Saving the Iberian lynx: How humans rescued this rare feline from extinction Earth.com
Despite Biotech Efforts to Revive Species, Extinction Is Still Forever Yale Environment 360
Running From Zombies in The Snow: A Guide to The Arctic Apocalypse The Sentinel Intelligence
California Burning
Massive fire at US’ Northern California lithium battery facility continues to burn Anadolu Agency
Moss Landing battery fire: A ‘Three Mile Island’ for key renewable energy industry? The Mercury News
***
Private firefighters are increasingly popular with insurers. But do they pose a risk? Cal Matters
California’s FAIR Plan, the home insurer of last resort, may need a bailout after the L.A. fires Los Angeles Times. It’s not even fire season.
New wildfire concerns in Los Angeles: Strong winds could return next week. USA Today
Hydroclimate volatility on a warming Earth Weather West
‘Literally off the charts’: LA’s critically dry conditions stun scientists as fires rage Cal Matters
Climate/Environment
We All Live in the Firestorm: Infinite Crisis and the LA Wildfires The Tech Bubble
Pandemics
Wait a Minute. Do They Actually Want a Bird Flu Pandemic? A Look at the Preparations. The Sentinel Intelligence
The Koreas
Protesters storm South Korea court after it extends Yoon’s detention Channel News Asia
China?
Henry Huiyao Wang: With deal-maker Trump, business cooperation could reset US-China ties Pekingnology
European Disunion
Revolving Wall Street door threatens EU sovereignty Thomas Fazi, Unherd
O Canada
Chrystia Freeland’s campaign to lead Canada starts with humblebrag: ‘Trump doesn’t like me’ The Guardian
IMF raises US economic forecast as Canada and Europe fall behind Semafor
Syraqistan
Netanyahu says cease-fire ‘temporary,’ reserves right to resume war Ynet
If all this is not done as preparation for an attack against Iran, or a major provocation (two Supreme Court judges were assassinated in Teheran today, but that’s just a minor distraction) – I’m going to be left genuinely surprised.
Israel cannot continue with the perception…
— Alon Mizrahi (@alon_mizrahi) January 18, 2025
Netanyahu Is Counting on Hamas to Help Him Derail the Second Phase of Cease-fire Talks Haaretz
Forget Trump — agreeing to a ceasefire was Netanyahu’s own calculation +972 Magazine
Houthis vow to respect Gaza ceasefire, but pledge to resume attacks if Israel breaks the deal Drop Site
Israeli army drops leaflets on Gaza mocking suffering of Palestinians ahead of ceasefire The New Arab
***
Trump comeback restarts Israeli public debate on West Bank annexation Al Monitor
Kushner’s Saudi-backed fund doubles stake in firm financing illegal West Bank settlements The Cradle
***
Two judges shot dead at Iran’s supreme court Channel News Asia
Attack on Iran’s nuclear program more likely with Trump presidency Al Arabiya
Trump’s Return and the Second Version of the Gulf De-escalation Approach Emirates Policy Center
Iraq seeks Iran-backed militia disarmament in new push Intellinews
***
The USA is building a new megastructure HQ in Lebanon over 43 acres as an “Embassy”.
Lebanon is a country with the area and population of Yorkshire or Connecticut, but a tenth of the economy.
So what is it? pic.twitter.com/iVK6Mjeq9l— Craig Murray (@CraigMurrayOrg) January 18, 2025
New Not-So-Cold War
North Korean Troops “Blowing Themselves Up” To Avoid Capture In Ukraine NDTV. No wonder they’re so hard to find.
Iskander Missile Strike Kills Danish F-16 Pilot in Ukraine – Reports Military Watch
How the CIA and Ukrainian intelligence secretly forged a deep partnership ABC News
***
Sanctions continue to be ineffective. East’s Substack
EU To Bypass National Vetoes To Adopt Next Sanctions Package European Conservative
***
Ukraine’s lithium wealth diminishes as key deposits fall to Russia Al Mayadeen
The Imminent NATO-Ukrainian Defeat’s Implications for the Fate of the Ukrainian State Gordon Hahn, Russian & Eurasian Politics
AfD sparks outrage with call to deport Ukrainian refugees from Germany The New Voice of Ukraine. Commentary:
the Ukraine war, so gleefully welcomed by Acela Corridor hacks & weapons industry-funded think-tankers, ending up so predictably awful and we’ve barely begun the consequences phase of this warhttps://t.co/PCfrip2HrR
— Mark Ames (@MarkAmesExiled) January 18, 2025
***
Love in the Baltics in a time of war bne Intellinews
Baerbock left the government meeting, refusing to be photographed, after Scholz’s decision to block a new €3 billion aid package for Ukraine.
memes didn’t wait long
via @DD_Geopolitics pic.twitter.com/NQdWu84JKV— — GEROMAN — time will tell – 👀 — (@GeromanAT) January 18, 2025
South of the Border
Trump’s team wants Maduro to leave Venezuela Axios
Subsoil Bonanza: Venezuela’s Natural Resources Venezuelanalysis
B-a-a-a-a-d Banks
Regional Banks Face Headache From Rising Treasury Yields Bloomberg
The Problem of Good Conduct among Financial Advisers Journal of Economic Perspectives “…approximately one in fifteen advisers has a history of serious misconduct, with this rate rising to one in six in certain regions and firms.”
Biden Administration
Goodbye to Joe Biden, and Whoever Was President the Last Four Years Matt Taibbi, Racket News
Trump 2.0
The tech bros have front-row seats at Trump’s inauguration, but what they want goes way beyond that Quinn Slobodian, The Guardian
The tech oligarchy has been here for years Blood in the Machine
It’s ‘Drill, Baby, Drill,’ Yet Time to ‘Chill, Baby, Chill’ on Lower Prices Real Clear Investigations
Democrats en déshabillé
An American tragedy: how Biden paved the way for Trump’s White House return The Guardian. Commentary:
No one worked harder to get Trump elected more than the Democrats. They refused to back down from their genocide, they refused to remove Biden until it became a public embarrassment; they refused a democratic process for picking the replacement, instead choosing a candidate who… https://t.co/Ah4UwdFRWw
— Sana Saeed (@SanaSaeed) January 18, 2025
Police State Watch
The Enduring Power of Copaganda Alec’s Copaganda Newsletter
Government Monitoring Those With “Negative” Views of Health Insurance Companies Ken Klippenstein
Background checks may be the future of 3D printers News 10
Immigration
Outsourcing Lobbyists Astroturfed Support for H-1B Visas During the Obama Era Lee Fang
Imperial Collapse Watch
The Pentagon Keeps Losing Equipment and Buying Stuff It Doesn’t Need Reason
General Atomics tapped to close low-cost missile gap with China Asia Times
Groves of Academe
AHA vetoes resolution on scholasticide in Gaza. Rather than putting the resolution to a vote of the entire organization, they chose to disillusion a generation of their most active members. Drawbridges raised once again to protect the shrinking kingdom. https://t.co/AEyQ9YUTQ8
— Nikhil Pal Singh (@nikhil_palsingh) January 17, 2025
TikTok TikTok
US TikTok users lose access to app; Trump likely to give 90-day reprieve Business Standard
Perplexity AI makes a bid to merge with TikTok U.S. CNBC
Here’s Why RedNote Will Probably Be Banned Like TikTok Forbes
AI
Fearing AI Will Take Their Jobs, Workers Plan a Long Battle Against Tech The Markup
Guillotine Watch
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman Says This Will Be the No.1 Most Valuable Skill in the Age of AI Inc.
The Bezzle
Donald Trump launches his own $TRUMP meme coin — and it’s already worth billions Bankrate
Solana Spikes to All-Time High Price as TRUMP Doubles Dogecoin Trading Volume Decrypt. Commentary:
Thinking about this again as Solana is now host to a Trump memecoin and is being talked about as one of several “US-made tokens” the new admin might support. A policy assist from crypto czar David Sacks. https://t.co/yo1r2RmZVP
— Jacob Silverman (@SilvermanJacob) January 18, 2025
SF’s biggest Trumper sells dinner with the Donald to crypto elites for $1 million The San Francisco Standard
Class Warfare
Workers at Some of DC’s Best-Known Restaurants Move to Unionize Washingtonian
Change the story, change the future Common Weal
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
156 comments
Comments are closed.
‘– GEROMAN — time will tell – 👀 —
@GeromanAT
Baerbock left the government meeting, refusing to be photographed, after Scholz’s decision to block a new €3 billion aid package for Ukraine.’
If I got the story right, Scholz wants to take out a loan for that €3 billion aid package for Ukraine though he says that they have received enough already. Baerbock, on the other hand, wants that €3 billion to come from the German federal budget – which means that they would have to cut stuff like pensions, education, money for infrastructure, etc. to afford it.
Seems like that is what is happening. Baerbock lamenting that Germany isn’t seen as a force for peace in Europe is a little rich. As if giving Ukraine the requested 7 billion € would promote peace in Europe.
Got on board 1/7 watching 24/7
Didn’t think of what a January conflagration could do
Oh, that talk of missed opportunities, fire breaks and chaparral
Rang true, sure rang true
Seems it never rains in southern California
Seems I’ve often heard that kind of talk before
It never rains in California
But Santa Anas, don’t they warn ya?
It burns, man, it burns
Firemen doing work in Cat 3 winds
Out of water, hydrants whinge
They’re understaffed, they’re underled
Losing 12,000 homes
It never rains in California
But Santa Anas, don’t they warn ya?
It burns, man, it burns
Will you tell the folks back home the conditions made it?
Had warnings but didn’t know which one to take
Please don’t tell ‘em about missed opportunities
Don’t tell ‘em how things could have gone for communities
Gimme a fire break, give me a fire break
Seems it never rains in southern California
Seems I’ve often heard that kind of talk before
It never rains in California
But those Santa Anas, don’t they warn ya?
It burns, man, it burns
It Never Rains in Southern California, by Albert Hammond
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=meDpNwem0Vo
Thanks. I wonder what became of Antifa. I had become accustomed to an opening poem.
“Hydroclimate volatility on a warming Earth”, Introduces the analogy of an “Expanding Atmospheric Sponge” to (partially) explain our new weather. Well worth a read and one of the better climate articles I’ve seen in a stretch. Here’s is an easy to understand quote regarding our current hydrological cycle intensification;
But while overall atmospheric water vapor does increase with warming, that does not mean that it increases everywhere and at all times. In fact, at times and places where the atmosphere is not saturated (i.e., when there are not clouds and/or precipitation present), this very same thermodynamic mechanism also explains why the atmosphere has an increased propensity to evaporate water from bodies and water and the land surface. In practical terms, this means that the gap between the “floor” and the “ceiling” (i.e., the amount of water vapor that air actually contains, versus how much it could contain) itself rises exponentially in a warming atmosphere, leading to rapid increases in what is known as the “vapor pressure deficit” as well as driving widespread and large increases in evaporative demand (i.e., the “thirstiness” of the air itself).
From “Literally of the Charts” we get;
IN SUMMARY
Key moisture measurements are only 2% to 5% of average, leaving dusty soils. And the recent swing from wet to dry is among the most extreme on record. This combination of climatic conditions crossed into a danger zone, priming much of Southern California for wind-whipped fires.
From the ever prescient Ms Wildfire’s “Running From Zombies in The Snow: A Guide to The Arctic Apocalypse” we get;
The general public still doesn’t grasp that climate collapse never meant “warmer weather.” It meant weather chaos.
I’m sensing a theme.
“The general public still doesn’t grasp that climate collapse never meant “warmer weather.” It meant weather chaos.”
It’s the general public’s inability to grasp the meaning? Really? For decades, the phrase “global warming” was everywhere.
The Santa Anas, they roar!
Think it’s too soon to joke about the L.A. fires? Think again.
Dave Chappelle Stand-Up Monologue 2025 – SNL
Hadn’t heard the whole monologue, just the outstanding story about Carter in Israel so thanks for the link.
Lol, I linked to that as well. He does, and with style and enough grace to pull it off. Mr Chappelle is as close to George Carlin as we’re going to get. I admire the man.
Thanks for that one! This guy is also pretty funny. He had another routine from a few weeks earlier about St. Luigi that was also really good.
“Chrystia Freeland’s campaign to lead Canada starts with humblebrag: ‘Trump doesn’t like me’”
‘Both the English and French versions of the campaign video amplify the patriotic theme by closing with a graphic that renders the candidate’s name as “Free Land” in the red and white of the Canadian flag, with the shadow of a maple leaf over the letter A.’
If she was more honest, she should have chosen blue and yellow for her colours. Come to think of it, the colours red and black would be much closer to the mark and she has been photographed next to a flag bearing those colours.
TDS is evergreen for those with skeletons in their own closets. But based on my brief visits to the Great White North I’d say Canada’s attitude toward their bigfoot neighbor was always a bit of love/hate. Also I believe the place is a lot less liberal than their health care system would lead you to believe.
Universal health care in Canada doesn’t come from liberalism. So in that Canadians are less liberal than those like you to our south, you are correct.
Universal healthcare in Canada was started by the great Tommy Douglas and the CCF (Cooperative Commonwealth Federation) in Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan doctors went on strike and the public response was so overwhelmingly in favour of public medicare they had to back down. Later it was adopted as a federal program. But it was a socialist farmers’ party that actually got it done.
Incidentally , Tommy Douglas was the lightweight boxing champ of Manitoba at 15 and a Baptist minister. A great man.
She’s an anarcho-syndicalist?
If she had been born in Ukraine in the 1920’s like her grandfather, she’d have been “Miss Nazi 1941”.
Her Mom (nee Chomiak) put up a memorial to the Galician Brigade in Edmonton – it’s still there. The Galician Brigade was a Nazi unit that massacred thousands of Poles, Jews, Roma, in 1943-44 in Ukraine. The Chomiaks are just nice folks.
Her mom put up a memorial to the Galician Brigade while no one was watching, but she put up an actual Galician Brigade member in front of a parliament to a standing ovation. I wonder what will the next generation do.
> Change the story, change the future Common Weal
>> Which is to say this stuff is all a trick designed to prevent change. Change the story, change the future.
Jacobi: man muss immer umkehren. (Invert, always invert.)
Polya: In carrying out our plan we must be careful to arrange its steps in the proper order, which is frequently just the reverse of the order of invention.
Hudson: So, Herman’s analysis was on systems analysis. You define the overall aim and then you work backward.
Dan Williams: Social epistemology needs an explanatory inversion.
Inversion and The Power of Avoiding Stupidity [fs.blog/inversion/]
“The Pentagon Keeps Losing Equipment and Buying Stuff It Doesn’t Need….”
Something I used to know about, up to 2019. It is likely as bad or worse now!
F-35 parts at contractors is a thing called “government furnished property” (GFP. GFP can be a stock of repair parts as the case in F-35 minor (small for the trillion buck boondoggle) faux pas or test equipment bought or sent to keep the contractors from charging big bucks, or parts to go into new production similar to loading spares.
GFP has twin problems: the government program offices don’t spend much nor worry about it. The contractors have the same problem.
I did GFP for one MIC vendor as a sidelight to my support contractor gig. They had no process and gave it to the guy charging money bills! It was last on my list and hardly any care as I left in about 12 months, to another contract gig.
I was involved in several program offices as a GS employee arguing someone other than my logistics workers should manage GFP in the vendors’ hands. It was a job beyond my manpower authorization and my employees and I had other pressing issues like no one funding government spares…..
It is one of those thing that kills the financial audit that can be fixed wot process and resources, neither rise in priority of things like accepting F-35’s with cooling design defects.
Yossarian had nothing on logisticians in the MIC!
“The Pentagon Keeps Losing Equipment and Buying Stuff It Doesn’t Need….”
Something I used to know about, up to 2019. It is likely as bad or worse now!
F-35 parts at contractors is a thing called “government furnished property” (GFP. GFP can be a stock of repair parts as the case in F-35 minor (small for the trillion buck boondoggle) faux pas or test equipment bought or sent to keep the contractors from charging big bucks, or parts to go into new production similar to loading spares.
GFP has twin problems: the government program offices don’t spend much nor worry about it. The contractors have the same problem.
I did GFP for one MIC vendor as a sidelight to my support contractor gig. They had no process and gave it to the guy charging money bills! It was last on my list and hardly any care as I left in about 12 months, to another contract gig.
I was involved in several program offices as a GS employee arguing someone other than my logistics workers should manage GFP in the vendors’ hands. It was a job beyond my manpower authorization and my employees and I had other pressing issues like no one funding government spares…..
It is one of those thing that kills the financial audit that can be fixed wot process and resources, neither rise in priority of things like accepting F-35’s with cooling design defects.
Yossarian had nothing on logisticians in the MIC!
Our sworn enemy for the rest of our lives will be fire, and why we are wasting time on boondoggles such as F-35’s when we could be making firefighting drones, planes helicopters, you name it.
One of the 2 Canadian super soaker planes was out of commission in the heat of the battle of the LA Infernos, it’d be tantamount to a squadron of a couple B-17’s as our entire strike force in WW2.
I was reading that the US was considering buying 10 Russian Be-200 fire fighting tanker planes before the war as they had superior performance. But then the Ukraine got involved and scuttled the deal because Russia. So ‘the states decided to eventually purchase Ukrainian ones, which had to undergo special certification, which Ukraine eventually refused to do, and the contract was never fulfilled.’
https://en.iz.ru/en/1823736/2025-01-17/zakharova-compared-us-refusal-buy-firefighting-planes-russian-federation-childish-behavior
“I was reading that the US was considering buying 10 Russian Be-200 fire fighting tanker planes before the war as they had superior performance…”
Important how harmful prejudice repeatedly shows itself to be. China has been working hard on water distribution through the country, including the forming of wetlands. Also, fire monitoring and firefighting equipment has been a focus, including new tanker and robot development.
Also, Chinese advanced battery development has severely limited fire possibility in production and application.
In the early 1970’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM!!) had a small fire fighting fleet in central Alaska run out of the army airfield at Ft Wainwright, Alaska one of their aircraft was a B-24. A large lumbering aircraft on take off!
Air National Guard of several states have a number of C-130’s surely could be rigged for fire fighting! The C-130’s assigned to deliver airborne troops go down to Ft Bragg and Benning and fly 30 minute runs from pick up to pick up of troopers!
On the damaged plane, I looked at the colliding drone fragments that did the damage. It was clearly a small DJI drone that was under 250g.
Because:
In the United States, under-250-gram recreational drones don’t require FAA registration. Additionally, they’re often exempt from compliance with Remote ID requirements, again simplifying the flying experience.
Found that interesting. Even such a small one could cause that damage.
That is one of my pet peeves with Canada. I argue that the 14 billion dollars for 88 F-35s could be spent on about 130 big water bomber planes. While the US IS the biggest threat to Canada, has been and will be, the F-35s will never help, and the fire can be more destructive and immanent.
Some numbers behind the US Navy’s activity in the Red Sea vs. Houthis. More than 400 Houthi aerial drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles.
https://www.twz.com/news-features/navy-just-disclosed-how-many-of-each-of-its-surface-to-air-missiles-it-fired-during-red-sea-fight
‘McLane added that the Navy’s missile expenditure in the conflict is within “the historical norm.” “We’ve done the analysis with what we used to shoot in World War II, and we’re at about two rounds per incoming missile,” McLane said.’
Pretty sure that those WW2 rounds that they use to shoot did not cost the equivalent of two or three million dollars each. Just sayin’.
I figure SM-2s and 6s must grow on trees for how we’re so generous with them.
Well, it’s from Raytheon… so as far as politicians are concerned, it might as well be trees. For a bit of history, the SM history is General Dynamics, Hughes, and their subcontractors, all consolidating with Raytheon in the late 1990s. Consider who the president was at this time.
Production is in Tucson, AZ. There used to be some in Los Angeles area, don’t think it can restart there but it’s been a while since I swam in those circles.
My sis and her husband were high up wheels @ the ‘Estes Rocket Factory’ in Tucson, and highfalutin pensions need a little help being missile-led, Yo!
Estes rocket engines! Thx for the memory – spent much time in my youth launching rockets powered by Estes (or Centuri).
During WWII, only the British navy had to contend with actual, brand new, super-innovative German missiles (radar-guided, IIRC); the US navy was dealing with what were effectively cyborg missiles — they were called kamikaze.
Wouldn’t the statistics of anti-aircraft / anti-missile / anti-ship ammunition and missile expenditure during the Falklands war constitute a more relevant basis to evaluate the efficiency / sustainability of the US navy performance in the Red Sea?
US Navy also encountered German guided anti ship missiles off Sicily and Italy in 1943 and 1944.
Once Allied interceptor fighters were operating out of Sicily the German enterprise declined.
The problem with US Navy missile ships is they shoot their loaded vertical launchers and they have to go to a proper port to reload. In other words the ship has no magazine to rearm the launchers at sea.
This is being addressed maybe another clads of support ship…….
Are you suggesting that the statement “we’re at about two rounds per incoming missile” implies that for technical reasons two rounds is the maximum those ships can actually shoot at incoming missiles?
re: private firefighters and insurance.
an aside: what better way to privatized (slowly) public services than by demonstrating apparent incompetence in public management?
Jimmy Dore, utube, ~15+ minutes.
LA Firefighters Blow Whistle On Shocking Fire Chief Incompetence!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAvV6Kq8sYU
Bill Maher has a few words on twtr-X
Axios ran a story on how getting the water out of the hydrants in Pacific Palisades was more complicated than it seems.
I’m sure it’s very complicated. That’s why I pay 13% of my income in the state every year to people who I assume were working on things like this.
LA’s mayor, Karen Bass, the Nero of American politics, was fiddling in Ghana while the city burned. and later . I’ve heard people say, do you want to pay more taxes to fund this? No, I want you to use the exorbitant taxes you already collect to prioritize it.
https://x.com/EricAbbenante/status/1880469089371431313
Here is a full clip of Bill Maher and a proper recap of the situation in southern California….from the perspective of a resident….
If my recall is worth anything this is perhaps his closing monologue, and usually quite good. I can’t find agreement with Maher 100% of the time but I like hearing his thoughts even if I don’t agree with his stance or views. This is worth the 8 or 9 minutes to those on a time constraint.
https://youtu.be/C5S8rhNCBnc?si=-zWW6bWzLIXcniJa
The City of Angles is a most fLAky place, with make believe being it’s signature triumph, albeit fading badly.
Nobody in theory in charge in this ongoing debacle has advanced their careers much other than being wide awoke, and profusely thanking the brave firefighters when somebody asks a pertinent awkward question as to why and how it occurred the way it did.
Fire-ist, a new epithet, slur or mangled concept.
Now available to defend against critiques by the time-honored misdirection.
Use when logic of argument and commonsense are just too painful.
Pick up some near you, wherever taxes are misallocated.
How our ancestors handled it in 2011:
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2025-01-18/amid-dangerous-winds-in-2011-lafd-engines-stood-ready-in-the-palisades-that-didnt-happen-this-time/
Amid dangerous winds in 2011, LAFD engines stood ready. That didn’t happen this time
You pay taxes so real estate developers, financial industry, etc. can keep up the growth by building in places they shouldn’t. Meanwhile, the politicians either adhere to an anti-regulatory idealogy or are influenced by the donors from the same real estate and finance interests.
Bingo …
Everything after that is secondary …
You don’t want to go back to private firefighters like it was in the 19th century. That is why actual Fire Departments were set up to replace them. I think that most firefighters were paid for and run by insurance companies. So if you insured your house with the Acme insurance company their fire fighters would cover your house. And if your house caught fire and the fire fighters from the XYZ insurance company turned up first, then you were all out of luck as they would do nothing. Unless you signed up with them too on the spot.
There were financial advantages in fighting fires too though I forget the details. It’s in a book that I have on American fire fighting. So a result was they when an alarm came in, the biggest Irish fire fighter would run to where the fire was with a barrel. When he got there he would slam the barrel over the nearest fire hydrant so no other group could use it and would fight off other firefighters trying to get to that hydrant with bare knuckles – while the fire burned in the background. And you know that I am not making this all up.
One who paid for insurance got a door marker, referred to as a Fire Mark (or Fire Badge, House Plate). The homeowner would nail these to their front door to indicate which company should be saving them from conflagration. From the Fireman’s Hall Museum in Philadelphia, here are some examples.
Thanks for that. I had forgotten about them.
https://baltimoreequitableinsurance.com/perpetual-insurance/why-perptual-insurance-is-an-asset/
Maybe California will readopt various mutual schemes . In the 19th century, established insurers didn’t want anything to do with farm houses.
One day in the life of an anti-fireman…
I’m way rural, and i’ve spent the last decade removing anything that can burn on the many splendored acres in my care, and the last few months have been using a 14 foot pole saw to excise dead wood from trees up to around 20 feet, and each oak is good for about 2 wheelbarrows of ready-to-burns, which I dutifully dispatch in my fire pit sometimes the same day or maybe the next morning, ya gotta make hay while the Sun doesn’t shine too brightly, if I did the same thing in August they might lock me up and throw away the key-the danger being extreme if not more so.
Combine that with a $899 firefighting gas powered water pump and i’m essentially my own volunteer fire dept, but no pancake breakfasts please.
In lieu of $1000 a day for a private firefighter, my budget for everything is around a grandido also, and a heck of a lot of elbow grease.
Yes, this is what everyone should be doing. If they did there’d be less need for public or private firefighters. https://www.nifc.gov/fire-information/fire-prevention-education-mitigation/wildfire-mitigation/home
“Unlike private firefighters who are contracted directly with Cal Fire, fire crews who work for insurers or homeowners may not have the same training as regular firefighters, Collins said. Some fire departments, for example, require firefighters to be trained as paramedics.” They don’t have the same training because they don’t do the same job, but he knew this when he made the statement.
“There’s no way for us as professional firefighters to vet their training, or their personal protective equipment,” he said. What is this guy’s real message when they’re fire preventers, not firefighters like the public ones.
There’s always someone richer and someone poorer than you. Complaining of unfairness when someone can pay a company to clean up their property is a two edged sword. Are you going to give your money to everyone poorer? Of course not. If you’re away from your home when a fire is close should you be prevented from calling a local handyman or gardener or fire prevention expert to clean up around your home because someone thinks it’s “unfair?”
Most of the articles I’ve read on this subject are nothing more than attention getting hogwash at best, propaganda at worst.
I burn my slash in a pit kiln to produce charcoal which I then use as animal bedding before eventually putting it in my garden as biochar. I’ve only been doing it for a few years so can’t swear it makes a difference, but it does make my soil a lovely black colour.
No defense of Bass, who’s response has been catatonic, but as Bill Cody points out on This Is Revolution Podcast, people have conflated the Palisades Fire, the responsibility of the City of Los Angeles, and the Eaton Fire, which is the responsibility of LA County. The LA County Supervisors have more power than the mayor, yet the Mayor of LA is posed as the sole one responsible. Nothing whatsoever is being reported about the dysfunctional County response to the fires.
You don’t have to be Blue Anon, to use journalist Aaron Mate’s term, to see the development of a narrative intended to re-direct blame to political – in this case, Democratic – foes, at the expense of most Angelenos.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEFBmkGtMuQ
Interview begins around 8:45…
Full agreement with this. I would go a bit further and say that the unmentionable truth here is that these fires would have happened no matter what, because the simple truth is that fire hydrant sytems are built to put out the occasional house fire, or maybe two or three houses at once, but not to save an entire block or neighborhood. When you have drought, tinder dry conditions, and hurricane force winds, especially in areas filled with houses jammed cheek by jowl, there is nothing that can be done. An equal and similar situation concerns river and hurricane flooding in flood plains – when people build houses and factories in riverine lowlands and then those river flood, which they always do, not much can be done. Our current urban density and lifestyle is to blame, not a mayor or a fire department….
Thank you for saying this.
Today is Lynx pardinus day in news and antidote!- Thank you for both. Few days ago, while biking i met for the first time in my life a wild cat (Felis silvestris). So shy and rare they are.
Antidote kitten looks like it has seen the future in a vision and is filled with ineffable terror.
I might be projecting a bit.
Yes, the future being AI generated art. Lynx kittens are way cuter than that.
The antidote reminded me of the paintings by Margaret Keane, which I find creepy.
https://www.keane-eyes.com/item/cats/page/2/
If it isn’t AI, then the photographer was a master of depth of field, keeping the face in focus while everything else is a blur.
Lucky sighting! I just got around to looking at pictures of European Wildcats, and they are gorgeous. Here we have bobcats, lynxes, and eastern mountain lions. Over my three-score years I’ve twice seen a bobcat. It’s a rare sight indeed. My wife had a one-on-one with a mountain lion while solo hiking east of Bennington. VT. It was a ten or fifteen second stare down too, with about 50 yards between them. Lucky for her, that was all it amounted to.
Possible fictional (kindof) companion piece to Zombies in the Snow:
https://samkriss.substack.com/p/theres-someone-on-the-ice?utm_source=post-banner&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=posts-open-in-app&triedRedirect=true
That was a fun read, thanks.
‘Alon Mizrahi
@alon_mizrahi
If all this is not done as preparation for an attack against Iran, or a major provocation (two Supreme Court judges were assassinated in Teheran today, but that’s just a minor distraction) – I’m going to be left genuinely surprised.
Israel cannot continue with the perception of humiliation, having been forced to treat Hamas as its equal after all this death work. It needs something to feed its psychotic ego with; an achievement to reassert its imagined exceptionalism and superiority. It will attack Iran, and I’m guessing sooner rather than later.’
Israel may want to do it but without the US supporting them they can’t. They don’t really have the wherewithal. They have been pushing the US under Biden to attack Iran but even he was not going to do that as it was too late into his Presidency. And I cannot see Trump agreeing to attack Iran on Israel’s behalf. He has a full program planned for what he wants to do to America itself – for better or worse – but if he attacked Iran, the resultant war would use up every minute of his four year term and he would get hardly anything done that he wants to. And since Netanyahu is in his bad books, he is not going to risk his Presidency just so that Bibi get to stay out of jail a little longer.
And I cannot see Trump agreeing to attack Iran on Israel’s behalf.
True, but it does not mean that some underlings more beholden to neocon fantasies / zionist projects / democrat grudges than to Trump might not take some bold initiative, or just “let something happen” that will in the end force the hand of the president — because whatever the reason for the conflict and whoever is ultimately responsible for it, we cannot let the USA lose face, can we?
Not going to happen, unless the security pact between Russia and Iran was a lie.
Not a lie, but not as deep as the pact with North Korea. This is the text of Article 3.3 of the Iran pact:
There’s a lot of cooperation outlined in the agreement, but nothing about head stomping, S-500’s, etc.
Full text in English.
…a billboard I saw yesterday on Interstate 15 in Pavlovegas
‘Standing Against Antisemitism Is Standing With America’
Maybe somebody should set up another billboard saying-
‘America – your standing in it. Israel? That’s some other country 6,000 miles away.’
“Israel – You’re soaking in it” (Delivered by Madge of course.)
The other prominent billboards en route tend to mostly be shylock lawyers-the more coarse ones will practically exclaim that they’ve won Billions!
You almost feel like swerving into the car in the next lane-‘In A Wreck-Need A Check’, they promise.
From what I saw yesterday, a lawyer named Ed Bernstein must have the largest billboard budget, there are dozens, with his ugly mug on each one.
On Interstate 15, by Wall of Voodoo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUSGlb72YVw
So Better Call Saul was more a documentary than a terrific (and Emmy snubbed) TV series? The late David Lynch is discussed elsewhere today but Vince Gilligan is/was a little more down to earth.
As for twinning America with anti-Antisemitism there’s not much historical evidence for that although Jews were certainly a lot more welcome here than in Crusader Europe.
How about, ‘us and israel, united in genocide!’
In other news, water is wet.
All cease-fires are by definition temporary and subject to renewal (or not) after a certain time. Otherwise they would be called something else. See my essay of last week.
Anything signed by US/Israel/etc is very temporary, even if it is called “pinky swear permanent and not in any way temporary”. One does not need an essay to say that, though countless can be written in an attempt to justify being non-agreement-capable.
I’ve got Thursday, the 23rd of January 2025 on my Bingo Card for when this one goes bad.
Jared better get his West Bank real estate and condos built. He’s got about 6 months-ish or so for the time being.
We’ve heard remarkably little out of Jared and Ivanka this time around. It’s almost as though their disastrous contribution to Trump One has put them on the outs.
Re. bne IntelliNews – Love in the Baltics in a time of war
A cousin and wife in Lithuania adopted an ethnic Russian daughter in the mid-80s. The woman doesn’t know she was adopted. Her facial features might remind one of famous Russian communists. She has 2 adult children that are half Russian. Of course, being good Lithuanians, they hate Russians with white hot fire. I wonder how the family rationalizes all this? Their 2 natural sons were in paramilitary groups as teens, one works for the “Lithuanian KGB” I was told. The Baltics are depopulated sewers, IMO.
Probably should’ve added this comment to Connor’s EU piece… in the interwar period under Smetona’s Fascism-Lite dictatorship, Lithuania had a grossly over-sized Army with a well fed officer class. Their pay and benefits were several multiples of teachers or civil servants. When the Nazis came, they just blew through the Baltics and turned over management to their collaborators with minimal oversight until 1944. Jews and undesirables were virtually gone by fall 1941. There were many good Nazis then and now.
I have a friend who adopted a baby from Russia back in the day. She still loves Russia based on her multiple trips there, but the son has only hate. My suggestion that he withhold judgement until traveling there fell on deaf ears, but perhaps some day. I don’t know anyone who has visited Russia who hasn’t left with a favorable impression. Except for Michael McFaul who has a stronger calling to a horned boss in a very warm place.
“Iraq seeks Iran-backed militia disarmament in new push”
Those Iraqi leaders are acting just like EU leaders. They want to get rid of one of the most effective fighting forces that they have in the hope that Trump will be nicer to them. Let me know how that works out.
The Shi’a militias that with Quds pushed ISIS out of Iraq are rooted in the factions repressed by the Sunni minority gov’t of Hussein.
ISIS did not seem to bother US in Iraq, and U.S. did not defeat them, leaving it to Shi’a and Kurdish Iraqis.
The FM opposed to their continued existence is likely a coalition position from a Sunni section.
IIRC when ISIS was defeated the militia were to be integrated into Iraq militia.
I suppose US wants room for HTS in Baghdad.
Guess we now know for sure why Litcoff was sent by Trump to “salty language” Netanyuhu. Well on the bright side we have an example where a certain a mount of peace and profitiering (or is merely a tactical retreat within a broader war?) align ………. “Kaushner’s Saudi-backed fund doubles stake in firm financing illegal West Bank settlements”
“Walgreens replaced its refrigerator doors with digitized ad-laden glass. It might become a $200 million debacle”
Unintentionally funny this. So Walgreens, in their infinite wisdom, decided to replace actual glass doors with some high tech junk simply so that they could flash ads at their customers. And to get those adds on the screen, they outsourced it to another party which meant that there was a new middleman between Walgreens and their customers which worked out as well as could be expected. Add in the extra electricity, the cost of installation and all that technical support and you are talking about big bikkies here. So maybe they should have stuck with glass doors which work like forever.
All this while understaffed pharmacists and techs are working their butts off trying to get sick people their meds. Misdirected funds in every way.
It alao seems like Walgreens was missing out on money it could have made with POP marketing to walk-in traffic. They basically put in a middle man that could extort them.
But all the buzzwords about how “digital” must mean automatic “innovation”.
It’s walk-in traffic. A customer comes to the store and the store sticks another middle man corporation between its sales opportunity.
Sorry for repeating you. Lost track of what I was first going to say.
That is: They probably used third parties to help get the customer in the store. But, once they are inside, maybe start cutting out some of the middle men…
“Digitized ad-laden glass” on fridge doors—the “innovation” we didn’t know we needed because, well, we didn’t—and certainly didn’t want. (It all comes down to ads, doesn’t it?)
“Government Monitoring Those With “Negative” Views of Health Insurance Companies” **** Do these people creating this policy ever get out and talk to others? Because that would be just about every last person in America outside elite enclaves and insurance employees.
If the “people creating this policy” gave two shits, this situation would have been rectified long ago. The “insurance industry” is an economic mainstay and generator of the almighty gdp, in addition to supporting the illusion that america has any kind of a “healthcare system” at all.
But it seems to me that a reevaluation of “healthcare” insurance may get caught up in a reevaluation of “insurance” in general, particularly after the ongoing debacle in LA. That the cost of “insurance” of all kinds–“homeowners,” auto, business as well as “healthcare”–is becoming prohibitive and the performance grossly inadequate is becoming impossible to ignore.
Insurance only survives as an “industry” when the scale of loss is relatively minimal compared to the pool of insureds. It would seem that that business model has been “disrupted” by the scale of loss in LA and/or Florida. With respect to “healthcare,” reports of an explosion of things like cancer in previously healthy populations may provide the same urgent need for a reckoning.
I guess we shall see.
Scale of loss: also due to some ground-breaking asset inflation (down to the artwork), curtesy of the easy money regime.
Live by the asset inflation sword, die by the asset inflation sword.
Apparently not. I’m almost 70 and have many friends who are the same age, or close. When it comes to our “healthcare” and “health insurance” all I hear is horror stories. One friend in particular is trying to save money on blood thinner meds. They are making him jump through enough hoops he should be in a circus. 15 pages of all the meds he has taken over the X amount of years, then hand deliver them to the doctors office because the have to be faxxed to the company.
None of that makes any sense to me, but that’s what he is doing trying to save money. A 9 month supply of XARELTO costs him $700 bucks. There are others that are cheaper but apparently his doctor won’t go with them.
Best I can tell it is all a giant racket.
Navigating the American Healthcare System
This is from a South Park special that was released last May. I can’t figure out why Team Blue didn’t even make phony promises, but I suppose it was because they promised to fix Obamacare when it was up and running for four years that they thought it would be too obvious.
“Sanctions continue to be ineffective.” On the contrary. Gasoline prices in my area jumped about 20 cents a gallon after sanctions on Russian energy were announced by Washington.
Biden’s final gift to the American people. Thanks Joey.
Link “EU To Bypass National Vetoes To Adopt Next Sanctions Package” in the European Conservative buries the lead:
Go long Nutrien – north american potash producer. What the heck, might as well profit from the stupidity…..
The Craig Murray video is well worth 15:24 of your time.
re: The Enduring Power of Copaganda Alec’s Copaganda Newsletter
How long before this (the Laken Riley Act) is used to round up and disappear ordinary “documented” US citizens? Your papers can be very easily lost or misplaced. Without due process there’s no need to establish your identity or citizenship at all. Eventually, police will just use it, against everyone, and bypass the courts altogether.
Please, stop the cray cray.
US citizens cannot be denied entry to the US, EVEN WITH NO PASSPORT. This is not a matter of papers but legal status. From the ACLU:
https://www.aclunc.org/our-work/know-your-rights/know-your-rights-us-airports-and-ports-entry
I know personally someone who didn’t have their passport who reentered without it. The border agents took their booking info (you have to have provided your passport info to get a boarding pass for the reentry flight) and then verified using other ID that the person before them was the same as the one whose name was on the boarding pass.
Since this incident, passport photos are biometric and when Americans return, they take a photo at the agent’s booth to compare it with the biometric photo on file. So there is an additional way to verify.
Plus Laken Riley clearly violates the Constitution. Everyone, even undocumented immigrants, has due process rights. This won’t survive a court challenge but someone will need to find a good plaintiff in order to bring a suit. But it will probably take 2-3 years to get it overturned.
I’m not denying it’s cray or that it’s unlikely to survive a constitutional challenge. I sincerely hope it doesn’t survive. It appears Trump will sign it into law, regardless.
But meanwhile, this Act isn’t about denying citizens entry to the US with or without a passport. It’s about detention of “undocumented” people already on US soil, upon accusation or arrest for crimes. Whereas previously the law required 2 or more convictions before deportation, thus some form of due process, with this act that would change so it doesn’t require any conviction at all, therefore no due process required.
I’m saying it would be very easy for police or DHS to say any US citizen is “undocumented” and thus incarcerate them, it seems indefinitely if the article is to be believed. Or deported. With an accusation, a person is automatically an alien and who can contradict them? I’m saying it’s a loophole which can be exploited against even established citizens.
It’s the immigration equivalent of proving a negative. It flips the burden onto the individual to prove their identity, which they obviously can’t do from a position of incarceration, and if no court appearance is required or no court requires their identity to be established, which appears to be the case here. Thus it appears a person won’t even have the opportunity to establish citizenship, no need for biometric or record checks.
I’m pointing out a way this law can be abused.
Any abuse like that is successful multi-million dollar litigation futures. The press, which is extremely anti-Trump, would be all over it like a cheap suit. It would lead to additional legal grounds for overturning the law. It will also be an embarrassment for the Trump Administration and if it arguably happened at anything other than the very isolated incident level, it would discredit Trump and could even lead his MAGA base to start to turn on the initiative. And thus the DHS will be incentivized NOT to go there.
But given the design of the law, the Feds acting on false accusations (say by ex-spouses or angry business partners) is possible.
The planned sanctuary city raids suggest to me that the Trump Team recognizes that Laken Riley is destined to have a short shelf life and want to get as much done in the window when it is operative as possible.
From 1929 to 1930 the Mexican Repatriation Program was in existence. US citizens were deported to Mexico. And right now ‘people are talking’ about ending birthright citizenship. So it’s easy to get to paranoia these days.
Well, Jose Padilla would agree with that.
In general, Americans enjoy a lot of due process rights that other countries citizens don’t. But lately, all it takes is Congress to yell “because national security” and our gutless Supreme Court to find some pretext to dodge the merits of the case, and we’re looking more like your typical Arab republic.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Padilla_(criminal)#Habeas_corpus
Thanks for that refresher. ChrisFromGA. According to that Wiki, looks like Padilla is due to be released next year.
As an additional antidote here’s Dave Chappelle’s opening monologue from last nights SNL. As usual, he’s brilliant and hilarious.
Re new US embassy Beirut
A new Crusader fortress springs up in Lebanon!
For some reason put me in mind of Rumieh prison, also on a hill top not too far away…
Published Jan, 16, 2025 on the American Heart Association website:
https://www.heart.org/en/news/2025/01/16/how-the-virus-behind-covid-19-can-harm-your-blood-vessels-and-your-heart
How the virus behind COVID-19 can harm your blood vessels and your heart
Thanks for the link, antidlc.
From the article, this sentence stood out to me:
.
Thousands of people will either become disabled or dead long before our bodies (the live ones) will “learn how to fight” (is she a democrat?) the virus better. Must be part of the “learning to live (and die) with it” plan.
From New wildfire concerns in Los Angeles: Strong winds could return next week.
If tens of thousands of people do this, where does it all go? Is someone gonna come pick up all this brush?
Since this is an actual emergency, maybe they should suggest people bury the stuff in their yards in the meantime?
Crazy winds are coming in a few days, it would take me months to clear 200 feet away of brush from the house if I started today. Sounds very CYA from the LAFD Chief
Burying wood debris under the top layer of soil is an old gardening technique called “hugelkultur.” We do it here under two of our raised garden beds. It is a longer term soil building technique.
See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%BCgelkultur
So between now and noon tomorrow we should find out who Biden will pardon as he leaves office. Probably should have a Bingo card. Guessing;
Fauci
Liz Cheney
Schiff
others on J6 committee
Brother James
others in family
I know I’m forgetting some, but it should be interesting. As well as the spin…They didn’t do anything wrong but they get a pardon just the same.
Bring ’em on!
Can’t wait to hear who the “biden administration” thinks is too guilty to take their chances in a court of “law.”
Just destroy any reputation these traitors have left by laying the permanent stain of a “pardon” on them and let them spend the rest of their lives ‘splainin’ how they didn’t do nuthin’ wrong. Then use them as a roadmap to all the buried bodies…
Bibi Netanyahu. Federal writ runs in the 51st state after all.
and probably not Leonard Peltier…
Nor Steve Donziger
Big Oil made an example of Attorney Donziger. They so want him out of the picture forever. A great lawyer. His case is an example of corruption at the highest level.
I think Fauci has done more to destroy the credibility in the profession of medicine than almost anyone in my lifetime. Believe me, I hear it all day from my bright blue PMC patients. Anytime the topic of vaccines comes up especially. Despite what MSNBC and CNN are telling America, the beating heart of anti-vaxx is actually Bright Blue America.
That being said, I am fully behind the pardon for Fauci. It will stain him for the rest of his life and for all of eternity in the history of medicine. Why else would Biden need to pardon him if he had never done anything wrong.
There is not enough time left in his life to fully prosecute him, and even if he was indicted for lying to Congress and doing GOF research illegatlly among other things, his case would be heard in DC and he would be instantly exonerated.
I have students from elite schools all the time. Praising him to the high heavens. I ask about 3-4 questions about his misdeeds and have them blubbering like idiots in usually just under a minute. His guilt is impossible to hide.
He thought he was going to get a Nobel in 2020. No. His name will live in infamy in medicine for all of time. Just give it a few years.
His behavior in the AIDS crisis was equally reprehensible. Why anyone thought this time would be different is a mystery. Lying and hiding things about older drugs. Exposing critically ill AIDS patients to drugs that were killing them right and left. For years, being allowed to scare the entire population into being deathly afraid of a virus – knowing all the while it was almost exclusively confined to a few groups. I came of age during that time. It was something to behold. Never forget – one of the most prominent anthems of the 1980s rock scene was all about the panic that Fauci et al piled onto the population. The song obviously originated in the gay community – but the message was certainly apropos for everyone in Generation X that came of age during that time – RELAX – DON’T DO IT – WHEN YOU WANNA GO TO IT. And despite all evidence to the contrary this misinformation was allowed to go on for years. I hold nothing against anyone who is very careful early on when nothing is known. Once officials begin to learn the real situation and the truth, our officials need to be at the vanguard of calming people down by informing them of the said truth. Fauci did no such thing during AIDS until forced to do so, and he certainly did the exact same during COVID. Fauci clearly likes the power that comes with panic and misinformation.
I welcome the stain of the pardon. It will be the only way to mark him for posterity in my profession.
I certainly remember in early elementary school being worried about getting AIDS, as like an 8 year old.
I didn’t realize this dude is why.
Great guy.
I didn’t think of this angle – but it makes sense. Thank you once again. Too bad so many will still consider him a hero and drink out of a coffee cup with his picture on it.
I would love to see Fauci smeared in this manner. But I would also love it for another reason. A Fauci pardon will be the Hunter pardon redux for Biden. Everyone knows Hunter’s pardon was about self preservation, it was an indictment of Joe and his actions in Hunter’s dealings. while it isn’t as clear now, pardoning Fauci would also eventually destroy any illusion that the Administration was acting in good faith when Joe and Kamala ripped their masks off, declared Covid over and embraced a non sterilizing vaccine as the one and only Covid killer. They knew none of that was true.
Senator Johnson of Wisconsin made a point in an interview with Bret Weinstein which made me optimistic in the face of this pardon crime. He said – don’t get fixated on criminal convictions – sure they won’t happen. But we will expose these people, who live and die on their reputations. Their reputations will be destroyed and that is enough.
So – I’m hopeful these scum, Fauci, Collins, Blinken, Sullivan, Biden and many more- they will live out the rest of their lives in infamy and disgrace. They won’t be able to go out in public. Their children and grandchildren will carry the stain. And for their sake I hope there is a hell.
https://x.com/BenjaminNorton/status/1880596346065027310
Ben Norton @BenjaminNorton
To make housing more affordable for working people, Spain has proposed policies that could have a very positive impact, by reducing speculation.
The core of the proposal is a 100% tax on purchases of homes by people who don’t have European Union residency. This would make it unprofitable for foreign speculators who “invest” in housing not to live in, but rather to get richer from capital gains, or to rent the housing out to locals or tourists. The financialization of real estate has pushed up prices significantly.
The plan also would include expansion of public housing, which is very important, as well as the end of the “golden visa” scheme which gave residency to people who purchased a property worth over €500,000, thereby also pushing up prices.
This would be a good start. Homes should be for living in, not for speculation.
Here is an article about the proposal:
https://theomcdonald.substack.com/p/spain-set-to-ban-vulture-funds…
7:41 AM · Jan 18, 2025
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1CgKt
January 30, 2018
Real Residential Property Prices for Spain and Portugal, 2000-2024
(Indexed to 2000)
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1twQO
January 30, 2018
Real Residential Property Prices for United States, United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain, 2000-2024
(Indexed to 2000)
I like this, very much. Now if every other country could do the same, including Canada…
But I think it only addresses a small part of the problem. It’s still necessary to clamp down on or reduce real estate as a primarily investment vehicle. A larger part of the problem is residents or corporations of a country owning multiple properties.
“I like this, very much…”
Absolutely, this analysis applies to Canada and the UK. Artificial increases in property prices, leading to excess investment that in turn limits necessary productive investment in infrastructure and industrial production or manufacturing.
Real estate speculation in the US is fueled by subsidized mortgages that offer 5x or 10x leverage on down payments. Plus tax breaks. Otherwise it isn’t all that attractive as an asset.
But yea … I agree with anything that is directionally useful.
IN Canada there is already an unoccupied house tax (Underused housing tax). 1% of the assessed value per year. Generally applies to foreign nationals.
https://www.canada.ca/en/services/taxes/excise-taxes-duties-and-levies/underused-housing-tax.html
‘Homes should be for living in, not for speculation.’
Didn’t President Xi say the same thing the other day? But he’s right. You let homes become the basis for speculation and before long you have AirBnB, high rents, private equity firms buy up all housing instead of ordinary people and then you are in a helluva mess.
Fascinating article. This is nice, Indeed, in prioritising the incentivisation of public housing Sánchez unveiled the unlocking of a new legal mechanism whereby all housing built by the State will remain in public ownership ad infinitum.,
Remember the anti-tourist protests? All of this has created a cocktail of societal upheaval which played out on the streets recently with mass demonstrations characterised – rather foolishly – as ‘anti-tourist’.
Late last year, thousands protested at a holiday resort in the Canary Islands to highlight the influx of tourism which locals argued has priced them out of the housing market.
Lots of good color as well, thank you for this.
General atomics gonna make low cost missiles…
I was there for 30 years, wouldnt say low cost was their forte, rather they were good at getting gov contracts after 3-mile island killed civvy nuclear power industry… sd union reported once that they were no. 4 in bribes… er, contributions, to congress.
They do make the predator, but can’t see them as a low cost high volume mfr. course, nobody else in mic is that, either.
Norman Finkelstein on the “ceasefire agreement” between Israel and Gaza
He reviews previous agreements and finds reasons to not be optimistic. Well, that is an understatement.
This is the complete talk from Norman Finkelstein, streamed live on January 17, 2025:
Prof. Norman Finkelstein on the Gaza genocide
It surprises me that when I read about what our best and brightest expect to happen over the next few years no one mentions the Pandemic(s).
Covid has not gone away, the effects are cumulative and extremely serious and nothing is being done to prevent Bird ‘flu from taking off like a rocket.
Nada.
This may be partially to do with Covid induced brain damage as well as Cocaine, when the shipments coming into Baltimore are 40,000 Lbs at a time it tells me that Coke is a popular pick me up with those who can afford it.
re: ‘Literally off the charts’: LA’s critically dry conditions stun scientists as fires rage Cal Matters
I recall as a child watching Emergency!, or the Brady Bunch, or Six Million Dollar Man, or Bionic Woman, or CHiPs, and disliked the dry-looking chapparal sagebrush grassy scrub biome typical of California, it always looked like a dry tinderbox especially on television. I still prefer lush, leafy, green places to brown and yellow with occasional green.
And quite a few episodes of Emergency! had the crew fighting forest fires, which might have lent the childhood impression the place was always endlessly on fire.
And now it’s drier than usual, on fire more often.
Perhaps shelter could be taken in the ubiquitous quicksand of my childhood television impression.
Because California has a distinct rainy season the land turns green starting around January then turns brown some time after the rains stop about March. By June all the annual grasses turn golden brown. Quite lovely. Probably because they didn’t want to film in rainy weather the TV scenery rarely looked green.
Once upon a time you dressed so fine
Threw the Zionists a Dime in your prime, didn’t you?
People call say ‘beware Antony, you’re bound to fall’
You thought they were all kidding you
You used to laugh about
Everybody that was speaking out
Now you don’t talk so loud
Now you don’t seem so proud
About having to be scrounging your next deal
How does it feel, how does it feel?
To never have to atone
Like a complete known known, like a Netanyahu clone
Ahh you’ve gone to the finest French schools, alright Mr. one & only
But you know you only used to get used in it
Nobody ever expected you to get tossed out on the street
And now you’re gonna have to get used to it
You say you never compromise
With the mystery man in Jerusalem, but now you realize
He’s not selling any alibis
As you stare into the vacuum of his eyes
And say do you want to make a deal?
How does it feel, how does it feel?
To never have to atone
Like a complete known known, like a Netanyahu clone
Ah you never turned around to see the frowns
On the podium when the anti-Zionist clowns all accused you
You never understood that it ain’t no good
You shouldn’t let other people get a microphone and lambast you
You used to ride on your high horse being a diplomat
Who carried on his shoulder a Bibi cat
Ain’t it hard when you discovered that
He really wasn’t where it’s at
After he took from you everything he could steal
How does it feel, how does it feel?
To never have to atone
Like a complete known known, like a Netanyahu clone
Like a Rolling Stone, by Bob Dylan
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syNLBJ_Lq9E
Excellente!
Alas, we’ll be rid of Antony in less than 24 hours time. As for other comedic material see my inauguration tribute below …
RE: Wait a Minute. Do They Actually Want a Bird Flu Pandemic?
Are we really going to have to live with another four years of TDS?
Jessica Wildflower (is that a real name, or an AI nom de plume?) goes on about how the “Trump Mafia” is intentionally creating a pandemic and using Meta, among others, as her proof. Meta, the compay that followed every Democrat Blob censorship request demanded over the last 4 to 5 years before deciding to give up that position now that the new Administration is coming.
Readers here have been made well aware of the unfolding Bird Flu issues for well over a year now. Jessica Wildfire has apparently forgotten which Party and who has been leading the country during that time (not that anyone really knows who that has been, surely not Joe Biden)
In the last Water Cooler
amfortas and others posted links to music which I enjoyed.
As usual I was very late to see that
I thought I would now post two rather old songs that make me happy when I hear them.
LIma Beans – Eddy Ware – 1951
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lA3qWnJfnM
Bald Head – Professor Longhair – 1949
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9s8uQxhVII
Oh, and one more that I think could be our national anthem with
climate change and many surly human interactions these days
Not Dark Yet – Bob Dylan – 1997
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZgBhyU4IvQ
Pennsylvania Avenue
Melody from “Electric Avenue” as performed by Eddy Grant
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yxep-9BQ6Uo
Oi!
Boy!
Now in DC there is violence
And, and a lots of jerks on the run
Trump’s gonna drain out the swamp, yeah.
But I don’t foresee a shortage of scum
(Oh no) Trumps gonna rock down to Pennsylvania Avenue
And jack the Dow Jones higher!
(Oh) He will abandon you for Musk and Vivek, too
His team’s a dumpster fire!
Workin’ so hard to kill soldiers
Our rotten overlords in DC
Deep in their hearts they abhor ya
Can’t stop their killing spree
(Good God!) Trumps gonna rock down to Pennsylvania Avenue
And jack the Dow Jones higher!
(Oh) He won’t improve the view from your far, distant pew
His team’s a dumpster fire!
Oh, no
Oh, no
Oh, no
Oh, no
(Oh no) Trumps gonna send gunz to Ukraine and Netan’hoo
And jack the Dow Jones higher!
(Oh) He won’t improve the view from your far, distant pew
His team’s a dumpster fire!
Who will he bomb in what country?
Never can get the right one
Stealing their land for vacations
And they still can’t feed everyone
(Oh no!) Trumps gonna rock down to Pennsylvania Avenue
And jack the Dow Jones higher!
(Oh) He won’t improve the view from your far, distant pew
His team’s a dumpster fire!
Oh, get out in the street!
Out in the street
Out in the daytime
Out in the night
(Oh no) Trumps gonna send gunz to Ukraine and Netan’hoo
And jack the Dow Jones higher!
(Oh) He won’t improve the view from your far, distant pew
His team’s a dumpster fire!
Out in the street
Out in the street
Out in the lobbyists playgrounds
On the darkside of town
Trumps gonna rock down to Pennsylvania Avenue
And jack the Dow Jones higher!
(Oh) He won’t improve the view from your far, distant pew
His team’s a dumpster fire!
Rock it in Mar-a-lago!
Electric Ave…It was played as a party song, but had this for a last verse:
“Who is to blame in one country?
Never can get to the one
Dealin’ in multiplication
And they still can’t feed everyone”
Another AI article reporting how everything’s going just ducky with AI:
Microsoft eggheads say AI can never be made secure – after testing Redmond’s own products
https://www.theregister.com/2025/01/17/microsoft_ai_redteam_infosec_warning/?td=rt-3a
I suppose Wall St has to get it’s knickers in a bunch about something they think is gonna change the world, but I think they’ve gone from selling the sizzle to snorting too much hopium on this one.
This ought to be interesting. This may be the most fascinating month in our life times. I do believe if this is truly followed through with, it will go a long way to heal the nation and let us know who do what to whom. I would also love to see the Epstein List.
https://x.com/TheChiefNerd/status/1881116372803215619
Imagine a video of Larry the Cable guy saying “Git’er done.”
The L.A. Fires Expose a Web of Governments, Weak by Design
Regarding Ukraine:
The odd thing (to me) is that the proposed Trump people and Zelensky are both pushing for a ceasefire without a settlement, and openly discussing a future settlement, with Ukraine in NATO, its army rebuilt, and Russia making concessions, etc.
In Vietnam and Afghanistan, everybody in the US was sick to death of them and wanting these conflicts to disappear. Zero interest in re-fighting them.
I have zero confidence in Trump. But rely on his instinctive reaction to being the bag holder in this debacle. He will call anything he does a victory, and immediately continue blaming Biden and everyone/anyone else. Plus he promised a deal … not a big win. Any deal is better than no deal. Especially when no one outside the blob really cares.
Then there is China and Greenland and the Middle East. The blob may need a war, but they have irons in the fire and are actively teeing up the next, “Biggest challenge since Munich”
Any deal is better than no deal, for whom exactly? Trump? Zelensky? You? NATO? Russians? The World?
I started reading the . . “. Wait a minute… do they actually want a bird flu pandemic?” article till I got to the point of having to subscribe, and then I stopped reading.
But yes, obviously, as I have said several times in comments, they are doing the best they can to facilitate the evolution of bird flu into a megadeath human pandemic, deliberately and on purpose, while hoping not to get caught.
I feel validated now that smarter people than me are also writing about it and admitting the basic fact that ruling class policy is to HIHOP bird flu into a Spanish Flu 2.0, if they can.
Didn’t see this coming – ‘ Trump meme coin crashes after Melania launches her own’
‘Melania Trump introduced her memecoin to her 3.2 million followers on X on Sunday evening, gaining immediate traction. Promoted across her social media accounts, the memecoin reached a $4 billion market cap within 30 minutes of its release, according to DEXScreener.’
https://www.rt.com/news/611263-melania-trump-meme-coin/
https://x.com/MELANIATRUMP/status/1881094861279129643
I’m proud to announce the launch of MembersOnlyCoin, each of which comes with a virtual 1980’s jacket.
Mr President, what does pump and dump means?
I have not seen Retired Carpenter commenting recently. I wanted to thank him for posting the “Nevada Jane” song a while ago. It was lovely.