Kazakhstan launches programme to reintroduce tigers to lost habitat BNE Intellinews
47 Tigers Die In Vietnam Zoos Due To H5N1 Bird Flu Virus: Report NDTV World
Climate
The Next Climate Conversation Is About Marine Clouds Persuasion
To slow global warming, could methane be stripped from the air? Science
* * * China could cut CO2 by a third by 2035 with new UN targets, think tank says Channel News Asia
This winding LA highway is notoriously treacherous. Extreme weather is making it worse Guardian
New assessment suggests Anthropocene started in the 1950s Phys.org
Botanists identify 33 global ‘dark spots’ with thousands of unknown plants Guardian
Hurricane Helene
Biden: Congress ‘may have to’ come back to approve Helene relief Politico
The Town Meeting North Carolina Rabbit Hole
US govt hiding top hurricane forecast model sparks outrage after deadly Helene The Register
Syndemics
Rwanda limits funeral sizes due to Marburg virus outbreak BBC
WHO DON: Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus – Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Avian Flu Diary
Was Missouri’s bird flu case a one-off or something more? Quest for answers faces testing delay STAT
US Whooping Cough Outbreak Underscores Need for Timely Vaccines Bloomberg
The symptoms of ‘stronger’ Covid XEC variant and what to look out for Birmingham Live.
China?
China’s ‘World Bank’ gives backing to wave of renminbi bonds FT
China’s ‘golden week’ consumers unwilling to shell out as hairy crab prices tumble South China Morning Post
IN FOCUS: As expats exit Hong Kong and mainlanders enter, businesses and communities are counting the costs Channel News Asia
Myanmar
On Our Good Leg, We Rise: Fighting To Heal on Myanmar’s Front Lines The Diplomat
India
Google taps India’s love for gold to boost its credit play TechCrunch
Africa
China to bring Tanzania-Zambia railway back to full speed with US$1 billion boost South China Morning Post
Syraqistan
Consequences of Nasrallah New Left Review
Israel and Iran are at war — and if a nuclear site is hit, all bets for peace are off The London Standard. Commentary:
Vali @vali_Nasr is getting the point: whether we like it or not, whether it fits our political preferences or not, Iran's close ally, China, is rapidly and robustly becoming the only superpower.
So Iran can afford to wait, as per Sun Tzu's strategy. https://t.co/IP8wffsjJo pic.twitter.com/gv0zM4Dwqk— Nassim Nicholas Taleb (@nntaleb) September 29, 2024
* * * Satellite Images Show Damage to Israel Air Force Base After Iran Attack Haaretz
Missile barrage on Israel: What were the ‘hypersonic’ weapons used by Iran? France24
Yemen’s Houthis claim drone attack on ‘vital target’ in central Israel Anadolu Agency
* * * Israel attacks heart of Beirut as Hezbollah pushes back in southern Lebanon Al Jazeera
Military briefing: Can Israel’s land offensive ‘defeat’ Hizbollah? FT
‘As if we don’t exist’: Under bombs in Lebanon, Americans feel abandoned Al Jazeera
* * * Israeli rabbi, extremists plan conquest and settlement of Lebanon as war continues The New Arab
U.S. Jewish Institutions Are Purging Their Staffs of Anti-Zionists In These Times
Your Crisis of Faith is not My Concern (There’s a Genocide Going on) Steve Salaita
European Disunion
Mystery deaths and mass layoffs: Europe’s green battery dream Northvolt turns sour France24
Western Balkans emerges as nearshoring destination BNE Intelliews
New Not-So-Cold War
The significance of Russia’s capture of the Ukrainian stronghold of Vuhledar France24
Winnipeg Jets unveil reimagined logo embroidered with Ukrainian heritage CBC
Kremlin says no request for Putin to speak with Scholz has been received Ukrainsks Pravda
High-voltage transmission lines damaged in Kharkiv suburbs due to Russian strike Ukrainska Pravda
2024
Kamala Harris, Liz Cheney to stump at birthplace of Republican Party FOX
* * * DoJ accuses Donald Trump of ‘private criminal effort’ to overturn 2020 election result FT
What newly unsealed evidence reveals about Trump’s alleged actions on and before Jan. 6 CBS
Trump not entitled to immunity for efforts to overturn 2020 election, US special counsel says France24
Digital Watch
WP Engine sues WordPress co-creator Mullenweg and Automattic, alleging abuse of power TechCrunch
The Final Frontier
October’s new moon will bring us a spectacular ‘ring of fire’ eclipse Space.com
Why Is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon? Scientific American
Supply Chain
Recession fears stoked on day three of America’s port strike Splash247
Huge blow to motorists who face fuel price hikes if Middle East conflict rages on Daily Mail
Guillotine Watch
America’s Strategy of Renewal Antony J. Blinken, Foreign Affairs
Bridging Innovation and Empathy: Bill Gates’s “What’s Next?” 3 Quarks Daily
Class Warfare
Return to office and dying on the job Cory Doctorow, Medium
Ahead Lies Ruin: The Decay of Social Trust Charles Hugh Smith, Of Two Minds
Surrealism as a revolutionary movement Anti-Capitalist Resistance
Fredric Jameson, 1934-2024 Terry Eagleton, Verso
Tapia, Tabbi, Tabique, Tabby Places Journal
Antidote du jour (Charles J. Sharp):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
157 comments
Comments are closed.
From Meryl Nass’s substack:
Today’s specials: Marburg and MERS
No one caught Ebola (a cousin of Marburg) on a plane or a train. Never mind–panic anyway! Then worry about MERS, a mor severe cousin of COVID
https://merylnass.substack.com/p/todays-specials-marburg-and-mers
It’s beginning to look a lot like weapons of mass destruction
Everywhere you go
Take a look at the Levant, it’s glistening once again
With ballistic missiles and delivery lanes that glow
It’s beginning to look a lot like thermonuclear near
Lurking in many an armament store
But the pettiest sight to see is the fallout that will be
On many a front door
Being in cahoots and a America that shoots
Is the wish of Bibi and Biden
Media that’ll not talk and will go for a walk
Is the hope of Zionism and lap doge
And the Donkey Show can hardly wait for world war to start again
It’s beginning to look a lot like WW3
Everywhere you go
There’s a war in the Holy Land, one in the Ukraine as well
It’s the usual kind that doesn’t mind the sorrow
It’s beginning to look a lot like it’ll happen by Christmas
Soon the klaxons & bells will start
And the thing that’ll make ’em ring is the dread that you sing
Right within your heart
Sure, it’s 1945 once more
“Military briefing: Can Israel’s land offensive ‘defeat’ Hizbollah?”
No. Oh, you want a longer comment? The IDF does not have the capability to occupy Lebanon up to the Litani river. If the IDF is still fighting Hamas in Gaza – who are bush-leaguers – after a year has gone by but are unable to get rid of them, then how are they supposed to fight the pros of Hezbollah? Gaza is flat. Southern Lebanon is mountainous and whatever Hezbollah has there, they have had a coupla decades to build it out. The IDF put in a platoon or more a day or so ago and ended up with 8 dead and about 40 in the hospital. You think that Israel will be able to sustain those sort of casualties each and every day? Probably the Hezbollah strategy will be to kill and wound as many Israelis as possible to make the IDF eventually buckle. Larry Johnson just came out and called out the Israelis for being cowards as they only know how to kill defenseless women and children. Let’s see how they go in ground combat against highly-trained professional soldiers with the high ground in their favour.
Thank you and well said, Rev.
It was interesting to read that the officers killed, captain and major, were in their early 20s. Bit odd.
Not unrelated, yesterday afternoon, an academic acquaintance advised that he’s under investigation by his employer for anti-semitism after writing some about the war and criticising Starmer. He’s being asked to retire quietly. If that news gets out, he will lose an irregular BBC gig.
Thank you, Colonel. You were noting the ages of those officers and how young they were. Scott Ritter was talking about this in a video a very long time ago and how it came down to how the IDF was structured. In a normal military organization officers are grown so if you met a British major for example, you would note that he has years of experience at each level of rank as he worked his way up to being a major. But the IDF is to a large extent a conscript army so they do not have the depth of officers to command those formations when they are activated. That is why you have 22 year-old captains and 23 year-old majors. Add in the fact that when you have casualties among officers an even younger guy is promoted you get a very inexperienced officer cadre.
It’s been noted a lot in the last year. In the early days of Al-Aqsa Flood the Western press featured teenage tank girls who had been making their own targeting decisions, rather badly, on day 1. They all had officer ranks, iirc.
I wonder if this aspect of IDF culture relates or co-relates with its enormously high self esteem.
In early WW II, it was not uncommon to see a full colonel in early 20’s.
The service expanded so rapidly.
Bar tenders in clubs would take glee in asking a young colonel if he was old enough to be served liquor….
Story told to me in early 1970’s.
In principle, a conscript army would train part of the conscripts to be reserve NGOs and reserve officers. These reserve officers would have military refresher training camps and courses, and based on those, they would be promoted.
In this system the reserve officers are always much older than their professional counterparts, because they are promoted much slower. So slow, actually, that people very rarely reach the rank of major in reserve.
So, something is seriously wrong with the IDF from where I’m looking. I believe they do have a tendency of leading from the very front (partly because troops are conscript, partly due to the weird version of machismo), so Gaza may have taken a huge toll on the professional officer core.
The early days of Israeli reoccupation of Gaza featured many prematurely high ranking officers. This seems to be a feature of Israeli armed forces. Possibly a devil’s bargain with conscripts that they will leave with social cachet and pay and knock-on inflation for permanent staff.
Did all those immigrants from the the former Soviet Union not impart any of that classic Slavic equanimity in the face of suffering ? Budget for a few tens of thousands of KIA and they might be able to defeat Hezbollah. Proportionate to population that would be no more than the Ukrainians have lost in their fight against Russia.
“Return to office and dying on the job”
This has a 3 letter acronym in corporate techie circles (Slack and MSFT Teams channels mostly) -> RTO. As in, “don’t even look at working for that miserable company, they are threatening RTO”, etc.
Yes this is ham-fisted way to clean house and lay people off. And yes this is a better way to spy on your employees, ensuring they do nothing useful in the office instead of doing useful nothing at home. But I feel like this is also a ham-fisted way to attempt to go back to pre-pandemic bustling cities full of office workers commuting and spending $$.
https://wolfstreet.com/2024/10/01/epic-office-glut-hits-records-in-san-francisco-atlanta-chicago-los-angeles-seattle-washington-dc-dallas-availability-rate-dips-to-30-houston-rises-to-29/
C’mon, man. Those buggy-whips aren’t going to manufacture themselves. Gotta get that 2019 economy back again.
haha absolutely! Make San Francisco expensive again!
RTO is also used for stealth layoffs.
If construction sites are required (well, at least in Canada) to have a sign indicating number of days since a safety incident and also required to implement stringent workplace health and safety measures, shouldn’t offices be required to do the same?
“It’s been 0 days since a COVID death due to WFO.”
And if someone like me gets COVID, which I haven’t yet, it can ONLY be because I was required to go to the office because I’m still isolating, as is my family. That said, my office is very well ventilated, thankfully, which I think has been helping.
Come to think of it, I wonder what has been happening in the workplace compensation and long and short term disability areas as a result of COVID, have claims gone through the roof at all workplaces?
>Consequences of Nasrallah New Left Review
If the US leaders refuse to call the Israelis to heel, who can? Nasrallah understood Israel better than most. His successor will have to learn fast. The nineteenth-century German philosopher Bruno Bauer once wrote that ‘only he who knows its prey better than it knows itself can defeat it.’
But who is the prey? Are the “US leaders” able to call Israel to heel, or is Israel, like Ukraine, being used to control the ME? Does Israel via. it’s grip on US political/media/economic sectors, control the US leaders? Or are they both one and viewing them as separate a Hegelian dialectical intended to misdirect/confuse?
Are the “US leaders” able to call Israel to heel?
According to Gilbert Doctorow’s latest interview with Nima the Russian view is that the US are all in (regardless of what they say for public consumption)
And that they are sacrificing Israel in a proxy war in the same way that they have sacrificed Ukraine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlfcSi-Rr-s
(annoying sound effects from a neighbour’s power drill makes it harder to hear in the 2nd half but still watchable)
Lee Fang looks at ILA Union leadership and it’s not pretty.
https://open.substack.com/pub/leefang/p/longshoremen-strike-highlights-deep?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=jz47a
The ILA has long been mobbed up: Anthony Anastasio (brother of famous Mob whack-ee Albert Anastasia) led the Brooklyn ILA local for years… then Tony Scotto, Anastasio’s son-in-law, who was juiced into the Democratic Party until he was indicted on racketeering counts in 1979.
They’ve always stood in pretty marked contrast to the West Coast longshore workers (Harry Bridges, Presente!), which has a reputation for financial probity, militant trade unionism and political radicalism.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/03/business/economy/port-strike-union-leader-harold-daggett.html
October 3, 2024
‘They Can’t Survive Too Long’: The Union Boss Who Shut Down the Ports Is Playing Hard Ball
Harold J. Daggett is seeking big raises for longshoremen on the East and Gulf Coasts who have fallen behind workers on the West Coast.
By Peter Eavis
Nearly two decades ago, Harold J. Daggett was accused of being part of the mob’s efforts to control a powerful union, the International Longshoremen’s Association.
He was a midlevel official of the union. After a high-profile trial, a jury acquitted him of fraud and extortion conspiracy, and he joined reveling supporters outside the Brooklyn federal courthouse. Motioning toward the building, he asked onlookers, “What doorway do I have to go through to get my reputation back?”
Now, after 13 years as the union’s president, Mr. Daggett is seeking a different type of victory.
He is leading a strike that began on Tuesday, shutting down most trade at a dozen big ports on the East and Gulf Coasts. The union, whose members move containers and other cargo on and off ships, is demanding much higher wages, improved benefits and limits on labor-saving technology.
Mr. Daggett has cast the strike as a battle against large multinational corporations that earned outsize profits during the pandemic-related supply chain chaos. He has asserted that his 47,000 members have the upper hand because their work is essential to the automakers, retailers and other businesses that depend on the ports.
“We’re going to win this thing,” Mr. Daggett, 78, said on Tuesday, along with an expletive, as members picketed outside a port terminal in New Jersey. “They can’t survive too long.”
Some labor experts say Mr. Daggett is well positioned to get a good deal. “If they stop working, the goods stop moving,” said William Brucher, an assistant professor at the Rutgers School of Management and Labor Relations. “They have real economic power and leverage.”
But for all the bravado on display this week, the question of reputation still hangs over Mr. Daggett.
His style is autocratic, some members say. The union has struggled to match the gains of its counterpart on the West Coast. And questions about organized crime’s influence on the I.L.A. have never been fully resolved…
Meanwhile, in North Carolina…
Experienced pilot rescuing flood victims in NC ordered to stop, threatened with arrest
https://x.com/Breaking911/status/1841554196576759991
and this
This is Johnathan Howard, he’s up there running major rescue operations.
https://x.com/GardensR4Health/status/1841478510889648518
Thanks flora, both of these videos are must watch.
I’ll have you know flora, that those tweets caused me to utter most unchristian-like language in front of my computer. Good thing the wife was elsewhere. The military is still waiting for Title 10 authority still? Really? How many days has it been now since that hurricane hit – about six days now?
The idea that the powers that be don’t want anybody to see just how bad the carnage asada is in NC, is indicative of the wrath wrought.
Just because you have military helicopters on the ground doesn’t mean they necessarily work, as in grounded.
A friend was in the army in West Germany in 1973 when the Yom Kippur war broke out, and he estimated that 3/4’s of the U.S. tanks had been shipped to Israel in a hurry, the cupboard being a bit barren.
Probably the greatest secret that the US has right now is the state of their military inventories and stockpiles of ammo. I’m willing to bet that quite a few weapons depots are now standing empty. That is certainly true of the UK so probably true of the US as well.
‘Suppose they gave a war and nobody had any ammo to bring.’
I certainly would salute the flag of the “People’s Republic of Fulham.”
“carnage asada” LOL!
Once again the mastery of the vocabulary is on point and in full view. Indeed there is carnage! Added today it is 6+ days since lo this carnage was dispensed onto land from the high seas of the Gulf.
I’m personally gonna mark the full seven days since I briefly lost power, tomorrow at 8am Eastern. Nothing prominent or solemn, just a harrumph to myself to start my day.
M60 tanks couldn’t be produced quickly enough to replace tje M60s that were flown out to Israel (Operation Nickel Grass, they called the airlift–not the most efficient way to move tanks, but they wanted it to be fast.) so old M48s were upgunned with 105mm L7 guns to replace them in US inventory for a while.
Up to 1,000 soldiers from Fort Liberty, N.C., will deploy to help get food, water and critical aid to communities still reeling from Hurricane Helene, the Defense Department announced Wednesday…They join roughly 6,500 National Guard troops from a dozen states working on hurricane recovery across the southeast.
…
The Defense Department has also already provided Army and Navy helicopters and crews to move personnel and supplies where roads are not safe, search-and-rescue teams from the Air Force and high-wheeled Army vehicles and crews. The Army Corps of Engineers has sent temporary power teams, route clearance teams, water and wastewater management experts and bridge inspectors.
https://www.stripes.com/branches/army/2024-10-02/military-hurricane-helene-recovery-15382039.html
Good.
Latest update (yesterday) from Congressman Edwards office.
https://edwards.house.gov/media/press-releases/hurricane-helene-update-5-congressman-edwards
Seeing as how government knew hurricane was coming, article above, then immediately sent Tennessee and Georgia National Guards to defend favored people’s border elsewhere, and most enraging, “Mayorkas Says FEMA Will Run Out of Funds Before Hurricane Season is Over; Agency Spent $640.9 Million on Noncitizens in 2024” link below.
Maybe Biden Harris are resurrecting the old McCarthy saying
“Better dead than Red” after all these damned people are just Trump voters?
FEMA’s shelter and services program is a prime offender, “providing “financial support to non-federal entities to provide humanitarian services to noncitizen migrants following their release from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The intent is to support CBP in the safe, orderly and humane release of noncitizen migrants from short-term holding facilities.”
https://www.fema.gov/grants/shelter-services-program#totals
Three Southern Area Incident Management Teams are reportedly mobilizing, per NIFC’s daily situation report. This is too little and way too late.
A half-dozen of these teams should have been ordered up and directed to stage while the storm grew to Cat 3 and was still well offshore. The western fire season has been winding down for weeks and there are still plenty of seasonal resources available, but from what I can determine it seems none have yet been ordered. These crews spend the summer cutting down trees clearing vegetation in terrain similar to Appalachia.
This looks like a total failure on the part of FEMA and “Biden”.
Since no real investigation will ever take place and the only people who will suffer the consequences are the victims, I will offer three interlinked explanations: (1) General decline in competence resulting from the boomers’ total failure to train their successors or prepare government agencies for their retirements, (2) General decline in competence due to manic DEI hiring which has, in the case of the Forest Service, helped produce a $750m budget hole, (3) Systemic hatred of poor white people that is the essence of Anglo-American globalism.
Each large U.S. military unit has an emergency preparedness liaison officer (EPLO). Trained in how to marshal his unit’s assets.
The process is for the governor to go to FEMA who start the process to get federal/military support. The state adjutant general coordinates with the military once actions approved.
Seems somewhere between governor and FEMA things got slow.
Maybe no one is trained for FEMA response.
I was an EPLO for a time in late 1990’s. Never was “tasked”, thankful!
Not to worry, Biden/Kamala have promised $750 to residents to help rebuild and get through this natural disaster (although they may not get it too soon, still waiting for that promised $600 Covid check).
What if Biden/Kamala say that they will give that $750 to residents to help rebuild and get through this natural disaster – just as soon as they are re-elected. If you remember, that is what they said about that $600.
That is trending on Twitter. Bunch of tweets showing how much money we gave to wars while only $750 for victims of the hurricane. Not a good look. For those paying attention, we remember East Palestine, the Hawaii fires, and now this. Shouldn’t be surprised at all.
It seems increasingly obvious they don’t care about us.
It’s incredible when you think about it. The election is only about a month away and yet they cannot resist the urge to give Americans only pocket change while they send tens of billions of dollars to the Ukraine and Israel. It is in their own vital self-interest to be generous with aid and help and yet they simply can’t do it.
Has Sherrod Brown been to Scioto County (poverty rate 24%) where a state of emergency has been called following Helene? I know Gov. DeWine has.
The Dems obviously don’t care about Ohio. We have not forgotten East Palestine. We will remember the lack of help after Helene as well.
If only Twitter were the country as a whole; maybe this resonates with voters in a few key swing states, the only people that matter, and even then only during the final stages of an election year!
I’m in Ohio, but I talk to a bunch of PMC people from Michigan as well. The flooding is not even on their radar. Not even mentioned. They are all in a tizzy about the election and their hatred of Trump. His guy, the union leader of the port strike is calling this strike so they run out of toilet paper. But worse, he is going to hurt the economy, therefore the democrats, in order to get Trump elected. IOW, they could care less, and the flooded people are probably Trumpers anyway so who cares.
They live in their own created bubble and that’s how they roll.
Yearly defense spending has now reached $1.052 trillion:
https://apps.bea.gov/iTable/?reqid=19&step=2&isuri=1&categories=survey#eyJhcHBpZCI6MTksInN0ZXBzIjpbMSwyLDNdLCJkYXRhIjpbWyJjYXRlZ29yaWVzIiwiU3VydmV5Il0sWyJOSVBBX1RhYmxlX0xpc3QiLCI1Il1dfQ==
September 26, 2024
Defense spending was 57.1% of federal government consumption and
investment in April through June 2024. *
$1,051.5 / $1,842.2 = 57.1%
Defense spending was 21.3% of all government consumption and
investment in April through June 2024.
$1,051.5 / $4,943.0 = 21.3%
Defense spending was 3.6% of GDP in April through June 2024.
$1,051.5 / $29,016.7 = 3.6%
* Billions of dollars
We had something similar, if a bit longer delayed happen in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Roughly speaking, turf wars between ‘local’ “officials” and “organizations” and outsiders who came in and donated real services and materials were ignited by the ‘local’ powers trying, and eventually succeeding, to monopolize rescue and supply operations after the disaster. The local powers demonstrated that, if something useful could not be placed under their direct control, then the effected people got nothing.
Next up, the locals in Appalachia should look long and hard at the “recovery” efforts proposed by the “official” actors. A stealth power grab and economic consolidation by the upper income elites happened after Katrina on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. The same might happen in Appalachia. Watch closely any proposals about “upgrading” building codes, police and fire department “rules,” and tax rates and definitions.
I hesitate to say this, but in such chaotic conditions, legal remedies for such power grabs are non-existent. By the time the people find out about and prepare to fight the power grabs, it is already too late. The law changes will be already in effect, and often weaponized to suppress popular outrage. The only recourse then will be ‘illegal’ methods.
Stay safe. Stack deep.
If I lived in the US, I would be very loath to donate to any special appeals by the American Red Cross for money for those victims-
https://slate.com/business/2017/08/dont-give-money-to-the-red-cross-we-need-a-new-way.html
We are giving money to our church. The national body. They have boots on the ground, facilities (if left standing) everywhere and were already instrumental in helping family members
I would never dream of giving a dime to the Red Cross or other national non profits. I have seen with my own eyes the waste in the organizations and I want the money to go to the victims not the 60% or more skim these organizations take off the top. Non profit and all that.
Which denomination, may I ask?
For me and mine, it is Unitarian Universalist.
In NC, the Baptists typically coordinate church-based relief efforts (including protestants and other denominations) They were rebuilding in eastern NC for several years after Hugo hit (20-25 years ago). Here’s what they’ve set up to date for Helene relief. Baptists are by far the largest religious group in the Carolinas.
During the aftermath of Sandy here in the NY metro region, the word got out pretty quickly that the Red Cross was useless. It was, yes, local groups that imo did the most. One of my favorite things was something that grew up from some Occupy Wall Street veterans, Occupy Sandy.
Wikipedia on Occupy Sandy
Their successful social media methods might not be as useful to church and community groups now as they were then, but at the time it really did help connect people who wanted to help provide what was really needed and wanted using social media.
yes.
and remember 9/11?
the police and firefighters in pitched battle, literally–historically mutual enemies in ordinary times–as they ran up against each other while frantically trying to rescue that elusive one more survivor in that unsurmountable pile of rubble.
rescue work in any large-scale disaster is traumatizing.
things go wrong and people act out. some more than others.
not defending anyone, just, this is human reality.
shock doctrine will be applied, i doubt not, i would not say might be, post-helene.
simultaneously, i’m now realizing, watching helene, remembering 9/11, katrina, it is another human reality that often (not always) in disastrous situations, many people pitch in on the ground to help their neighbors, and strangers, in whatever way they can. people seem to me to be able to organize themselves and get help moving remarkably quickly. this response is as automatic for some people as going into defense/control mode is for others.
as the disasters come more often and get bigger and worse, it will become more and more clear to everyone who reacts with helping, who reacts with stupid power grabbing/clinging. i do want to remember that the 99 percent are many and many will help. and many of them will have had no such plan, no idea beforehand that they were going to.
We were in Asheville earlier this year, selling MIL’s house, and met so many nice people. Here’s a reply we got from a neighbor, and a recommendation for donations.
Take with a generous dose of salt but doesn’t seem too outlandish that you need to be on a “preferred vendor list” to participate in helping victims.
https://x.com/ryantyre/status/1841583311782568064
Mild disagreement, but the pilot was licensed and fully trained. Was he supposed to leave him teenager son / co-pilot there and just return back to the airport?
This was on local news, not far from where I am in South Carolina. Not a good look ( my opinion only ) for local based rescue efforts especially when one considers that Chimney Rock and the town of Lake Lure were practically obliterated from earth, hyperbole intentional.
There are multiple efforts ongoing now from airports both local and further away. There was a feature on those efforts where small or light aircraft, by example in Concord, NC, were basing their charitable runs to varied locations
added here is the more official news story I alluded to above
https://www.qcnews.com/news/investigations/sc-pilot-flying-volunteer-supply-and-rescue-missions-ordered-out-of-lake-lure-under-arrest-threat/
I’m anti-preferred vendor list :). The link I posted was geared more towards food/water/etc rather than pilots (i’m skeptical about the link but i also wouldn’t be shocked).
I’m glad they are allowing rather than denying small aircraft now, what they did to that pilot was atrocious and I’d assume it was just a local official who was overwhelmed.
You are giving the Firechief too much credit. He is supposed to train for dealing with disasters of all sorts, much less fires. His acting out there was a classic case of ego rage. If he could not be in control, then he will cast out the transgressors. Since the flooding had just demonstrated to him that he was definitely not in control, he lashed out at someone who he thought that he could control and thus salve his bruised pride.
People like that are what Hannah Arendt probably meant when she wrote those famous words; the banality of evil.
I’ll shut up now. This is making me recall all of the “less than civilized” persons, many of them “officials,” who bedeviled our lives after Katrina. It still makes me angry.
Appreciate that response, and in particular why I opened the above comment with the “mildly” disagreeing disclaimer…And back to this pilot story and the arc of the news reached full circle on the same news network last evening.
I’ll plan some time today to share more and hopefully post that interview between the reporter and the Lake Lure town official. I will not defend the aforementioned fire / EMS official but this is a very small town, emphasizing the small part.
Lake Lure, NC town government website is incredibly basic in appearances, but they do have press releases preceding and after the storm
If western NC showed up blue on the voting map, do you think we would see the same delays and foot dragging, with election day a month away?
Probably. Now if it were in a swing state…
That’s the point. NC is one. But if turnout in the western mountain region is low, it no longer is.
To slow global warming, could methane be stripped from the air?. In a word, “No”.
Articles like that are making me hate scientists and engineers.
My Brother in Christ, just consume less. You can’t engineer your way out of these problems. It’s like Godel’s Incompleteness Theorem… you’ll have to keep inventing systems outside the current one in order to solve/explain it… ad infinitum.
Billions of chimps who are fiending for that black gold. Can’t kick the habit because they’ll die of withdrawals…
Don’t hate on scientists and engineers. They’re just doing what they do, trying to figure things out.
Our elected on the other hand… when’s the last time you heard any of them talking about conservation/use reduction?
Ahh mrsyk, I had thought you realized.
Their “trying to figure things out” only aids and abets Business as Usual.
Only when BAU changes will we see meaningful progress towards rejuvenating our dying planet.
Until then, scientists and engineers are the “yes men”
IDK, you certainly appeal to my black heart. I won’t disagree. There’s a legion of yes men (and women!) amongst them, and they indeed “aid and abet”. I’m not ready to cast the entire guild under the bus quite yet, and, despite the odds, I would be pretty fu**ing excited if one of them pulls off a miracle and saves our sorry asses.
You do have to a go to an ABET certified college to get a PE license.
Articles like that have nothing to do with scientists and engineers, and everything to do with the managerial class. Misplacing your hate makes you part of the problem.
Pfft. Everyone is part of the problem, Funny Guy.
As an engineer (formerly scientist) myself, I can say with great certainty we are part of the problem.
Pfft. Not everyone is part of the problem.
As an engineer (formerly scientist) myself, I can say with great certainty I was never part of the problem.
In my book, anyone who ever got Amaz*n ship his/her order FREE is the part of the problem.
I’m not saying that you did, though.
You make a good point, but I’m thinking gravy is merely frustrated and not “part of the problem”.
Like I wrote, mis-directing that frustration is part of the problem, and only aids and abets Business as Usual. Maybe it’s all Putin’s fault.
“You can’t engineer your way out of these problems.”
The scientifically literate will find “consume less” is suspiciously similar to an engineered solution, with multiple benefits too, and certainly part of potential solutions arising from human agency–one way or another–not just facile moral displays or uncontrolled psychological manifestations or authoritarian followership motivated by sigmoidal biological phenomena.
We imagine a representative political economy would be more rational, humane and adaptive.
Who might be willing to engineer such a thing? A very bloody project, that.
Yours, In the Blood of the Sacred Christ.
There is a difference between what most people think of as “consume less” versus what we here call “radical conservation” which means widespread and very large reductions in energy and resource use.
Sometimes the individual can “consume less”. Sometimes the individual can’t.
Restoring America’s whole lost system of passenger trains, trolleys and streetcars would allow people to reduce driving-based gas-consumption by increasing mass-transit-based less-gas-consumption. But as of right now, you can’t take the train where no train goes. Or trolley or streetcar either.
>Why Is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon?
Because Stanley Kubrick passed away…just kidding (or maybe not).
Heh.
In my view it’s a combination of the roots of the program (especially in Ares and that misbegotten kludge of a rocket) and decades of incentivizing progress and not results.
It’s why over two decades after I worked on a Mars Sample Return proposal as an ISU intern at Boeing HSF&E the U.S. is still working on MSR. We don’t really have a strategy for our space efforts, other than Mars, for which the Moon is seen as an annoying diversion.
China does have a strategy, that of looking for energy & resources on the Moon to better their tribe. The same reason humanity has always used to go over that next hill. I made myself a bit of a Moon expert after ISU, and they’re not wrong. I even have a modicum of respect for their efforts; they tell us what they’re going to do in the next five years and then they, you know, do it.
China has a moon mission? They have a space station!? That’s was a friend’s puzzled question to me recently to me In MSM clogo-sphere (you read it here first), information that deals with the advances/successes of other countries is sure to get clogged up before it gets through to a the general population. Just like most never see what a Chinese city really looks like.
A reader gave a link to an article about the whole Artemis program and it was a shocker so I hope that reader pipes up and claims credit for linking to it originally-
https://idlewords.com/
Simply unbelievable. By the time Artemis gets to the Moon, they will be able to stay at the Chinese Hilton already there.
Beautiful dynamite job on the Artemis Moon program. What a joke the US crewed space program is.
If there is a second race to the moon, it’s the Chinese racing against themselves.
The side note about the launch pad is more serious than it appears. Because the actual upper stage (EUS) of the SLS is taller than the current mobile launch tower, they have to redesign and completely reconstruct the whole thing. Twice. And the cost overruns on both of them are absolutely horrendous. Legend has it Siemens told a steel supplier it would need steel without actually committing to buying that steel, so when it came time to order that capacity was already taken (and if rumors are true, taken by SpaceX as it builds other launch towers).
Quick correction: I misremembered Siemens for Bechtel. If you want a more informed discussion of the topic, check out a post on Casey Handmer’s blog.
I should have added this. On that page is an illustration named ‘An early SpaceX rendering of the Human Landing System, with the Apollo Lunar Module added for scale.’ The Human Landing ship is as big as a tall building. More to the point, it triggered a memory. Here is an excerpt from the series “From the Earth to the Moon” so watch the segment at least from about the 2:00 minute mark-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMe7dRoPRVU (3:27 mins)
Pro quoll cool on the antidote, love the nose and spots on that beastie~
I’m reasonably sure that, in my younger days, I saw several of those beasties after a night of drinking and other ‘recreational’ ingestions.
Al Jazeera have (has?) released a long (1hr21min) investigative feature
https://youtu.be/kPE6vbKix6A
This feature length investigation by Al Jazeera’s Investigative Unit exposes Israeli war crimes in the Gaza Strip through the medium of photos and videos posted online by Israeli soldiers themselves during the year long conflict.
The I-Unit has built up a database of thousands of videos, photos and social media posts. Where possible it has identified the posters and those who appear.
The material reveals a range of illegal activities, from wanton destruction and looting to the demolition of entire neighbourhoods and murder.
The film also tells the story of the war through the eyes of Palestinian journalists, human rights workers and ordinary residents of the Gaza Strip. And it exposes the complicity of Western governments – in particular the use of RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus as a base for British surveillance flights over Gaza.
“The west cannot hide, they cannot claim ignorance. Nobody can say they didn’t know,” says Palestinian writer, Susan Abulhawa.This is “the first livestream genocide in history … If people are ignorant they are wilfully ignorant,” she says
Powerful article by Steven Salaita, can’t find anything to disagree with. Zionism must be dustbinned like every other fascism.
>America’s Strategy of Renewal Antony J. Blinken, Foreign Affairs
We were similarly clear-eyed when it came to blah blah blah…
Appropriately this article was subsumed under Guillotine Watch. Blinken certainly has an interesting biography, and I’m not talking about the one on Wiki.
Blinken’s wife has an interesting biography, too. Among other things, she is the granddaughter of James J. Rowley, the head of the Secret Service from 1961-1973 (some rather important years). You won’t find that information on her Wiki page.
Now, that’s interesting. I never heard that before. The incestuous nature of TPTB rivals ancient Egypt. Thank you for the information, Lena. I always appreciate your posts.
What’s Tony smoking?
We’re involved in a proxy war with Russia, Israel is committing blatant genocide with U.S. supplied weapons, the Middle East is a powder keg, there’s endless blathering about war with China, we’re sanctioning a third of the countries on earth, more countries are joining BRICS every year, and we’re closer to nuclear war than anytime since the Cuban missile crisis, yet here’s Tony Blinken attempting to convince us that their disastrous neoconservative foreign policy has been some kind of grand achievement. If this is success, I’d sure hate to see what failure looks like.
It’s all of a piece with that other clown, Sullivan, and his ill-timed publication written late last September crowing about how the Middle East is “quieter than ever.”
Idiots, all of them.
Re The Town Meeting–key takeaway
“the Ingles was back open”
Wish mine was. Seriously though the key info may be that I-40 is open to the east and the governor has said that residents can also flee via I-26 to the south even if rubberneckers coming up the other side of the highway are unwelcome. So while a crisis exists, those with somewhere else to go–probably the wealthier residents–can go there.
As for the notion that life without power or cellphones is bizarre, those of us who go camping for just such an experience are somewhat unmoved. The real crisis is not having access to those groceries and of course water.
We all may need to become a little bit prepper given a climate worsening that we all have contributed to. It sounds like Black Mountain is handling it.
since all this started, ive been wondering: is this the same Black Mountain in Black Mountain Manifesto?
as for learning to live without the modern world…as i keep saying…it can be done…but it aint in any way easy, and cant be just started up on the fly.
ie: learn how to build a fire in the wet woods when you do not NEED to.
etc.
Yes–once home to a famous artist’s colony.
I don’t think it’s connected to the Dark Mountain Manifesto.
It was, however, the home of Black Mountain College.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Mountain_College
Ooh, civil rights!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Mountain_poets
Architects were there too and it played a role in “from Bauhaus to our house.”
And there is this Black Mountain…
https://youtu.be/CcNF-bmDLbU?si=Z1jC9llhSTsn9Zto
I saw them in Seattle. They rock!
And possibly an occasional source cited here on the post-Soviet world, Black Mountain Analysis?
https://bmanalysis.substack.com/
Here in the Isles, the Black Mountains are in Wales but the Black Mountain is in Ireland: the big one behind Belfast, pinning the city to the sea….
I think the novel “Shaman” by Kim Stanley Robinson starts that way, with a pleistocene adolescent being examined for adulthood, by having to survive by himself for days and having to start a fire in very wet conditions…
Bewildering technology…
I have a book called “Tunnel in the Sky” by Robert A. Heinlein. In this novel, the only people that are allowed to have positions of any sort of profession on alien planets must first pass a 2 – 10 day survival test. They can take any gear they want and can be sent to an ice field, an alien planet, an African savanna or anywhere to test them out. So you have a hyper-advanced society but which insists that its young be tested in survival basics before going out to the stars-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_in_the_Sky
It’s a good book.
One of Heinlein’s best young adult novels. Read it again for the umpteenth time during the pandemic, and it was even better than remembered.
And featured as the site of the post-EMP devastation (plausibly non-fiction) novels of Prof. William Forstchen One Second After and its 3 sequels. Whether the derivative mini-series with laundered and coiffed handsome actors is made before the real thing occurs is TBD.
Huge blow to motorists who face fuel price hikes if Middle East conflict rages on No shit. From the department of “Least of our worries”.
Crude is up a little over 5% today as I type this.
Long time lurker, but first time poster.
In relation to the article on expats leaving Hong Kong is an interesting one by Kit Klarenberg about the influx of Hong Kongers into Shenzen.
Thought I would post it even though the article is from back in May.
http://www.kitklarenberg.com/p/cia-hong-kong-agitators-reject-revolution
“In relation to the article on expats leaving Hong Kong…”
A fine retrospective.article, for which I am grateful. Just now there is a long PBS program being repeatedly shown in America on the Hong Kong effort at color revolution. The effort will not come again with the simple adoption in Hong Kong of a national security law, but the funding evidently remains.
Recommended Substack article by USA east coast based geopolitical analyst,
Marat Khairullin (https://x.com/RealKhairullin)
on the functionaries that Putin strongly relies upon & the post SMO border possibilities.
Russia’s Ukrainian Dilemma
https://maratkhairullin.substack.com/p/you-cant-give-it-away-and-you-cant?publication_id=2099482&post_id=149737760&isFreemail=true&r=35fvyq&triedRedirect=true
This winding LA highway is notoriously treacherous. Extreme weather is making it worse Guardian
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Grapevine is no biggie normally, but add inclement weather and over 4,000 feet altitude at tallest vine, and things get dicey quick. That road don’t look good in snow, and the SoCalist movement isn’t used to frozen goods.
A few miles from the highest point on the Grapevine lies Fort Tejon, an ideal bathroom stop and your chance to see a circa mid 19th century military fort, once the location of the United States Camel Corps for 6 months, in 1860.
https://forttejon.org/camel.html
Fun fact – Tejon is the Spanish word for a badger.
You don’t want to mess with a badger.
When I saw the title, I assumed they were talking about the Pasadena Freeway. I always thought it was was the first “freeway” and when built, was anticipating cars going 50 mph. Of course for a long time, cars have been going 70+. Those curves are tricky at that speed. Then, add a bit of ice and or snow and, oh my.
Grapevine is no biggie. Driven it many times both as a person and as a delivery driver. Its grade is steep so people on it are already are aware, cautious, and have their “heads up”. If you have trouble, you just get in the “trucker’s lane” where speeds can be as little as 30 mph.
“Tricky” is an understatement … right-angle entrance non-ramp from essentially full stop. Maybe that’s why every second car in Pasadena is an EV! Ludicrous mode indeed.
I thought they were going to talk about the Los Angeles Crest Hughway
Ukrainian heritage (more or less in its entirety):
– red & black flag
– blue & yellow flag
– a fork
– F-16
– fleeing to Canada
You think that people would get upset if somebody spread that Winnipeg jets logo on social media – but with the Ukrainian Trident removed and replaced by a Nazi Swastika?
Yea. It would be bad PR, because the narrative is that Putin is new Hitler. They have to use the dog whistle. In the article it says that the patterns are tinted in blue and yellow reflecting on the colours of the Ukrainian flag. It has to leave out that the patterns tinted in red and black are reflecting on the colours of the other Ukrainian flag, but every Banderite knows (and anti-Banderite too). Swastika in public is still considered not kosher, and is functionally replaced by a fork. Somene should write a book about all the “heraldic gymnastics” done in order to make Nazi symbolism more palatable to idiots.
Here is an example of what you mean.
https://www.crwflags.com/fotw/flags/lb%7Dssnp.html#:~:text=The%20flag%20shows%20the%20party%27s%20emblem%2C%20a%20red,party%20values%20of%20freedom%2C%20duty%2C%20discipline%20and%20power.
There used to be a findable website or wiki or something showing many many such symbols
for many many such movement . . . Svoboda, Pravy Sektor, Azov, and many others from all over the world. I have no idea how or where to find that general guide to the Notzi Swassikas of the world.
Yes. As ignorant of history as most Canadians are, they likely would notice that. If anything, Toronto and Montreal fans would be delighted to dream up insults about the “NAZI” Jets.
They might not care about the politics but hockey is SERIOUS.
More seriously I wonder if the Jets may get some kickback.
There is a big one (part of Ukrainian heritage) that people don’t want to remember: a lot of “Ukrainians” have always thought themselves Russian–just glancing over the top officials’ names in Russia today, you can spot a lot of “Ukrainian” names. Of course, funnily, the West is rebranding them (well, at least the ones from the past) as “Ukrainian.”
re: “This Winding LA Highway…”
One time years ago, “I was headed up (coming down) that Grapevine hill, passing cars like they was standin’ still!” (Look it up if you don’t remember. Commander Cody version, I think).
No, really. I was. The actual Grapevine, I think, is the north end of the Tejon Pass where it descends into the San Joaquin Valley. It goes on for about 10 miles at a pretty steep grade, like 10 or 12%. I was coming down that thing in my little car one night when my brakes went out. I think I hadn’t realized how little I needed to use them to avoid them getting hot. I had to just coast down it, engine braking only, at about 75-80 mph. I had to zip in and out of traffic, passing the left lane traffic on the right, and stuff, for several miles. The angel for dip-s!!! drivers watched over me and my unsuspecting fellow travelers.
Cool story!
Covid XEC:
“Vaccines remain the best defence against serious illness, hospitalisation, and even death, even if they may not completely prevent infection.”
LOL!
It really has become very tiring. And very concerning all at the same time.
Now their statements have become logically incongruent within the same paragraph.
The regular citizens are noticing this too.
Yes, regular citizens do notice, all of it. The lies, the omissions, etc. Case in point, the local five and dime store now sells IVM, horsey version. I haven’t been able, but hubby can now get IVM via prescription. Brother is hiding IVM in a back closet from his wife. He reads and lives by the NYT but when he got Covid, snuck himself some paste and was well in a couple days. At least he believes in IVM now but still races to get vaxxed. His wife, who thinks Fauchi is the livin’ end, has a “sore throat” for going on the second week. Tested three times but “doesn’t have Covid”.
I think people who were dooped by the propaganda have a real hard time believing otherwise. But the truth eventually gets out.
You can order it without a prescription from pharmacies in TN, and they’ll ship it; you don’t have to live in TN, either.
I tired doing this but was unable to find a pharmacy that would do it. Can you recommend one?
We get ours from Heartland Apothecary in Knoxville, TN https://heartlandapothecaryrx.com/ Don’t know if they will have supply chain issues due to Helene.
Thank you!
The best stash is the injections bottle, imo. Easy to meter out the dose with a syringe. Lasts for a serious treatment or two to a few people.
Did you ever live through a polio epidemic?
NO? I thought so.
Biden: Congress ‘may have to’ come back to approve Helene relief Politico
BREAKING:
US government – the same one that is $35 trillion in debt – is afraid to spend money it doesn’t have.
They really are trying to start an armed rebellion, aren’t they?
I wonder why money cannot be redirected from one bucket to another, i.e. from project Ukraine or maybe all those 5000 pound bunker bombs meant for Netanyahu’s personal genocide campaign could be recalled, and the Pentagon funds transferred to FEMA.
Of course, I’m sure that Biden, “Freeze Frame” McConnell, UpChuck Schumer, and Mini-Mike Johnson would claim some legal reason why that can’t be done … arcane House rules or something.
Funny how they suddenly rediscover rules when they suit their needs, and not those of the ‘mercan people.
They might be able to organize something but then the Senate Parliamentarian would strike it down on technical grounds.
Low-level comptroller types have “Anti-deficiency Act” drilled into them. It is the start of FY25 under a continuing resolution which the comptrollers will have to decide what obligations are allowed. Sure, someone high enough could say “do it, and we’ll find a funding document later” but bureaucratic institutions don’t really select for that kind of leader, though my experience is the “go to” guy is the one who can work the system.
“I wonder why money cannot be redirected from one bucket to another…”
They can do it when they want to.
US Govt gets creative like that in order to “borrow” from Social Security.
Oops! There went the surplus! Which allows the various SocSec haters and “reform and repeal it” propagandists to say ” it is unsustainable” and “underfunded.”
The response to Helene reminds me of Plunkitt of Tammany Hall. I recall Plunkitt talking about the response to a fire that burns down a home in his ward. He said that he would be the first person there and would provide for the residents’ needs. He said that the party didn’t matter but that it would still benefit the party because it helped to create the perception that the party delivered for its constituents. Leaving aside my issues with machine politics, I think it’s a good reminded that the purpose of government and elected officials is to deliver for their citizens.
Bad responses show incompetence and/or indifference on behalf of the government, which is bad politics, but also undermines belief in the government. Looking at responses to Helene, COVID, the situation at the border, the conduct of wars in Ukraine and Israel, can anyone argue that people in the bureaucracy are competent?
That wasn’t only Plunkett but all the ward bosses as well. Their job was to help people whose homes had been burned down, who just got off the boat from Europe, whose wife was about to deliver and needed a midwife, a person that needed a job, etc. They provided material benefits for people and in return those people delivered their votes to Tammany Hall. You had the same sort of thing too in Kansas over a century ago. Imagine that. Providing material benefits for voters. I do believe that when people in the US register as Democrats or Republicans, then both parties feel safe ignoring them as their votes are already locked up.
The important caveat for the Plunkitt story is that he really did deliver the aid, not just “pretend.” He called it “honest graft” and that’s the honest part. The graft part is elsewhere–the machines were big on not “grafting” at the expense of the masses (at least not so directly), as well as making sure that they were providing the real benefits.
The trouble with the politicians today is that they are not only “pretending,” but pretending very badly. Of course, there’s a good reason for that: the machines wanted to convince the “little people” that they were their friends and you can’t convince people of their goodwill just by pretending to do something for them–proof of pudding and all that. Modern politicians don’t care about the “little people”: they just want to convince the PMC that they are doing things for the little people. The PMC don’t know and don’t really care if these programs actually work all that well–they just want to feel good about themselves. (e.g. the bit about ACA posted by Socal Rhino on the VP debate page)
I always wondered how this changed, and one hunch I have is that this is driven partly by turnout patterns and perception of what “policy” means. It used to be that, for most people, the proof of “policy” was in its outcomes–this is one important reason why everyone had to be in Social Security: unless everyone was on the receiving end of the “policy,” they wouldn’t know what it does. Nowadays, “policy” is for other people. it is abstract, distant, and symbolic. How it works doesn’t matter and, to be frank, the whole thing is “waste” anyways in the sense that it doesn’t affect you (mostly the PMC)–so, whether “knowingly” or not, you sabotage the program so that it is very difficult to actually use (and divert the benefits mostly to your friends along the way). Now, this “you” doesn’t really need to be the PMC in principle, I suppose, but in practice, political participation is a leisure activity for many and the workingpeople could not afford to participate in politics much for, well, pretty much forever. They need organizations to actively mobilize them–thus the machines, unions, and so forth.
Now, it’s worth remembering that, at the turn of the 20th century, the working people turned to “populists” and machines, while the well-to-do became “Progressives,” who hated both machines and populists. It seems that not much has changed a century plus hence.
I think the other big aspect is how the parties are funded. In the time of Tammany Hall, the machine expected kickbacks from everyone who got a job or contract because of them so there was a material incentive for the party to win. It was the source of their graft.
In contemporary politics, the parties (or machines) make money off fundraising and advertising, incentivizing them to do as much as both as possible. I’m seeing tons of advertisements from Harris asking for money. Massachusetts is not in play and money for more spending is the explicit purpose of them. My understanding is that consultants get a cut of the TV and internet spend so increasing advertisement is in their interest. In addition, they might be able to able to raise more money if their party wins than loses.
I’m not sure the voters get anything out of the modern arrangement, and a part of me thinks it might be better if the people were paid for their votes. That’s how little I think of the modern arrangement.
There is something that one of my senior collegues said at an academic conference very casually back in the days when I was in academia that I just couldn’t believe: how to people learn about the state of the economy? from the news.
Really? That’s not the lived experience from myself, my parents and relatives, and my old neighbors. They learned it from the prices that they saw for groceriess, gas, and other things, and whether their neighbors still had jobs or not. But, if you see politics as the product of “advertising,” then this makes sense. You “advertise” to the people who don’t have direct experience with the outcomes. You advertise that things are good to people who don’t face the direct consequences of policy. So, maybe, there are people who don’t know that $1 bag of sliced bread exists (true story from some article that I saw in a twitter exchange several years ago–the person whose article was retweeted asked, rhetorically, where do you find a loaf of bread under $5 (or something like that)?) So you get the electoral universe you describe when the government is distant and symbolic to a lot of people–we know it exists, and does stuff for “other people,” but we don’t think it affects us. I suppose, an ideal Republican universe where the government has indeed become an abonimal snowman, I guess (that we may already have arrived at). So, to the voters who “matter” (i.e. are being advertised to), government becomes a symbolic plaything, something whose workings are tinkered for their vanity (and I’m talking about both Republicans and Democrats in this category). But the people who actually need government rather often, this is a path to hell. The recourse by the PMC who don’t think they need government for much, then, is to declare them a problem and shut them up, and so goes the cycle of campaigns that depend largely on “advertising” about things that are symbolic, distant, and irrelevant.
As I understand it, similar on the ground competence at getting things done and providing concrete material benefits to the people is at the root of the rise of Hamas and Hezbollah as political entities in Gaza and Lebanon respectively.
The Charles Hugh Smith article needs to be read as background to the crises we are facing. I’ve been saying for at least a decade that reform in the US is impossible because the System rewards corruption and incompetence. This comes from the saying we had in the consultant community in Washington “no good deed goes unpunished.” Eventually, people who mean well are gradually purged and careerists and their various networks are rewarded. Trust in the authorities is going down (not fast enough for me though) and it follows that it is hard to trust each other since, one might assume, that everyone is out for themselves–this is an impossible situation for social cohesion. We didn’t really believe in what George Carlin said many years ago, i.e., “the system is rigged” and it was then and is even more so now.
Snippet for those who didn’t have time for the article about the best hurricane forecasts being held back from the public for the benefit of private insurers.
There’s probably a Trump video with a similar proposal, in keeping with his policy of going back and forth about whether he knows or cares about P2025 but also always supporting everything in it whenever he needs or wants to.
Regarding going back and forth, be aware the both Trump and he authors of the P2025 have stated many times that Trump has nothing to do with that paper. Seems that many people have fallen for the Dem propaganda that Trump is associated with P2025 – he isn’t. Classic talking point used many times and convincing people of a falsehood (AKA lie).
I can only assume that the Bill Gates article was written by someone angling for a job at the foundation. The (family blog) kissing was almost off the charts, along with an overwhelming techno-optimism.
This quote stood out, and I think sums it up, talking about reducing demand for energy to combat warming. “Only capitalist incentives combined with activism would encourage people to make these sacrifices, which is why it’s especially important to invest, as Gates does, in new startups that promise to make money.”
Most startups lose money. “New startups” is redundant and should be reported to the squad squad.
https://x.com/MyLordBebo/status/1841480861356621929
“Invasion”
“Intervention”
“Limited ground operation”
Colonel Wilkerson (on Nima’s podcast) was talking about an enormous ground force being allocated to this operation. I am curious at the number od men and equipment that will be involved in (and lost in) this “limited ground operation.” If you already massed troops, can you go back after a bloody nose or two, pretend you meant very little, and pull them back without committing them, without losing credibility?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
He went out war hunting with his elephantine MIC funds
In case of Congress he always kept mum
He’s the all American aviator glasses wearing mother’s son
All the children sing
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Deep in Persia where the mighty menace lies
Joe and his AIPAC adjutants were taken by surprise
So Bibi & the IDF zapped them right between the eyes, Zap!
All the children sing
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
His children asked him if to kill was not a sin
“Not when they looked so fierce”, Jill butted in
“If looks could kill it would have been Hamas instead of him”
All the children sing
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
Hey, Genocide Joe
How many had to go
Genocide Joe?
The Continuing Story of Bungalow Bill, by the Beatles
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J39DC9t0I5o
re: U.S. Jewish Institutions Are Purging Their Staffs of Anti-Zionists In These Times
I suspect this was happening well before Oct 7th, the article unfortunately makes it seem as if it’s been happening since that date in particular. Also, not even limited to Jewish institutions or Jews.
Look at how an obscure Jewish donor named David E. Spiro blocked the hiring of a leading human rights scholar Valentina Azarova at University of Toronto, bypassing the recommendation of the hiring committee, and after she had been confirmed, because one of her published papers *seemed* to suggest support for Palestinian rights. This was in 2020. This is only what we’re able to see, imagine what we’re not seeing. Apparently University of Toronto administrators clear decisions with donors first.
The New Yorker version of the story:
https://archive.ph/0JnzK
So even as organizations are setting up processes to ensure bias-free hiring as a way to reduce discrimination in hiring practices, here is one university at least where the administration did the opposite, perpetuating a bias in the process and giving hate the final decision. Against academic freedom and freedom of belief and expression.
There probably needs to be a way to track Zionist donors in the same way we track white supremacists and sex offenders.
Rep. Paul Findley wrote a book about this many years ago, called They Dare To Speak Out. At least one of the chapters was about how a whole post WWII generation of liberal zionist Jewish organization leaders for Peace with Palestine back when Yasser Arafat himself was still alive were all steadily purged and burned from organizations which they had led, and were then “unpersonised” after that by the Revisionist Zionist and Likudian types as they conducted their Long March through the Jewish Institutions and Organizations.
That was when different flavors of zionism supported different approaches to peace.
Paul Findley talked at length to some of those purged and burned and unpersonised former Institution and Organization leaders about how and why they got purged and burned and unpersonised from the Institutions and the Organizations and the community.
Here is an image of a super-limited handful of pages from the book itself as a taste and a teaser.
https://archive.org/details/theydaretospeako00find/mode/2up
Here is another such link. It might be to a pdf of the whole book. But they want my email. When I have more drive and initiative, I might see if a fake made-up email might be good enough for them.
https://www.perlego.com/sign-up
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/03/us/politics/liz-cheney-kamala-harris.html
October 3, 2024
Liz Cheney will campaign with Harris at the birthplace of the Republican Party.
By Nicholas Nehamas and Reid J. Epstein
Vice President Kamala Harris will campaign alongside Liz Cheney, the most prominent Republican to cross party lines and endorse her, on Thursday in Wisconsin at a symbolic location: the birthplace of the Republican Party.
Ms. Harris and Ms. Cheney plan to appear together in a joint appeal to the sort of Republican voters who may retain conservative positions but are repelled by former President Donald J. Trump and his politics. Their event will take place in Ripon, Wis., the site of a series of meetings that helped lead to the foundation of the G.O.P. in 1854…
>Biden ‘frustrated’ by Israel –The White House reportedly accepts that it may be unable to prevent a “regional war” in the Middle East- Politico
Politico claimed that Israel did not warn the US in advance about “the specifics” of its strikes, which supposedly angered the White House…Biden has defied calls from pro-Palestinian groups and some Democrats at home to stop supplying Israel with weapons, even after the UN repeatedly accused the IDF of indiscriminate attacks on civilians
Not buying this good cop bad cop crap…
https://www.rt.com/news/605146-biden-angry-at-israeli-conduct/
Someone way upthread suggested that the US has decided to use Israel as its ” disposable Ukraine” for fighting Iran with. I wonder how many American policy-makers and carry-out-ers still want revenge for ” America Held Hostage” during the end of the Carter Administration.
And since Netanyahu wants a war for his own corruption-trial-delay purposes, he is happy to pursue the same objective. And in this interpretation, he is egotistical enough to think that he is “easily moving” America and the DC FedRegime is letting him think so.
But even if that theory is correct, the DC FedRegime can’t be sure that America itself won’t become irreversibly committed to personal American combat against Iran in a let’s-get-Israel-ablated war between Israel and Iran. Netanyahu would certainly try to get America personally committed to personally fighting.
https://3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2024/10/bridging-innovation-and-empathy-bill-gatess-whats-next.html
I’m impressed by how socialism has triumphed in many developed countries.
Ship with explosives for Israel “asks for Portuguese flag to be cancelled”
The ship is currently idling in the Adriatic.