Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Marc Dion: I'm a Drug War Success (Creators Syndicate)
If you add all the Americans who take Xanax to all the Americans who drink beer, and all the Americans who use cocaine, and all the Americans who smoke meth, and all the Americans who use heroin, and all the Americans who use prescription pain killers, it's a wonder anything ever gets done around here. Which it does not.
Froma Harrop: Would Climate Engineering Be Playing God? (Creators Syndicate)
There are also conventional means of carbon capture. Trees do it. (Devices that capture carbon basically operate like artificial trees.) Plowing the soil releases carbon, but planting cover crops keeps it in the ground.
Ted Rall: "The Secret Campaign for 2020: Where the Democratic Candidates Stand on Foreign Policy" (Creators Syndicate)
The military sucks up 54% of discretionary federal spending. Pentagon bloat has a huge effect on domestic priorities; the nearly $1 trillion a year that goes to exploiting, oppressing, torturing, maiming and murdering foreigners could go to building schools, curing diseases, funding college scholarships, poetry slams, whatever. Anything, even tax cuts for the rich, would be better than bombs. But as then-presidential candidate Mike Huckabee said in 2015: "The military is not a social experiment. The purpose of the military is to kill people and break things." If you're like me, you want as little killing and breaking as possible.
Lenore Skenazy: Does Fear Ring a Bell? (Creators Syndicate)
Note to Amazon if you're listening (and I'm pretty sure they are): Streaming stranger danger and a "Call the cops!" mentality into the collective bloodstream is not a new kind of neighborliness. It's a new level of lockdown, as calming as "Hit the floor!"
Mark Shields: A Uniquely American Story (Creators Syndicate)
Feb. 19, 1942, was not President Franklin Roosevelt's finest day. Some 10 weeks after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, FDR signed Executive Order 9066, which violated the legal rights of some 120,000 Japanese Americans. In short order, people of Japanese descent were given just 48 hours to dispose of their homes, their farms, their businesses. Their investments and their bank accounts were expropriated.
Susan Estrich: Rapists Go Free Day (Creators Syndicate)
If you find a 16-year-old being locked in a box, it shouldn't matter how the relationship started. If you prey on a 14-year-old (or anyone else), it shouldn't matter that you've only raped one girl. It's still rape. These should be easy cases. The fact that they are not tells you that there are rapists going free every day of the week.
Dream McClinton: "Stephen Colbert: 'Trump has never read one word of the Bible'" (The Guardian)
Late-night hosts discussed William Barr's no-show and the president's fumbled attempt to quote from the Bible.
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Presenting
Michael Egan
responded:
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
from Bruce
Anecdotes
• For a while, Michael Sembello, although he preferred jazz, played guitar for Stevie Wonder. A friend got Mr. Sembello to audition by pretending that they were going to a place to jam, but he did mention that Stevie Wonder would be present. When Mr. Sembello found out that it was an audition, he was ready to leave immediately. For one thing, about 200 people were there to audition, and the wait would be very long to play. His friend, however, waited until no one was looking and erased the first five names on the audition list and put his name and Mr. Sembello's name first. Mr. Wonder was going in a different, more jazzy direction at this time, and so Mr. Sembello had an advantage on the other guitarists although they knew the Stevie Wonder catalog of hits. Mr. Sembello remembered, "It was kind of like a game show for guitar players: if you hang in there you got to stay, but if you screw up you were eliminated." Mr. Sembello got to stay. At one point, Mr. Wonder played some songs from an album that had not yet been released, but Mr. Sembello "copped the changes immediately." When Mr. Wonder asked him how he was able to do that, Mr. Sembello replied that he had a good ear. Mr. Wonder asked if he had heard the new album, and Mr. Sembello replied that he had not. Mr. Wonder asked an assistant, "Is the album out yet?" No, it was not. Next question: "How the hell do you know these tunes?" "I don't know the tunes. I'm just guessing where you're gonna go." "You've got the gig." "I didn't come here for no gig - I just came here to jam." Mr. Sembello ended up taking the job. He said about the experience of working for Mr. Wonder, "I had all the technical ability in the world and could play like the fastest guitar player in the West, but he was the one who taught me the most about feel."
• Arthur Whittemore and Jack Lowe became a two-piano team by accident. In 1935, when Arthur was 19 years old and Jack was 18 years old, Arthur's aunt invited him to visit her in Puerto Rico. Arthur wanted his friend Jack to come with him, so he told his aunt that he and Jack were a two-piano team and so Jack had to come, too, so they could continue to practice together. His aunt invited Jack to visit, and she arranged a two-piano concert for Arthur and Jack to play in San Juan, Puerto Rico. As soon as they found out that Arthur's aunt expected them to play a two-piano concert, the two young men immediately began to practice together. They had no music for two pianos, so they transcribed famous musical classics. The concert was so successful that they decided to continue working as a team. This is fortunate for music history because they were so good, and because both were so gregarious that they probably would not have worked as solo piano virtuoso pianists because they would have hated being lonely while traveling on tour. One of their prized possessions was a letter from twentieth-century French composer Francis Poulenc, to whom they had sent a copy of their recording of his Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra - the orchestra was the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Leonard Bernstein. Mr. Poulenc wrote, "Your performance of the Concerto, like that of [Vladimir] Horowitz of my Toccata, is the one for posterity."
• Early in its history, online book seller Amazon lacked money and inventory space. Of course, it needed to order books, but book distributors required that each order contain at least ten books, and Amazon often needed only one book. Amazon found a way to receive one book in an order. It would order a copy of the book it needed, and then add to the order nine copies of an obscure book on lichens that was always out of stock. By the way, early employees worked long hours. One employee spent eight months getting up, biking to work, working, and then biking back home and going to sleep. He completely forgot about his blue station wagon and the city law requiring it to be moved occasionally. After eight months, the employee had time to look at his mail - anything that wasn't a bill he had put in a pile. He found several parking tickets, a notice telling him that his car had been moved, a few notices from the towing company, and finally a notice that his car had been auctioned off.
• Dawn Foster, who wrote the opinion piece "I hate my job, I hate my job, I hate my job - what many think but won't tell the boss," for the British newspaper The Guardian, knows that many people hate their jobs, often for good reason. She remembers being a temp at a company where, on her last day at work, her boss dumped a lot of work involving invoices on her desk and told her that once again she - the boss - was way too busy to do these invoices. Ms. Foster wrote in her opinion piece, "With nothing to lose, I pointed out that she had a large plate glass window behind her, so for the entire length of my temp job, I'd been able to see that she spent most of the day playing Spider Solitaire."
• The union animators at the Disney studio once went on strike, and of course they wanted people not to see Disney animated movies so they picketed various movie theaters showing Disney's The Reluctant Dragon. At the Pantages Theater in Hollywood, a uniformed doorman would open the car doors and greet moviegoers. (This was a long time ago.) A chauffeured limousine pulled up, the doorman opened the car doors, and a fabulously dressed couple got out. The chauffeur also got out and handed the fabulously dressed couple a picket, and they joined the picket line. The fabulously dressed couple was Steve and Audrey Busustow, and the chauffeur was Maurice Noble. Steve and Maurice were on strike against Disney. Eventually, the strike was resolved by arbitration in favor of the union.
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Original Costume At LA Auction
Darth Vader
A rare and authentic Darth Vader costume from "Star Wars" is set for auction this month in Los Angeles.
The 17-piece costume used in "Star Wars: Episode V - The Empire Strikes Back" is outfitted with everything from gloves, boots and a pair of capes to a cod piece and a battery pack.
Auctioneers estimate the costume will be sold for anywhere from $1-2 million when it goes on the block May 14 at Bonhams Los Angeles.
The costume itself is owned by Bryce "Kermit" Eller, who landed a gig in 1977 making personal appearances as Darth Vader all over the country, from film premieres to book signings and even the 1978 Academy Awards.
Eller wore the original -and only - Darth Vader costume from the original "Star Wars: Episode IV-A New Hope". By 1979, he was provided with one of a few complete costumes produced for The Empire Strikes Back, which is the one currently up for auction.
Darth Vader
Wayne State University
Jack White
Jack White has long been a renaissance man. Following up last year's experimental solo album Boarding House Reach, this year he revived The Raconteurs after a decade. Plus, the sought-after producer and guitarist maintains his own record label, Third Man Records, and has spearheaded documentary series like 2017's American Epic. Now, White has added a new accolade to the list, as later today, he'll officially become a doctor.
White is one of three figures set to receive an honorary doctorate from Wayne State University on Friday. The rock icon will attend the school's graduation ceremony in his hometown of Detroit to accept "an honorary doctor of humane letters degree for his dedication to Detroit and significant contributions to the arts as one of the most prolific and renowned artists of the past two decades." The Dead Weather co-founder will be joined by fellow honorees Florine Mark, president and CEO of the WW Group (fka Weight Watchers), and Earl Lewis, a leading social justice scholar and champion.
Born and raised in southwest Detroit, White graduated from Cass Technical High School, worked as an upholsterer and played in underground bands before founding The White Stripes, a garage rock duo that revolutionized music. White has won 12 Grammy Awards, and all three of his solo albums have reached number one on Billboard charts. Rolling Stone recognized him as one of 'The 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.' He has collaborated with Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones, Pearl Jam and Beyoncé, to name a few."
Jack White
"Knob Touch"
Moby
Moby turned up on Friday's "Real Time With Bill Maher" to share a whopper of a story about the time he says he rubbed his penis up against Donald Trump (R-OfVlad).
Needless to say, the musician and animal rights activist was drunk at the time - and Trump was years away from becoming leader of the free world.
"There was one night, it was about 2001, and I was out at a party and I was very drunk," Moby told Maher, before adding that he's been sober for 10 years. "I was with some friends and they were telling me about a game they used to play in college called Knob Touch."
As Moby explained, both in his new memoir "Then It Fell Apart" and on Maher's show, "Knob Touch is when you take your flaccid penis out of your pants … and you walk around a room and you brush your flaccid penis up against people indiscriminately - it's not sexual, there's no gender involved."
Then Moby continued with his story: "My girlfriend at the time dared me to Knob Touch Donald Trump. So I've only rubbed my flaccid penis against one person in the entire world and that man is currently on a golden toilet in the White House tweeting about something."
Moby
Quick Update
George RR Martin
George RR Martin has emerged from the crypts of Winterfell today with a new blog post, which offers no details on his upcoming books but does have some information on HBO's ongoing attempts to extend the Game of Thrones universe.
Responding to recent reports of at least one of the Game of Thrones successors being canned, Martin said that three successors, out of a starting slate of five, are still in development:
Oh, and speaking of television, don't believe everything you read. Internet reports are notoriously unreliable. We have had five different GAME OF THRONES successor shows in development (I mislike the term "spinoffs") at HBO, and three of them are still moving forward nicely. The one I am not supposed to call THE LONG NIGHT will be shooting later this year, and two other shows remain in the script stage, but are edging closer. What are they about? I cannot say. But maybe some of you should pick up a copy of FIRE & BLOOD and come up with your own theories.
Fire & Blood being the title of Martin's Westerosi history book, this suggests that at least one of the series is going to be delving into that history. As for what The Long Night could mean, I'll leave it to you all to speculate. Westeros lore nerds, this is your time to shine.
George RR Martin
Faulty Material
NASA
After a lengthy investigation, NASA has finally pinned down the reason two science missions failed to launch. A supplier had been sending faulty aluminium for rocket parts - after fraudulently altering test results and falsifying certifications.
The supplier was Sapa Profiles, Inc. (SPI), an Oregon-based aluminium extrusion manufacturer, and it had been perpetrating its fraud for 19 years. Not just against NASA, but hundreds of customers.
After a multi-year technical investigation, NASA's Launch Services Program has revealed that SPI had been falsifying the results of its tensile tests, designed to ensure the consistency and reliability of the aluminium it extruded.
"It is critical that we are able to trust our industry to produce, test and certify materials in accordance with the standards we require," said Jim Norman, director for Launch Services at NASA Headquarters. "In this case, our trust was severely violated."
The company has been ordered by the Department of Justice to pay $46 million to NASA, the Department of Defence and others it defrauded.
NASA
Black Hole Devouring a Neutron Star
Gravitational Waves
We've seen black hole mergers. We've seen that incredibly memorable neutron star merger. Now the LIGO-Virgo collaboration seems to be mixing it up, with what could be the first ever gravitational wave detection of a black hole devouring a neutron star.
It's only just come in, a burst of unusual gravitational waves, ripples in the very fabric of spacetime, the shockwaves of some colossal event, detected by the LIGO and Virgo observatories at 15:22:15 UTC on 26 April 2019.
Astronomers are still analysing the event, and it could turn out to be something completely different. But ever since that first gravitational wave discovery announced in February 2016 blew the field wide open, astronomers have been hoping to detect many different kinds of mergers.
An initial analysis put the odds that this event is a black hole-neutron star merger at only 13 percent, but scientists are still hopeful.
"This candidate is different from everything else that we've observed," as LIGO team member Gabriela González at Louisiana State University told New Scientist.
Gravitational Waves
Studied from Space
'The Great Whirl'
An enormous ocean whirlpool the size of Colorado appears every spring off the coast of Somalia, and it's so big, scientists can see it from space.
Satellite data recently revealed it's even bigger and lasts longer than once thought.
Known as the Great Whirl, this churning, clockwise vortex was first described in 1866 by British geographer Alexander Findley, in a book about navigating the Indian Ocean. Findley said that its whirling created "a very heavy confused sea," and recommended that sailors avoid its powerful currents when approaching the African coast.
The whirlpool starts to spin with the arrival of annual Rossby waves in the Indian Ocean. These slow-moving waves, which measure just a couple of inches in height, carry reservoirs of stored energy that fuel the vortex. Once the vortex is awhirl, the monsoon winds arrive and keep it spinning; at its peak, the Great Whirl can expand to over 300 miles (500 kilometers) wide, according to the 2013 study.
Still, researching it in greater depth has proved to be challenging. Because the vortex is so big, it behaves differently than smaller whirlpools. Efforts to study it have also been hampered by pirates who operate near the Somali coast, according to a new study.
'The Great Whirl'
"Raw" or "Unwashed"
Poppy Seeds
A Georgia man is dead and his family believes his death is tied to a product you can buy legally online or even at the grocery store.
Scientists say "raw" or "unwashed" poppy seeds can have morphine levels higher than a deadly dose of prescription drugs or even heroin.
The idea that poppy seeds can be dangerous has typically been played for laughs, even appearing as a joke on TV in the popular show "Seinfeld."
But safety groups say 12 deaths have been linked to poppy seed tea and the numbers are likely much higher. Scientists say that unless a special test is done, a poppy seed death looks like any other opioid overdose.
Scientists at Sam Houston State University tested the morphine levels of 22 different easily available brands of poppy seeds in their lab.
Poppy Seeds
Silly Political Ad Lib
Battle of Winterfell
Sometimes, actors just need to say something. Anything. That's a lot of pressure, especially when you're under stress. So occasionally you say weird things.
Jacob Anderson, for instance. Recently, D.B. Weiss and David Benioff, appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live to discuss the rapidly wrapping up final season of Game of Thrones, and revealed that Anderson, who plays Grey Worm, had a particular strange one during the Battle of Winterfell.
"At one point," Weiss said," Miguel [Sapochnik], the director, starts yelling at Jacob to improvise something in Valyrian, yell to your troops in Valyrian. And Jacob was so tired and so delirious and so out of it that all he could think to yell was, 'Mike Pence! Mike Pence! Mike Pence!' So in one of those scenes where Jacob is yelling and pointing-whatever he was saying was dubbed over-but what he was actually saying was, 'Mike Pence! Mike Pence!'"
For a series that once featured a George W. Bush prop head in a compromising situation, this isn't the most goofily political the show has gotten around the margins. My question, though: how do you say Mike Pence in Valyrian?
I mean, we already know how to say, "Release the Snyder Cut!" What more do you need to know?
Battle of Winterfell
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