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Links 2/22/2025

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California Takes Steps Toward Officially Recognizing Bigfoot SFGate

Amazon buys James Bond franchise – The Reg has some scripts The Register (Chuck L)

#COVID-19/Pandemics

This is making the rounds. Dr. Kevin sent: New coronavirus with potential to cause pandemic discovered in China Daily Mail Online

GM’s take:

Clickbait.

This is just another in the line of regular such papers they have been putting out for 20 years, on a number of such viruses, and none of them would have received all that much attention had it not been for the pandemic.

Climate/Environment

Trump to shut down all 8,000 EV charging ports at federal govt buildings Electrek

Trump energy chief says there are upsides to ecological collapse Heated

China?

Japan warns over threat from China’s chip material export controls Financial Times

Commercial flights diverted as Chinese warships undertake apparent live-fire drill in sea between Australia and New Zealand Guardian

Tech bros back in China’s official spotlight as Jack Ma meets Xi Asia Times (Kevin W)

European Disunion

Chartbook 354: Of trains and tanks. Or does the German political class actually know how bad things are? Adam Tooze (Micael T)

Ukrainian move – collecting info from ordinary Swedes Aftonbladet via machine translation. Micael T: “Is this an off-ramp for military analysts laying blame on the people or are they gauging how well the war propaganda is working?”

Old Blighty

The great British food shortage: Why your weekly shop is about to get worse Independent

Britain’s productivity puzzle is turning into a crisis Financial Times

Thirty English councils granted exceptional financial support packages Guardian

Israel v. The Resistance

“The I.O.F. ‘weaponizes’ UNRWA.” The Floutist

Iranian Christians feared death in Iran. Then the US deported them to Panama USA Today. resilc: “I think a trade up from both Iran AND USA USA.”

New Not-So-Cold War

This timing makes sense. Russia had massed troops on the Ukraine border in March-April 2021:

Brief summary from the front on February 20, 2025 Marat Khairullin

On Ukraine, Macron attempts to prepare public opinion for an unprecedented war effort Le Monde

Putin orders regulation of process of return of foreign companies Kommersant via machine translation (Micael T)

Trump ‘very frustrated’ and Zelensky must strike minerals deal, says adviser BBC

US, Ukraine near agreement on mineral rights deal Anadolu Agency

Nigel Farage dissents from Trump’s Zelenskyy ‘dictator’ claim Guardian (Kevin W)

By Drones, Mines And Missiles – The British Naval War Against Russia In Ukraine Moon of Alabama (Kevin W)

Big Brother is Watching You Watch

Apple yanks encrypted storage in U.K. instead of allowing backdoor access Washington Post (Kevin W)

Imperial Collapse Watch

Who will now stabilise the world economy? Financial Times. Huh? The US lack of concern about how its interest rates affect the rest of the world has been a major source of instability. Volcker sending US rates to the moon caused the Latin American debt crisis, FFS. More recently, in 2014, a group of central bankers headed by Raghuram Rajan called on the Fed to complain about how the Fed’s indifference to the effect of its rate changes worsened hot money flows in and out of emerging economies. Of course nothing changed.

Potomac River Midair Collision: An Accident Waiting to Happen Sonar 21.

Trump 2.0

No friends, only foes in Trump’s trade war onslaught Asia Times (Kevin W)

How Tariffs Could Shock America’s Power System Wall Street Journal (resilc)

‘Brics broke up’: Trump claims bloc went silent after 150% tariff threat Business Standard

* * *

Trump fires top US general CQ Brown in shake-up at Pentagon BBC. Holy shit. Not just moved out of post as head of Joint Chiefs but fired.

The anti-woke overcorrection is here Financial Times

* * *

Roaming Charges: America on Droogs Counterpunch

Elon Musk spells danger for Accenture, McKinsey and their rivals Economist. BWAHAH

Supreme Court rules that government watchdog fired by Trump may temporarily remain on the job CNN (Kevin W)

DOGE

WHY SHOULD WE CARE IF THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION, AND MUSK’S DOGE, ARE ACTING UNCONSTITUTIONALLY? Nathan Tankus (Bill B)

How Is the Trump Administration Funding DOGE? ProPublica (Robin K)

White House restores 9/11 health program funding after uproar The Hill

Immigration

Trump’s extremist border policies are part of a global authoritarian moment Aljazeera

DHS makes shock decision on Prince Harry’s secret US visa records that could reveal if he lied about drug use Daily Mail (Li)

Our No Longer Free Press

FTC Launches Broad Tech ‘Censorship’ Probe Targeting Meta, Uber Bloomberg

AP Sues Trump Officials for Retaliatory Blocking of Reporters Common Dreams

Canada dispatch: Montreal activist jailed after series of charges over Israel-Gaza social media posts Jurist

Police angry at my writing about ridiculous charges, so add more Yves Engler

AI

The most underreported and important story in AI right now is that pure scaling has failed to produce AGI Fortune

The Bezzle

DOJ Investigates Medicare Billing Practices at UnitedHealth Wall Street Journal. Or US Probes UnitedHealth’s Medicare Billing Practices, WSJ Reports Reuters

Guillotine Watch

Luigi Mangione lawyer says Mayor Adams publicly discussed undisclosed evidence Gothamist

Many pix of Mangione doing a very good simulation of a model at the hearing on X:

Powerful legal and financial services enable kleptocracy, research shows PhysOrg (Paul R)

Class Warfare

Software Engineering Job Openings Hit Five-Year Low Pragmatic Engineer

The (AI-Driven) White-Collar Recession Crisis Investing (Micael T)

The West’s dirty secret: How most affluent nations poison the Global South RT (Robin K)

Antidote du jour. mrsyk: “This is Buster storming the snow fort. Despite his sister Dude’s stoic defense, an emphatic sacking was the result.”

And a bonus (IM Doc):

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.

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205 comments

    1. Steve H.

      A couple of years ago, when Janet retired as a nurse after 45 years, I began an almost-daily refrain:

      > I’m So Glad You’re Out!

      A lot of friends-of-friends have gone through SNL. I switched professions after two knee surgeries in medieval times. Theater and film were last bastions of masking and testing and dammit, now we’re here. You are only entertainment elite if you show your face. Put yourself in place of those people, not just emotional attachment, not just peer pressure, but your agent up your back with a percentage in mind. So hard to resist, “Where’s Hader” when Hader has a history of wise choices…

      If you can find a clean clip, check Jost’s face after the joke. He flashes his teeth, but then his top lip goes straight. They knew.

      Reply ↓
      1. Terry Flynn

        As Brit/Aussie SNL was never “a thing” for me. I now only see segments via YT. I got into it via Norm MacDonald and his unrelenting pursuit of *ahem* certain people. He got fired for this. However, I, though I loved his totally “on the nose” style on SNL, adored his ability to string out a really “dad” joke into a 5 minute monologue on late night talk shows (like this ) (some of which he was brought in at the last minute when the “official” guest dropped out suddenly) bringing in things like obscure Russian literature really made me doubly appreciative of him.

        The definition of a man who disguised his utter genius under the persona of the “everyman”. Plus he made the joke that you do NOT lose a battle with cancer…..at worst it is a draw (tie) since if you die, the cancer dies too. And he made that joke at a time when he undoubtedly knew he was terminally ill with cancer. Which he told nobody about except a very small circle of friends and family because he he never wanted sympathy. A truly great man.

        Reply ↓
    2. Wukchumni

      During the Communist era, we could fly our relatives from Prague to the USA for a visit on our Dime, and it was always a hostage situation in that aunt Jarmila could come-but her husband couldn’t. Kind of a perfect anti-defect defense.

      She visited sometime in the late 70’s and SNL was by far the coolest thing on the tube and was must-see TV, especially for teenagers the likes of me.

      So the whole family is watching, and Jarmila had ok English-barely adequate @ best, and Czech speakers learning to speak English have this halting pattern of speech, and on come the Festrunk brothers looking for foxes!

      I think Dan and Steve spoke pidgin Czech perhaps, and it was hilarious-but not to Jarmila who was mortified by the skit, yelling at the top of her lungs ‘They/ are /NOT/ Czech!’ before we were able to calm her down and explain what went on without the help of a replay button, very much lost in translation.

      Reply ↓
  2. The Rev Kev

    Working link for “WHY SHOULD WE CARE IF THE TRUMP ADMINISTRATION, AND MUSK’S DOGE, ARE ACTING UNCONSTITUTIONALLY?” article at-

    https://www.crisesnotes.com/why-should-we-care-if-the-trump-administration-and-musks-doge-are-acting-unconstitutionally/

    Some Presidents act as if the Constitution is just an optional extra. George Bush once shouted ‘Stop throwing the Constitution in my face. It’s just a goddamned piece of paper!’ And look how well his Presidency worked out for the rule of law.

    Reply ↓
    1. rob

      I’m sorry,
      You are going to have to be more specific than that. Which George Bush?
      Was it the guy who was the criminal banker and cia chief who was also part of the savings and loan scandal decades and Iran contra., and war on drugs.(supplying the drugs and monetizing it with the crime bills and corrections industrial complex).. or
      was it the other george bush who oversaw the cover up of 9/11 and started the war on terror, and the war on freedom, and invaded Iraq under false pretenses..,torture,dark sites,etc.

      I mean if you are just saying george bush was no friend of the truth, or the US…. you’re just gonna have to be more specific.

      Reply ↓
    2. The Rev Kev

      The later, who I call the Frat Boy President. The guy who got into elite universities, even though he was only a C student – and joked about it when President. The one who joined the Air National Guard to defend the skies of Texas against the Vietnamese Air Force. The guy who one day wandered off his base and never returned to finish his military service. And people say that Trump is not qualified to be President.

      Reply ↓
    3. Carolinian

      Joe Biden would be another with Executive Orders that were struck down by the SC in several instances. Then there were his radical moves in the healthcare area such as the “vaccine” mandates.

      The press cheered these Biden moves while being horrified by Trump’s return serve in the battle of the bigshots. I have a theory that what is really going on is a civil war among the elites and that Trump/Musk are out to get their establishment rivals, not ordinary people who were sidelined politically (and therefore mostly irrelevant to big power) some time ago.

      In other words not for nothing did Biden issue all those pardons as he walked out the door. It’s likely there are many skeletons in many closets. Bondi has even said she will release Epstein’s client list.

      Reply ↓
      1. JBird4049

        >>>Bondi has even said she will release Epstein’s client list.

        Really? I need to keep some popcorn ready for that.🍿

        Reply ↓
    4. .human

      “Stop throwing the Constitution in my face. It’s just a goddamned piece of paper!”

      Later denied by those allegedly in attendance. There are no lasting citations. In this “modern” world of deceit, and the power of the word, nothing is to be believed or trusted at face value and little upon extensive research.

      Reply ↓
    5. Jason Boxman

      What’s interesting about all this, whatever justifications that the Trump administration might utter, the truth is as Trump said recently. He’s saving the country and whatever he does is legal. That is the real justification for this. The truth is, going to the courts to “stop” all this isn’t going to yield any satisfaction. The executive has both the actual money printing apparatus and the state security services.

      Which court exactly is gonna stop them?

      This is already game over.

      The Constitutional always relies on a broad agreement that it is legitimate as widely understood. Trump and his people understand it differently. And that’s how it is, going forward. For all practical purposes, unless someone with greater force disabuses Trump of his notions, then here we are. No court rulings are gonna change that if they aren’t voluntarily respected.

      A general strike and widespread social disobedience might, but I don’t expect that is gonna happen. And the politicians with at least access to megaphones to promote this, the liberal Democrats, are squirming at criticism that they aren’t doing anything. So no help at all from those quarters. And what constitutes the Left in this country is mostly the woke left, the crowd that left workers to get disabled and die from the ongoing Pandemic, to perpetuate brunch. So no help there.

      This year is gonna be scorched!

      Reply ↓
  3. Acacia

    From the “Amazon Buys the Bond Franchise” article…

    SpaceX rocket debris crashes into Poland
    https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c62z3vxjplpo

    Polsa has confirmed that “an uncontrolled re-entry of the Falcon 9 rocket’s second stage occurred between 04:46 and 04:48 on February 19, 2025, over Poland”.

    …and this is the company that got the contract to de-orbit the ISS safely, so that Musk can eventually sell a replacement to the US et al.

    Maybe Amazon can do a remake of Moonraker with a 3D recreation of Roger Moore and …

    In the original film, Bond investigates the vanishing of a Space Shuttle, leading him to Hugo Drax, the owner of the shuttle’s manufacturing firm. Along with astronaut Dr. Holly Goodhead, Bond follows the mystery from California to Venice, Rio de Janeiro, the Amazon rainforest, and finally into outer space to prevent a plot to wipe out the world population and repopulate humanity with a master race.

    …it’s pretty clear who gets cast as Hugo Drax.

    Reply ↓
    1. MaryLand

      I’m going to start referring to Elon as Drax.

      And BTW, it’s so, so sweet to have comments back. If the pause was a way to scuttle some trolls I’m happy it worked!

      Reply ↓
  4. Acacia

    The most underreported and important story in AI right now is that pure scaling has failed to produce AGI

    Jeebus. No sh*t. It’s just mind boggling that anybody ever thought this would produce AGI. See Hubert Dreyfus, Rodney Brooks, et al.

    Reply ↓
    1. ocypode

      Did people really expect that? Don’t the techbros know not to get high off their own supply? And given Deepseek’s achievements, if anyone is even remotely close to AGI, it’s probably the Chinese (even so, not likely).

      Reply ↓
      1. flora

        The emperor paid his tailors vast sums of gold because they promised to make him the most wonderful clothes ever, clothes only the ‘right people’ could see. / ahem.

        Reply ↓
    2. Steve H.

      There’s a clip of Sapolsky saying the only difference between chimps & humans is we have less olfaction and two extra rounds of brain cell development. So there’s been some cross-disciplinary support for the idea of scaling.

      Ah well, nevertheless.

      Reply ↓
      2. Mikel

        “Cross-disciplinary support”
        Still sounds like comparing apples and oranges – so to speak – putting AI in the camp with chimps and humans.

        Reply ↓
    5. tet vet

      AI definition: Modern day alchemists looking to, as Webster puts it, “transform substances into gold or cure diseases”.

      Reply ↓
  5. Lieaibolmmai

    On T Cells and COVID. You know you can get you T Cell Levels tested by your Primary Care Doc? I just had mine done because I was having some weird skin, lung and fatigue issues (unrelated to COVID since I has been happening all my life, possible partial immune deficiency).

    The test is labeled as “LYMPH MARKER LIMITED,FLOW”. My CD3 T Cell percent came in at 61%, the very low limit of low. It seems like my T Cells are not maturing well. I am getting a Blood Smear test this week.

    Almost every time I go to a doc they take my labs and want to test me for AIDS even though I tell them I am at zero risk for it and I test negative every time. HIV deplete T Cells as well, which is why my Doc was smart to check for me. She is also ordering a serum zinc test since she said that seems to increase T Cells.

    New you can use!

    Reply ↓
    1. IM Doc

      I feel compelled to add some nuance here.

      The first thing I would say is who am I to criticize another MD who is doing their very best to diagnose, quantify or treat Long COVID, or more commonly in my experience Long Vaccine? We have been left to our own devices. To my knowledge there has not been any diagnostic strategy, or recommended treatment algorithms published by any of our agencies or big medical centers. During the days of AIDS, these types of things were out and debated by everyone all during the time of that pandemic when we did not know what was going on. So, I myself feel at times that I am just pulling at straws, doing my best to help the person in front of me. It must be noted that we must be very careful. Private practice MD groups are not big research centers. In big academic centers doing research, procedures like the above test are usually paid for by the research. Not so in regular care – and the patient could be stuck with huge, and I mean huge, bills. Especially if the insurance company finds the coding inadequate to cover the lab on the diagnosis. A simple search on our system here reveals that the above test is about 5000 dollars.

      I have ordered these myself very rarely on a very specific type of patient. The oncologists order them much more frequently. A “Limited Flow Lymph Marker” test is used when a patient has lymphedema – swelling caused by lymphatic obstruction. It is a QUANTITATIVE ONLY test to tell the relative levels of CD cells and other types of immune cells in the patient’s blood. The ratio of the various dozens of these markers can tell us what is likely the underlying cause of the lymphedema. This is a different type of exam than immunophenotyping which is also QUANTITATIVE ONLY – and that is used for example in AIDS to follow the CD4 counts. None of these things are QUALITATIVE – in other words none of them are able to tell immune damage or dysfunction in the cells themselves. That takes a very dedicated lab and dedicated scientists. This is what Dr Leonardi is describing and I assume he works in some such lab. Regular physicians can only dream of ordering such items. I have several patients with the resources to pay for this kind of study on their own blood, and it has been at times very illuminating, but I will not even share the cost they paid – it is so staggering.

      As I have said a few other times, this entire problem has so far been ignored largely by the movers of the profession. We have no diagnostic criteria, no recommended tests, and certainly no treatment. I have myself repeatedly seen elevated ESR, elevated CRP, and elevated D-Dimers in these patients, Often they have elevated liver function tests. This is often years after vaccination. In the absence of any guidance, we are trying our best to come up with things that help. That is where we are today.

      Reply ↓
      1. Lieaibolmmai

        As I have said a few other times, this entire problem has so far been ignored largely by the movers of the profession. We have no diagnostic criteria, no recommended tests, and certainly no treatment.

        Thank you for this, for it is the truth.

        Just for clarification. my doctor had a reason for ordering this test and it was covered by Medicare. I am disabled now for 30 years and have a consistently low WBC (~3-3.5). She is the first on to care about this and wanted to rule out Leukemia, which it look like might be the case, which is the reason she order the smear. Also My CD4 and CD8 were both low but the ratio was fine signalling a possible immune deficiency and not a viral problem (In HIV only CD4 is low). Again, this something I have lived with since I was a child. (To note the severity of my issues I also had an ADA and PNP enzyme assay which showed slightly elevated DeoxyAXP and low normal ADA activity which was again to investigate a possible immune deficiency, which seems like is there but only partial.) So, you see, I am not an ordinary patient, but my insights of my own health issues may benefit others. The Limited Flow Lymph Marker is useful in HIV infection as well and the CD4:CD8 ration is a common test for people with HIV.

        At least I would like to see more T Cells testing in people with Long COVID, at least to rule it in or out.

        Reply ↓
        1. Steve H.

          > certainly no treatment.
          > but my insights of my own health issues may benefit others.

          Thank you for this.

          Janet and I considered buying the materials for testing CD4 & CD8. Two main reasons we didn’t:

          : So now you get to tell someone they’ve Acquired an Immune Deficiency. Yay.

          : So What? Once someone knows, what do they do?

          This last is a subset of Broken News. I’ve spent some available time reviewing my notes, and it’s usually not fruitful, as the consequences and implications have been incorporated in practice. We don’t worry so much about flu because our Covid precautions cover it. But vitamins and herbs and other interventions we do can seem inadequate against systemic unknowns.

          When someone takes us on a journey through their landscape, whether burnt trees or our health care capacities, it helps me frame an uncertain environment. So again, thanks.

          Reply ↓
          1. Lieaibolmmai

            You’re welcome.

            I consider myself a citizen scientist so that is why I do all of this. Most of the time I do not care and just live in the forests and mind my own business. But since my family has the same issues as well I thought I could help them too. I think there are some things that help me for sure and this was proven by an increased WBC count. Keeping down my stress is important.

            Reply ↓
      2. Chet G

        I often wonder what has happened to discusion about the aftereffects of the “vaccine.”
        Several months after I had the first two vaccines, I came down with polymyalgia rheumatica. After that was diagnosed and I was seeing a rheumatologist, he mentioned that he had been seeing many such cases after the vaccine. He spoke quickly and I didn’t follow up on the point.
        And after the polymyalgia, my hips went south, so to say. That might have been due to the prednisone I had been taking, but nevertheless, I ended up with both hips being replaced. Might that have been because of the vaccine, or did the vaccine simply lead to the other factors? I’ve no idea, but I’ve been avoiding covine vaccines (and any indoor gathering of people) ever since.

        Reply ↓
      3. hermeneut

        Are you able to provide evidence for the existence of so called “Long Vaccine”? And are you able to refute evidence that the vaccines have reduced incidence of Long COVID among the vaccinated? Or are you claiming that both Long COVID and Long Vaccine exist in tandem? Damned if I do, damned if I don’t?

        For example, can.you counter Dr. Al-Aly’s study, among others, that demonstrates both lower rates of Long COVID among the vaccinated and higher post-COVID chances of developing metabolic and gastrointestinal disorders, including diabetes and dyslipidemia, among the unvaccinated?
        https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2403211

        Reply ↓
        1. flora

          an aside, noting both the anecdotal nature of this substack, and the understood “correlation is not causation”, but still….:

          Yale Researchers Find COVID Spike Protein in Blood 709 Days After Vaccination, Positing Millions of Long COVID Patients May Actually Be Vaccine Injured

          NIH has poured $1.6 billion into Long COVID research, but little or nothing to study vaccine harms, causing patient advocates to hide vaccine injury.

          https://disinformationchronicle.substack.com/p/yale-researchers-find-covid-spike

          Reply ↓
        2. IM Doc

          Unfortunately, because of some of the worst malfiesence of my lifetime as a physician, the Pharma companies were allowed to get away with profound and severe breaches in protocol regarding these products. As an IRB member for years, I have never seen anything like this. The FDA and other authorities just let them do it “because”. Accordingly, the best source of data for answers like this is now completely obliterated. You just do not release the control or placebo groups in any study. The study you cite above is backward looking, and because of the very nature of how they are looking at the information is so wildly confounded as to be pretty much worthless. There may be many other issues involved in, for example, why they have a higher incidence of diabetes. Please recall, truly unvaccinated status was very common in the Black and Hispanic communities – and they are much more commonly going to have diabetes. This confounding is the problem with all of these things now because the authorities let these companies break the control group.

          So, as a physician, with thousands under my care, I have to revert back to my training and how to assess what is going on in front of me. So far, there has been basically zero help from any kind of agencies doing really well done studies. And so far, they have completely censored much of the actual granular data – so I must do what I was trained to do long ago and do the best I can for my patients.

          I have kept complete and thorough records. Unlike the EMR systems the agencies use to document vaccine status in clinical trials, deeply flawed, I investigate everyone’s immunization status thoroughly. This is especially true of the hundred or so “Long COVID” patients in my care. I have not done it lately – but a quick EMR search the way the research trials do it without abstractors revealed a few months ago that 54% of these patients were “unvaccinated”. However, on my own personal records – every last one of them has been vaccinated at least twice. So, there is that huge glaring problem that has never been dealt with. Many of these patients have also been COVID infected – so it is very difficult to know what to make of any of this.

          I will repeat again, there are no diagnostic criteria, there are no algorithms, and there is no treatment advice. But the problem is very very real.

          Reply ↓
          1. Huey

            Thanks for this, the lack of criteria is frustrating and leads to a lot of confusion south here about this, in terms of whether it’s a unique entity and how to differentiate it.

            This is something we could really use more research on, especially regarding management.

            Reply ↓
      1. Jason Boxman

        There are so many confounders with this Pandemic, I wonder if we shall ever really know what’s happening with anyone individually or population wide.

        All I do know is that avoiding infection with SARS-CoV-2 as much as possible is critical, and the best way to do that is to wear a fitted respirator, N-95 or better. Whatever else is another layer, but this is the primary layer and the most effective at preventing infection when possible.

        Because it isn’t possible all the time; small children, medical emergencies, some disability that prevents it, cleaning the air is a duty of care that we as a society must have, no different than clean water.

        Stay safe out there!

        Reply ↓
        1. JBird4049

          >>>There are so many confounders with this Pandemic, I wonder if we shall ever really know what’s happening with anyone individually or population wide.

          As with much else in history, we will eventually discover what actually happened at least at the population level, but most of us will be dead of old age, if nothing else, by then. As with science and scientists, history advances with the deaths of both the participants and historians with their particular advocacies; too many people want uncomfortable truths and the information supporting them suppressed and only by their deaths does that suppression weaken enough.

          Reply ↓
  6. Ben Panga

    “Trump fires top US general CQ Brown in shake-up at Pentagon ”

    From the article:

    “Trump said he would nominate Air Force Lt Gen Dan Caine ……as the new chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.”

    ——

    I did a little digging as I have a suspicious mind…

    That would be this Dan Caine https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-caine

    1. Last month announced as a Venture Partner at Shield Capital. Shield Capital invest in similar (often the same) defence startups as Andreessen Horowitz and the Thiel boys – “Shield Capital invests in frontier technologies including cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, autonomy, and space.”

    [Bonus: Shield Capital analyst’s article in Foreign Affairs calling for the Pentagon/gov to harness the power of tech companies]

    2. Also last month, Caine joined Thrive Capital as an advisor. Thrive is run by Joshua Kushner (brother of Jared), has Peter Thiel as an investor, and is itself an investor in Anduril among other companies in this part of the SV VC incestuous universe (also Open AI, Stripe).

    Curiously Thrive’s website seems to be bare bones with parts “under scheduled maintenance” and the only reference I can find to Caine’s role is on his own LinkedIn page.

    3. Even more also last month, he joined Palantir partner Voyager Space as “Chairman – National Security Board)

    (4. Final also last month, he became a Venture Partner at SV Fintech VCs Ribbit Capital)

    —

    I believe this is the real reason the Joint Chief of Staff is being replaced. At the risk of broken-record behaviour, I think a huge realignment (read: money grab) in defense procurement is underway and this move supports my oft-repeated “spigot redirection thesis”

    Reply ↓
    1. Mikel

      “spigot redirection thesis”
      Indeed there’s that.

      On another note:
      If no war with China materializes, who does that reveal as the targets of all this mess?

      Reply ↓
    2. Emma

      It’s the final smash and grab against the population of the Metropole. And we thought it would only happen to mud people on other continents or deplorables (of all varieties). It’s looking more and more like the PayPal Mafia is making a play to eat up the defense contractors and banks. Their first step is to get rid of all the regulators and the revolving door between the Pentagon and the MIC.

      They’ve also just sacked the entire contracting department at OPM. https://www.reddit.com/r/1102/comments/1iuzrv1/opm_has_officially_rifd_their_contracting_office/ and GSA apparently just waived education and warrant requirements for making their contracts. This could mean that federal contracting procedures used to assure some level of fair playing field, may be completely going out the window. I could see enlisted military personnel with no formal training just rubber-stamping sole source contracts to certain favored personalities, based on calls from higher up in the chain.

      I really need to move my finances abroad, which is extra hard for an American 🤢.

      Reply ↓
      1. TimH

        My thinking is to buy a duplex somewhere without terrible climate risks, Atlanta darea say. Live in one half, rent the other. Rent follows inflation so you have a hedge and somewhere to live reasonably isolated from sh*t.

        Reply ↓
        1. Emma

          I’m looking to get out. I don’t feel safe in this country and I know that oligarchs are eyeing retirement savings, RE appreciation, and social security as the last big pot of money to loot, just as they have looted so many private pensions in the last 40 years. I know there are risks everywhere but this country is almost as crazy as Israel or Milei’s Argentina. Take a look at the West Bank to see how a lawless entity deals with little people’s property rights.

          Nowhere is safe from climate change, as Helene and the freak heat waves in the Pacific Northwest (supposed climate refuge) shows.

          Reply ↓
    3. Arby

      The F35 has a life cycle cost of $100 million. The Air Force bought 1000. Only 3 in 10 are mission capable at any one time ever. The air force wants to buy 1500 more. The B21 Raider has a procurement cost of $700 million each. The air force wants to buy 100. The B21 must fly hours to deliver its missile payload and cannot survive a modern peer to peer, multi system antiair environment (a hypersonic ballistic missile by contrast costs about $1 million each and is unstoppable). Maybe shifting the grift will totally serendipitously save taxpayers money.

      Reply ↓
      1. Ben Panga

        My ignorant take: the budget will not be reduced but America may get more useful weaponry for it’s dollars – Anduril’s Arsenal-1 idea does make sense, as does the move away from exquisite weapons and cost-plus contracts. The integration of AI into everything, I’m less sure about to put it mildly.

        Overall I think every dollar saved on things that go boom will go into building some janky Skynet knock-off.

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            1. converger

              Aha! The underlying endgame for deliberately accelerating global warming is finally revealed.

              But what will they do when they realize that Greenland is way smaller than it looks on a map?

              Plus, IIRC they never found all of the nuclear warheads that got dumped out over Greenland in 1968.

              Oh! Oh! And the US military has just been suborned by MiniMes of not one, but two apartheid Dr. No clones, spawned in a secret Technocracy laboratory financed by Goldfinger with the gold that he stole from Fort Knox.

              Yes! The next 007 movie script is writing itself, in real time.

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      2. wendigo

        Or more along the lines of funding the provision of Tesla’s Full Self Driving capability to the F35 and B21.

        Just think of the savings in pilot training.

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        1. Emma

          Planes don’t make much sense in the era of autonomous drones and long range missiles.

          But take a look at how much Tesla has improved their vehicles in 10 years and then compare BYD 2015 to BYD 2025. None of these vaporware hawking SV Broligarchs can turn the tide on American military decline, even if they earnestly wanted to.

          Reply ↓
          1. wendigo

            Wouldn’t a more fair comparison for Tesla be the improvement from the Roadster to the Cybertruck?

            With the decline in Tesla sales and the likely loss of the EPA carbon credit income Tesla needs a new income stream.

            I was thinking more along the lines of Tesla drones and missiles. They seem to have mastered the art of hitting things.

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            1. Emma

              They barely used them in Ukraine.

              I’m aware of the latest developments in both Chinese and Russian aviation but I think it’ll switch over to unmanned drones as the tech gets better in the coming decade. A manned plane is limited by pilot tolerance for acceleration, has to support the pilot’s weight and life support, and would be more risk adverse than an unmanned drone with the same capabilities.

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              1. heh

                They barely used them in Ukraine.

                Only if by barely, you mean a lot. Su-35s (and Su-30s) have been patrolling the skies every single day. Su-34s have been less active until the glide kits for FABs have been developed, but have been dropping bombs on industrial scale ever since. Su-25s (and helicopters) have also been active daily, since the very beginning. In addition to that, all three types of Tupolev bombers have been launching long range missiles from safe distance all along. Su-57s also did some work, and also testing in real combat situations (including the incident when a companion drone had to be shot down over enemy territory). I think that Russians would say that planes would still make sense in the era of autonomous drones and long range missiles (and not only because they are missile carriers).

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      3. Carolinian

        Thanks. The Pentagon soaks up a major portion of the budget and is full of boondoggles like the F 35. Indeed the plane is a standing joke around here. Musk just called it junk which should be canceled.

        Perhaps any replacement of current Defense Dept management would be an improvement. Unfortunately when it comes to gold plated turkeys in the weapons arsenal they may have to get those past a Congress which keeps them alive to promote jobs in their districts.

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    4. DorothyT

      Ben Panga’s curiosity about the choice of Lt. Gen. Dan Caine turns out to describe the very definition of private equity.

      Reply ↓
    5. Roland

      For my part, I’m just happy that the president reminded the general staff that he is their commander-in-chief. Trump should have done this during his first term.

      Trump’s opponents like to cite the Constitution. He can do that, too.

      As for the new guy, of course he’s somebody aligned with the current government. That is generally true everywhere. War is politics. Armed forces are political organizations. Senior military posts are political appointments. In the USA, even a promotion to three-star rank requires express government approval.

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    6. Samuel Conner

      > I think a huge realignment (read: money grab) in defense procurement is underway

      On the bright side, it seems plausible that such a change would not actually result in increased military capabilities, so it might in future be harder to break things here and there around the globe.

      For some time I’ve thought of the US defense budget as an overt jobs program and a covert “peace through weakness” agenda. The peace agenda hasn’t worked out very well, I admit, but it might have been even worse if we had been better at prevailing in the conflicts we engage in.

      /s

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    7. matt

      Fun comment!!! What im hearing is that i could profit by investing in thiel backed defense companies. But seriously. I do think that a defense money realignment would be interesting. Id expect some form of kickback from the MIC, but it might just be the democrats flailing around more with messaging that doesnt land. Trump admin has a solid argument for shifting money away from current defense contractors – they do kinda suck lol. But im doubtful that techbro MIC will be any better than traditional MIC. I need to imagine how this will play out.

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  7. ocypode

    Chartbook 354: Of trains and tanks. Or does the German political class actually know how bad things are? Adam Tooze (Micael T)

    If even the famous German trains aren’t running on time, what else is left? I guess everyone recalls what people said about Mussolini and trains (even if it was way overblown), which might signal the AfD’s time has finally come? Given apparent penchant that the German elite has for supporting genocide, bad things might be on the horizon.

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  8. griffen

    That dog looks pretty contented with his current situation, surely that’s a summer location given this week even here in the southeastern US we got some serious low overnight temps over a 48 hour window more or less. Thursday was a very cold and high wind day, by most standards, for late February in South Carolina.

    Spring will be here soon.

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  9. The Rev Kev

    ‘Hans Mahncke
    @HansMahncke
    Feb 21
    Jeffrey Sachs just told the European Parliament that Jake Sullivan privately admitted what he refused to acknowledge publicly—a simple truth about NATO that could have averted the Ukraine war. Utterly damning. Everything Sullivan touches turns into chaos, destruction and misery.’

    I think that Jeffrey Sachs misread the situation here. He believed Jake Sullivan. I think that starting a war with Russia using the Ukraine as a proxy force was the plan all along. People like Sullivan wanted this war as he thought that the NATO trained & equipped military would beat the Russians on the battlefield. So here he fobbed Sachs off as he was in on the war plans and only wanted Sachs to shut up and go away while the ‘adults in the room’ carried out their plans. Now that the war is entering its final stages, Sullivan has made himself scarce.

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    1. GramSci

      I think of it as the day Jeffrey woke up. I checked his CV, and Sachs likely gained his audience with Sullivan in his role as advisor to Chief EU Gardener, Josep Borrell.

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    2. flora

      So, the EU is still huffing that 120-year-old Mackinder “pivot of history” smoke. More recently, it was replaced in 1992 with Fukuyama’s “the end of history.” Now, history has re-started and the pivot of history has moved farther east, imo. It’s hard to let go of longtime organizing principles and beliefs. / ;)

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      1. flora

        an aside: this is sort of funny in the “you’re kidding, right?” category of funny. / ;)

        Germany issues warning to US
        Europe should make it clear to President Trump that failure to back “liberal democracies” will come at a price, Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock has insisted

        https://swentr.site/news/613126-germany-us-russia-ukraine/

        I remember back in the day thinking the Greens were the peace party.

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        1. JBird4049

          The Greens were the peace party, but it was subsumed by the neoliberal Borg collective as the leadership wanted their not so metaphorical thirty pieces of silver.

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        1. The Rev Kev

          Jee-zuz. It hits all the bases, doesn’t it? Prominent family, ex-spook, lawyer, Yale, connected to Joe Lieberman and John McCain, in on the effort to impeach Trump. It’s all there. Thanks for that link.

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    5. TomW

      Nov. 2021 U.S.-Ukraine Charter on Strategic Partnership

      https://perma.cc/3NMV-G943

      Did they deliberately pour gasoline on a fire? Or was it an accident?

      Sullivan was right that it was never going to exactly happen. How popular would a US Nuclear war over Ukraine be in the US?

      Sachs was correct that the war is being fought to preserve the right of Ukraine to enter into security agreements that were never going to happen.

      Just background … here is John Mersheimer listing why NATO membership for Ukraine was the cause of this War. https://mearsheimer.substack.com/p/who-caused-the-ukraine-war

      This unconventional view, should have been common knowledge, as Mearsheimer explained in his 2015 YouTube video on the start of the Ukrainian crisis. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrMiSQAGOS4

      The blob* was working overtime to Trump proof this war. By starting his peace proposal accepting this point, he has blob proofed the his peace initiative.

      *In Defense of the Blob
      America’s Foreign Policy Establishment Is the Solution, Not the Problem
      https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/defense-blob

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  10. Terry Flynn

    re UK councils bankruptcy. This is an issue I waded into – perhaps taking the bait inadvisedly in last day or so. However, it was good to hear that this kind of issue – the breaking up of society into electoral groups that can no longer rely on the insurance principle of having a social contract where the richer help properly maintain services – is not specific to the UK.

    Council Tax was a band-aid (heavily based on the old “rates system”) introduced by then Prime Minister John Major after Thatcher got ousted, in an attempt to defuse a major meltdown in Britain, where the poll tax riot came to be seen as one of the worst riots in the UK capital since Peterloo in early 19th Century. No Party wants to touch the “new” (cough) Council Tax since it automatically will cause major outcry in the NIMBYs and home-owner classes. Yet the system of funding of local councils – where most funding is via direct grants from central government and any deviation from projected revenue has a massively disproportionate effect upon the 25% of funding Council Tax imposes on locals has inevitably led to even “old-school Good One-Nation Tory councils” getting into trouble. But of course “leftie” cities like Nottingham get highlighted by the major media (and the lickspittle Guardian).

    As I’ve discussed elsewhere, it is ironic that Nottingham never gave in to the StageCoach/FirstBus duopoly and keeps winning the prize for best bus operator in the UK via its independent (but I *think* partially city owned) bus company. I’ve lived in various cities and repeatedly had to tell my mum that the cost per mile and comfort levels on Nottm City buses was so far ahead of the duopoly running other cities I lived in when she complained.

    Nottingham, in the boom years, brought back trams etc. These were necessarily (given the artificially small size of “Nottingham City”) co-ventures with the donut of borough councils surrounding the city. The praise for these all went to the boroughs who enabled posh people to commute into central Nottm easily and enabled moves to massively pedestrianise Nottingham centre, Of course, when central funding (courtesy of the Conservatives and the Lib Dem allies during the coalition) began to collapse, Nottingham got the blame.

    Ironically the “flight from the city”, seen across the UK and US, has now become “flight from the suburbs” and the donut of borough councils are now beginning to feel the pinch. They’re all struggling to find a reason why “things are family blogged”. How’s about “because Nottingham and Nottinghamshire were divorced by the Tories so revenue sharing and insurance principles were destroyed”? Irony alert: the big issue round here is whether all the borough councils (sections of the “donut”) should merge to form a “super-council” to spread costs etc. Of course (though nobody admits it) the roadblock is “who is likely to get majority electoral control of such a council since some boroughs are Labour, the one represented by arch-one-nation former Tory grandee Ken Clarke is Tory, and the others are beginning to lean Reform).

    Let’s be clear. If this nonsense isn’t sorted soon then all of the parliamentary constituencies in South Notts, and potentially all of Notts – the KEYSTONE of the red wall – will be Reform in 2029. Labour are in the last chance saloon but won’t grasp the nettle to sort out this mess regarding local government.

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    1. The Rev Kev

      ‘Labour are in the last chance saloon but won’t grasp the nettle to sort out this mess regarding local government’.

      C’mon now. That would mean that Keir Starmer would have to make a decision.

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      1. Terry Flynn

        Indeed. Instead he has minions like my local MP saying “vote for me, vote for MEEEEEEEE, I’m LGBQT and have your interests at heart!”.

        If you really were insterested in local people you’d have set your stall up at ASDA, NOT Sainsbury’s (where you’re less likely to have someone take a pop at you). And no I’m not voting for you cause you’re gay. Stop doing divide and rule. I’m never voting for you cause you don’t understand a balance sheet and got onto a House of Commons Subcommittee IMMEDIATELY on election – something that NEVER happened in years gone by unless you bought your way there or did something I can’t refer to on here. Any politically savvy Brits who know how MPs traditionally “climbed the ladder” know you NEVER went straight onto a parliamentary subcommittee unless you were an already nationally regarded expert. This guy ain’t that.

        Instead of putting wedding pics of you and your hubby on X, try putting pics of you being there for re-opening of a SHOP in our main suburb. That’s what people wanna see (including me). And you wonder why Reform are cleaning up around here? Sheesh.

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    2. Terry Flynn

      A PS re trams. The “donut section borough” that benefited MOST from the trams was Rushcliffe….the borough whose Parliamentary Constituency happened to be that of Ken Clarke (alas alumnus of both my secondary school and Cambridge College). Thus Nottm City taxpayers paid large amounts to enable rich Tories to get into Nottm on the cheap.

      Those people who go on about “Robin Hood travel” corruption are frankly liars: YOUR favourite borough was only an average funder but huge beneficee of the tram extensions. So WHY are there huge ongoing traffic issues? These are through YOUR borough. Quit saying “Nottingham corruption via their Robin Hood trans-operator scheme”. We all know that’s rubbish. The funding for the trams extensions (into Rushcliffe – the Tory borough) were pushed by tories. Quit making crap up. For anyone wanting proof, LOOK at the map of the tram extension……it’s all for the rich borough. If you have a problem then it’s because your pet tories are the problem. Your pet companies have screwed the local authorities left right and centre and we have a total hole in our city centre thanks to the INTU scandal.

      The poor areas of Nottm that got served by the trams from the early 1990s were only served because they were necessarily on the route out to posh areas. One area, (Hyson Green) happens to be where I was born in early 1970s. Back then it was back to back Victorian slums with no toilets. Thankfully it’s all been knocked down and replaced and there is a revistalised area. But the “you must be Nottingham from 13th centure” mob don’t like that. Sheesh.

      I could go back to give history lesson involving an Earl from MILES away which skewed up nottingham but I don’t want to insert too many links and it is easy to look at wikipedia to learn why Nottm is so messed up.

      TL;DR Nottingham is becoming Detroit

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    1. Emma

      Yes. This and finally letting Assange go home are the only good things that Biden did in his horrible 4 years in office.

      Reply ↓
      1. Carla

        Lina Khan was one more good thing. She rocks! Oh, and also Deb Haaland as Secretary of the Interior — very good also.

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        1. Emma

          Their work has been undone by the first thirty days of Trump 2.0. We aren’t even going to have a functional SEC or CFPB anymore.

          All the people onboard in the last year or two are now fired in mass via the “Valentine’s Day Massacre” of 2025.

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    3. JBird4049

      Yes, seeing Peltier with that smile on his face made my day; he was old, gray, and tottering, but with a big smile. I am thinking that he believes in his life’s choices.

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  13. Louis Fyne

    re. Culture Critic’s color/colour thread….

    Critic left out an important aspect (but not the only)….any type of color (outside of browns, beige, mother of pearl, etc.) was expensive pre-19th century, and thus a show of wealth, status, particularly blue hues in the time of Titian.

    color has never been as cheap as now. so Just as “skinny” morphed to be an elite marker, the Overton Window has shifted away.

    bonus factoid, anon. Chinese hinterlanders discovered synthetic dyes >2000 years before the Germans. but of course,Confucian scholars hated decadent colors too, just like Plato.

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    1. The Rev Kev

      Certainly the choice of darker colours in films and TV shows is nothing more than a trend. I saw a video the other day comparing the bright colours of the original film “Shogun” with Richard Chamberlain and its modern iteration where the colours were so somber if not gloomy. And as the following link points out, in the final battle of “Game of Thrones” it was so dark it was hard to see what was going on. It does not have to be this way so I think that this is Hollywood imposing their choices on everybody else because they know better-

      https://variety.com/2022/film/news/why-movies-so-dark-hard-to-see-batman-1235195535/

      As for cars, well, “50 Shades of Gray” was supposed to be a film, not a palette of car colour choices-

      https://www.consumerreports.org/consumerist/a-brief-history-of-car-colors-and-why-are-we-so-boring-now/

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      1. Carolinian

        Hollywood’s original three strip Technicolor system was considerably influenced by a Technicolor employee named Nathalie Kalmus who insisted on bright colors as seen in, say, The Wizard of Oz. Eventually the industry dropped the bulky Technicolor system–for the most part–and switched to film similar to that used in consumer cameras and filmmakers could be more individual and creative with color. See Gordon Willis photog in the Godfather movies.

        So yes these things in part a fashion but not only.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natalie_Kalmus

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    2. Terry Flynn

      Random colour counter-example. When I lived in Sydney my project manager bought a new car. The colour was what we all called “vomit orange”. She loved it. We asked why (since back then in the early 2010s Sydney was already dominated by black/grey/white/silver). She said “I’m fed up of being unable to find my family blogging car in IKEA car-park. Now I see it a mile off.”

      Good point. If I were to buy a car I would definitely go for something like lime green, not the silver I had in Sydney and which drove me insane.

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      2. Vandemonian

        +1. Ours is a bright iridescent orange. Spot it instantly in a supermarket car park. Unfortunately one other local made the same choice, and looked at me strangely when I tried unlocking hers…

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      3. Laura in So Cal

        I love silver cars. We have 4 street vehicles and only one isn’t silver. Our old pick up truck is blue.
        1. I like an anonymous and unassuming car and don’t want to stand out. No vanity plates, no bumper stickers, etc.
        2. Silver is great in my hot climate at reflecting heat. White would be better, but see #3.
        3. Silver doesn’t show dirt or dust much. I never notice how dirty it is until it gets washed and detailed 1X/year.
        4. I keep cars forever so I wouldn’t necessarily want to buy a trendy color that would look old in a few years.

        I confess to liking some of the new cars I’ve seen that are a dark, saturated, orange which is one of my favorite colors to wear, but I don’t think I’ll buy a car in that color.

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    3. .Tom

      I’ve been grumbling along the same lines as that thread by Culture Critic for years. The movies of Pedro Almodóvar can be an antidote and useful contrast to the desaturation of so much cinema and cinematic TV. On video cameras, “picture profiles” are all about achieving different kinds of “cinematic” desaturation, or so it seems to me.

      I’m inclined to interpret the loss of color as relating to the loss of creative confidence in the arts generally.

      Speaking of Almodóvar, I can recommend his recent book “The Last Dream”. I had no idea he was such a good writer but he really is.

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      1. Terry Flynn

        Film vs digital actually goes further. Digital recording can never be “upscaled” beyond the pixel level it was recorded at. Film can always be rescanned for DVD or higher resolution Blu-Ray etc.

        I might be convinced that certain digital recordings are sufficiently high-res so that there is no benefit to any greater resolution. However, the issues discussed here regarding colour grading etc and generally “messing about” makes me think we have not yet reached that point.

        Ergo I think we should be using film. At least we retain the ability to scan at various ranges etc. It’s a case of “keeping maximum flexibility”.

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        1. Acacia

          Film archives say that under good conditions in a vault, 35mm film can be preserved for two centuries.

          They are more worried about digital, as the support media can fail catastrophically in a matter of years, plus you need working hardware to read that support media, and support for that working hardware, etc. etc.

          Single Microsoft is all about “forced obsolescence”, the best case would probably be some Linux file system like EXT4 for the archive media, and then of course you have to have a backup, and copy the backup every few years to a fresh HDD, but when you consider that a single BluRay could be 20 GB, and that’s still not even the quality of film… yeah, it begins to look like you might as well just archive a film negative.

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          1. IM Doc

            I am not a movie professional or cinematographer. A simple google search I just did tells me that just 8% of modern films and TV are shot with actual film. All of the rest are digital. Perhaps someone out there with more knowledge can elucidate that. I literally cringe when patients bring me stuff from Dr. Google, so I understand the limitations of internet searching, especially with the search engines of today.

            It may be just as well that all the digital films end up unreadable in a few decades. As things are going now, the movies being made now are largely going to be a blight on the reputation of this generation in the future. It is not just the color palette that is rendering the vast majority of them unwatchable.

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            1. Carolinian

              Yes practically everything now is shot with electronic cameras and why not? Interestingly however there is now a climate controlled archive in LA where film transfers of these digital movies are stored on the theory that digital copies may indeed be vulnerable.

              One should also mention that vast chunks of early cinema have crumbled into dust in rusty film cans or were simply trashed.

              Film does have a unique look and some natural light French films from the 60s are achingly beautiful. But the big special effects films of today are heavily generated inside computers so there’s no reason not to photograph them digitally.

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            2. Terry Flynn

              I’m totally with you on hoping digital copies don’t survive and we retain analogue but the stories that have emerged regarding some key movies (Star Wars, the true horror film Sam Neill was in but but which got partially lost) make me think we need more attention to preserving analogue film

              I’d pay anything to see original cut of Event Horizon, even though it is undoubtedly a pretty challenging awful film.

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          2. Terry Flynn

            Thanks. Though I don’t have an example I can link to, I do recall examples of films that that were found, after being widely considered as “lost” and they, thanks to forward thinking about humidity etc, were stored in places that preserved them. IIRC, even the original Star Wars had a scene or two “rescued”.

            A great film is considered “gold dust” – it it both readable and scanable to any degree of digital accuracy. After “digi-rot” I can’t help but wonder if we would be better served filming via film and storing it in appropriately accilmatised place.

            I was an early adopter of CDs in early 1980s. Two of my most treasured classical music CDs succombed to rot. To be fair, later manufacturing processes solved this and I’ve never had any of my 400+ CDs and hundred of DVDs/BluRays succomb. But there are companies who have estimated when these are likely to fail. I’ve ripped all the important stuff so I’m OK but I’m still very aware that “old films” etc should be preserved. But what if the Blu-rays have been burnt to disc in a stupid fashion?

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            1. Carolinian

              We’ve had this discussion here before. Ironically if all those lost silent films shot on nitrate base had been released during the home video era then millions of copies would exist around the world and they could have been saved.

              Which is too say that film too has its problems when it comes to storage and particularly color film which uses organic dyes that are subject to deterioration. In any case don’t expect film to make a comeback. Kodak does still manufacture it in Rochester but in a much more limited way.

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            2. Acacia

              Large parts of Lang’s Metropolis were considered lost, but a 16mm transfer in poor condition was found in Argentina and you can now at least watch a complete version. The problem with Star Wars is not the film but Lucas himself. If you want to see the original, track down the “despecialized” edition that has been reconstructed by fans who love the film but have come to hate Lucas’ attitude towards it.

              Upshot: tons of stuff has been lost and will be lost, but I would submit usually not because the film support itself deteriorated but more because nobody cared or looked after it. (There were also cases such as Japan in which the US Occupation destroyed many films considered “feudal”).

              Interestingly, none of the early pioneers thought cinema was more than a fad. Edison lost interest. Méliès actually destroyed many of his own films in a bout of frustration, and the Lumières very famously said it was “an invention with no future” (a statement which Godard inserted into his film Le Mépris. Clearly, they were all very mistaken, as it became the dominant form of popular culture for the entire century. As Bazin put it, cinema is neither art nor industry but an industrial art that will disappear as soon as the commercial aspect is gone. Preservation costs money. Temperature controlled vaults cost money, etc.

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              1. Carolinian

                Well, you are correct. Our ever expanding copyright laws mean that old films are at the mercy of whoever owns them. And restoration and preservation cost money.

                Plus there are many, perhaps a majority, of films that don’t really merit preservation. Speaking strictly for myself the loss of the Star Wars franchise would provoke no tears.

                But, as I say above our digital age means that copies of current films are ubiquitous so copies of almost anything current are likely to survive. If it’s a blu-ray copy then you are getting as much visual detail as you would get in many movie theaters which are almost all now digital.

                So visiting future aliens sifting through the detritus of our civilization will be saying “who was this person, George Lucas?”

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        2. Jonhoops

          Terry , I guess you have never seen Topaz Video AI in action. Up-rez of digital recordings far beyond the original pixel resolution is done routinely now.

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          1. IM Doc

            Does this really work?

            I have so many family videos and things like that. I would love to do this if this really works.

            Do you have any experience with this?

            Reply ↓
            1. Acacia

              Doc, there are ways to just capture what you’ve got to digital that will at least stabilize it and you can make backups. There are services that will do this, to safeguard your media. Anything on a videotape or in arcane video formats, for example, should be transferred, as it can deteriorate. As Carolinian points out, above, more copies is the best protection. And there are simple, standard techniques like deinterlacing that can improve a video image.

              But upscaling is pretty controversial and especially anything treated with “AI”. Basically, you can’t introduce details that weren’t in the video without unpredictable and often downright weird results. Many people who are serious about film just reject these “restorations” but they are being forced on us anyway. E.g. Check this out:

              https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rfHJbvNYqKY

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    4. Mikel

      Reminds me of the life being squeezed out of digital audio with all the compression and other over processing. Loss of dynamics noticeable over the years.

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        1. matt

          some new artists are actually incorporating this into their music! i think the embrace of really intense sounds is fun. like speedcore, hyperpop, some forms of soundcloud rap.
          my favorite example is sematary. my mom says he sounds like the music they play to torture prisoners in guantanamo bay but i really like it! here’s one of my favorite songs of his: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=REGXZZ67F_k

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    5. Es s Ce Tera

      I wonder if one possibility for why we’re seeing this shift is desaturation, sun-bleaching. With more sunlight, colours become desaturated, overexposed, less vibrant – similar to overexposed Kodak photos from the 70’s, only this time could it be it’s our own eyesight, possibly due to there being more direct sunlight in the world? Another possibility, pollution creates haze, which will have the same effect. Or, could it also be LED and fluourescent indoor lighting? Artists who paint know natural light makes for a more visible and true spectrum of colours, if you paint indoors under fluorescent lighting your paintings will tend to use less vibrant colour, but do all the fashion designers, photographers, videographers, architects, etc., those producing our culture and cityscapes, also know this and compensate for it?

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    1. Emma

      Until they can figure out a safe and economic way for humans (or at least their mining robots) to get off Earth, this is all just crap vaporware that they sold for decades to justify their depredations in the present.

      “The future is so rich and wonderful and how dare you stop our march towards the future (which is actually completely unconstrained technofeudalism for the masses). Are you some kind of luddeite who hates human progress…”

      Yes I am.

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      1. The Rev Kev

        More like the Man from Missouri who demands ‘Show Me!’ Besides, we are not marching to the future but are regressing to the 19th century if not medieval times as we lose things like public health, secure jobs, good healthcare, etc.

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    2. judy2shoes

      I read that article you linked, GramSci, and came to the conclusion that the author is a true believer. What he’s describing is the new utopia of intelligence and wealth that will come to all who embrace AI as their savior.

      This paragraph towards the end of the essay, “Their utopian rhetoric often glosses over risks: job displacement, centralized corporate or state power, and tools that could entrench surveillance and the oppression of individual freedom. Their vision of progress is not concerned with us—the little people” ignores the entire rest of the essay in which the author’s own utopian rhetoric glosses over the risks of job displacement, etc. It is clear to me that the author is not one of the “little people” now; however, at some point he may find himself in the same boat with the rest of us.

      Reply ↓
    3. Henry Moon Pie

      The gung-ho Techno-Optimist includes this without any understanding of how it relates to his overall point, much less his disparagement of those who think an “infinite pie” can’t fit on a finite planet.

      You see, back in the 16th century, the English relied on burning trees for energy. But as the population grew, they started running out, and that meant running out of power.

      So on to the next resource, and the next and the next…

      Reply ↓
    4. Lee

      Unless a robot can upgrade the electrical wiring on a Victorian or other vintage structure without interfering with its aesthetic appeal by running a lot of exterior conduit, my kid’s job is safe. On second thought a lot of his contractual work is currently paid for by the relatively highly paid in IT and finance whose jobs are at risk of being rendered redundant by AI. In terms of social relations favoring the owners of capital at the expense of the worker bees, AI absent a new and improved New Deal will exacerbate our currently diminishing state of social cohesion. At this rate of improvement the entirety of the U.S. could become flyover country.

      Reply ↓
  15. lyman alpha blob

    A little bit ago there was a link here about the massive cost and time to build one train station in the Boston area and some discussion about why the US can’t do infrastructure anymore.

    I will just add that the Big Dig is the gift that keeps on giving. Giving falling concrete – if you’re driving through Beantown, maybe wear a helmet.

    Reply ↓
    1. GramSci

      Boston drivers don’t slow down for anything.

      Although that particular tunnel is fifty years old and wasn’t part of the Big Dig…but who needs maintenance? AI will give the US Infinite Pie :-/ (op cit.).

      Reply ↓
    2. griffen

      Regards to traffic construction, the long running joke in North Carolina has been that those infamous orange traffic cones were the state’s wildflower…given the prevalence of roadway works being a constant on I85 and I40 in and around the Research Triangle, and then further south there is I85 and I77 roadways in and through Charlotte.

      It’s a long term jobs program, and in recent years NC toll roads became the new thing. Of course population growth has largely boomed in the past decade plus.

      Reply ↓
      2. Jeff H

        In Pa we used to joke that the road sings for construction zones were worded backwards, it should have been “Temporary Improvement, Permanent Inconvenience”.

        Reply ↓
  16. Camacho

    California Takes Steps Toward Officially Recognizing Bigfoot SFGate

    Still more resonable than most of things coming from the US officials in recent times.

    Reply ↓
    1. Wukchumni

      Some years ago one of the cabin owners was really enthusiastic about the game camera he’d installed by wrapping it around a tree-easy peasy, and all the action he got from it. bears, mountain lions, but no tigers, etc.

      Another cabin owner had a friend with a convincing enough looking abominable snowman outfit that he borrowed and waited for the snow to come and around mid winter after a snowmobile ride up, strides like a Yeti with a lurch in front of the camera, and then had to wait 3 months to get the much anticipated response from the mark, who roared with laughter upon watching the evidence.

      A mountain lion striding on top of the snow in 2010

      https://silvercitywebcam.com/archives/favorites/MountainLion20100321.jpg

      Reply ↓
  17. timo maas

    Every aspect of life is being stripped of color.

    Not in Ukraine. There, everything is painted in blue and yellow.

    P.S. I rememeber seeing a video of Russian repainting something to white-blue-red, and then losing that town, and Ukrainians painting blue-yellow over it.

    Reply ↓
    1. Wukchumni

      We hiked to the Goat Canyon Trestle near San Diego the other day and parked next to a newish vehicle at the trailhead that had 8 Ukrainian stickers festooned upon it all over the car-perverse premeditated overkill, it was by far the largest display of support i’ve seen on any rear echelon on the road to partition.

      Reply ↓
  18. edgui

    The tariff debate blew up in my face when Petro finally agreed to receive the flight with deportees after Trump’s threats. The outcome was predictable. But what will happen to such de facto tariff policies against countries like China or Germany? That is my concern. Then I came across Michael Roberts’ blog post, “Trade tariffs as economic policy: the debate”, which I want to recommend (and discuss), because, although I am not an economist, I found his arguments very solid. Not only does he put on the agenda what has been discussed so far (Pettis, Krugman, etc.), but he also discusses it from a Marxist perspective.

    Reply ↓
    1. CA

      “I came across Michael Roberts’ blog post, ‘Trade tariffs as economic policy: the debate’, which I want to recommend (and discuss), because, although I am not an economist, I found his arguments very solid.”

      Excellent comment and article by Michael Roberts: https://thenextrecession.wordpress.com/2025/02/08/trade-tariffs-as-economic-policy-the-debate/ .

      The point is that Pettis and Krugman evidently have no idea that China is actually investing in making stuff, making wonderful stuff, such as high yield, variable environmental conditions tolerant, high nutrient rice or wheat or corn, or making magical stuff such as actual autonomous electric cars for under $10,000.

      Reply ↓
      1. Mikel

        While in the USA there is a desperate search to privatize any services not privatized. More than tariffs, there has to be a will to reshore some industry.
        USA: a service economy cannibalizing and monopolizing services

        Reply ↓
  19. OIFVet

    The waste colonialism of the affluent North now is practiced upon its own periphery, too, akin to Chris Hedges’ “sacrifice zones” in the US. For example, solid municipal waste being exported from rich EU countries to poor EU countries to be incinerated, because of the corruption which ensures regulatory non-interference in the latter.

    Reply ↓
  20. The Rev Kev

    “Potomac River Midair Collision: An Accident Waiting to Happen”

    Been thinking about it but for the life of me I can’t think of a good reason why you would establish a “helicopter alley” that crosses one of the busiest flight paths in the nation with only a hundred feet or so of separation. More so when a lot of those military helicopter flights are training flights. If they really wanted to do that, then maybe they should have had them training over the Potomac river south of Washington. Or maybe just under the flight path of fighters, bombers and transport planes flying into and out of Andrews Air Force base if they wanted to go that way.

    Reply ↓
    2. CA

      “I can’t think of a good reason why you would establish a ‘helicopter alley’ that crosses one of the busiest flight paths…”

      Really important. Remember too that the T flight path necessarily involves altitude changes, since the path leads to a landing strip.

      Reply ↓
      1. Carolinian

        That Larry Johnson link–by a pilot–is an excellent article.

        And it says helicopters have now been forbidden from the National Airport flight path.

        Reply ↓
  21. Wukchumni

    Goooooooood Moooooooorning Fiatnam!

    What to call our Commander In Chief was frankly the platoons’ biggest dilemma to date, does he prefer to be called King, and if so, do we call the First Son by the First Lady, Baron Barron?

    Reply ↓
      2. griffen

        All due apologies to James Best, the actor who portrayed local sheriff Roscoe P Coltrane in the aforementioned Hazzard series…if Trump is the proverbial boss wouldn’t Musk then be the sheriff?

        I’d reconsider this analogy instead pivoting to the Godfather….for the Don has a Luca Brasi at the ready it very much appears. Elon wielding a “magical, mythical” chain saw and so forth…

        Reply ↓
        1. Wukchumni

          Chainsaw Al would like a word…

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s1ny6rPPVaA (5 minutes)

          Albert John Dunlap (July 26, 1937 – January 25, 2019) was an American corporate executive. He was known at the peak of his career as a professional turnaround management specialist and downsizer. The mass layoffs at his companies earned him the nicknames “Chainsaw Al” and “Rambo in Pinstripes”, after he posed for a photo wearing an ammo belt across his chest. It was later discovered that his reputed turnarounds were elaborate frauds and his career was ended after he engineered a massive accounting scandal at Sunbeam Products, now a division of Newell Brands, that forced the company into bankruptcy. Dunlap is on the lists of “Worst CEOs of All Time” published by several business publications. Fast Company noted that Dunlap “might score impressively on the Corporate Psychopathy checklist” and in an interview, Dunlap freely admitted to possessing many of the traits of a psychopath, but considered them positive traits such as leadership and decisiveness.

          Reply ↓
        1. ambrit

          Hush now lest you invite the unwanted attentions of Cardinal Marsarin.
          I have yet to find any reference to Her Highness as being “arch” in any way, nor Dutch.

          Reply ↓
  22. AG

    re: Executive Order (Carl Schmitt)

    Is it possible that only an unlawful, undemocratic and violent means like the E.O. has the capabality to dismantle another unlawful, undemocratic and violent entity like the US Deep State?

    Or to put it differently: Is it plausible that Senate/The Hosue would ever dismantle the Deep State? Can the Deep State be disempowered by democratic means? (being rhetorical questions.)

    Under the – most likely fictional – pretense that Trump does intend to change anything substantial.

    German Constitutional Blog has several entries on Carl Schmitt.

    But since they like their Neocons:

    From 2022 on the Executive Order by Brookings´s Quinta Jurecic

    10 March 2022
    Donald Trump’s Post-9/11 Presidency and the Legacy of Carl Schmitt
    https://verfassungsblog.de/os5-trump-schmitt/

    +

    Mark Sleboda/Garland Nixon on the broader context
    Trump’s Radical Realist Foreign & Security Policy Changes Could Change the US, Geopolitics, and the World
    https://marksleboda.substack.com/p/trumps-radical-realist-foreign-and

    However the show worth the time does not live up to the headline. Actually I do not quite understand Sleboda´s enthusiasm re: change. The shift is rather fast forwarding the tilt to China which was the ultimate goal all along.

    Nixon makes an interesting suggestion however – the US´s intention to separate RU from China by offering them an obedient EU. Which won´t work however. Then what will happen? So eventually we end up at square one again.
    And in addition: If the EU refuses how will Trump react? He could very well crush EU economically. So what´s it gonna be…

    To quote Dr. Banner in the jingoist “The Avengers – Infinity War”: “You are so fucked now.”

    Reply ↓
    1. hk

      Alexander Hamilton (via Fedsralist 70) would probably agree. (As would Alexis de Tocqueville and others who looked at the history of post revolutionary France.) Admittedly, both ssts of commentaries have other issues.

      Reply ↓
  23. flora

    re: AP
    As I understand it, the spat between AP and T is about AP’s refusal to use T’s new term “Gulf of America” instead of Gulf of Mexico. OK, fine.

    Personally, every time I hear T say “Gulf of America” I hear Golf of America, and expect to see maps with the Golf of America label include little green arrow tags denoting golf courses in the US and Mexico. / ha

    Reply ↓
    1. Louis Fyne

      irrespective of politics…..this is a weird hill for AP to choose to make a stand, versus all the random DC stuff that has happened over the past 30 years.

      IMO. YMMV

      Reply ↓
    3. hk

      This makes me think of the ridiculous spat between Japan and SK over the name of Sea of Japan/East Sea. Koreans threw around enough tantrum that a lot of maps now have both names now. It’s stupid, but people have fought (even literally) over many stupid things…

      Reply ↓
  24. flora

    re: Apple yanks encrypted storage in U.K. instead of allowing backdoor access – Washington Post

    Thanks for the link. Good for Apple. This is an important issue. The U.K. is going full Orwell, imo.

    Reply ↓
  25. Wukchumni

    Talked to a friend in the know, and he related that there have been firings across the board in Sequoia NP (save fee collectors and law enforcement apparently-the perps know what they’re doing) of permanent positions with an emphasis on science’y jobs, with the plan as of now to not open Potwisha* & Lodgepole campgrounds in the summer, the latter being the largest in the park. All visitor amenities will be lessened, and if we get the usual jam job of a couple million visitors, it’ll put the old record of a 6 mile backup on Highway 198 to the park entrance once upon a time very much in doubt.

    Disarray was a good way to put it as far as the survivors of the purge were concerned as to the nature of their workplace, and he also told me of the USGS (US Geological Survey) being told that their usual compliment of 10-12 seasonal workers will be difficult to fill, as a total of 70 seasonal workers was available for the whole country now.

    This is part for the course with Bizarro World FDR, he’s ridding the forest for the trees and raking out occupations.

    * a stoner’s whet dream of a name

    Reply ↓
    1. Carolinian

      In other words it was already a mess during high summer and now will get worse?

      I camped at Sequoia many years ago and don’t remember particularly large campgrounds. Have they built more?

      Of course none of us are defending arbitrary firings but overcrowding in certain parks seems to be an ongoing problem. The last time i visited Zion the headquarters parking lot was full and I had to park outside the entrance and walk in.

      Reply ↓
      1. Wukchumni

        Most any 50% more weekend holiday (Mem Day, 4th July, Labor Day) can be hectic here, where swarms of say 30 vehicles are let in without collecting fees if the backup warrants it, so Sequoia NP loses out on those fees in order to move ’em a long little doggies.

        Sometimes you get long backups when you least expect it, and once they clear customs, then have to jockey for a parking spot in the Giant Forest and good luck with that.

        Dorst Campground was as large as Lodgepole, but has been closed for years now, and thinking about it-this leaves little Buckeye campground as the only campground open in Sequoia NP in the main part of the park this year, yikes.

        Haven’t heard anything about the 2 campgrounds in Mineral King yet.

        Reply ↓
        1. Carolinian

          The parks are supposed to preserve and not just serve as tourist attractions (your neighbors might not agree). So perhaps some attendance discouragement of the only casually interested is not such a bad thing.

          At any rate I’m glad I’ve already seen most of them. Back East, in my area, the Smokies are about it. Last time I passed through and on a holiday weekend no less it was unbelievably crowded.

          Reply ↓
          1. Wukchumni

            It doesn’t mean much to me, as 99% of the visitors go to 1% of Sequoia NP, and I’m more like the 1% of visitors that go to 99% of Sequoia NP.

            Reply ↓
    2. Emma

      If the American people surrender unconditionally to the Chinese by May 31st, can we get 🚠 at every NPS scenic lookout and 20,000 miles of HSR built by 2030?

      Reply ↓
        2. Emma

          Yes. But it can be revoked at any time at the discretion of Xi Jinping. You also give up access to all future legal and administrative remedies for everything you did since you were five.

          Reply ↓
  27. Tom Stone

    How long will it take our Congresscritters to figure out that if the President holds the purse strings they don’t have anything to sell?

    Reply ↓
    1. Mikel

      Considering that hypothetical situation: What if, without the purse strings more spread out, all the buyers of influence become a circular firing squad as they battle for the attention of the one or few that control the purse strings?

      Reply ↓
  29. CA

    https://news.cgtn.com/news/2025-02-22/Chinese-researchers-find-new-target-to-treat-Parkinson-s-disease-1Bc8suHvpni/p.html

    February 22, 2025

    Chinese researchers find new target to treat Parkinson’s disease

    Chinese researchers at Huashan Hospital, an affiliate of Fudan University in Shanghai, have become the world’s first to discover FAM171A2, a new therapeutic target for treating Parkinson’s disease, according to research * published in the journal Science on Friday.

    Led by Yu Jintai, deputy head of Huashan Hospital’s neurology department, the team has also identified a candidate drug that can slow the progression of Parkinson’s disease based on this new finding. This discovery was made after five years of research.

    The research was also conducted under the auspices of the National Center for Neurological Diseases and the National Key Laboratory of Brain Function and Brain Diseases.

    Parkinson’s disease is the second most common neurodegenerative disease after Alzheimer’s and seriously affects patients’ daily lives. Traditional drugs and surgical treatments only address the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease and do not block its progression.

    The number of people with the disease may reach 13 million by 2040, with Chinese patients accounting for nearly half.

    Pathological alpha-synuclein is a key pathogenic protein in the disease. Its aggregation can disrupt the normal function of neurons and lead to their death. It can also spread, damaging adjacent healthy neurons. When it affects different regions of the brain, it can cause motor symptoms such as bradykinesia, resting tremor and rigidity, as well as cognitive impairments like memory decline…

    * https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adp3645

    Reply ↓
  30. Es s Ce Tera

    re: The anti-woke overcorrection is here Financial Times

    An example of this is the recent Delta crash in Toronto. The news and forums are abuzz with the shocking revelation that one of the pilots was a woman, therefore concluding that DEI is the reason for the crash.

    (Google “toronto delta crash dei” and you’ll see what I mean.)

    Reply ↓
  31. AG

    I had an argument yesterday and on one issue I lacked the research since it´s Berlinale at the moment:

    When I tried to explain and justify a few of Vance´s points in Munich re: freedom of speech the counter-argument was that the US administration was hitting heavily on academia and firing people if they defended DEI. But how substantial is the latter suppression of freedeom of speech in comparison to what is happening in Europe?

    p.s.

    Matt Taibbi with a helpful little collection of EU/US censorship laws sorted by country and date:

    Racket Library
    The Library: Timeline of Foreign Censorship Laws
    Legislation, codes, agreements, and other documents pertinent to the ongoing speech debate.
    Matt Taibbi
    and Kathleen McCook
    Feb 22, 2025
    https://www.racket.news/p/the-library-timeline-of-foreign-censorship

    Reply ↓
    2. Kouros

      DEI is not meritocratic and likely from an HR perspective not legal, since meritocracy is still the foundation of public service in developed countries.

      Reply ↓
    3. lyman alpha blob

      I suppose in defending DEI, a person would be speaking freely, however having sat through many hours of ridiculous DEI “training”, DEI itself is a proscription of speech. And just trying complaining about DEI to your HR department rather than defending it.

      Reply ↓
  32. Otaku Army

    Re: Is Trump Wrong on Tariffs

    I may have missed it, but it doesn’t seem that NC linked to Yanis Varoufakis’s article earlier in the month that described a risky “masterplan” behind the apparent petulant arbitrariness of the tariffs. https://unherd.com/2025/02/why-trumps-tariffs-are-a-masterplan/

    Since this is the sort of thing that NC is really geared towards and many people including Yves were actively involved in commenting on the Greek debt crisis, I’d love to know what Yves herself and the NC cognescenti think of Yanis’s take.

    Reply ↓
    1. Samuel Conner

      I think Lambert linked to it in one of the water coolers, but this was during the comments holiday and so there was no opportunity for discussion.

      I too think this is an interesting discussion topic. Here is my brief “take” — I found YV’s argument slightly confusing, but perhaps what is confusing is DJT’s agenda, which may contain mutually incompatible elements.

      1) YV thinks that DJT wants the USD to decline relative to other currencies in order to make US exports more attractive, and restrain imports. From an early paragraph:

      > But why blame this on the dollar’s global role? Because, Trump answers, foreign central banks do not let the dollar adjust downwards to the “right” level — at which US exports recover and imports are restrained.

      According to YV, DJT wants the USD to decline relative to other currencies but still remain the international reserve currency:

      > Central to this new global order would be a cheaper dollar that remains the world’s reserve currency — this would lower US long-term borrowing rates even more. Can Trump have his cake (a hegemonic dollar and low-yielding US Treasuries) and eat it (a depreciated dollar)? He knows that the markets will never deliver this of their own accord. Only foreign central banks can do this for him. But to agree to do this, they need to be shocked into action first. And that’s where his tariffs come in.

      > his critics do not understand. They mistakenly think that he thinks that his tariffs will reduce America’s trade deficit on their own. He knows they will not. Their utility comes from their capacity to shock foreign central bankers into reducing domestic interest rates. Consequently, the euro, the yen and the renminbi will soften relative to the dollar. This will cancel out the price hikes of goods imported into the US, and leave the prices American consumers pay unaffected. The tariffed countries will be in effect paying for Trump’s tariffs.

      At this point I am kind of confused. The (per YV) DJT-preferred foreign Central Bank policy will cause USD to appreciate relative to foreign currencies, offsetting the US tariffs. But surely this policy will make US exports even less attractive than they now are. US imports may not increase, but exports can, I would think, be expected to decrease. A larger trade deficit will (assuming the US domestic sector remains in the current balance/surplus/deficit level that it is in) result in larger Federal deficit (the sectoral balances identity).

      YV thinks that DJT wants foreign CBs to subsequently intervene to appreciate their currencies (while holding their interest rates low)

      > Acquiesce to what? To appreciating their currency substantially without liquidating their long-term dollar holding. He will not only expect each spoke to cut domestic interest rates, but will demand different things from different interlocutors.

      Now I am really confused. I have the impression that international hot money flows happen in response to Central Bank interest rate changes. If foreign CBs have low rates, but want to appreciate their currencies relative to USD, what will the CBs do? Purchase their own currencies from private actors wanting to dump it? And pay with what? USD? Then the vast foreign USD holdings will be in the hands of private actors rather than CBs. Not sure that is a more stable arrangement than what now exists.

      Superficially, this seems to me to be a difficult circle to square.

      Reply ↓
  33. CA

    A note about electricity backups. China has been constructing ultra-high voltage transmission lines for years. I do not yet properly understand the mathematics, but China uses ultra-high voltage alternating and direct and “flexible direct” current to transmit electricity over long and very long distances with little loss of power along the route. The point is to always have backups to electricity supplies.

    Inspection and maintenance of the ultra-high voltage lines and support and conversion towers is done by robots and workers when necessary.

    Reply ↓
    1. micaT

      UHVDC is used for longer distances vs UHVAC is used for shorter distances.
      UHVDC is more efficient than UHVAC but it costs more, so economics make more sense in longer distances.
      The exact distances that determine which to use is somewhat flexible as best I can tell.

      I don’t know exactly what they mean by flexible. Maybe someone else can chime in.

      Reply ↓
  34. CA

    https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202407/29/WS66a77ca0a31095c51c510947.html

    July 29, 2024

    China begins work on world’s first ultra-high voltage flexible direct current project
    By Zheng Xin

    The world’s first ultra-high voltage flexible direct current (UHVDC) transmission project has commenced construction on Monday, said its operator State Grid Corporation of China, the country’s largest power utility firm.

    The project, the Gansu-Zhejiang ±800 kV UHVDC Transmission Project, will enable the transmission of over 36 billion kWh of electricity annually from Gansu to Zhejiang once completed, with more than half of this amount generated from renewable energy sources, it said.

    Ultra-high voltage transmission lines refer to power transmission cables operating with greater than 800 kilovolts of direct current, or 1,000 kV of alternating current. Compared with traditional transmission lines, ultra-high voltage lines not only increase transmission capacity and extend transmission distances, but also reduce transmission losses.

    The project, with a rated capacity of 8 million kilowatts and a total investment of about 35.3 billion yuan ($4.82 billion), passes through six provincial administrative regions, namely Gansu, the Ningxia Hui autonomous region, Shaanxi, Henan, Anhui, and Zhejiang provinces, it said.

    The project stretches for a total length of 2,370 kilometers, with converter stations being constructed in Wuwei, Gansu, and Shaoxing, Zhejiang.

    The project will further facilitate the large-scale development and utilization of clean energy in Gansu, optimizing the region’s energy supply structure, and increasing the proportion of green electricity consumption…

    Reply ↓
  35. AG

    re: Napoleon and color

    Whilst the degrading of color is one aesthetic feature also due to modern re-coloring options via CGI it is a bit unfortunate to attach an ideological suspicion to Ridley Scott of all film directors.

    This treatment of colour has been his trademark for as long as he has been working with DOP Dariusz Wolski and well before. Just compare “Napoleon” to the other works like “Alien Covenant”, “Exodus”, “House of Gucci” or “The Last Duel”.

    Dariusz Wolski list of movies:
    https://www.imdb.com/de/name/nm0003011/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_0_nm_8_in_0_q_dariousz%2520wolski

    Similiar characteristics can be observed with franchises like “Pirates of the Carribean” or “LOTR” and many more.
    Besides R. Scott´s work was never known to be overly colourful. (“Gladiator”!?)

    His brother Tony Scott (“Enemy of the State”, “Déjà Vu”) who too worked with Wolski (“Crimson Tide” “The Fan”) did share a few of the same colour palettes in the greys and blues I would guess whilst choosing overexposing with sunny spots and a certain sympathy for those “orange” filters we got accustomed to in the 1980/90s via the (in)fmaous array of Bruckheimer´s action flicks (most iconic of course with “Top Gun” and “Days of Thunder” which might be one reason why they look so dated today.)

    Jerry Bruckheimer:
    https://www.imdb.com/de/name/nm0000988/?ref_=fn_all_nme_1

    Dariusz Wolski in conversation on R. Scott and Napoleon
    40 min.
    https://theasc.com/videos/clubhouse-conversations-napoleon

    Reply ↓
    1. wol

      Some of Romantic painter Casper Friedrich’s monochromatic ink wash landscapes and seascapes are set at dusk, when color is hard to discern. Dusk could be a metaphor for our time.

      Reply ↓
  36. Sub-Boreal

    Just finished reading a lengthy, fascinating investigation of the linkages between Australian and Canadian promoters of nuclear power.

    Excerpts:

    On the face of it, Ontario is an odd part of the world on which to model Australia’s energy future. Privatization in both places has evolved messy, complicated energy grids, but that’s about all they have in common. One is a province on the sprawling North American landmass, and the other is a nation that spans a continent. Ontario has half the population of Australia and spends five months a year under ice. Its energy system has traditionally relied on hydro power and nuclear, where Australia is famously the driest inhabited continent on the planet that used to depend on coal but now boasts nearly 40% renewable electricity as of 2024. One Australian state, South Australia, already draws more than 70% of its power from renewables and frequently records weeks where all its electricity needs are met with solar and wind. Unlike Ontario, and the rest of Canada, Australia has no nuclear industry aside from a single research reactor in the Sydney suburbs. The cost of transmitting power over vast distances in Australia makes up approximately two-fifths of retail power prices. Electricity prices in Ontario, meanwhile, have been artificially lowered by an $7.3bn a year bundle of subsidies for households and businesses. Comparing the two jurisdictions is stranger than comparing apples and oranges; it’s more like comparing apples and maple syrup.
    …
    The initial price for Ontario’s new reactors, however, was offered before the design had been finished. As the cost is not fixed, any change to the design at any part of the process will up the cost as the plans are reworked. Professor M.V. Ramana, a physicist with the University of British Columbia and author of the book Nuclear is Not the Solution says this is standard for the industry – and a threat to the business that needs to be constantly managed. Even with market capitalizations of tens of billions of dollars, the publicly-owned utility companies most likely to invest in nuclear power take on considerable financial risk with any given project – a risk that only goes up as the price tag climbs through the billions. At some point, this risk hits a ceiling. Credit rating firms will threaten a downgrade, forcing the project to be abandoned to stop the financial destabilization of the company. In this way the nuclear business, Professor Ramana says, depends on the sunk cost fallacy.

    “If you start off with a very high cost estimate, then there’s not much risk of it going up, because you’ve already padded it so much, right? But that’s not what these people are doing, because they know that once you say it will cost $20 billion, the government is going to say, ‘oh, we can’t afford that.’,” Ramana says.

    “So the industry has to start small, tease people in, invite them into the game. And once they have put in a certain amount of money, once the ground has been dug, then you jack up the cost estimate, and they’re stuck.”
    …
    Within this convergence of pro-nuclear activism, internationalist conservative political ambition and new media ecosystems, companies within Canada’s nuclear industry have also been positioning themselves to take advantage should the prevailing wind change in Australia. In October 2024, Quebecois engineering services and nuclear company, AtkinsRéalis – the parent company of Candu Energy that now employs Ontario’s former energy minister, Todd Smith – announced it was opening a new Sydney office to “deliver critical infrastructure for Australians”.

    Though little known in Australia, the company has a storied history in Canada. Formerly known as SNC-Lavalin, the Quebecois company changed name in 2023 in the long wake of a lingering corruption scandal involving allegations of political interference by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in the justice system. Today the company holds an exclusive license to commercialize CANDU reactor technology through Candu Energy and in 2023 signed an agreement with Ontario Power Generation to help develop Canada’s first SMR reactor. A year later, the company signed a memorandum of understanding with GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy to support the deployment of its BWRX-300 reactors in the UK.

    Reply ↓
    1. nyleta

      In Australia nuclear power is like those nuclear subs we pay danegeld to the Yanks for, never going to happen without the Chinese doing it. Nuclear power boils water, so is a backwards step, waste heat is gong to wreck everything.

      We are badly placed for storage here and like other countries our grid is getting shaky as the renewables lessen the inertia in the system. Those Canadian SMR’s will come in handy next century when the few remaining are sheltering in the limestone caves on the rim of the Great Australian Bight living on mushrooms and engineered sheep that live on the same mushrooms.

      Reply ↓
  37. Mikel

    ‘Brics broke up’: Trump claims bloc went silent after 150% tariff threat – Business Standard

    Has it fallen so far that it merits lower case letters?

    Reply ↓
  38. chris

    Did you know that the price of college has been dropping? According to the Atlantic, it is true!

    I don’t know what data they’re relying on to make that statement. As a simple example, the cost for my kid to rent an office campus apartment is roughly 25% the cost of living on campus. We keep getting notices of price increases for tuition and fees too. We don’t pay full “sticker price” because my child has a number of scholarships. But those scholarships are compared to the full sticker price. We don’t get a reduction in cost. We get money to pay a higher fee.

    With scholarships, the net cost of my BS degree, graduating in 2000, was roughly 20k$. The cost of my oldest to finish their degree next year will be 80k$. We’ll get the same degree from the same institution too, just 25 years apart. So, from my observation, the cost of college has quadrupled.

    Reply ↓
      1. CA

        Correction – average should be median:

        The college price has increased far faster than inflation and far faster than “median” family income.

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    2. CA

      An excellent essay:

      https://branko2f7.substack.com/p/trump-the-state-and-the-revolution

      February 15, 2025

      Trump, the state and the revolution
      By Branko Milanovic

      To say that Trump in his new incarnation is different from the Trump No. 1 is to state the obvious. The world and the United States have been subjected to a deluge of decrees and decisions that have changed affairs internationally and domestically. It has been a three-week wild ride that does not seem to have run out of steam yet and has confirmed the idea that the new Trump will rule very differently from the old.

      There are two reasons for this difference…

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  40. spud

    thanks Yves, Keens youtube completely vindicates my views on free trade. yes its free trade we live under now, as described by Bill Mitchel,

    “as bill mitchell points out, yes its free trade. what is free trade? its unfettered capital.

    https://billmitchell.org/blog/?p=34677

    “the transnational movements of goods and services and capital flows.”

    free trade is not government managed,

    “when a government enters into a free trade treaty, essentially they are entering into a treaty not with fellow sovereign countries, but with corporations.

    under free trade, government no longer has sovereignty and democratic control. government is now subservient to capital, they now are the enforcers of free trade for capital.”

    these treaties are not written by government, they are written by corporations, and corporations dictate to governments, not the other way around.

    and we know that free trade is almost completely corporate driven, that has gutted sovereignty, and has made government merely a enforcer for corporate free trade policies.”

    Keen also points out what i point out, it was Bill Clinton. and when we speak about the economic conditions in the U.S.A. and the world, we should say B.C.(before Clinton), A.C. (after Clinton).

    Reply ↓
    2. johnnyme

      More details can be found here:

      Musk gives all federal workers 48 hours to explain what they did last week

      NEW YORK (AP) — Hundreds of thousands of federal workers have little more than 48 hours to explain what they accomplished over the last week as part of billionaire Elon Musk’s crusade to slash what he describes as “waste everywhere” in the federal government.

      “Consistent with President @realDonaldTrump’s instructions, all federal employees will shortly receive an email requesting to understand what they got done last week,” Musk posted on X, which he owns. “Failure to respond will be taken as a resignation.”

      Shortly afterward, federal employees received a three-line email with this instruction: “Please reply to this email with approx. 5 bullets of what you accomplished last week and cc your manager.”

      The deadline to respond is Monday at 11:59 p.m.

      Reply ↓
    1. The Rev Kev

      He is a very good comedian but has suffered for years now both from Trump Derangement Syndrome and Russia!Russia!Russia! Any worse and the poor guy would be sporting yellow and blue ties as well.

      Reply ↓
      1. ambrit

        I liked the meme of the “Victorious” Ukranian troops dropping their trousers and mooning the Russians with one cheek blue and the other cheek yellow.

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