Do Some Electric Fish Sense the World Through Comrades’ Auras? (press release) Columbia University
Number of weak US banks jumps as NYCB stabilised on $1bn capital raise FT. And the deck: “Investors including former Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin stand to make hundreds of millions on bailout.” So it’s win-win!
Climate
Anti-Anthropocene vote is ‘null and void’ Climate & Capitalism. Yikes!
* * * Not All Forms of Carbon Removal Are Created Equal JSTOR
How You Can Easily Delay Climate Change Today: SO2 Injection Tomas Pueyp, Uncharted Territories. Cf. Neal Stephenson’s Termination Shock; review at NC here.
* * * Solar helps US clean power additions smash record despite wind slowdown: report S&P Global
Power lines ignited the largest wildfire in Texas history and one nearby, officials say Associated Press
Water
States in Colorado River Basin pitch new ways to absorb shortages but clash on the approach AP
One of the world’s most populated cities is nearly out of water as many go “days if not weeks” without it CBS. Mexico City.
India
Valley breathing freely and tourism flourishing: PM Modi in Kashmir Business Standard
Syraqistan
Biden will announce a plan for a temporary port on Gaza’s coast to increase flow of humanitarian aid AP. Hmm. Aid in, but, as part of Israel’s end game, a Palestinian remnant out?
Pretending The US Can’t Just Drive Aid Into Gaza Caitlin Johnstone
* * * Red Sea Disruptions Benefit Shipping Companies’ Near-Term Profitability Hellenic Shipping News
China to continue shipping steel via Red Sea despite attack on vessel: traders S&P Global
* * * Western media concocts ‘evidence’ UN report on Oct 7 sex crimes failed to deliver The Grayzone
Israel ‘likely’ machine-gunned down and killed Reuters journalist in Lebanon Canary
* * *
European Disunion
Sweden officially joins NATO, prime minister declares it a ‘safer country’ France24
Dear Old Blighty
Problem With UK’s New Retirement Plan Is UK Stocks John Authers, Bloomberg\
A lesson from history Funding the Future
New Not-So-Cold War
Ukraine Enters New Phase of War With Russia: Dig, Dig, Dig WSJ. Now?!
Europe is at last adjusting to the new reality in Ukraine FT. And the United States?
Greek operators regain share in Russian crude exports despite tighter sanctions Hellenic Shipping News
* * * SITREP 3/7/24: Macron Raises Rhetoric Temp, First HIMARS Kill, Black Sea Fleet Setbacks & More Simplicius the Thinker(s).
Rostec Chief Confirms Russian Army Now Fields T-14 Tanks: Explains Why They Are Held Back From Ukrainian Frontlines Military Watch
* * * Stalin and Georgia: the history of complicated relations JAM
South of the Border
Petrobras in Transition Phenomenal World
The Caribbean
U.S. fears Haiti could fall ‘at any time’ as doubts grow over Biden’s backup Kenya plan Miami Herald
How a lack of leadership allowed gangs to take over Haiti (interview) France24
Biden Administration
Big-Money Forces Want Antitrust Regulators’ Budget Slashed Jacobin. Working through Jean Shaheen, a Democrat. Naturally (and called by Stoller a week ago).
State of the Union
Five key takeaways from Joe Biden’s 2024 State of the Union address Al Jazeera
Biden gave ‘speech of his life’ at SOTU. Here are 3 things he did right and 3 things he got wrong Mark Penn, FOX
Disaster for Trump as Truth Social Crashes at Critical SOTU Moment Daily Beast. Trump should have used X (so Elon, too, is cash-poor?).
The Supremes
Momentum builds in major homelessness case before U.S. Supreme Court AP
Our Famously Free Press
America Enters the Samizdat Era Matt Taibbi, Racket News (JBird4049). Awards to Bhattacharya, the New York Post’s Miranda Devine, and Taibbi. I loathe Bhattacharya, and all his fellow service providers at the house of ill-fame that is Stanford. That said, if I want speech from Devine and Taibbi, and I do, then I have to accept speech from Bhattacharya (and ankle-bite as much as I can).
Supply Chain
Red Sea crisis underlines the need for greater data transparency Seatrade Maritime News
Digital Watch
Furious Congress plows forward with TikTok bill after user revolt Axios
Why the political clock is ticking for TikTok Nate Silver, Silver Bulletin
TikToks Sharing NYC Rent Overcharge Stories Drive Surge of Tenant Records Requests The City
* * * Why most AI benchmarks tell us so little TechCrunch
[O]ne benchmark cited by Anthropic in its recent announcement, GPQA (“A Graduate-Level Google-Proof Q&A Benchmark”), contains hundreds of Ph.D.-level biology, physics and chemistry questions — yet most people use chatbots for tasks like responding to emails, writing cover letters and talking about their feelings.
So the tech bros loaded up the training set with data they would want, because of course. So are those same tech bros really the people we want “helping” us to “understand” our feelings? Considering especially that the enshittification of AI will be a million times worse than Google search?
The Terrifying A.I. Scam That Uses Your Loved One’s Voice The New Yorker
Critique of Artificial Reason The Baffler
Healthcare
UnitedHealth Outlines Timeline for Restoring Services After Hack Bloomberg
Doctors Who Performatively Fetishized RCTs Aren’t Out to Advance Medical Research, But Rather to Sow Doubt & Mistrust Science-Based Medicine. On RCTs, see KLG here.
Crime
New York will send National Guard to subways after a string of violent crimes AP. Commentary:
🧵 ON NYC SUBWAY BAG CHECKS
I'm from a family of lifelong New Yorkers. I went to NYU in the 80s and have spent more than 35 years in Manhattan since then. And let me say this:
National Guard bag checks have NOTHING to do with subway safety. This is about conditioning the… pic.twitter.com/bvQIdjDOQ1
— Peter Daou (@peterdaou) March 7, 2024
Opinion: New York’s showy crackdown on subway crime is the wrong approach CNN. “Wrong” for what?
It’s almost like they’re conditioning people to acquiesce to the conditions of martial law. It’s almost like they’re practicing for some big event in the near future. https://t.co/T57g8iZRn0
— Leah McElrath (@leahmcelrath) March 7, 2024
Subway crime is down, but so is MTA customer satisfaction Spectrum News. Headline is deeceptive: “Data shows that in 2023, overall crime was down 2.6% in 2023 compared to 2022, with 60 fewer crimes. But numbers in two categories went up. Felony assault went up 2.5%, and burglary was up over 140%.” Absolute numbers are quite low, however.
Boeing
Tire falls off United flight departing SFO, crushing several vehicles in parking lot, company says and United Airlines engine catches fire mid-flight from Houston airport, flames caught on camera ABC. 777 and 737 respectively.
Boeing hasn’t provided documentation about panel that blew out in midair: NTSB chair The Hill
Book Nook
Blake’s Tone E.P. Thompson, London Review of Books. From 1993, for E.P. Thompson stans. Grab a cup of coffee.
Guillotine Watch
Daniel Ek’s new longevity clinic (email) Sifted. “[L]ifespan-extending work perks.” Like clean air — for free!
Class Warfare
More Money From “Side Hustles” Provides Spending Tailwind Morning Consult
Classic Mayo-Dressed Tuna Salad Sandwiches Serious Eats. Umami.
The Second Soul, Part I Anton Howes, the Age of Invention
Against Revulsion Scott Madin. A must-read.
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
151 comments
Comments are closed.
THE WANDERER
(melody borrowed from I’m A Wanderer by Dion)
Oh I tried to make a home inside of Palestine
I chased the Arabs out I told ’em it was mine
I killed ’em by the thousands I left ’em halt and lame
I killed ’em like its nuthin’ like in a video game
Now they call me the Wanderer
Yeah the Wanderer
I roam around around around around
Oh well I pushed my borders out every time there was a fight
The Torah taught me well how to smash and how to smite
There’s Syria and Egypt lovely Lebanon’s the best
Stealing from my neighbors was my only real quest
But now I’m a Wanderer
Yeah a Wanderer
I roam around around around around mmmm
In days of ancient Babylon
The Jews weren’t happy over there
And when their king said ‘Get thee gone!’
We went to fight the Greeks and Romans ’cause we just can’t share!
All the Arab states around our tiny home
Said stay inside your borders don’t pretend you’re Rome
But all our scriptures say that Jews will own the world
At the End of Days when all those lightning bolts get hurled
So now I’m a Wanderer
Yeah a Wanderer
I roam around around around around
(musical interlude)
Oh yeah we had a big old war we fought Arabs all around
They killed most of our troops they flattened every town
Survivors wandered off and we wander to this day
We blew our only chance there’s not a whole lot more to say
Now I’m a Wanderer
Yeah a Wanderer
I roam around around around around around around
‘Cause I’m a Wanderer
Yeah a Wanderer
I roam around around around around around around around
‘Cause I’m a Wanderer
I’m a Wanderer
so… I always enjoy your stuff Antifa, and this rocks, but I’m having trouble following you here.
Jewish scripture does not say that they own the world, just a piece of it. And this was escapist fantasy anyway because in the age of empire far from being a big bully, they were the 90 lb weakling on the beach, getting sand kicked repeatedly in their faces by the Babylonians, the Persians, the Romans, etc, one after the other.
Do agree with not doling out even a square foot of land to ‘the Jews’ at the expense of the global South.
But when it comes to owning the world, the whole Rapture and all (when the saved are lifted up while the others are flushed into eternal torture) is contained in the Apocrypha which is not Jewish scripture, not an accepted part of the Jewish canon.
Those texts became very popular among medieval Christian sects focused on the Second Coming in catastrophic times (think the Plague). Some of their teachings demonized Jews, including the notion that Jews controlled the world and stole Christian babies to drink their blood. And ironically the persecution of Jews, that they were run out of one country or region or another as a result of this demonization, is how they came to be called Wanderer. Insult to injury, dude ;-)
A plea that the NC songbook should not inadvertently give any purchase to the despicable Netanyahu/AIPAC/etc. practice of mistaking a principled antiZionism for the pernicious and indefensible scourge of antiSemitism.
🦑🦆
Indeed, the thousand years when Jews rule all the nations is found in the Apocrypha, which is not mainstream Jewish scripture. No argument there.
But the Zionist fanatics who make up the three far right coalitions that lets Bibi run Israel believe this stuff. They think they can force the Messiah to appear and usher in this thousand years of peace through Jews ‘perfecting the world’ simply by reclaiming ancient Israel and building the Third Temple on the spot where the Al-Asqa mosque sits now. So they are talking about bombing it in order to get started.
That current situation is what I had hoped to convey.
“Israel ‘likely’ machine-gunned down and killed Reuters journalist in Lebanon”
I think that it is safe to say that the Israelis have another doctrine being used where they try to kill all the journalists. They don’t even have to be in Gaza or the West Bank but can be in another country like Lebanon. At the very absolute minimum the Israelis have killed over a hundred journalists in Gaza alone and some of the stories that survivors tell makes clear that the Israelis are trying to hunt them down. And here I was thinking that deliberately murdering journalists was an actual war crime. Come to think of it, when US troops entered Baghdad over twenty years ago, a US tank shot at a hotel that was where the journalists were staying and independent journalists were not safe either from Coalition attack. Must be all part of the international rules-based order or something.
Thank you and well said, Rev.
Please don’t expect western and wannabe hacks to publicise such killings and, as they did for Khashoggi, arrange a memorial service at some church in London.
And not just israel.
Of course they did. Unless someone will be held responsible, this is basically just Israel giving us all the middle finger and daring us to do anything about it.
That was the “Palestine Hotel”, I believe. Prescient.
Joe, Joe was a man who thought he was a 2-termer
But he knew it couldn’t last
Joe, Joe left his home in Scranton, Pennsylvania
For some White House grass
Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back Joe, Joe
Go home
Get back, get back
Back to where you once belonged
Get back, get back
Back to where you once belonged, yeah
Oh, get back, Joe
Sweet Kamala Harris thought she was a woman
But she was Willie Brown’s man
All the pols around her say she’s got it coming
But she has to wait until she can
Oh, get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Get back Kamala, woo, woo
Go roam
Oh, get back, yeah, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Yeah, get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Ooh
Ooh, ooh
Get back to that action-figure pose
Your wardrobe’s waitin’ for you
Wearin’ those high-heel shoes
And a low risk, vetted
Get back on cue, Kamala
Get back, get back
Get back to where you once belonged
Oh, get back, get back
Get back, oh yeah
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEESfv-11ng
Go easy on Joe, he’s probably sleeping off an epic hangover after the bender he went on that turned him into “Angry Whopper Joe” last night.
(sing to the tune of, “Bad medicine” by Bon Jovi)
Joey is on bad medicine
Bad medicine is what he needs
Whoa-oh-oh, shake it up, just like bad medicine!
There ain’t no doctor who can cure his disease
(Bad medicine)
Joey got war fever, got the neo-con disease
And it’ll take more than a doctor to prescribe a remedy
His PAC has lots of moolah, but it isn’t what he needs
Gonna take more than a shot to get him to lucidity
And he’s got all the symptoms, count wars, one, two, three!
First you need! (that’s what you get for voting while drunk)
Then your ears bleed (Margie heckles, but it’s never enough)
And then you’re on your knees (that’s when he forgets what decade it is)
Now this boy from Scranton gonna go angry mode!
Whoa-oh-oh
Joey is on bad medicine
Bad medicine is what he needs
Whoa-oh-oh, shake it up, just like bad medicine!
There ain’t no doctor who can cure his disease
Bad, bad, medicine
Joe don’t need no needle to be giving him a thrill
And he don’t need anesthesia to forget JFK got killed
He’s got a dirty-down addiction that doesn’t show no tracks
He’s got a jones for genocide like a monkey on his back
There ain’t no paramedic gonna stop this heart attack
First you need! (that’s what you get for voting while drunk)
Then your ears bleed (Margie heckles, but it’s never enough)
And then you’re on your knees (that’s when he forgets what decade it is)
Now this boy from Scranton gonna go angry mode!
Joey is on bad medicine
Bad medicine is what he needs
Whoa-oh-oh, shake it up, just like bad medicine!
There ain’t no doctor who can cure his disease
Melody
Five killed in Gaza by US airdrop:
https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/palestinian-reports-5-gazans-killed-when-hit-by-airdropped-us-aid-packages/
Our own little taxpayer funded contribution to Nakba. I’m sure Bibi got a chuckle out of this story.
‘MRE Too Movement’
Yes, we had someone a few days ago mention that airdrops over inhabited areas can and have killed before. Look out below.
Yes, we stopped dropping over towns and villiages after the targets of our “assistance” pleaded for us to stop.
The method that I mentioned, open-topped cardboard crates, while still ineffective, is safer to those below: the MREs will float and wash ashore. But the food is still sniper-bait, and the free-fall dispersal drops are nowhere near as sexy as parachutes for the cameras, which is what this is for anyway.
Break the blockade, and let the trucks roll: anything less is bullshit.
BTW, Caitlin Johnstone was on fire with her piece linked today– love that writer!
Re: Antidote du Jour
Who needs to go off-planet to see alien life forms.
I legit thought it was a fairy and was reevaluating my whole world view until I finished my coffee
RE: SOTU
I flipped over a couple times to take a quick look. Regardless of the subject at hand, all I saw was “Angry old man yells at cloud”. Now we get to watch a whole news cycle of pundits pretending they didn’t see that, and talking instead about how “presidential” GenocideJoe looked for managing not to shuffle off his mortal coil on live TV. Winning!
In the interest of fairness, Trump is an angry old man who yells a lot, too. God help us all.
I swear to god while I was half-listening to old Joe, that he did his ‘who would swap places with Xi Jinping’ routine again. And yet after flicking through three transcripts I can find no mention of it. Odd that. Did not help that not long after you had a large part of Congress shouting ‘USA! USA! USA!’ as if they were at a football game. Showed to me that if Biden were to confront China, that a large part of Congress would back him.
‘Four More Wars! Four More Wars!’
ROFLMAO funny, coffee all over the laptop, damn you!
https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-targets-china-during-state-of-union-speech/7519040.html
March 8, 2024
Biden Targets China During State of Union Speech
By William Gallo
BEIJING — U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday criticized China’s “unfair economic practices” and insisted he has done a better job standing up to Beijing than did former President Donald Trump, his rival in this year’s presidential election.
In his State of the Union address, Biden also touted other aspects of his China policy, including “standing up for peace and stability in the Taiwan Straits” and revitalizing “our partnerships and alliances in the Pacific.”
“I’ve made sure that the most advanced American technologies can’t be used in China … frankly for all his tough talk on China, it never occurred to my predecessor to do any of that,” Biden added…
“Showed to me that if Biden were to confront China, that a large part of Congress would back him.”
What President Biden made clear and what Congress is supporting are the attacks being waged against the economic development of China are considered morally proper and necessary and will continue. American leadership is applauding undermining the economic development of a benign 5,000 year old civilization of 1.4 billion.
To me, this is terribly saddening.
this is simply to distract the average american that thinks, or thought that free trade works, to put the blame onto those others.
biden voted for free trade, then said the chinese are nothing, and put the blame on americans who would not learn to code.
so yes his anger is to be expected, out of those whom are bigots, racists, and servants to rich parasites, who are trying to distract, and sow doubt and confusion, the currency of deceit.
I thought it was a great speech. Biden was upbeat, optimistic, full of energy, he touted the many accomplishments of his administration and called out the conservatives on the Supreme Court and in Congress for their anti-American behavior. The only thing I wish he would have done is put on the aviators at the end of the speech. Republican heads would have exploded.
Who was the unfortunate, weepy, depressing woman in that sad kitchen who gave the rebuttal? I guess we’ll never hear from her again.
potential new guy same as old guy
https://news.yahoo.com/trump-says-israel-finish-problem-214217131.html
Not only that Trump was the guy who spent his term
– isolating Palestinians via the Abraham accords
– recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel
So no, the new old guy is going to be the same as the old old guy
Not even Kennedy would be different on that score.
Would be nice if we had a candidate who was maybe under 60 and didn’t favor genocide.
Hard to care who wins, and I likely will just sit this one out. I did that for the last couple elections, including the recent primary despite the pleadings on my phone machine from Nikki Haley, whose campaign should know that I have NEVER voted republican for anything.
Have to say not voting for the first time felt pretty good. Can’t blame me for this mess – I didn’t help put any of these clowns in positions of power.
Look up Shiva for President for someone under 60 and doesn’t favor genocide
with much lees institutional support they coud be carbon copies and the institutionally supported old guy will be exponentially worse
One thing for sure: a lot fewer Palestinians got killed during the Trump years, than during the Biden years (a lot fewer Ukrainians got killed, too, but that’s another discussion).
As for the Abraham Accords, what’s so bad about trying to promote good relations between other countries?
Re: Jerusalem. I say that recognition should, at least eventually, fit the reality. Is it better to maintain decades-long absurdities, of pretending a country’s capital city is someplace else?
Did all those countries’ non-recognition of the Israeli capital at Jerusalem do much to help Palestine?
Caught some recap this morning…Frank Luntz was recapping on CNBC and his focus group puts paid to the lip service and promotion of raising taxes with zero focus to cut spending.
We’ll hear about taxing billionaires and corporations, fine talk in a lame duck Congress. Not much of that came to pass in 2021. It’s the Obama playbook. Corporations are mean or evil but I need their funds to line my campaign coffers. And pay me six figure speaking fees when I’m out of office, or for Joe, maybe give Hunter a cushy role on a pharma company board.
I’ll fix it in my net term!
Lies and the lying liars who tell them
Hey I have an idea, throw some sops at regular people, then promise the lobbyists you’ll address their problems in the next term when the plebes foolishly re elect you.
Nawwww… the plebes deserve nothing but scorn.
Joe sure repeated himself an awful lot while I was driving home from yesterday after slumming it with the Dartful Codgers on skid row in Mammoth…
Was the repetition intended, or was I reading too much into that?
C’mon, man. He is just wanting to finish the job – look it up.
Biden could say anything, but as long it was sufficiently belligerent, the MSM would pronounce this to be the greatest public speech since Churchill addressed the House of Commons in 1941.
>Globetrotting for Genocide: Foreign Fighters From US, France and India Are Fighting Israel’s War in Gaza
JFK’s Peace Corps has morphed into War Corps. The Archons have been busy these several decades…
Fetouri expanded on this, writing in the Middle East Monitor that “America’s Neutrality Act, dating back to the founding days of the US, mak[es] it illegal for any American citizen to take part in any foreign war, or establish a militia for that purpose.” He noted the legislation, however, hasn’t been reinforced lately “as hundreds of Americans have participated in wars in Ukraine, in Libya in 2011 and, now, in Gaza.”
Yes? Laws are meaningless. Enforcement is what matters. .
This is why, for example, HRC could flatly violate the Espionage Act of 1917 and nobody would do anything about it, hell, Comey even made excuses for her.
If she were a normie, she’d be facing life in Leavenworth.
None of this is against the rules.
NC Covid Links Missing?
Is this the first time that NC has published without the CV rubric/category? If so why now? Are you making room for 2024 election coverage?
Ask Lambert. I always include them. Maybe he thinks he had enough with his Water Coolers.
I can tell him you want them every Links.
Noooo please, I’m glad to see them go.
Only so much I can absorb, and a daily-dose is enough: I know where to find the covid-info, I like the format, and one-stop shopping.
Against Revulsion is deploying some of Jesus logic from the gospels in a nice secular way. I was oblivious to the phenomenon of the RETVRN guy, and now that I am made aware I am not happy about it.
That conservative humans are more sensitive to emotion of disgust than liberals is old research. Paul Ekman was writing about this in the 1970’s.
Scott Madin has gotten an intuition of what has already been investigated — long ago (just one mention: Susan Sontag’s “Fascinating fascism”) — about fascism: its cultural project, its aesthetic viewpoint, and how it condemns ugliness to destruction.
For a thorough, abundantly illustrated exposition of all those points in the case of nazi Germany, there is an excellent documentary dating from 1989 entitled “Undergångens arkitektur” — also known as “The architecture of doom”. There is a version (though of really poor quality) on the YewToob.
I mean…. that’s most of liberalism these days though, isn’t? The whole anti-racism, “do better”, personalization/internalization of systemic issues?
That said, Marin’s version of “do better” seems particularly unhelpful, since all it does is reverse the direction of blame while assuming that all authoritarian impulses exist on the opposite side of the binary – it’s only ever the other guys who want to censor books and squash democracy. And while he does admonish his readers not to hate the players – we shouldn’t even be disgusted by fascists! – but he doesn’t quite get to telling them to focus on the game instead.
Madin does point out that liberals and leftists indulge in the exact same emotions en masse.
Still, I agree that there is something dubious about that article (even though I think it makes a good point about how arbitrary and counterproductive this revulsion is). Maybe that he seems to be conflating a wide variety of right-wing phenomena as “fascism”. Isn’t this overly broad usage of “fascism” basically an expression of the same kind of irrational revulsion? i.e. it appears to me that fascism is simply everything that feels politically “icky” to him, and that he assumes must be equally repulsive to all other people of sense.
Likewise, the way he enumerates assorted stereotypical leftist hate figures at the start seems self-defeating. Even though I don’t agree with or particularly like any of the people mentioned myself, I am bothered by what seems an awful lot like an attempt to trigger a revulsion reflex (whether he realises it or not; he probably doesn’t). “You’ve heard the story about the Nazi bar”, he says. I’ve heard it, and I wasn’t very impressed. If we’re supposed to be bothered by what people do and not what they are, it doesn’t bother me that much that Nazis would simply gather at some bar. I rather assume they would congregate at some venue or another, while they exist at all. It’s all the other stuff they do that I don’t like, but that’s not what that liberal fable is about.
Like the famous saying goes, when Fascism comes to America, we’ll call it anti-Fascism.
I had trouble getting past the beginning of the essay for precisely the reason you mentioned. In fact, since I suspect that he likely considers me and a lot of my people to be “obvious Fascists,” I found his way of thinking both amusingly disturbing and deeply patronizing.
Regarding the deployment of the national guard in the NYC subways…if they weren’t deployed in the 80s and 90s, why now?
Among other things, this could be seen as a way to circumvent “guardrails” implemented to curb NYPD abuses in the wake of the G. Floyd summer protest waves. Does the National Guard have an oversight board?
Also, what better way to neuter protests than by preventing the proles from getting around town? Protestors definitely aren’t taking cabs during rush hour to get to Union Square.
What training does the NG possess, that would make them qualified to patrol confined spaces with assualt rifles, or deal with the public at large?
So many questions….
While not participating in the underground movement, i’m in sympathy with subway dwellers now subject to search and frisk you teams.
I have seen the National Guard at various postings to NYC’s transportation portals before, most notably the entrances to Grand Central and Port Authority, which involved a lot of standing around conspicuously. What they weren’t doing was checking bags at the entrances to the subways. That was a roaming unit or two of the NYPD. Who could easily be avoided by changing entrances.
This is absolutely overkill and questionable. I didn’t go to “training acceptance the public” but now that it has been brought up I cannot unsee that as a very real possibility.
My first thought on reading about this was of the checkpoints all Palest’s go through to get to work in Isr. 6 min utube from 9 months ago, before October. NY subways aren’t this bad. It’s not directed toward a specific group. However, New Yorkers, get ready for a longer commute.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UWVtgRKZCY
And, doesn’t this undermine the whole “come back to work in the office, no more work from home” demands?
Vell, you know, vee must check your papers to insure zee wrong elements do not pass. If you have no papers …vell … submitting to some friendly interrogation should be quite pleasant as vee have vays of gettig vat vee vant. Cigarette old man?
I would not be surprised to see National Guard stationed everywhere come this November. Certainly at polling stations but perhaps at transport hubs as well to help restrict the number of protestors coming in via public transport.
Early in Bush the Latter’s term he did a dog and pony show, show up to Sequoia NP & Everglades NP, and we weren’t here then, but friends told us of the security set up, where the NP was closed to outside traffic and all trails closed with secret service personnel all over the place. Some fellows that worked on trail crew were startled to run into secret service around Eagle View-but they weren’t taking any chances, as George W was walking up Moro Rock to take in the view & photo-op on top, making him an easy target for a sniper’s nest a mile west.
https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2001/05/images/20010530-1.html
i saw the same security theater in clear lake, texas, when they brought a space shuttle mockup to JSC:
https://amfortasthehippie.blogspot.com/search?q=space+shuttle
it was crazy to watch…esp with my dad and uncle, who had been inside such government agencies(dad, at dia and nasa, uncle at nasa, stepmom coordinating with fbi/homeland for houston isd…etc)
When POTUS is abroad, the service basically takes over running the destination city for a week beforehand. And the routes planned have US snipers stationed along it, and all manholes are welded shut.
I worked in minor positions on bicentennial events separately attended by Reagan and his VP GHW Bush. We dreaded the Bush events as the difference in security level was massive. Reagan’s details were everywhere (and I do mean everywhere) but unless the President was in a specific area they didn’t shut down access. The agents themselves were also less threatening and dismissive on Reagan’sdetail. I saw one of them apologize for causing more work, something no one on Bush’s detail was known to do. And the Bush detail was known to ignore their own time table for area shut downs and close far earlier with no change in the VP’s time table.
Whether it was because of GHWB’s time in the blob or some other reason, security overkill is SOP for the Bushies.
Care to comment? Not kind to the NPS.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/03/07/protecting-wilderness-in-sequoia-and-kings-canyon-national-parks/
This Hanson character who is a serial sewer of lawsuits is from the John Muir Project of Earth Island Institute, whose claim to fame according to Wiki, is:
“Earth Island Institute is the standard-bearer for dolphin-safe tuna labeling in the United States. The organization works to verify or reject domestic tuna as dolphin-safe.”
The only potential plus of this security theatre song and dance is that perhaps residents will find this little number so offensive that Mayor Adams is soundly defeated in the next election (as if we needed more reasons).
Sorry, something got lost in editing…. The calling out of the NG is at the Governor’s request, but it (and further militarization of the various NYC police forces) has been fully supported by the Mayor.
Oh I think Adams has a very small chance of being re-elected. Besides the security theater cost of the migrants and how it has cut the city budget is going to be deadly. Oh and I think congestion pricing for the city is going to be deadly for both Horchul and Adams.
The heavy use of troops in the subways is only one of the numerous ways their decisions will come back to hurt both.
It’s not that they’re qualified for anything, that’s not the point.
They’re like traffic lights and road signs, they may initially be there in the interest of safety but the larger desired outcome is to condition you for compliance. Namely to fear uniformed command structure and obey commands.
The other aspect of this is, this is how structures such as police or military come into being, scope creep, initially criminal they take small increments of power for themselves. Hitler’s SA did the same, dramatically increasing visibility everywhere, using presence to dominate spaces and assert control.
Throughout history it’s how any such groups legitimize themselves. In the US, the KKK eventually became the police, at first it was catching a few slaves, then roaming the countryside looking for any slave not on plantation, demanding papers, then taking on the mandate of putting down slave revolt (which was non-existent), then they were hired by a few cities, then by a few states….
> the KKK eventually became the police, at first it was catching a few slaves, then roaming the countryside looking for any slave not on plantation, demanding papers, then taking on the mandate of putting down slave revolt
That can’t be right, can it? The KKK was only founded in 1865, after slavery had already been abolished.
Yeah, ixnay on the slavery angle..
Locally, back in the day~
https://www.loc.gov/item/95519888/
Sorry, I tend to equate the KKK with the slave patrols which emerged in the American south in the 1700’s and, as you rightly point out, were not the same although one thing surely led to the other. So I stand corrected, American police originated from the slave patrols, not the KKK (directly). Thank you.
https://www.sagepub.com/sites/default/files/upm-binaries/50819_ch_1.pdf
The same people in those slave patrols often were in the Ku Klux Klan, and both had extremely similar functions and methods, so it is not that big a goof.
Also, don’t forget that the slave patrols were also used to separate and control both the black and poor white populations. Poor whites were occasionally violently and physically punished for even being friends with blacks. Alliances between the two threaten the power structure and had to be prevented. The police were good at that. This also was seen outside the South especially in areas like Chicago and Detroit at least into the 1970s. I do not have direct evidence for later, but I would be shocked, if it still wasn’t happening. Mass movements are a threat.
In the North, the police started as migrant, vagrant, and poor people control for local businesses. Later, they added the control and repression of blacks.
Policing in both areas had different reasons for being formed, but they eventually became almost entirely the same. I would argue that Southern policing is more. nakedly about raw power and service to the local elites, but that is more a difference in degree, not kind.
Also, after the Second World War, a lot of Southern veterans went to northern an especially western areas and went into policing, which is why policing in Oakland and Los Angles, even for a time San Francisco, in California have such poor reputations.
The police ain’t your friend especially if you are any lower than the upper middle class, or an actual lefty, or non-white. That leaves something, I would guess, of 10% of Americans that might have friends among the police. Maybe.
Lincoln so understood what the results of free trade and a lack of tariffs would do to economic investments for the american people.
http://www.abrahamlincolnsclassroom.org/abraham-lincoln-in-depth/abraham-lincoln-and-the-tariff/
“a revealing article in the Sangamo Journal by one ‘Lancaster,’ probably a Lincoln pseudonym, may shed light on his thinking. Protective tariffs did not unfairly burden ‘the poor farmer,’ Lancaster argued, because all ‘manufactured articles were sold as low and many lower after [the enactment of the 1842 tariff] than they were before.’
Prices stayed down because manufacturers ‘were encouraged to start their factories believing they could find a sale for their goods,’ and the increased number of firms heightened competition, thus preventing ‘any extortion in prices.’
Lancaster insisted that ‘These facts prove that our revenue is paid entirely by the foreign manufacturers; except perhaps occasionally some of our Fops and Dandies may be inclined to show off with a London Coat, a Paris pair of boots, or ornament his table with a set of English knives and forks, or his parlour with an European carpet.”
“The tariff is the cheaper system, because the duties, being collected in large parcels at a few commercial points, will require comparatively few officers in their collection; while by the direct tax system, the land must be literally covered with assessors and collectors, going forth like swarms of Egyptian locusts, devouring every blade of grass and other green thing. And again, by the tariff system, the whole revenue is paid by the consumers of foreign goods, and those chiefly, the luxuries, and not the necessaries of life.
By this system, the man who contents himself to live upon the products of his own country, pays nothing at all. And surely, that country is extensive enough, and its products abundant and varied enough, to answer all the real wants of its people. In short, by this system, the burthen of revenue falls almost entirely on the wealthy and luxurious few, while the substantial and laboring many who live at home, and upon home products, go entirely free.”44 ”
(the federal reserve and the federal income tax are the replacement for tariffs, the free trade quacks will soon pine for a Vat tax as our economic condition further deteriorates.)
“Had the policy advocated by Mr Clay, as embodied in the tariff of 1842, been maintained, there could have been no secession, and for the reason that the southern mineral region would long since have obtained control of the planting one.
If now maintained – if measures be now adopted for enabling the people of the hill country to profit of our present tariff – and if capitalists can have such assurances of its permanence as is required for securing the creation of mills and furnaces, and the opening of mines — we may retrace our steps and thus secure the permanent maintenance of the Union.
If, on the contrary, our people left in doubt as to the purposes of the Administration, are compelled at each succeeding session of Congress to fight for life, and if, finally, the British free trade system be readopted – the Union must, before the lapse of may years, be rent into numerous fragments, mere instruments in the hands of foreign powers. From this, there can be no escape.
Three lines, in your forthcoming message Mr President, indicative of the principle of protection as the true Union policy, would be worth to the country more than the total cost of the war — great as that is likely to be.137 ”
“Had the policy of 1842 been maintained, it must be now that center, and the slave owners of the swamps & river bottoms would be so utterly powerless that you might do with them what you pleased. Had it been maintained, the whole of the great tide region would now be intersected with roads by means of which the free people of north & south would be communicating with each other, freed from all intervention on the part of the slave proprietors of Virginia & Carolina.-
As it is, they stand between us & the southern friends of the Union, who are being crushed out of existence, and all for want of a road by means of which we might give & receive assistance.” Carey continued: “British free trade is the policy of sectionalism.
It has broken up the Union. That we may become once again, & permanently, the United States, it is indispensable that we pursue that course of policy which looks to the development of the mineral resources of the country, North & South, and to the creation on the land of a market for all the products of the farm.138 Like Lincoln, Carey was anxious to pursue the nation’s economic development. ”
“In the White House, wrote historian Gabor S. Boritt, “Lincoln followed his ‘political education’ to the point where he managed not to directly mention the tariff at all in official messages.
He did not have to. Congress passed tariff increase after increase and he signed them into law. Rates reached unprecedented and previously unimaginable heights.
They were made frankly protectionist.”141 One economic consequence was a dramatic increase in the manufacturing capacity of the North as the labored to meet military needs. About such an industrial expansion, President Lincoln cannot have been displeased.”
Among many other issues related to this, the assault rifles are almost shocking. Are you kidding me? In the subway? What, NYC has had an ISIS problem, all of a sudden? And just imagine one of these NG dudes, who, like a ton of NYC cops, don’t live in NYC and probably have contempt for the place, especially if they’re from upstate, untrained in subway crime enforcement, opening fire down there when spooked.
And 80s/90s? Pfft. Try the 70s when I first arrived.
Do they actually issue ammo? I think after Kent State they have placed severe limitations on ammo. It’s theater.
Maybe a way to send more money to NYC. Counting worker’s comp and litigation NYPD are remarkeably expensive and their Union is quite powerful. The subway seems to have a separate police force and these Unions are quite powerful. Funding for the NG probably comes from the Federal Government. The guardsmen are happy to be getting active duty pay and benefits so there is little pushback and the Mayor is happy to be getting the visible help. At some point they may realize that it would be cheaper to provide the homeless and mentally ill with a guaranteed annual income or jobs guarantee and free room and board.
Funding depends on if the NG is activated under Title 32 or State Active Duty (I suspect the later).
“Regarding the deployment of the national guard in the NYC subways…if they weren’t deployed in the 80s and 90s, why now?”
Do I really have to explain? Or am I too thick to grasp that this was a rhetorical question?
This is the last day to order the free rapid tests from the USPS. Yes they are likely expired, but they can still be a bit of a resource.
Link to USPS portal
Thank you.
Re: Taibbi, a couple of quibbles. Doesn’t detract from his main point, but:
1) “The Soviets had a mania for reducing beautiful language to state-acceptable ugly compound words” The “ugly compound words” method of abbreviation was started by the Whites during the Civil War (but swiftly picked up by the Reds as well). It had little to do with state oppression and a lot with (if I had to guess, given these known origins) military preference for speaking quickly. I prefer it over the ABC style of abbreviation, myself. It is easier to comprehend without prior knowledge.
2) More consequentially, of course the samizdat had approximately nothing whatsoever to do with the destruction of the Soviet Union (that was the handiwork of self-interested Soviet elites). It did enable an alternative culture to exist in it, though, and even alternative opinions. Mind you, a lot of samizdat was squarely apolitical or at least nonpartisan. The man who created the term, Nikolai Glazkov, wasn’t exactly a politically active dissident, he was just an eccentric poet with some admittedly risky critical opinions who could not get published normally due to censors. Letting people share ideas outside mainstream channels is a good thing, overall, just not the weapon of revolution he makes it out to be.
Wonderful. And this is what the PMC does, discuss semantics. While the powers that be crush antitrust regulators.
Also samizdat circles were often declassed PMC, reactionary in nature. There was one prominent member of such circles few years ago whining that their Ukrainian house maids were asking too much money. Liberals – people fed well enough to think symbolic values are more important than material ones.
It is hard to eat non material symbols.
>>>It did enable an alternative culture to exist in it, though, and even alternative opinions. Mind you, a lot of samizdat was squarely apolitical or at least nonpartisan.
The reality of my having to submit my English homework via a Microsoft program using Microsoft Word and Hotmail/Live with out even an explicit pro forma assurance, forget a guarantee, of privacy is why I submitted the link. I am sure somewhere on the CanvasStudent portal that there is some boilerplate, but the professor herself reminded everyone that it is the internet where nothing is ever truly hidden or lost. A good teacher in a good class will push his students to push their thinking, occasionally into controversialI views. I am longing for when I used a manual typewriter and handed the complete hard copy to the teacher. At least, whatever ever I said remained only in my handwritten draft and the teacher’s file cabinet. Yes, he or she could always submit a photocopy to someone else, but some three letter agency or a corporation could not easily scoop it up via the internet. I already have to be more careful in conversation, but now I have to be in the written word.
I do not have proof of organized, nefarious, and authoritarian intent, but I would be extremely foolish to think otherwise when I listen to the words of the authorities, the sheer and often illegal reach of agencies like the NSA, and the lack of effective security for information being kept by government and corporations. With samizdat at least it is harder to be spied on to keep some privacy, but do not forget that the USPS does photograph ever piece of mail it delivers, and it has done so for decades.
Censorship is mostly done by individuals and not by an agency. When people are afraid, they will proactively censor their speech, and when the government and powerful corporations have effectively uncontrolled access to your written, and often your verbal speech, the censorship will be extreme and often unconscious, I believe
‘Boeing’
Wouldn’t you know it. Boeing has more problems with their jets. A month ago a Boeing 737 Max 8 was coming in to land when the rudder pedals got stuck. The pilot was able to land the plane and thirty seconds later the pedal was moving again but this sort of thing does keep happening-
https://www.forbes.com/sites/zacharyfolk/2024/03/07/ntsb-investigating-another-boeing-737-max-aircraft/?sh=53f93a2dad75
MBA pencil pushing, COVID labor effects, and COVID brain damage, have converged on the airline industry.
A technician probably forgot to torque to bolts!
The plane landed but the problem was during roll out. Suggesting a weight on wheels sensor or some such issue.
Re Simplicius the Thinker piece:
“It is worth noting that the exercises are conducted in Scandinavian climatic conditions, where many fighters will encounter difficulties for the first time.
According to open sources, not only northern countries are participating in these exercises, but there are also representatives of Spain, France, Italy, for them such a change in the geography of tasks, although within the framework of training, is a fundamentally new experience.”
I worked at the Lillehammer Olympic Winter Games in Norway in 1994. On the day of one of the cross country skiing events it was particularly cold, towards -30 C or so. A Spanish skier quit during the race in tears saying he had never experienced such cold and could not go on.
Speaking of Nordic Response, i can’t shake the feel that this time round it is taking place far closer to the border than during previous years.
Maybe it is thanks to the participation of Finland, but previous NATO exercises up north rarely strayed into Finnmark as best i recall.
Further to the Syraqistan links, readers may be interested in what the hubby of David Cameron’s cousin and son in law of Thatcher’s adviser has to say, https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v46/n05/pankaj-mishra/the-shoah-after-gaza.
Thank you, Colonel.
Every word of the link worth reading, but I choose to quote this one:
“A strenuously willed affiliation with the Shoah has also marked and diminished much American journalism about Israel. More consequentially, the secular-political religion of the Shoah and the over-identification with Israel since the 1970s has fatally distorted the foreign policy of Israel’s main sponsor, the US. In 1982, shortly before Reagan bluntly ordered Begin to cease his ‘holocaust’ in Lebanon, a young US senator who revered Elie Wiesel as his great teacher met the Israeli prime minister. In Begin’s own stunned account of the meeting, the senator commended the Israeli war effort and boasted that he would have gone further, even if it meant killing women and children. Begin himself was taken aback by the words of the future US president, Joe Biden. ‘No, sir,’ he insisted. ‘According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war … This is a yardstick of human civilisation, not to hurt civilians.’“
Like idol like follower?
https://www.counterpunch.org/2014/10/21/truth-and-fiction-in-elie-wiesels-night/
Didn’t watch the State of the Union but sounds like it was typical Biden–fast and loose with the truth with catcalls to those who dare question his “narrative.” If hubris precedes nemesis we’re waiting. Maybe in November.
Thank you for posting this. It is one of the very best meditations on Israel and the West I have read. We probably use the phrase “must read” too often, but this is definitely one of those. Every word worth reading, indeed.
Boeing doesn’t repair or replace tires. That is on the airlines maintenance people. Tires are replaced about every four hundred landings. The tire falling off was either a part that failed ( they have a built in safety lock system to prevent this from happening) or the installation wasn’t done correctly.
Boeing doesn’t make engines. Compressor stalls are not uncommon. And can have a number of different reasons why they occur. ( across all different engine manufacturers and airframe makers)
I follow aviation stuff and pretty much daily there multiple planes with mechanical issues requiring a return to the airport. You can listen to the actual radio messages between tower/arc and the plane. Pretty interesting.
Boeing deserves all the crap it’s getting.
But these things are not Boeings fault.
Boeing is in charge of the ecosystem involving their planes. Just another difficulty in the airplane manufacturing biz. But it is never not their fault because they always have an influence on the training, certification of people and parts, and being a leader in the industry. No abdication allowed.
Oh please. I believe only recently there was a fake parts scandal in Britain and these keep cropping up (airline parts are supposed to be rigorously documented). For awhile some airlines were flying planes to Central American countries for cheaper scheduled overhaul. Trying to put everything on Boeing is just seeing what’s under the spotlight.
Would you blame Ford if you got a bad oil change at Midas?
If we could only buy cars from Ford or Toyota, and the Fords kept catching on fire after those oil changes, but none of the Toyotas, and there was a coordinated silence in the MSM about how Wall St debt and looting was causing similar quality failures across the entire economy, then sure, I would blame Ford and not Midas. Kinda like how all Fords were tainted by the Pinto. Reputation is a funny thing.
It’s like they’re today’s sacrificial goat – a lightning rod for public criticism and anger to protect the billionaire class.
Was it a wheel that fell off, or a tire? I have been encountering press coverage that has it as a wheel, which might carry a different implication. If I own a car, sure, maintaining the tires is on me, but if a wheel falls off…
> Sweden officially joins NATO, prime minister declares it a ‘safer country’ France24
Whelp, NATO got stronger and I was wrong a year ago.
I thought Turkey or Hungary might get skittish. Not so much. I still think it’s existential for Russia. But the sanctions workarounds feel more like business as usual than collapse.
> Sweden officially joins NATO, prime minister declares it a ‘safer country’ France24
I’m sure a couple of Russian missile are now dialed into the coordinates of Sweden’s Capitol. Just in case things go all out…
Those missiles have been dialed in since the cold war.
Sweden may have been officially neutral, but it played on the side of the yanks during that whole period.
I knew full well from the outset that, even if Turkey or Hungary got skittish, an application of “carrot and stick” from the US would bring them around.
All the points of any significance in Sweden have now been added to one or more Russian nuclear target packages. When someone pushes the button labeled “nuke NATO”, they are gone, too.
I’m not sure how this adds up to being a “safer country.” Better to be nowhere near NATO at this point, I think.
It’s the rhetoric that matters. The prime minister knows full well that he is lying. He does not care, since nobody will call him out on it.
The temporary pier seems most like a delay tactic to buy more time to do nothing to stop Israel and keep sending them more bombs, but there’s also speculation online that it’s an end run around Egypt’s refusal to “voluntarily evacuate” Gazans into the Sinai. So not about getting aid in as forcing desperate Gazans out.
I could see them all getting shipped to a hellish Moroccan concentration camp to be memoryholed by the collective West, while freeing up Israel to concentrate on land grabbing in the West Bank.
60 to 90 days takes Biden to summer when there are fairly significant disruptions. Basically, they expect people to lose interest. Remember Biden trying for a reset during the SOTU is absurd given its declining viewership.
It is most likely there to protect Democrats as they campaign locally. It’s noticeable when there are no young people at events and even more noticeable when the only young people are ticked. I’m not sure “we are building a pier in Israel” is a good campaign message given the state of US infrastructure.
Part of the problem is DC rats are flippant and can’t conceive people have values and ideas beyond the trash on Joe Scarborough.
The temporary pier is a moral figleaf, that is, an attempt to have it both ways while fooling precisely nobody other than those who wish to be fooled.
The pier won’t even get past the planning phase before either the genocide is complete or the election is over, in either case making the point moot. Team R still will scream about “abandoning Israel”, which I wish Biden actually would.
Going downhill dept:
The supposed mother of all storms had passed as far as new moisture was concerned on the eastern flank of the Sierra Nevada as the Dartful Codgers descended from afar by car. Sometimes a wanna-be Codger comes and what a phony as he’s only 52… but not this time, i’m flying solo as my better half aged out a few years back, its that gremlin lurking in the mind of every lifelong skier, when does it happen to me?
I’m the youngest of the 7 of us on this go round who are essentially ski bums in our lifestyle, and I was a ski bum for a year in Tahoe in the mid 80’s, and the feel is kinda similar but different as we’re all retired and every day is Saturday-but never ski on Saturday, that’s for working stiffs who like a lot of people watching in long lift lines.
Our circa 1968 rental condo keeps having niggling problems that seem to happen more often as of late, as in a broken toilet that required sticking your hand into the back tank to flush it, and a lack of enough cutlery and towels, but being only about 100 yards walk from the Eagle Lift chair #15 still solves a lot of issues, along with it only being $250 a night, suck it up buttercup and to accommodate all seven, 2 of us need to sleep on air mattresses, just like I did in 1986, ha.
The elder skatesmen are turning 71 & 74 next month, and the younger of them used to be out in front going down ski runs when I first applied my traits with the Codgers 7 years ago, now he brings up the rear, but still glad to be here.
Mammoth ended up getting 4 feet of snow out of the system, which is a normal decent storm, not the mother of, by any means.
The thing that made this one really different was the crazy winds after the finale of falling snow, in that it blew all over the place, and what ever skier and snowboarder hoped would be a most excellent powder day on Monday, instead was this janky windblown mess of snow not all that enjoyable, and one thing I noticed was there was virtually no snow apparent on any of the branches of the pine trees, so complete was the sweep of the zephyr.
From Tuesday on it was all groomed corduroy and perfect, c’est la ski.
George Galloway was interviewed on Glenn Greenwald’s show. I’ll listen to it and get back to you in a few hours.
I enjoyed it. Invigorating. He said only one thing that I thought stupid. Strangely enough, apart from that gaff, evening he said was only surprising because you never hear that from a politician. If you are a moral person who is paying attention then it was all rather obvious. It’s that he got elected and that Sunak rolled out emergency government measures as a result that’s so interesting.
Re: Tuna Salad Sandwiches and Umami.
Yes, fish sauce! Pay a little extra and get the good stuff. Red Boat is the one I keep on hand. I use it everywhere: a splash in homemade chicken rice soup; over steamed greens, after the oil (olive, sesame, peanut); in stews (meat or veggie); in tomato sauces; in fried rice.
One thing about fish or oyster sauce. Look for protein on the ingredient list. If there is none it may not be authentic.
Yeah, Red Boat is very good, but there are others that also are: Parrot Brand from Hong Kong (hard to find), Golden Boy, Three Crabs Brand, some very expensive artisanal ones that you can only find in Japan, including an amazing one that uses salmon instead of anchovies… For oyster sauce Lee Kum Kee Old Brand (it doesn’t say Old Brand on the label in English, but you can recognize it by the painterly illustration of a woman and a male child in an open boat on the label, and the significantly higher price — is the only one I use, and the only one that lists oysters as the first ingredient (all others, including other LKK brands like Panda, list sugar, salt and some sort of starch before oysters). Red Boat fans should also try Red Boat Fish Salt, which is amazing in very small amounts — a warning for the faint of heart, it is unbelievably stinky when you open the jar, but do not be afraid, when you cook with it, the smell disappears and only the umami effect remains. It’s too intense for a tuna sandwich, but magical for fried chicken (essential ingredient!), steak, ribs, etc. Also, try a bit of Korean gochujang (or samjang if you don’t like chile) in a tuna sandwiches…
Thank you, Don. I am now on the hunt for Red Boat Fish Salt!
And will look for some Korean gochujang to keep in the fridge beside the jar of chili crisp and Marie Sharpe’s hot sauce.
“Rostec Chief Confirms Russian Army Now Fields T-14 Tanks: Explains Why They Are Held Back From Ukrainian Frontlines”
Seems only logical. Throughout the war the Russians have kept back some of their best troops and their best equipment in case NATO did something stupid – like try to go into the Ukraine. So why send the T-14 into the battle lines where western analyst can get a much clearer picture of it and what it’s weaknesses may be. Who knows what other gear they are still holding back on.
I’m so old I remember when International Women’s Day was a thing.
I was just reminded of it and an early proponent Clara Zetkin by the
Angela Saini piece at the Guardian:
I’ve travelled the world researching patriarchy – and found it is far from inevitable
There will be a huge march today in Montevideo. And I will be going. Interestingly, men are not invited. They may be allies but this is a March for women by women…
Good for you, I have an old friend in Uruguay, but he won’t be going.
Dennis Kucinich talks with Briahna Joy Gray on utube, ~1 hr.
Why Dennis Kucinich LEFT RFK Jr.’s Campaign & is Running Independent for Congress
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTe8PO7az6c
Thank you, two people I like.
Kucinich on the force to conform for new congress people:
Abandon all hope, ye who enter in!
He’s running for congress again, I hope he makes it.
They get to a discussion of RFK Jr ~44:00.
“Europe is at last adjusting to the new reality in Ukraine”
‘Europe is belatedly but inexorably moving towards deeper involvement in the war. We do not yet know how it will be involved, but there is no other choice.’
There is another choice. Call it a day and walk away. The Europeans have bet the house on a Ukrainian victory. They have stripped their armouries down to the bone, gone into debt to give the most corrupt nation in Europe tens of billions of dollars, sent their own soldiers disguised as mercs, sent more of their soldiers to operate technical equipment that was used to kill Russian civilians in Russia itself. The only option left is to send their brigades into the Ukraine but as they would be slaughtered, those European countries may find themselves with military mutinies first. It’s the sunk cost fallacy but they refuse to see it. They are just trying to hold on in case “something happens” giving the Ukrainians victory. if you thought that the day after Trump won back in 2016 was something, just wait until the day after the Ukraine gives up.
“Europe is at last adjusting to the new reality in Ukraine”
This is terrifying, as though the French and European allies did not understand in 1812 that forcing Russia to defend its very existence would end in disaster even if Moscow were lost for a short time. As though the Germans and European allies did not understand even in the midst of the Holocaust that forcing Russia to defend its very existence would end in disaster no matter the prolonged Siege of Leningrad.
I have said from the outset that the Sunk Cost Fallacy means that the West can ever always only escalate and never de-escalate. The longer this war continues and the more escalations, the greater the sunk cost and consequently, the greater the pressure to escalate.
This abuse of The Sunk Cost Fallacy is entirely intentional. From the PoV of a Macron or a Sholtz, it’s a Martingale bet. Keep doubling down until you win, since they themselves never face consequences and they could not care less about the peons, whether at home or in Ukraine.
“Keep doubling down until you win”… or until you are tapped out, or until your house or some other existential object or relationship is on the table, or until others stop you… any of which pretty much describes where “they” are about now. Cheer up, there are circumstances so dire that no-one never faces consequences.
All that applies to regular Martingale bets at a casino. In this case, the rulers are betting with other people’s lives, so they themselves never pay the cost.
More and more it seems, at least from a European standpoint, that the Ukraine thing is a fight between globalism and nationalism.
Perhaps, in a historical sense, it is the latest iteration on Ricardo’s Comparative Advantage. A stringent belief that free trade and ease of travel will bring peace and prosperity to all.
But when they get pushback they fall back to that old “positive liberty” reflex of forcing the ignorant public to be “free” at gunpoint.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/state-of-the-union-2024/
He said that?
We truly live in Crazytown.
The “vaccines” developed by Orange Man!
Well the pandemic doesn’t control his life, so why would he think it should be any different for people who don’t have his advantages. And I believe that includes NPIs ranging from ventilation improvements to supplement cocktails.
As for his line on the vaccines, I have thought for awhile that the mRNA options were fast tracked not because they were the likeliest but because getting mRNA based pharmaceuticals was becoming increasingly impossible because they couldn’t pass any tests. They needed an EU authorization to open the door. Whether Trump, or Biden, were in on the ulterior motive or were just sold a bill of goods I don’t know. But most everyone who should of known of the issues certainly were. Getting them into the lucrative oncology therapy sector was part of the plan all along. It was a big Mission Accomplished shout out to Pharma, Private equity and insurance donors, all of which will be feasting on the rewards.
Anti-Anthropocene vote is ‘null and void’ Climate & Capitalism. Yikes!
While I agree with the sentiment to declare a new ‘-cene,’ I feel it is pretty arrogant and even optimistic about human’s position in the future. We are not entering a new geologic time period yet. To early to tell and I think the odds of it being anthropocentric are lower than these people think.
The KT extinction, the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, was likely caused by an asteroid impact, maybe some volcanic activity as well. One of the pieces of evidence for that is the existence if a thin iridium rich layer (all over the earth) between the geologic formations associated with the cretaceous period (dinosaurs) and the tertiary period (no dinosaurs). Asteroids are often enriched in iridium.
Take a look at the last 800,000 years of ice core CO2 data and note the changes associated with ice ages, and then what looks to be a vertical spike of anthropogenic CO2 at the end. Geologically, we are currently in the short period of time that is the meteor impact. The Holocene is ending(along with the Quarternary? Hopefully not the Cenozoic!). I am not sure distant future geologists, whatever they may be, would be able to distinguish the Holocene from the Pliestocene in the geologic record. But they will see a layer filled with all sorts of stuff between periods . There will the Pliestocene (Quarternary?) layer, the radiation/plastic/concrete/asphalt thin separating boundary (the iridium boundary layer) and then some other geologic layer (maybe not containing human fossils among many other species). I am afraid it won’t be the anthropoCENE. It will be the anthro-boundary line.
My favorite long term projection: The Next Ten Billion Years by Michael Greer.
You forgot the Plasticine layer.
From the Revulsion article:
From Lao-Tzu:
Tao te Ching #2 (Le Guin rendition)
It’s that old Dualism blues.
Oops. My comment above should have been in the Revulsion subthread.
This comment is in reply to Ghost in the Machine.
I’d differ with you about the relationship between the Pleistocene and the Anthropocene. The graph at the top of this page (a synopsis of a scholarly article) shows the difference. During the Pleistocene, temperature fluctuated over 6=10 degrees C as cold and hot fluctuated up and down frequently in geologic time. The Holocene is as if Earth found its sweet spot, at least from a human point of view. Flunctuations shrank to little more than a degree from high to low, providing a much more stable climate.
Anatomically modern humans lived in both periods. During the wild fluctuations during the Pleistocene, humans picked up and moved to an area with a more hospitable climate. When the Holocene arrived, permanent settlements, agriculture and what we think of as civilization all became a lot easier and more attractive as an option.
As for “Anthropocene,” I view it as appropriate now because I think of it as a matter of responsibility. If a meteor struck, especially prior to human space flight, humans cannot be held responsible. But what is happening now to the planet? That’s on us.
Amen
I recall an article linked here a while back about a poll done at the Davos summit that listed Disinformation” as a top worry amongst the world’s capitalists. I had first heard this term really hit the news ahead of 2016, when various “fact checkers” were deployed throughout the internet to tell loyal Democrats which news sources they could trust and which were dastardly psyops with “BiAs!”
It was obvious to me then that this was a reaction to the threat the establishment felt from the Sanders campaign. That was when the Russian interference narrative really kicked into high gear — A useful distraction from the wikileaks revelation that the DNC had blatantly cheated in various ways to help Clinton’s campaign. The actual news that shpuld have been blasted at the front page became obscured behind headlines that speculated over who leaked the information, the same way a child caught breaking the rules cares more about who tattled than what they did. In the end, the elites zapped the Sanders coalition by getting social media to supress uncomfortable truths. News sites like RT and the Hill were deprioritized or even hidden completely for spreading “disinformation”
So it’s no surprise that they’re goin after TikTok. It’s an easy play, just rinse and repeat:
Uncomfortable truths (here, US funded genocide) gaining traction in social media? ✅
Scary enemy nation to scapegoat? ✅
Refusal to address the core issue? ✅
With the same solution: Kill the messenger. With capital and their PMC lackeys incapable of introspection, or perhaps just gleefully evil, they can’t possibly believe that Palestine is tranding on TikTok because they’re genuinely more sympathetic to starving children than they are to cackling bastards dabbing over corpses to a trending song. When confronted with the consequences of their actions, congress must find itself wondering “Am I out of touch?” and concluding just as the meme does: “No. It’s the children who are wrong!”
Seems like a terrible idea to kill the best distraction youth has had in a decade right before it’s warm enough for them to hit the streets, but go off.
Once upon a time, not so long ago, any development that the Establishment of the day didn’t like could automatically be blamed on Jews.
Today, the Establishment is much more enlightened. They don’t blame Jews. They blame Russia.
Re: Tik Tok Causes an Upsurge in Rent History Requests
This is my line of work, and it’s great news that word is getting out that a large percentage of deregulated apartments in NYC were deregulated illegally. Hopefully the upsurge will bring a bigger budget to DHCR, the enforcement agency. With a little luck on how the courts handle the unresolved legal questions on how far back we can go to challenge past overcharges, we can begin to bring rents down in stabilized apartments, which are half of the rental stock in our fair city.
Apologies if this has been posted before.
COVID-19 virus can stay in the body more than a year after infection, research finds
“The scientists found pieces of SARS-CoV-2, referred to as COVID antigens, lingering in the blood up to 14 months after infection and for more than two years in tissue samples from people who had COVID.“
“They detected portions of viral RNA for up to two years after infection, although there was no evidence that the person had become reinfected. They found it in the connective tissue where immune cells are located, suggesting that the viral fragments were causing the immune system to attack. In some of the samples, the researchers found that the virus could be active.”
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-03-covid-virus-stay-body-year.html
$4.01k update…
Fortune favors the brave who get in on the ground floor and ride through thin and then even thinner times before eking out a 17.76% return over my initial purchase price when Bitcoin was a measly $56k. Unlike many on here, yes, I have no FOMO.
Tire (wheel) falls of United flight from SFO, fire in air etc.
United Airlines “maintains” their planes in cheap labor China.
Soon to be President Trump; Please sign executive order forcing planes flying into the U.S. to be F.A.A. airworthy and maintained in the U.S.A.
Too corrupt, and too late?, to replace Biden.
“Of the $956 billion in spending appropriated in the first five years of Newsom’s governorship, the vast majority went to programs and compensation that benefit corporations, unions and associations that donate to the governor and state legislators.
About 40% of that spending is required by the constitution but the other 60%—more than $500 billion over those five years—was appropriated under statutes enacted and amended by the governor and Legislature.”
https://sfstandard.com/2024/03/08/gavin-newsom-donors-california/
There’s still time for Genocide Joe
To (family blog) it up
(family blog) it up
And then depart the scene
…depart the scene
…depart the scene
Kamala in Casa Blanca?
Casa Blanca
Casa Blanca
Mon dieu
Mon dieu
Mon dieu
Word salad sandwich
A limited bandwidth
Many a glitch
First lady President
Without precedence
First lady President
There’s still time for Genocide Joe
To (family blog) it up
(family blog) it up
And then depart the scene
…depart the scene
…depart the scene
Music To Watch Girls By, by the Bob Crewe Generation
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwhflMf0Gyc
Point of clarification:
Did the Biden WH just use the SOTU to sneak in a declaration of war(s)?
How long now have they been under attack?
Gooooooood Mooooooorning Fiatnam!
The Fiatcong specialized in ambush and no matter how well you were armed, they always had an endless supply of fiscal artillery in a F.I.R.E fight-not dissimilar to a punter versus a casino, they could simply outlast your resources-combined with easy resupply via virtual drone on the Owe So Min(imium) Trail, while we made do with crude weaponry such as Quarters formed into arrowheads with a hacksaw & attached to tally sticks, utilizing a line of credit as an ad hoc bow.
Why is Macron out of step with rest of Europe over putting boots on ground in Ukraine? Which also makes no sense unless you have solid air support and solid anti-missile defence? Maybe it’s a bait & switch. Getting military ready to deploy at some point to Lebanon? A country with a French colonial past unlike Ukraine. (Which would mean Israel is a much much bigger priority for West than Ukraine – Ukraine is going to be thrown under the bus as West rushes to support Israel – hence Nuland’s exit).
Brace for inevitable economic impact of war in the Middle East – inflation is going to come back with a vengeance. (Krugman said team transistory was right in the end – a clear sign we’re going to see the opposite).
As the oft-cited Scott Ritter is wont to say, the NATO bloc finds itself “on the horns of a dilemma.”
It’s ancient history now, but up until Mr. Putin gave the order in Feb. 22, his Western partners contrived a situation in Ukraine from which the Russian government could not extract any good options – either cede the Black Sea and the artifacts (and people) of a bygone era in Ukraine, or dust off some old maps and color in the red lines again.
One might say the Russian government was at that time “on the horns of a dilemma,” but, with the benefit of hindsight, they were probably more accurately “between a rock and a hard place.” After all, didn’t the army invade with a heroic force of… outnumbered 10 to 1 by nazi hordes… or some such? Or maybe the Russian government saw the writing on the wall and prepared accordingly – I think there’s more evidence to support this argument nowadays, but to each his own (if you’ll excuse the gendered language).
Fast forward a coupla years, and the Western partners find themselves once again in an Eastern European spring thaw, wearing two left shoes, laced together on the sly by the dastardly cheating Russians. They could untie them easy enough but it wouldn’t matter anyway cuz they’re up to their asses in the распутица and shovels aren’t NATO standard issue anymore – no margin in shovels and besides only Russians use shovels.
Which brings us to Mr. Macron, Le Grand Canard Boiteux of the Fifth Republic, coming out hard for direct, declared NATO involvement in the Ukraine conflict. Could just be a simple case of Gaulic hotheadedness, but I reckon Mr. Macron barking, with the assist from Mr. Fico, gives the lie to NATO’s bite. Tie it together with the recent NATO exercises up Russia’s wazoo, the concomitant losses sustained by the Black Sea Fleet, a key State Dep’t departure, and you can start to see the rough outlines of a path to lay the groundwork for the beginnings of a sketch of a roadmap to a secure and lasting peace. Or, perhaps more likely, le cordon sanitaire proposed earlier by “Danger” Dmitry Medvedev.
Could be wrong, probably am, hope I’m not.
“Iran: We will extract oil and gas from the “Arash-Dorra” field if Kuwait takes such a step”
Iranian Presidential Assistant for Legal Affairs Mohammad Dehghan said that if Kuwait begins extracting oil and gas from the Arash-Dorra field, his country will take a similar step.
…
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Nasser Kanaani expressed his country’s rejection of the Gulf Cooperation Council’s statement, which considered the Dorra gas field to be owned by Saudi Arabia and Kuwait alone, and described it as “unconstructive.”
The Dorra field is of great importance on the economic and political levels, as its importance lies in being considered a waiting store for gas production, while its location, which is located in a border area, has disrupted its production since the date of its exploration in the year 1960.
https://www.nabamart.com/2024/03/iran-we-will-extract-oil-and-gas-from.html
Iran would be wise to remember what happened to Iraq in 1990, and this issue is ripe, almost begging for exploit by our hawks and friends of Israel who are already none too happy with Saudi-Iranian rapprochement.
As if the US needs a reason to invade Iran. As if it wouldn’t have done so decades ago and haven’t done everything short of it for decades, and failed to accomplish anything. Because Syria or Libya or Iraq did something to bring the US on themselves, rather than just because they were weak and vulnerable at a particular moment and the US took full advantage.
Iran fends off the US because it is strong and is backed by a strong China and Russia. It has every right to make a play for a major shared resource rather than passively accept plays by US backed stooge regime in Kuwait, who nevertheless is smart enough to understand that while US support is temporary and conditional, Iran will be the primary regional power for the foreseeable future.