Beetles Conquered Earth by Evolving a Tiny Chemical Factory ZME Science
How Elon Musk’s Plans for Mars Threaten Earth Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Reining in Our Tech God-Emperors Democracy
Climate/Environment
Big, biodiverse and beautiful: can Romania’s centuries-old giant haystacks survive modern farming? The Guardian
US electricity prices are surging. These companies want out. Floodlight
Farmers in Trump Country Were Counting on Clean Energy Grants. Then the Government Moved the Goalposts. Allegheny Front
Pandemics
What we know about the U.S. bird flu outbreak and its chronic disease risk The Sick Times
***
COVID-19 may put patients at risk for other infections for at least 1 year CIDRAP
COVID-19 re-infection doubles risk of long COVID in kids, young adults, data reveal CIDRAP
China?
China strongly opposes US ‘reciprocal tariffs,’ to take countermeasure: commerce ministry Global Times
Taiwan chip industry can have ‘brief reprieve’ after Trump tariff exemption: Analyst Focus Taiwan
China’s Tariff-Dodging Move to Mexico Looks Doomed WSJ
Trump signs order ending duty-free treatment for cheap shipments from China Business Times
China Restricts Companies From Investing in US as Tensions Rise Bloomberg
By being like Silicon Valley used to be, East Asia challenges it Asia Times
***
China carries out live fire drills in East China Sea in escalation of Taiwan exercises Channel News Asia
US approves sale of F-16s to the Philippines in $5.5bn weapons package Defense News
THE EIGHT TRIBES OF TRUMP AND CHINA The Scholar’s Stage
European Disunion
France opens investigation into threats against judges in Le Pen’s trial Anadolu Agency
What happens to EU’s anti-war bloc without Marine Le Pen? Responsible Statecraft
Greece to invest €25 billion in defence, eyes Israel for ‘Shield of Achilles’ dome Euractiv
Old Blighty
‘Neighbours are more trusted than government’: When crisis hits, communities are saving themselves Big Issue
O Canada
Canadian election: Carney’s defence against Trump is an attack on workers Counterfire
Syraqistan
Economic officials in Israel are in complete shock over the Trump administration’s decision to impose a 17% tariff on Israel. “We are in shock. We were sure that the decision to completely cancel tariffs on imports from the U.S. would prevent this move. But it didn’t happen.” https://t.co/9FiKgNdTFn
— Amichai Stein (@AmichaiStein1) April 2, 2025
Google is Acquiring Tech Firm Founded by Ex-Israeli Intelligence Officers for Record $32 Billion Drop Site
Blacklisted spyware firm Candiru acquired by Integrity Partners in $30 million deal CTech
Netanyahu announces new ‘security corridor’ inside Gaza cutting off Rafah from Khan Yunis The Cradle
Israeli Prime Minister visits Budapest in first European trip since ICC arrest warrant Bne Intellinews
Will Russia Help Defend Iran Against a US/Israel Attack? Larry Johnson
New Not-So-Cold War
Senior Russian negotiator expected to meet Witkoff in Washington this week Semafor
British intel sought to silence West’s top Russia academic, leaks reveal The Grayzone
Russia defies sanctions with record number of billionaires in Forbes rich list Bne Intellinews
South of the Border
OK To Shoot Down Cartel Drones Flying Over Border Sought By NORTHCOM Boss The War Zone
Main food app rejects delivery workers’ demands; thousands go on national strike Brasil de Fato
“Liberation Day”
Pharma, semiconductors escape Trump’s tariffs. See full exemption list here Business Standard
Just figured out where these fake tariff rates come from. They didn’t actually calculate tariff rates + non-tariff barriers, as they say they did. Instead, for every country, they just took our trade deficit with that country and divided it by the country’s exports to us.
So we… https://t.co/PBjF8xmcuv
— James Surowiecki (@JamesSurowiecki) April 2, 2025
They are basically assuming that there will be an ability to make big carve-outs from the headline policies just announced.
Similar statement from Chamber. https://t.co/WRxpdTqdaY
— Skanda Amarnath (@IrvingSwisher) April 2, 2025
Here’s the real kick about how Trump’s tariffs are going to hike prices for everything: Once that happens, even if the tariffs go away, the prices are never, ever going back down again.
— David DeWitt (@DC_DeWitt) April 2, 2025
The Cost of Tariff Chaos Apricitas Economics
Dow futures tumble 1,000 points on fear Trump’s tariffs will spark trade war: Live updates CNBC
***
Next Pentagon Chief Confirms Willingness to Provide More Allies with Nuclear Attack Capabilities Military Watch
Trump preparing executive order to increase weapons exports, sources say Reuters
The Man Who Would Be King: Method in Trump’s Madness, Contradictions in Trump’s Method Nonsite
DOGE
Trump Tells Inner Circle That Musk Will Leave Soon Politico
Trump and DOGE Defund Program That Boosted American Manufacturing for Decades Wired
The Expert Who Kept Eye Drops From Blinding You Was Fired Yesterday Vanity Fair
HHS fires entire staff of program that helps low-income people afford heat and air conditioning The Hill
Democrats en déshabillé
Democrats’ big election night gives them first hope since Trump’s victory Christian Science Monitor
Frank Luntz: Booker marathon speech ‘may have changed the course of political history’ The Hill
It’s not a filibuster y’all bc there’s no legislation on the floor to hold up. It’s political theater…again.
Donation texts & emails will be sent out in 5..4…3…2… pic.twitter.com/WgviWMmX0g
— Monica
Free
(@BlakPantherBabe) April 2, 2025
Second COVID nursing home death’s case against Cuomo tossed WFIN
Police State Watch
With Detention of Beloved Farmworker Organizer, ICE Comes for the Labor Movement Truthout. Surprise!
No Person Shall Be Deprived… Unpopular Front
Texas’ AI-Powered Surveillance Arsenal Has Ballooned. Proposed Laws Provide Few Guardrails. Texas Observer
Groves of Academe
You can’t survive on ramen and Natural Light: Lawmakers confront college food insecurity Minnesota Reformer
Anthropic launches an AI chatbot plan for colleges and universities TechCrunch
AI
Vibe Coded AI App Generates Recipes for Cyanide Ice Cream and Cum Soup 404 Media
Healthcare?
FTC pauses lawsuit against PBMs over insulin pricing Fierce Healthcare
‘They won’t help me’: Sickest patients face insurance denials despite policy fixes Clear Health Costs
Not even wealth is saving Americans from dying at rates seen among some of the poorest Europeans NBC News
Imperial Collapse Watch
PATRICK LAWRENCE: American Freefall Consortium News
The Bezzle
Shitcoins for shitocracy w/Jacob Silverman NEFARIOUS RUSSIANS (Audio)
Class Warfare
In tough times, they sold farmers cheaper fungicides. A top manufacturer, Syngenta, intervened. Investigate Midwest
How could so many people in the world’s richest nation be without enough to eat? Minnesota Reformer
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
Secure Payments Powered by Clover
‘Amichai Stein
@AmichaiStein1
Economic officials in Israel are in complete shock over the Trump administration’s decision to impose a 17% tariff on Israel. “We are in shock. We were sure that the decision to completely cancel tariffs on imports from the U.S. would prevent this move. But it didn’t happen.” ‘
It was their own fault. They trusted Trump.
How’d this slip thru AIPAC handlers??? I’m sure they’ll get someone close to Trump to convince him to cancel this in no time.
It must have gone through Thomas Massie. He is the only Republican without an AIPAC handler. :)
Irony dept: Here are some countries that are functionally immune to tariffs from the US because they are already sanctioned to the point where any trade with the US is miniscule.
Russia, Iran, Belarus, North Korea, Syria
One suspects that over time that list will get longer and longer.
As I listened to the morning’s Military Summary Channel report, I realized that a lot of countries can simply stop trading with the US. Maybe not China, or Germany, but what is stopping France from putting 100% export tariffs on French wine, or just stopping everything at customs?
Time to run to Trader Joe’s and hoard cheese!
Would you say Benedict Donald is trying to make a ‘Smoot Point’?
♫ Wreck the Dow with laws of Hawley, Fala-lalala, lala la la…
Oh dear, that’s good!
Move to Wisconsin, we have plenty of cheese and will have more because of decreased exports
Here’s a link to Trump’s tariff country list:
https://www.newsweek.com/trump-reciprocal-tariff-chart-2054514
View Heard and McDonald Islands on Google Earth. I couldn’t find a building.
Aren’t those islands solely occupied by penguins?
Poetry interlude.
https://bsky.app/profile/verybadllama.bsky.social/post/3llwo3jxxas2v
Elephant seals who are plotting reciprocal tariffs as I type…..
Cory Booker fundraising appeal hit my inbox about 1 hour after long speech performance. Maybe two.
I seriously block every dang text I get from those craven beggars, but they still found me and asked me for money.
In addition to blocking them, if you have the ability to report them as junk, do so. I do, for both parties, since I never signed up for notifications of any sort.
{musical interlude}
Time is Tight, by Booker T & the M.G.’s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LujHv3vTNkY
Completely agree and please do so.
Back before the 2023 election ads for Kamala Harris were inundating my faceborg feed so I reported them as frauds and scams. The ads soon disappeared fur me anyways.
I haven’t been getting much in the way of texts, ever, thankfully.
For email, I finally resorted to configuring an audit redirect filter on Google Workspace (sigh) where I host my email; it redirects all funding raising emails, which is easy because they all come directly through NGPVan servers — some serious consolidation in liberal Democrat fundraising land — back to the CEO of NGPVan.
Occasionally I check, and I still get the emails, I guess he has a filter on his side or I’m blocked. But I never see the emails, so works for me.
I sent very ugly emails to the DNC about Hilary Clinton, the truth really hurts them until on got off their list permanently. I get nothing now from the Democratic Party. Had to do it to the republicans too at one time. Not a chance I am either of these parties. I vote 3rd party when possible, but if I can’t do that…..I don’t vote. What difference does it make at this point.
I was proudly telling the other Dartful Codgers how i’d voted for Wink Martindale the last 3 Presidential elections, and one of them volunteers in a precinct in Michigan and practically cursed me out for the practice, as it really gums up the works-the write in candidate…
Mission accomplished!
I’m thinking about Rocky & Bullwinkle for prez and vp next election, if not Boris & Natasha. Two fictional characters for apparently fictional choices.
These monkeys are ready to do anything for money. They are skilled in disconnecting words from deeds.
Same here. All talk and no action but begging for my money.
And we all know that they have enough rich people to give them money….they don’t need mine.
Taking away their vote is all we have left.
What about refusing to work for them?
the Senate is where presidential aspirations go to wither; and grifters rule.
Biden proves the rule, Obama is the exception to the rule…but only because he didn’t need to grift (book sales).
JFK (didn’t need money, exception to the rule)
Please don’t feed the beast. understand one’s desire for a savior, Booker is not it. Unless i missed that passage in Sunday School….our messiah will be of the House of the Senate, born in Bethlehem!
Of course there was a fund raising email. Booker was the guy who used to save people from burning buildings stop criminals all by himself. Booker the crime fighter and other wise have his staff PR people plant fake stories about him. This guy doesn’t give one whit about the issues he brought up in his fake filibuster. I remember him admonishing Obama for saying mean things about corporate America.
So I’m not feeling it for Mr booker either.
No comparison with Otto Lecher’s 12-hour speech. The Austrian parliament required that you stick to the subject (trade relations with Hungary) and he did so. And Lecher, unlike Booker, had Mark Twain to report on it (“the longest flow of unbroken talk that ever came out of one mouth since the world began”).
From the Sam Gindin essay on nonsite.org in links:
However much we might prefer Trump losing to the Democrats, we must abuse ourselves of illusions about the present or future Dems being the vehicle for a better world. Welcoming them back will mean the return to a status quo so recently criticized, thereby consolidating a lowering of expectations when we especially need to raise them.
Totally agree. Am supporting local pols who are building a movement rather than a campaign war chest. They do exist.
Yeah, when Booker was considering hopping into the primaries back when, his first and last trial public event was a speaking engagement at Morehouse college and nobody showed up.
Canadian election: Carney’s defence against Trump is an attack on workers
This analysis is corrrect except in two places: internal barriers to trade and loss of military support from the US.
Eliminating these barriers do liberalize trade and be weakened but will not make much of a difference. From the Royal Commission in 1985:
“Two general conclusions from this brief overview of the pattern of production and trade within the Canadian economic union help inform subsequent sections of this chapter. First, interprovincial movements of goods and services are a small portion – about one-fifth – of the total activity of the Canadian economy. As Commissioners explain subsequently, we do not believe that these movements are restrained significantly by existing barriers. Secondly, the position of individual provinces within the economic union varies significantly, most notably in the discrepancies between sales to other provinces and purchases from them.” Royal Commission on the Economic Union and Development Prospectsfor Canada – Volume 3 – 1985 – Chap 22 p. 109.
“…we do not accept the view that Canada has already become hopelessly balkanized. The direct costs of existing interprovincial trade barriers appear to be small. There are many barriers to interprovincial trade and factor mobility, but their quantitative effect on the level of economic activity in Canada is not sufficient to justify a call for major reform. There is also at least at present substantial harmonization across provinces in areas such as taxation, insurance and securities regulation, where economic efficiency strongly suggests the importance of such co-ordination.” Volume 3 – pp.133-134. Report of the Royal Commission on:The economic Union and Development Prospects for Canada, 1985.
Secondly: Canada is welded to the US DoD and MIC. This 2022 document spells out that there is no sunshine between US and Canadian foreign policy: “NORAD modernization project timelinesFact sheet: NORAD modernization project timelines”
Have you seen the latest ad from Juice Media’s Honest Government about the Canadian election?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wT_n4Khmq0o (3:29 mins) – Language alert!
We have our own in Oz in about four weeks time. :(
Hee, hee… sh¡t, or sh¡t lite…
Let’s have a coalition government and we can have a shjt sandwich!
Lol, that is worth a link. (strong language, sassy Australians)
Hilarious and most enlightening explanation yet for preferential voting.
Thanks!
A big hat tip to Ginger and Rev for starting this thread.
Been watching their offerings for a while, excellent site and some good looking Aussie women narrating. I kinda like seeing beautiful women swear like saliors.
And know what they’re talking about.
Usually is just one person narrating, the wife of the producer. The beautiful girls just lipsink…
Being that I live in a Minivan; Thank you Trump for dropping oil 6% this morning!
What utter stupid chaos. But I have no 401K, so sorry to anyone that does, but I have to say, I have been complaining to the Democrats about abandoning people like me but they wanted to focus on some mythical homogeneous group that looked like a typical woke neoliberal family with a $450k income. So to the friends who abandoned me in my mental illness and poverty because my situation made you feel guilty, good luck.
But MAGA and the Republicans are DOA as well. The first sign of this is the removal of Musk, but no MAGA is going to take inflation and seeing their portfolio vanish, nor will they accept being hassled by a dysfunctional Social Security office.
I am online right now buying all parts I think I will need for my van, then I am off to the woods….
please avoid the lowest priced parts, if possible, especiallyt from dubious online sellers. best case: spotty quality and you’re right back tk square onie n 5 months; worst case: outright counterfeit
I have been very low income and a phrase we used to use was, “a cheap tool is better than no tool”. So it’s always a question of priorities, and a tough call.
Indeed. There is that oft repeated wisdom of the man buying cheap vs expensive boots, and how long they last.
However, any boots are better than walking barefoot. Unless you’re one of those smelly hippies!
Happy Liberation Day, America!
You’re 401k has been liberated from the past, unburdened of unrealized capital gains. It is now free to embrace the future. The future will have fewer digits.
You’re welcome,
Don
just as one party is on the verge of self-destructing, the other party out does them. it has happened before and will happen again
What hasn’t happened before is both parties spontaneously combusting in one cycle. I’ve got this nagging feeling I should be careful what I wish for.
Yes, but the majority of them all could be vaporized while in session in DC via courtesy an Oreshnik. At least there would be no residual radiation…
…shouldn’t Liberation Day really be
‘Alter Tag’
Another Hedwig joke?
Yanis Varoufakis@ UnHerd
“Will Liberation Day transform the world?
The Nixon Shock set a radical precedent”
Posted by ChrisRUEcon late in yesterday’s links.
https://unherd.com/2025/04/will-liberation-day-transform-the-world/
Do you think he’s right that Trump has a clear strategy and plan with the tariffs? (Varoufakis says Trump intends to negotiate tariff relief bilaterally with each trade partner in exchange for concessions, e.g. moving some production to the US.) I’m leary of any hypothesis based on Trump having strategy. I suspect he’s really talking like this to try to frighten europolicypeeps and shake them awake to the EU’s absence of economic strategy.
I’m also curious about Varoufakis being treated seriously on BBC News. I would have though him untouchable for a number of reasons. Is he regular on BBC News?
Please see the post that just went up.
Administration spokescritter said not.
Vietnam and Thailand had made offers to the US, Thailand even committed to buying more US fuel.
The tariffs are based on a formula which economists say is ridiculous.
Thank you, yes, I’ve read that now.
I also this morning read that Varoufakis is assuming that Trump is much guided an essay by Stephen Miran “A User’s Guide to Restructuring the Global Trading System”. So far I read only the Executive Summary and it corresponds to what Varoufakis recently wrote is Trump’s plan.
https://www.hudsonbaycapital.com/documents/FG/hudsonbay/research/638199_A_Users_Guide_to_Restructuring_the_Global_Trading_System.pdf
Inspired by Trump’s mystical tariff calculations, we’ve followed suit, and it has put our household budget on a path to abundance.
First, we took all the monthly bills people keep sending us, added in groceries, savings for year end property tax, tossed in $400 for emergencies, and then divided that by the amount of homework our seven public school prisoners bring home each night. Then we divided that in half out of pure kindness.
Voila! There is now much less month left at the end of the money, and that little red sports car is back on my Bucket List.
My neighbor shook his head and backed away very slowly when I told him about this scheme, but once he sees our stroke of genius in action he’ll come around.
Trump isn’t bright enough to grasp strategy and IMO he is a little (maybe more) insane. There are plenty of words in a Psychology 101 textbook to describe him
Sounds lots like what Michael Hudson wrote in Super Imperialism in ’74–since updated a couple of times.
Farmers in Trump Country Were Counting on Clean Energy Grants. Then the Government Moved the Goalposts. Allegheny Front
~~~~~~~~~~~~
Godzone is a outlier’s outlier in terms of politics in Cali, so red politically it practically blushes-with there being no liberal farmers, its all hard right types that rely upon Mexican-Americans to do all the heavy lifting, I’ve never seen a regular white guy working the orchards in 20 years of observing.
In 2016 and 2020 Hwy 99 (‘Pearl Harbor Survivors* Memorial Highway’) was festooned with hundreds of Trump signs in the runup to elections those years, and when he levied tariffs against China, they retaliated against Big Nuts and the Almond Brothers (not really brothers, but it sounds like a certain southern rock band) all became non-profit businesses, with a good many going bankrupt since then.
I was on Hwy 99 a day before the November 5th election and counted 3 Trump signs, to give you an idea of visible support.
And then Trump dumped a billion gallons of their water out of a couple of reservoirs here a few months ago to prove some sort of point-with every drop being wasted, water that really has no need in the winter, but come the 100 days of 100 degrees and trees out of dormancy that need it.
I’m sure the farmers still voted for Trump, but just didn’t want to admit it.
* if they survived-why is it a memorial highway?
* if they survived-why is it a memorial highway?
Maybe it’s because they are all dead now??
Well, my SS came in, so far so good. I had a dream last night that an alien ship came by, got wind that Musk wanted to go to Mars and obliged him. I didn’t get any further details.
Like with the original Alien, they probably blew him out the goddamn air lock. No word if he then got run over by that Tesla he launched a coupla years ago.
In the past when inflation wasn’t a factor, perhaps it made sense to not start taking your Social Security annuity @ 62, but that was then and this is now, with double trouble in both inflation and perhaps in the future, one will need to bring a grandparent to the SS office in order to get on the gravy train.
Everything Trump has done is to throw a spanner in the works, he took all NPS credit card limits down to a buck (the usual wager, Winthorpe?) so that not only is there nobody to clean the bathrooms in our National Parks, there isn’t any way to buy toilet paper or cleaning supplies!
He’ll do the same with Social Security, and as JG Wentworth states:
‘It’s your money!’
Time to start getting paid, people.
One can also argue that because of Lambert’s Rules (“because markets … go die!”) its best to take the money while you’re still breathing. Outliving your money suddenly doesn’t seem to be a problem.
Outliving your money…, lol, a newer item on my bucket list.
So I called up the Captain, “Please bring me my wine”
He said, “We haven’t had that spirit here since 1969”.
“eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow you may die … because markets!”
My “Windfall Elimination Provision” backpay check for 2024 landed in my account last month along with the updated monthly amount. I was anticipating it would be delayed but, it must have been in the works before DOGE got it’s hands on the SSA.
I can’t wait for the 2pm version of”Mr market has a sad” with our topsy lopsy economic policy. We truly live in interesting times. Oh well, I still have 20 years before I can realize the benefits of shoveling money into a tax sheltered account. Hopefully inflation won’t eat my lunch before I get there.
Can someone explain why the market always has that effect at 2PM? I always saw that but thought I was imagining it!
“Beetles Conquered Earth by Evolving a Tiny Chemical Factory”
‘If one could conclude as to the nature of the Creator from a study of creation it would appear that God has an inordinate fondness for beetles’ – J.B.S. Haldane
An interesting article. Instead of evolving their basic forms, they evolved an internal chemical factory that more or less did the evolving for them. The only way that they could have bettered that was to evolve acid for blood.
As I type, angry 1/8th inch invaders are taking down the largest trees in the world in many different local Sequoia groves.
It’s David versus Goliath writ large~
They’ll be playing their greatest hits…
“You’ve lost that living feeling’
‘The end’
‘Hello, goodbye’
‘I saw it standing there’
‘I want you’ (she’s so heavy)
‘If I fell’
‘I’m down’
‘You wont see me’
https://warnercnr.source.colostate.edu/new-research-provides-insight-into-bark-beetle-involved-in-giant-sequoia-tree-death/
Time to plant Super Giant Sequoias on Mars in Elon’s Hedwig Grove?
re: de minimis… Policy entrepreneurs need to be held at least as personally responsible for their childish gaming as any other entrepreneur. Every time you have to pay $25 to receive a foreign package, go find Stoller and hide him for it personally.
Serious question: What do our overlords have to gain by eradicating FEMA? Is it as simple as a desire to kill as many of us as possible? Serious. I can’t even make sense of this.
For years now FEMA has been a bugaboo with conservatives with them telling stories how they will be arrested and locked up in FEMA camps. That “threat” had to go away. Probably the final nail in FEMA’s coffin when orders were given to avoid conservative homes in the middle of a disaster a few months ago and not help them.
FEMA was once a great agency. Originally organized to deal with river flooding in the Mississippi and Ohio River valleys, it did excellent work. After its reorganization in the W. Bush admin in 2003 it became something else. You may remember its first director after the Bush admin reoganization: Heck of a job Brownie.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Emergency_Management_Agency
Where was FEMA in Maui, in East Palestine, in N.and S. Carolina and Tennessee? Those are the most recent disasters. If it showed up at all, was it more help or hindrance?
The US needs something like the old FEMA, not whatever the new FEMA has become, imo.
adding: Michael Brown may have gotten a bad rap (deliberately) from W. with W’s ‘heck of a job” remark during the Katrina hurricane disaster.
per the wiki link above:
President Bush appointed Michael D. Brown as FEMA’s director in January 2003. Brown warned in September 2003 that FEMA’s absorption into DHS would make a mockery of FEMA’s new motto, “A Nation Prepared”, and would “fundamentally sever FEMA from its core functions”, “shatter agency morale” and “break longstanding, effective and tested relationships with states and first responder stakeholders”. The inevitable result of the reorganization of 2003, warned Brown, would be “an ineffective and uncoordinated response” to a terrorist attack or a natural disaster.[20]
They’re just “devolving power back to the states” … remember, “Heckuva job, Brownie?” Immortal words from 43, who uttered them while thousands of black families without food or water huddled in the Superdome, and the lower 5th ward went underwater.
Because markets … just die!
They are creating the expectation of “You are on your own” so that they can just focus on defense and keeping the surveillance state going without being expected to help anyone.
I came across Tom Murphy’s (proprietor of the “Do the Math” blog and physics prof at UCSD) series on Ishmael, a book by Daniel Quinn that came out in the early 90s. The book addresses the problem we face with myth and worldview, a dilemma that Daniel Schmachtenberger calls the “Metacrisis” that lies behind our polycrisis.
Murphy is yet another person seeking to educate people about the polycrisis who has come to realize that there will be no progress on addressing that polycrisis without a widespread change in worldview. Any government that attempts to enact realistic policies to address the polycrisis will meet intense opposition in a society whose understanding of human nature and our role in the universe is limited to “the one who dies with the most toys wins.”
I’ve previously linked here a discussion among three of the leading lights in investigating this Metacrisis: Iain McGilchrist (neuroscientist/psychiatrist), John Vervaeke (cognitive scientist) and Daniel Schmachtenberger (hippie-educated polymath). Another pioneer in this area, Ashley Hodgson (behavioral economics and systems), is doing interesting work at her blog, The New Enlightenment. Finally, Nate Hagens covers this beat with several interviews with others involved in this effort.
This is where the action is as far as I’m concerned. Until we make progress on this front, there will be no advancement in addressing the polycrisis.
Thanks HMP. I hadn’t heard of Quinn before and just added Ishmael to my reading list.
My middle school teacher read Ishmael to us. It was an absolute pleasure. Definitely threw a wrench in my acclimation to society, but that was probably a good thing.
re. health of rich Americans v. poor Europeans…
about time. this was a nagging question that isn’t really looked into (because it’s expensive to construct the studies)
not a suprise, but good to know.
the typical diet of a random rich American isn’t that much different from the median American or Henry VIII….just better cuts of meat and better booze, and served in a nicer restaurant.
https://dx.doi.org/10.1056/NEJMsa2408259
In a phrase: obesity rates. Check the 2 chart maps in this article.
https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/two-maps-and-one-graph-comparing-obesity-in-america-and-europe/
Also, a lot of ingredients allowed in US food are banned in European food.
Thanks. Numbers showing how much food is prepared at home vs commercially prepared food and dining out would be interesting here.
Correlate that with how many adults can’t cook a simple meal such as chicken roast with mashed potatoes and steamed greens… although I would raise the grade and say prepare from scratch any sort of pasta sauce.
Restaurants provide the 3 main food groups – salt, sugar and fat. Well around Wisconsin they do. Two friends dined out for most meals, he is dead, she is obese, just got a knee replacement and has cardiac issues, just an anecdote.
Raise your own food, buy local meat and eat at home.
Leading a solitary computer nerd life, lo! these many years, my skills as a cook are on the modest side. Nevertheless, I enjoy home cooking a lot more after I started using certain spice mixes (German brand “Beltane Biofix”) from the natural food store.
Where regular supermarket mixes consist of only one spice packet, these have two. First you have the spices with fat-soluble flavor components — you stir these directly into the oil at the start — then there’s a second packet of water-soluble ones you add later. Yummy.
Spices are the key. The mixes are rather pricey, so the Dutch friend who introduced them to me has learned, from reading the ingredient lists of the ones she likes, which individual spices to buy in bulk and how to combine them herself.
You can’t fix stupid.
RE: Reining in Our Tech God-Emperors
That was some seriously weak tea – yet another article where all the societal ills are caused by the right having too big of a megaphone while the liberals are assumed to be as pure as the driven snow. The author did touch on one bit of truth which is rarely mentioned, due to the need to ramp up the hysteria against Trump –
“For example, Perrin and McFarland find that when conservatives said in surveys that they believed Barack Obama was a secret Muslim, most of them probably didn’t actually believe that this was true. They write, “Further analysis of these polls strongly suggests that they reflect respondents’ self-identification as members of a public that dislikes the president, not that actually believes him to be a believing or practicing Muslim.” ”
Of course they don’t really believe this stuff. Yes, it’s a tribal thing – how you signal that you’re part of the “in” group. If the two brain geniuses who did that studied turned their focus on the “liberal” side of things, I bet they’d find, for example, that most of them don’t really believe boys should be allowed to declare themselves female and beat their daughters in high school sporting events, but they don’t like to admit that either. Virtue signalling goes both ways after all.
There was pretty much nothing in that article given as a remedy for the very real problem of too much concentrated wealth – just hand wringing about measures that were either too hot or too cold. Might I suggest a method that does seem to have some efficacy? – have Xi take them out to the woodshed to help them get their minds right about no one person being bigger than the nation itself. Maybe someone could ask Jack Ma how he likes teaching classes in Japan these days.
“Mars Attacks”
In reading this excellent article, you are reminded how much Musk is like a little boy that says that he does not have to follow any rules and he can do whatever he wants – and then stomps his foot. He may dream of – other – people going to Mars but until he solves the radiation problem, then that is just a nasty way for a million people to die. Well, unless they are Musk fanbois who believe his lies that is. His idea seems to be an American colony on Mars so that they can eventually annex the whole planet and declare it part of the US. There is a similar idea with the Moon where people like Musk and others in the government want to set up mining colonies there. But then they want to declare a “security zone” of several hundred miles in radius meaning that they will be claiming it. And that would, so they think, mean that no other country can land in that zone and set up their own outpost. No going to work out. Space is too big trying to dominate it for their own personal exploitation. That was why the ISS was an international effort. One day, Musk will be merely a bug splat on the windshield of history.
Musk will move production to Mars in order to circumvent Trump’s tariffs.
If Mars Air hadn’t gone b/k while planet hopping, I would have made the return flight, but like countless other fellow travelers on your fair orb, we were stranded here, having to endure your frankly odd behavior since.
Elon, i’d volunteer to go back and see the family…
The country is going to find out what happens when money is thrown into a black hole.
Lol, anyone buying a house these days has at least seen the trailer.
And speaking of “rules for thee but not for me,” the “price” of silver, (arguably the most heavily manipulated ‘market’ in the world,) has already dropped six and a quarter percent this trading session.
Fun fact #1: silver and gold are mined in a roughly seven to one ratio.
Fun fact #2: gold and silver are presently trading at a price ratio of 96 to 1.
Now tell me about “irrational exuberance.”
As I stated earlier; that “hidden hand” of “the Market” is there to pick our pockets.
This quote is about gold and is from what happened about thirty years ago but you can assume that this holds true for silver as well for today-
‘We looked into the abyss if the gold price rose further. A further rise would have taken down one or several trading houses, which might have taken down all the rest in their wake. Therefore at any price, at any cost, the central banks had to quell the gold price, manage it. It was very difficult to get the gold price under control but we have now succeeded. The US Fed was very active in getting the gold price down. So was the U.K.’
Edward ‘Steady Eddie’ George, Governor Bank of England 1993-2003
Even the barbarous relics are not immune from today’s market rout. Makes me think a whiff of deflation is in the air … that’s what the dread Pirate Powell is hoping, too.
Let’s see what happens after the first hour or so of trading. We undercut the prior low in the SP 500 so methinks this has some more downside to play out.
The biblical standard of 16 ounces of silver equaling 1 ounce of gold held for an awful long time, and then in particular came the Big Bonanza in Virginia City where they found so much that there was no markets anywhere to absorb the windfall, so politicians of the time came up with the Bland-Allison act which called for the minting of silver Dollars in extreme amounts in order to use up the largess.
As late as the early 1960’s you could go to the Federal Reserve building in DC with $1000 and buy a bag of brand new 1880’s era silver $’s for face value, as none were really made to circulate-they were an accessory for big business of the era-which was mining.
Repealing the Sherman Silver Purchase Act of 1890 was a big factor in the Panic of 1893, and that whole William Jennings Bryan Cross of Gold speech?
We were swimming in silver-so much of it around waiting to be coined into money.
The silver-gold ratio in the depths of the Great Depression was about 100-1, same as today.
When I was a junior in high school, all of the sudden i’ve got 3 or 4 tongue twister Persian named classmates who speak good English, and part of a most unusual diaspora from Tehran to LA, in which all of them brought oodles of Pahlavis with them which they cashed in near the top of a generational bubble thanks to the Hunt Brothers machinations and bought real estate in LA, smart cookies.
None of them were argent provocateurs on the 747’s that spirited them out of harm’s way (it was 5 Iranian Rials to the $ in the 70’s, I heard it just hit 1 million Rials to the $ the other day) as silver is bulky and doesn’t travel well, discretely.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pahlavi_Gold_Coins
’16 ounces of silver equaling 1 ounce of gold’
Wait a minute. I’m old enough to remember the Imperial system of weights and measures we used to use. So you are saying that 1 pound of silver was fixed to 1 ounce of gold then?
You do realize that the English Pound was just that, a pound’s worth of silver in weight.
Yeah, but I only learned that fact only a few years ago. About the same time that I learned that the definition of an inch was once three grains of barley laid end to end. Oz dumped pounds, shillings & pence in ’66 and then dumped the Imperial system of measurements back in ’74 and we have never looked back since but still remember much of those measurements. Of course there is nothing to say that Trump won’t demand that the world switch to Imperial measurements or else they will not be allowed to trade with the US. I wouldn’t put it past him. :)
Dropping £sd in the sixties, how appropriate~
I remember weighing myself in Stones on scales in NZ, and Imperial gallons in Canada.
I sometimes have screaming flashbacks to a younger me learning in school that twelve pennies made a shilling, twenty shillings made a pound….
Most Aussies my age would remember the decimal currency jingle campaign at the time of the switchover-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtyNLwqljzI (4:26 mins)
The barleycorn (one third of an inch) is still used as the basis for American and UK shoe sizes. Multiply foot length in inches by 3, then subtract an integer depending on gender and location (UK or U.S.) Thus, one barleycorn = one shoe size unit. Australia and New Zealand use the U.K. system, btw, so you would use barleycorns on occassion.
You may still remember that the top speed of a common garden snail is about 80 Furlongs per Fortnight. Or that either an 11/16 inch or 17mm socket wrench can be used to assemble a Manhasset Model 48 music stand. The joys of unit conversions are never-ending here in the U.S.A.
Is that connected with the air-speed velocity of an unladen swallow?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liIlW-ovx0Y (2:31 mins)
African or European?
The hidden hand picking pockets? Singular!
Two hands- the other is busy stacking The Deck!
There is an old Orange pair that is juggling shiny orbs while his bros pillage….
The pledge, the turn, the prestige.
Great movie! I loved David Bowie as Nicola Tesla, he had the Eastern European accent perfectly, and the high voice register, too.
I think that the depressed price of silver, compared to gold, isn’t so much outright manipulation as it is that central banks around the world buy and hold gold as their monetary metal of choice far more than they buy silver.
Gold doesn’t tarnish, is much more compact and easy to store, and isn’t used as much in industry, so if makes a certain amount of sense.
I believe that central bank accumulation is the biggest tailwind of gold, but it doesn’t impact silver nearly as much, thus the substantial difference in valuation between the metals.
Not an expert in this stuff by any means, just my take.
With all these tariffs going into effect, would I be wrong in my suspicions that tarriffs has nothing to do with re-shoring business but everything to do with bringing money into the Treasury to be used to buy Trumps crypto currency? Did Trump and Bros already suggest having Treasury buy this stuff?
It would amount to the bigliest grift in history – thus making Trump the greatest con man eva
RE: the David DeWitt tweet
While I am definitely not defending these ridiculous tariffs, I’m not so sure he’s correct about prices staying high even if tariffs are dropped.
Twenty years ago when it was the oil boys starting wars, gas prices rocketed to over $4/gallon. I remember thinking that those prices would never go down once people got used to paying that much and it was baked into the overall economy, but they did.
They’re back up in our region. Gas is in the $3.90s at this point.
$6 a gallon for 91 octane (nuthin’ but the best for my A4!) here in the Central Coast.
of nobody buys it at a high price, the price will come down.
inventory gets cleared, at a loss if necessary
I haven’t seen sales on go-juice since gas wars in the 60’s,
Some prices are stickier than others.
What hasn’t been discussed is the “crafty environmentalist” nature of Trump’s policies.
As I recall, there have been two brief periods when world wide CO2 production flattened off, one was the global financial crisis 2008 and the other was the covid19 lockdowns of 2021-2022.
Both times economic growth stagnated.
Encouraging economic growth while attempting to combat climate change seems at cross-purpose to me.
But then I view the economics profession as containing many enablers of environmental devastation as the profession seems to promote that economic growth IS ALWAYS good.
Trump’s policies could do some unintended good, especially if the Democrats step up to provide adequate food , medical care, and housing to USA citizens.
But I don’t view Trump as someone concerned about climate change or environmental destruction.
RE:”Just figured out where these fake tariff rates come from. They didn’t actually calculate tariff rates + non-tariff barriers, as they say they did. Instead, for every country, they just took our trade deficit with that country and divided it by the country’s exports to us.”
And oddly demonstrating one of the USA’s biggest exports: financial engineering.
(ok, I’m making something not a product into a product, but you catch the drift.)
There are many ways to commit financial suicide, and we have the king of going bankrupt on our side as an added bonus.
There’s no shortage of bankrupt ideas in this country…especially from the ones cheering for bankruptcy.
Re the Larry Johnson–for those of us worried about a new war against Iran this is some cheering and, I think, believable insight. He’s saying that Russia will not go along with a Trump plan to bomb Iran and they will use the UN as a vehicle to challenge such a plan. The support for this comes from the fact that Putin is not, in fact, compromising his Ukraine goals to appease Trump and this is what has Trump “pissed off.” Clearly if Putin means what he says about a new multipolar world then allowing a new and even more unhinged hegemon to arise under Trump would be a complete capitulation.
Of course Trump believes he can somehow bribe Russia into becoming a partner in crime but with Europe standing in the way and even the supposedly dismissed Zelensky there’s really nothing he has to offer.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=1p3CZJkkANk
GOP senator to fired federal worker: ‘You probably deserved it’
What is wrong with these people?
Welp, wait until someone does a Mangione on the Senator at the rate things are going.
Eh, he probably had it coming…
Not advocating that action…
Of course you’re not. Just like Henry II.
Something for our becket list?
What is wrong with those that vote for them?
Remember the “Tis a mystery” category? Ran across this article in the NYT (via Atlantic)? Doctors explain DVT, the blood clot affecting Damian Lillard and other NBA players
I’ve followed the NBA since I was little. I don’t remember any blood clots disabling a top tier athlete. No mention of possible causes in the article, of course. Hmmmm…. ‘Tis a mystery.
Chris Bosch retired at age 31 due to a blood clot issue.
‘Heads are going to explode’: Critics stunned as Trump delivers bizarre history lesson https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/heads-are-going-to-explode-critics-stunned-as-trump-delivers-bizarre-history-lesson/ar-AA1CaXaA?ocid=spartan-dhp-feeds
“In 1913, for reasons unknown to mankind, they established the income tax so that citizens rather than foreign countries would start paying the money necessary to run our government,” Trump said. “Then, in 1929, it all came to a very abrupt end with the Great Depression, and it would have never happened if they had stayed with the tariff policy; it would have been a much different story. They tried to bring back tariffs to save our country, but it was gone. It was gone. It was too late. Nothing could have been done.”
Some 80% of the soft white wheat grown in the PNW is exported. Japan, Taiwan, the Phillipines, Vietnam, Indonesia, are all regular buyers with China a big swing buyer. Trump supporters are bleeding along with everyone else. Let’s see how long vocal resistance takes from this community that will be broke in a years’ time even though another farm subsidy bill is being considered after the $10billion authorized in December. Ports, fertilizer and implement dealers, car dealers, fuel sellers, insurance companies are gonna feel the bite. Dan Newhouse already has a copy of Kelton’s book, nice chapter on trade. Looks like I’ll have to give away more copies!
re: “U.S. Electricity Prices Are Surging. These Companies Want Out”
Not new. Pre- buyback frenzy, many major companies took action:
DOW cogenerated in Pittsburg, CA, and still has cogeneration plants in Saskatchewan and (did) in Hamburg, although they’d be DuPont now.
https://www.newsweek.com/elizabeth-warren-raises-alarm-social-security-benefits-doge-2054621
Senator Raises Alarm Over People Not Receiving Social Security
This idea of a national emergency is what they’ll invoke when they send troops after us.
Shock Doctrine… Naomi Klein. Never let a good crisis go to waste.
Manufacture crisis, manufacture consent..
Manufacture dissent. Grey panthers ride the third rail into DC and shut it down?
Saturday April 5… a day of Infamy? Make some signs and go hang with like minded pals.
Re: the Gray Panthers; tell me more. Have been reading a history of the Black Panthers, and they had so many good ideas. We wondered if we could revive the gray ones, only with a greater edge.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/08/opinion/sunday/gray-panthers-maggie-kuhn.html
If the Times is not anathema here. Which might largely be deserved.
An aside: Crooke on Judge Napolitano’s show. twtr-X
Europe’s elites—France, Germany, Britain—are trapped in a dangerous delusion: preparing for war with Russia out of desperation, not necessity. They see their system collapsing, their power slipping, and the middle class sinking into poverty.
https://x.com/apocalypseos/status/1907188204530475152
Neoliberalism is now failing at the elites’ level, imo.
Mar-a-lago-ville
Sing to the tune of, “Margaritaville” by Jimmy Buffett
Livin’ on ‘taters
Watchin muh stonks crater
All of those tickers covered in red
Strummin’ my six-string
On my front porch swing
Smell of soup lines and free loaves of bread
Wasted my gains again in Mar-a-lago-ville
Searchin for my lost bullish assault
Some people claim that there’s an Orangeman to blame
But I know it’s nobody’s fault
Don’t know the reason
I shopped here all season
Nothing’s for sale but this new tube of glue
But it’s a real beauty
A nose-sniffing cutie
How I’ll retire, I haven’t a clue
Wasted my gains again in Mar-a-lago-ville
Searching for my lost bullish assault
Some people claim that there’s an Orangeman to blame
Now I think, hell, it could be my fault
[Interlude]
Jay busted out his rate-drop
Took out my loss stops
Tipped off Wall Street, it’s time to go long
But my last resort lender
Of rot-gut shall render
That frozen concoction that helps me hang on …
Wasted my gains again in Mar-a-lago-ville
Searching for my lost bullish assault
Some people claim that there’s an Orangeman to blame
Now I think, hell, it could be my fault
A beauty!
I’m very much getting those non consecutive Presidential terms Panic of 1893 feeling with the Donald, it was the end of Grover.
He’s a clever bullshitter, but you can’t out-bullshit momentum, which is going entirely not his way.
re: MONTHLY REVIEW long-read April ed.
The U.S. Ruling Class and the Trump Regime
by John Bellamy Foster
https://monthlyreview.org/2025/04/01/the-u-s-ruling-class-and-the-trump-regime/
Happy days are here again!
The skies above are clear again,
Let us sing a song of cheer again,
Happy days are here again!
Altogether shout it now,
There’s no one who can doubt it now,
Let us tell the world about it now,
Happy days are here again!
Your cares and troubles are gone
There’ll be no tariff more from now on!
Happy days are here again!
The skies above are clear again
Let us sing a song of cheer again
Happy days are here again!
So long sad times, go long bad times,
We are rid of you at last;
Howdy grey times, cloudy gay times
You are now a thing of the past.
Happy days are here again!
The skies above are clear again
Let us sing a song of cheer again
Happy days are here again!
Your cares and troubles are gone
There’ll be no more tariffs from now on!
Happy days are here again!
The skies above are clear again
Let us sing a song of cheer again
Liberation Day is here again!
A few other “oldies” we may want to consider, see category of Bear market wisdom.
“The tide going out reveals who’s been swimming naked.” (Warren Buffett?)
“The most violent rallies happen during bear markets”
“Return of principal is more important than return on principal”
“Averaging down in cost is always a mistake”
A few random questions.
At this point the destruction of American Civil Society is a done deal, is the faith our overlords have in the tools developed for control in Gaza warranted?
Where’s your Daddy, Lavender and the like?
I have read Nick Land’s “Dark enlightenment” and Andreesen’s “A Techno optimist’s Manifesto” and I’m wondering who gets the Nukes and who handles sites like Hanford?
The current plan envisions destroying Civil Society and after a period of disruption which involves “Rightsizing” the population, establishing a Techno Utopia.
What happens to the needed infrastructure in the meantime?
Things like the Electric Grid, Water systems, waste handling, food production and distribution….
As far as I can determine the “Right Size” for the population is about 100MM, how do you ensure it is the right 100MM?
I shouldn’t be worried Grok and Open AI will have the answers!
Tangentially a great read… The World Without Us, Alan Wiesman.
He has written a lot of good stuff, World Without Us premise is humans go POOF! and what happens to all the remaining untended mechanical systems we have contrived. Quite good.
I believe A I will start to fizzle as there will be no juice.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/248787.The_World_Without_Us
also, Countdown, on population. That one was also seriously revelatory.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17332183-countdown
One of my favorite books by one of my favorite authors deals with the subject matter in a thinking persons way…
Earth Abides, by George Stewart
Earth Abides does kind of hammer a point home, doesn’t it?
One of the saddest moments in the video version of The World Without Us is a small dog, patiently looking at a closed refrigerator….
We have some abandoned mini-rentals around here, by the golf course. I think from the 1990s. Abandoned and dilapidated. Broken windows. Blinds still in place. Still, stale air. A golf ball inside here or there. The cheap furniture still sitting around, stacked or fallen. Maybe 200 square feet total?
It’s sickeningly eerie, actually, to go inside just for a few moments through the broken glass.
But what’s that like if I’m not here to feel it?
There Will Come Soft Rains …
https://www.btboces.org/Downloads/7_There%20Will%20Come%20Soft%20Rains%20by%20Ray%20Bradbury.pdf
Trump is treating the USA the same as a private equity firm treats a recent company takeover. Just replace cash influx via massive debt with high tariffs and then pay all the oligarchs a “special dividend” with the proceeds. A form of bankruptcy will follow and the productive parts will be handed over to Trump’s cronies a la Russia in the 1990’s. Good times.
Taibbi’s latest. No paywall.
A Response to a Member of Congress
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2KBpqiORkU
Oops, sorry.. Here’s the correct Taibbi link.
https://www.racket.news/p/a-response-to-a-member-of-congress
You think this is his drawing the red line?
And will it work?
Breaking: Germany sends troops to the Russian border in Lithuania, hospitals prepare for war: Martin Armstrong.
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/international-news/germany/germany-troops-move-to-russian-border-in-lithuania-1st-time-post-wwii/
Correct me but those German troops had been agreed on for a long time now.
Hardly “Breaking”…
This was announced over a year ago, and they won’t even have close to the announced 5000-sized force here for some years still.
That’s what? A brigade, or maybe a third of a single division, probably less?
This appears to be another of those Unit-8200 stories, which seem to be lampshading military tech transfers and in this case outright monetary transfers from the US MIC to the Israeli MIC. But this is a LOT of money for what amounts to a software startup firm. The lampshading doth protest too much.
re: Russiagate latest
Exclusive: Clinton Plans Long In The Making
https://www.sleuth.news/p/exclusive-clinton-plans-long-in-the
p.s. why is SleuthNews the only one covering this topic for some time now…
The US is bombing civilian infrastructure in Yemen. US airstrikes destroy water source for 50,000 Yemenis, the Cradle
As I just discovered today, the Strategic Culture website has now become inaccessible from Germany unless one is using a VPN.
Few things have done more than ISP-enforced Internet censorship to destroy my earlier belief that the E.U. is a good thing.
Censorship is the return of the political “the (Uni-)Party is always right,” bullying, paternalistic mentality that East Germany was known for before the Berlin wall came down. It is a sign of weakness and lack of confidence in one’s own side’s arguments’ ability to persuade on factual and logical grounds in open and democratic debate. A regime / a ruling elite so insecure it feels it needs to censor deserves its people’s resistance and contempt.