Yellowstone National Park’s oldest wolf gave birth to 3 pups this spring Scripps (Furzy Mouse)
Governors and Heads of Supervision reiterate commitment to Basel III implementation and provide update on cryptoasset standard Bank of International Settlements
Financial capital is not scarce, so why do we pay so much for it? Funding the Future
Novel Evidence of Macroeconomic Regime Change Policy Tensor. “Tight labor markets.” But why? ‘Tis a mystery!
The Global Loss of the U-Shaped Curve of Happiness After Babel
Climate
Have feedbacks taken over? Arctic News
How does the Southern Annular Mode control surface melt in East Antarctica? Securing Antarctic’s Environmental Future
La Niña switch expected to fuel extreme weather later this year FT
* * * Future energy demand does not need new fossil fuels, study says FT
Unity co-founder David Helgason’s next act: Gaming the climate crisis TechCrunch
Why a tool to tackle climate change is struggling for cash BBC
Don’t cut them down: Letting dead trees rot can help make new life National Geographic
Water
Burst pipes in Atlanta leads to water outages, boil water notices The Hill
Syndemics
It wasn’t just rats. Body lice may have helped spread bubonic plague. WaPo. Know Your Plagues!™
Why The Biggest Threat from Bird Flu is Neoliberal Propaganda Jessica Wildfire, OK Doomer
* * * Now, Portugal:
In Portugal covid deaths are approaching January levels. In June. Total disaster. Total silence. https://t.co/Xoln3fA0lW
— Nate Bear (@NateB_Panic) June 3, 2024
For a pandemic that’s so over, Covid certainly seems to be not over at all.
‘Tis a mystery:
Doctors say they are seeing an alarming number of seemingly healthy younger patients having heart attacks. Now doctors at Mount Sinai are tracking patients to see if they can uncover the new risk factors behind the trend. @annenbcnews reports. pic.twitter.com/DrPZuMMOXR
— TODAY (@TODAYshow) May 30, 2024
* * * NPR means “Lebensunwertes Leben” but saying that out loud would be crude:
Military Pilots Reported 1,700% More Medical Incidents During the Pandemic. The Pentagon Says They Just Had COVID Military.com
* * * NIH documents show how $1.6 billion long Covid initiative has failed so far to meet its goals STAT. Or not.
China?
China probe successfully lands on far side of Moon Agence France Presse
What Produced the China Miracle? Foreign Policy. Concrete material benefits…
Has a ‘Thucydides’ Trap’ been set? Political scientist Graham Allison gauges risks that could send US-China tensions into armed conflict South China Morning Post
Russia-China gas pipeline deal stalls over Beijing’s price demands FT
Malaysia’s chip industry falls in crosshairs of US sanctions on Russia Al Jazeera
Heavy metal hijabi band Voice Of Baceprot on playing at this year’s Glastonbury Festival Channel News Asia
Syraqistan
Israel has accepted most of the broad outlines of Biden’s proposal on Gaza cease-fire: Local media Anadolu Agency
US expects Israel will accept Gaza ceasefire plan if Hamas does BBC
‘We will not accept the rule of Hamas in Gaza at any stage’: Israel Al Jazeera. The idea seems to be that war aims can be achieved by mere intransigence, and not on the ground. Israel isn’t the only country suffering from this delusion.
* * * What happens when the Houthis stop shooting Splash 247
* * * Why Did America Stumble Into a Trap in Iraq? Foreign Policy. “[F]rom the end of the Cold War, U.S. policymakers proved unable to define national interests and set global priorities, with the result being that there was no way to articulate why one region or country merited more attention than any other.” Rewriting history on the Grand Scale; see Sachs’s interview with Tucker Carlson on the neo-cons (or one of their key pre-Iraq efforts, the Project for a New American Century, which “define[d] national interests and set global priorities” with great clarity and effectiveness, and put Iraq squarely in the crosshairs). “Know your enemy and know yourself.” We seem to be astonishingly bad at both.
* * * US State Department official resigns, says US report on Gaza inaccurate Reuters
European Disunion
The German climate movement is falling apart over Palestine The New Arab
Dear Old Blighty
Why Labour staffers and MPs don’t say no to ‘power behind the throne’ Sue Gray Guardian (Colonel Smithers). She seems nice.
New Not-So-Cold War
German Defence Minister explains decision to allow Ukraine strike Russia with German weapons Ukrainska Pravda. Commentary:
Germany has been completely pacified since 1945. France are the only country in Europe that has the potential to become a military power.
— William (@WilliamMcHorse) June 1, 2024
Spreadsheet thinking…
China, Saudi Arabia to to stay away from Ukraine peace summit BNE Intellinews
Zelenskiy accuses China of deterring countries from going to peace summit Guardian. Somebody call a wh-a-a-a-m-bulance….
Zelenskyy to go to Philippines after Singapore Ukrainska Pravda
Global Elections
India’s Modi eyes election victory, top opponent back behind bars Channel News Asia
Trump is now a convicted felon. Here’s what that could mean for his rights ABC. Among the consequences of Trump being in New York’s criminal justice system would be a complete physical and mental examination, among other things; see Water Cooler here.
Johnson in Trump verdict aftermath: ‘I do believe the Supreme Court should step in’ Politico
Commodities, shipping in focus in watershed South African election S&P Global
South of the Border
Choice of next Mexico president almost certain; her energy policy, not so much S&P Global
How Claudia Sheinbaum Could Change Mexico The New Republic
Supply Chain
Singapore is new chokepoint in global supply chains Seatrade Maritime
Customs brokers under scrutiny as US CBP confirms ecommerce crackdown The Loadstar
Digital Watch
Researchers crash Baidu robo-cars with tinfoil and paint daubed on cardboard The Register. The deck: “The fusion of Lidar, radar, and cameras can be fooled by stuff from your kids’ craft box.”
Healthcare
Hospitals are killing patients because they don’t feel like doing infection control The Guantlet
The Insulin Empire The Baffler
Zeitgeist Watch
Doctor Who, the Traveling Time Lord JSTOR. Smooth sailing now that Disney is involved.
Groves of Academe
The University of the Arts is closing June 7, its president says The Inquirer
Boeing
Emirates president asks Boeing for compensation over 777x delays Arab News
How Emirates’ President Believes Boeing Can Fix Its Production Issues Simple Flying
The Final Frontier
Artemis Accords: What are they & which countries are involved? Space.com
Housing
Hell Is an Underwater Landlord Maureen Tkacik, The American Prospect
Why N.Y.C. Hotel Rooms Are So Expensive Right Now NYT. Why not now:
There was a point in American history where you could buy a house as a kit from a catalog and put it together yourself. Literally thousands and thousands of families did it this way. Can’t imagine dudes doing this now. pic.twitter.com/faIJ4RPPoR
— holly (@girlziplocked) June 1, 2024
The Supreme Court case that could impact the homeless coast-to-coast CBS
Guillotine Watch
The Dark Stain on Tesla’s Directors Lawrence’s Substack. Elon’s package.
Class Warfare
Boeing, firefighters settle contract, ending lockout Leeham News and Analysis
Violent doodles made by children 2,000 years ago raise eyebrows FOX
Why Did Primates Evolve Big Brains? It Might Not Be The Reason You Think Science Alert
Antidote du jour (H. Zel):
Go for that yacht, buddy!
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
219 comments
Comments are closed.
JOSEPH BIDEN’S BAND
(melody borrowed from McNamara’s Band as performed by Bing Crosby and The Jesters)
O, me name is Joseph Biden, I’m the front man for a band
A band of crazy neocons completely out of hand
We look around this world and know we’re meant to rule it all
My train of thought is shot so that’s as much as I recall
O, when-we-harangue-all-the-sturm-und-drang is for leading folks astray
To keep the public on our side across the USA
The DNC-promised-me-I’ll-be-their-nominee corporate cash in hand
My opponent at the moment’s busy damaging his brand
O, I sleep in the Oval office or I play at solitaire
I’m often on vacation at my house in Delaware
I’m 83 this fall so I need lots of helping hands
My neocon appointees help me sign off on their plans
O, when-their-plan-fails-or-runs-off-of-the-rails or it simply melts away
We blame it on the Russkies and we get on with our day
That pipeline-that-used-to-be-under-the-Baltic-Sea that’s our sleight of hand
And now we’re planting soldiers in the Finnish hinterland
O, I can’t abide the folks who do not like the things I’ve done
They shout right out at rallies and it ruins all the fun
Israelis need our bombs to build a perfect Promised Land
And we need lots of laborers to wade the Rio Grande
O, the-war-in-Ukraine-is-completely-insane we sent all our best machines
And loads of NATO soldiers to run things behind the scenes
But every day those Russians take some more of Ukraine’s land
Who knows how far toward the west that Russia will expand?
O, the-bomb-goes-BOOM-there’s-a-big-mushroom and then Moscow goes away
I reckon-the-sitrep-means-we-gotta-be-prepped if Putin wants to play
A nuclear-war-pleases-me-to-the-core here’s the football close at hand
You can count on Joseph Biden to push buttons on demand
I’m Joseph Biden!
Bravo, brought Dr. Strangelove to mind…I mentioned the subtitle How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb in a conversation the other day and the allusion was completely lost on my interlocutor.
Guilty of initially skipping by your work (again) because I need to shout at somebody like now. Bloody brilliant as usual, thanks.
“The Global Loss of the U-Shaped Curve of Happiness”
Well that’s what happens when your complete, entire society goes pear-shaped. The article goes into fine detail, about what is happening but into not why. Let me spell it out. Kids of my generation could expect to have a good working life, overseas holidays, achieve a good education without long-term debt, get married and have children, get a mortgage on a house and pay it off, have hobbies and interests and look forward to a comfortable retirement. So I ask you. For the kids of this generation, how much of that is that true anymore?
You will have nothing and you will not be happy. People need to stop partaking in the voting pantomime to delegitimize it. Voting is a hate crime.
“The Supreme Court case that could impact the homeless coast-to-coast”
The article reports that an inadequate number of shelter beds is available for the homeless in Boise, as is the case in cities across the country. No discussion about building more shelters, or god forbid, more affordable housing. No, the hope among TPTB is that SCOTUS will rule to criminalize homelessness. Let them be “housed” in prison if possible. Problem solved.
Perhaps a “for-profit” prison, you know, a “public/private partnership”? All good then. As long as they’re not smelling up the “free speech zone”.
My sarcasm is permanently on.
“My sarcasm is permanently on.”
Thanks for that admission, mrsyk. I thought I was the only one embedded in The Onion.
Those “for-profit” prisons built and run by “public/private partnerships” are going to need enormous help from government funding which will no doubt be forthcoming in an amazing groundbreaking bipartisan bill.
My bitterness is permanently on.
I was going to add a “my tax dollars” quip as well, but I’m feeling lazy. You are, of course, correct. Gotta get outside and let the garden work its magic on this burning anger in my chest.
You triggered me Lena. COVID$$ are being used for jail expansion in Podunk AR. Iowa City filed suit over this. Department Treasury doesn’t give a rat! I’m shocked.
I’m sure these two are not unique. Its a construction / govt / judges cartel and we’re all in it. (Sorry for no links).
Recently somebody mention in comments the “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine” episode called “Past Tense” where it was shown in the 2020s, major cities in the US had a “Sanctuary District”, a walled-off ghetto that was used to contain the poor, the sick, the mentally disabled, and anyone else who cannot support themselves. Maybe New York could use Manhattan island as there would be no escape from there. Sounds like a plan. /sarc
Yeah that was me. And the episode took place in 2024, which is why it’s on my mind these days, especially because of this Supreme Court case.
There was already a movie about something like that that came out in ’81:
“In a dystopian 1988, amidst war against an alliance of China and the Soviet Union, Manhattan has been converted into a maximum security prison to address a 400% increase in crime. The island is walled off from the outside world and under heavy police surveillance.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escape_from_New_York
The movie also featured a jet plane crashing into the World Trade Center, disproving many government official’s claims that no one could’ve predicted such an event before 9/11.
Just before 9/11 there was an episode of “The Lone Gunmen” – a spin off from the “X Files” – in which the guys stopped a government plot to fly an airliner into the Twin Towers ‘ and blame the act on terrorists to gain support for a new profit-making war.’ The wanna believe that that episode was deep-sixed-
https://the-lone-gunmen.fandom.com/wiki/Pre_9/11_controversy
But $60 Billion for the “nationalists” (ergo Nazi’s) in Ukraine. The money for better living conditions is avalable—the will is not there!
I love the orca. Such a magnificent animal. I also think it would be enjoyable to be one, so long as you could keep a distance from humans.
I was thinking about keeping my distance from them, but yeah, they’d do well keep us at arm’s length.
You’ve probably seen this before: video showing an orca (“Sophia”) eliminating the threat of a great white shark. One quibble about National Geographic’s narration, it describes Sophia’s strike as “so powerful, it shattered the shark’s ribs“. If I remember my marine biology, sharks’ cartilaginous skeletons lack the rib cage of their bony relatives. Nevertheless, the orca’s power is pretty impressive.
Gets me thinking about a clip were an orca is hunting seals in the surf.
Once a seal got caught, it was tossed around like a wet rag for minutes before getting eaten. Orcas can be really cruel when they want to.
Still beter than what otters do to baby seals.
Re kit homes. They are still popular in Scandinavia.
That tweet was talking about kit homes from perhaps the 1940s or 1950s and insulting modern “dudes” in a cheap shot. Of course unmentioned is the fact that so many guys in America these days are working two or three jobs just trying to tread water and not end up on the streets. Those guys back in the 40s could get by on only one job so had the time in the evenings, weekends and holidays in building their kit home with the help of some buddies and/or family and a coupla bottles of beer. More typical was places like Levittown where you had professional crews building house after house like an aircraft factory thus-
‘To build houses rapidly and inexpensively, Levitt used the method made famous by Henry Ford: the production line. Levitt broke down the construction of a home into 26 separate steps. Teams of construction workers leveled the land, paved streets, poured concrete slabs, planted trees every 28 feet, and installed plumbing and electrical wiring. A hundred houses were built at a time. Construction was governed by clockwork. By 8 a.m., trucks unloaded prefabricated siding at each house site; at 9:30 a.m., toilets arrived; at 10 a.m., sinks, tubs and Sheetrock were delivered; at 11 a.m., flooring was sent. To speed construction and trim costs, painters used spray guns instead of brushes, and carpenters used power saws. Interior partitions, roof trusses, and door and window units were cut to the required shape before they left the factory.’
https://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/disp_textbook.cfm?smtid=2&psid=3427
Buster Keaton, One Week. A 20 minute silent film about newlyweds and a kit home from Sears.
Many of those men building Sears houses in the 1950’s were recently returned WWII vets like my father. At a young age, he learned to build just about anything from his father, a union factory worker and WWI vet. My dad also built the furniture my newlywed parents had in their first home. Carpentry was not his profession (he had another fulltime job and was going to college) but it was a skill he had. I doubt my older brother could have built a house or even a chair in the 1970’s when he came of age but he could play a mean air guitar.
As I understand it, many of the techniques were in fact products of WW2 development: building military facilities of all types at faraway places using prefabricated materials became huge during WW2 (eg quonset huts) and the practice becoming civilianized was, I suppose, inevitable. Many of the returning vets would at least have had contact with these and saw how prefabricated buildings and facilities were being put together while in service, at least.
Even those working in war industries at home must have watched as those factories were erected using prefabricated parts and assembled on site.
Fair point. There was a whole liberty ship put together in like 4 days from beginning to the launch from prefabricated parts, as a demonstration of what could be done. I imagine this was common everywhere in US during World War 2.
Liberty ships proved that ships could be built using welding, resulting in a still ongoing revolution in the industry worldwide.
Watch the same play out today, as PALS grids become more and more common on civilian backpacks etc.
Frankly much of modern life is thanks to wartime blank checks, and industry needing to find new markets for their output capacity come peacetime.
Heck, how marketing came to be via Bernays’ Public Relations thing after WW1.
My father was also a WWII vet and while he never built a kit house, he loved to tinker with all sorts of projects. He built a color TV he bought as a kit from Radio Shack; he built his own darkroom; he built his own stereo speakers.
He took on bigger projects later in life, building three 26-30 foot sailboats by himself and sailing them on the Great Lakes. He took us kids on epic (to us) journeys from Lake St. Clair in Detroit up to Thunder Bay in Canada – about a 500-mile round trip.
After spending several years in the Pacific during WWII, he had no qualms about taking on challenges of a tamer sort back home.
Looks so much like my house. Makes me happy to read about it.
Our home was a kit house.
Our elderly neighbor explained that it was delivered by train, unloaded on the other side of the lake in dead of winter, and hauled across the frozen lake on pallets to its present location in 1934.
Originally about 800 sq. ft. Tiny houses are not a new thing.
Almost all Douglas fir, so naturally resistant to bugs and rot.
Since the house was executed in so light a manor, our additions have involved removal of a lot of nice vintage lumber which I’ve repurposed and/or hoarded.
Roof sheathing for instance was mostly completely clear-grained 1×12 or 14 Douglas fir, beautiful stuff that I’d never be able to find these days.
Tiny houses were the norm until the introduction of indoor plumbing, best i can tell. You had maybe two rooms often, removing some of the smell etc from the kitchen. People would sleep wherever basically, as long as it provided a flat surface.
Not that many spent their days indoors unless it was in the arctic and winter. Fields needed tending etc.
I found that tweet gratuitously offensive.
They are still available in the US:
PMHI prefab kits
I could probably do this with another set of hands helping me. I would probably need help navigating how to get the permits/water/electrical hookups however.
One start to wonder when someone will come up with a system of modules based on shipping container measurements. That can be deployed either in a free standing stack to create a house, or piled into a larger framework (similar to a parking garage) to create an apartment building.
There are, literally, container homes available for sale on Amazon. I imagine there may already be stackable versions out there.
Ah yes, found a video of a dudebro and friends unpacking one of those (and filling it with other stuff from Amazon). Looked more like a hard plastic camper than a house once unfolded. Was funny watching them temporarily fold back a wall to get the sofa in though, way easier than wrangling it down the hallway.
Wikipedia states Sears kit homes were sold in the U.S. from 1908 to 1942.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sears_Modern_Homes
After WWII, Sears started selling Homart Homes. That’s the type of home advertised in the tweet.
I went back to visit my childhood Sears home about a decade ago. The family who lives there had remodeled and added on so the house was barely recognizable. The only room they hadn’t altered was my old bedroom. Since I was the youngest, I had the smallest bedroom. Going back to see it, I couldn’t believe how tiny my bedroom was – like a closet (that’s what the current family was using it for). My room was just big enough for my crib, then later a ‘youth bed’ (shorter than a twin) and a chifforobe. It had never seemed small to me. I lived there for 10 years.
All mail order shopping (especially houses) enabled Blacks & refugees a way past monetized segregation by Joe’s Dixiecrat klaven? Red-lined streetcar suburbs & sacrifice zones never developed churn, speculatiors noticed (until white-flight suburbanite kids gentrified blue-collar retirees out, as yuppies ate up bulldozed Black business districts during Reagan’s Miracle?
https://www.hayekcollege.com/hayekian/when-sears-used-market-combat-jim-crow
>>>>Why Did America Stumble Into a Trap in Iraq?
wowsers, why doesn’t “Foreign Policy” ask W Bush and Hillary Clinton? Amazing that the Establishment stenographers are acting like Iraq was an Act of God and that the same literal 500 people (or their proteges) haven’t been holding the levers of power since 1993.
This article was like the British historian who famously said ‘We seem, as it were, to have conquered and peopled half the world in a fit of absence of mind.’ Yeah, nah. Like the British Empire, the invasion of Iraq was part of a long-term plan by Washington elites-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVkjsjjtGlA (5:29 mins)
The Empire was a fitful thing, Rev.
– The Dominions were a very deliberate attempt to spread Albion’s seed, with a particular urgency after we let the Rebellious Colonies get away.
– British India was an accident, a commercial undertaking as the East India Company that got bailed out as the Raj in order to maintain great power status. The rest of the Mediterranean and Asian colonies existed to service and defend it or, in the case of China, secure its markets or, in the case of Malaya, defray its expenses with rubber and tin etc.
– The Scramble for Africa was late-stage Mission Civilatruce madness, egged on by cunning oligarchs in Rhodes, de Beers etc.
– the Rest were romantic obsessions like stamp collecting. The Falklands, for example, or the New Hebrides….
For people prone to absentmindedly acquiring more land, the British sure trafficked a lot of slaves and opium and destroyed a lot of native industries/livelihoods to finance the whole thing. Lots of very impressive heaps with pretty rhododendron filled gardens too.
But you see Putin called for peace and urged the US not to use force. He was clearly trying to trick Mother into voting for the war so it would embarrass her later. And do you want Putin to win?
The PNAC was
under-appreciatedmostly hidden from view at the time.FaustGeneral Wesley Clark may has well have had an Army Officer NDA but blurted out the neo-conjob plan, which was duly ignored by most media. There wasn’t much to benefit the Americans in that plan other than the waste of resources and some bodies. /s :(“Why Did America Stumble Into a Trap in Iraq?”
There was no stumbling:
https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/18/opinion/good-reasons-for-going-around-the-un.html
March 18, 2003
Good Reasons for Going Around the U.N.
By ANNE-MARIE SLAUGHTER
With the news that the United States was abandoning its efforts to get United Nations approval for a possible invasion of Iraq, yesterday looked to be a very bad day for staunch multilateralists and critics of American policy.
That view is understandable, but incomplete, even after President Bush’s speech last night made it clear that America would be going to war largely on its own. By giving up on the Security Council, the Bush administration has started on a course that could be called ”illegal but legitimate,” a course that could end up, paradoxically, winning United Nations approval for a military campaign in Iraq — though only after an invasion.
Anne-Marie Slaughter is dean of the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton.
“Why Did America Stumble Into a Trap in Iraq?”
There was no stumbling:
https://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/27/magazine/the-empire-slinks-back.html
April 27, 2003
The Empire Slinks Back
By NIALL FERGUSON
Let me come clean. I am a fully paid-up member of the neoimperialist gang. Two years ago — when it was not at all fashionable to say so — I was already arguing that it would be ”desirable for the United States to depose” tyrants like Saddam Hussein. ”Capitalism and democracy,” I wrote, ”are not naturally occurring, but require strong institutional foundations of law and order. The proper role of an imperial America is to establish these institutions where they are lacking, if necessary . . . by military force.” Today this argument is in danger of becoming commonplace.
Niall Ferguson is Herzog professor of financial history at the Stern School of Business, New York University, and a senior research fellow of Jesus College, Oxford.
And that guy is still a Neocon and hanging around international events as recently as last week.
You can find on a web search a graph of pentagon spending at least as far back as WW II.
The GWOT, Iraq in particular reversed the paltry peace dividend caused by the collapse of USSR.
Nwe have Kiev, after 20 years fighting GWOT to keep the pentagon green.
>China probe successfully lands on far side of Moon – Agence France Presse
The United States is also planning to put astronauts back on the Moon by 2026 with its Artemis 3 mission.
How’s it going with that, 2026 is pretty close…
China aims to send a crewed mission to the Moon by 2030 and plans to build a base on the lunar surface.
Lay your money down, make your bet, will the Van Allen belts zap China’s Taikonauts, will they find the American Flag still waving in the Moon’s vacuum?
That article also said this-
‘But Washington has warned that China’s space programme is being used to mask military objectives and an effort to establish dominance in space.’
Did the United States Space Force tell Washington this?
Well, they do use sea to hide submarines.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/sideswipe-june-28-china-using-sea-to-hide-submarines/EJWUM6ALX7LTRAQOC6LLHXAOPU/
I hear the Chinese also hide aeroplanes, by moving them rapidly to different locations. /s
Through the air, no less!
For an encore, they will show you how they hide millions of people in their ‘cities’.
This is what they were saying about the SOviets after 1950s… Soo much projection.
“Washington has warned that China’s space programme is being used to mask military objectives and an effort to establish dominance in space.”
Washington has been formally trying to undermine China’s entirely peaceful space program since passing the Wolf Amendment in April 2011. * The object has been to utterly contain China and undermine Chinese development.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_exclusion_policy_of_NASA
In April 2011, the 112th United States Congress banned NASA from engaging in bilateral agreements and coordination with China
https://english.news.cn/20240603/385ecd4bb7a448d9b9b6730ae6f919bb/c.html
June 3, 2024
Foreign scientists thank China for sharing lunar exploration opportunity
BEIJING — After China’s Chang’e-6 touched down on the far side of the moon Sunday morning to collect samples, foreign scientists participating in the mission expressed their excitement and thanks for taking their scientific instruments to the moon.
The Chang’e-6 mission carried four payloads developed through international cooperation, providing more opportunities for global scientists and merging human expertise in space exploration.
Scientific instruments from France, Italy and the European Space Agency (ESA)/Sweden are aboard the Chang’e-6 lander.
“Thank China so much for taking us to the moon,” Sylvestre Maurice, a French astronomer from the University of Toulouse, said after he watched the landing process in a control room at the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences on Sunday.
“Today’s landing is absolutely amazing. It’s hard to land on a planet, and it’s very hard especially on the moon. Don’t think it’s easy. Remember it’s on the far side of the moon where we cannot see. And China had even to put another relay satellite to watch the landing. They landed right where they wanted to. So it’s quite an achievement, something we’ve been looking for so many years,” said Maurice….
The current Chinese plan is to use multiple launches to assemble the mission in low earth orbit, much like the US intends to do around the moon. The usual dismissal I hear is that they’re reusing old Soviet mission concepts and are entirely focused on flags-and-footprints, which for what they intend to achieve is all they need.
Works better than the options from SpaceX or Boeing…
Given that the Soyuz capsule has been in reliable service since the 60s, i do not see reusing soviet plans as a knock.
Regarding the testimony about the small house built with from kit with seasoned lumber in the ad, it is still there and looks quite habitable at 1845 University Avenue, Dubuque, IA. I stayed in a similar structure in Norman, Oklahoma once. A lovely Craftsman house built-by-kit from Sears, Roebuck & Company that was used as a short-term rental in the year 2000. Imagine!
Most of my neighborhood growing up was Sears Roebucks, years of additions and renovations obscured this, but the only real problem was they were plopped down to align with the street without a sense of
water flow.
The “current” problem is the costs of replacements as mcmansion construction drives what is available.
From the first time i read about them, mcmansions has struck me as an attempt at replicating what you get when starting with something like a Sears home and then add extensions and wings as it passes from generation to generation. Basically trying to buy fake air of history.
Lots of both Sears and Aladdin kit homes in my area – browsing through the old catalogs makes me sad.
Nothing like the quality or variety today.
https://www.cmich.edu/research/clarke-historical-library/explore-collection/explore-online/michigan-material/alladin-company-bay-city/aladdin-catalogs#a3
Interesting story about Insulin. Of course given that American medicine is hugely about money then the pharma companies might well say “why not us?”
Not mentioned in the story is how the current obesity epidemic may contribute to their profits. For ordinary people to fight back the time to cope may be before you get sick.
>Why Did Primates Evolve Big Brains? It Might Not Be The Reason You Think Science Alert
A key assumption here is that species with larger brains are more intelligent
Strange/deceptive term, “larger brain,” is used throughout article. ChatGPT me that a whales by far have a larger brain, at an average 17lbs, whereas humans are on average a measly 3lbs.
Read an article sometime ago about some gene modifications that led to weaker masticator muscles in early hominids. Those muscles are anchore on the skull. Very strong muscles end up styflying potential brain growth by pressuring the skull. A weaker muscle removes that constraint and allows the skull to grow, allowing the brain to grow if needs be.
Fascinating!!
Astute observation. This from abstract of “Neuronal factors determining high intelligence”:
[emphasis added]
Probably I’m just shouting at the wall, but something is very rotten with this whole Biden “peace plan”. It looks like there is a lot of false reporting in the press – quelle surprise. That wouldn’t be deliberate, an attempt to get this off the front page just in time for the summer (Paris Olympics, Dem convention) now would it?
https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/netanyahu-says-there-are-gaps-between-israels-proposal-and-terms-presented-by-biden/
And, maybe I missed something, but while the proposal emphasizes, as stage one, a complete ceasefire and withdrawal of Israeli forces from ‘occupied’ areas of Gaza, it says nothing about allowing free-flow of food, water, medicines, fuel, into the area.
So, stop the shooting/bombing, but ‘non-violently’ strangle Gaza by blocking critical aid shipments? The ‘silent genocide?’
Correction, from the “populated” areas. And I should point out that anything reduced to rubble is not populated.
Thank you for the correction, Es s Ce Tera.
Look closer in. Hunter is just about to have his star turn and some counter-programming for distraction is just the ticket. Obama wants his glory as Mr. Middle East Peace Plan Dude and doesn’t need Joe to F up yet another thing. As if Joe could’ve put together anything coherent. Hah.
I noticed this morning that the CNN website ended their “live update” feed on the Gaza war … and nothing at all about the ME on the front page of “World” news.
The Israeli Ambassador to Canada was on The Roy Green show yesterday and clarified the proposal.
The proposal is based on Hamas laying down its arms.
https://globalnews.ca/national/program/the-roy-green-show
The Ambassador interview is 12 minutes long.
Yup. If, as Biden insists, the plan was “Israeli,” why is there any doubt that “Israel” might not accept it? Maybe because Israeli government itself contradicted Biden already? It seems to me that this is such an obvious con job that US may well lose Israel soon. If Israel goes the way of, say, the path Georgia seems to be on now, it would be amusing to see people wonder “who lost Israel?”
It seems to be getting worse, CNBC is reporting that Biden’s description of Israel’s cease fire proposal was “not accurate” and in fact Israel has not changed its conditions to reach a poermanent cease-fire. Hamas must be destroyed first.
To your point, it doesn’t make any sense that the proposal would have been generated in Israel, and yet at the same time they need to agree to it?
Negotiating against themselves?
I don’t think so. Another false statement from the WH and a dirty game but also a stupid one. All it bought Biden was a 1% ramp in the Nasdaq.
Now Netanyahu knows he’s dealing with a liar he can’t trust. China ought to step in and broker a real ceasefire.
Yes. And more to Biden’s apparent short term goals, if I were either a Zionist voter or a Palestine-sympathetic voter in US, I would not touch Biden with a 25 ft pole now, after all the lies (to both sides as well as to the American people in general) from the administration. I don’t see how any politician could be this dense!
True, far more honest on the Trump/Republican side.
“Finish Them”
The key point is to change the headlines and rescue the Biden campaign. They just need the phrase ‘Biden’s Peace Plan‘ in as many headlines as possible. That is all.
‘Do you support Biden’s Peace Plan?’ Who can be against a ‘peace’ plan.
Agree … and they’re relying on short attention spans. All these atrocities in tent cities will be memory-holed by Labor Day.
Well, that’s the plan, at least. Reality may have a different outcome. But printing up “Atrocities in Tent Cities” tour t-shirts could be a winner for Bibi.
Netenyahu shot Biden’s ceasefire deal down so bluntly it died on impact and the press is now having to pull a “Weekend at Bernies” to slowly talk it down without exposing the utter humiliation to the Biden Admin this has been. Be assured the plan is an ex-parrot and this is all theater.
Rents, anyone? From Stoller::
In a far less-noticed law enforcement action, the FBI this week conducted a dawn raid of corporate landlord giant Cortland Management over what’s called algorithmic price-fixing. This corporate real estate management firm, based in Atlanta, rents out 85,000 units across thirteen states. But Cortland is allegedly part of a much bigger conspiracy orchestrated by a software and consulting firm named RealPage to increase rents nationwide by coordinating landlord pricing decisions and holding apartments off the market.
https://open.substack.com/pub/mattstoller/p/monopoly-round-up-fbi-raids-big-corporate?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=jz47a
Very interesting – thanks for sharing!
I’m tentatively hopeful this will yield some white-collar crooks a reservation at Club Fed.
A “monthly roundup of political prisoner, prison rebel, and repression news, happenings, announcements, action and analysis.”
https://itsgoingdown.org/in-contempt-41-june-11the-events-malik-on-hunger-strike/
Meh, probably just a shakedown to increase the bribe amount. The Big Guy needs moar than his 10% what with that inflation and all.
The public could use a RICO case or two about now. That could launch the new summertime blockbuster season. :)
Naw, let’s save RICO for Trump. He’s a bad person. Jeeez
“concrete material benefits”, now there’s a phrase you don’t hear that often.
I attended a small estate auction yesterday, local. One lot to be offered was a pair of caltrops (word of the day here not that long ago). Nobody knew what they were.
But now we know what “caltrops’ are, thanks to you and NC, mrsyk. Useful little items. Hikers and mountaineers might want to include some as the ’11th essential.’
it is shocking how easily effective caltrops can be made with just some metal trellises, cutting out “+” shapes at an angle for a point and using pliers to bend the four arms at 45 degree angles. as the kids say, “it’s super effective!”
>How Claudia Sheinbaum Could Change Mexico – The New Republic
On Sunday, Mexico is likely to elect its first woman president: a left-wing climate scientist, contributing author to a report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and former mayor of Mexico City. Claudia Sheinbaum,
Strange that the word “Jewish” appears nowhere in the article. I would think a country that is almost 100% Catholic that that would be news. Should this not be a point of pride, like the here gender and climate scientist warrior status?
I’m going to take that last para as a bit of sarcasm flavored with both glee and jealousy, although it won’t much matter what tribe she’s come out of, or whether she plays it or not if they don’t start getting some rain.
Claudia Sheinbaum should continue with AMLO’s anti-GMO stance. Here is an overview and update of the situation in Mexico:
https://www.thenation.com/article/world/corn-us-mexico-tortilla-war-gmo-glyphosate/
Well, the last nation that was basically Catholic, both Orthodox and Western that “elected” a Jewish Head of State that I can think of was the Ukraine.
Counterintuitively, being not of the dominant religious group in a country can be an asset. You can easily sidestep religiously based attempts at political coercion. A Catholic Bishop threatening excommunication to a Jewish politica? Still, it is Mexico.
That she was Mayor of Mexico City, which is almost a country of its own, is a good thing. She should already “know the ropes” politically.
Also, just what is “Left Wing Climate?” Friendly and inclusive tornados? Equal opportunity hurricanes? Kinder gentler derechos?
Ah well. Buena suerte Mexico.
I reject the idea that Zelensky is in any way Jewish. He was not raised Jewish (either religiously or culturally), and in the Jewish religion, you are considered Jewish by birth if your mother is Jewish (in Zelensky’s case, his Jewish roots are through his father). In addition, AFAIK, he never claimed Jewish heritage until it became convenient to counter claims of N***s in Ukraine.
In the Jewish religion, yes. In post-Soviet countries, no, Jews are Jews based on ethnicity and not religion as far as most people are concerned. Atheist Jews are still Jews. Eastern Orthodox Christian Jews used to be considered Russians at least formally, but this notion, already pretty tenuous, has decayed completely since 1917 (granted, some prominent Jews who converted to Orthodoxy post-1991 declared that they did this to become Russian or reaffirm their Russian-ness; but this was met with widespread derision from ethnic Russians and Jews both).
There is pre-presidency video of him saying that he is Russian speaking Jew, and that everyone should be allowed to speak their native language, and all that jazz that got him elected as peace candidate.
Yes, what he got elected for in the first place, not what revisionists want to assert after the fact. Dang, I’m sounding too theoritical now. All this deep reading thanks to NC.
a more “on the ground” perspective:
Mexico’s election: A victory for organised crime
by Belén Fernández
Under Claudia Sheinbaum’s presidency, organised crime will likely be calling the shots.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2024/6/3/mexicos-election-a-victory-for-organised-crime
“Anyway, what is US-imposed capitalism if not very organised crime?”
For the Euro elections: Yanis Varoufakis’ MERA25 party campaign speech may be of interest to some readers here. I’d be interested in the Commentariat’s thoughts. YV says some interesting things that track many of the discussions on this site. In Italy, the candidates are linked to the Pace, Terra Dignità party.
YV clearly and simply laid out the political lay of the land in the EU and, in some ways, other parts of the world that make up the “empire” of Washington DC. He provides an excellent precis on why Euro elites support the Washington agenda (war all the time in as many places as possible) for two reasons in my view: 1) what YV mentioned which is Europe sells goods to US and oligarchs take that profit to Wall Street thus keeping the US economy humming; and 2) war mongering creates a “cause” (a healthy society must provide people with a sense of collective meaning to endure) with identifiable good guys and bad guys thus enabling repression of people deemed “bad” like YK and providing reasons for repression which German authorities now feel safe doing without being accused of being you know what.
Of course, the movement YK supports has little chance of influencing anything (other than inviting repression for spreading “misinformation”) because Europeans are, on the whole, more into conforming than even Americans used to be. Americans in contrast have become very cynical about the central government and authorities in general even if there is little way of changing the system other than voting for Donald Trump–but at least we have an option! Maybe I’m wrong about Europe we’ll just have to see.
Thanks CC! I can assure you that many Europeans are cynical as well. Italians, in particular, are not eating the dog food. My original post resulted from discussions with my (Italian) wife. She was despairing over the choice of candidates in the EU elections. I happened on the video by chance (in the sidebar of a Neil Oliver vid) and I liked most of what YV had to say – and his party was fielding candidates in Italy!
I know that it is unlikely that his movement will have much direct influence. YV says as much. Tearing the “happy face” masks off the warmongers is something that appeals to me. Who knows? The righteous rage may open a few eyes before EU citizens commit to sending their children to die (or simply disappear) in the vastness of the steppes for their American masters when Ukraine runs of Ukrainians.
“The German climate movement is falling apart over Palestine”
I wonder if the same is true of the German Greens? They were supposed to be big on environmental issues – until that went gung-ho for coal fired power plants. That must have created a double take. But now being all in on Israel’s genocide must be really fracturing support among their base. Perhaps not the true believers but it would among the little people. And political support is a numbers game.
This is just the next phase in the ‘Catch and Kill’ program set up to capture potential political opposition parties, ‘Baerbockify/Melonize’ them, then let the results play out. Divide and conquer.
I wonder if anyone could give an analysis (I’m sure there’s something on the internet) describing how a “left” party became a neo-fascist war-party.
Not an analysis, just an anecdotal evidence from a Nordic country: when I was hanging out with local greens in the early 2000, their post-list started to turn into a liberal hellscape, where people were seriously pushing market solutions to achieve green revolution.
As far as I know, there was an neoliberal party trying to gain ground here in 1995-99, but it failed miserably, and the supporters soon found a new home in the Green Party, that was – at the time – welcoming all comers. Not that there weren’t already some rather neoliberal characters already in the movement. People who didn’t feel belonging either left or right, in the traditional sense.
The oddest thing to me is how the Greens can keep their support even now that they are exactly the same as any other party taken over by the authoritarian war-mongers.
The answer can only be that certain people who self-identified as or claimed they were left were not.
The left cannot be left if imposing ideologies with force, coercion and against the will of others. Or killing people for wrongthink, or wrong side, or wrong group, or otherness, or difference. The left is defined by the socialization of ideas or else it is the right.
Yet, if a fascist organization (e.g. a corporation) pushes a left agenda, suddenly everyone thinks the left is being fascist because they’re not being very nice and socialist. Even though the left is also anti-corporate, anti-capitalist. It’s because corporatism is fascism (although a given corporation may be internally democratic, it functions outwardly as a fascism).
Meanwhile, there are confused so-called lefties who think their job, as lefties, is to be the thought police, a la Lenin or Stalin, who will not tolerate divergence, variation or even a progressive learning mode, or forgiveness, and who like to engage in great purges. Those are the ones who are pro-war and would just as soon bring in firing squads and gas chambers too. They claim to uphold Marxist, socialist or even democratic values, their desire to punish and kill others for being different betrays otherwise.
I don’t see that Greens in Germany are Marxists. The whole war project, at least in the USA, is about making money from war. In fact, the idea is that losing wars is more profitable to major corporations than “winning” them in the US context. Thus the Greens in Germany are clearly serving the class interests of oligarchs/capitalists and, clearly, they are supporting neo-Nazis in Ukraine. Surely there are at least some Germans that realize this, though I see little evidence of that except on the fringes.
European greens, or at least the offshoot up here in Norway, seem to carry the idea that their urban consumer lifestyles can be maintained just as long as they ban gasoline and diesel and go electric.
German Greens, jumping onboard Biden’s proxy war to cut Rooski gas & hook EU’s AGW-mitigating industry on a fracking Ponzi scam, even Trump never really fell for) was almost FUNNY, at first? As if reality was an algorithm parody, based upon Backwards Day?
New Turley on the kangaroo court.
https://jonathanturley.org/2024/06/03/buzz-kill-the-trump-conviction-presents-a-target-rich-environment-for-appeal/
Thanks for the link. Democrats, constrained from winning hearts and minds through economic policy by their wealthy donor base, are going instead for decapitation of the opposition through legal maneuver. If that fails, such is the visceral intensity of the fear and loathing of Trump, particularly within the national security sector, that perhaps literal decapitation will follow, and thus a martyr will be created. In any event, whether Trump lives or dies, wins or loses the election, I don’t see much improvement in the material circumstances of most of us to be forthcoming from either wing of the currently fractious duopoly.
Even in the oldest neighborhood I’ve lived in – where I had transoms and a little side door for the iceman to come by and put an ice cube in the metal-lined ice cupboard – all the houses were plopped down in a grid with no concern for water flow.
Just anything thing wrong with progress, I suppose.
The “Don’t cut them down” link brought to mind a little good news I heard about over the weekend. Good news on the justice front at least, if not the environmental.
Turns out poisoning trees isn’t such a good idea either, at least for one rich couple’s wallet. A couple of prominent “people from away” decided to improve their ocean view by poisoning a group of trees so they could be cut down, a practice that I hear is not uncommon in parts of Maine when ordinances won’t allow healthy trees to be cut, generally for very good reasons. Unfortunately for these two overprivileged plutocrats, what they did also damaged the property of their neighbors, who happened to be the heirs to the LL Bean fortune. So far they’ve had to pay close to two million in restitution to their neighbors, about what they originally paid for their own property. But the poison has also leached into public property as well, and they are now facing even more fines from the town. What they really ought to get is some time in the slammer to consider what they did.
https://www.centralmaine.com/2024/05/26/camden-couple-paid-1-7-million-for-herbicide-damage-and-its-not-over-yet/
The poisoning happened in late 2021 yet the article states that this couple “are” rather than “were” seasonal residents of Camden. Seems to me that the perpetrators might want to make themselves scarce after what they did, but apparently shame is not a character trait in existence among many of the wealthy today.
A shame that the couple didn’t investigate methods of tree-murder more thoroughly. Girdling works, and is non-toxic. It’s a slow and lingering death for the tree, and might offend the more tender-hearted.
We lived in a suburb of Denver, back at the beginning of the 2000’s, in an HOA (never again!) development built around a water reservoir, that featured a stunning view of the Front Range. The expensive houses had a mountain view out over the lake. Except there was a line of very tall evergreens, planted in the sixties, and now blocking a clear view of the mountains.
One day, walking the lake trail, I noticed that three of the massive evergreens, had a ring of missing bark about two feet up from the ground. No one really talked about this: omerta? Standing in front of the trees with my back to the lake, there was a sight-line directly to one of the ‘expensive’ houses. The trees took about 2 years to die and were finally removed by the HOA. A for-sale sign went up on that house shortly after. I wondered if the neighbors had ‘shunned’ them. Or had the HOA board begun a harassment campaign, as only an HOA board can.
Or maybe the idea was to improve the value of their house by being able to advertise views to the lake and when that had been done after the dead trees had been removed, it was time to cash in.
Oh, Rev, I didn’t even think of that! You are probably correct. I was figuring that if the HOA could send me nasty letters threatening me with fines about my tomato plants, and the realtor neighbor a few houses down could send his large dog to trample them, they would be even more heavy-handed to someone who killed the common property trees. But, it’s all about property values.
Re girdling, some of the trees targeted didn’t belong to them. They’d already been called on topping and trying to cut down trees on the other side of their property line. This is a “rich eating the rich” story. Camden was poisoned a long time ago.
This author is not a serious person. It is obvious to even the casual observer that the Houthis are in possession of a eye-raising cache of intelligence about the shipping industry, its owners and operations. Probably well in excess of that of most government tax authorities for a certainty. John Helmer covered the degree of their intelligence several months ago
There have been other cases of ships being attacked which ultimately trace to (Likud backing) Israeli shipping magnates. The Houthi attacks are decidedly not random. It is clear that their blockade is a seriously organized, long preplanned operation, making such effective use of new cheap technology as the threaten the obsolescence of the air carrier. This is not the work of a local “crime family” firing “assortments of missiles”. Anything thinking this needs to get real. That the author is in the shipping industry is even more surprising, though it might explain why ships are still trying to run the blockade if insider really think this way.
Whether the Houthis intelligence or weapons come from Iran or are homegrown is immaterial. What matters is that the blockade has worked — billions of dollars of shipping now transits round the Cape of Good hope — and more importantly NONE of the current global naval powers(incl Russia or China) have an answer for it. Twitter is gabbling about the USS Eisenhower this week, whether targeted or hit or out of countermeasures, but regardless of specifics the aircraft carrier has withdrawn. Naval presence isn’t working, air power isn’t delivering, and the Houthis reported army of 400,000 would necessitate a Gulf 3 land campaign to dislodge.
Comparisons of the Yemen situation to the Barbary Pirates are desperate delusion. The closer analogue is the Battle of Tsushima in the Russo-Japanese War, which fundamentally upended the political map of East Asia. Without a industro-technological answer from the western MIC, the Red Sea blockade will probably be the most significant long term development out of the Gaza War. Peeving about things online is not a policy.
Agree totally. The article’s author struck me as a rather petulant fellow, like a spoiled child denied his dessert and sent directly to bed. I particularly liked the last sentence: “The Houthis will probably be around until they really annoy someone, and get invaded.” The idea that the collective west might invade Yemen and impose order is utterly delusional. FWIW, Yemen is roughly the size of California and Pennsylvania combined.
Still, it’s fun and informative to read articles like this one. And to understand that people like Andrew Craig-Bennett (gotta love these fancy hyphenated surnames) are out there in positions of authority and influence.
And ignores that they have already been through years of civil war, including outside interference from the Saudis etc, and basically won.
Has anyone ever actually conquered Yemen? Pat Lang, who knew the place well–he was US military attache there and spent a long time wandering Yemeni deserts and highlands talking to people, and I remember him as having utmost regard for their fighting prowess. I do know that the Yemenis did in Nasser’s Egyptians and the British Empire forces outside of Aden.
The Ottomans tried many times. Even at their 16th century peak, a dominion of under a decade was the best they could do, and most expeditions ended poorly, with massive casualties. According to one of my professors, it was commemorated in a folk song, but I could not find it now. From what I remember, its vibe suggested a similar experience to that of Americans and Soviets in Vietnam and Afghanistan respectively.
I did find this quote in Wikipedia: “We have seen no foundry like Yemen for our soldiers. Each time we have sent an expeditionary force there, it has melted away like salt dissolved in water.”
When the British left a former colony, there would be ceremonies, handing over of documentation, lowering and raising of flags, etc. When the British left the Yemen region, they had to shoot their way out of the place.
I think it’s been something of an open secret for a long time that aircraft carriers are giant targets. We’ve just gotten away with it by always making sure to fight opponents we could be reasonably sure had no ability to reach them. What’s changed is just how cheap and prevalent the ability to strike from range has become.
And the lesson is being delivered by one of the poorest countries on the planet, but one with much recent military experience and deep stockpiles of ranged weapons (at this point Yemen is probably one of the premier powers when it comes to understanding of ballistic missiles. The drone component is a bonus). We likely went in expecting a cake walk (somehow oblivious to the Saudi experience, but of course they’re also backwards turban wearers; that they failed surely can’t be indicative of anything. /s).
I avoid Camden at all cost. It represents the very worst of Maine coastal gentrification (Portland says “Hold my beer.”). Let the rich eat each other. As an aside, I imagine there may be some yet to be paid penalties for using Tebuthiuron too close to the shoreline, among other things.
This in response to lyman alpha blob above. Clearly time to put the laptop down.
“China’s Economic Takeoff: Did Beijing’s Leaders Really Lift Millions Out of Poverty?”
Another article saying that what China did was great but that they only have stagnation ahead of them as if it were any different in most of the rest of the world. It might have been a better article if they had mentioned some of the real factors of China’s success – the people themselves. And by that I mean extremely hard work, lots of studying and training, lots of dedication and professionalism and a belief in themselves. Just like was the case with the United States in the 19th century as they sought to industrialize themselves and become a great power. The United States transformed themselves into a powerhouse back then and that is what China is doing right now.
Exactly. The article does grant that “history and culture” are what makes China successful since Mao. Give people a fair chance at success and they will aspire to improve their lives (especially when they can read about their past history or learn from other societies).
There is always some serendipity in world events, but like Russia now, China is preparing for the future as well as anyone.
China was always ahead of the rest of the world until the Manchus conquered them in the 1600s. They stagnated and were humiliated until 1949, when Mao essentially created a new dynasty. It’s taken a while for the new dynasty to affect the culture, but they have since Deng Hsiao Ping. Trying to “contain” the Chinese is futile, as shown by the Huawei phone.
There’s also no good reason to expect that China will stagnate. China’s long-term economic growth, just like other economies historically, has matched almost perfectly its growth in primary energy consumption. A lot of this has come and still comes from coal, and at a severe environmental cost, but that doesn’t change the fact that it has translated consistently into economic growth.
Unlike Western countries, which more or less voluntarily chose to stop consuming more energy in the 1970s, China continues to grow for example its electricity production at around 8 percent annually. And while it’s true that China faces increasing demographic headwinds, its high rates of fixed capital formation, its rapid progress in AI, robotics/automation, 5G/6G etc. all counteract those tendencies and pave the way for continued growth. This is again unlike the West, which instead chose the path of financialization, hollowing out of both public and private R&D capabilities, deindustrialization and the impoverishment of its lower 80%. (Too bad.)
Even the conventional argument (which I don’t accept, for reasons described above) – that countries reach a mature state and then just naturally stagnate – doesn’t really hold in this case. China is still, on a per-capita basis, even when adjusted for PPP, at a level of between one third and one half of that of Western countries (where I include South Korea, Singapore and Japan).
If we accept the IMF’s 2024 GDP projection for the United States as given, China is not even at 30%. ($85,373 per capita, PPP adjusted, projected for the US and $25,015 for China.) In other words, China has a long way to go until it reaches the same, presumed unsurpassable, level as the West.
The only reason, again working with the conventional model of a “mature economy”, to expect that China would peak at such a drastically lower per capita output is that China as a non-Western and non-white country is simply anchored at a much lower level of productivity and living standards. This ultimately racist assumption has underlain predictions of China’s doom since the 1980’s and it has over and over again been proven wrong.
The biggest advantage was their central bank pegging their currency to the USD by printing yuan in exchange for dollars from their exporters. Created artificial demand for the US dollar so that it didn’t reach an equilibrium with the yuan based on actual demand from China for US goods. Ultimately eliminated risk for US corporations to outsource their supply chains to China. PBoC was able to get out of that business once the “private” sector in China filled demand for the US dolllar, not for goods, but for FDI in US assets.
Have feedbacks taken over? Arctic News
Pretty alarming data and discussion. I think ‘degrowth’ is coming whether we choose it or not.
” ‘Degrowth’ is coming whether we choose it or not.”
I too think this. It’s baked in at this point, even if all further carbon emissions were somehow switched off completely tomorrow. The only choice in our current circumstance is whether we will plan and mobilize for degrowth or allow degrowth to be imposed by events.
This has been Today’s Moment o’Light™, from The Lord Curmudgeon.
Indeed, and why the rich of this world is setting themselves up as “barons” once the dust settles.
Yes. There are two ways to degrowth: shared sacrifice is one; degrowth for you and not for me is the other. Somehow, I don’t think the former is very likely in the West today.
The dust won’t settle for another couple of hundred years. This is just getting started. By the end of this century the rich will all have gone underground — literally. Easier to control temperature a couple of hundred feet below the surface. There may be some government efforts to provide underground housing, but not much. Most of the poor will die on the surface, and then the rich will build plants to make food from algae, mushrooms, and bacteria. See Isaac Asimove, “Caves of Steel.”
Neo-cons might have a plan: a little bit of nuclear winter to cool things off. /s
Ha, in Boardwalk Empire, there are a few episodes later in the show where one of the characters actually does assemble a house from scratch, but the doors don’t quite fit and the plumbing isn’t quite working right. It’s hard to imagine this was an easy thing to do, even if it was possible. You’d never meet all today’s building standards, would you?
In Unforgiven the town sheriff, played by Gene Hackman, built his own house with similarly comic results.
To your points about the ease of a project and meeting standards, a clearly written manual compliant with the building codes used in a given jurisdiction would go a long way to avoiding pitfalls. For example, the order in which things are to be done can be critically important. As are details like the nail size and spacing to be used for a given application or how to properly flash a window opening. An equally important, if not more so, issue is the builder’s commitment to the concepts of level, plumb, and square.
That said, the success and ease of a build often comes down to the local building department. Many inspectors take pleasure in assisting builders getthe job done while still meeting standards. Others, not so much. Some seem to resent being questioned and/or get off on requiring re-dos.
Here are some tiny house kits on Amazon that maybe a Geographer, such as myself, would be able to assemble.
https://www.amazon.com/b?node=21424006011
“Voice of Baceprot” drummer is fierce… who knew?
Yeah, I’m not a heavy metal maven by any stretch, but that was fun!
Have feedbacks taken over?
back in 2010 Bill McKibben wrote “Eaarth: : Making a Life on a Tough New Planet” and after reading the book the one thing that stuck with me the most was the convective loop of methane escaping from the permafrost and rising giving strength to the warming and thus further warming the atmosphere – in 2014 megaslumps started appearing in Siberia from the melting of the permafrost – a person i know moved to Alaska in 2016 and we communicated by email and one of subjects were the bubbles forming in some lakes that folks would throw a lit book of matches at which would cause ignition of obvious gases – again the melting of the permafrost – the ongoing loss of indigenous land in that icy part of the world from the same cause – yes a feedback has taken over and now reading about shipping, both commercial and tourist, lauding the possibility of traversing what was once the frozen north – the ice–albedo feedback missing and the arctic heating up – someone wrote yesterday about the Wiley Coyote moment when he ran too far over the cliff and gravity is about to take over when he looks down – i keep looking down – on so many fronts our civilization has reached that moment – i wake every morning and play with the dogs, watch birds come to feed and fuss over my tiny orchard until the shadow creeps over the prefrontal lobes –
Around the time late 90s the famous PNAC document was released basically saying that the USA would descend into chaos if we lacked a common goal as a country–I thought the analysis was sound and thought that dealing with environmental threats, lifting people out of poverty and so on could have been common goals. Of course the PNAC people suggested that war provided a common purpose and that is the direction we went in because that was the best way to enrich the oligarchs who know control the US and Europe. Do you even think its possible to change this? As things are going it is impossible to go in any other direction.
the shadow creeps further – it’s a slow-mo train wreck and we’re just spectators – truly wish it was a different feeling that inhabits my thoughts, but it’s not – there is an ember of hope that always flickers even after reading NC and the comments – gotta have some hope, which comes in the occasional breeze that blows across that ember of hope –
This is a good time to do what Jungians call “shadow work” which entails looking at our individual darkness. I think the same could be said for our collective darkness. Let’s look at it with clarity. The problem with hope is that it nurtures illusions. Still, hope does spring eternal when it comes out of love.
Due Dissidence guys, utube, ~12+.
Trump Reports MASSIVE Fundraising Haul 24 AFTER Guilty Verdict
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zwqb7s8al3E
The people who hate him with every inch of their body and the people so afraid he will be reelected have done a bang-up job of putting him back in office. Maybe these geniuses ain’t quite so damn smart after all. Who would have thunk it?
My neighbor across the street was a big Trump fan. They had yard signs and a big Trump flag. I didn’t see them in 2020 for some reason, but the big flag went back up Saturday.
I have talked to quite a few people in the last couple of days who aren’t real keen on the guy, but after this trial they said they are voting for him for no other reason than to “get these crazy people out of office.”
About time for another indictment me thinks.
I was thinking myself, after the trial, of voting for Trump–though not quite as radically weird as the Stalinist show trials in the 30s it qualifies as the action of a totalitarian state. Along with many other acts of repression the Party is imposing on us it may cause me to vote for the Donald (as he was known back in the day).
I was going to leave the top line blank. Not anymore. I will vote against every dem on the ballot. Not that I think the other side will be any better, but they sure can’t be any worse. I also admit I despise all of them and think they all suck beyond imagination.
They have Fauci in front of congress today. I would love to watch but my blood pressure would not hold up. Probably just another dog and pony show for the TV cameras and nothing will get accomplished.
Same as it always is. The only time they accomplish anything is when we the people get screwed – again.
I had been planning to vote for any party but the Uniparty but I may follow your lead and vote RP all the way (wince).
William Burroughs once said you need to be in Hell to see Heaven and must confess have given that option of voting RP some thought to just pitch us into the abyss, and also after Drumpf mentioned pardoning Assange – certainly is not a promise or platform plank unfortunately – voting is a conflicted and twisted path – not saying it’s wrong or right – it’s such an enormous clusterf@#k –
keep considering the Carlin way – George Carlin doesn’t vote –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIraCchPDhk
“same as it always is”………made me think of Talking Heads ‘Once In A Lifetime’ and found this wonderful version by Angélique Kidjo – can’t help but smile – musical interlude –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z84rtbVbIEQ
the song that introduced me to Angelique – immediately bought Oremi and fell in love –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36bGFi1U_vw&t=119s
can dance by myself to the whole album
same song with Buddy Guy – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EN_K84TAxNs
brings smiles and tears of joy – hope it does the same for y’all –
Angelique, what a wonderful human
I saw her at Hill in A2 with a European Orchestra some years ago, can’t think just now which one, but a major one, maybe Berlin. It was, I believe, a work written for her, or her in mind. She is versatile.
lucky lady Ms X – perchance you caught Bassekou Kouyate & Ngoni ba when they were at Hill – jaw dropping amazing – here’s a taste if not familiar –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t2vQAmySTfw
Thanks, no I didn’t catch him, another great Malian musician.
Saw Alice Coltrane at Hill. Hoped in vain she’d be allowed to play the Hill Pipe Organ. Fantastic show. Saw Patti LaBelle there in her “space” place. Both early 70s
was living in Chicago at the time when i missed Alice in 2006 at Hill but a friend who went said her interpretation of Love Supreme was fantastic – she died in 2007 and sorry i didn’t try to make it – love her harp work –
Thank you Flora for all the links you provide us. It has been reported by Eric Trump that the total haul since the end of the trial is now over 1/4 billion dollars (30% of the donations came from people who had never donated to a political campaign before, and $70 million of the initial funds raised were small donors (under $250)).
Marton Oline
And everybody knows that Eric Trump tells the absolute truth, all the time. It’s a family trait./s
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/time-to-bet-big-on-trump/
Personally I think this election will be all about Biden, not Trump.
Trump will need all of that money to pay for his lawyers. He is now a convicted felon, 34 times over. He will appeal but that will take at least a year. He will have to report to a probation officer.
Sure, the dead enders who like him will feel a lot of butt hurt and support him even more. But others in the middle will shun him. It only takes a shift of 2 or 3 percent to guarantee his loss. We can only hope.
People who haven’t bought the delusional propaganda coming out of the media and DC can only hope that most of the incumbents, including Biden get booted. And that third party and independent candidates get elected wherever possible. And in an entirely fair law based world Biden would also be an indicted felon for higher crimes than an obscure reclassification of a known philanderer paying off a mistress as election fraud. Personally I find Influence peddling to be far more detrimental to most Americans than that.
“Artemis Accords: What are they & which countries are involved?”
Others may disagree but as far as I am concerned, the Artemis Accords are simply an institution of the International Rules Based Order. They are not meant to affirm the 1967 Outer Space Treaty but to replace them with something more malleable. If you look at the countries involved, nearly all of them don’t even have a space program so it means nothing to them. Certainly the Island of Man doesn’t. I think that the true aim of these aims is the corporatisation of space travel in lieu of nations who will have to take a back seat. And under Deconfliction of Activities, it says that ‘This also covers the establishment of so-called “safety zones” with areas that can be established between countries and which can be ended when relevant operations cease.’ What the hell does that mean. Neutral zones or something? Declaration of parts of space off limits to other countries? It also says that ‘Nations signing the Artemis Accords are committed to assisting astronauts and personnel in outer space who are in distress.’ So does that mean that the US will send the blueprints to their docking facilities so that China can be involved? I read that the US refused to do so earlier so that there is zero chance of a Chinese space craft docking with an American one, including the ISS. Tough luck if they needed the Chinese to do a rescue mission. These Artemis Accords are nothing but a bad brew dreamed up by the US State Department.
I guess someone hope to start a space gold rush, pulling of something akin to The Expanse.
Funny that you mention that show, as I’m smack in the middle of my fourth (or something) rewatch.
I think its vision of colonization of the solar system is almost implausibly dark: What technologically advanced civilization would even want to bother to mine asteroids and so on essentially with slave labor?
Still, who can say whose vision of the future is “correct” or not? And it goes without saying that it’s a terrific series (or I wouldn’t be rewatching it over and over).
Perhaps because humanity has a history, into the very present no less, of using “slaves” rather than tech as long as it is cheaper.
Just look at why so much of US industry was offshored, because it was cheaper to hire some Asians to do it than retool the factories for automation and deal with US unions. Lets not forget that Foxconn factories making iPhones had to be fitted with suicide nets to catch workers jumping off.
Now, Portugal:
From the graph I interpret Portugal is having 130 weekly (or biweekly, not so sure) cases per 100.000 which is indeed high. In Spain it is also climbing though last week figure was 56/100.000 while the previous week it was at 33/100.000. Mortality rate is climbing somehow above the expected by models. This “summer mortality peak” has occurred during the last four summers though in 2023 the end summer peak was relatively late, short and low. Something to do with heat waves?
“wow those miracle vaccines sure knocked out the pandemic…..”
LOL
Shocking news: the vast majority of gender dysphoric children…..wait for it…..outgrow their confusion around twenty five years of age. No sterilizing hormones or amputations required:
https://modernity.news/2024/04/03/15-year-study-vast-majority-of-children-grow-out-of-gender-confusion/
So basically they may just be teens with a less than happy puberty, and a deep longing for a community and acceptance.
Yep, vulnerable kids, ripe pickings for the trans activists to groom and then herd onto the “trans train”.
I find “groom” to be an overly sinister term for what is going on.
This is more like the latest satanic panic, and the vast majority think they are doing good and saving lives by preventing someone from suicide.
Back in 1990s and oughts, that’s (about 15-ish,) roughly when second generation Asian immigrant youths started having, eh, identity issues–became “super ethnic” and often became unwitting parody of certain Asian stereotypes (stuff that Asians self-attribute to themselves, but aren’t really true.)
Come to think of it, that was the Worf story on Star Trek TNG, wasn’t it?
Would not surprise me if the same is playing out in Europe right now…
I had blood work done this morning at my oncologist’s, then went by Trader Joe’s.
I was the only person wearing a mask at either place.
I wonder if it felt like this in July 1914?
“They” had similar problems with maskaphobia back during the Spanish Flu Pandemic of WW-1. (Why the ‘Spanish’ flu when it originated in Fort Riley, Kansas is one of Lifes enduring mysteries.)
From History dot com: “Scientists still do not know for sure where the Spanish Flu originated, though theories point to France, China, Britain, or the United States, where the first known case was reported at Camp Funston in Fort Riley, Kansas, on March 11, 1918.”
And yet the first study to conclude the origin was in USA (by Dr. Edwin Jordan, editor of The Journal of Infectious Disease) was published in 1927. This was confirmed by a British study in 1934, and again by an Australian study in 1942.
The first cases apparently were recorder in late January 1918 in Haskell County, Kansas.
Why the ‘Spanish’ flu when it originated in Fort Riley, Kansas is one of Lifes enduring mysteries.
The story I have read is that there was some pretty strong censorship among the WWI Western war powers who did not want to encourage Germany. . Spain was not in the war and could report honestly. It may be true.
I’ve read that because the “Spanish” Kansas flu started during WW1, most countries at first censored news of the pandemic (have to keep up morale). Because Spain was not at war, they didn’t censor the news, so the first place where the pandemic became widely visible to the world was Spain.
To be fair, the self-protective masks were invented by a Malaysian (ethnic Chinese) doctor in 1911. I assume they were slowly becoming established in the US in 1918. This would definitely have tickled some anti-Asian phobias that were rampant in the US West at the time. The “San Francisco Anti-Mask League” had a parade.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_Lien-teh
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Mask_League_of_San_Francisco
RE: TODAY show May 30, 2024:
“Doctors say they are seeing an alarming number of seemingly healthy younger patients having heart attacks.”
February 9,, 2023:
https://x.com/1goodtern/status/1623745373192826881
Did the TODAY show forget about the February 9, 2023 segment?
Did the TODAY show forget about the February 9, 2023 segment?
“Coming up next: “Brainfog after mild Covid. Is it affecting you?””
Burst pipe in Atlanta? Are they going to run that gag in November again?
Fulton County has several decades of something something always causing a problem. I always thought they should vote two weeks early compared to the rest of the state to help them work things out by election day. Minimize the drama.
Or maybe I am missing something?
. . . ” Hospitals are killing patients because they don’t feel like doing infection control The Guantlet ” . . .
I suspect that “Guantlet” was intended to be “Gauntlet”.
Re. the Doctor Who “reboot” (in the a–e that is.)
Having watched a lot of Doctor Who as a kid, (curiously enough on the local Public Television station back then,) I can testify that “The Doctor” has transmorgified into a complete garbage dump of overt socio-political propaganda. Whether you agree or disagree with the “agenda” now being promoted, the basic premise of the show, and indeed any show, is to first entertain the audience. Then, if you are any good at communications work, subtly place a few ‘nudges’ in the content to steer your viewers in your preferred direction.
The segments of the latest program that I have seen present as absurdist theatre. The BBC appears to have fallen to the level of ‘box ticking’ to demonstrate virtue signaling of a PMC nature. In short, the present iteration of “The Doctor” is not just an example of “an alien being,” but rather a parody of a “marginalized population group.”
I never thought that I would see the day when I could describe “Doctor Who” to others as “camp.”
Stay safe. Cherish reality.
That, sadly, was my impression too as is the case of nearly all recent British productions. I think Britain may have changed more dramatically than any country I know of in the past quarter century or so.
No, just the British media and other people who would consider themselves influencers.
We’re as conservatively Eeyorish as ever. :-)
Everything the rat touches these days seem to go that way.
The Critical Drinker has many unkind words to say why the latest Doctor Who episodes fail so badly-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRT2gT9ECt4 (8:01 mins) – some language.
~US State Department official resigns, says US report on Gaza inaccurate
Stacy Gilbert, the official, was interviewed on DN last Friday, May 31. The episode is here.
The staff wrote the report indicating that Israel had actively blocked aid (though not the sole reason). The report was bumped to a higher level (ie political) whereupon it stated the reverse.
I would suspect a similar flow for the administration’s adamant insistence that they have not seen evidence of a genocide. Etc etc.
In the UK Nigel Farage announces the coming announcement of his candidacy. utube.~14 minutes.
Nigel Farage To Stand For Election In Clacton | Becomes Reform UK Leader
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRvpHnxft6I
Ansel Adams would play with negatives in the darkroom to get the desired result, early Ansel Intelligence, if you will.
It does look like the Chinese are trying to squeeze the Russians with the gas deal and pipeline. Ultimately, the Russians will push through the hurdle with Ukraine and come on the other side, and will be less squeazable, while China’s needs will grow… While Russians might say that they prefer to keep the gas in the ground, for climate change mitigation… And when the mortal heat wave will start hitting the middle east, those countries might say the same thing…
Yeah, the apparent Chinese decision to gouge the Russians on the terms of the new gas pipeline has always struck me as incomprehensible, especially given China’s recognized need to reduce its dependence on seaborne routes for energy imports. It seems quite narrow- and short-sighted and as such highly uncharacteristic for China.
Very soon a crisis could break out over Taiwan, and while direct US military action against China wouldn’t likely be very effective, if the US threatens to use its nuclear submarines to sink oil and LNG tankers, bulk carriers carrying coal etc. headed to China, that would surely have a chilling effect on such traffic.
China would then find itself with no new gas pipeline from Russia and many years to go until one could be finished. I don’t think there is enough railway capacity built to transfer oil on tanker cars in the needed quantities (beyond the capacity of the existing crude oil pipelines) in such a crisis situation either.
Same thing would go for coal, grain and so on too obviously. The opportunity to put that new railway capacity in place has apparently been squandered over the last decade or so, just as with the pipeline project, but whose fault that is I can’t say exactly.
With increasing industrial output (and presumably increasing electricity, commercial and household demand to go with that), the Russians may also decide that the natural gas shouldn’t necessarily stay in the ground but that it’s now needed at home. At that point the Chinese may well wish they had another long-term supply contract in place, like the one that signed was in May 2014 (in connection with Power of Siberia 1).
Considering the speed that they’re building up solar and wind generation capacity, I have to imagine that in 10 years or so they would mostly need fossil fuel for industrial processes. So they might just be getting down a really good deal for the time being.
The Chinese have always driven very hard financial bargains with the Russians on fossil fuels and both sides are constantly line up alternative arrangements to improve their respective bargaining position (this Russia selling oil to India on quite unfavorable terms and keeping the pipeline sales to Europe after SMO started. They’re both very carefully guarding their sovereignty and national interests, as good national governments ought to do.
I wonder if the argument is about intermediate off-take?
Most of the pipeline is not in China but in Russia and Mongolia. The pipeline will benefit the Russia interior, including Irkutsk, and by collateral circulation the proposed pipeline west of Mongolia into Xinjiang, and will also service Ulan Bator, possibly bringing it the first gas. From China’s perspective, this pipeline brings specific energy dependence on Russia to its restive border province and to its most important buffer vassal state.
I imagine the wrangling is not about price for Chinese industrial margins’ sake but for influence. The cheaper China gets gas, the harder it is for Russia to offer a better deal to Mongolia for transit (China doesn’t want a Ukraine transit situation arising) and the easier it is for China to stimulate industry in Xinjiang with cheap energy and thus buy loyalty with affluence.
Indeed, the Chinese may plan to use cheap Russian gas throughout their near abroad as a diplomatic tool (Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, North Korea), much as the USSR did with the Warsaw pact and Russia did with Europe. If this is the case, China needs the lowest price possible to undercut US LNG….
I don’t think China and Russia are not friends on this topic but each has a clear sphere of influence and China has to negotiate a price that enables it to kill the US shale gas export trade in SE Asia as and when it chooses, by giving it away for free if necessary. China wants Russia’s support in this, not a cheap deal for its factories. Russia wants its own leverage. I am sure they’ll find an accommodation.
I also wonder if spare capacity that the project might create on the original pipeline to the East is a negotiating issue. Russia could supply North Korea or Japan directly and China may be seeing assurances of Russia’s intentions here….
“China needs the lowest price possible to undercut US LNG”. By how much? 200%, 300%, 400%?
Yes, there is a lot more to this than meets the eye I suspect.
China knows that Russia needs the pipeline more than China needs the natural gas – China is a relatively light user of gas and has substantial fixed contracts for LNG with Qatar and others. They seem determined to push a hard bargain while Russia is the more dependent side of the partnership. Developing a gas infrastructure deep into western Russia and east Asian in general is very important for Russia’s future, and of course ideally they’d like someone else to pay for it.
One factor in China’s planning is that they are increasingly putting themselves as an intermediary in key commodities, even when they are not primary producers. For example, China is now exporting substantial amounts of processed animal feed made from Brazilian imported soy (this may also reflect a collapse in the piggery industry due to swine fever and over optimistic demand forecasts). I suspect they are also doing the same with fertlizer, which has always been seen as an achilles heel for China, and cheap gas is very important for producing cheap fertilizer.
Even at the massive rate that China has been building out solar and wind power, solar and wind generation is still less than 15% of total electricity production. Once you start going significantly above that, the total costs (that is, for the economy of as a whole) of electricity production increase dramatically. That might be OK for Western countries who are not serious about economic development, but not for China.
The OECD’s Nuclear Energy Agency (yes, I realize the name will repel a lot of people) has put out a couple of reports that describe in detail why this happens. They can be found by searching for “System Costs 2019” and “System Effects 2012”. But to summarize, key reasons include balancing costs (you have to build out at least the same amount of capacity in dispatchable generators, such as gas turbines, and/or storage – both seasonal, daily and weekly – for when solar cells or wind power aren’t producing power) and grid costs (solar and wind, being distributed sources, require a much more extensive and complicated electrical grid). Another major reason are the instabilities introduced by wind and solar power to the operation of the power system, as they do not contribute to system inertia or to reactive power regulation.
At 10% share of total generation these factors are not such a big deal, but at 30%, not to mention 50%, you will begin experiencing major problems. (For example Denmark will point to 50% electricity production from wind power. That’s basically accounting fraud: What they don’t mention is that they are electrically intregrated with Norway, whose hydropower capacity alone is enough to supply Denmark’s peak electricity demand more than six times over. On top of that they get, on demand, coal power from Germany and Poland, nuclear power from France and Sweden, and so on. In addition, they depend on significant thermal generation capacity in their own country – see “balancing costs” above.)
The perhaps most important reason is self-cannibalization: The value to the system of the electricity produced by wind and solar dives like a stone as penetration increases beyond a certain (quite low, around 5-10%) threshold. This arises from the fact that in a given region at any given time, more or less all solar plants and wind turbines are either producing electricity or not producing.
It should be said that China has undertaken a massive hydropower buildout over the last 20 years, together with UHVDC lines to transfer the electricity to population centers, which to some extent mitigates these issues. Having more or less exhausted its (economical) hydropower potential, it is now beginning an equally massive buildout of pumped-storage hydroelectric plants, which also help (by evening out daily variations in demand and supply). But dispatchable power sources, namely hydropower, coal, natural gas and nuclear power, will remain the bulk of China’s electricity production.
FOX news:
I really like this. The war on semite custodians proceeds apace.
Coming to your town next!
> Financial capital is not scarce, so why do we pay so much for it? Funding the Future
We have the most laissez faire elastic currency there is. Does Richard Murphy want the same just at a lower cost?
My instincts are to go the other way. At the very least more governance, like what Japan’s central bank was doing before they precipiated “bankers gone wild” leading up to their lost decades. Back when they were more “functional” they had a window guidance system – delivering currency where it was needed, working hand in hand with the Ministry of Finance. See Princes of the Yen. That way, you still get growth, but at least with a more “visible” hand. As “Prices of the Yen” describes it, Japan was a war economy before WWII ended and after WWII ended – they were a powerhouse.
That said, at some point, our addiction to growth will need to be reconsidered in the face of climate change.
Not sure if that satisfices what Richard is looking for. If it’s more about Joe Sixpack, then a lot of that could be satisficed with Fed Gov spending crowding out the need for private debt. The obverse of what Michael Hudson explains: a motivation to cut Fed Gov spending is it increases demand for private debt by Joe Sixpack.
Side note: Joe Sixpack doesn’t care about growth if he can put meat on the table. In my mind it’s the petite bourgeoisie who clamor for growth – to creatively destruct their way up the social ladder.
US seizes Ret Maj Scott Ritter’s passport:
https://www.rt.com/news/598711-us-seizes-scott-ritters-passport/
In EU there are way arround the clamping on RT…
Yikes!
try
swentr.site/
your link as posted on swentr.
https://swentr.site/news/598711-us-seizes-scott-ritters-passport/
Dissenters will not be tolerated by the Biden White House.
Was also reported on Sputnik, which is not yet blocked in the EU.
That tweet about guys today not building their homes from a catalog like the good old days…when would guys today be able to do that? Every weekend while they simultaneously pay rent somewhere else while they build on their mortgaged land? Would they take time off and risk losing their jobs to build their house? Would their friends come a every weekend and help them out? Or maybe their gracious parents would take a break from their ipads and make lemonade and help build their house….what an asinine observation from a clueless individual…our time has been vaporized