M Is FOR MASHUP - March 28th, 2018
DJ Useo took the day off.
Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: Putting the Ex-Con in Conservatism (NY Times Column)
The modern G.O.P. is no country for honest men.
Joe Bob Briggs: "News Alert: The Russians Aren't Stupid" (Taki's Magazine)
"Okay, guys," he's likely to say. "As soon as you get authorization on these encrypted desktops, create a couple of fake American Facebook pages and show us what you can do. Boris, you do pro-gun control, and Ivan, you do Second Amendment gun rights. Whoever gets to 30,000 followers first is the winner." In other words, this is the kind of stuff, in the intelligence services, that interns do. What is it about these fake Facebook accounts that makes people so angry?
Joe Bob Briggs: None of the Above (Taki's Magazine)
Here's a simple rule: If you go into the election booth and your first reaction is "Wow, this is too much information to deal with, I think I might have heard of one of these guys, but then again maybe he has the same name as the East Side rapist," this is a signal to exit the voting booth. Go home. Open your Facebook account. Somebody will ask you whether NFL football players should take a knee. Tell them you don't give a flying frijole. Feel good about yourself. You just voted None of the Above.
Former US Navy Admiral, Former US Navy Admiral, William H. McRaven, conquers his day with this one small task in the morning (YouTube)
"Spoiler alert: hats off to our men and women in uniform - especially ones like this." - Andrew Tobias
Hannah Devlin: "The naturopath whistleblower: 'It is surprisingly easy to sell snake oil'" (The Guardian)
Britt Maria Hermes was a committed practitioner in America's multi-billion-dollar complementary medicine industry. Then she found her clinic's herbal treatment for cancer was potentially illegal - and overnight became a highly vocal sceptic.
Suzanne Moore: Think you're immune to advertising? It's the greatest trick Facebook ever pulled (The Guardian)
Now that digital ads are fragmented and microtargeted, we have no idea how minds are being changed - and that's scary.
Peter Bradshaw: From Hidden to No Country for Old Men - why the 2000s is my favourite film decade (The Guardian)
Featuring Coen brothers masterpieces and an astonishing run by Michael Haneke, this was the decade in which film rediscovered its history - and explored its future - thanks to digital technology.
Peter Bradshaw: The Son's Room (The Guardian)
No self-respecting sophisticate admits to crying in a film - unless in carefully ironised or sentimentalised terms which announce a warm tribute to your inner child, while leaving untouched the dignity of the outer adult.
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David Bruce has over 80 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
Presenting
Michael Egan
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Reader Comment
Current Events
Janet found the craigslist ad linked below. The person who wrote the ad captures it all beautifully. (Vacancies in the near future? Hit refresh. Now again.)
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
from Marc Perkel
Marc's Guide to Curing Cancer
So far so good on beating cancer for now. I'm doing fine. At the end of the month I'll be 16 months into an 8 month mean lifespan. And yesterday I went on a 7 mile hike and managed to keep up with the hiking group I was with. So, doing something right.
Still waiting for future test results and should see things headed in the right direction. I can say that it's not likely that anything dire happens in the short term so that means that I should have time to make several more attempts at this. So even if it doesn't work the first time there are a lot of variations to try. So if there's bad news it will help me pick the next radiation target.
I have written a "how to" guide for oncologists to perform the treatment that I got. I'm convinced that I'm definitely onto something and whether it works for me or not isn't the definitive test. I know if other people tried this that it would work for some of them, and if they improve it that it will work for a lot of them.
The guide is quite detailed and any doctor reading this can understand the procedure at every level. I also go into detail as to how it works, how I figured it out, and variations and improvements that could be tried to enhance it. I also introduce new ways to look at the problem. There is a lot of room for improvement and I think that doctors reading it will see what I'm talking about and want to build on it. And it's written so that if you're not a doctor you can still follow it. It also has a personal story revealing that I'm the class clown of cancer support group. I give great interviews and I look pretty hot in a lab coat.
So, feel free to read this and see what I'm talking about. But if any of you want to help then pass this around to both doctors and cancer patients. I need some media coverage. I'm looking for as many eyeballs as possible to read these ideas. Even if this isn't the solution, it's definitely on the right track. After all, I did hike 7 miles yesterday. And this hiking group wasn't moving slow. So if this isn't working then, why am I still here?
I also see curing cancer as more of an engineering problem that a medical problem. So if you are good at solving problems and most of what you know about medicine was watching the Dr. House MD TV show, then you're at the level I was at when I started. So anyone can jump in and be part of the solution.
Here is a link to my guide: Oncologists Guide to Curing Cancer using Abscopal Effect
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
ELIMINATE THE SECOND AMENDMENT!
'MONEY FOR KILLING AND DICKS FOR FREE.'
TRUMP'S COURT JESTER.
REPUBLICAN CRIMINALS RUN FOR OFFICE!
THE FAKE LIVES OF RING WING JERKS.
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and seasonal.
If ICE Comes Knocking
ACLU
A new series of animated films from the American Civil Liberties Union seeks to help immigrants know their rights so they can better protect themselves when interacting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
On Tuesday, the ACLU and legal defense group Brooklyn Defender Services released four animated short films in seven languages as part of a new "We have rights" campaign. The films are narrated by celebrities, including actor Jesse Williams narrating the English films; actress Diane Guerrero, the Spanish; and comedian Kumail Nanjiani, the Urdu. The films cover four common situations immigrants may have to confront: what to do if ICE is at their door, in their home, in their neighborhood, or arrests them.
"It's to provide information to [immigrant] communities, but also to expose a broader American public to ICE's tactics, to what's actually happening to immigrant communities," Natalie Montelongo, campaign strategist with ACLU's immigrant rights division, told HuffPost Friday.
Beyond the videos, ACLU's "We have rights" website will feature a tool to help immigrants create "emergency preparedness plans," such as a document laying out who children should call if ICE detains their undocumented parent.
In the months to come, the group plans to roll out an "on the ground" campaign, including training people to be "legal observers," to identify instances where ICE may be violating immigrants' rights and encourage them to record the interaction.
ACLU
Watching Arctic Sea Ice
NASA
NASA spends a lot of its time gazing into the depths of the cosmos, but one of the great things about having high-powered cameras orbiting our planet is that you can easily observe changes to Earth as well. NASA uses that power to provide data on sea ice levels via the National Snow and Ice Data Center, which records the seasonal changes in the amount of sea ice and plots trends over time. Now, in its most recent data dump, the group is once again sounding the global warming alarm, and things aren't looking good.
According to the most recent readings, the annual sea ice maximum - that is, the point at which the most Arctic sea ice is present, on a per-year basis - has been at its lowest points over the past four years. That means that out of all the recorded data, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018 were lower than every other year, and the numbers aren't even close.
Arctic sea ice goes through relatively predictable changes over the course of each year. At its thickest, which typically occurs from late February to early April, its maximum is recorded, and this important data point offers an overall glimpse at how the Earth's temperature is changing on the larger timeline.
Variations are expected on a year-to-year basis, but the long-term trends reveal that the planet is indeed getting warmer, and as sea ice levels drop we get closer to reaching (if we haven't already reached) the all-important "tipping point" at which the planet may not be able to recover from the changes humanity has wrought.
"The Arctic sea ice cover continues to be in a decreasing trend and this is connected to the ongoing warming of the Arctic," Claire Parkinson, a senior climate scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, said in a statement. "It's a two-way street: the warming means less ice is going to form and more ice is going to melt, but also, because there's less ice, less of the sun's incident solar radiation is reflected off, and this contributes to the warming."
NASA
'Beginning Of The End?'
Right Whales
The winter calving season for critically endangered right whales is ending without a single newborn being spotted off the southeast U.S. coast, a reproductive drought unseen for three decades that experts say brings the rare species a perilous step closer to extinction.
"It's a pivotal moment for right whales," said Barb Zoodsma, who oversees the right whale recovery program in the U.S. Southeast for the National Marine Fisheries Service. "If we don't get serious and figure this out, it very well could be the beginning of the end."
Researchers have been looking since December for newborn right whales off the coasts of Georgia and Florida, where pregnant whales typically migrate each winter to give birth in warmer Atlantic waters.
Trained spotters in airplanes who spend the season scouting the coastal waters for mother-and-calf pairs found nothing this season. They wrap up work when the month ends Saturday.
The timing could hardly be worse. Scientists estimate only about 450 North Atlantic right whales remain, and the species suffered terribly in 2017. A total of 17 right whales washed up dead in the U.S. and Canada last year, far outpacing five births.
Right Whales
Descendants Hit Back
Alexander Graham Bell
Descendants of Alexander Graham Bell have accused a Canadian tax adjudicator of bias after he questioned, during a dispute over a hefty property tax assessment, the legitimacy of Bell's claim to have invented the telephone.
Bell, who was born in Edinburgh but spent much of his life in Canada, is widely credited with patenting the first telephone in 1876. He later founded the telecommunications company AT&T.
But that history has been challenged in a tax dispute over Bell's sprawling estate of Beinn Bhreagh Hall in the province of Nova Scotia.
According to provincial authorities, the property is worth C$885,000 - a figure Bell's descendants say is almost twice what they think it's worth. They argue that because the 125-year-old site is a heritage property, mandatory maintenance costs diminish its market value.
The row deepened last year when tax adjudicator Raffi Balmanoukian issued a written decision in the case, saying: "I confess I am not a fan of [Bell's] claim to fame."
Alexander Graham Bell
Playbook
Stormy
Looking to get ahead in President Donald Trump's Washington? Borrow his media playbook.
With suggestive statements, cryptic tweets, provocative lawsuits and must-see television interviews, Trump's adversaries are using some of his own tactics to grab - and keep - the spotlight. From adult film star Stormy Daniels to former FBI Director James Comey, each has become a must-see supporting character in the president's daily drama.
At the moment, the most visible is Daniels, who received a $130,000 payment to stay silent about an alleged affair with Trump and is now seeking to invalidate a non-disclosure agreement. She and her attorney Michael Avenatti have teased out details of her relationship with Trump for weeks, with Avenatti giving explosive interviews almost daily and Daniels taunting the president on social media.
Avenatti and Daniels have also hinted she might have proof of the affair. Avenatti tweeted a photo of a CD-Rom that purported to contain evidence. And when Daniels was asked on CBS' "60 Minutes" if she had texts, images or other items, she replied: "I can't answer that right now." It was, of course, the kind of cliffhanger Trump has perfected.
He mastered the art of the tease, building suspense in the name of more attention, long before he ran for office. He's employed similar tactics in the White House, bringing reality show stylings to the often mundane functions of government.
Stormy
Are Thriving
Elites
President-for-now Trump (R-Corrupt) paints himself as the patron saint of farm hands and factory workers. Yet the people faring best under the Trump presidency are those more likely to be his peers and guests at the swanky Mar-a-Lago club than the "forgotten men and women" who helped elect Trump.
The average Wall Street bonus hit an 11-year high of $184,220 last year, according to new data from the New York State comptroller. That's largely because profits at Wall Street trading firms rose 42% in 2017, to the highest level since 2010.
Public U.S. companies are on track to buy back a record $800 billion worth of their own shares this year, which would be a new record, according to J.P. Morgan Chase. That's largely because of the new cash freed by the sharp drop in business tax rates Trump signed last December. Share buybacks generally boost the value of stocks-since they reduce the supply of shares-which is a boon for shareholders.
The tax cuts themselves are a windfall for the wealthy. The Trump tax cuts include rate reductions in virtually every tax bracket, but they provide much bigger savings for the wealthy than for anybody else. An average middle-income family will save about $930 per year in lower taxes, according to the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. Tax savings, meanwhile, will average $13,480 for those in the top 5% of earners, $51,140 for the top 1%, and $193,380 for the top one-tenth of 1%.
Average wages, meanwhile, are rising a scant 2.6% per year.
Elites
NASA Delays Liftoff To 2020
Webb Space Telescope
NASA is delaying the scheduled launch of its next flagship observatory, the $8.8 billion James Webb Space Telescope, by a year - which may hike its cost so high that Congress will have to OK more money.
Acting agency administrator Robert Lightfoot said that the outlook for additional delays emerged from an internal schedule review, and that a new date for the telescope's launch on an Ariane 5 rocket would be negotiated with the European Space Agency.
For now, NASA is looking at launch in May 2020, rather than the spring of 2019 as previously planned.
The telescope has been in the works for decades, and cost overruns and schedule delays have accumulated steadily. There's no talk of canceling the project, but the setbacks announced today are sparking more than the usual soul-searching.
NASA will be adding personnel from Goddard Space Flight Center to monitor the integration and testing of the telescope's two halves at Northrop Grumman's facility in California. It'll also set up an independent review board - chaired by Tom Young, a retired aerospace executive and former NASA official - to ensure that the project will stay on track.
Webb Space Telescope
A Million People
'Uninhabited' Amazon
Areas of the Amazon previously thought to be uninhabited may have been home to up to a million people in the centuries before Christopher Columbus arrived, new archaeological research has found.
Scientists from Britain and Brazil uncovered evidence of hundreds of fortified villages in the rainforest away from the major rivers -- areas long thought untouched by human civilisation before Europeans arrived in the late 15th century.
The findings, published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications, follows the discovery of extensive earthworks and fortifications in another region of Brazil, bordering on Peru.
Researchers now believe such pre-Columbian habitations could stretch over an area as wide as 400,000 square kilometres, and may have been home to between 500,000 and a million people.
The discovery of 81 new archaeological sites dating back to 1250-1500 -- among them 104 large geometrical earthworks -- was based in part on satellite images.
'Uninhabited' Amazon
Researchers Discover Mummy
Mer-Neith-it-es
Since it was bought 160 years ago, University of Sydney archaeologists didn't think there was much to a particular sarcophagus in its collection.
The coffin of one Mer-Neith-it-es sat in the Nicholson Museum, listed as empty in a 1948 handbook, while the museum database said it contained "mixed debris."
Dating circa 664-525 BCE, it had been purchased by an early founder of the university, Sir Charles Nicholson, as part of 408 Egyptian objects that would form a basis for a collection.
It all changed last June, when researchers needed to take a photo of the previously undocumented hieroglyphics under the coffin. That's where they discovered the remains of human feet and bones.
The discovery led to researchers embarking on a project to document all the mummies in the Nicholson Museum. Fraser said they had never been dealt with before because of how difficult and sensitive one needs to be when dealing with human remains.
Mer-Neith-it-es
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