Links 8/5/15

Hitchhiking Robot Destroyed On Cross-Country Trip Onion

Eating Spicy Food Linked to a Longer Life New York Times. Spices have lots of antioxidants.

Keynes was half right about the facts John Kay, Financial Times

How Netflix’s parental leave policy and soaring share price are linked Sydney Morning Herald. EM: “I am dubious about the alleged linkage, especially for a bubble-priced DotCom 2.0 darling like NFLX with a P/E over 100, but interesting nonetheless.”

How China’s economy suffers when it tries to cut pollution Sydney Morning Herald (EM)

Foreigners flee Thai stocks as patience wanes over pledges Bangkok Post

ECB’s economic hitmen nunbalanced evolution

Flash – Westminster under suspicion as ex-PM faces child abuse claim France 24. Lambert: “Edward Heath. Awful.”

In the words of young Germans, just ‘merkeln’ Politico (IsabelPS)

Grexit?

FWIW, ekathirmerini was down as of 3:00 AM, which is prime time in Athens. Seems like a DNS problem.

Greece needs €100bn debt relief as perpetual depression looms Telegraph

Greece upbeat about bailout deal, sees one within two weeks Reuters

Will Greece ignore the economic omens and go for new coal? WWF CrisisWatch

GDP bonds answer to Greek debt problem Financial Times

Capital Controls Destroy Greek Small Businesses; Bank Shares Plunge Again; Record Contraction Michael Shedlock. As we had warned….

Greek businesses left gasping as capital controls bite Financial Times

In Cash-Starved Greece, Plastic Casts Light Into Shadow Economy Bloomberg. Huh? This means the capital controls were not really about stopping the bank run, as in halting deposit flight. Consistent with stories of people of means buying as many tangible goods as they could during the bank holiday.

Syraqistan

Syria Feature: 4 Key Points from Interview with Kurdish General Commander EA WorldView (resilc)

Syria: Negotiating Ethnic Cleansing And A Temporary Partition Moon of Alabama

Big Brother is Watching You Watch

Light shines on Thomson Reuters de-risking service The Baron

Shooting Down Drones Bruce Schneier. They need a magnetic pulse to fry these buggers

The True Story of an Ex-Cop’s War on Lie Detectors Bloomberg

Imperial Collapse Watch

These two articles have strong class warfare elements (the sorry state of adjuncts even two decades ago) and are important reads:

My Human Terrain, Part One: Me and Mitzy Carlough War Nerd, Pando. Biographical, but also a window into the Army’s failed Human Terrain System program, “which had been touted as The Next Big Thing in counterinsurgency warfare.”

My Human Terrain, Part Two: “Which way to the bombs?” Pando

Political Staff Overruled “Purists” at State Department Who Tallied Slavery Problems Dave Dayen, Intercept

Trump: Harvard students ‘fraudsters and liars’ The Hill. No sense of humor and no class. More pranks, please.

McConnell’s vow: No more government shutdowns The Hill (furzy mouse)

The Earthquake That Will Devastate the Pacific Northwest New Yorker (EM)

Black Injustice Tipping Point

Alabama Police Officer Kept His Job After Proposal to Murder Black Man and Hide Evidence Guardian

Libor trial: Hayes handed over a UBS ‘instruction manual’ on rigging, prosecution says Telegraph (Lambert). From last month.

Oil Re-Bloodies the “Smart Money” Wolf Richter. Note how PE firms doubled down

Class Warfare

Citadel’s Ken Griffin Leaves 2008 Tumble Far Behind Wall Street Journal. Be sure to read about the divorce.

239 Years Ago, Adam Smith Predicted Fury of Seattle Business at CEO Who Pays Workers Well Intercept

The Costs of Accountability American Interest (Resilc). Un, we were on to this as a problem in 2006: Management’s Great Addiction

Antidote du jour (@World):

pretty bee links

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.

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62 comments

    1. Oregoncharles

      Hmmm. Yes. And what happens when one of the big, indispensable economies calls the bluff? That’s the point of the article, of course, and what we’ve been discussing all along.

      I would think Germans,in general, would be EXTREMELY nervous about the way the present use of the Euro recalls the WWII occupation. Long run, that’s deeply toxic. But we don’t see much sign of awareness – I guess that’s where culture kicks in. They sincerely feel they’re doing the right thing, which also happens to be self-serving.

      Should be interesting times. I’m glad there’s an ocean in between. Oh, yeah, there really ISN’T anymore. Globalization was SUCH a great idea.

  1. Rene

    re: increase in bank cards in Greece. Can someone explain how Greek banks still have reserves to settle the electronic payments? Or why not all the money has been moved to banks outside of Greece, with no capital controls, to convert into cash?

    1. Nathan Tankus

      We were just having an email thread about this today. The Bank of Greece has to be providing intraday credit and finding someway to get banks to lend to each other or lending on some other program not called ELA they haven’t been publicizing.

      They’ve been blocking transactions using Target which is why there isn’t a deposit outflow out of the country.we have no data on deposit flows within Greece. It would be really interesting if certain banks are experiencing concentrated deposit inflows/outflows. there is some evidence that they’re using taxes on unauthorized transactions and firing of employees who authorize unauthorized transactions to enforce Target’s lack of use.

      http://www.bankofgreece.gr/Pages/en/transactionsinfo/trapargvraxdiark.aspx

      1. Rene

        Thanks for that, interesting read. I guess that as long as it remains in the system it indeed doesn’t matter where it’s at.

        1. JTMcPhee

          Doesn’t matter to who? The People Who Matter? Interesting read — enough “relief” for the mopes (pensions payable, medical supplies) to avoid insurrection, and makes “legal” in obscure ways all the c___ that the Few want to do… The drafters have a real future, somewhere.

      2. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

        They could unblock Target for themselves (they, meaning the Greek gov’t), because they know they will (unlike, say, an oligarch) cash it abroad to bring that money back.

  2. abynormal

    Muchas gracias for linking The Earthquake that will devastate the PN.
    it read like the Great Global Malconomy…every 4 minutes of modern economic deconstruction will result in a 9.0 somewhere along the ring of fire.

    “Nor, from the feel of it, was there ground on the ground”
    …Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic. Dune

  3. tongorad

    Haunted by Student Debt to the Grave

    Many people will be surprised to learn that any seniors are still paying off their student debt. They are: 706,000 households headed by someone 65 or older are still paying off their student debts, according to a report by the GAO. Collectively these households owed $18.2 billion in 2013. That’s six-and-a-half times as much as they owed in 2005, when these senior households’ total debt obligation was “only” $2.8 billion.

    1. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

      Our benighted world is such that the only way to get ahead, to live a happy life, is with acquiring know-how and information, through the traditional educational system, and not with one’s heart.

      Then, one looks at some of those fancy temples, one wonders if wisdom teachers are to be found living on food stamps, and why aren’t more people seeking them out?

      1. optimader

        Our benighted world is such that the only way to get ahead, to live a happy life, is with acquiring know-how and information, through the traditional educational system, and not with one’s heart.

        Sorry Beef but that is demonstrably very much not the case

    2. John Zelnicker

      A portion of the student debt owed by seniors is due to co-signing loans for their children or grandchildren. When the younger relative defaults, the lender will go after the co-signer. I’m not sure how big a portion this is, but I suspect it’s a substantial part of the increase over the past few years since these new graduates are having such a tough time finding a job at a living wage that also covers the loan payments.

  4. Bill Smith

    Moon of Alabama: Syria: Negotiating Ethnic Cleansing And A Temporary Partition

    “The U.S. has no interest to defeat the Islamic State”

    What crap.

    1. ambrit

      Even c— is useful as fertilizer to grow new things.
      First, which America does the original poster focus on? The America of Mom, Guns, and Apple pie? The America of oligarchic cabals pursuing transnational aims? The America divided against itself, as demonstrated by our famously schizophrenic Security Services? The America that built up and funded Daesh, or the America that lost control and has been turned on by it’s erstwhile “ally?”
      Then you have the entire worms can of what Daesh really is. Is it committed Jihadists? Is it the ambitious Proto Caliphate functionaries? Is it the cadre of anti Shia ‘trainers’ originally tasked with raising an army to fight proxy wars against Iran on behalf of The Kingdom?
      This has been going on, in it’s “modern” incarnation, for over a century now. America is just again learning how hard managing the Middle East can be. The Porte tried, and after a couple of centuries of hard work, look what happened to them.

      1. NotTimothyGeithner

        I think the unusual nature of Daesh is due to the leading status of Bin Laden and Cadre leaving the world stage. Prior to Bin Laden’s death, much of the would be fighters (let’s ignore motive) saw Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, the brand, as the legitimate leader for their cause and waited for orders from on high. I think Bin Laden and friends liked their status in the underground as long as they were in safe compounds and didn’t want to be upstaged hence the emphasis on suicide bombing. Their martyrs weren’t around to view for leadership.

        Now that the Mujahideen are gone, their sympathizers are acting on their own accord against whatever their perceived enemy or interest is. Weaker regimes and promises of weapons and resources have moved a number of fighters to joining conflicts in Libya and Syria, but there is no legitimate strategist/general of the movement anymore. Combined with the young populations of the state’s in question, there is a ready force available, but no clear direction or ability to control or isolate a single leadership.

        One of the argument ends against Iraq in 2002 was that for every enemy we killed he had 5 little brothers who weren’t of age yet but would be and would not appreciate the killers of their older brother or father.

        Since Al Qaeda had no succession plan or potential successors, every potential fighter is acting instead of waiting.

        1. ambrit

          It looks like the head of the Caliphate arm of Daesh has learned the lesson of al Quaeda. I read recently that the individual was setting up a mechanism of succession should he be killed or incapacitated.
          Seeing as America, or the West in general, tried to coopt al Quaeda during the Afghan Soviet War, to the extent of training and arming the Mujahideen; this can be seen as the second time in recent history the West had ‘put their foot in it.’

          1. NotTimothyGeithner

            At least to me, the head of the caliph of Daesh isn’t a celebrity compared to Bin Laden. I wonder if his position is seen as similar to the president or a pope given the size of the operation. Merely holding these offices makes you more impressive than any celebrity.

            Did you know who Francis I was before he became pope? Perhaps you as an individual did, but most people didn’t. Do the structures and brand of ISIS and so forth overshadow an individual?

            1. ambrit

              For a person in as sensitive and dangerous a position as bin Laden was, I would have thought that secrecy and ‘true humility’ would have been the proper positions to take. Celebrity status brings with it the temptation to indulge in narcissism. Real revolutionaries subsume themselves to the ‘movement.’ In this respect, the ‘Caliph of Daesh’ is being rational and faithful; a difficult combination to effect under the best of circumstances. His actions show that the Daesh plans on being around for a long time.
              I had forgotten that Frances 1 had been the head Jesuit for Argentina. The first Jesuit Pope!

              1. NotTimothyGeithner

                An American Jesuit. You can bet the old world Jesuits don’t approve.

                I’m not sure Bin Laden was a real revolutionary as much as he relished fighting the “good fight.” In ’90, he pushed for an Afghanistan rerun in Iraq and Kuwait. The KSA didn’t want to risk it either Bin Laden failing or succeeding. The U.S. took his victory away and pretended like he didn’t exist.

    2. Raj

      I suppose you prefer “The U.S. has no interest to defeat the Islamic State until the Assad regime is overthrown”? Did that fix it?

  5. jsn

    Particularly enjoyed the re-branding of Unbalanced Evolution in the credit. Has the Pope put in equity?

  6. Ditto

    re Adam Smith

    I find modern conservatism as far removed from their own ideological roots as an ideology can be.

    It is more akin to a religion at this point than even an ideology .

    They seem to have nothing to say about concentrated market power

    1. jsn

      Au contraire!
      Concentrated market power is the only thing left they actually conserve and their silence speaks volumes!

      It’s just that conservatives are so loyal to the term its use blinds them to the radically extractive and destructive ideology that marches under its banner.

      1. Dittio

        I was taught my consetvatives

        I disagree with them but what passes for oy now is nothing like what they taught

        Even the stuff the Drmocras peddle seems further to the right than historic conservatism

        Eg the concentration of the health insurance matket is not something that a Teddy Roosovelt type would endorse

        It would be seen as bad for free markets

    2. rowlf

      They seem to get trapped by dogma. Arguing them into a corner gets them very agitated.

      (repost, as my reply got separated from Ditto’s comment)

  7. Eric Patton

    Your Management’s Great Addiction piece is stellar. I strongly urge everyone to read it if they haven’t already.

  8. russell1200

    The link about Greek Coal burning power plant does ignore one very important point. Greece has indigenous sources of goal, but has to import oil, gas, and presumably the “alternative” sources the post champions. Not saying that makes it smart, but it presumably goes a long way toward improving their balance of payments. If they go the route of the economic pariah, they could go all-in like the Germans did prior to WW2 and liquefy coal to make “synthetic” fuel.

    1. ambrit

      South Africa traveled the same road with coal liquefaction after the anti apartheid sanctions began to bite.
      Another possibility is in passive solar. Look closely at any photograph of an Israeli cityscape. All thise metal sheds on the roofs are probably solar water heating units. Southern Greece is in roughly the same climate zone. Does any reader from Greece have any information on the penetration of solar water heating is in that country? Thanks in advance.

    2. craazyboy

      All it takes is about $2 Billion USD and 7-10 years of design, construction and production tuning, and Sasol of SA with build them a plant.

      Then someone will eventually demand it be shutdown, because the Sasol plants in SA are the single highest point source of CO2 emissions on the planet.

    3. Brooklin Bridge

      Greece has abundant sun light and wind – and solar alone has recently become cheaper than coal – so the creation of such a behemoth is as absurd as the draconian conditions of the so called bail out. More relevant to the explanation of why they would make such an insane choice of power production would be questions such as:

      Who will get to build the plant at tax payer’s expense?
      Who will get to own the plant for 3 cents on the Euro after it has been privatized and before it becomes hopelessly unprofitable due to carbon credits?
      Who will dismantle it at tax payer expense once the government has bought it back from the private company at 1 Euro on the original Euro cost plus, of course, the millions of Euros for CEO bonuses for running it into the ground?

  9. Roquentin

    On Netflix: No one told the author of that article that correlation doesn’t equal causation. If anything, the causation probably runs in the other direction. They can afford to be so generous with paternity leave precisely because they’re a hot, bubble-priced company. That’s just aimless speculation though, and I don’t want to do the same thing I’m criticizing the author for.

    Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s cool, but correlation not equaling causation is pretty much research methodology 101.

    1. PlutoniumKun

      Yes, its obviously very difficult to take that seriously.

      The huge problem for any company which gives serious attention to family issues is that they end up attracting people who will want to take advantage of it. I had the experience a few years ago of working in an organisation with very good maternity leave benefits. We were recruiting about a dozen professionals, requiring a minimum of 5 years experience, at a time when it was very hard to recruit suitably experienced people. All but one of those who got the jobs were females in their 30’s, all worked previously in small private consultancies, and predictably, within 12 months, all were on maternity leave or about to go. It was infuriating, but understandable from the point of view of the individuals, and nobody of course complained because nobody wanted to criticise the organisations very humane family policies. I’ve heard through the grapevine that later, after having 2 kids or so, some of them then resigned, going back to their old companies.

      This of course is the reason why it should not be up to individual companies to have good family friendly policies – it has to be a statutory duty on all employers, to create a proper level playing field.

    2. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

      Is it more ‘enlightened’ if it’s only for the first child, and not, say, the 5th child, because of the population explosion issue?

      And for those deciding against adding to the world population, do they get a ‘thank you for non-paternity’ leave?

      1. PlutoniumKun

        I suppose it is argued that the ‘thank you for non-paternity’ is that you should in the long run benefit from being in the office longer, although thats not always the case.

        There is though, to be serious, a real issue with people who need family time off who don’t have kids – for example, if caring for elderly relatives. I have to say that at the time I described above I was dealing with elderly, ailing parents, and it was quite a point of contention for me and others in my work that we were not entitled to the sort of help and support new mothers and fathers received. Its quite a difficult issue.

        1. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

          Regarding caring for one’s parents, here is a question.

          If your parents receive care from you, can they say that, that care -service has a monetary value and if you give more than $14,000 worth of care-service in a year, are you required to declare it as a monetary gift over $14,000 (the 2015 annual gift exclusion)?

          That is, you care for your parents and you have to pay taxes for doing that?

          1. PlutoniumKun

            Thankfully, my care was worthless…..(or beyond price, depending on who you talk to).

            1. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

              I agree with you.

              But to the ardent capitalism believers, everything has a price and the tax collectors will help you (or anyone doing that) to sort out the imputed value.

              “Congratulations, sir. You just save that baby’s life. The baby owes you his/her life. The value is estimated to be about $1 million. That exceeds the free gift limit. You have to pay the gift tax on that.”

              Such is the absurd world we live in.

  10. Jim Haygood

    You knew it had to happen. Yesterday a media scrum was all over Apple, trashing its stock and saying it could only go down more.

    Today, AAPL is up 1.42% at mid-morning. Chart:

    http://tinyurl.com/oq5m2g2

    The MSM, comrades: they’re the 21st century’s Wrong-Way Corrigans.

    1. Jim Haygood

      Now AAPL is up more than 2 percent, as the journos desperately buy back their shorts.

      I love the smell of burnt fingers in the morning!

  11. Vatch

    A disturbing tragedy at a factory farm:

    http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/money/agriculture/2015/07/28/iowa-father-son-die-manure-pit-fumes/30809037/

    It takes just a few seconds for routine maintenance work in a pig barn to turn deadly, said Daniel Andersen, a water quality and manure management professor at Iowa State University.

    It’s hydrogen sulfide that can be the deadliest of the gases created when manure decomposes — along with methane, ammonia and carbon dioxide, Andersen said.

    http://www.care2.com/causes/father-and-son-die-from-manure-pit-fumes.html

    Farmers are not the only ones who are in danger from these fumes. Factory farms are so large that the noxious gases created from these farms are doing harm to the environment and public health. One factory farm houses thousands of animals at a time, with an estimated 65 billion animals housed in factory farms worldwide. That’s a lot of noxious gases.

    At many of these farms, the animal waste is funneled into giant waste lagoons, a pleasant way of saying a giant poop pond. Sometimes, these waste lagoons break, leak or overflow, sending all the stuff inside it into water supplies for public consumption.

    1. PlutoniumKun

      This is actually a disturbingly common reason for death in farming these days. Not just factory farms, but any farm which is in any way intensive. All you need is an enclosed space and a need to store slurry (which is of course is not necessary on lower intensity farms).

      1. Vatch

        This is of relevance for those situations in which police officers claim to fear for their lives. Clearly, farmers must also fear for their lives. Also, professional fishermen and loggers.

    2. JerryDenim

      Nice link. I grew up in southeast North Carolina and enjoyed the story linked here a couple of weeks ago that described how Duplin county has basically become one giant Chinese-owned pork sweatshop producing copious amounts of stink and “effluent” that even the Chinese don’t want in their backyards.

      Modern industrialized pork ‘farming’ (if you can even call it that) is very dirty business.

    3. Gio Bruno

      …those waste lagoons don’t have to leak or break to create havoc on the environment. A pig farm waste lagoon is no different than a hyper-trophic (severe algal bloom) lake. Decomposition of organic matter (be it poop or algae) without oxygen (reducing environment) produces hydrogen sulfide.

  12. Jim Haygood

    The Sheldon Adelson Republican Party(TM) casts its lot with Netanyahu:

    Netanyahu has engaged the most effective lobby in Congress — the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) — to pressure all members of Congress, especially the 13 Democratic senators needed to override the eventual veto that Obama will use on a negative congressional vote [on the Iran nuclear deal].

    By turning the Iran issue into a political battle against Obama, Netanyahu has pushed American Jewry into a corner: They must allegedly choose between an allegiance to their president and loyalty to the Israeli prime minister.

    http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/08/03/aipac-chooses-sides-it-picks-bibi-over-its-own-supporters-us-jews

    Heh, heh … he said ‘dual loyalty.’

  13. Tertium Squid

    How China’s economy suffers when it tries to cut pollution

    The headline troubles me. The fact that clean air is not a factor accounted for in “the economy” speaks volumes to how paltry and useless such a definition is.

  14. JerryDenim

    “Shooting Down Drones story”

    Interesting legal quandary we find ourselves in with the sudden explosion of affordable and capable video equipped drones. I’ve been appalled recently by the popularity of selfie-sticks and the danger and nuisance they pose while attempting to ski unmolested or simply walk in a public place without being smacked in the face by a camera mounted on a long pole. Ski resorts and sidewalks have simply not been designed with the use of these devices in mind. Many people can’t seem to figure out how to safely and politely wear a device as simple and as traditional as a backpack on crowed sidewalks or in airports, subways, etc. so I have little hope humanity will figure out the etiquette of how to properly wield selfie sticks anytime soon. Now our modern age of technology driven narcissism has unleashed cheap, readily available drones which are suddenly invading our most intimate private spaces like our backyards, and our tranquility in public spaces. I had to put up with some guy’s drone buzzing over my head last week while I was surfing. Surfing is the closest thing I have to mediation, so I found it very annoying to say the least.

    If I had a drone buzzing around in my backyard my first instinct wouldn’t be calling the cops, it would be to repel the drone’s invasion of my private space. Since I don’t have a twelve gauge and if I did, discharging it would be be an instant cause for arrest where I live, I might call the cops on my way out the door to the sporting goods store, where I would promptly buy a slingshot capable of disabling the offending drone if it reappeared. A video drone in your backyard is no different than than having the human who is operating it in your backyard with a camera, so I would see such an event as nothing less than a home invasion. If someone wanted to sue me for destroying their rude little voyeur toy I would lawyer-up and invoke laws aimed at jailing peeping toms and claim self defense, as in I feared for my safety. I would claim it was impossible for me to know the drone’s intentions or capabilities, perhaps it was armed. How would I know? I’m not a DARPA drone expert and there have already been cases of people modifying video drones with firearms . The legal headache would be a real pain but that’s a fight I would be willing to have. Our privacy is worth fighting for and I believe we must pushback strongly if we are to keep it in this age of creeping surveillance and techno-narcissism.

    1. craazyboy

      Nothing to worry about really. The government is watching over your property with the real time version of Google Earth.

    2. Kurt Sperry

      I think a net with small weights at each corner might work launched from a slingshot without sending anything potentially dangerous aloft. You just need to get a rotor tangled and the drone will lose control and fall. If it falls into your property, that establishes the position it was flying to a good degree of certainty.

  15. Gio Bruno

    RE: Northwest Earthquake

    Hmmm, I have my suspicions about this article. Nearly the same article was written by LA Times staff writers some months ago (a year maybe?). The LA Times is pretty good at long form investigations. And earthquakes are on everyone’s mind out here.

    This article may seem like news to the general public but geologists have been piecing their evidence together on this fault zone for a long time now. They’re now confident with their assessments of the Cascadia fault. Hence, ready for public consumption.

    1. Gio Bruno

      The LA Times article on the Cascadia Fault was published in March 2014. One of the authors was Ron Lin.

    2. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

      Didn’t they find well preserved underwater trees off the coast up there, linking them to ancient quakes?

      1. tegnost

        definitely a complex tectonic zone but the time frame is almost incomprehensible. My own comforting thought is we’ve had a volcano and 7+ earthquake “recently” so…and not much light activity which might imply some instability. The southern san andreas or that one they’re lubricating with fracking fluids back east would cause me more concern, but still earthquakes in the us (building codes matter) are mostly a storytelling event, occasionally someone gets hurt. I was driving over the train tracks on mercer in my old 56 GMC, always a bouncy ride, and missed the whole thing, figured it out when i saw people pouring out of the buildings…

  16. ewmayer

    o German prosecutor sacked over Netzpolitik treason probe – BBC News
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-33772316

    Fascinating internecine shitfight going on in Germany – money snip for me is ‘Critics have accused Mr Range of double standards, with the prosecutor earlier this year dropping an investigation into alleged tapping of Chancellor Merkel’s phone by the the US National Security Agency over lack of evidence.’ Seems to me they didn’t look very hard for said evidence. But what they really need to do is to emulate the US and set up a secret court system with strictly one-sided argumentation to decide such tricky constitutional issues. It’s all about ‘modernization’ of the judiciary, Germany!

    o 3D Printing an Ornate Bridge Over a Water in Amsterdam | Mish
    http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2015/08/3d-printing-ornate-bridge-over-water-in.html

    Just because we can, doesn’t mean we should. Enjoyed the completely uncritical regurgitation of the PR talking points by the company CEO, though! /sarc

    o Idaho woman comes under fire for celebrating her killing of giraffe | Reuters
    http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/08/04/us-zimbabwe-wildlife-idaho-idUSKCN0Q82AW20150804?feedType=nl&feedName=domesticNews

    Let’s adapt Ms. Corgatelli’s own defense of her avocation to the predations of a serial killer: ‘Everybody thinks we’re cold-hearted killers and it’s not that,’ Dr. Lecter said in the nationally televised interview. ‘There is a connection to the person, and just because we hunt them doesn’t mean we don’t have a respect for them. People are very dangerous animals. They could hurt you seriously, very quickly.’ (Especially if they realize you are a probable threat, by virtue of you having gone out of your way to hunt them). And what better way of giving them your respect than by eating their liver with fava beans and a nice chianti?

    o Bottle in car of Ohio man shot by police held fragrance: coroner | Reuters
    http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/08/04/us-usa-police-ohio-idUSKCN0Q82DS20150804?feedType=nl&feedName=domesticNews

    So, a possible ‘in fragrante delicto’ defense by the trigger-happy cop?

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