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Links 4/26/2025

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Duck moves in to Minnesota DNR EagleCam nest and lays eggs Star/Tribune

The oldest ant ever discovered found fossilized in Brazil ScienceDaily (Kevin W)

Who Were the Carthaginians? Ancient DNA Study Reveals a Stunning Answer Haaretz

A Strange Phrase Keeps Turning Up in Scientific Papers, But Why? ScienceAlert (Chuck L)

Computational analysis of US congressional speeches reveals a shift from evidence to intuition Nature (Paul R)

#COVID-19/Pandemics

Climate/Environment

Seeing lost winters, not just rising temperatures, shakes climate indifference PhysOrg (Chuck L)

84% of Earth’s Coral Reefs in Crisis as Worst Bleaching Event on Record Hits ScienceAlert (Chuck L)

From boiling hot to freezing cold: Sudden flips in temperature set to increase with climate change PhysOrg

Experiments to dim sunlight to fight global warming will be given the green light by the Government within weeks Telegraph

China?

China exempts some goods from US tariffs Reuters

China tells Trump: If you want trade talks, cancel tariffs BBC

China’s rare-earth mineral squeeze will hit the Pentagon hard Defense One (Kevin W)

Trump tariffs: President vents at China over Boeing as Beijing denies claims of trade deal talks Independent

Rules on self-driving cars loosened in bid to challenge China The Hill (Kevin W)

India

US Seeks India Trade Deal on E-Commerce, Crops and Data Storage Bloomberg

India-Pakistan Row

Pakistan shuts airspace to Indian airlines and suspends trade RT (Robin K)

After deadly Kashmir attack, India reports exchange of fire with Pakistani soldiers NPR

Africa

Why the US can’t beat al-Shabaab in Somalia Responsible Statecraft (resilc)

Sudan War Is A Global Crisis In The Making – Analysis Eurasia Review

Joshua Craze, Sudan’s World War New Left Review (Robin K)

O Canada

Rising demand at food banks seen as ‘canary in the coal mine’ for affordability crisis CBC

European Disunion

Why Europe won’t splurge to ward off Russia Euractiv

Brussels rebuffs UK bid to prise open access to EU single market Financial Times

The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) continues to rise in popularity, firmly establishing its leadership among political parties in the country UATV

Old Blighty

Recruitment agencies are shutting for business at their fastest rate since the financial crisis as companies tear up hiring plans amid rising taxes and global economic uncertainty Staffing Industry

Israel v. The Resistance

US Has Launched 750 Airstrikes on Yemen Since March 15 Antiwar.com (resilc)

Iran Doesn’t Want Rubio’s Fake ‘Compromise‘ Daniel Larison

New Not-So-Cold War

Ukraine may have to give up land for peace – Kyiv Mayor Klitschko BBC. resilc: “Temporary is like 50-100-1000 years?

Trump says Ukraine has not signed minerals deal Reuters

The Road to War in Ukraine — The History of NATO and US Military Exercises With Ukraine — Part 2 Larry Johnson

UK intel behind Ukraine’s disastrous Krynky invasion, leaked documents reveal GrayZone (Kevin W)

Ukraine silently encroaches on ‘friendly’ Moldova OpenTheMagazine (Kevin W)

* * *

Imperial Collapse Watch

US to spend $946B through 2034 to maintain, modernize nuclear military power Anadolu Agency

ONE WAR AT A TIME AND PLENTY OF MONEY TO BE MADE IN THE MEANTIME – THIS IS TRUMP’S GAME AS THE RUSSIAN AND CHINESE GENERAL STAFFS UNDERSTAND John Helmer

Trump 2.0

Trouble signs emerge for Trump in DDHQ/The Hill polling average The Hill

Hegseth orders makeup studio installed at Pentagon CBS (Dr. Kevin)

Musk-owned company says it qualifies for federal contracts reserved for small businesses Musk Watch

Trump cuts federal grants to plantation museum focused on reality of slavery Guardian

Tariffs

How to Prepare for the Coming Supply Chain Shock Matt Stoller

Uncertainty Over Trump’s Tariffs Paralyzes U.S. Businesses New York Times (resilc). Important.

Exclusive: US pharma tariffs would raise US drug costs by $51 billion annually, report finds Reuters (Kevin W)

Why China is taking a much tougher stance towards Donald Trump this time round South China Morning Post

China, Japan, Korea sense Trump trade war weakness Asia Times (Kevin W)

Tariffs imperil America’s status as world investment magnet Axios (Kevin W)

Product shortages and empty store shelves loom with falling shipments from China NBC (resilc)

DOGE

Elon Musk and DOGE’s Savings May Be Erased by New Costs New York Times (resilc). If you thought this was about savings, as opposed to ideology, you were not paying attention.

Steve Bannon wants Elon Musk to provide ‘specific accounting’ of government fraud uncovered by DOGE Semafor (resilc)

Inspector General Probes Whether Trump, DOGE Sought Private Taxpayer Information or Sensitive IRS Material ProPublica

Immigration

Milwaukee County Circuit Judge Hannah Dugan charged with 2 felonies in ICE case Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Pam Bondi’s striking comments on arresting judges Washington Post (Kevin W)

Trump administration reverses abrupt terminations of foreign students’ US visa registrations Politico (Kevin W)

ICE Cancels $3.8 Billion Contract for Immigrant Tent Detention Camp at Fort Bliss ProPublica (Robin K)

A plot so lost it may never be found The Racket (Randy K)

Our No Longer Free Press

New England Journal of Medicine gets swept up in U.S. attorney inquiry into alleged bias STAT (Dr. Kevin)

What the Doxxing of Student Activists Means For the First Amendment Progressive.org (Robin K)

The Obligations of Capacity Sam Husseini

California proposes to allow testing of driverless heavy-duty trucks Guardian (Kevin W)

Mr. Market Has a Nervous Breakdown

Consumer sentiment is now lower than during the 2008 financial crisis, reflecting worries that President Donald Trump’s tariff policies will create new inflationary pressures Investopedia

US home sales lowered more than expected in March — dropping to their slowest pace since 2009 as panicked buyers bail, new data out today shows Daily Mail

The Bezzle

Indicted ‘Bitcoin Jesus’ Pays Roger Stone $600,000 to Lobby for Him New York Times. resilc: “Nigeria has no where near the level of corruption we have in USA USA.”

Why Macro Forecasting Is So Hard Impossible Barry Ritholtz. resilc: “ez, if Trump is alive, it will be worse.”

Guillotine Watch

The Superrich Have Turned the Tiny Florida Town of Manalapan Into the Next Palm Beach Wall Street Journal

Luigi Mangione Enters Plea in CEO’s Murder Case MedPage Today

Class Warfare

Madrid’s Biggest Landlord? U.S. Investment Firms New York Times. resilc: “The cancer of capitalism needs chemo.”

New report cites ‘harmful effects’ of private equity firms buying nursing homes • Iowa Capital Dispatch (Robin K)

Antidote du jour (via):

And a bonus:

A second bonus:

And a third:

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.

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122 comments

    1. The Rev Kev

      Thanks for that link, hardscrabble. The idea seems to be the one Trump had for Covid back in 2020 as in if you don’t report incidents, then cases remain low in number. Meanwhile Elaine Herzberg still remains unavailable for comment.

      1. hardscrabble

        Yes.

        ‘Move along folks… nothing to see here… OMG a dead body!’ – Chief Wiggam

      2. Skip Intro

        It worked in New Orleans with Katrina! That was a heckuva job, and a remains an inspiration to this day.

      1. JBird4049

        It could be the location of the VPN especially as bots seem to switch between locations themselves triggering whatever defenses a site is using. Even using the same service I sometimes have to switch between different cities even as everything else is the same.

        1. Yves Smith Post author

          It seems you are misunderstanding my point. I have never gotten a challenge even when accessing from multiple ISPs in SE Asia, the US, and VPNs set to different countries. You would think that would have triggered a challenge if The Hill were doing that but I have never gotten one, evah.

  2. The Rev Kev

    ‘Matt Van Swol
    @matt_vanswol
    Apr 23
    🚨#BREAKING: A wild report from a firefighter in Tennessee confirms that an Amish community whose sawmill completely burned to the ground on the night of April 8th…
    …had been COMPLETELY REBUILT AND WAS ALREADY FUNCTIONING on April 17th, just 8 days later
    Read that again.’

    There was an interesting reply to this tweet below-

    ‘Jeff Leavitt
    @poonschooner
    I lived near Amish country for 2 years in Pensylvania, never met a more humble, hard working people. Doing business with them was always a joy. Every transaction built on trust and integrity. God bless them all.’

    I wonder how many communities that you could say the same of.

    1. griffen

      Remarkable. Like going back in time, say for comparison in a Gene Hackman film called Hoosiers. Of course that story about Hickory High and a fictional Jimmy Chitwood is a Hollywood creation.

      Maybe Weird Al was accurate, “we spend most our lives living in an Amish paradise…”

        1. griffen

          I am a bit unfamiliar with that equation you reference, but much like the fictional school from that film I attended a very small school in eastern NC. So my connection to the story is strictly on that timeline in the mid to late 80’s, and the film being a memorable depiction of smaller school basketball no matter the location.

          If I’m taking shots at Indiana basketball that was a self goal; in my defense I do admit to loving the story of Coach Dale and the memorable performance by Hopper. Tar Heel is not one word, so I’ll stay in my little yard go forward I suppose, friendly banter or knucklehead comments notwithstanding.

          1. Steve H.

            Price’s equation can be applied to cooperation, with those who are more alike (less variance) being more likely to cooperate. You and I, iirc we enjoy many of the same things, co-variants as it were. I went to high school in Chapel Hill, and have a certain emotional response to Carolina Blue despite my overt affiliation with Cream-and-Crimson.

            All love, griffen. We are of a one.

            1. griffen

              I have very fond memories of living there after going elsewhere for college. It’s a wonderful location. And although I never attended it is the one college that befits how former CBS news stalwart Charles Kuralt once described it. There is my bias upfront.

              I suppose many college specific towns once, not so long ago, really had that, and today it may be a fool’s errand to even suggest that it remains true however.

        2. dougie

          I have a portion of the interview in my business to weed out the “Dookies”. I show them a picture of me in my Duck Fook! t shirt, and ask if they would like one of their own.

          My favorite Duke joke is “What do you have in common with the person standing next to you in line wearig a Duke Tshirt?” “He didn’t attend Duke, either.”

          diddukewin.com is a wonderful site to check out. The current answer will remain in place until football season begins. It will give me much amusement over the summer!

    2. petal

      They would intentionally undercut us(the other farmers) at market and refused to interact in any way with the other market vendors. Wouldn’t even say hi. We were a pretty friendly, nice bunch. They would have a sketchy-looking normie drive them up. This was in upstate NY. They were not liked, except for customers who thought they were quaint and cute in their costumes. The females were not treated very well from what we observed. Also the use of human waste to fertilise crops would lead to problems down the road. And then there are the puppy mills, and the discarded draft horses that had been mistreated.

      1. dougie

        Thank You. After spending a week at my brother in laws house in southern TN, where he lived an off the grid life in and around a largely Amish community, any idealization I had for that culture was gone. There were so many that the local Walmart had hitching posts for their wagons out front. They had a medical emergency, refused to contact “the English” EMS, yet had no problem asking my brother in law to make the drive to Florence Alabama , an hour away for medical care. I could go on, but those are not my stories to tell.

      3. Eclair

        Petal, I always read your usually perceptive and informative comments with interest. But I really do have to reply to your observations on the Amish sellers at the farmer’s market.

        ” …. intentionally undercut(ing) us(the other farmers) at market ….” Gosh, sounds like some recent discussions about China. Are the Amish ‘undercutting’ or are they pricing their produce so they make what they consider a fair return on their investment? And, if they can sell at a lower rate than the English farmers, either because their costs are lower or they need a lower mark up to realize a profit, isn’t that just good ole’ market competition? Or, are you suggesting that all the farmers should engage in a price-fixing cabal?

        ” …. a sketchy-looking normie …” Would you be referring to a local resident, an ‘Englisher,’ often someone who is economically marginalized, who is running a business of offering a transportation service to the Amish community? For which they, the Amish, pay.

        “The females were not treated very well ….” Could you offer a few concrete examples? That maybe are worse than how many ‘English’ males treat women. Rape is rare, if not unknown, among the Amish. I have never heard any Amish male use a derogatory term (like c*nt, b*tch, w**re, etc.) to refer to a female. In fact, the Amish speech that I have heard over the decades, is remarkably free of any kind of violent war-like or sports-term imagery.

        ” …. the use of human waste to fertilize their crops …” Now that may be outright libel. Amish farmers use animal manure … cow especially. As do an increasing number of English small farms. They do have outhouses, but, in my experience they are carefully cared for, limed, cleaned, etc. And, after careful treatment, liming and composting, human waste is pretty benign stuff. I worry more about the health effects of the gas wells in our part of the county.

        ” …. puppy mills and discarded draft horses …. ” Examples? I will admit that the Amish I have known are not sentimental about their animals. Not to say they don’t care for them, but a draft horse that has outlived its usefulness is a liability. But, the English dairy farmers in the area have what they jocularly refer to as ‘the dead cow pile.’ Dead farm animals are hitched to the back of the tractor and dragged down to ‘the pile’ in a back field, and …. composted. The buzzards are happy too.

    3. Eclair

      There are a number of Amish sawmills in our corner of south west New York and Pennsylvania. Two years ago we happened to be driving down to Pennsylvania and saw a plume of black smoke billowing up. Of course, we had to see what was happening; an Amish sawmill was burning, so fast and so hot that we could see the blackened ribs of the structure being consumed. We passed a couple of young Amish women, hurrying down the road, presumably to alert the neighbor, and maybe use their phone to call the local volunteer fire department (who carry their own water, btw, there being to public water or sewage out here.) The mill was rebuilt in a couple of weeks; we drove by regularly to check on it.

      I have been seeing advertisements for a book about Amish ‘ways,’ supposedly a bible for preppers and homesteaders. What it does not do, is discuss what I consider the greatest strength of the Amish communities; their communal structures of mutual aid and support, focused on the primary social unit of the parish, or church group, usually 15 or so families. Never any larger that can be fit into the ‘front room’ of their Sunday services, held at the homes of each parish family, in turn.

      From the groups of young men who every fall cut and stack a winter’s supply of wood at the house of of each elderly member, to the younger women who gather to clean the house of the family who will host that week’s church gathering, to the sharing of labor and machinery during the planting and harvesting season, especially in case of illness. A large part of their effectiveness comes from their practice in working together: one ‘house raising’ frolic (the local term for the combination of work party and eating) I attended a few years back was a revelation: my husband brought his carpentry tools, but was gently told that he should just enjoy the day, as the group of men raising the house all had their appointed tests and were a practiced team. I had a conversation with a jolly woman whose sole task at this frolic (and all gatherings that required large amounts of food) was to make coffee. Enormous pots, on wood and kerosene stoves, available from dawn to dusk.

      I am going on April 30th, to an auction, for family and friends, at the house and store of my Amish friend, L. She has reached the age when each Amish person, or couple, is expected to pare down their accumulation of ‘stuff.’ There will be food …. and endless pots of coffee ….. and family members and friends will bid on the items for which she has no further use. Similar to the Swedish ‘death cleaning,’ so you don’t leave a huge mess for your family to clean up after you pass on. And, the money raised is a little cushion for your final illness, or to make your old age a bit more comfortable.

    4. gk

      The San Carlo opera house in Naples burnt down in 1816. It was rebuilt, and reopened in January 1817. These were Catholics, not Amish.

    5. Es s Ce Tera

      The thought had crossed my mind that had we lived like the Amish we wouldn’t be in our current situation.

      Capitalism is the evil one must spiritually overcome. In overcoming, one ends up living much like the Amish or according to the monastic/community traditions of the early church years. We may yet by necessity need to return to the example, whether one believes in religion or not.

  3. Henry Moon Pie

    Amish barn building–

    The Amish do not buy insurance. They are not alone among Christian denominations in eschewing insurance, but most of the others do so because they believe buying insurance betrays a lack of faith in God. The Amish may also cite that reason, but they emphasize that no insurance means that a member of the community that suffers a catastrophic loss will be required to rely upon their neighbors to help them recover.

    This is the opposite of modern American cultural practice. Is the electrical grid subject to frequent outages? Don’t band together to demand better regulation from the government or better management from the utility. Buy a Generac! Are frackers polluting the underground water sources and poisoning your family’s water well? Buy bottled water. Is public transportation poor or non-existent where you live? Buy a car!

    The rest of us outside the Amish community may have to learn to emulate them when it comes to insurance. As insurance companies withdraw from more and more areas due to climate catastrophes and governments find it ultimately impossible to pick up the slack, those who live in high-risk areas may have to band together like the Amish. The problem is that with these modern fires and floods, everybody gets devastated at once.

    1. Ann

      I am most familiar with the Hutterites, another brand of self-sufficient Anababtists since the 16th century. I knew them in South Dakota, where they have many colonies. Now I find that they also have colonies in Alberta, B.C. Saskatchewan and Manitoba. I admire their resilience and fortitude. They split off daughter colonies when their number exceeds 125, drawing straws to see which familes will move to the new place. In South Dakota they would all converge on a neighbor’s fields to help harvest if the family had suffered a disaster of some sort.

  4. griffen

    Temperature flips, hot to cold and vice versa…nature is a mad scientist. I’ve always or long thought that life in modern America, with shelter and indoor plumbing and all the modern amenities that accompanies a routine existence beats the history of say, life in the post Civil War era. Given the givens but can’t say I’d always reach the outhouse if I had an emergency situation. TMI maybe.

    Modern living with indoor AC makes my younger childhood days, coping at night with a simple window and an old time metal oscillating fan just seem almost barbaric. First world problem for sure!

      1. amfortas the hippie

        Aye!
        Ive been living second world at best for nigh on 3 decades,lol.
        i have a laptop, a minisplit(that i will only turn on after june 1st, if then) and running water.
        but i cook over a fire more often than not, and heat primarily with wood.
        much of this became habit due to necessity…ie: poverty…but it is, indeed, habit.
        when my hip died, and a replacement wasnt forthcoming, wife and i made a plan for autarky, which i am almost finished with.
        we figured that it sure looked like i had been right, and that the system of systems could not continue forever…and planned accordingly.
        so when the Archdruid wrote “Collapse first! avoid the rush!”…we were already there,lol.
        Cousin gets onto me for being a more strategic prophet of doom…not very useful for buying the dips, etc….but you cant set this sort of thing up in a day on a budget.
        takes years.

        and here we are,lol…in spite of the things i still lack, i’m better set up to weather all this than anyone i know….even the mennonites down towards fredericksberg.

  5. The Rev Kev

    “The Road to War in Ukraine — The History of NATO and US Military Exercises With Ukraine — Part 2”

    What Larry Johnson could have mentioned was that after the coup, that not only was NATO outfitting the Ukrainian army with their weaponry & technology but that NATO instructors were training about five Ukrainian battalions each and every year to NATO standards. For all intents and purposes the first Ukrainian army that the Russians destroyed was a NATO army. I believe that the thinking at the time was that a NATO-trained Ukrainian army would rip through the Russian formations whose soldiers would panic, throw down their weapons and run for their lives. After that it would be a simple matter of occupying the Donbass Republics and maybe expelling the population to Russia. Well, except those that were to be reserved for special treatment that is. And even today they are still underestimating the Russian military. I’m sure that if it got to the point that you had a Russian tank battalion drive down Whitehall, that they would label it as a desperate measure.

    1. ilsm

      To quote an astute acquaintance “what were they thinking” giving Kiev fresh tactics and training without the right NATO equipment.

      While neglecting to provide the air portion of their air land battle.

      Russia should invite them to send more stuff and training without pause until the empire runs out..

      Now watch Bibi unleash the U.S.’ air part on Iran w/o the land part.

      1. Aurelien

        Well, the short answer they were thinking the Russians would run away. The Johnson article (the second in a series I think) isn’t really worth your time. By his own admission it’s right outside his area of expertise (he was a counter-terrorism analyst) and most of his data is small-scale and mundane. He doesn’t realise (why should he?) that from 1993/94 onwards NATO was engaged in a desperate struggle to seem “relevant” by trying to jettison its historic war fighting image and turn itself into a peacekeeping/crisis management/anti-piracy type of organisation. It was also urgently looking for troop contributors to bolster its forces in Bosnia after 1995. As I recall, it got involved in some pretty bizarre antics as a result, and tried to put out feelers to just about everybody to participate in exercises. This is an example of what’s called “backshadowing,” a problem well known to historians (and analysts) which consists of retrospectively fitting events in the past into a scheme that didn’t actually exist at the time.

    2. Ignacio

      This part 2 was a good recap on NATO activities involving Ukraine since 2000 showing that Ukraine was being laced to bring it to the Western sphere of influence. When in 2021 Blinken told Lavrov that Ukraine would enter NATO and nukes would be planted there you can imagine what his intention was and we already know now how badly was this miscalculated. Three years later the military balance has inclined in favor of Russia which, i guess, was not exactly the strategic goal intended. Today Arnaud’s post is about an inflection point with regards to US dominance. The Ukraine war has turned to be a very remarkable precedent.

      1. Michaelmas

        Ignacio: When in 2021 Blinken told Lavrov that Ukraine would enter NATO and nukes would be planted there you can imagine what his intention was

        Not that setting up 30-plus US bioweapons labs in Ukraine on the borders of Russia and under Ukraine supervision hadn’t already given Lavrov and the Russians a clear understanding of what the US intended, you don’t think?

        If I was Russia, I’d have been banging on that about non-stop at the UN and everywhere else. The evidence is out there.

  6. DJG, Reality Czar

    Who were the Carthaginians? A tad breathless. Here’s a breathless quote: ” “This is the first known case where genetics shows a complete mismatch to cultural continuity,” says Prof. David Reich of Harvard University, a leading expert on ancient DNA and one of the scholars who led the new study.”

    I am not sure what Reich is talking about. Reading the article, what we discover is that the Punic language and Punic religion dominated in a population that was a mix of peoples, including Greeks, “Sicilians,” and north Africans = Berbers.

    These are people who have mixed for centuries. Reich should have read The Leopard, in which Tomasi di Lampedusa refers to Sicily as “that America of antiquity.”

    In Sicily, from about 600 BC to 900 AD, Greek was the prestige language. The majority of Sicilians are of Greek descent – but, genetically, Sicily and Malta are a mix. The article acknowledges the mixture that is “the Sicilians” but still doesn’t seem to get the import.

    Likewise, farther north, in Republican Rome, many customs related to the kingship and religion were imports (loans) from the Etruscans.

    Ahhh, yes, the Mediterranean world, ever the mystery to the Anglosphere.

    1. The Rev Kev

      And you could also say the same of the Roman Empire where different cultures adopted Roman culture and made it their own – except for those bits of local culture the Romans adopted. Surprising, not surprising how often they will do a DNA test on Roman skeletons in places like Pompeii and find that they were never even born in the Italian Peninsular. But Romans they were.

      1. vao

        “Surprising, not surprising how often they will do a DNA test on Roman skeletons in places like Pompeii and find that they were never even born in the Italian Peninsular. But Romans they were.”

        Those DNA analyses confirm what earlier research had established by exhaustively recording the names found on funerary steles and on various archaeological artifacts.

        Names in the classical world provide a good indication of the origin of the person (Greece, Gaul, Syria, etc) as well as other information (some names were typically associated with slaves for instance). There are in fact entire (very expensive) specialized books tabulating the names found in various regions of the classical world.

    2. Daniil Adamov

      Yeah, it’s interesting, but hardly “stunning”. I hadn’t thought on the precise ethnic composition of the Carthaginians, but yes, this mix figures. I wonder if today’s “Arabic” Tunisian mix is very different genetically from the “Canaanite” one of old.

    3. Darthbobber

      Big Serge commented that this is.l8ke being surprised that New York today is not predominantly Dutch

    4. lyman alpha blob

      Indeed. I’m returning from a nice couple weeks in Greece and after meeting some family members on mainland Greece during the first week, I learned that my family origins on the Greek side are not just Greek, but Vlach. I just said goodbye to some Cretan “Greeks” who have a parent who is Belgian or French or German or USian. Same as it ever was.

      USians like to think they were the first to create the “melting pot”, but it has been that way for a long time. Just ask the Greeks, who will tell you that they were the first to invent just about everything a couple millennia before the US existed.

  7. The Rev Kev

    “Hegseth orders makeup studio installed at Pentagon”

    Rumour has it that they borrowed the make-up kit from the J. Edgar Hoover building museum.

    1. ambrit

      J. Edgar Hoover building? Are you suggesting that Hegseth’s career will soon need a forensic makeup specialist?
      “What’s that intriguing scent he’s wearing?”
      “Trump No. 5.”
      “Ah, male bovine excrement. I knew it!”
      “Hush now General Flynn. Don’t gloat.”

  8. flora

    re: Canada. From Mark Carney’s think tank, or personal advisory board.*

    https://horizons.service.canada.ca/en/2025/01/10/future-lives-social-mobility/index.shtml?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

    It’s written as if this future (or present) is an inevitability, not something to be avoided by better govt policies. ( I love it the illustration has two hands whose two nexus points are the Apple logo and a computer scene. How WEF is that? / ;)

    Sounds like Canadians will own nothing and they will not be happy.

    * from the paper:
    “Policy Horizons Canada (Policy Horizons) is the Government of Canada’s centre of excellence in foresight. Our mandate is to empower the Government of Canada with a future-oriented mindset and outlook to strengthen decision making. The content of this document does not necessarily represent the views of the Government of Canada, or participating departments and agencies.”

    1. Skip Intro

      A lot of it sounds like the authors were transported in a time machine to the US in the year 2010.

  9. Kouros

    Poor Moldova…

    “Ethnic Moldovans account for close to 78% of the nation, which is predominantly Christian; Romanians make up 8% and Ukrainians less than 5%. Several officials in the government of President Maia Sandu are Romanian nationals, adding to disaffection among a majority of locals.”

    As a Romanian I have my biases.

    Ukrainians were a nasty lot before 1900s, during USSR, and after 1991.

    But this article is likely linked with the ongoing Russian propaganda, that Moldovans in R of Moldova are not Romanian.

    The historical Moldova straddled both sides of River Prut. One side is now in Romania and there are 4-5 million “Moldovans” in Romania. By this article’s definition I might not be “Romanian” since I am from the westernmost part…

    And more than 50% of Moldovans in R of Moldova have Romanian Passports, including their president…

    1. The Rev Kev

      You do realize that that last sentence is not a good thing. It would be like the Prime Minister of Canada waving around an American passport. You would never be sure who they would owe their final loyalty too. That’s why the law in Oz says that if you sit in Parliament, you cannot have a passport with another country. Can you imagine if that was true for the US Congress?

      1. Kouros

        Probably a lot of them wanted to have the ability to travel and work in Romania and Europe, but that is not the only reason. Having now enshrined in their constitution that their language is Romanian, the link with their ethnical, cultural, historical brethren has been formalized.

        Life will find a way. I am enjoying watching the resurgence of authentic folk traditions in Romania & Moldova, with some mixing of modernity.

        Here is a concert where the main artist is a 20 years old young woman, with an astonishing talent and full of contagious pashion:

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7JrVoOJPvsk

        And here is a band that seems to be able to be a war band but also a party band as well: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgfxNx5ptmo

        Both concerts are from Chisinau, R of Moldova, with the first being a singer/group from Oltenia (south Romania) and the second a group from Chisinau, which operates both in Chisinau and Bucharest.

        Nobody there has any problem understanding eachother and the songs are all in the Romanian national folk repertoire, somebody like me from the western part also knows them and sings them.

      1. Kouros

        I didn’t say that.

        But in this particular respect, they don’t budge, keep insisting that Moldovans are different and don’t even speak the same language. I read such statements on RT, made by Maria Zacharova, Russian Forreign Affairs spokeswoman and expert in… Chinese.

        The latest hysteria about easter and how christians are persecuted in Moldova was a pure example of that, the actual story being that the state wants to bring all orthodox Moldovans under the Bucharest Patriarchy (which is orthodox) from under Moscow Patriarchy.

        If ethnic Russians/Ukrainians in Moldova want to stay with Moscow, is fine by me. My dad was uniate himself – proud of it but albeit a smart guy, didn’t know why or the implications.

        1. Darthbobber

          I think that strictly started as Soviet rather than Russian propaganda, and the Russian Federation picked up on it for similar reasons of diplomatic convenience.

          If the situation in that corner of Europe is ever fully stabilized (not holding my breath) the propaganda will vanish along with the reasons for it.

  10. The Rev Kev

    “Iran Doesn’t Want Rubio’s Fake ‘Compromise'”

    Rubio is who you send when you are not seriously negotiating at the moment. Meanwhile it looks like the Israelis are trying to torpedo any deal to be had. There has just been a massive explosion in Shahid Rajaee, Iran’s largest commercial port-

    “The source of this incident was the explosion of several containers stored in the Shahid Rajaee Port wharf area,” a crisis management official said, according to BBC Persian.

    https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cx251yyvwr3o

    It will be interesting to hear what Trump has to say about this explosion.

    1. Geo

      “It will be interesting to hear what Trump has to say about this explosion.”

      What he’ll say: He doesn’t know about it. It’s fake news. He had nothing to do with it. If he had it would be the biggest explosion anyone has ever seen.

  11. Afro

    Re: Zionist Jewish mob chase a lone woman in NYC and chant “Death to the Arabs” in Hebrew.

    I’m partly flabbergasted but also partly not because I know how insular some Jewish people are. The talk about anti-semitism right now is not helpful, it’s one of the most discussed problems, but it’s certainly not one of the biggest actual problems. To be honest I can’t recall once in my mostly North American life where I’ve witnessed actual anti semitism.

    The victims in that video are those two women walking away while being harassed. Sadly, I’m also worried about that cop that I think tried to help. Is a hedge fund owner going to call the police chief and “ask” that the cop he laid off?

    2. The Rev Kev

      In Israel they call this Tuesday. If you can’t have over a hundred men harassing and shoving a defenseless woman around, where is the fun in that? You could see that cop calling for backup as that could have gone bad real quick and I suppose you would have the same sort of atmosphere at a lynching. If they had managed to trip her over, then I bet that it would be real bad. You wonder though. All those men there. Are they the same ones that jumped aboard a plane out of Israel to avoid serving in Gaza?

      2. Buzz Meeks

        Chuck the Schmuck Schumer will rush forward to say they have suffered enough, just like Jonathan Pollard has.

    5. JP

      Anti-other is found everywhere. I am old but in the 50’s of my youth I witnessed prejudice abundant in adult conversation. Antisemitism was common but not as pervasive as racial prejudice. (Jews are not a race) I remember Italians, polish, certainly Mexicans and sometimes native Americans were targets. The civil rights era and politics of my generation did a lot to push back on that in the 60’s. It went too far in the era of political correctness and now antisemitism is being employed as a cudgel to repress dissent.

      Face it, the other side of national or cultural pride is exclusion and ridicule of anyone else. That can be very true of flag waving patriots anywhere. There are very few Jews to pick on where I live so we prefer to look down on trailer trash.

    6. jcusick@gmail.com

      And, in regards to this and the Canary Mission, I think it’s important for US citizens that, hopefully, cannot be deported, go to the Canary Mission’s contact page and let them know, politely or not, how bad their “mission” is for both Americans and Jews.

      https://canarymission.org/contact_us

      The more pushback they get, the better for all.

    7. bertl

      It is the essence of pure evil. I felt sick at the thought of these cowards hounding and assaulting a very brave woman and a very brave policemen a coolheaded policeman. They certainly had more balls than their assailants. I hope the NYPD make use of all the footage they can get hold of, lift them, temporarily mislay the records of the police stations each has been sent to give them a thorough interrogation, and then prosecute those bastards to the hilt.

      These are creatures who should be stripped of their nationality (after all they have at least two so losing one won’t be that much of a bother) and permanently lodged in a hostelry in El Salvador with a likeminded international crew with whom they could share pleasantries while undergoing a process of character formation and moral development.

      Alternatively, they could be allocated to Storm Groups and sent to Yemen to fight the US’s enemies man to man.

      This is mob violence of the worst sort in Trump’s home town and, if he is not careful in how he responds to it, this event will become the defining legacy of Trump’s Presidency. Or doesn’t the law apply to Zionist mobs?

  12. The Rev Kev

    “Trump tariffs: President vents at China over Boeing as Beijing denies claims of trade deal talks”

    You have to wonder what sort of briefings that Trump is receiving then and who is giving them. He was probably told that the Chinese economy is a paper dragon, that losing the American market would cause the Chinese people to lose their moral & panic, that the government is weak and one major push could lead to regime change by ‘friendly’ billionaires, that they would abandon their markets in other countries so that they don’t lose the American one. Trump seems confounded by the fact that the Chinese came out swinging instead. Wouldn’t the US do the same if positions were swapped? And making bs claims that he is negotiating with them does not impress them and they called him out on it calling it fake news. And if President Donald Trump said that Boeing “should default China” for not taking planes that it had committed to purchase, does that mean the World Trade Organization? Good luck with that as the US has blocked new judges being elected for years now so they no longer have the numbers to rule on any cases. Trump needs a new game plan and one based in reality. And hopefully not one developed by the same people that told him that knocking off China would be easy.

    1. Michaelmas

      Boeing is almost certainly done — finished, kaput — and likely within months, even should the US Federal government de facto or outright nationalize it.

      It is utterly dependent on Chinese parts and materials, both for its civil and military/aerospace division. China has cut those off..

      In months, those parts and materials Boeing now has in store or can lay its hands on will run out. When Washington then goes bleating to Beijing that they’ll take off US tariffs on China to whatever extent if China takes its sanctions off imports to the US, China has absolutely no reason to not tell Washington: ‘You started this and we’re finishing it. We’re not taking our sanctions off and COMAC will take over Boeing’s former market.”

      China is killing Boeing, Part I: As a builder of passenger jets and competitor to COMAC
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNZcXNc9yJs

      China is killing Boeing, Part II: As a major Pentagon contractor
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFEMeWAor98

      The source here, Kevin Walmsley, is an American businessman who’s based himself inside China for the last dozen years.

        2. Lefty Godot

          Yay! More money for stock buybacks and executive bonuses then! (No China-sourced components needed for those.)

    2. Glen

      I have to wonder what Trump is being told too. But I’m going to go with the upside here first, I’m no longer worried about America pushing the Ukraine war until somebody provokes a nuclear exchange (and the EU/UK should just wise up, and accept peace and prosperity for their people, rather than a losing war, I mean REALLY? WTF? Just go ki$$ Russian and Chinese a$$, it’s probably nicer than ki$$ing American a$$ anyways).

      But if Trump had any real plans to end the Ukraine war, make friends with Russia, and pry Russia away from China, he can kiss it all goodbye. Gonna deny critical imports to China? They can get them all from Russia. Gonna hold the American market over Chinese exporters? BRICS is the majority of the world market, and is going to benefit from fire sale prices from China.

      Done, that took all of ten minutes or so to game out. And I’m sorry about the bad language. (I tried to hide it from the youngsters!) But Trump better hurry up, he’s losing Japan and South Korea to China, and I’d bet Canada and Mexico would join them if we weren’t so attached to each other.

      This is just INSANE to watch.

    3. Geo

      “Trump needs a new game plan and one based in reality.”

      Can’t imagine that happening as anyone based in reality wouldn’t be allowed in the room with him. Making deals is a lot harder when they’re not pre-scripted by his reality TV producers.

      Far from my area of expertise but from what I’ve gathered it appears too many still think “Made in China” means lower quality. But does anyone think Boeing is still the best plane maker? And I don’t know anyone who prefers American cars.

      Over the last couple years the majority of high-tech gear I’ve invested in for my own business (film stuff like cameras, lenses, lighting, and computer accessories) have been from China. Not because they’re cheaper but because they’re far superior. They also happen to have the added benefit of being more affordable too. But even if they weren’t they’d still be my tech of choice. The other countries of origin for these items have been Australia, Japan, England, Korea, and a few others. almost nothing of any merit for my industry is made here. Heck, even many of the best films are from elsewhere.

      So, as many have said before, without a years long effort to revitalize manufacturing and product development (real products, not rent-seeking apps and Wall Street financial instruments) in the US no amount of tariffs will do anything but stifle business and raise costs of living in the US. But that would take longer to accomplish than one election cycle so doubtful it will ever happen barring a decades long plunge into darkness like a century ago where it took two world wars and a Great Depression to inspire Americans to elect some reality-based thinkers.

  13. Camelotkidd

    Chinese companies are recruiting recently laid-off U.S. scientists—particularly those with expertise in artificial intelligence.

    Companies are offering generous “full-cycle support” for relocation to Shenzhen.

    Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.
    Like Yves says–It’s not about savings but ideology

    1. The Rev Kev

      KLG was talking about this in his “Coffee Break” post yesterday. How laid-off American research scientists are leaving the country to take up posts elsewhere. And when you think about it, there is no guarantee that they will ever return to live in the US again. After all, they may even get a frosty reception at the border and all sorts of hostile examinations on visits back. Can’t blame them for leaving as what else are they to do? Try to find a teaching job or something? A scientist has only so many years to do his work and the thought of just wasting the next four years to pass hoping that the political situation will change would be a bad joke. This really is a case of America burning it’s seed corn and as you say, it is all about ideology.

      1. Vandemonian

        “… wasting the next four years to pass hoping that the political situation will change…”

        Even if/when the political situation improves, it will take years to rebuild the once-massive academic and research infrastructure, and the precious store of accumulated knowledge, wisdom and know-how is probably gone for good.

    2. Paleobotanist

      If I were younger and up to learning a third (or sixth?) language, I’d think hard of Shenzhen…
      Some guys were trying to convince me to job hunt in China a decade ago, but moving the family seemed hard at the time. Maybe I should have…
      I will encourage my students to look there.

  14. Cervantes

    > Who Were the Carthaginians? Ancient DNA Study Reveals a Stunning Answer Haaretz

    The article seems shocked that some ancient people didn’t primarily identify with their genetics but instead with language, religion, and culture, with some family ties mixed in. Maybe that is the assumption that needs most challenged.

    Even the Romans weren’t primarily about genetics–it was, again, language, religion, and culture.

    And arguably the Greeks in the wake of Alexander’s conquest were the same, although they did retain separate populations from locals.

    Heck, I personally most closely identify with the lineage of my surname, which is only 25% of my genetic heritage at the grandparent level. So even family tradition isn’t the same thing as genetics.

  15. ChrisFromGA

    Re: Tariffs and lagged effects

    So this is why I detest the stonk market. It seems the just randomly switch from trading off fundamentals to a mode of psychopathic meth-addled rage buying, where every rumor and false narrative triggers hopium-induced FOMO.

    I guess it is a reflection of our sick society more than anything.

  16. Carolinian

    Re NBC on tariffs

    “The threat of empty store shelves has appeared to raise alarm bells inside the White House, more so than months of warnings from businesses about rising prices, said a person familiar with business lobbying efforts around tariffs. Trump administration officials seemed particularly concerned about a shortage of products around holidays, like the Fourth of July and Christmas, the person said.”

    Trump crossed the Rubicon when he let Netanyahu resume the genocide and now, to switch metaphors, he has met his Waterloo with the huge “Liberation Day” mess. In truth who ever knew of a president in such a hurry to fail.

    The problem seems to be that, as in Trump One, he has hired a cast of goons like Pam Bondi with the only difference being this time they are loyal goons so there’s no Trump pretending he had nothing to do with it. Seemingly all he can do is lie to the press about what’s going on and hope Fox News won’t notice. Those empty shelves in the toy department though–the political disaster is becoming ever more obvious.

    1. The Rev Kev

      He’ll want to get a deal before the middle of next year. July 4th 2026 will be the 250th anniversary of the United States – the Semiquincentennial – when the Declaration of Independence was signed. There will be celebrations galore. Guess which country supplies 98% of America’s fireworks.

      2. Adam Eran

        In other “news,” medieval Islamic scholar Ibn Khaldun observed that empires typically last 250 years.

        1. LifelongLib

          So if the U.S. became an empire in 1945, that gives us until 2195. But I’d be surprised if our hegemony lasts anywhere near that long. Being the last man standing after a world war destroys every other major power is a historically unique situation (maybe that Bronze Age collapse comes close) that is already ending.

          1. Jorge

            I place it at 1920. Woodrow Wilson waited until the European great powers greatly weakened each other, then swooped in and took over in 1918 as the party was ending. It was a brilliant move; it set up The American Century.

    2. farmboy

      No precedent for this level of stupidity.

      Spencer Hakimian
      @SpencerHakimian
      ·10h
      Keep in mind that S&P 500 earn 6x more in China than they export from the U.S. to China.
      Apple selling iPhones to Chinese consumers. Starbucks selling coffee. McDonald’s selling burgers. Etc.
      Nobody dominates and benefits more from global trade than the United States does.
      Tearing the current system down voluntarily would be the biggest unforced error in economic history.
      No precedent for this level of stupidity.

  17. Dan S

    Re: Experiments to dim sunlight to fight global warming will be given the green light by the Government within weeks

    I suppose we could also just nuke England and that would mostly have the same effect. It would also be a great jobs program. /s If we are resigned to running the largest uncontrolled science experiment in world history (i.e., anthropomorphic impacts to global warming), can we at least not make it worse with crazy geoengineering crap? Do we even have a firm grasp on the first order impacts of such things, let alone the second and third order impacts? In the mostly forgettable adaptation of Matheson’s excellent “I Am Legend” with Will Smith, the premise of the plague is the best part – can’t you just see us, in our ever growing ignorance to risk, gulping down any pill that will give us the cure we’re looking for without any consideration of the risk? I wonder what all the folks taking the GLP-1s just for a quick weight loss fix will be facing in 10-20 years…

    1. Henry Moon Pie

      If you ask Thiel and his acolytes about the Precautionary Principle, they will tell you it is not common sense but an irrational impediment to their idea of progress.

      One thing we have going for us is that the project requires a plane that doesn’t exist yet. Maybe Boeing could build it. Seems appropriate.

  18. Lefty Godot

    What Trump should say about “dimming the sun”: To any country that wants to inject chemicals into the air to dim the sun, I will help you by sending a nuclear warhead via hypersonic delivery to your capital city to speed the process along!

    1. flora

      The UK proposes adding sulfur dioxide to the atmosphere to dim the sun. Sulfur dioxide. You know, the acid rain component. What a bunch of Bugs Bunny marroons are those UK “experts.” (aka morons.)

      1. Henry Moon Pie

        This should be seen as an admission by desperate authorities that things are worse than has been admitted, and that we have moved on from the always impossible attempt to convert a consumerist society to electricity powered by renewables. They’re now ready to try desperate Hail Mary hacks before tipping points are reached. Shooting sulfur in the sky every two years is a particularly bad idea because of that acid rain you mention, which will have adverse effects on agriculture as well as add to oceans already too acid from absorbing some of the excess CO2.

        It would not surprise me at all for the Trump Administration to make a U-turn on the “climate hoax” and propose geoengineering (managed by Elon and Gates, no doubt). Consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds as far as Trump is concerned.

    2. Ann

      Sink Carney? All of that is happening right now in Canada and worse in the U.S. Electing the Conservatives will make it happen even faster. This is Canada’s Project 2025.

  20. GrimUpNorth

    Trump Order Fast-Tracking Deep-Sea Mining Threatens Ocean Health LINK

    Haven’t seen this posted yet, he wants to mine both US and international waters.

    Here’s the White House LINK to Trumps executive order issued yesterday.

    1. Jason Boxman

      Heh. The CIA used deep sea mining as a cover to try to recover a lost Russian nuclear submarine. Strange story. They almost succeeded.

      I think it’s not viable in practice. Or we’d be doing it.

  21. Michael Hudson

    The article on the “Phoenicians” is very interesting. My archaeological colleagues use the term Syrians to describe how merchants brought Near Eastern trade and economic practices — including the charging of interest! — westward around the 8th century BC. I describe this in Ch. 1 of “The Collapse of Antiquity.”
    The practice of traders since Sumerian times was for merchants to create temples as “chambers of commerce” for mediation with local populations. These remained throughout the Aegean, typically offshore or on islands (such as Delos).

    1. Vandemonian

      Ariel David really should read a bit more widely. He might consider dipping in to “Who Were the Phoenicians?”, by Josephine Quinn, 2017. From the blurb:

      “ Who were the ancient Phoenicians, and did they actually exist? The Phoenicians traveled the Mediterranean long before the Greeks and Romans, trading, establishing settlements, and refining the art of navigation. But who these legendary sailors really were has long remained a mystery. In Search of the Phoenicians makes the startling claim that the “Phoenicians” never actually existed. Taking readers from the ancient world to today, this monumental book argues that the notion of these sailors as a coherent people with a shared identity, history, and culture is a product of modern nationalist ideologies–and a notion very much at odds with the ancient sources. Josephine Quinn shows how the belief in this historical mirage has blinded us to the compelling identities and communities these people really constructed for themselves in the ancient Mediterranean, based not on ethnicity or nationhood but on cities, family, colonial ties, and religious practices. She traces how the idea of “being Phoenician” first emerged in support of the imperial ambitions of Carthage and then Rome, and only crystallized as a component of modern national identities in contexts as far-flung as Ireland and Lebanon.”

      1. flora

        I have no answer to your question ‘who were the Phoenicians.’ I’ve often wondered if the Mycenaean civilization, many centuries hence the last officially recognized last date of Phoenician trade, was the last great social great civilization gathered on the ancient Phoenician trade routes. The Mycenaean empire, aka Mycenaean Greece was the lastgreatextraordinary Phoenician trading empire civilization, predating what’s now called (in modern archeology) ancient Greece.

    2. Kouros

      Except the clean slate principles, which likely was anathema for the comercial/business class. Maybe this is why they expanded, to run away of those social shakles…

    3. The Rev Kev

      Maybe Nicholas Shaxson can write a new book – “Treasure Islands – Ancient World Style”

  22. Es s Ce Tera

    re: Zionist Jewish mob chase a lone woman in NYC and chant “Death to the Arabs” in Hebrew.

    It’s almost like a multiple scenes from any of the four gospels. Or from various chapters in Acts.

    Outwardly they appear to be religious, inwardly are very far from God and the covenant with God.

  23. Tom Stone

    The Zionists are telling the USA who to deport, who to fire and they are attacking both those protesting Genocide and Arabs in US Cities.
    And AIPAC has a handler in every congresscritter’s office except that of Robert Massie.
    Move along, nothing to see here.

  24. Culp Creek Curmudgeon

    Here is, I think, the key paragraph in the article about Carthaginian genetics:

    “And of course, there is still a major ongoing debate, often colored by less-than-sound political implications, on the degree of genetic connection between modern Jewish people and the original Israelites who lived in the ancient Levant, Reich notes”

    Of course it the next to the last paragraph but it’s significant that this was published in Haaretz.

    1. steppenwolf fetchit

      That might fit right in with the point of the article which is that “peoplehood” is not “genetic”, it is cultural, tribal, etc.

      The desire to find a genetic basis for peoplehood is a strictly Western Racialism-based desire.

  25. Jason Boxman

    From Seeing lost winters, not just rising temperatures, shakes climate indifference

    So too with COVID.

    “People working in these fields have a sense that binary data is more effective, and our study adds theoretical rigor, using careful cognitive experiments,” Dubey said. “Our study also helps explain why the ‘Show Your Stripes’ visualization is so compelling because it takes continuous data and presents it in a more binary format.”

    By focusing on the increasing rate of once-rare events, like extreme heat days or thousand-year floods, or the slow loss of seasonal joys like skiing or outdoor ice skating, the researchers hope that the same temperature data that once led to public apathy can instead help communities care more about the climate crisis.

    People don’t turn blue and explode, so there needs to be some way to convey the danger of repeat infection.

  26. John Beech

    Ducks move into an eagle’s digs, chicks should survive the drop, yada, yada.

    Me? Taking the over on ducks-on-the-menu (eaglet-chow) before season’s end.

      1. flora

        er, sorry, typo.

        “Cans’t” not shoot eagles in the US. Can shoot ducks.
        Duck a l’Orange anyone? / ;)

  27. Jeff W

    Sawmill…had been COMPLETELY REBUILT AND WAS ALREADY FUNCTIONING*

    Rebuilding barns and other buildings rapidly seems characteristic of Amish communities as the update to this 2020 blog post [rebuilding a barn; the post includes other examples], and this 2022 news report [rebuilding a market] would appear to indicate. (The news report carefully notes that the Amish community “quickly submitt[ed] a permit for the new building.”) The blog post says this rapid rebuilding is “typical of the Amish community with its culture of mutual aid.”

  28. GramSci

    Virginia Giuffre has died

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/apr/26/virginia-giuffre-suicide-dead-aged-41

    «Earlier this month, Giuffre posted on social media that she had just days to live after a school bus crashed into her car.

    WA police later confirmed a 41-year-old woman was in a car that collided with a bus on 24 March but there were no reported injuries. It is understood Giuffre presented to a Perth hospital emergency department on 1 April.»

    Her family confirmed she took her own life.

    1. flora

      I am very sorry. She was a very brave young woman. She spoke out against the highest elites’ behaviors. She has my respect.

    2. The Rev Kev

      Meanwhile Bill Clinton and Prince Andrew continue to lead their lives instead of being in prison – along with scores of wealthy and power men. Hey Trump, where’s that list that you promised to publish as President? (crickets)

  29. Butch

    In the 80’s and 90’s, Manalapan was code for Ocean Inlet/ Boynton Inlet, about a mile south. Awesome waves. Sebastian, Stuart, Riviera Beach, Palm Beach would be packed wen the waves were up. There’d be 2 to 4 of us at Manalapan b/c no one knew where the hell it was. I guess that’s over…

  30. Jason Boxman

    COVID taste damage?

    My Matcha-Dusted, Lemon-Scented, Tahini-Drizzled Adventures in Flavormaxxing

    The coronavirus pandemic is a big reason for the way we eat now, said Bettina Makalintal, a senior reporter for Eater who started her popular Instagram account, @crispyegg420, during the early lockdowns. Her first post featured a piece of buttery sourdough toast, wilted kale and a sunny-side-up egg with dollops of chile crisp, a condiment that quickly became a staple of quarantine cooking and started appearing on big-box grocery store shelves.

    The headline intro

    In this era of hyperflavor, many people seek out increasingly elaborate combinations of ingredients and spices to satisfy — what exactly?

    Or maybe it’s all just an existential crisis of existence.

  31. XXYY

    Re. Measles:

    People listen to conspiracy theorists over scientists.

    Considering the miserable performance of scientists over the last five or six years, I think people have every reason to be skeptical of the scientific community. Especially when one considers that the origin of the covid virus itself may have been the scientific community.

    The fact is, the “conspiracy theorists” don’t have that bad of a track record if you look back over recent history. Just to take one example, scientists insisted that covid was spread by droplets, but conspiracy theorists told us it was spread through the air. The latter group was demonized for years while we spent millions and billions of dollars putting up plexiglass shields and scrubbing surfaces in public buildings.

    I could make a similar list stretching over many pages if I felt like spending the time.

    1. skippy

      I remember it differently mate. It was the conspiracy theorists under the banner of freedom and liberty that demanded everything opened up, let if rip, herd immunity, covid is just the flu, masks were a form of totalitarianism, etc etc …

      Ideologues wrapping themselves in the term scientist so they can gaslight the world is just a Upton quote at minimum or worse fully aware and continue anyway to preserve the narrative. Hayek would be chuffed.

    2. Jason Boxman

      I really don’t recall those that recognized airborne transmission as ever being conspiracy theorists. They were simply ignored.

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