By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
Chicken Tune of the Day
Northern Mockingbird, South Shore of Pueblo Reservoir, Pueblo, Colorado, United States. Begins slowly, however turns into fairly virtuosic.
In Case You Would possibly Miss…
- Trump: Time’s “Particular person of the Yr.”
- Why Ernst modified her thoughts on Hegseth; some hypothesis.
- Thumbs down on UCLA’s AI-designed textbook cowl.
“How a center schooler discovered a brand new compound in a chunk of goose poop” [Phys.org]. “A gaggle of younger college students grew to become bonafide biomedical scientists earlier than they even began highschool. By a partnership with a close-by college, the center schoolers collected and analyzed environmental samples to search out new antibiotic candidates. One distinctive pattern, goose poop collected at an area park, had a bacterium that confirmed antibiotic exercise and contained a novel compound that slowed the expansion of human melanoma and ovarian most cancers cells in lab checks. Inequities in instructional assets, particularly these in science, engineering, know-how and math (STEM), the place experiments are costly, have saved some college students underrepresented in these fields. By participating a gaggle of those college students early in actual, high-quality analysis, a group from the College of Illinois at Chicago led by Brian Murphy is offering younger learners an opportunity to see themselves as scientists and discover careers in science with hands-on expertise. The group partnered with a Boys and Women Membership in Chicago to convey center schoolers right into a 14-week utilized science program.” • So being on a flyway has its benefits…
My electronic mail handle is down by the plant; please ship examples of there (“Helpers” within the topic line). In our more and more determined and fragile neoliberal society, on a regular basis regular incidents and tales of “the communism of on a regular basis life” are what I’m in search of (and never, say, the Pink Cross in Hawaii, and even the UNWRA in Gaza).
Politics
“So most of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in truth a rational administration of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles
Biden Administration
“Biden commutes roughly 1,500 sentences and pardons 39 individuals in greatest single-day act of clemency” [Associated Press]. “President Joe Biden is commuting the sentences of roughly 1,500 individuals who have been launched from jail and positioned on house confinement in the course of the coronavirus pandemic and is pardoning 39 Individuals convicted of nonviolent crimes. It’s the most important single-day act of clemency in fashionable historical past…. Biden stated he could be taking extra steps within the weeks forward and would proceed to overview clemency petitions…. Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., and 34 different lawmakers are urging the president to pardon environmental and human rights lawyer Steven Donziger, who was imprisoned or underneath home arrest for 3 years due to a contempt of courtroom cost associated to his work representing Indigenous farmers in a lawsuit towards Chevron. Others are advocating for Biden to commute the sentences of federal demise row prisoners…. Extra clemency grants are coming earlier than Biden leaves workplace on Jan. 20, however it’s not clear whether or not he’ll take motion to protect towards doable prosecution by Trump, an untested use of the facility.”
Properly, who else?
Donald Trump is TIME’s Particular person of the Yr https://t.co/IjP5W2otV5 pic.twitter.com/CVHX9o0DB3
— TIME (@TIME) December 12, 2024
Trump to Time cowl artist: ‘Be sure my fingers are large!”
“Donald Trump 2024 TIME Particular person of the Yr” [Time]. “Trump has a prepared clarification for his unbelievable resurrection. He even has a reputation for its climactic closing act. ‘I referred to as it 72 Days of Fury,’ he says because the interview will get underneath approach. ‘We hit the nerve of the nation. The nation was indignant.’ It wasn’t simply the MAGA devoted. Trump harnessed deep nationwide discontent in regards to the economic system, immigration, and cultural points. His grievances resonated with suburban mothers and retirees, Latino and Black males, younger voters and tech edgelords. Whereas Democrats estimated that many of the nation wished a President who would uphold the norms of liberal democracy, Trump noticed a nation able to smash them, tapping right into a rising sense that the system was rigged.” • Or, to place issues extra concisely: “These parasites had it coming.” That’s, Trump could also be browsing a extra highly effective wave than he, or anybody else, is aware of. It could be a darkish historic jest if Trump turned out to be this century’s Kerensky.
* * * “Pete Hegseth Will Be Confirmed” [Mark Judge, Splice Today]. “Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA), who was reluctant to assist Hegseth, emerged from a gathering just lately saying Hegseth ought to get an opportunity to make his case at a public affirmation listening to. ‘We’re having actually good discussions, and we mentioned a number of objects that have been actually necessary to me,’ Ernst stated. That is exceptional coming from Ernst, somebody thought-about a frontrunner within the combat towards sexual assault within the army. Hegseth was accused of sexually assaulting a lady in 2017…. So what modified? Joni Ernst is a survivor of sexual assault. Why did her opinion shift so abruptly? I don’t know the reply to that query, however I’m keen to make a guess. I believe that in 2017 Hegseth was extorted by DNC goons who set him up. I believe, now free of any non-disclosure settlement, Hegseth has been in a position to speak in regards to the extortion. I believe that’s what the FBI and senators know and what turned the tide.” • Massive if true. Within the creator’s view, he was arrange in related style in the course of the Kavavanaugh hearings. And see Water Cooler again in November: “Democrats are enlisting high-powered attorneys, whereas opposition researchers on the Democratic Nationwide Committee are compiling dossiers of incoming federal officers.” And oppo the Hegseth tales (true or not) actually have been.
* * * “Billion greenback squirrel: Trump impact fuels crypto’s ‘memecoin’ growth” [Financial Times]. “Cryptocurrencies representing a euthanised gray squirrel, a Thai pygmy hippopotamus and a cartoon canine have exploded in worth since final month’s US presidential election, as Donald Trump’s victory triggers a surge in hypothesis in so-called memecoins. The marketplace for tokens representing on-line viral moments has expanded quickly since early November as merchants guess that Trump’s administration will usher in additional crypto-friendly attitudes and regulation in Washington. There are tens of millions of memecoins, which may simply be arrange utilizing on-line memecoin mills. They haven’t any enterprise mannequin, money circulate or elementary worth, and don’t give their homeowners a share of any bodily asset. As an alternative, these extremely unstable tokens depend on their reputation amongst merchants to generate liquidity. ‘They haven’t any worth, they by no means could have worth,’ Charles Hoskinson, co-founder of the Cardano blockchain, stated about memecoins just lately. ‘There’s no utility behind them, no person needs them — once they lose their lustre they go to zero.’” • Look, the Thai pygmy hippopotamus (“Moodeng”) referred to as election 2024. If that’s not “worth, I don’t know what’s.
* * * “Save a Reagan Initiative From Musk and Ramaswamy” [Wall Street Journal]. The deck: “The Division of Authorities Effectivity might search to slash the Nationwide Endowment for Democracy’s funding.” • What’s incorrect with slashing funding for the spooks?
“Blow Up Washington” [Tablet]. “Your entire historical past of the republic has taken place towards the backdrop of regular enlargement within the scope and focus of energy on the federal stage…. Whereas too many new presidents have embraced this course of, Reagan sought to reverse it, solely to sluggish the sprawl for a couple of years. Is the lesson, then, that Washington will proceed to broaden on the expense of the remainder of the nation? Is that this course of unstoppable? It needn’t be. Whereas placing a steadiness between the attributions of the federal and state governments is difficult, controlling the bodily location of presidency exercise is rather more easy. Let’s disperse the federal government companies away from the gridlocked highways and overpriced actual property of the Washington, D.C., space to the economically depressed areas of the nation they serve, recycling the federal finances again to the economic system from which it got here. If the companies are in truth dispersed all through the nation that helps them, recycling tax {dollars} into the native economies from which they got here, it could not solely be useful to the nation at massive, but in addition, not like the well-intentioned however solely briefly efficient reforms of the Reagan period, it could show irreversible. As soon as the federal government companies that now crowd Washington and its suburbs are relocated to Appalachia, the Rust Belt, and the poverty pockets of the West, the states that will welcome them will combat within the halls of Congress to maintain their share of the $60 billion-plus payroll from returning to the banks of the Potomac.” • A lot will depend on the places chosen. One may argue, for instance, {that a} (hypothetical) Dental Floss Safety Company ought to be positioned within the midst of the alabaster waves of dental floss fields within the heartland (to be “nearer to the shoppers”). However may that result in extra business seize, somewhat than much less?
* * * “Chris Wray folds like low-cost swimsuit. Don’t be Chris Wray” [Public Notice]. “FBI Director Christopher Wray grew to become the newest public official to take away his personal backbone and dissolve right into a puddle of genuflecting goo for the higher glory of MAGA together with his announcement Wednesday that he’ll resign earlier than Trump’s inauguration. FBI administrators are imagined to be impartial, and Wray nonetheless has greater than two years left on his time period…. Wray stated that, in mild of Trump’s animosity, his resignation was ‘the easiest way to keep away from dragging the Bureau deeper into the fray.’ For Wray, apparently, the looks of resistance is a bridge too far, so it’s greatest simply to let the fascist win so he can impose the swift, unilateral peace of autocracy.” • I like “fascist”; it reveals a dedication to the bit few Democrats have. Extra centrally: “You’re gonna need to study your clichés.” One folds “like a deckchair” (an affordable swimsuit might wrinkle, however it doesn’t fold). The “low-cost swimsuit” snowclone (phrasal template) works like this: “The ____ have been throughout ___ like an affordable swimsuit.” The blanks could possibly be stuffed in with, say, “press” and “me.” Or “spooks” and “the Trump marketing campaign.” Or “enterprise capitalists” and “AI.”
“A Scandalous Resignation” [The Atlantic]. “However a scandal it most actually is. By , FBI administrators serve 10-year phrases, a norm designed to insulate the FBI from strain to serve the president’s whims.” • The Norms Fairy sheds a tear…..
2024 Submit Mortem
Democrats en déshabillé
“Democrats can work with DOGE. I do know precisely the place to begin.” [Ro Khanna, MSNBC]. ” I sit up for working with the Division of Authorities Effectivity (DOGE) to cut back waste and fraud on the Pentagon, whereas strongly opposing any cuts to packages like Social Safety, Medicare, the Division of Veterans Affairs or the Shopper Monetary Safety Bureau. There are a number of areas of waste and abuse that I hope DOGE will handle.” • And the CIA Black Price range. Notice, nevertheless: “DOGE co-chair Elon Musk.” Musk will not be the co-chair of something, as a result of DOGE will not be an formally constituted entity of any variety (“Hey youngsters! Let’s placed on a present!” doesn’t meet that criterion). And when (if?) it turns into one, I’d guess it should conform to the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA), identical to HICPAC. From GAO:
Federal advisory committees are created by Congress, Presidents, and government department companies to achieve experience
and coverage recommendation from people exterior the federal authorities. Establishing an advisory committee might also enable the federal authorities to supply a discussion board the place doubtlessly controversial subjects could also be mentioned by consultants exterior the political enviornment and scale back the workload of government department workers and Congress.
That positive feels like DOGE’s use case to me. Elon can opine and gather strategies on the Twitter all he needs, however in some unspecified time in the future DOGE must, because it have been, have interaction the clutch and start transmission to the federal government; FACA is the plain API for that. In any other case, Elon is simply jawboning, and I wouldn’t give a lot for his possibilities of success, even when he does handle to induce the occassional DOGEpile on some hapless civil servant.
Syndemics
“I’m in earnest — I can’t equivocate — I can’t excuse — I can’t retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison
Covid Sources, United States (Nationwide): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; contains many counties; Wastewater Scan, contains drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, however nationwide information). “An infection Management, Emergency Administration, Security, and Basic Ideas” (particularly on hospitalization by metropolis).
Lambert right here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To replace any entry, do be at liberty to contact me on the handle given with the crops. Please put “COVID” within the topic line. Thanks!
Sources, United States (Native): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater studies); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (wastewater); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).
Sources, Canada (Nationwide): Wastewater (Authorities of Canada).
Sources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).
Hat tricks to useful readers: Alexis, anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, KF, KidDoc, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, sq. coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).
Keep secure on the market!
“An Interview with Zhou Liang, the Creator of Zimi Masks” [CovidAware]. LIANG: “I began designing and producing masks in 2013. Zimi is my third entrepreneurial challenge… Zimi masks = body + filter ingredient. The body is manufactured from plastic, doesn’t include steel, and is accessible in quite a lot of sizes. The body has elastic properties and might be reused till it breaks or cracks. This time will not be mounted. For instance, when you ask me, how lengthy can your telephone case final? The filter ingredient is principally composed of filter materials and sealing materials. The filter materials is a polypropylene-based fiber materials with static cost. It has a number of layers, and static electrical energy is continually consumed throughout use. The sealing materials is a brand new composite materials with a 2+1 construction. There’s a layer of hermetic materials within the center, so it’s snug and doesn’t enable air to penetrate. The filter ingredient might be changed after use….. As of December 2024, Zimi masks have 4 frames, and the frames for XS and XL sizes are accomplished inside a month….” • Attention-grabbing to hearken to a working engineer!
Sequelae: Covid
“How Covid Can Change Your Intestine” [New York Times]. “We don’t have good estimates for what proportion of individuals with Covid go on to develop persistent gastrointestinal signs, however some restricted and small research counsel they are often between 16 and 40 p.c…. One concept about how the coronavirus may trigger these signs is that it might ramp up irritation within the gastrointestinal tract. Covid also can disrupt the intestine microbiome, Dr. King stated, leading to fewer of the ‘good’ microbes that tamp down irritation and extra of the ‘dangerous’ ones that trigger irritation. Over time, irritation can injury the liner of the gut, making it extra permeable or ‘leaky,’ Dr. Chey stated. That leakiness might enable molecules from meals to flee from the intestine, inflicting immune cells to mount an allergy-like response to meals. Covid-induced irritation might also ‘chew away’ on the nerves that management contractions and ache alerts within the intestine, stated Dr. Braden Kuo, a neurogastroenterologist at Massachusetts Basic Hospital. This may trigger the nerves to ship ache alerts to the mind, even when digestion is working usually, he stated. Anxiousness and melancholy usually worsen intestine signs, too.” • If the Instances is protecting this, it have to be dangerous…
TABLE 1: Day by day Covid Charts
Lambert: CDC’s wastewater web page loaded. No Thanksgiving surge that I can see.
| Wastewater | |
| This week[1] CDC December 2 | Final week[2] CDC (till subsequent week): |
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| Variants [3] CDC December 7 | Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC November 30 |
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| Hospitalization | |
| New York[5] New York State, information December 10: | Nationwide [6] CDC December 5: |
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| Positivity | |
| Nationwide[7] Walgreens December 9: | Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic November 23: |
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| Vacationers Information | |
| Positivity[9] CDC November 19: | Variants[10] CDC November 4: |
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| Deaths | |
| Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11] CDC November 20: | Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12] CDC November 20: |
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LEGEND
1) ★ for charts new at the moment; all others should not up to date.
2) For a full-size/full-resolution picture, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Home windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open picture in new tab.”
NOTES
[1] (CDC) Excellent news!
[2] (CDC) Final week’s wastewater map.
[3] (CDC Variants) XEC takes over. That WHO label, “Ommicron,” has executed an important job normalizing successive waves of an infection.
[4] (ED) Down.
[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Leveled out.
[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). Really improved; it’s now one of many few charts to point out the complete course of the pandemic to the current day.
[7] (Walgreens) Down.
[8] (Cleveland) Down.
[9] (Vacationers: Positivity) Leveling out.
[10] (Vacationers: Variants). Positivity is new, however variants haven’t but been launched.
[11] Deaths low, positivity leveling out.
[12] Deaths low, ED leveling out.
Stats Watch
Employment State of affairs: “United States Preliminary Jobless Claims” [Trading Economics]. “US preliminary jobless claims soared by 17,000 from the earlier week to 242,000 on the primary week of December, effectively above market expectations that they’d fall to 220,000, to mark the sharpest rely of latest claims since October.”
Inflation: “United States Producer Costs” [Trading Economics]. “Producer Costs in the USA elevated to 146.49 factors in November from 145.94 factors in October of 2024.”
Manufacturing: “Inside Boeing’s battle to make its best-selling airplane once more” [Reuters]. “Boeing’s cautious method, following criticism that the planemaker for years rushed manufacturing, has garnered reward from regulators and a few airline CEOs. However it additionally has some smaller suppliers who reduce jobs or working hours in the course of the strike hesitating to staff-up once more, creating additional uncertainty in an already fragile provide chain, in response to three suppliers, one analyst and an business supply…. On the manufacturing unit, every day duties are paired with exacting efforts to scrub up and take steps to keep away from error, with note-taking FAA officers carrying clipboards and donning reflective vests an everyday sight, they stated…. [FAA Administrator Mike Whitaker] informed Reuters that Boeing has an extended journey to attain its focused security tradition. ‘, as you’d anticipate, however they’re frank about the truth that they’ve obtained an extended method to go,’ he stated….. Seattle-area provider Rosemary Brester hoped she and her husband would be capable of get their steel plane parts processed extra shortly following the top of the strike, however delays persist… ‘Till I see some actual stability, I’m not going to rent anyone,’ Brester stated.” • The plant wasn’t clear? The thoughts reels. Once I purchased printing, I all the time made positive to go to the candidates. Beer bottles underneath the tables have been a robust no. And the press ought to all the time be working (“time is cash”). If “cleaner” means what I believe it means, it feels like if Boeing have been a printer, I’d have gone elsewhere. And never a monopoly participant, after all. Can any readers affirm?
Manufacturing: “A Nearer Take a look at Boeing’s Choices Market Dynamics” [Benzinga]. “Excessive-rolling buyers have positioned themselves bullish on Boeing, and it’s necessary for retail merchants to take observe. This exercise got here to our consideration at the moment by way of Benzinga’s monitoring of publicly accessible choices information. The identities of those buyers are unsure, however such a big transfer in BA usually alerts that somebody has privileged data. Immediately, Benzinga’s choices scanner noticed 10 choices trades for Boeing. This isn’t a typical sample. The sentiment amongst these main merchants is cut up, with 60% bullish and 40% bearish. Amongst all of the choices we recognized, there was one put, amounting to $227,500, and 9 calls, totaling $410,750.” • I don’t play the ponies, however when you do…
Manufacturing: “Boeing’s India exports stay excessive, climbing over $1.25 billion” [BusinessLine]. “International progress of civil aviation, together with excessive home demand, has led aerospace main Boeing to stay the most important exporter of plane components and software program from India. Talking completely to businessline, Boeing India and South Asia President Salil Gupte cited that the aerospace main’s annual sourcing from India has grown considerably over the previous decade, rising from $250 million to over $1.25 billion yearly. ‘This marks a considerable improve, pushed by the enlargement of the provider community and developments in manufacturing capabilities,’ Gupte informed businessline. “It is usually honest to say that this progress is actually exceptional contemplating that the manufacturing of the aeroplanes themselves on the civil aspect has been a lot decrease than earlier than the pandemic.’”
Manufacturing: “Opinion: Why Embraer Would possibly Be Prepared To Take On Airbus And Boeing” [Aviation Week]. “A lot focus has been on China’s Comac. Typical knowledge holds that China’s speedy advances in army propulsion and area ultimately will lengthen to business aviation…. I’m not so positive. Within the close to time period, Comac doesn’t should be a worldwide participant for its new C919 narrowbody to succeed. China’s home market is large enough to take in most of Comac’s restricted manufacturing capability. Creating a very aggressive worldwide product would require certification within the West and the creation of a worldwide upkeep and assist community, no small duties. The continuing decoupling of the Chinese language and Western provide chains poses yet one more problem. The corporate to keep watch over in 2025 is Embraer, the feisty Brazilian producer that was nearly purchased by Boeing after which jilted on the altar. With wonderful engineers and visionary leaders, Embraer has constructed world-class airplanes for many years whereas defending the mental property of its suppliers. It’s actually able to upgauging to a much bigger airplane that would problem the duopoly. Aviation Week has discovered that a number of massive airways within the U.S. and Europe have informed Embraer they’ll collectively order lots of of airplanes if a brand new program is launched.” Hoo boy. However: “A key query, after all, is whether or not Embraer can play within the large leagues. It has 1/twentieth the income of Boeing and thus would wish a monetary associate with billions of {dollars} to develop a brand new product. Discuss has targeted on buyers from the Center East, significantly Saudi Arabia. One other problem is that Embraer’s enterprise mannequin depends closely on outsourcing main parts.”
Manufacturing: “GM to retreat from robotaxi operations as soon as championed by CEO Mary Barra” [Business Standard]. “With the choice to fold Cruise into the dad or mum firm, GM is giving up on hopes of reworking itself right into a multi-platform know-how firm that focused bringing in $50 billion in income from robotaxi fares and subscriptions by 2030. The carmaker had hoped to double its income by 2030 on the dual pillars of autonomy and electrical automobiles. That purpose, which GM has referred to as “aspirational,” additionally now appears to be like distant with out Cruise as a brand new enterprise and after GM scaled-back its EV manufacturing targets.” • Ah, “aspirational.”
Immediately’s Worry & Greed Index: 51 Impartial (earlier shut: 48 Impartial) [CNN]. One week in the past: 56 (Greed). (0 is Excessive Worry; 100 is Excessive Greed). Final up to date Dec 11 at 1:27:47 PM ET.
Christmas Pre-Recreation Festivities
“Demonic Christmas Show at State Home Destroyed” [NH Journal]. “Neglect St. Nick; somebody in Harmony might find yourself on Devil’s naughty checklist after The Satanic Temple’s Baphomet statue was destroyed Monday night time in an act of yuletide mayhem. Harmony Deputy Police Chief John Thomas informed NHJournal that whereas the investigation into the vandalism is energetic and ongoing, he can rule out at the very least one doable suspect. ‘Santa wouldn’t do that,’ Thomas stated. ‘Santa loves all people.’ The statue of the hooded demon was discovered damaged in half round 7 p.m. Monday night time, a couple of hours after the marble slab exhibiting The Satanic Temple’s seven rules was cracked. State Rep. Ellen Learn (D-Newmarket), who helped manage The Satanic Temple’s show, was noticed gathering up the damaged shards of the goat-headed determine Tuesday morning after getting a name in regards to the destruction. She’s undecided if members of The Satanic Temple plan to place their monster model again collectively.”
Dry, very dry:
As a veteran, which firm ought to I begin?
A podcast referred to as “WARFIGHTER MINDSET” the place some former water purification specialist interviews different vetbros about “the warrior life-style” whereas hawking their very own line of “tactical” beard oil
One more veteran-owned espresso firm…
— Warlizard (@War_Lizard) December 9, 2024
“Tactical beard oil.” The responses are nice.
“Argument escalates when man visits neighbor with sword and firebomb, Florida cops say” [News & Observer]. I’ll say! “When interviewed, the 36-year-old man confirmed utilizing a bottle with some gasoline in it and brandishing a sword ‘to make some extent,’ police stated. The suspect stated ‘he went to the residence to ship a message relating to disrespect to a member of the family,’ police stated. Particulars of that incident weren’t launched.”
Groves of Academe
“UCLA’s new AI-designed literature course has the worst-looking textbook cowl I’ve ever seen” [Literary Hub]. “UCLA introduced the opposite day that ‘Comp Lit 2BW would be the first course within the UCLA Faculty Division of Humanities to be constructed across the Kudu synthetic intelligence platform. The textbook: AI-generated. Class assignments: AI-generated. Instructing assistants’ assets: AI-generated.’ The professor’s clarification of why any of that is good doesn’t make any sense to me — she appears to be describing normal instructing practices like discussing texts and placing collectively a syllabus, however now AI is concerned. Which to me all the time looks like a looming labor problem — I wouldn’t be shocked to see this software program cited as justification to fireside professors or TAs, or scale back their pay.” Plus ça change…. Extra “However what actually obtained me fuming was the horrible, horrible textbook cowl that was extruded for this course.” • Right here it’s:
Concluding: “This cowl sucks, it’s so dangerous. Have some dignity individuals, we don’t need to reside like this.” • UCLA directors: “Sure, you do.”
Poetry Nook
A villanelle (?):
“The villanelle has been famous as a type that often treats the topic of obsessions, and one which appeals to outsiders; its defining characteristic of repetition prevents it from having a standard tone.” Possibly the poet is an outsider now….
“Seattle highway signal’s message raises questions after CEO’s capturing” [KOMO (PI)]. “It’s not but recognized who was accountable for programming the signal or which company operates it — Washington State Division of Transportation (WSDOT), Seattle Division of Transportation (SDOT) — or a non-public firm.” • Wowsers:
These swing voters are getting actually antsy….
“Practically half of US teenagers are on-line ‘continuously,’ Pew report finds” [Associated Press]. “Practically half of American youngsters say they’re on-line “continuously” regardless of issues in regards to the results of social media and smartphones on their psychological well being, in response to a brand new report revealed Thursday by the Pew Analysis Middle. As in previous years, YouTube was the only hottest platform youngsters used — 90% stated they watched movies on the positioning, down barely from 95% in 2022. Practically three-quarters stated they go to YouTube day-after-day. There was a slight downward pattern in a number of fashionable apps teenagers used. As an illustration, 63% of teenagers stated they used TikTok, down from 67% and Snapchat slipped to 55% from 59%. … X noticed the most important decline amongst teenage customers. Solely 17% of youngsters stated they use X, down from 23% in 2022, the 12 months Elon Musk purchased the platform. Reddit held regular at 14%. About 6% of youngsters stated they use Threads, Meta’s reply to X that launched in 2023.” • In all probability excellent news, really, on Musk’s hellsite (as its customers have affectionately dubbed it).
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