew Up Downtown Josh Brown
Check Fraud: It’s Time to Jettison Price v. Neal Credit Slips
Climate
Governing the Climate Phenomenal World
Our Megathreatened Age Nouriel Roubini, Project Syndicate
Book Review – Crossings: How Road Ecology Is Shaping The Future Of Our Planet The Inquisitive Biologist
We’re melting….
Rapidly melting ice made this year especially dangerous on Mount Everest. A close-up look at the mountain shows how quickly it’s changing—and the risks climbers face. https://t.co/PvIWjanpke pic.twitter.com/1aOLOHkdXc
— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) December 17, 2023
Over the transom from alert reader Bob. Seems to go well with the previous:
Reminds me of some of the set pieces in Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey/Maturin series.
#COVID19
Effectiveness of cough etiquette maneuvers in disrupting the chain of transmission of infectious respiratory diseases BMJ. From 2013, still germane. N = 31. From the Abstract: “All the assessed cough etiquette maneuvers, performed as recommended, do not block droplets expelled as aerosol when coughing. This aerosol can penetrate profound levels of the respiratory system. Practicing these assessed primary respiratory hygiene/cough etiquette maneuvers would still permit direct, indirect, and/or airborne transmission and spread of [infectious respiratory diseases (IRD)], such as influenza and Tuberculosis. All the assessed cough etiquette maneuvers, as recommended, do not fully interrupt the chain of transmission of IRD. This knowledge urges us all to critically review recommended CE and to search for new evidence-based procedures that effectively disrupt the transmission of respiratory pathogens.” Funny how nobody ever asks for an RCT on whether coughing into your elbow is effective.
Chennai Covid News: 6% who survived Covid-19 in 2020-22 died by 2023 Times of India
China?
China jobs: suspended production, extended unpaid leave embody woes with private businesses under pressure South China Morning Post
Column: China is still the top dog in commodities, but its bark is changing Mining.com
China’s Millionaires Are Worried. That’s a Problem for Wall Street. WSJ
Gold gains traction among country’s investment options China Daily
* * * “China hype” (from a thread by Arnaud Bertrand):
Allison is the inventor of “the Thucydides trap,” for good or ill.
‘China is a fatal distraction’: Former defence chief on the biggest threat facing Australia Sydney Morning Herald. “Climate change will get us before China.”
* * * China’s Once-Dependable Tourists Are Growing Younger and Spending Less PYMNTS.com
India
India’s External Affairs Minister Jaishankar to travel to Russia later this week WION
‘Our country has lost its moral compass’: Arundhati Roy The Hindu
Africa
What does Palestine have to do with Africa? Africa Is a Country
Syraqistan
Egyptian sources say Israelis, Resistance open to ceasefire: Reuters Al Mayadeen
Why the UK and Germany back a sustainable ceasefire David Cameron & Annalena Baerbock, Times of London
Inside U.S.-Palestinian talks about post-war Gaza Axios
Former Israeli Advisor on Netanyahu, Qatar and Irreversible Damage In Gaza | Ash Meets Daniel Levy (video) Novara Media, YouTube (Alice X).
* * * Israel finds large tunnel adjacent to Gaza, raising new questions about prewar intelligence Politico. “The entryway to the tunnel is just a few hundred yards from the heavily fortified Erez crossing and a nearby Israeli military base.” Handy!
Freed Israeli hostage warns soldiers not to go into Hamas tunnels: ‘It’s a colossal danger’ FOX
* * * In Israel, 20,000 Gazans Are Responsible for Their Own Deaths. I’ve Never Been So Ashamed Haaretz
‘Disturbing reports’ coming from northern Gaza of mass detentions, mistreatment of Palestinians: UN Anadolu Agency
Starving Palestinians loot aid trucks as desperation mounts in Gaza’s Rafah Al Jazeera
* * * Netanyahu’s tactics are weakening Israel Ben Wallace, The Telegraph
Hamas’s rising popularity in the West Bank France24
From the Holy Family Church in Gaza:
This is beyond crazy, and hopefully can alert people to the indiscriminate nature of the killings that are occurring in Gaza.
In case you don't know, since the time of Jesus the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem guards two of the holiest sites in the world for Christians: the site… https://t.co/E2pn8a4Wks
— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) December 17, 2023
* * * Pakistan’s Farms, Mines in Trouble With Afghans Pushed Out The Wire
New Not-So-Cold War
The Russo-Ukrainian War and the Durability of Deterrence International Institute for Strategic Studies. The deck: “Putin has defined his nuclear red line consistently and – compared to other Russian figures – restrictively. So long as NATO continues to respect it, there is no reason to believe he would authorise nuclear use.”
* * * Ukraine needs mobilization to keep existing number of defense forces – intel chief Ukrinform
‘People Snatchers’: Ukraine’s Recruiters Use Harsh Tactics to Fill Ranks and Ukrainian Marines on ‘Suicide Mission’ in Crossing the Dnipro River NYT (Furzy Mouse).
* * * Ukrainian Infiltration Force in Bakhmut Destroyed By Russian Drone Units – New Footage Military Watch. A stunt.
Ukrainian special ops commandos are freelancing top-secret sabotage missions, poisonings, and assassinations in Russia, says military source Business Insider. “Technology and our entrepreneurial mindset will defeat Russian meat and steel.” Cope.
* * * Ukraine shouldn’t have to pay the price of the GOP’s wedge politics E.J. Dionne, WaPo. Politics ain’t beanbag.
South of the Border
Chilean voters reject conservative constitution, after defeating leftist charter last year AP. Timotheus comments: “The right wing constitution was voted down today 54-45%. That’s the second failure to rewrite the Pinochet document of 1981. You could note the remarkable and enviable efficiency of the paper ballots counted by hand. No one has raised the slightest doubt about the accuracy of the results.”
The jungle between Colombia and Panama becomes a highway for migrants from around the world AP
Biden Administration
Congress stares down brutal January The Hill
Police State Watch
Ohio Gets ‘F’ Grade for Lack of Law Against Costly, Speech-Chilling Lawsuits Cleveland Scene
Digital Watch
Biden’s secretive AI strategy goes against ideal of OpenAI FOX
Google moves to end geofence warrants, a surveillance problem it largely created TechCrunch
How To Authenticate Large Datasets The Intercept. Media critique for the 21st century….
Xmas Pre-Game Festivities
Healthcare
Hospitals are dropping Medicare Advantage plans left and right Becker’s Hospital Review. Time to move on to a new grift, I suppose.
“Access” to care:
One of my patients (who labels himself a #PriorAuthSurvivor) diagrammed the unnecessary complexity of trying to get his medication approved on time 👇
Rinse & repeat and this is a cyclic nightmare that has nothing to do with chemo but rather the bureaucracy of US healthcare pic.twitter.com/3fDt3lF7O3
— Mark Lewis (@marklewismd) December 15, 2023
Supply Chain
Why suspending shipping operations in the Red Sea matters for global trade Hellenic Shipping News. Incident map and thread:
Here's a full list of incidents reported so far in the Red Sea, Bab-el-Mandeb and Gulf of Aden since the Galaxy Leader hijacking on November 19. 1/many
Source: Office of Naval Intelligence Worldwide Threat to Shipping report. Map courtesy @UK_MTO pic.twitter.com/bNTKdNnWxS
— Mike Schuler (@MikeSchuler) December 15, 2023
Red Sea Convoys & An Increase in Naval Presence around the Bab el-Mandeb – Op Prosperity Guardian (video) What is Going on With Shipping, YouTube (MV).
Imperial Collapse Watch
Mastermind ‘Fat Leonard’ Gets the Last Laugh in Disastrous Navy Corruption Trial WSJ. The deck: “Businessman Leonard Francis, who bilked the U.S. out of millions, offered to help prosecutors snare crooked Navy officials—then he disappeared” [to Venezuela]. Important given both the role of the Seventh Fleet in the Pacific and DOJ over-reach.
Guillotine Watch
Class Warfare
Southwest Airlines Flight Attendants Forced to Rerun Contract Vote After Crew Discovered Ballot System Was Vulnerable to Fraud PYOK. Astonishing, except not:
During a live video stream of the ballot result, a representative of TrueBallot shared their screen, which displayed an internet URL in the address bar of their web browser. A flight attendant watching the stream copied the URL into their own computer and discovered that the link took them to an unsecured database of the vote.
The flight attendant was able to view the name of everyone who had voted and what ballot they had cast, alongside their email address. The database could even be edited, and ballots could be added and deleted.
“TrueBallot.” Never eat at a place called “Mom’s”….
A Woman Construction Worker on the Slab Briarpatch. This post is great (even if from 2015). In the most PMC scenario imaginable, I ran across it while searching on the keyword “slab,” hoping to discover text on the Wittgenstein’s “Builder’s Game” for my post on nouns (“But when I call “Slab!”, then what I want is, that he should bring me a slab“).
One Significant Adult Culture Study
Natural Selection Orion
Antidote du jour (via):
Bonus Antidote:
Smart horse shaking this tree for fruit
pic.twitter.com/FawF7ujPC5— Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) December 17, 2023
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
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Comments are closed.
‘‘Disturbing reports’ coming from northern Gaza of mass detentions, mistreatment of Palestinians: UN”
The more you hear about what is going on in Gaza, the worse it gets. Caitlin Johnstone reports the following-
‘Some weeks ago I saw a Hamas claim being circulated on Twitter that Hamas fighters had been luring IDF troops into ambushes by playing recordings of the sounds of children, and it was working because Israeli troops reliably go after kids. I didn’t pay much attention to the claim at the time, thinking “No way, that one can’t be true,” but now the IDF is indignantly complaining that “In an attempt to ambush our troops, Hamas terrorists connected dolls to speakers playing crying sounds and set them up in an area rigged with explosives.”’
https://caityjohnstone.medium.com/the-idf-are-so-good-at-killing-israelis-they-should-consider-joining-hamas-9e9cd7b3ebed
For any interested, here is a tweet talking about the problems that the IDF is encountering and the high number of officers lost through sniper fire-
https://twitter.com/Megatron_ron/status/1735731925325692955
I watched a brief video recently by this American guy who use to be in the military. He was noting the ages of the officers and how they were much, much younger than their American counterparts. One example he gave was of a 19 year-old IDF sergeant killed and he was saying that you would not have a 19 year-old kid as a sergeant when he was in the US military.
The Israelis are showing the world who they are, and it is very, very ugly.
Thousands in northern Spain stand to form image of Palestinian flag.
This flag and demonstration was held in Guernica, a town from Basque Country, that was bombed by german nazi pilots in the spanish civil war.
Guernica, immortalized in the painting by Pablo Picasso.
The (future) “Gaza Holocaust Memorial” was not hyperbole– get a load of this:
‘Flatten’ Gaza, turn it into museum like Auschwitz: Israeli council head
In an interview with Tel Aviv’s Radio 103FM station on Sunday, David Azoulai said that the Israeli navy should take the Gaza residents to the shores of Lebanon so that they can go to refugee camps, and then destroy Gaza and turn it into a museum resembling the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland.
“The entire Gaza Strip should be emptied and leveled flat, just like Auschwitz. Let it become a museum, showcasing the capabilities of Israel and dissuading anyone from living in the Gaza Strip. This is what must be done to give them a visual representation,” Azoulai said.
https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2023/12/18/716590/Israeli-council-head-calls-for-turning-Gaza-into-empty-museum-like-Auschwitz
Perhaps I’m overly cynical, but this just sounds like Israel setting up their cover story in advance for targeting childcare facilities.
(I do tend to be cynical, but even I didn’t predict that Israel would be openly targeting hospitals and emergency service vehicles by now).
WE’VE ONLY JUST BEGUN
(melody borrowed from We’ve Only Just Begun by the Carpenters)
We’ve only just begun to kill
Arabs and Amaleks
The Gaza strip will be empty soon
Or we’ll kill everyone
And then El Aqsa mosque goes BOOM!
We want our temple back
The whole West Bank and Jerusalem
So yes, we’ve just begun
And if Hezbollah wants to mess with us
We can send in the USA
We own their Congress so they’ll fight for us
Redrawing borders like we say
Together . . .
And once that war is done, Torah
Says we take Syria
And roughly half of all Lebanon
So we will get that done
Three thousand years ago we owned this place
That’s what we think our scriptures say
We’ll take it back ’cause we’re the chosen race
We don’t play nice so we can’t play
Together . . .
Together . . .
When all these wars are won, gentiles
Will live in fear of us
This sure sounds crazy but that’s our style
And yes, we’ve just begun
nice job Antifa – guess the optimism of David Cameron & Annalena Baerbock working towards a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine — once the killing has stopped ain’t going to get too far – is there desire virtue signaling? or just lying BS propaganda? trying to create a new news cycle? or just two morons babbling?
My vote is for two morons babbling.
Kicking the can down the road like the last 70+ years… Now is not the right time…
Congress will vote on a Friday when no one’s paying attention.
The Shabbos GOP.
~
For those who don’t get it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shabbos_goy
Just to dot the Ts and Is- it was written by Paul Williams and Roger Nicols. Weirdly originally written as an advertisement jingle for a bank
Re: “US Army faces ‘TikTok mutiny’ as Gen Z recruits whine about low pay, ‘sh***y’ food and FITNESS TESTS while on bases in uniform”
Soldiers b****ing and moaning is probably as old as organized militaries but some of the listed complaints are simply ridiculous, like the complaints about having to do PT and maintain basic physical fitness standards. Not that I am a great supporter of the military, despite being a veteran myself, but WTF did these kids expect from the military? It ain’t a place where one goes to be coddled, physical fitness is absolutely necessary for mission effectiveness. Ironically, the Tik Tok complaints about lousy pay and food are only slightly more valid, given that we live in the information age and anyone can get a fairly good idea about military life and make an informed decision before signing a contract by searching online.
About the only valid complaint I saw is about the military railroading soldiers about injuries sustained on duty. It doesn’t happen in every case but it happens way too much.
‘Soldiers b****ing and moaning is probably as old as organized militaries’
Very true that. I recall reading how the old British Army use to train their officers. So long as those soldiers were moaning and griping, they were told, then all was well and it was like background noise. But if they went quiet, then that was the time to be careful and to watch them carefully.
The “wet service” version of that is that “a b****ing sailor is a happy sailor.”
And it’s fairly accurate.
So basically akin to raising kids?
Or the teacher’s lounge in any school…
Wait til the TikTokers have to bear witness to real combat like what is happening in Ukraine.
It’s hard not to think the nuclear option is the only thing left in our belt. I can’t imagine the American military as it currently exists winning anything at all.
And the DC loons will threaten credibly to use that option.
Not the best and the brightest.
While the US Army does engage in recruitment hype, I had to laugh at the complaint about “no privacy.”
Any tv show or movie that they may have seen about military life never hides the existence of barracks.
If you value privacy, dorms and barracks are not the places to be.
But I just thought about something else, while profit is the main driver behind the development of and hype about the weight loss drugs, how much of this development and research is because it is now considered a MIC imperative?
Yes, but before the truth of being in the military did not tend to seep out to the very population targeted for recruitment. This is the real reason the Deep State hates TikTok, it has become a platform for political discussion among young people covering the reality of the US Empire and the misuse of the military, debunking Hasbara propaganda, and showing the reality of the exploitation of the youth for the Empire etc.
With Vietnam it took years and a draft to get the reality out, now its out even before the Empire tries to start a new war. “Too much real democracy” is really bad for the elites, as the Trilateral Commission Report stated in 1973.
Rations now changed to SOS three times a day.
Ask any Vet about that chow.
Is that like the WW2 ration “S*** on a Shingle”?
The very same.
About the access to care and prior authorization tweet.
That tweet may seem a bit overdone, but I can assure you it is not.
As a PCP, I have to deal with the patient’s insurance carrier, the pharmacy, the pharmacy benefit manager, and often 1-2 companies hired by any or all of them to handle these issues. All with a different agenda and different priorities.
At any one time, there are often 10-15 of these quagmires on my desk, almost always with life-changing consequences for the patient. The office handles about 30-35 of these every day. With 1 or 2 ending in a quagmire status as described in this tweet. Taken together, literal reams of paperwork are required to be filled out and they kick it back on the doctors routinely for the most ridiculous of things , ie capitalizing the name of a generic drug, using the abbreviation SEP instead of 9 on a date on one page, and then the opposite on another.
I have 1.5 FTE employees doing just this all day long. And again, many of these quagmires involve desperately ill patients. So instead of actual patient care, these employees are doing a paper chase. Other Patients cannot get their lab results, or other expected things because the entire office is turned into a triage clinic or a crisis management team. And there are quite frankly no more staff to hire out there.
This is completely different than medicine was thirty years ago and certainly not what I signed up for. I long for the days when I could spend time every day on the phone going over the simplest things like lab results with my patients. Now, I spend that time on the phone begging with faceless bureaucrats. And the decline rate is very high. And then as the PCP, trained in old school medicine to be relentless for your patients, you begin to feel like a failure. This leads to severe moral injury.
Is there a reason why suicide and depression are so common in health care workers? Why yes there is.
The mass exodus out of the profession is well underway. Good luck finding a PCP in any of our cities unless you are willing to pay extra fees for concierge style medicine. And FYI, concierge style medicine is what everyone had 30 years ago before Obamacare came along promising everyone much cheaper rates.
What a laugh, but we all fell for it.
Doc,
We and you didn’t ‘fall’ for anything, much like everything in the last 40 years, it was shoved down our throat with a ten foot pole.
Happy holidays all.
IM Doc, I rarely disagree with you but I have to put it earlier as in 50 years. I bow to no one in my hatred of Obama’s save the insurance company health care scam, but it happened largely because the HMO scam from 1974 was falling apart. I am of the opinion that that failed because too many people, including politicians, still thought it should come with actual healthcare, so it put too many restrictions on the process. But still it codified the ever increasing levels of approval and paperwork needed by both doctors and patient. It also attacked the doctor patient relationship as it was previously known. Obamacare was just the bait and switch that was pulled because insurance companies felt they were having to pay for too much care and were losing profits. And the ever increasing and unaffordable premiums were making too many people ask why entities like United Healthcare were getting billions for being a middleman that just complicated the process, increased the bureaucracy and ultimately rationed healthcare. There had to be reform, unfortunately our corporately owned representatives reformed it for the minority, the Insurance and Pharma owners. And so despite putting a bandaid on it the problems have gotten worse, because no matter how many billions they steal it isn’t enough. Even better with AI, they don’t have to have minimum wage workers putting patients and doctors through hoops to get care and reimbursement because it is all automated. Oh, and the public have increasingly realized they got screwed, and gave the insurance companies lots of tax money for the privilege.
That it has burnt out healthcare workers at all levels is apparently just a lovely bonus.
But why then are the doctors not out there fighting for universal health care?
I guess they have student loans, mortgages, and car loans to pay like everyone else, and occasional complaints about them to medical license boards to fend off. Doctors are easy to silence, apparently.
You make a valid point. Doctors have high incomes and high status to lose. Many (if not most) physicians fear a change to single payer health care would lower their incomes, so as bad as it is the status quo is preferable for health care providers. It’s also important to note that most physicians are employees these days. They can be fired. They can be blacklisted.
That is another weapon in the arsenal, after all.
I think this is unfair. I seem to recall an article from a few years ago talking about the generational divide within the medical profession in its attitude towards universal healthcare. IIRC, older docs don’t want to rock the boat as they secured their positions before things became really bad. Whereas younger docs are seeing a lifetime of pushing paper within a large HMO etc instead of caring for patients.
Can’t seem to find it, but here’s something sorta like it from four years ago. The writer seems biased against the idea, but once you get past the attempts to smear proponents as being confused or ignorant of what they’re arguing for, they at last clearly state that there are changing attitudes and increasing support for change.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/43p44n/american-medical-association-single-payer-universal-healthcare
Many are. One organization is Physicians for a National Health Program (PNHP): https://pnhp.org/; I believe there are others.
As IM Doc says, this is bad for physicians as well as patients. As usual, it’s the third parties who’ve inserted themselves as intermediaries who profit.
FYI: PNHP just sent me an email about their new website attempting to simplify the complexity of traditional Medicare’s different plans and focus on the dangers of Medicare Advantage plans (and how to fight back). It’s at https://healmedicare.org/
Haven’t reviewed the site, but sounds very interesting.
I think there are physicians who do want a single payer system. Single payer and universal insurance coverage could actually make it easier for doctors to bill. One system, one set of rules. There are physician organizations that support this (pnhp.org). The big resistance comes from the insurance lobbies for obvious reasons. Collapse of the major corporate insurance companies with one big winner could also affect the stock indices as well.
Socialized medicine and having doctors work for the government as employees would have a lot of opposition. Universal insurance, not so much imo, I think it could make things easier for insurance providers like physicians and NPs to deal with one company even under the current miserable prior authorization system.
“Medical bureaucracie” = social murder.
Bureaucracies may be necessary, but should be record keeping after the event, not gate keeping before.
It took me 2 weeks, many hours on the phone and an in person visit ( I showed up and told the receptionist I was not leaving until the problem was resolved) to get a prescription for a blood pressure med renewed.
This is a med I have been taking for 3 years with no problem, not an opioid.
In addition to all the other issues, I would imagine all the additional time consuming paperwork, algorithm powered denials, and other run arounds regarding prescriptions would hide an increasing problem with drug shortages.
Or are insurers and other companies always transparent when shortages exist?
Not deliberately trying to make you jealous, but here in the magical world of Oz, I’ve started receiving care from a specialist in another state. We have a consultation using FaceTime, and if needed, he sends a prescription to my mobile phone by SMS. When I need medication dispensed, I go to a pharmacy of my choice, and click a URL in the doctor’s message. This opens a page with a QR code. The pharmacist scans the code to download the script, and 15 minutes later we’re done. Costs me AU$8 for 58 tablets.
If that’s possible for me, it’s possible for you guys. Where’s your spirit of ‘76? Where did it go? How can you get it back?
We were supposed to be fully metric by the Bicentennial-but weren’t even capable of that, and all it involved was changing numbers around.
1776 was an anomaly. Americans don’t do rebellions. Instead, they cower in fear and hope they aren’t tasered.
Mostly joking, but at this point, Americans may not be able to live under a different system.
An American friend came to live in Toronto because of work. It was only for a year or so, but long enough for her to qualify for our single-payer system. Said her first visit to a doctor felt very strange because there was almost no paperwork and she didn’t have to pay before leaving. Oddly, not paying made her feel very uncomfortable. Like a shoplifter expecting to be stopped before she left. And that fear made her walk faster and faster until she was almost sprinting out the door. Very strange.
We’re living the Spirit of ’76 as the war for independence was a counter-revolution.
IM Doc, in my mid-70’s I have developed a deep, outspoken and totally sarcastic black humor around ‘health care.’ In my youth I was among the radicals calling for single payer principally because as young and stupid as we were, we saw the insurance companies as an unnecessary middleman, and were well aware that every other industrialized nation had national health care. Now, many of my visits are commiseration between the doctor and myself about the degradation of care via insurance companies, along with the problem at hand. I empathize with your office and the hoop dance being done daily for that oh so elusive pre-authorization. Health care in the U.S. sucks.
One of my PCPs told me that he fired his insurer when they demanded that he spend no more than 6 minutes per patient. In that era only 20 years ago he was able to push back effectively and to exercise alternatives.
The reported details on the Zuckerberg compound / estate / underground tree houses reads like a fantasy world come true..for one of the richest people on the planet I would come away unimpressed with finding otherwise. Ho hum, simple large mansions and private jets on the West Coast are for the lesser lights I suppose.
Remarkable what a whirlwind of keystrokes in a Harvard dorm have wrought to life and fruition. And in hindsight, guess I just wasn’t trying hard enough…\ sarc
In a future timeline all those billionaires that wrecked and destroyed our society, just so that they could have more billions that they could never spend, take to hiding in their underground bunker to escape the consequences of the chaos that they themselves have created and unleashed. But in a final mission, USAF & USN pilots have their aircraft loaded up with the last of the bunker-busters that they still have in their armouries and proceed to use them on every single one of those bunkers as they know where every single one of them are. Best thing about that fantasy is that it could actually happen.
Maybe. More likely everyone of these underground bunkers will become the property of the security team hired to protect whichever billionaire hired them. Once everything falls apart, trained gunmen will become the new billionaires.
This. The USD will lose its value as legal tender when this all falls apart. The preppers going on about canned food and ammo are right in an accidental way.
While I am pontificating, I expect all the gold bugs to be robbed.
Don’t forget the Maxi Pads and Ibuprofen!
And don’t forget the adult Depends for when the sh*t hits the fan.
The sh*t has already hit the fans of millions of Americans. Lives have already been ruined too many times, but this is the price you have to pay for living in a system controlled by some of the greediest b*st*rd capitalists in human history.
But maybe the demise of the american experiment will truly be exceptional. The spark that ignites the system will seem like a bolt out of the blue, but all the while, that same demise will be seen as a slow motion train wreck that fitfully chugged along its capitalist tracks, running slowly over whole generations of poor people, and poor regions, unchecked forever.
John Michael Greer wrote–Retrotopia–depicting an America in the future after a civil war, where one of the themes was how the former billionaire were all killed by the guards who were supposed to protect them, and all of the “gold bugs” had their friends and family tortured to reveal its location
“”Views on the economy have shifted dramatically over the past year””
No Shit Sherlock! We are in an economic depression in the Bay Area.
“We” being the former middle class.
“Both of us used to be executives, and now we’re standing in a food line…I have a master’s degree,” Teresa said. “This is insane. … I can’t believe I can’t find work.”
Wait until former tech executives start getting elbowed out of line by people that arrived here in the last couple of years from Kenya, China or Guatemala.
https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/season-of-sharing-food-banks-18438879.php
That’s an even better fantasy than Morrisey’s “Margaret on the Guillotine.” But why wait that long?
Not that Zuckerberg is mistakenly gonna be thought to be Lono, but you could see a similar scenario with Captain Cook, who showed up for a lunch date one fine day on the islands.
It was his own fault. He should have asked who was on the menu rather than what was on the menu.
His name was “Cook.” The instructions were written on the box.
Can recommend Douglas Rushkoff’s “Survival of the Richest – Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires” for more on this topic.
In Israel, 20,000 Gazans Are Responsible for Their Own Deaths
Side note: It’s interesting the victims are now routinely labeled “Gazans”, not simply “Palestinians”. They’re a separate, rather unique breed, it seems.
Twenty eyes for every eye
IDF let loose with big guns all over the cloistered hood, eh
(Gaza City, here we come)
You know it’s not innovative, it’s a Warsaw Ghetto like oldie but a goodie
(Gaza City, here we come)
Well, the residents really have no where to go
Everybody is waiting for Godot
And we’re goin’ to Gaza City, ’cause it’s twenty to one
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, gonna have to expunge
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, ’cause it’s twenty to one
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, gonna have to expunge, now
Twenty eyes for every eye
They say we’ll roll the streets and get some settlements goin’
(Gaza City, here we come)
You know they’re out sufferin’ with indignation growin’
(Gaza City, here we come)
Yeah, and there’s two kinds of anti-Semitic guise
And all you gotta do is use the kill-ratio, 20 eyes for an eye
And we’re goin’ to Gaza City, ’cause it’s twenty to one
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, gonna have to expunge
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, ’cause it’s twenty to one
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, gonna have to expunge, now
Twenty eyes for every lost Israeli eye
And if my Merkava breaks down on me somewhere on the invasion route
(Gaza City, here we come)
I’ll strap my Uzi to my back and hitch a ride in my Kevlar armored suit
(Gaza City, here we come)
And when I get to Gaza City I’ll be shootin’ everything but a squirrel
And checkin’ out the civilians for a dirt nap curl
And we’re goin’ to Gaza City, ’cause it’s twenty to one
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, gonna have to expunge
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, ’cause it’s twenty to one
You know we’re goin’ to Gaza City, gonna have to expunge, now
Twenty eyes for every
Twenty eyes for every eye
Surf City, by Jan & Dean
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ERrwjR4ZlfI
The callous disregard described in that article reminded me of a recent film review. It’s an adaptation of a novel about the Commandant of Auschwitz, who lived an idyllic life with his family just outside the walls of the camp. Interview with the director, Jonathan Glazer:
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/dec/10/jonathan-glazer-the-zone-of-interest-auschwitz-under-the-skin-interview
I think regular readers of NC would see the parallels, but what I’ve been turning over and over in my head is the thought that there will be many who will see the film and understand it as merely a reminder, the justification, for committing atrocities.
Höß was later hanged in Auschwitz (in the so-called ‘Stammlager’ – the main camp).
By the communist government of postwar Poland. Does it make him another anti-Russian hero now like that guy in Canada? (/s)
“Zone of Interest”, the book on which the film is based, was written by the late great Martin Amis. I recommend the book. Many vids of Amis on youtube, by the way.
‘Science girl
@gunsnrosesgirl3
Smart horse shaking this tree for fruit’
Horses are very, very smart and are not to be underestimated. Horses have another characteristic. They are also sticky-beaks. If a horse & rider go by our place, they run down to that part of the fence to watch them and see who they are. If you have a road crew start work nearby, again they will run there to see what the go is. Nothing gets by them.
We had a competition at our riding club where some horses were put in a shed for the night, and they were tied to the wall next to each other with a halter and a rope to the left and the right. My friends and I also spent the night in that shed, and after a while, we noticed that one of the horses was walking around. So we caught him and put him back. Two minutes later, he was walking around again. This time, after putting him back where he belonged, we watched what was going on and it was this: The first horse put his head under the nose of the horse next to him, and the other horse grabbed the halter with his teeth and the first horse pulled his head out, turned around and started munching on the oats in the bucket behind him. We then tied them both shorter and it stopped.
This blew my mind. I still don’t get what the other horse got out of it.
Self interest vs. the well being of all: unlike many of we humans, they are not sociopaths.
We keep ours where we live largely for the pleasure of their remarkable company.
Not just smart but also beautiful like other lean and speedy grazers. Unfortunately for them a 1000 lb animal needs to eat a lot which led to much abuse back when the world ran on horses.
I recently read a great book called The Eighty-Dollar Champion about an Amish farm horse bought off the slaughterhouse truck in the 1950s and trained to become the US champion jumper–all a true story.
I like to photograph the white tail deer we now see around town. They are incredibly graceful.
That was a truly enjoyable book, Carolinian. I think it would be a good movie. Really quite amazing that this horse would become a champion jumper. Since I love horses, I’ll recommend another. This horse was incredibly smart and his antics were truly some of the funniest I have ever heard of. I don’t think I have ever read such an entertaining animal book of any kind. The legend of Zippy Chippy. ( life lessons from horse racings most lovable loser.
* as to the horses removing their halters, this is a much played game by the retired horses at Old Friends equine retirement farm near Lexington Ky.* I’ve gone there it is the best day I’ve ever known.
There’s a great documentary about this, I watched it on Netflix: “Harry & Snowman”
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2898306/
truly a remarkable tale!
A movie was planned back in the 60s but never happened.
Not being a horse person I only learned about all of this from the book. Seems this tale is almost a legend.
Harry DeLeyer and Snowman: http://www.harryandsnowman.com/
Harry de Leyer died in 2021. Here’s a tribute to him from one of his neighbors here in Central Virginia:
https://dailyprogress.com/news/community/greenenews/op-ed-saying-goodbye-to-an-unassuming-legend/article_7d9a92dc-efbe-11eb-8c13-7f6a8533027e.html
Thanks for the link–didn’t know about the documentary. Maybe the library has it. Upstate SC has gone from dirt farmers to horse country.
And their abuse in wars, I know of WW1, WW2, US Civil War, Napoleonic wars. Quite dreadful.
Here in Oz not that many years ago this women bought a horse at an auction that otherwise would have been headed off the knackeries. She helped it and trained it and before long she took it to compete for Oz in the Olympics.
A number of years ago I was camping in a meadow. Nearby was a horse corral with three horses. I had made a cup of spicey tea and walked over to the corral. As I stood there one of the horses trotted over very rapidly. Though there was a wood fence between the horses and me I stepped back a bit. The horse began pressing against the fence and I then realized that the horse wasn’t interested in me, but my tea. So I placed the cup of tea on the fence post and stepped back. The horse spent a minute or two sniffing the tea, and then with curiosity satisfied it trotted away. I retrieved my tea and enjoyed the rest of the morning.
Long, long ago when I was pregnant I visited horses in a pasture. A visibly pregnant mare saw me, came up to the fence, and nuzzled my belly. Sisters.
Nuclear options in Ukraine.
The talk in the late 70’s early 80’s about NATO was “how many days before a Soviet attack needs tactical nukes to stop it”. Many said ‘low single digits!’
That remains my perspective with bearding the bear.
The empire is crackers thinking there was some point where they had Russia surrounded so thoroughly as to disarm its nuclear option.
On the strategic level from the cold war there are rumors of more than one instance where Soviet patience averted a mistaken exchange.
Fortunate for the mankind Russia is still served with rational, patient professionals!
Is Biden aware how close he could come……
To rephrase your last: Is Biden aware …
The short answer is No.
I’m not as sure about that. Biden getting mad about his poll numbers was the reaction I’d expect if he thought it wasn’t his fault. I don’t think Joe sets policy, he just sells it on TV. So if his popularity takes a hit, that’s on the people setting unpopular policies and that ain’t him.
Unfortunately, it’s yet another article, on the subject of nuclear warfare, that fails to make any mention of ballistic missile defense. While Freedman’s piece was a workmanlike rehearsal of well-tried themes, and gratifyingly mature in tone, I think it was too narrow in scope, and relied too much on the assumption that Russia retains a fully secure second-strike capability.
The degree of effectiveness achievable by modern BMD is the most important single question in today’s power-politics.
If BMD effectiveness ever reaches a significant degree, then six decades’ worth of assured-destruction strategizing could become obsolete, and our world would become a much more dangerous place, since first-strike would gain the critical advantage.
One could choose to be dismissive of almost forty years of intensive BMD development in the USA, which has proceeded uninterrupted across seven consecutive presidencies. One could dismiss as irrelevant the abrogation of the ABM Treaty some twenty years ago–a policy never reversed since. One could dismiss as irrelevant, too, the establishment of a whole new branch of the US armed forces, dedicated to warfare in orbital space. One could dismiss as irrelevant the actual use of tactical-level missile defense systems in wars that are taking place right now.
But regardless of one’s opinion of the likely effectiveness of BMD, one must not discuss the topic of nuclear warfare without at least mentioning BMD (even if only to say, “pish-tosh.”)
If you search for legal tenderness
It isn’t hard to find
You can have the lucre you need to live
But if you look for truthfulness
You might just as well be blind
It always seems to be so hard to give
Hegemony is such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty is hardly ever heard
And mostly what we need or it’s through
I can always find someone
To say they Dollar sympathize
If I wear my reserve currency status out on my sleeve
But I don’t want some dismal scientist
To tell me pretty lies
All I want is everyone to believe
Hegemony is such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty is hardly ever heard
And mostly what we need or it’s through
I can find a lever
I can find NATO friends
I can have security until the bitter end
Anyone can comfort me
With promises again
I know, I know
When we’re deep inside of the Ukraine war
Don’t be too concerned
We won’t ask for nothin’ while it’s game on
But when we want security
Tell me where else can we turn
‘Cause war is what we depend upon
Hegemony is such a lonely word
Everyone is so untrue
Honesty is hardly ever heard
And mostly what we need or it’s through
Honesty, by Billy Joel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4gOIt-M02A
> Natural Selection Orion
A brilliant essay, from its opening cases, through art, and deep introspection.
A better read than its analysis could be. One tendril:
>> I am most interested by the implication that the men on the high bridge called the woman from a place of earnest, ignorant desire, unaware that their attraction was not sparked as much by the woman as it was by the bridge.
Driving back from the country, watching traffic decisions as they occurred, I recollected some recent conversations concerning
Do We Have Free Will
and the answer I got was
Not always.
Thanks!
I had passed that one by, not suspecting from the title such a cornucopia.
Great Cape Horn video~
The most notable passing of 2023 was my mother, followed closely by Gordon Lightfoot, whom I always adored for his abilities…
Ghosts of Cape Horn
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eacnVUCoSyg
And talkin’ Cape Horn… Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana, Jr, is one hellova read, in particular if you’re a Californian~
Video shot almost 100 years ago, mostly from the top of a Tall Ship mast looking down at the sails. Lots of it during storms.
Crazy. The narrator’s pace is impressive.
Terrifying. I was wondering why they were still carrying sail in that weather, and then I realized that on that kind of ship you have to send crew up the rigging to furl them (which they presently did). None of them seemed nearly as scared as I would have been.
They had no choice in the matter, lest they are all lost to the sea for being immobilized by fear.
This is why some survive critical situations vs others … as individuals and groups … for some this is when they are at their very best IMO.
May they rest in well-earned peace.
I’ll second that song, and that book, which few have heard of. It, not the dense Moby Dick, should have been required reading for youngsters in school. A page-turner giving us a front row seat to the round-the-horn trade and early California.
While in Rome at the end of a biking vacation a few years ago, my wife and I wandered into the Protestant Cemetery. Among the famous and well-to do, I was surprised to find there the grave of Richard Henry Dana.
I once read a memoir by a very senior American journalist (wish I could remember which one) who sailed as a young lad on a large sailing ship.
He recounted that when a crew member fell overboard, the captain grabbed a sheet in one hand and dove into the sea after the man, trusting his life to both his grip, and the fact that a crew member would see the situation and haul the men back in.
He said the captain could do any crewman’s job better than the man himself, and every man on board knew that to be true.
Wooden ships and iron men indeed.
Harrowing tales of early voyages around the Horn make one appreciate life more now.
Heading south through the Roaring 40s, then the Furious 50s and onto the Screaming 60s before sampling in reverse in that other one, the Mare Pacificum.
How many said, even lived to recount, Not so pacific now, matey.
“Southwest Airlines Flight Attendants Forced to Rerun Contract Vote After Crew Discovered Ballot System Was Vulnerable to Fraud”
‘The flight attendant was able to view the name of everyone who had voted and what ballot they had cast, alongside their email address. The database could even be edited, and ballots could be added and deleted.’
Pretty sure that Southwest would love to have a copy of those files. That way they know who to keep and who to punish and fire. And nothing can be proved. Took a look at this TrueBallot mob and they are based out of Bethesda, Maryland. Odd thing about their website is that it looks like it was designed back in 1995 when TrueBallot was incorporated and has not been changed since. It certainly has a long list of clients-
https://www.trueballot.com/trueballot.aspx (click on the ‘Clients’ section)
They would be a prefect fit for CalPERS I gotta say.
“A Woman Construction Worker on the Slab” heartwarming article of hard work, grit, fortitude and camaraderie. Thank you for including it in our otherwise steady diet of doom and gloom articles. Not that the doom and gloom is not well-deserved.
Thanks for the link on light pollution and migration. There are also birds who go around cities, and then don’t have energy left to make it to their destination.
Outdoor cats’ impact on birds is nothing compared to the larger problems we’ve created for them. And outdoor cats are eating birds that live well in cities where they are fattened by the billion dollar wild-bird feeding industry. (Reptiles and amphibians are a different matter.)
“Sleepless Birds: Light Pollution Exposed”: Al Jazeera documentary
https://www.aljazeera.com/program/witness/2023/10/2/sleepless-birds-light-pollution-exposed
“Inside U.S.-Palestinian talks about post-war Gaza”
Only a person like Jake Sullivan would think that this was a viable idea. Have President Mahmoud Abbas run Gaza? He is hated there as he is in the West bank. He is the Palestinian face of the Israeli occupation and his forces work for the Israelis, not for the Palestinians. He would never be accepted, especially after his forces tried to coup the Hamas politicians when they were first elected about fifteen years ago. Only a Biden White House would come up with an idea like this.
Himmler thought he could get himself recognized by the West as the leader of postwar Germany, didn’t he?
For those inside the White House Bubble within the DC Bubble their fantasies are realities. Listen to the Daniel Levy interview in Links.
Brings to mind the song “Himmler’s Ring” by Lowell George:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLPT6W5z_7I&ab_channel=LowellGeorge-Topic
People like Sullivan always think like a member of the Good Old Boys club. Mahmoud Abbas is one of those good old boys so of course Sullivan would think he’d be a great choice to govern Gaza. The Good Old Boys club is global in nature. The same names keep popping up over years and decades. No new blood. No new ideas. Just the same old sh*t. Over and over again. Nothing changes.
Jake Sullivan is an immediate disqualifier of competence let alone honesty – i listened to the interview with RFK Jr on Breaking Points over the weekend and your comment RK made me think about it – have to give RFK Jr a nod of respect for doing it, there a few things of his policy stance i do not agree with, others that i do like Ukraine – Krystal went pretty hard at him on Israel which i certainly appreciated and most of his answers disturbed me – he made an assertion that i haven’t dug deeply into since it seemed absurd on its face – he stated that the leadership of Hamas have made themselves millionaires and billionaires – a simple search provides as much conflict as possible – rather than hitch up the waders and dig in does anyone have a verified opinion about this accusation?
The RFK, Jr. claims is effectively wrong. There is a political and a military wing to Hamas. I understand they are close to independent. The political wing, for instance, had no idea of the 10/7 attack.
The men at the top of the political wing are in Qatar and are quite rich. But they have close to nada to do with militant wing.
OUCH! that seems quite a contradiction but thank you for the illumination – what political benefit could they be if at odds with military wing? – i read that although Hamas military is usually described as Iranian backed in MSM, that Iran was not pleased with being kept in the dark about 10/7 and are keeping Hamas at arm-length – the only thing i fully agree with RFK Jr about is Ukraine – in a previous interview he gave such a full-throated endorsement of capitalism it was disturbing – wouldn’t vote for him but would like to see him on the ballot in all states –
The wealth or lack of it of the Hamas political wing is irrelevant to Israel’s continuing genocide of the people of Gaza. Kennedy needs to do his homework. Listen to what Daniel Levy had to say in the interview posted in Links this morning.
It’s my understanding that the Palestinian society is a lot like the one in Lebanon – the populations are very closely related, after all. In principle people belong to a family (extended) and a family belongs to a clan (which is the smallest political unit in most cases) and a clan belongs to a sect. Clans may switch loyalties, but families don’t.
For example there are Christian Palestinians only because at some point the clan decided they’d benefit from conversion and from then on, the members were Christians. At least in principle, nothing prevented them from participating in Muslim or Jewish celebrations and religious progressions in the neighborhood and vice versa.
Anyway, when the society is organized that way, the elders on the top, the ones that will be the leaders of any organization or movement, will always be some of the richest individuals of the society because they also the leaders of their clans. Whether their wealth is solely at their disposal or more for the clan’s benefit, I don’t know and it’s probably worth a completely different discussion.
Sounds like Palestine, like the much of the rest of the world, has a political establishment facing a crisis of legitimacy.
RFK, Jr’s dad was assassinated by a Palestinian. That seems to have warped his thinking.
Wikipedia: ‘In a 2023 episode of Club Random, Kennedy Jr. asserted that Sirhan was not the shooter who killed his father. Kennedy Jr. named Eugene Thane Cesar—a security guard at the time—as the man who fired four shots from behind, one of which killed Kennedy: “Sirhan was a distractor, and the real shooter was behind my father”.
‘he stated that the leadership of Hamas have made themselves millionaires and billionaires’
Scott Ritter was talking about that claim the other day. He dug into it and it seemed to have stemmed from some professor saying it in an Israeli university back in 2014 but without giving any proof of that allegation. But the lie was so good that it took on a life of it’s own.
thank you RK, it did seem a bit ludicrous on its face – sad the way lies become an illusion of truth after being repeated over and over, like the beheaded babies and rape BS – The Husk still believes and mentions the fallacy of beheaded babies – and the salacious smear of rape has been used over and over through the centuries to fire up the masses, used with Black folks and Indigenous – emotional propaganda –
For a second time: “German chancellor Scholz contracts coronavirus, has mild cold symptoms”
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/german-chancellor-scholz-tests-positive-coronavirus-ntv-2022-09-26/
Yemen (well, part of it anyway) – the little country that could.
That’s what makes this public health failure so insidious, that public education on this has apparently always been based on what seems right, and never confirmed. I’ve been sneezing into my shirt sleeve my entire life thinking I’m doing everyone a favor, and apparently this is just incorrect public health education. No wonder no one thinks any pathogens are airborne! A lifetime of being told sneeze into your elbow.
Especially for Lambert:
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202312/1303823.shtml
December 17, 2023
Chinese scientists published first study on long COVID at 3 years after primary infection
Chinese scientists have published the first study on long COVID three years after the primary infection.
According to the latest study jointly conducted by teams led by Cao Bin from China-Japan Friendship Hospital and Zhang Dingyu, head of Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital, approximately half of COVID-19 survivors exhibited at least one sequelae symptom after three years from the onset of symptoms.
The most prevalent long COVID symptoms reported were fatigue or muscle weakness, and hair loss. The study, * published in The Lancet’s respiratory medicine version on December 21, noted that compared with survivors without long COVID, those with long COVID had a higher proportion of re-infection and were more prone to pneumonia after re-infection….
* https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(23)00684-9/fulltext
Inside the Booming Business of Cutting Babies’ Tongues
Sick f**king people:
“How Pfizer Blew Up” Downtown Josh Brown
How many newbie retail investors who piled into what seemed like a no-brainer during earlier days of the pandemic are busy selling low?
I do hope Pelosi lost a bundle.
Joe Biden had half a Century to make a fortune with perfectly legal insider trading and instead took the fast money obtainable by peddling influence to foreign Nations.
Which $ was spent on Hookers, Blow, big houses and fancy cars that the Family was barely able to afford.
With a little self restraint they could have been much wealthier and not facing impeachment or jail time, but waiting a year or two to buy a ’67 Corvette or a 500 Horsepower pick up truck was not their style.
He’s really not very bright. Never was very bright. Why else would he so obviously plagiarize UK MP Neil Kinnock’s 1988 political speech for his – Biden’s first pres run. B has an ear for catch phrases but not much else between his ears, imo. Cheating probably seems easier than thinking. / ;)
Maybe Kamala was the *only* person available for VP whose word salad nonsense makes B’s talking sound good. / ;)
Low level grifter. That anyone would think this scum presidential material indicts the whole system.
The last thing the donors want is a smart, independent thinker.
‘Ask how high on the way up.’
Denninger on AI and colleges.
Colleges Continue To Destroy THEMSELVES
https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=250318
Because AI is an input/output computer program where the input is someone else’s writing what happens to the charge of plagiarism in academic writing? Is that no longer academically punishable by a failing grade or job loss or demotion? How would one footnote a paper? *ChatGPT? That’s an authoritative source? Would footnotes be skipped entirely?
I read somewhere that the long term carying capacity of Australia is about 7 million people, and it seems they are going to overshot that 4 times any time now…
To be a US enemy is dangerous, but to be a US friend is deadly…
Australia really is the picture perfect frog, having its brain removed (normal frogs don’t stay to get slowly boiled alive), slowly boiling alive, while the US bullfrog serenades them…
They made us an offer that we could not refuse. :(
Dr. Doom
Methinks Roubini piles a bit too much on his plate here and suffers from the inevitable indigestion. Only a short while ago he was taking about debt deflation…where did that go? Little productive investment taking place anywhere, but productivity could save us from the megadoom. And all in the face of rapidly mounting public and private debt. Rentier capitalism all the rage…I’m hearing crickets. He chucks in carbon capture…yeow…is getting paid by the word? Sloppiest thing I have read by him in many years.
“Sloppiest thing I have read by him in many years.” I agree, he was basically just rambling. AI might save us from the climate crisis, that’s when I knew for sure that we are doomed for sure. The peak oil guys are probably rolling on the floor now laughing at this supposed Dr Doom because the later’s prognostications were actually relatively benign.
None of the arguments against this make any sense to me. Because the media want to know the results right away so they can get better ad rates? Please! Especially for the Presidential election, where the electee doesn’t get sworn in for over a month, the slower and more careful, the better. And having the voting itself spread out over multiple days would allow more people the opportunity to vote. Start Saturday afternoon and continue through the following Tuesday. Everything on paper, making recounts easy and electronic hacking impossible. Yes, more arduous for poll workers, but once every 4 years is not totally awful. Many of us have had to pull all-nighters and work weekends when it was critical for our employers. Pay the overtime.