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Links 2/7/2024

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Driving the best possible bargain now isn’t the best long-term strategy, according to game theory The Conversation

It’s Confirmed! Laser Fusion Experiment Hit a Critical Milestone in Power Generation ScienceAlert. Chuck L: “Is commercial fusion power now only 29 years away, down from the 30 years Ralph Lapp predicted when I was in college 65 years ago?”

Scientists Have 3D Bioprinted Functioning Human Brain Tissue Popular Science.

Why people hate Wegovy Cathy O’Neil

10 Timeless Papers That Challenged Our Thinking Nautilus (Micael T)

#COVID-19

Rampant COVID Poses New Challenges in the Fifth Year of the Pandemic Scientific American

Why So Quiet about Long COVID? The Tyee

Climate/Environment

Breaking EU Commission recommends to target 90% net emissions cut by 2040 RTE

Could the planet be warmer than we thought? Ocean sponges might be telling us something Associated Press

Why Private Investment Isn’t Driving a Rapid Green Transition Jacobin

Worried about grocery prices? The U.S. wastes 40% of the food it produces. In Canada in 2019, it was nearly 60%. Douglad Lamont (Micael T)

Does the hurricane scale need a Category 6? New climate study found 5 recent storms have met the threshold. CBS (Dr. Kevin)

China?

US to vent overcapacity complaints in Beijing talks Asia Times (Kevin W)

Japanese, Italian PMs meet as ‘G7 becomes US-led mechanism to contain China’ Global Times

How China Banned Soros in 1989 Canadian Patriot (Micael T)

European Disunion

View from London: Europe is finished International Affairs (Micael T)

Hungary’s Industry Drops Most Since 2020 as Recovery Falters Bloomberg

The legal arm of NATO German Foreign Affairs (Micael T)

The case of Hans-Georg Maassen: A fascist at the summit of the German state WSWS. Micael T: “No wonder Germany is so active in Ukraine.”

The Price of Abolishing Sweden’s Two Hundred Years of Neutrality Valdai Club (Micael T)

Gaza

‘Operation Al-Aqsa Flood’ Day 123: New testimonies emerge of Israel torturing detained Palestinians in Gaza Mondoweiss

The U.S. Deported A Palestinian To Gaza — And He Was Killed A Few Months Late HuffPost (ma)

* * *

Houthis launch new wave of missile attacks on ships off Yemeni coast Arab News

Israel’s a hard sell for Biden’s war-ending plan Asia Times

The enemy within: Arab states that trade with Israel The Cradle (Micael T)

Syraqistan

US Blocks Yemen-Saudi Peace Deal Antiwar.com (Kevin W)

White House Falsely Declared It Warned Iraq of Impending Airstrikes Intercept

Iran closer than ever to weaponizing uranium, building nuclear bomb Jerusalem Post (Dr. Kevin)

The Old Lies About Iran and Nuclear Weapons Just Won’t Die Daniel Larison

New Not-So-Cold War

Ukraine’s top general sparing neo-Nazis from frontline slaughter – ex-CIA analyst RT. This was also reported by Alexander Mercouris by a private, hence almost certainly independent, source.

Big Brother is Watching You Watch

3 million smart toothbrushes were just used in a DDoS attack. Really ZDNET (BC). I said that washing machine that was using so much data was mining Bitcoin. That idea is looking less crazy with every passing day.

Imperial Collapse Watch

BIDEN LAUNCHES FAKE ATTACT + US MEDIATOR AMOS HOCHSTEIN IS A CROOK Garland Nixon. A bit discursive and sometimes rant-y, but the Hochstein story is important yet very poorly covered. Also note Hochstein is negotiating the never-going-anywhere scheme that Lebanon pull back from their own inhabited southern border region to the Litani River. This same type of pretend negotiation was used at the pretext for the 2006 Israel invasion of Lebanon. And this is even more obviously bogus because Hochstein is not talking to Hezbollah.

CMV-22B Osprey “Not Operationally Suitable” According To Test Report WarZone (Kevin W)

Trump

Trump loses immunity appeal, effort to toss Jan. 6 case The Hill

Biden

Biden threatens to veto Republican Israel aid bill RT

Community leaders call on The Wall Street Journal to retract controversial opinion piece about Dearborn Click on Detroit (furzy)

Versus: Rising crime risks turning Oakland into a ‘ghost town.’ Newsom is sending in reinforcements CNN. Furzy points out: “Oakland wasn’t safe in the aughts, when I was living in the Bay Area…”

2024

Nikki Haley Loses to ‘None of These Candidates’ Option in Nevada GOP Primary: AP Bloomberg. Ouch

Texas Company Was Behind Voter Robocalls That Impersonated Biden, N.H. Say New York Times (furzy)

GOP Clown Car

House vote to impeach Mayorkas fails in stunning defeat for Republican leaders CNN

Immigration

Biden Proposes Ankle Bracelets and Commands Will Solve the Immigration Problem Michael Shedlock

Open Borders and Closed Courts: How the Supreme Court Laid the Seeds for the Immigration Crisis Jonathan Turley

Our No Longer Free Press

Supreme Court to weigh whether Covid misinformation is protected speech STAT

EU Right To Repair: Sellers Will Be Liable For a Year After Products Are Fixed ars technica

What Is a Wire Transfer? Adam Levitin

The Bezzle

The cruelty of crypto aeon

You’ll Have To Visit an Apple Store If You Forget Your Vision Pro Passcode Macrumors

How to Guarantee the Safety of Autonomous Vehicles Nautilus. Micael T: “How about guaranteeing the safety of people from autonomous cars?”

Guillotine Watch

No, the World Economic Forum is not coming for your coffee Chris Lang

Antidote du jour:

A bonus:

And a second bonus:

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here

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184 comments

  1. Antifa

    <strong)FOGGY BOTTOM</strong
    (melody borrowed from Yellow Submarine by The Beatles)

    We love some military porn
    We’ve no respect for sovereignty
    If people claim their right to life
    We will send in the Marines
    We must remain Tha Numbah One
    No deviation from the mean
    For colonies that misbehave
    We serve Chianti and fava beans . . .

    At Foggy Bottom it’s always Halloween
    The matrix looks okay on everybody’s screen
    When things go south it’s our job to intervene
    With TNT we’re promptly on the scene!

    There’s just one rule across-the-board:
    Use the Big Stick — the two-by-four —
    When vassal states go their own way

    At Foggy Bottom it’s always Halloween
    The matrix looks okay on everybody’s screen
    When things go south it’s our job to intervene
    With TNT we’re promptly on the scene!

    Full speed ahead Mr. Blinken, full speed ahead!
    (Full speed ahead it is, sir!)
    Send a cable! Send a cable!
    (Aye, aye sir! Aye, aye!)
    Sinking! Sinking!

    We’ve got Ivy League degrees (we got degrees!)
    The right diploma (the right diploma) is all we need (is all we need!)
    There’s no review (no review) of our routine (it’s our routine!)
    Our hearts are pure (hearts are pure) our hands are clean (hands are clean!) Ahh-hah!

    At Foggy Bottom it’s always Halloween
    The matrix looks okay on everybody’s screen
    When things go south it’s our job to intervene
    With TNT we’re promptly on the scene!

    At Foggy Bottom it’s always Halloween
    The matrix looks okay on everybody’s screen
    When things go south it’s our job to intervene
    With TNT we’re promptly on the scene!

  2. The Rev Kev

    “Iran closer than ever to weaponizing uranium, building nuclear bomb’

    It has happened in the past that NC has accidentally linked to an article that is actually a year or two old but here linking to an article that is at least 30 years old is a bit on the excessive side.

    1. Feral Finster

      I recall an article in Jane’s Defense, claiming that Iran was months away from nuclear weapons.

      The article was published in, IIRC, 1985.

      For that matter, the Shah had inked a deal with the United States to purchase breeder reactors, ostensibly for generating electricity. In approving this agreement, White House Chief of Staff Dick Cheney remarked that a country awash in hydrocarbons could have only one use for a breeder reactor.

    2. sfglossolalia

      The same people who write the stories about Iran being close to developing a nuclear bomb must be the same people who write the stories about how close we are to self driving cars.

    2. sfglossolalia

      I’m not sure it was a stunning defeat. Only 4 republicans voted against it. That means for all the other ones they have the huge PR boost of reminding their base why Republicans need to win the next election to get rid of the RINOs. It’s not like replacing Mayorkas would change anything.

  4. The Rev Kev

    ‘Will Schryver
    @imetatronink
    ‼️ 🤡 American Exceptionalist Clown Show
    Linked below is a short interview (4 mins) with a retired US F-16 pilot who assures us that F-16s, flying in Ukraine, could easily defeat Russian air defenses and also fly devastating close air support missions.’

    Pretty tall talk from a guy who in his entire career never flew against a peer nation but only third-rate ones militarily speaking. Does he really think that Russian pilots are a bunch of “cabbage-heads”? I say let this guy and his buddies take a job flying F-16s with the Ukrainians. They could call themselves “The Flying Tigers 2.0”. What could possible go wrong. Runways are a problem as the Russians keep on bombing them so the Ukrainians recently approached the Moldovans and asked if they could have their jets take off from there but the Moldovans balked as they knew that it would drag them into a shooting war with the Russians. He may deride Russia’s older fighters as clunky in their cockpit layout but I never heard of near an entire squadron of them sitting on the runway being unable to boot their fighters up.

    1. ilsm

      I knew F-4 pilots who said they could beat F-16!

      I don’t know any current F-16 pilots, last tactical air forces unit was 39 years ago, when F-16 was pretty new. At that time it had engine failure issues. Today a USAF F-16 may have one of two company’s engine, and engines still perform below spec’ed reliability and spares shortage remain an issue.

      That said the old F-16 from minimal training countries going to Ukraine have an old weapons control system, not that USAF F-16’s are current either. How these will beat MiGs and SU’s is beyond is me.

      Maybe US will give E-3’s (50 year old AWACS) with sheep dipped crews to vector old F-16’s to find targets, of course the F-16s would be too busy keeping the E 3 from being shot out of the sky…..

      USAF F-16 mission capability is low, it will be lower when all their spare parts go to Kiev to make it look like they can keep old F-16’s flying.

    2. cfraenkel

      He’s a pilot, that’s how they talk.
      War story time…. In a previous life, I was stationed maintaining geosych communications satellites for the AF. We had a ‘dog and pony’ workstation for visiting VIPs, and since we were just a boring bunch of geeks in BDUs sitting in front of computer terminals, we had a big map on the wall showing the vehicle’s ground trace – the typical figure 8 due to the small inclination of the orbit so the VIPs had something to look at. We had a visiting General come through, a pilot (they all are), and after sitting through a routine contact, his only comment, looking up at the map, was “How many Gs does it pull when it turns around”.

      1. Benny Profane

        I’m thinking that these guys are like pro jocks, with amazing physical skills and abilities, but, instead of going into the MLB or NFL, they went the Top Gun route, and were well rewarded with adulation and free sex. But, like pro jocks, clueless and dumb, outside of the arena.

    3. MT_Wild

      In their defense, what good is a fighter pilot that isn’t cocky?

      What’s the difference between God and a fighter pilot?

      God doesn’t think he’s a fighter pilot.

      1. Jorge

        Same with surgeons. Do you really want Woody Allen operating on you? “Mom was right, I should have been a lawyer!”

    1. The Rev Kev

      The Kremlin has reported that the interview has already taken place so I guess we wait until it is released. And Elon Musk came out with a statement that anybody that says Tucker Carlson should be arrested when he returns should actually be arrested themselves. Thems fighting words!

      1. Randall Flagg

        I will be interested in how other media outlets mention this interview with their opening remarks. Will Tucker Carlson be described as:
        Pro Putin?
        A Putin sympathizer?
        A Putin sycophant?
        Pro Russia?
        Anti Ukraine?
        Trump supporter?
        Anti American?
        A Traitor?
        All of the above?
        Simply for doing his job…
        As someone else said yesterday I think, stand back and wear PPE to protect from all the exploding heads.

        1. Neutrino

          There will be some agreed-upon phrase to be brandished by the usual outlets. Not much agency involved.

          1. Martin Oline

            Yes indeed. I am always fascinated by the MSM’s delay in reporting a politically significant story. Coverage is delayed many hours, sometimes days, until they (you know who they are) can create a story and transmit it to our ‘independent and courageous’ media. Wait until the next unexpected story breaks and you will see for yourself.

        2. ToWard

          According to the CNN website, Carlson is “doing the bidding of the Kremlin,” whatever that means.

          1. undercurrent

            CNN knows exactly what it means because doing the bidding of the American empire is its business model, and business is very good, and very, very lucrative.

        3. Feral Finster

          One Robert Kagan is already calling for Carlson to be silenced, pending some clarity.

          That pesky First Amendment, who needs it?

      3. Benny Profane

        Tucker has already announced he is doing this, for all to see on his Twitter channel, and it’s radio silence on the NYT page and Fiox news, just checked. Can they bury it with silence? We’ll see.

        1. flora

          That didn’t take long. Just as predicted. / ;)

          From the article above:
          “Carlson’s work in Russia could see the former Fox News host in hot water with the EU, Guy Verhofstadt, a former Belgian prime minister and current member of the European Parliament, told Newsweek.

          The lawmaker—who has called for the EU to explore imposing a “travel ban” on Carlson—described Carlson as “a mouthpiece” of former President Donald Trump and Putin, adding: “As Putin is a war criminal and the EU sanctions all who assist him in that effort, it seems logical that the External Action Service examine his case as well.”

          ( Laughably predictable. In fact, NC readers predicted this turn of events. See this thread above. / ;)

          1. juno mas

            Well, that video is doing just what the msm is doing, only gentler. Ryan and Emily both stated that whatever Putin says is propaganda! Whatever Biden says is Truth??!!!. It is flat impossible to inform Americans. They like being uninformed. It is easier.

  6. Colonel Smithers

    Thank you, Yves.

    Further to the link about Europe being finished, I would be careful about Allister Heath.

    Heath used to edit City AM, “the Sun of business journalism” according to Mervyn King, and pushed neo-con, neo-liberal, brexiteer and libertarian views. His team have dispersed to the MSM, Tory HQ and Whitehall and were influential in bringing back Dominic Cummings* into the government and campaigned for Truss. One told me in the spring of 2019 that she “was excited about having Dom at the heart of government”.

    Heath’s brother in law, Matthew Elliott, has advised the government and stirred matters up, usually over Brexit and for Liz Truss, for his employer’s investment strategy.

    Heath grew up in France and has a strange mid-Channel accent. Like many brexiteeers, e.g. the Peruvian planter Daniel Hannan, he has an idea of England, not the UK, that has not existed for decades, certainly not in their lifetimes and one that, as they lived abroad, they would be unlikely to encounter.

    This said, at a Christmas reception in early December, I heard from some EU officials in London that they fear for Europe and are encouraging their children to consider lives outside Europe. In particular, the officials blamed the ECB and its thought leader, the Bundesbank, for the EU’s problems.

    1. pjay

      Yes. It is interesting to to compare the various ideologically-driven arguments as to why Europe is crumbling. It’s “socialist” decadence according to right-wing libertarians like Heath. No, it’s the take-over by right-wing fascist extremists according to the Trotskyists at WSWS. Personally, I think LaRouchians like Matt Ehret are closer to the truth, despite their own obsessions and blind spots. This may make me a wild-eyed conspiracy theorist in the eyes of “serious” foreign policy pundits, but I’m just choosing the model that best fits the empirical evidence.

    2. PlutoniumKun

      Yes, I don’t know that magazine, but anything published by Allister Heath is, shall we say, a little tarnished. This is the guy who thought Liz Trusses first budget was an act of genius. The article itself is the usual mish-mash of random factoids strung together into a grand theory of something or other.

      It is one of the peculiarities of English politics that the most patriotic and libertarian among them have a habit of living anywhere but Britain. Usually in a tax haven of some sort, but not all.

      Although I’m not a fan of much of his recent writing, I think Fintan O’Toole nailed the historical and cultural background of those people back when he was focused on Brexit – he saw it as a mostly cultural movement based on a very specific sort of English nationalism that focused on the golden age of 19th Century full on capitalism (back before it went neo).

      As to your last comment, its become increasingly obvious that German ortho-capitalism (along with other peculiarly German psychodrama hangups) is becoming parasitic upon the EU as a whole. Mind you, unless the Norwegians open up their borders to everyone, its hard to see these days where you could find a refuge for their children to grow up that isn’t on a route to something just as bad.

    3. Mikel

      I read the article and immediately became wary about the author.
      While he may have accurately called out the pressure points and problems, as well as homage to the problems of the working class, one should be wary of what kinds of solutions would come from such a mind.

    4. c_heale

      I started reading the article and stopped as I realised it was full of right wing Brexiteer propaganda. It should be looking at the problems in the UK, where a complete degredation of the public sphere, roads, transport, hospitals, drug crime, sewage disposal, etc. is taking place.

  7. Benny Profane

    The Will Schryver tweet linking “cabbage head” Top Gun F16 pilot and the other tweet with Biden doing his daft old man bit thinking Mitterand is still alive reminds me of that famous Napoleon maxim, ‘Never interfere with an enemy while he’s in the process of destroying himself’, although it may not have been the original statement, but, you get the point. https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/07/06/never-interfere/

    2. digi_owl

      The problem is that this is an enemy that may well decide the launch them nukes should they before spooked…

  8. ChrisFromGA

    I’m a little surprised at no mention of the big collapse of Freeze Frame and Chucky’s excellent adventure in grand bargains.

    Seems that this is a big story, and maybe the excellent analytical skills of the commentariat could be put to use here. To some, I’m sure this is a pleasant surprise. I never thought it was going anywhere, because it seemed obvious that Johnson is a different sort of cat than Muh Kevin!

    At any rate, here is some background music:

    The Death of a Border Agreement

    Sung to the tune of, “The Death of A Disco Dancer” by the Smiths

    The death of a border agreement
    Well, it happens a lot ’round here
    And if you think legislatin’
    Is a common goal
    That goes to show
    How little you know
    The death of a border agreement
    Well, Mitch’d rather not get involved
    He never talks to his neighbor
    He’d rather not get involved
    Oh …

    Gov. functionality?
    Gov functionality?
    Oh, very nice
    Very nice
    Very nice
    Very nice
    …but maybe in the next Congress

  9. Pat

    How many here would rush to the polls to vote “None of These Candidates”?

    If that were an option on the Democratic ballot for the probably won’t happen NY primary, I would be there so fast your head would spin. (I would send an apology to Marianne Williamson later. Sadly if the idiocy of NH is any indication Biden would still survive, but I would bet not by much.

    I recognize that Nevada has a very weird set up and the real battle between Haley and Trump happens later, and it is meaningless in the long run, but I sincerely appreciate that being a ballot line option. I want it on all ballots for real.

      1. Amfortas the Hippie

        beat me to it, Rev,lol.
        that movie was fundamental to my political development.
        i was 15 or 16 when it came out.
        of course, since then…both parties have been busy disenfranchising people and otherwise jiggering the electoral machinery to obviate the need for actual democracy.
        i got my voter registration card a week or so ago…lol, had no idea i was still on the rolls…but whatever.
        got me thinking about the Primary here in Texas.
        where i live, you go in, and there’s an equal number of oldsters from D and R parties, managing the polls.
        and you pick either D or R ballot…and when you pick D, there are always groans and eyerolls from the R’s.
        but when i’ve asked for a Libertarian or Green ballot…because they have Primaries, too,lol…no one knows what i’m talking about.
        because there are only 2 “real” parties, donchaknow….
        IDK if this is widespread…or due to lack of money…or oversight…or whatever.
        and another datapoint that ive mentioned here, before….but that no one local, D or R, seems to see as an issue: All of the local stuff…especially Sheriff…is decided in the GOP Primary…so one has to vote in that Primary in order to have any say at all in who sits in that rather large chair.
        this has been the case for 30 years…and by now is just the way it is…water is wet, etc.
        …and furthermore!…after Tam passed, and i was on the mind of the local public, apparently…i was asked by 3 different local bigwigs if i’d be interested in running(unopposed, naturally) for County Commisioner.
        1. sounds boring as hell, to me…and overconstrained by fiat from Texaslege…but 2. i said, only if i can run as a libertarian socialist/left libertarian.
        ergo, as night follows day, all that talk has ceased,lol.
        those people still probe my opinions about stuff, when i see them in the feedstore or wherever(i’m locally famous for being a heterodox thinker and a walking encyclopaedia…and when i come down out of the hills(rare, these days), everybody is amazed that i’m alive)…but i am no longer, apparently, considered a potential apparatchick.

          1. Jabura Basaidai

            OK – she sounds excellent and will write her in too – thank you – Roscoe won’t be disappointed, he just wants scratches anyway – will we even have socialist choices on the ballot here in Michigan?

            1. Giovanni Barca

              Fran Shor, who appears occasionally in Counterpunch, has appeared on my ballot for Wayne State trustee. There are usually a few socialists way in the back of the ballot for various minor elected posts.

    3. griffen

      Was thinking about this. If a pollster happened to approach me or somehow contact me in spite of my approach ( not accepting spam phone calls ), I would respond thusly “what is behind door number 3 ?”

      Door number 1. The doddering old politician with a proven record of lies and enforcing harmful legislation, and not sure to whom (at times) he is referring to or if he is supposedly always cogent and on topic. Not the man we want near a red button. Lies are covered up by a compliant media.
      Door number 2. Slightly younger but still a doddering real estate casino and or “mogul”, dependent upon who exactly is doing the math. Penchant for not really being predictable. Not the man we want near a red button. Nothing he says escapes scrutiny from aforementioned media.

      With choices like those, do we really need enemies outside of this country. Get the popcorn, comrade, we watch US of A collapse.

    4. EarlyGray

      I actually think that None of the Above should be an option on all Congress/Senate ballots and if it wins then a random member of the electorate should be selected as the representative for one term only. With decent financial compensation to make it worth their while of course. If combined with mandatory voting, it could provide a cure for the terrible candidates we always seem to get.

      1. Jabura Basaidai

        since Kucinich was RFK Jr’s campaign manager makes me wonder what his stance on Gaza is given RFK Jr’s is staunchly pro Israel come hell or high water – and yes he was smeared when he left the RFK Jr camp – hopefully he isn’t pro Israel and if he isn’t, hope he gets traction getting his old seat back –

          1. Jabura Basaidai

            yeah that’s what i would think too but not in any of the links i read about it, just the usual smear and obfuscation –

    6. Tom Doak

      I would love to disqualify all of the current candidates, and maybe a plurality of Americans would concur. But then what? Who’s going to survive that process? We’d probably wind up with Michelle Obama, or just a vacant office.

  10. The Rev Kev

    “3 million smart toothbrushes were just used in a DDoS attack. Really”

    I’m trying to think of a reason why I might possibly want my toothbrush to connect to the internet. To get an update for those bristles? So that social media friends can compare their brushing habits? Use it to get a 3d image of their sparkling pearlies? To use it in connection with your mobile to know where you are brushing? And of course you are giving your dental data to a corporation. Here is one guy saying that they are not really worth it-

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLPGJfZhPzw (7:54 mins)

    1. timbers

      When I replaced my washing machine a year or two back, I gave strict orders to the fella who rents my lower level under no circumstances use any smart features or internet for example notifying you when your wash is done via internet. I explained internet usage could destroy the machine. Am also baffled at garage door openers pushing you to use internet driven opening/closing command when a battery operated hand device is entirely adequate and less hackable.

    2. Randall Flagg

      I’m waiting for the internet connected refrigerators/freezers to get hacked and have the food spoiled with hackers changing the temps. Or ordering supplies/more food automatically that are not needed.
      Or cookstoves turned on and burning up the items inside, or just wasting fuel.
      Ignorant question probably but, how do any of these internet connected appliances help reduce our energy usage when up in the “cloud” there needs to be a server keeping all this up and running ?

      1. The Rev Kev

        Several years ago there were all these people in the US that signed up for internet-connected thermostats to control the temperature in their homes that could be controlled by tablets or their mobiles. The corporation that made them was brought up by a bigger corporation who one day decided that they could be no longer bothered with those things and so shut down the servers for those devices. Suddenly, all those thermostats were now nothing more that plastic bricks and if I recall correctly, this happened in the middle of an American winter. Surprise!

        1. undercurrent

          This wouldn’t seem possible when I was growing– hey hang on for a sec, I gotta answer my toothbrush–

      2. Enter Laughing

        Or what if the fridge goes all Hal 9000 on you?

        I’m sorry Dave, I can’t let you open the refrigerator door until you lose more weight. Your BMI is just not acceptable.

        1. digi_owl

          Or go full on Cyberpunk 2077, with vending machines mounted inside every apartment (and outright porn ads blaring at you in the elevators).

        1. LifelongLib

          IIRC there’s a Ray Bradbury story where a robot servant is instructed to put a family on a diet, but it doesn’t understand that the diet is supposed to end after the people have lost a certain amount of weight.

    3. vao

      The article also states that these toothbrushes can run Java (I wonder which libraries are included).

      This, and connecting with the Internet makes me think that, whereas Russians are allegedly extracting chips from washing machines to endow their missiles with the necessary processing power, perhaps we could disassemble those toothbrushes to build large fleets of smart drones.

    4. gk

      “want”? If you’re in the UK, you might have to, in order to see a NHS dentist. Think how much Blair could make by selling your data.

  11. zagonostra

    >The case of Hans-Georg Maassen: A fascist at the summit of the German state – WSWS.

    The German ruling class is once again playing a particularly aggressive role in the global eruption of imperalist war. It is openly preparing for a direct war against Russia and is massively rearming the military to make Germany “able to wage war” again.

    Yes, but who are those “German ruling class?” Who do they/it represent? The German people?

    Having become acquainted Guido Preparata’s book, “Conjuring Hitler,” which takes Carol Quigley’s book, “Tragedy and Hope” and provides a narrative structure, with copious footnoting/documentation, my understanding of what happened in WW2 in Germany has changed. And, so has what is happening now. reading WSWS articles on “fascist” without this other view of history, is somewhat vacant and not very enlightening.

    https://www.amazon.com/CONJURING-HITLER-BRITAIN-AMERICA-DESTROYED/dp/B0CL7MZBWT/ref=sr_1_2?qid=1707312183&refinements=p_27%3AGuido+Giacomo+Preparata&s=books&sr=1-2

    1. pjay

      Yes. I made a similar point above before I read yours. I invoked (cautiously) “LaRouchians” like Matthew Ehret, but Quigley is a more “respectable,” if little known, source for a framework that seems indispensable today.

    2. Carolinian

      So the coalition running Germany is calling the Afd Hitler and WSWS agrees with them while saying that this ruling coalition is also Hitler and secretly sponsoring the other Hitlers?. Therefore only the Trotsky-ites at WSWS can save the day via a working class that seems more divided and conquered than ever not to mention in danger of replacement by robots.

      I’ve always found the WSWS a muddle but maybe that’s just me. News via commissars is seeming somewhat fusty these days.

        1. zagonostra

          I’ve only been recently introduced to his work. I trust you will make the decision on your own. He has many podcast on various platforms. If you look at his index and footnotes, I don’t think he is irresponsibly “speculative.” Indeed, I find his speculations and opinions, always stated as so on podcast I’ve listened to, refreshing.

          In any event, I find that I need to read more, and listen to podcast that summarize authors less.

    4. hemeantwell

      Wow. Preparata seems to lose track of the simple fact that interwar German elites, both bourgeois and neofeudal, feared being expropriated by the Soviets. I would see that fundamental conflict of interests as broadly determinative, regardless of prodding and nudging by Anglo-American capital. So it sounds like Preparata is reading back the current situation, rife with potential for collaboration between capitalist powers, into that period. ?

      It may be relevant that in this Wages of Destruction Tooze floated the idea that Hitler was more worried about the US than the Soviets but got little support from other historians.

      1. Revenant

        So many Hitlers, which one do you see? Or, in the current talk, and is this Hitler in the room with us now?

        Taking the bigger picture, Nazi policies (apartheid, eugenics, lebensraum) *are* the USA. Early 20th century Germany wanted to expand East as 19th century America had expanded West. There were just a lot of inconvenient Slavs in the way. And early 20th century USA and Britain wanted this German expansion to take the war to Communist Russia.

        It is frankly a mystery why Churchill did not make peace with the Reich and then encourage it to die on the hills outside Moscow rather than throw the Empire on the US’s mercy. Churchill was half-American: was he a double agent and if so on whose side, given the US is still fighting Russia with Britain cheerleading…?

  12. timbers

    Do the proposed ankle braclets for illegal immigrants have rhinestones? That’s important. Denying rhinestone adornment is of course a huge deterent. I’m sure that’s the thinking behind this, so yes they have it right. Good work, Senators.

    1. MT_Wild

      Nope. Just a couple ounces of det cord in case you skip your asylum hearing. Red meat for the base.

      Hope the Israelis don’t read NC and get any ideas, lol.

  13. Paradan

    “US to vent overcapacity complaints in Beijing talks.”

    to be followed tomorrow by..

    “China complains to US about subsidizing its currency, driving overcapacity, and rendering other currency’s unable to compete for reserve status.”

    1. timbers

      How about telling the US to get its troops out of Taiwan and calling it an invasion on Chinese soil?

  14. The Rev Kev

    “10 Timeless Papers That Challenged Our Thinking”

    Personally, I would have added the 1953 paper “Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid” by J. D. Watson and F. H. C. Crick. It is only a few pages long but it told us that DNA existed as a three-dimensional double helix which is how life recreates itself. Once the implications were worked out, it released a floodgate of advances that we are living with till this day, for better or worse.

    1. Carolinian

      The list seems to be more about thinking about science than actual science. I find the latter more interesting.

      1. vao

        And, apart from Marx, all by UK-USA authors. I was also expecting a paper by Einstein on relativity and was surprised not to find it.

          1. CA

            https://monthlyreview.org/2009/05/01/why-socialism/

            May, 1949

            Why Socialism?
            By Albert Einstein

            Is it advisable for one who is not an expert on economic and social issues to express views on the subject of socialism? I believe for a number of reasons that it is.

            Let us first consider the question from the point of view of scientific knowledge. It might appear that there are no essential methodological differences between astronomy and economics: scientists in both fields attempt to discover laws of general acceptability for a circumscribed group of phenomena in order to make the interconnection of these phenomena as clearly understandable as possible. But in reality such methodological differences do exist. The discovery of general laws in the field of economics is made difficult by the circumstance that observed economic phenomena are often affected by many factors which are very hard to evaluate separately. In addition, the experience which has accumulated since the beginning of the so-called civilized period of human history has—as is well known—been largely influenced and limited by causes which are by no means exclusively economic in nature. For example, most of the major states of history owed their existence to conquest. The conquering peoples established themselves, legally and economically, as the privileged class of the conquered country. They seized for themselves a monopoly of the land ownership and appointed a priesthood from among their own ranks. The priests, in control of education, made the class division of society into a permanent institution and created a system of values by which the people were thenceforth, to a large extent unconsciously, guided in their social behavior…

    2. ForFawkesSakes

      That paper isn’t without controversy these days, as they used the unpublished work of Rosalind Franklin and the rest of her team without giving credit.

  15. Alice X

    NYT Opinion – Bret Stephens [on Israel]

    Settler Colonialism: A Guide for the Sincere

    He wants to appear to be sincere in that he asks if we question the Israeli instance, why not the American? Or Australian, or Canadian and others. To me a whole pot full of wrongs doesn’t make a single right.

    He then brings up that the Israelis speak Hebrew and can read ancient texts, so there’s the link to the land of two thousand years ago. But my understanding is that the language was used only in religious settings for ages, until recently being revived as a living one.

    It seems to me that he is missing an important element but I’m not quite able to put it in a nutshell. Perhaps that the UN sanctioned the partition (which it did not have moral authority to do) and the violent implementation grossly violated its own protocols? It has been offering critical resolutions every since which have been consistently rebuffed.

    1. Alice X

      Daniel Levy was interviewed on DN today on the current negotiations, always a fount of wisdom. What the Israelis are offering is either ethnic cleansing and genocide or apartheid. Quite a choice there.

    2. Carolinian

      If you can fake sincerity you’ve got it made. Next thing you know you have “most moral” armies etc.

      And the diff between the American settler colonialism and the Israeli is that a horrific 20th century discredited colonialism even as the Israelis were embracing it and wanting the rest of us to join them in rolling history backwards.

    3. Henry Moon Pie

      “But my understanding is that the language was used only in religious settings for ages, until recently being revived as a living one.”

      You’re exactly right, Alice X. Hebrew was replaced by a close relative, Aramaic, long before the time of Jesus. Ability to even read Hebrew deteriorated so much that the Masoretes had to add vowels to the consonants-only text of the Hebrew bible to help people read it aloud in synagogue in the first century CE. It was necessary to translate the Hebrew text of the Hebrew bible to the Greek Septuagint in the post-exilic period (3rd – 1st BCE).

      Modern Hebrew is a re-invention of a long-dead language.

      1. gk

        In fact, the Karaites do not accept these vowels, so that the word for milk becomes the word for fat, sparing them the milk and meat nonsense. It also eliminates the land flowing with milk and honey, which otherwise is a sick joke, since Jews tend to be lactose intolerant.

    4. gk

      Israelis speak modern Hebrew, regarded (by non-ideological linguists) as both semitic and Indo-European. Israelis think they understand Biblical Hebrew, therefore “a young girl shall conceive” (rather than virgin) or Moses’ horns (rather than radiance – or rays of light which is complete nonsense). I’m with Michelangelo here.

  16. t

    Thank you for another link on Wegovy and that class of drugs. One side of my family is full of obesity and T1 and T2 diabetes and I want them taking it by the truckload. (Unless their history of pancreatic makes them a bad candidate. Apparently that’s a risk.)

    I suppose there’s room for concern about the nutrition of the working poor in food desserts – but they probably don’t have “access” to healthcare.

    1. cfraenkel

      The first comment in that article (by johnlovie928) was illuminating. It claimed a medical friend had compared maps of NYC showing uptake of Wegovy and obesity; and that the two maps were inverses of each other.

  17. The Rev Kev

    “Houthis launch new wave of missile attacks on ships off Yemeni coast”

    They are real goers who are not quitting. They are determined to see it through to the end. But Washington thinks that they will buckle if the right off-ramp can be found where they do not lose face. U.S. Special Envoy Tim Lenderking who is going to this region said ‘the longer the Houthi attacks persisted, the higher the danger of renewed fighting in Yemen and disruptions to food and medicine shipments needed in Yemen and Gaza.’ Well there is no renewed fighting as the other factions are supporting them and are sending weapons. So is Lenderking saying if you don’t quite, we will stop food and medicine getting to you or Gaza. Sounds like it to me. Lenderking also said ‘he hopes to hold talks on preserving a roadmap to end the war in Yemen worked out by the Houthis and Saudi Arabia, which intervened on behalf of the internationally recognized government in 2015.’ How is that going to work out? Biden just declared Ansar Allah a terrorist organization which puts the peace treaty between them and the Saudis in jeopardy-

    https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2024-02-06/diplomacy-underway-to-provide-yemens-houthis-with-climb-down-us-official

    1. Feral Finster

      “U.S. Special Envoy Tim Lenderking who is going to this region said ‘the longer the Houthi attacks persisted, the higher the danger of renewed fighting in Yemen and disruptions to food and medicine shipments needed in Yemen and Gaza.’

      A not very thinly veiled threat of blockade and genocide.

      1. Procopius

        The U.S. Navy has been blockading Yemen since 2015. See the section titled “Blunt Instrument” which explains why they also denied food and medicine shipments (a war crime, I believe). I suppose the blockade was suspended at the time the Saudis decreed a cease fire, but I don’t know. I would expect it to be reimposed now, but haven’t seen anything, in the MSM or elsewhere.

  18. Jabura Basaidai

    “…withdrawal of the HMS Diamond ship from the Red Sea for maintenance” – yep, just maintenance – sure – the ineffectiveness of these naval vessels is getting more obvious each day – and hopefully the Russian & Chinese vessels will remain in the Persian Gulf so the West thinks twice before doing something irreversibly stupid

    1. The Rev Kev

      That ship does have a history of technical issues, more so than most-

      ‘In 2021, the ship initially deployed to the Far East as part of the UK carrier strike group centred on aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth. She detached from the group for repairs in July. due to reported “technical issues” likely linked to longstanding power and propulsion reliability issues with ships of the class. It was later reported that the ship had “suffered a failure of one of her gas turbines”. Repairs were undertaken in Taranto, Italy. At the end of August, Diamond returned to sea to rejoin the group. In mid-October 2021, after rejoining the strike group, the destroyer again experienced “technical issues”, this time reportedly not related to her propulsion system and a decision was made to dock in Singapore to have them addressed.’

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Diamond_(D34)#2020%E2%80%93present

      1. Jabura Basaidai

        i stand corrected RK, thank you – still think all that floating armament ain’t doing so hot out there in quelling the Yemenis – thankfully

        1. The Rev Kev

          I only knew about these issues as Alexander Christoforou mentioned it once or twice in his videos causing me to look it up. But you are quite correct how all the wonder weapons that we have are being sorely tested by a bunch of tribesmen with missiles. Looks like western missile diplomacy – which replaced 19th century gunboat diplomacy – isn’t really working so well these days.

      2. vao

        longstanding power and propulsion reliability issues with ships of the class

        Well, aren’t the two British aircraft carriers plagued by issues with the propulsion, too? At some point, all type 45 ships were being overhauled because of those “power and propulsion issues”.

        What is going on with British naval engineering?

        2. PlutoniumKun

          The problems seem connected – the Royal Navy have gone for a hybrid system of diesel and gas turbines knowns as IEP that directly powers the ship with electric motors rather than the mechanical links that are typically used for hybrids (which is by far the most common set up in modern warships). The IEP was also chosen for the Zumwalt Destroyers, and we know what happened to them.

          Theoretically, this is a simpler and more reliable system, but for whatever reason its been very problematic, and it seems that everyone else (including the US Navy) is sticking with mechanical set-ups (CODLOG or CODLAG) for future vessels.

          The problem for the UK is that with a very small order book they have to pick a technology and stick with it if they want to keep an edge over everyone else (notably, on joint programs such as the Type 23, they are opting for older CODLOG or CODLAG systems, maybe on the insistence of the partner). If you pick the wrong horse, you are in big trouble, and it seems this is the problem the RN finds itself with. Given the number of key vessels using IEP there is no going back, they have no option but to try to make it work.

          In many respects, this has echoes of the failures of the Nimrod airborne radar system and the interceptor version of the Tornado aircraft, both of which chose speculative, highly risky technologies, but with no option they programs went on long after it was clear they didn’t work very well.

          2. digi_owl

            Curious that this should be an issue, as various kind of electric propulsion has been used in civilian ships for decades. It has allowed for increased flexibility by replacing static propellers with rotatable thrusters.

            1. WobblyTelomeres

              Don’t many locomotives use diesel – electric hybrids for the torque the electric motors can provide at 0 rpm? Said technology is not new.

              1. Don

                All, or almost all, of them I think, since the 1950s. (They were/are called traction motors and when still a teenager in the sixties, I used to haul them for CN, two at a time, in specially built heavy duty trucks.)

                1. juno mas

                  “trucks” is what the combination of steel wheels, suspension springs, and electric motor is called. The diesel/electric locomotive took over from the steam locomotive around 1954.

                  The diesel engine of the locomotive turns an electric generator at varying speeds to produce electric power for the “trucks”. The set up allows for massive application of torque to the wheels at dead-stop starts.

            2. Copeland

              Might it have something to do with the civilian ship having to earn its keep, so it simply must work, while the military ship doesn’t have to do anything but make a profit for its seller, so it doesn’t work?

          3. Polar Socialist

            As far as i know, which is not that much, the cause of problem with HMS Prince of Wales was 0.8 mm misalignment of the starboard propeller shaft. Since the shaft weights about 33 tons, the (uncontrolled) forces involved caused damage to the shaft and the rudder.

            In the type 45 the issues have mostly been about insufficient cooling (by warm surface water) of the gas turbine which has caused it to shut down suddenly, which forces electric motors to provide all the power to the shaft, and the peak load causes the diesel generators basically to shut down leaving the vessel literally dead in the water.

            While both problems are related to the propulsion, they seem to be mainly connected by not up-to-par quality control. And in the latter case, maybe even a bad design or cutting some corners – they are installing a third generator on the Type 45 destroyers now so the generators survive the peak loads, but it doesn’t do anything to keep the turbine from getting too hot.

  20. Enter Laughing

    I’m trying to understand the text of the border bill and I came across a baffling passage on page 213. It comes after the section on Page 212 that describes the mandatory activation of Emergency Authorization to shut down the border if:

    ‘‘(i) during a period of 7 consecutive calendar days, there is an average of 5,000 or more aliens who are encountered each 7 day; or ‘‘(ii) on any 1 calendar day, a combined total of 8,500 or more aliens are encountered”

    The bill goes on to explain that the average for the applicable 7-day period is calculated by adding up the number of immigrants encountered between land and border ports of entry.

    Then comes the baffling part on Page 213 Lines 7-10:

    LIMITATION.—Aliens described in subsection (a)(2)C from noncontiguous countries shall not be included in calculating the sum of aliens encountered.

    My understanding is the contiguous means sharing a border. There are 48 contiguous states in the U.S., and the United States is contiguous to two countries – Mexico and Canada.

    Surely the border bill is not saying that only immigrants from contiguous countries (i.e., Mexico or Canada) will be counted toward the 5,000 daily average, right?

    Can someone clarify? Trying to understand the language in the bill is an acquired skill I struggle with.

    1. tegnost

      Surely that is what they’re saying…
      exactly the kind of gotcha I would expect to find in a 300+ page bill
      We’re getting open borders whether we like it or not.

    2. IMOR

      The “unaccompanied minor child” reference on p.206 may be it, so that unaccompanied minors from further south than Mexico or anywhere else won’t count toward the trigger.

    3. marym

      The term isn’t unique to this bill. It may be a factor in other aspects of law, but in references to Title 8 immigration law it has to do with whether someone (other than unaccompanied children) attempting to enter illegally is detained (non-contiguous) or can be returned to their country of origin (contiguous). For unaccompanied children there’s controversy over something called “Section 235 of the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act” according to which children from contiguous countries can be returned to their home country and those from non-contiguous countries are turned over to HHS’s Office of Refugee Resettlement.

      https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43599
      https://uscode.house.gov/view.xhtml?req=granuleid:USC-prelim-title8-section1225&num=0&edition=prelim

      1. Enter Laughing

        Thanks for the explanation.

        If I’m understanding it, are you saying that immigrants attempting to enter illegally who are not from a contiguous country will be detained but will not be counted toward to the 5,000 daily average?

        Sorry for being extra dense today but even a brief brush with this border bill language has me confused.

        1. marym

          As far as I’ve read (media, not the bill) unaccompanied children from non-contiguous countries won’t be counted toward the 5,000 encounters.

          Encounters are people attempting to enter through ports of entry or illegally elsewhere. The number includes apprehensions and expulsions. Encounters aren’t necessarily unique individuals, since people who are expelled try multiple times. Apprehension may mean only temporary detention for people considered eligible for an asylum hearing.

    4. Revenant

      The charitable interpretation is that direct alien arrivals in the US not via MZ or CA are not to be counted. So, legal travellers into ports and Cuban boat people….

  21. Jabura Basaidai

    “Community leaders call on The Wall Street Journal to retract controversial opinion piece about Dearborn”
    and not a peep from Rep Dingell – she was the Rep from the district including Dearborn until redistricting – she’s a shill coasting on her husband’s legacy – she was a registered Repuke until ’81 – has refused to discuss Line 5 under the Straits of Mackinac –

    1. Alice X

      I cornered her one time and bent her ear on H.R. 676, she did put up a similar bill, but like the original, it will sit on the shelf forever.

      She is quite a disappointment. But I have a story on her old guy, who was a disappointment in his own right.

      1. Jabura Basaidai

        oh yeah, John Jr was a true apex political critter which is why he lasted so long – his dad was a peach too who supported locking up Japanese Americans – but Jr did reject NAFTA – HR 676 or anything even close to resembling it will never pass the uniparty controlled by the oligarchs – the Dingells are a legacy trading on the past to corrupt the future as well as the present –

  22. Roger Blakely

    Rampant COVID Poses New Challenges in the Fifth Year of the Pandemic Scientific American

    Maria Van Kerkhove, now interim director of the WHO’s Department of Epidemic and Pandemic Preparedness and Prevention, says, “The virus is rampant. We’re still in a pandemic.”

    “So we feel there’s a lot more work to do, in the context of everything else—[we no longer have a] COVID lens only, of course, but using masks for respiratory pathogens that transmit through the air is a no-brainer—plus vaccination, plus distancing, plus improving ventilation.”

  23. The Rev Kev

    “The Price of Abolishing Sweden’s Two Hundred Years of Neutrality”

    Two centuries of neutrality chucked in the bin. And they weren’t the only neutral countries to do so. Austria did it too and Switzerland went so hard against Russia that Russia now says that they are an enemy country. Recently Switzerland suggested a peace conference be held there as they have a long history of holding such conferences but the Russians told them to forget it. Finland threw away their neutrality and they are now set on fortifying their border with Russia and spending big time on military gear. There has to be a point after this war is over where the people in those country wonder what exactly they got in exchange for dumping decades, if not centuries, of neutrality and if it was worth it at all.

    1. zagonostra

      There has to be a point after this war is over where the people in those country wonder what exactly they got in exchange for dumping decades, if not centuries, of neutrality and if it was worth it at all.

      No, the “people” don’t make decision like this. A careful reading of H.J. Mackinder demonstrates that certain geopolitical processes/events/dynamics are determined far far from any kind of exchange that redounds to the benefit of the people.

      Also take a quick view of the map in Guido Preparata’s book “Conjuring Hitler” page 11 in the introduction, you will see exactly where Finland fits, you can find it in the free preview on Amazon.

      https://ndisc.nd.edu/assets/422105/mackinder_1904_heartland_article_17_pages.pdf

    2. digi_owl

      Most of that fortification will likely involve inviting USMC to set up camps, same as Norway has been doing in recent years (and was mentioned the other day in a tweet).

      1. Polar Socialist

        Finland is not yet planning to fortify the border. There has been a few comments suggesting it, but not by anybody that matters and the actual experts have so far shot the idea down immediately – there’s no need nor resources for it. There has been news that Finnish defense forces have made deals with certain land owners in Eastern Finland allowing the army to start construction on a very short notice, though.

        Ever since the Partnership for Peace brought the USMC to the Finnish forests (~80% of the country), in the public eye they have mostly been a source of amusement, especially in the winter. Finns seem to be relying – dumb as it is – on the US nuclear arsenal not the infantry or marines.

  24. Vicky Cookies

    Re: article on game theory vis a vis short-termism:

    I am baffled at the ignorance of the ideologically blind sociopaths in business. Were these people never children? What kind of psychological profile is required to see the world in this way, such that only upon the calculations of game theorists does one conclude that exercising maximal power for short-term gain is socially unhealthy?

    1. .Tom

      I am not at all baffled by it. I’ve seen how it works and basically these hierarchies select for the most psychopathic. Most people in the population have a conscience or moral compass that would make it very hard for them to do the top jobs in big firms. To get those jobs you have to be not just able to do them, i.e. psychopath, but eager.

      1. Vicky Cookies

        We might imagine society currently constituted as a tree, structured in such a manner that selfish right-wingers are evolutionarily advantaged to climb it. I haven’t personally seen this selection for pyschopathic tendencies up close, which might be the reason for my thunderstruck reaction. I simply have a hard time accepting that the author actually wrote this piece with a serious mind, it apparently never occurring to her that what she was describing are self-evident realities for members of a social species. I assumed that the business-jerks knew these things, but, not unlike smokers who know the habit is unhealthy, did not prioritize the knowledge when acting.

        1. CanCyn

          I disagree that the PMC sociopaths are ‘selfish right wingers’… most of the sociopathic administrators I encountered during my working life considered themselves liberal. I saw most of them as quite horrible people concerned only for themselves and their position on the ladder. Now living in a rural area where there are many conservative/libertarian types. They have no time for government or official organizations but they are friendly, generous and helpful people – most unlike most of the PMCers from my working days.

          1. .Tom

            I go along with selfish but I don’t think they are especially right-wing. Most that I met weren’t very interested in politics.

  25. .Tom

    Is reading Links every morning equivalent in my life to of doomscrolling? I wonder if I have developed a habit — that I look forwards every day to seeing, with my morning tea, all the ways that everything is terrible.

    1. Mikel

      A bonus:

      Dogs reaction to seeing owner first time after three years
      pic.twitter.com/2HYCvzKYn3

      — Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) February 5, 2024

  27. Mikel

    Who else wishes that in Nov. the entire USA had the “none of the above” option on the ballot?
    I guess write-ins are one thing…but those would not get as much mass attention.

  29. Feral Finster

    “Israel’s claims against UNRWA are falling apart, but UNRWA remains defunded.”

    The facts were never the point. If Israel had not made the allegations it made, then different allegations would be ginned up. The allegations were but a pretext, and the intent was to punish UNRWA for the ICJ ruling.

  30. Mikel

    “Worried about grocery prices? The U.S. wastes 40% of the food it produces. In Canada in 2019, it was nearly 60%.” Douglad Lamont

    Waste management (or lack of) rears its head again. Better food waste management would be a more immediate way to address any scarcity and without unknown health risks, more so than all the lab tinkering with food.

    1. CA

      https://www.rts.com/resources/guides/food-waste-america/

      2024

      How much food is wasted in America?

      Just how much food do Americans waste? Here’s some “food” for thought: While the world wastes about 2.5 billion tons of food every year, the United States discards more food than any other country in the world: nearly 60 million tons — 120 billion pounds — every year. That’s estimated to be almost 40 percent of the entire US food supply, and equates to 325 pounds of waste per person. That’s like every person in America throwing 975 average sized apples right into the garbage — or rather right into landfills, as most discarded food ends up there. In fact, food is the single largest component taking up space inside US landfills, making up 22 percent of municipal solid waste (MSW). All told, the amount of food wasted in America has an approximate value of nearly $218 billion – the equivalent of 130 billion meals.

    3. Ranger Rick

      The bizarre thing is how individual people are being blamed for this waste. There are some extremely vivid paragraphs in Grapes of Wrath depicting food being destroyed at industrial scale that will stick with me for the rest of my life:

      “The works of the roots of the vines, of the trees, must be destroyed to keep up the price, and this is the saddest, bitterest thing of all. Carloads of oranges dumped on the ground. The people came for miles to take the fruit, but this could not be. How would they buy oranges at twenty cents a dozen if they could drive out and pick them up? And men with hoses squirt kerosene on the oranges, and they are angry at the crime, angry at the people who have come to take the fruit. A million people hungry, needing the fruit- and kerosene sprayed over the golden mountains. And the smell of rot fills the country. Burn coffee for fuel in the ships. Burn corn to keep warm, it makes a hot fire. Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out. Slaughter the pigs and bury them, and let the putrescence drip down into the earth.

      There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure here that topples all our success. The fertile earth, the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificate- died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot. The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quick-lime, watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage.”

      2. Mikel

        “…Dump potatoes in the rivers and place guards along the banks to keep the hungry people from fishing them out…”

        Hits hard.

        Now we can add: they will try to sell a genetically modified potato instead.

        1. CA

          “Now we can add: they will try to sell a genetically modified potato instead.”

          There has been an especially important advance in potato growing that has been almost unnoticed in America. Chinese agriculturalists have grown potatoes that breed through seeds rather than tubers. Tuber growth resists crop improvement, while seed growth allows for natural crop improvement.

        2. CA

          https://news.cgtn.com/news/2021-06-25/Chinese-scientists-reinvent-potatoes-to-solve-global-food-crisis-11nmIctElUc/index.html

          June 25, 2021

          Chinese scientists ‘reinvent’ potatoes to solve global food crisis

          Chinese scientists have developed a generation of “pure and fertile potato lines” with genome editing technologies in a groundbreaking achievement.

          The experiment, led by Huang Sanwen, a researcher with the Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen (AGIS) under the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS), used genome design to transform potato breeding from a slow, non-accumulative mode into a fast-iterative one.

          Their study, * titled “Genome design of hybrid potato,” was published online in one of the world’s leading academic journals, Cell…

          * https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(21)00707-8

        3. CA

          https://news.cgtn.com/news/2022-06-12/Chinese-scientists-major-discovery-on-potato-genome-sequence-Nature-1aNGQLd1nQA/index.html

          June 12, 2022

          Chinese scientists’ major discovery on potato genome sequence: Nature

          Chinese scientists have mapped out high-quality genome sequences for 44 wild and cultivated potatoes and found a pivotal gene that makes potatoes the world’s most important non-cereal food crop.

          An international team led by Chinese researchers examined, among the genome sequences, 732 genes that are predominantly expressed in the stolon or tuber, and identified a transcription factor that allows the potato to grow tubers, according to the study * published in the journal Nature.

          The findings suggest that the recruitment of this gene may coincide with the emergence of tuber-bearing traits in the divergence of tomato and potato lineages.

          The tuber, a storage and reproductive organ that confers a distinct survival advantage to potato, is the very part that makes potatoes edible….

          * https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04822-x

  31. Jabura Basaidai

    started reading “How China Banned Soros in 1989” and hit a big HUH?? at the start of the third paragraph –
    “Yet despite the fact that actual British-directed deep state structures that oversaw the murder of so many presidents, including the recent coup in the USA itself in 2020….” – waddafug are they writing about?
    if recall correctly there have been other dubious claims on this website – stopped reading after that sentence –

    1. Sub-Boreal

      If you drill down to that site’s “Mission”, and scroll to the bottom, you’ll reach this Disclaimer: “The views expressed in the Canadian Patriot Review are inspired by the philosophy and strategic outlook of Lyndon LaRouche.”

  32. DeAndre Thomas Esq

    Re the crime ridden shithole Oakland is becoming. Massive housing projects and a Open Soros district attorney, what could go wrong?

    Origins of the recent exacerbation of the problem.

    p.s. 1 in 30 Oakland residents suffered car theft?

    How many people are too young to drive, or do not own cars there?

    Real number is X?

    In Alameda County, the Soros-backed California Justice & Public Safety PAC as of Thursday had spent more than $550,000 in support of Pamela Price, a longtime civil rights attorney attempting to unseat District Attorney Nancy O’Malley. Money has gone toward digital advertising and campaign mailers, according to campaign finance records.

    https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/05/28/liberal-billionaire-george-soros-spending-big-money-in-local-district-attorney-races/

    If a “history of redlining and intergenerational trauma” is the cause of this crime, as shreik the white liberals, many of whom are moving out of the Bay Area, to then lecture the locals where they move about gun control, then why are Nigerian, Jamaican, Hmong, Vietnamese and Lao immigrant families so successful in small business formation and educational achievements?

    1. Glenda

      Here is some current info about Pamela Price. What you are using is from 2018, but she was voted in as DA last year.

      She has been cleaning house in Oakland where there is rampant police violence and racial profiling. She has huge support from the POC community and low income folks who get lots of abuse from police. The Oakland PD has been in receivership due to its many cases of police corruption.

      OAKLAND — One out of every three dollars given last year to the recall campaigns targeting Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price came from a single Bay Area hedge fund partner who also gave money to help oust San Francisco’s top prosecutor in 2022, campaign finance records filed this week show.

      More about her.
      https://ballotpedia.org/Pamela_Price_(California)#Campaign_themes

    2. David in Friday Harbor

      I weep for Oakland.

      I wasn’t just born to immigrants to Oakland, my birth was celebrated above the fold in the Oakland Tribune back when Ike was president and Earl Warren was Chief Justice of the United States. Warren lived within spitting distance of Lake Merritt in The City Beautiful, and his children walked to school in Oakland. One of my cronies is quite likely the person at Bishop O’Dowd High School who coined the term “hella” which will always be associated with Oakland. I care about Oakland, and I’m ashamed that so many have abandoned The City Beautiful to criminals and to despair.

      But this decline began after World War 2, when white and Asian residents fled to the suburbs after GM and Ford closed their assembly plants and the promise made to those who took part in the Great Migration was slowly broken. Crime in Oakland is nothing new. I can remember the Panthers; I can remember the Symbionese Liberation Army; I can remember the Swingin’ A’s. It’s sad, because so many wonderful people still live there.

      1. JBird4049

        Ever since Southerners leaving the military after the Second World War joined the Oakland police, there has been serious, ongoing violence usually against Blacks, but not exclusively. That police department has been a mess for decades. One can always read about the Night Riders. Add the flight of much of the industry of any kind leaving Oakland at the same time it left the rest of the Bay Area. Then add the increasing levels of corruption of both of city government and police. And it looks like the perpetual triple digit murder levels of the 1990s are back at the same time as Covid.

        However, this is a story that has been repeated throughout California including Los Angeles. The Los Angeles Sheriffs Department needs to be fired, burnt to the ground, have the ashes salted, sprinkled with holy water, and dumped into the ocean. The local government as well.

        1. David in Friday Harbor

          OPD, LAPD, LASD, Salinas PD — policing in California has always operated as an occupation authority on behalf of the last wave of migrants against the next wave of migrants.

          Following the police example, each new wave of migrants turns the previous wave’s garden suburb into the next’s killing field as the Gold Rush/Hollywood/Silicon Valley California Dream reveals itself to be nothing but a Nixonian/Manson Family exclusionary delusion.

  33. Katniss Everdeen

    RE: Raheem tweet of biden video

    After such an abysmal performance, anyone who considers this man “qualified” to be “president” should immediately have their right to “vote” suspended indefinitely, and the entire dnc and its financial enablers should be placed on the terrorist watchlist for even suggesting him as a legitimate presidential “candidate.”

    No country can survive this level of deliberate, sustained malfeasance, and this country will be no exception.

    This can no longer be considered a punchline.

    1. katiebird

      He should be forced to withdraw from the race. I can’t imagine him being allowed to continue in any election of the previous century. I’m not even sure he should be allowed to continue in office. But keeping him in the primaries? Lunacy.

      1. Katniss Everdeen

        If “primaries” is what you want to call keeping everyone else off the ballot, or simply declaring him the “winner” without a single “vote” being cast, as the private corporation known as the dnc has done in Florida.

        That these machinations are employed by the “party” ever so fiercely protecting “our democracy” is mind fuckery at the highest level.

        The question of why “they” are so desperate for this “candidacy” is increasingly (at warp speed) alarming, at least to my battered brain.

    2. Screwball

      The excuses his base makes for his condition is off the charts. For example (as I was told);

      I think a growing issue with Biden in a public speaking settings is that his brain is still faster than his mouth can go anymore, and the result is bad elocution. He needs the discipline to speak slower but that seem unlikely to appear at this point.

      from a retired guy who teaches at U of Michigan.

      Others think he should “slay the dragon” by having a debate with Trump. OK. Yea, please do. Bet they won’t let that happen. If you even question his mental order, they lose it. How dare you, you ARE NOT a doctor, yadda, yadda, yadda.

      Yet they call Trump dementia Don. These people have lost their minds. They could at least blame Trump for that. Dummy me, that would take some self reflection in which they have none.

      1. Katniss Everdeen

        There will be a “debate” between Trump and biden–or biden and anybody–when hell freezes over.

        It really is that simple.

  35. sleeplessintokyo

    things have gotten so crazy that one almost imagines we are intentionally being led to take the side of China and Russia here. They make more sense every day.

    2. Jabura Basaidai

      i was hitting a warning page but if willing to take the risk it let me move on –
      if you can’t, try nitter.cz

    3. Procopius

      Nitter.net’s security certificate has expired. I’m surprised your Firefox browser didn’t tell you that. I don’t know why it doesn’t allow you to “I understand the risks and want to view the page” like it used to.
      Thanks, Jabura, I’ll try that.

  37. sleeplessintokyo

    ““It will have a chilling effect on the government … especially for the CDC,” said Dorit Reiss, a professor at UC Law San Francisco. “Because the line is fuzzy and because they don’t want to be accused of coercion, they’re not going to be sure when they can talk to social media.”
    This is the same CDC where half of the workers retire to go to work for Big Pharma.

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