Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: Deficits Matter Again (NY Times Column)
Why the Trump-Putin economy is not like Obama's.
U.S. Wages Rose 2.9% in December (Daily Beast)
According to The Wall Street Journal, President Obama's final full month in office was the 75th straight month in which employers added jobs-extending the longest streak on record since 1939.
Theresa May's 'shared society': magic policies that don't need any money (The Guardian)
Quick! Look over there at something that's not Brexit!
Dr. Luisa Dillner: What is belly fat and how can you shift it? (The Guardian)
The good news is visceral fat is so dynamic that you can shift it. You just have to eat less and exercise more - about half an hour a day of quite vigorous exercise should do it.
Tim Jonze: Once the baby man was a figure to be mocked. Now, manfants such as Donald Trump are taking over (The Guardian)
Why are we tolerating this widespread immaturity and not just sending them to bed with no pudding?
Richard Godwin: "Live by Night: how the gangster film went from top of the world to sleeping with the fishes" (The Guardian)
Mobster movies were once the pinnacle of film-making. Ben Affleck's homage to the classics could sound the genre's death knell.
David Barnett: V for Vendetta is a manual for rebellion against injustice (The Guardian)
Written in the Thatcher era, Alan Moore and David Lloyd's story of standing up to dystopian authority has lost none of its relevance.
Sam Jordison: "The Code of the Woosters: PG Wodehouse's guide to fighting fascism" (The Guardian)
Forget about the author's wartime mistakes, the way Bertie tackles Mosley-esque thug Roderick Spode is a great lesson in sending up would-be despots.
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David Bruce has over 80 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
wrote:
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Team Coco
CONAN
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Reader Suggestion
Key & Peele
Friend Janet in Texas found this video of Key & Peele doing Obama & Luther (the anger translator) making the farewell address.
As Janet says, just call me Luther:
Reader Comment
The Election
Marty,
DJ Useo has opined:
"You know, I was certain for months that trump was deliberately trying
to lose the race. I sure don't think he legitimately won. Sorry to
say."
I agree with him. It also seemed to me that T-rump also did not
really want to win, as he would more than just occasionally say (and
do) really stupid shit. But then, I look at Trump's opposition and
imagine how all the low-renters of "Fly-over" America was perceiving
the race. You know, all us "deplorables?"
So, yes ... did he really "win?" Regardless of whatever hacking
claims are being made about who initially outed Hillary's and
Podesta's emails, it has been determined that the emails are yet
accurate copies and consequently, relevant. Apparently, voting
America, as represented by the Electoral College, uncommonly found
those particular emails most objectionable.
Also ultimately, the question here is not just whether Tiny-hands
legitimately won the election, but more importantly, encompasses
whether Hillary legally lost it.
You see, in states like California, mail-in ballots are only counted
if the polling-station margin of victory for the winning candidate is
smaller than the number of ballots mailed in. Consistently, mail-in
ballots also tend to be 60/30/10% in favor of Republican candidates.
It is most likely that the national "Popular" vote advantage that
Hillary supposedly had is not near as significant as alleged, and at
best would still have been kicked to Capitol Hill.
It really is a shame that the Democratic Party's better candidate was
cheated out of his chance to be considered against Trump. His baggage
of personal historical conduct was not nearly as objectionable to the
anti-sex pervert coalitions of Progressive America as was that nuclear
wasteland of Hillary and her multi-rapist husband.
DanD
Thanks, Dan!
from Marc Perkel
Patriot Act
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
REPUBLICANS PUNISHING WOMEN!
THE SLIPPERY SLOPE!
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Rained pretty good.
Plans Tour
U2
U2 on Monday announced a stadium tour of North America and Europe to mark 30 years since "The Joshua Tree," the Irish group's seminal album.
U2 will start the 25 shows on May 12 in Vancouver -- the second straight tour that the band has opened in the western Canadian city -- and end on August 1 in Brussels.
The tour will mark the first stadium-size shows by U2 since the group's 2009-2011 "360" concerts, which remain the highest-grossing tour in music history.
Released in March 1987, "The Joshua Tree" reached into the roots of Irish and American music and produced classic hits "With or Without You," "Where the Streets Have No Name" and "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For."
Frontman Bono brought a political edge to the lyrics, taking on violent conflict and US support for Latin American dictatorships under Ronald Reagan.
U2
Suspended From Twitter For Harassment
'Pharma Bro'
Former U.S. drug executive Martin Shkreli, dubbed the "pharma bro" and vilified for raising the price of a lifesaving drug by 5,000 percent, was suspended by Twitter on Sunday for harassing a female journalist.
Shkreli, a supporter of Republican President-elect Donald Trump (R-Grifter), had dogged freelance reporter Lauren Duca, including sending her requests for dates, after she wrote an op-ed piece for Teen Vogue that was critical of Trump.
After the suspension, Duca tweeted, "Why is harassment an automatic career hazard for a woman receiving any amount of professional attention?"
Duca had drawn media attention for her article in December arguing that Trump had conned U.S. voters. Shkreli then tweeted about trying to date her, and he sent her an invitation on Thursday to attend Trump's Jan. 20 inauguration as his guest.
Duca replied on Twitter, "I would rather eat my own organs."
'Pharma Bro'
Renewals
CW
The CW was quick to renew some of its shows for the 2017-2018 TV season. On Sunday at the Television Critics Association winter press tour, the network announced early renewals for seven series. This early pickup list included "The Flash," "Supernatural," "Crazy Ex-Girlfriend," "Arrow," "DC's Legends Of Tomorrow," "Jane The Virgin" and CBS import "Supergirl."
Which means, "Supernatural" has been renewed for Season 13!
Of course, the series really wasn't in danger of being canceled so its renewal isn't a surprise to long-time fans. According to TVLine, "The Flash" is The CW's highest rated series. More than 3 million people tune in to the superhero show every week. It also enjoys a 1.2 demo rating. The second highest performing show is "Supergirl" drawing a weekly audience of 2.7 million viewers and a 0.9 demo rating. The third place goes to "Supernatural," "Arrow" and "Legends of Tomorrow" since they average a 0.7 rating season-to-date.
"Supernatural" makes considerable money for the network in syndication deals. Now that the series will have thirteen seasons, it will make even more money for The CW.
CW
Have Invaded Nearly 100% of Australia
Feral Cats
The cat's out of the bag - and all over Australia. A new study finds that feral cats inhabit 99.8 percent of the continent's landmass, including 80 percent of the land that makes up its islands.
Feral cats have long been recognized as a grave and widespread threat to vulnerable native wildlife - particularly in Australia, where species found nowhere else in the world are ill-equipped to deal with these invasive and deadly predators. But despite conservationists' efforts to track the felines' environmental impacts, the number of cats roaming Australia has remained elusive.
To put a number to the catastrophic invasion, 40 environmental researchers compiled data from nearly 100 relevant studies, finding that Australia hosts at least 2.1 million feral cats when prey is less abundant; when prey are plentiful, that number jumps to as many as 6.3 million.
European explorers first introduced cats to Australia in the 18th century. With no large predators and easy access to tasty small animals, the invasive felines swiftly adapted to the hospitable continent. Since then, feral cats have contributed to the extinction of close to 30 native mammal species - such as the big-eared hopping mouse, the Eastern hare-wallaby and the pig-footed bandicoot - and are instrumental in the current decline of many more, the study authors wrote.
"Australia is the only continent on Earth other than Antarctica where the animals evolved without cats, which is a reason our wildlife is so vulnerable to them," Gregory Andrews, Australia's Threatened Species Commissioner, said in a statement.
Feral Cats
2nd-Warmest Year On Record
U.S.
The U.S. had its second-warmest year on record in 2016, with every single state having a warmer-than-average year, according to a report released Monday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
While records were toppled virtually everywhere, Alaska earned the title of having the most unusually warm year.
Alaska, which is America's only Arctic state, had an average annual temperature of 31.9 degrees Fahrenheit, which was 5.9 degrees Fahrenheit above average. The state had its second-warmest winter, warmest spring, second-warmest summer and a warmer-than-average fall.
This wound up being the third straight warmest year on record in Alaska, where temperature records go back 92 years.
According to NOAA, Barrow, which is the northernmost city in the country, was 7.1 degrees Fahrenheit above average. For the first time in Alaska's climate record, its average spring temperature hit 32 degrees Fahrenheit, or 0 degrees Celsius.
U.S.
Withhold Public Fracking Information
Virginia
A bill adding an amendment to the Virginia Freedom of Information Act, offered to the state's House floor for a vote Monday, would keep descriptions of chemical ingredients involved in hydraulic fracturing in the state out of the public eye.
If HB 1678, along with its sister bill, HB 1679, pass, companies engaging in hydraulic fracking in Virginia will be able to file for protection of records regarding the names of chemical ingredients and quantities of those chemicals involved in "ground-disturbing activities." Virginia's Department of Mines, Minerals and Energy would decide whether such information could be deemed a "trade secret" worthy of a shield from FOIA inquiries, which often come from reporters and activists.
Kristin Davis, a staff attorney at the Southern Environmental Law Center, told International Business Times the bill not only put Virginians at risk by keeping them from knowing whether their well water might be contaminated by nearby fracking, but also destroyed years of regulatory work by a number of activists and groups including the SELC.
"Virginia just spent the past three years making regulation requiring drillers to provide that information," Davis said, adding that the requirement went into effect Dec. 28. "HB 1678 really seeks to rewrite the new regulations... That is not something that the stakeholders agreed to during all the years of discussion."
State Rep. Roxann Robinson, who introduced the amendment, did not respond to calls and emails from IB Times by press time.
Virginia
Texans Give Offensive Gift
Taiwan
On Monday, China said it "firmly opposed" Sunday's meeting between Taiwanese leader Tsai Ing-wen and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. Cruz and Tsai reportedly discussed "arms sales, diplomatic exchanges and economic relations," while Abbott's conversation was more focused on agriculture and gas trade. Abbott also presented a culturally offensive gift.
While Tsai stuck to an appropriate vase, Abbott gave Tsai "a clock bearing the Texas state seal." In Mandarin, the phrase "give a clock" sounds like "attend a funeral," and so giving a clock is, per Foreign Policy Asia editor James Palmer, "basically the Chinese equivalent of 'Luca Brasi sleeps with the fishes.'" In other words, it is highly taboo.
In fact, in 2015, Baroness Susan Kramer, then-British minister of state for transport, gave Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je a pocket watch on a visit to Taiwan. Though Ko noted that he did not believe in such superstitions, he also joked that he might sell it to a scrap metal dealer. Kramer apologized, insisting that she did not know of the taboo. "I had no idea a gift like this could be seen as anything other than positive: In the U.K. a watch is precious - because nothing is more important than time," she said.
Leaving aside that using Taiwan as a bargaining chip may not, in fact, be the best way to establish the long-term security of Taiwan, this Texas meeting raises a few questions. First, why is Cruz, whose father Trump accused of being involved in the assassination of U.S. President John Kennedy, charged with carrying out this renewed relationship with Taiwan? Second, if relations were to be renegotiated, would that not be at the federal, and not, say, Texas level? And if so, why was Abbott there? Because it probably wasn't for his cultural sensitivity.
Taiwan
Sells China Operations
McDonald's
US fast-food giant McDonald's will sell a controlling stake in its China and Hong Kong business for up to $2.08 billion to a consortium including state-owned Citic and the Carlyle Group, it was announced Monday.
The deal is part of an international turnaround plan by the Golden Arches as it struggles with sluggish growth at home.
Citic Limited, Citic Capital Holdings, Carlyle Group and McDonald's will form a company that will act as a franchisee for the chain's business in mainland China and Hong Kong for 20 years, the companies said in a joint statement.
Citic is a vast Chinese state-owned conglomerate with interests in businesses ranging from energy and manufacturing to real estate.
Citic and Citic Capital will have a stake of 52 percent, Carlyle will take 28 percent and McDonald's will retain 20 percent of the new company.
McDonald's
Could Trigger Collapse Of Ocean Current
Climate Change
In the 2004 disaster film "The Day After Tomorrow," global warming leads to the failure of an enormous current in the Atlantic Ocean, triggering catastrophic natural disasters and establishing freezing conditions in North America and Europe over a matter of weeks.
That scenario might not be so far-fetched, researchers have found.
The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), a deep-sea system that circulates warm water and helps to regulate Earth's climate, is far less stable than scientists once thought, according to a new study. Under climate-change pressures such as dramatic increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), the AMOC could even collapse entirely, resulting in a much colder Northern Hemisphere and a wetter tropical Atlantic region.
This particular scenario wouldn't happen for hundreds of years - if it happens at all, the study authors wrote. However, computer models used to predict Earth's climate future typically represent AMOC as relatively stable. An unstable AMOC, as described in the study, changes the equation and presents a future several centuries from now in which the current weakens and ultimately fails to recover from repeated disruption, with dire consequences for the global climate.
AMOC operates like a gigantic climate conveyer belt. In the depths of the Atlantic Ocean, cold, dense waters are carried southward, toward the equator. At the same time, closer to the surface, the current transports heat (in the form of warm, less dense water) from the tropics to the North, where it gets transferred into the atmosphere and warms the air. This heat exchange is what drives and maintains global climate patterns, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Climate Change
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