Wednesday, September 13, 2023

And another day of Earth outside its ‘safe operating space for humanity,’ GOP warnings of non-existent mandates, impeachment inquiries, the flood disaster in Libya, the GOP closing the DOE, and American youth that may never be able to own a home comes to a close:

“Today’s GOP is what fascism looks like.” -- Dean Obeidallah

Earth is outside its ‘safe operating space for humanity’ on most key measurements, study says. Earth is exceeding its “safe operating space for humanity” in six of nine key measurements of its health, and two of the remaining three are headed in the wrong direction, a new study said. Earth’s climate, biodiversity, land, freshwater, nutrient pollution and “novel” chemicals (human-made compounds like microplastics and nuclear waste) are all out of whack, a group of international scientists said in Wednesday’s journal Science Advances. Only the acidity of the oceans, the health of the air and the ozone layer are within the boundaries considered safe, and both ocean and air pollution are heading in the wrong direction, the study said. “We are in very bad shape,” said study co-author Johan Rockstrom, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany. “We show in this analysis that the planet is losing resilience and the patient is sick.”

There’s no sign of widespread COVID-19 mandates in the US. Republicans are warning of them anyway. While some individual schools and colleges have implemented temporary mask requirements, there is no sign that anyone in federal or state leadership is considering widespread COVID-19 restrictions, requirements or mask mandates. The administrations of several Democratic governors denied that any such moves are even under discussion. The overriding sentiment is to leave the decisions to individuals. -- Republicans are the masters of spreading fear and paranoia regardless of how much total bullshit their claims are.

DeSantis administration advises against Covid shots for Florida residents under 65. "What I have directed our department to do is to provide guidance that really recommends and advises against the use of these mRNA Covid-19 vaccines for anyone under 65," Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo said at an online panel hosted by DeSantis on Wednesday. The statement ignores the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's recommendations: The agency said on Tuesday that everyone ages 6 months and up who has not gotten a Covid shot within the last two months should get a new booster, which targets a subvariant of omicron called XBB.1.5.

What’s ahead now that Republicans are opening an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said he is launching an impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden, yielding to mounting pressure from former President Donald Trump and his allies in what’s shaping up as an election-year clash between Congress and the White House. In a statement Tuesday, McCarthy said the House investigations into the Biden family this year have uncovered a “culture of corruption” that demands deeper review.

Searchers race to recover bodies in Libya as death toll from flooding hits 5,100. The Mediterranean city of Derna has struggled to get help after Sunday night’s deluge washed away most access roads. Aid workers who managed to reach the city described devastation in its center, with thousands still missing and tens of thousands left homeless. “Bodies are everywhere, inside houses, in the streets, at sea. Wherever you go, you find dead men, women, and children,” Emad al-Falah, an aid worker from Benghazi, said over the phone from Derna. “Entire families were lost.”

'Peak oil' could be on the horizon, but new fossil fuel projects are pushing ahead. Demand for fossil fuels is set to peak by the end of the decade, according to a new projection from the International Energy Agency — but it might not be enough to curb the worst impacts of climate change or outpace new fossil fuel projects.

What High Heat in the Classroom Is Doing to Millions of American Children. With extreme heat still baking the country, many schools aren’t prepared for the effects of the climate crisis, leaving students and teachers with no other choice than to work inside sweltering buildings.

Trump wants to close the Department of Education, joining calls by GOP rivals. Former President Donald Trump said Wednesday he wants to close the Department of Education and have state governments “run the education of our children,” pushing for a long-held Republican goal that has been endorsed by several other 2024 GOP candidates. -- “States Rights” is Republican code for “no equality across the United States.” What state you live in will determine which rights you have as a US citizen. That sure doesn’t seem like it’s “The United States.” It’s more like 50 mini-countries. Vote Democrat and keep Republicans and their fascist form of government out of office.

18% of millennials, 12% of Gen Z believe they will never own a home. The No. 1 barrier to homeownership for millennials and Gen Zers is not exactly a surprise: affordability, as home prices are too expensive, per the survey. About one-third of millennial and Gen Z respondents said mortgage rates are also too high to buy a home, according to Redfin. Since reaching a low during the pandemic, mortgage rates have more than doubled, hitting their highest level in more than 20 years this summer, and home prices haven't softened.

Google’s search engine dominance is at the center of the biggest US antitrust trial in decades. The U.S. government is taking aim at what has been an indomitable empire: Google’s ubiquitous search engine that has become the internet’s main gateway.

‘We knew this day would come’: One of world’s most invasive species reaches Europe. The red fire ant, one of the world’s most invasive species, has been found in Europe for the first time, according to a new study. The imported ant, which has the scientific name Solenopsis invicta, is native to South America but has spread throughout much of the United States, Mexico, the

Caribbean, China, and Australia over the past century.

Justin Roiland used his ‘Rick and Morty’ fame to pursue young fans, text messages show. But as he partied with Los Angeles’ superstars and traveled the country for conventions, he also found he could use his fame to strike up conversations and develop relationships with young fans, including some who were underage.

NFL players union renews call for grass fields after Aaron Rodgers’ injury. “Like I said before, we already play a violent enough game. Don’t add to it.” -- Stop watching football.

Tantalising sign of possible life on faraway world. Nasa's James Webb Space Telescope may have discovered tentative evidence of a sign of life on a faraway planet. It may have detected a molecule called dimethyl sulphide (DMS). On Earth, at least, this is only produced by life. The researchers stress that the detection on the planet 120 light years away is "not robust" and more data is needed to confirm its presence. Researchers have also detected methane and CO2 in the planet's atmosphere. Detection of these gases could mean the planet, named K2-18b, has a water ocean.

Life’s short. Live, love, create, and help others.

Until next time, my friends. Stay safe and stay sane. Good night.

Friday, September 8, 2023

And another day of abandoning pretenses, denying bids, trying to find new terms, the GOP Project 2025, hurricanes, flash floods, excessive heat, the ‘Stone Belt,’ a human embryo without using sperm or eggs, and a golden orb comes to a close:

“These are not cranks, this is the Republican policy establishment.” -- Ari Drennen

There’s Nothing Patriotic about Today’s Republicans. The GOP has abandoned even a pretense of caring for our country and supporting democracy at home and abroad. Now all they care about are bigots, billionaires, and bullies. There was a time in this country when most Americans — regardless of political affiliation — agreed on a basic set of principles:...The Democratic Party still supports all these ideals, sometimes to their detriment, like when they refuse to “fight dirty” by creating sketchy scandals like “her emails” and “Benghazi.”  While these may give the party a short-term benefit, most Democrats realize the long-term harm to the nation isn’t worth the temporary gain. The post-Trump GOP, however, has rejected them all. Instead, it’s become the party of Putin, bin Salman, and Orbán, rejecting out of hand George Washington’s warning about partisanship replacing patriotism and, increasingly, rejecting the very idea of democracy in our republic.

Judge denies Mark Meadows' bid to move Georgia election case to federal court. A judge on Friday denied former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows' bid to move the Georgia criminal case against him to federal court, ruling that his alleged involvement in efforts to pressure state leaders to overturn the 2020 election results was not part of his official duties as a government official.

How a former Trump official’s conviction could echo in ex-president’s cases. The swift conviction of Donald Trump’s former trade adviser Peter Navarro for contempt of Congress sent two warnings to the multiple co-defendants in the ex-president’s approaching criminal trials. The first is that nobody, not even former White House big shots claiming to be empowered by presidential authority, is above the law. The second is that loyalty to Trump can be hazardous and often gets those who show it cross-wise with the law.

Republicans are trying to find a new term for ‘pro-life’ to stave off more electoral losses. “What intrigued me the most about the results was that ‘pro-choice’ and ‘pro-life’ means something different now, that people see being pro-life as being against all abortions ... at all levels,” Sen. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., said in an interview Thursday. -- Well Republican actions have shown the American people that Republicans are against all abortions. Reframing the wording as “pro-baby” will not change that fact.

Republican presidential Project 2025 plans to define trans people as ‘pornographic’. A Republican think tank’s proposal for LGBTQ+ rights if the GOP were to win the 2024 presidential election includes a section on how the next president could essentially erase trans people from public life...“The actions of liberal politicians in Washington have created a desperate need and unique opportunity for conservatives to start undoing the damage the Left has wrought,” the project’s ‘about’ section reads. Sections from its 180-day playbook – a list of actions taken in the first 180 days of Republican leadership – include completely stripping discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people from the law. Drennen noted in her tweet that the Heritage Foundation are not a fringe political think-tank, saying: “These are not cranks, this is the Republican policy establishment.” “They’ve put it quite vividly – declare trans content porn, imprison those who make it, put teachers who discuss it on the sex offender registry, and force companies that host it to close.” Drennen clarified in a separate tweet that the blueprint is not “actually about trans porn” but conflates “propagation of transgender ideology,” with pornography.

Vivek Ramaswamy says he'll deport children of undocumented immigrants born in the U.S. These children, however, are U.S. citizens, regardless of their parents' immigration status. The 14th Amendment states that “all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”

Ukraine is furious with Elon Musk for thwarting an attack on Russia's navy. The tech billionaire said Thursday that he had told his engineers not to turn on the Starlink satellite network over Crimea to prevent a planned attack on the Black Sea fleet last year.

Here's why Hurricane Lee is alarming even if it doesn’t make landfall. Hurricane Lee, the storm churning through the open Atlantic waters Friday, is expected to pass well north of Puerto Rico and several other Caribbean islands. But even if it doesn’t make landfall, its rapid intensification into Category 5 is enough reason for alarm, according to meteorologists and climate experts. It is the latest storm to accelerate at a breakneck pace partly because ocean temperatures have been unusually warm, giving hurricanes the energy they need to gain speed and power, according to experts.

Hong Kong paralyzed by flash flooding after heaviest rainfall since 1884. Record-breaking rainfall paralyzed much of Hong Kong on Friday, with flash flooding submerging metro stations and trapping drivers on roads, as authorities suspended schools and urged the public to seek safe shelter.

Fossil fuels being subsidised at rate of $13m a minute, says IMF. The IMF analysis found the total subsidies for oil, gas and coal in 2022 were $7tn (£5.5tn). That is equivalent to 7% of global GDP and almost double what the world spends on education. Countries have pledged to phase out subsidies for years to ensure the price of fossil fuels reflects their true environmental costs, but have achieved little to date. — $13m a minute. 

Puerto Rico schools cancel classes as they grapple with unceasing, excessive heat. According to the National Weather Service in San Juan, Puerto Rico stands to endure temperatures that could feel as hot as 114 degrees Fahrenheit next week. In a recent survey of 2,500 Puerto Rican teachers, 83% said they lacked air conditioning in their classroom. Heat-related emergencies have been reported in about half of the public schools on the island, the survey also found.

LA Council approves motion to ban sale or rental of RVs for housing. The council voted 12-0 to approve a motion seeking to amend city law to add recreational vehicles to the list of vehicles that cannot be used for housing…The council approved the motion without discussion.

Ever heard of the Stone Belt? Texas is in it. And parents, especially those of young girls, need to beware. Texas is part of what doctors call the “Stone Belt,” which almost forms a line across the southernmost tips of the country – it stretches west from lower California to the southern tips of Arizona and New Mexico and includes all of Texas, the south, and the southeast. North and South Carolina are considered the eastern tip. “It’s real. It is real,” Stanasel said of the Stone Belt. “In these states where the temperature is higher, we definitely see more kidney stones.” While it’s difficult to pinpoint an exact cause for the increase in young people, Stanasel said experts speculate hydration and diet are key.

Scientists have grown an entity that closely resembles an early human embryo, without using sperm, eggs or a womb. The Weizmann Institute team say their "embryo model", made using stem cells, looks like a textbook example of a real 14-day-old embryo. It even released hormones that turned a pregnancy test positive in the lab. The ambition for embryo models is to provide an ethical way of understanding the earliest moments of our lives.

Tennis ball wasteland? Game grapples with a fuzzy yellow recycling problem. Because tennis balls are extremely hard to recycle and the industry has yet to develop a ball to make that easier, nearly all of the 330 million balls made worldwide each year eventually get chucked in the garbage, with most ending up in landfills, where they can take more than 400 years to decompose.

Scientists Stumped by ‘Golden Orb’ From Seafloor That's ‘Biological in Origin’. A team of researchers exploring the seafloor off Alaska last week recovered a peculiar brassy-yellow object at a depth of over 2 miles (3.2 kilometers). The researchers still don’t know what it is. “While we were able to collect the ‘golden orb’ and bring it onto the ship, we still are not able to identify it beyond the fact that it is biological in origin.”

Life’s short. Live, love, create, and help others.

Until next time, my friends. Stay safe and stay sane. Good night.

Thursday, August 31, 2023

And another day of televised trials, J-6 sentences, TX banning gender-affirming care, porn age verification law in TX, AL AG says he has right to prosecute abortion travel arrangements, kicking judges off state supreme courts, and executed for tweeting comes to a close:

“Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.” — Robert A. Heinlein

Trump trial in Fulton County will be televised and live streamed, Georgia judge says. Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee said he will allow a YouTube stream of all related hearings and trials stemming from the investigation into an alleged scheme to overturn the state's 2020 presidential election results. The live stream will be operated by the court. There will also be pool coverage for television, radio and still photography allowed, he said.

Two ex-Proud Boys leaders get some of longest sentences in Jan. 6 Capitol attack. The 17-year prison term for organizer Joseph Biggs and 15-year sentence for leader Zachary Rehl were the second and third longest sentences handed down yet in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.

Texas high court allows law banning gender-affirming care for trans minors to take effect. The Texas Supreme Court allowed a new state law banning gender-affirming care for minors to take effect on Friday, setting up Texas to be the most populous state with such restrictions on transgender children...The Texas law would prevent transgender minors from accessing hormone therapies, puberty blockers and transition surgeries, even though medical experts say such surgical procedures are rarely performed on children. Children who already started the medications being banned are required to be weaned off in a “medically appropriate” manner, the law said. -- The cruelty is the point. Never trust a Republican. Almost all of them are fascists.

Federal judge bars Texas from enforcing book rating law. A federal judge said Thursday he will stop a new Texas law aimed at keeping sexually explicit materials off of school library shelves on the eve of the law going into effect, according to state attorneys and lawyers for a group who sued over the proposal.

Porn age verification law [in TX] is unconstitutional, says judge. “People will be particularly concerned about accessing controversial speech when the state government can log and track that access. By verifying information through government identification, the law will allow the government to peer into the most intimate and personal aspects of people’s lives. It runs the risk that the state can monitor when an adult views sexually explicit materials and what kind of websites they visit. In effect, the law risks forcing individuals to divulge specific details of their sexuality to the state government to gain access to certain speech.” As Ezra notes, Texas still hasn’t repealed a law against sodomy, making it particularly fraught to hand over identification for something like a gay porn site. “Given Texas’s ongoing criminalization of homosexual intercourse, it is apparent that people who wish to view homosexual material will be profoundly chilled from doing so if they must first affirmatively identify themselves to the state,” the ruling says.

Judge blocks Arkansas law requiring parental OK for minors to create social media accounts. A federal judge on Thursday temporarily blocked Arkansas from enforcing a new law that would have required parental consent for minors to create new social media accounts, preventing the state from becoming the first to impose such a restriction.

Alabama attorney general says he has right to prosecute people who facilitate travel for out-of-state abortions. Alabama’s Republican attorney general said in a court filing that he has the right to prosecute people who make travel arrangements for pregnant women to have out-of-state abortions. In a court filing Monday, attorneys for Attorney General Steve Marshall wrote that providing transportation for women in Alabama to leave the state to get an abortion could amount to a “criminal conspiracy.” -- So much for the GOP mantra of keeping the government out of our private lives.

Wisconsin's new liberal Supreme Court justice hasn't heard a case but Republicans may impeach. Even before the newly elected justice who gave liberals a one-seat majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court has heard a case, Republican lawmakers are talking about taking the unprecedented step of impeaching and removing her from office. And they have the votes to do it. -- All Republicans are a danger to American democracy.

Why Do Conservatives Want To Kick The Only Black Woman Off North Carolina Supreme Court? We'll Give You One Guess. Do you know who Anita Earls is? No? Well, let me educate you. She’s a North Carolina Supreme Court Justice who is the only Black woman in the state’s high court and only one of two Democrats. On Tuesday, it was revealed that many of her Republican colleagues on the NC Supreme Court are attempting to have her ousted. Why do you ask? She told the media the truth, citing that racial bias exists in her courtroom.

Saudi man sentenced to death for tweets in harshest verdict yet for online critics. A retired teacher in Saudi Arabia was recently sentenced to death for his tweets criticizing the country's leadership to his handful of followers, according to rights advocates and his family. The sentencing of Mohammad Alghamdi, who is in his mid-50s, is the latest in an escalating crackdown on social media users in Saudi Arabia. While others are serving prison terms ranging from 20 to 45 years for their tweets and online criticism of the government, Alghamdi appears to be the first person to be sentenced to death based solely on his posts on X, formerly called Twitter, and YouTube activity.

Can at-home COVID tests detect new variants Eris and Pirola? Here’s what experts say. If you have symptoms of COVID-19 and your home test is positive, “the likelihood of you having COVID-19 is extraordinarily high,” Russo says. “But if you have symptoms and the test is negative, you shouldn’t be saying, ‘Woo, yes! I don’t have COVID,’” he says. That’s especially true if you were recently exposed to someone with the virus, including a member of your household, Russo says. Test results can also be less accurate if you don’t have symptoms — if you are, in fact, infected but get a negative test result, it may simply be that levels of the virus weren’t high enough in your nose yet to be detected, Russo says.

US regulators might change how they classify marijuana. Here’s what that would mean. It’s unlikely that the medical marijuana programs now licensed in 38 states — to say nothing of the legal recreational pot markets in 23 states — would meet the production, record-keeping, prescribing and other requirements for Schedule III drugs. But rescheduling in itself would have some impact, particularly on research and on pot business taxes.

Life’s short. Live, love, create, and help others.

Until next time, my friends. Stay safe and stay sane. Good night.

Wednesday, August 30, 2023

And another day of journalism failing miserably, creating an alternative autocratic society, the US economy doing well yet Americans not thinking so, deepfake scams, mismatched libidos, and reclassifying marijuana comes to a close:

"We are all born ignorant, but one must work hard to remain stupid. " — Benjamin Franklin

Journalism fails miserably at explaining what is really happening to America. What we call the Republican Party is barely a political party in any sense of the word but a dangerous antisocial movement that has embraced many of the tenets of fascism, from calls for violence to its dehumanizing of “others” — from desperate refugees at the border to transgender youth. There is, in reality, no 2024 primary because this movement embraced its infallible stongman in Trump eight years ago. And there is no “Trump scandal” because — for them — each new crime or sexual assault is merely another indictment of the messenger, the arrogrant elites from whom their contempt is the No. 1 issue. These foot soldiers stopped believing in “democracy” a long time ago — no matter how big an Orwellian sign Fox News erects…These are the stakes: dueling visions for America — not Democratic or Republican, with parades and red, white, and blue balloons, but brutal fascism or flawed democracy…We need the media to see 2024 not as a traditional election but as an effort to mobilize a mass movement that would undo democracy and splatter America with more blood like what was shed Saturday in Jacksonville. We need to understand that if the next 15 months remain the worst covered election in U.S. history, that it might also be the last.

How Musk, Thiel, Zuckerberg, and Andreessen—Four Billionaire Techno-Oligarchs—Are Creating an Alternate, Autocratic Reality. I call them the Technocrats, in recognition of the influence of the technocracy movement, founded in the 1930s by Elon Musk’s grandfather, Joshua Haldeman. The Technocrats make up a kind of interlocking directorate of Silicon Valley, each investing in or sitting on the boards of the others’ companies. Their vast digital domain controls your personal information; affects how billions of people live, work, and love; and sows online chaos, inciting mob violence and sparking runs on stocks. These four men have long been regarded as technologically progressive heroes, but they are actually part of a broader antidemocratic, authoritarian turn within the tech world, deeply invested in preserving the status quo and in keeping their market-leadership positions or near-monopolies—and their multi-billion-dollar fortunes secure from higher taxes. (“Competition is for suckers,” Thiel once posited.)…I use the term techno-determinism to describe the path the Technocrats have dictated for our country because they have sold, and we have bought into, the idea that they are going to deliver us a bright future. The future they are now selling us, however—crypto fortunes, the merger of the human and the computer via AI, the prospect of spending our lives in the Metaverse or on Mars—is a lie. To quote Snyder once more, Donald Trump has shown that he “was lying not so much to deny the truth as to invite people into an alternative reality.” Such sleight-of-hand applies here as well. The alternative reality that these men are focused on is a world of technodeterminism, one in which AI may eventually do all the real work and a large number of humans may be rendered useless to society…Anyone who thinks this is some kind of dystopian fantasy should visit Amazon’s research-and-development facility to see the future of whole warehouses operated by five humans and 5,000 robots.

If the U.S. economy is doing well, why do so many Americans say it's terrible? The unemployment rate stands at 3.5%, as low as it has been since the 1960s. Over the last year, the U.S. economy has added an average of 312,000 jobs every month. Despite predictions of a recession, economic growth has been 2.0% or higher in the last four quarters. Inflation, while still elevated, is down to 3.2%. As a result, real wages have increased slightly over the last year. But an August survey by Quinnipiac University found that 71% of Americans describe the economy as "not so good" or "poor." (Just 3% say the economy is excellent.) Further, despite slowing inflation and consistent job growth, a majority of Americans say the economy is getting worse. (Just 20% say the economy is improving.)…One factor in Americans' pessimistic view of the economy is partisanship…In other words, regardless of economic conditions, more and more people will describe the economy as poor because they oppose the current president…But only 45% of Americans describe themselves as Republican or Republican-leaning, according to Gallup, so partisanship does not account for all the negative sentiment about the economy. Another piece to the puzzle is that millions of Americans are mired in low-paying jobs, struggling to make ends meet, and watching the fruits of their labor get funneled to wealthy CEOs and investors. This dynamic is captured in a new report by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS). The IPS report, Executive Excess 2023, analyzes the 100 large public corporations with the lowest wages in 2022. The IPS report found that at these corporations, a group that includes many of the nation's largest employers, "CEO pay averaged $15.3 million and median worker pay averaged $31,672." That's a ratio of 603 to 1…In the 1980s, perceptions of the economy were much more positive even though, by several objective measures, the economy was worse than it is today. In 1989, however, the average corporate CEO-to-worker pay ratio was 44-to-1.

House conservatives flirt with shutdown: ‘So be it’. A handful of hard-line Republicans are brushing off — or even embracing — the possibility of a shutdown, arguing that bringing the government to a screeching halt is more acceptable than allowing the country to continue on its current spending trajectory.

How Hurricane Idalia went from Category 1 to Category 4 overnight. Warm waters in the Gulf of Mexico helped fuel Hurricane Idalia’s rapid intensification hours before it made landfall, a phenomenon that experts say will likely occur more often in a warming world.

Sen. Mitch McConnell appears to freeze again at a Kentucky event. The Republican leader was silent for more than 30 seconds after being asked if he will run for re-election. He froze at a news conference in July.

This Texas town has about 250 people. It has 50 sworn police officers. KHOU 11 Investigates discovered more than half of the cops in the Coffee City Police Department had been suspended, demoted or fired from their previous jobs. -- This is just crazy. WTF?

Amazon CEO tells employees to return to the office or their days may be numbered. Jassy’s message reflects Amazon’s continued pressure on US office staff to comply with a policy requiring them to report to a physical office at least three days a week.

Deepfake scams have arrived: Fake videos spread on Facebook, TikTok and Youtube. Long feared, the deepfake scam has finally arrived on social media. Fake videos of celebrities hawking phony services have begun to gain some traction on major social media platforms like Facebook, TikTok and YouTube...Experts warn that such videos are no longer the most cutting-edge version of such scams. And they warned that scammers are using real-time deepfake programs to mimic celebrities on video calls with potential victims...Deepfakes — videos that use artificial intelligence to create believable but fake depictions of real people — have become significantly more common online in recent months. The unchecked rise of deepfakes has led some experts to warn that the first “deepfake election“ will arrive next year, when a substantial number of voters will see political disinformation videos online and not be able to tell with certainty whether they’re real. The technology has become far more accessible to everyday users. Apps that can create moderately convincing deepfakes, often in real time, are available to anyone with a computer or a smartphone...The videos also hint at the increasingly lucrative world of internet scams.

Latinos who are religiously unaffiliated continue to grow. The share of Latinos who say they are religiously unaffiliated grew last year, while the share of those who are Catholic continued to slide. — Leave the pews.

One partner wants sex. The other does not. What to do about mismatched libidos. In general, Donaghue says that “the amount of sexual desire that a person is comfortable expressing can be impacted by gender and sexual orientation,” noting, “Everyone is socialized away from their authentic sexuality by their gender, with all its rules and expectations — such as what is socially acceptable sexually for a woman, a mother or a wife. Fold in homophobia and how that polices what behaviors someone will feel comfortable requesting or engaging in, and one can easily see how all of this negatively impacts libido within a relationship.”

HHS official calls for reclassifying marijuana as a lower-risk drug in letter sent to DEA. Marijuana is currently classified as a Schedule I controlled substance, meant for the most dangerous substances, including heroin and LSD.

Live worm plucked from woman’s brain in Australia, a world first. An MRI scan revealed what doctors initially thought was a tumor, but when the woman underwent a biopsy in June 2022, the doctors were stunned...Yet there it was on the right frontal lobe of the patient's brain: not cancer but a live parasitic worm, about 80 millimeters (3 inches) long and 1 millimeter in diameter.

RIP Arleen Sorkin. She was 67.

Life’s short. Live, love, create, and help others.

Until next time, my friends. Stay safe and stay sane. Good night.

Sunday, August 27, 2023

And another day of racist hatred, exposure to extreme heat, GOP Presidential candidates eliminating the DOE, a kiss in Spain, harassment in Antarctica, banned books, free school meals, child failure, and the man who ‘screwed up’ college football comes to a close:

“The spectacle Trump is making over becoming an inmate is not just annoying. It’s concerning. Koolaid drinkers kids are watching, and thinking that a life of crime is not only acceptable, but heroic.” — Annie C

Jacksonville shooting is the latest incident of fatal violence driven by racist hatred. The killing of three Black people at a Dollar General store in Florida Saturday afternoon was the latest act of American gun violence motivated by racist ideology, a national scourge that federal officials have described as one of the most lethal forms of modern domestic terrorism.

Should you be masking with new COVID variants? Experts weigh in. "People 65-plus and people who are immunocompromised should strongly consider masking during flu, RSV, COVID season while in indoor public spaces," said Dr. Céline Gounder, a CBS News medical contributor and editor-at-large for public health at KFF Health News. "And for everyone else — it all depends on what their risk tolerance is."

Workers exposed to extreme heat have no consistent protection in the US. A historic heat wave that began blasting the Southwest and other parts of the country this summer is shining a spotlight on one of the harshest, yet least-addressed effects of U.S. climate change: the rising deaths and injuries of people who work in extreme heat, whether inside warehouses and kitchens or outside under the blazing sun. Many of them are migrants in low-wage jobs.

2024 Republicans want to eliminate the Education Department. What would that look like? Multiple Republican presidential candidates made it clear at this week’s debate that the Department of Education is in danger if they are elected...None of the 2024 candidates during Wednesday’s debate detailed how they would handle eliminating it, but conservatives have longed to see many of its tasks either completely eliminated or absorbed into other departments...“Although the effort to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education is grounded in the backdrop of a cultural war, this effort is also a direct affront to civil rights.” -- This is most definitely an affront to civil rights. “School choice” is code for “let’s make sure only wealthy white kids get a decent education.” It guarantees inequity. And as we all know, Republicans strive for inequity.

Republican candidates' threats of US strikes in Mexico spark worries. As the Republican race for the White House in 2024 ramps up, threats by the party's presidential candidates to launch military strikes on Mexico's drug cartels are being taken increasingly seriously, sparking worries on both sides of the border. -- No Republican should ever again be US President.

Harsh penalties approved for Florida state college employees who use restrooms that don’t correspond with gender assigned at birth. Florida education officials on Wednesday unanimously approved harsher penalties against state college employees who violate a new law barring them and students from using restrooms or changing facilities for a gender other than the one assigned at birth. The move by the state board of education comes as LGBTQ advocates have criticized the law as a larger effort to erase them from Florida schools and society.

Germany approves self-ID to make transitioning easier for trans people after year in legal limbo. The legislation, dubbed the Self-Determination Act, aims to make it easier for trans and non-binary people to change their names on legal documents such as birth or death certificates.

Afghanistan: Taliban ban women from visiting popular national park. Afghanistan's acting minister of virtue and vice, Mohammad Khaled Hanafi, said women had not been observing hijab inside the park. He called on religious clerics and security agencies to forbid women from entering until a solution was found.

France to ban wearing abaya dress in schools. France will ban children from wearing the abaya – the loose-fitting, full-length robe worn by some Muslim women – in state-run schools, the country’s education minister has said ahead of the back-to-school season. France, which has enforced a strict ban on religious signs in state schools since 19th-century laws removed any traditional Catholic influence from public education, has struggled to update guidelines to deal with a growing Muslim minority.

FIFA suspends Spain soccer federation president Luis Rubiales for 90 days after World Cup final kiss. FIFA suspended Spanish soccer federation president Luis Rubiales from office on Saturday while its disciplinary committee investigates his conduct at the Women’s World Cup final, which included kissing a player without her consent…FIFA has given no timetable for a ruling by its disciplinary panel. The body’s disciplinary judges can impose sanctions on individuals ranging from warnings and fines to suspensions from the sport.

Spain’s football federation accuses World Cup winner of lying about kiss from president. On Saturday, the federation doubled down on its accusations of lying against Hermoso. In a since deleted statement, the RFEF said, “We have to state that Ms. Jennifer Hermoso lies in every statement she makes against the president” and again threatened legal action. It is unclear why the RFEF chose to delete the statement from its website.

Women working in Antarctica say they were left to fend for themselves against sexual harassers. Monahon, 35, is one of many women who say the isolated environment and macho culture at the United States research center in Antarctica have allowed sexual harassment and assault to flourish. The National Science Foundation, the federal agency that oversees the U.S. Antarctic Program, published a report in 2022 in which 59% of women said they’d experienced harassment or assault while on the ice, and 72% of women said such behavior was a problem in Antarctica. But the problem goes beyond the harassment, The Associated Press found. In reviewing court records and internal communications, and in interviews with more than a dozen current and former employees, the AP uncovered a pattern of women who said their claims of harassment or assault were minimized by their employers, often leading to them or others being put in further danger.

Requests to ban books hit a 21-year high. See which titles were the most challenged.Books with LGBTQ+ themes have been among the most-challenged titles since 2016, according to ALA archives. Two of these top 13 books — Gender Queer: A Memoir by Maia Kobabe and Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison — were some of the first to draw complaints from parents at North Hunterdon High School in New Jersey in the fall of 2021, librarian Martha Hickson told CNN. Both titles were the top two challenged books in 2021. “They labeled both books as pornographic and obscene,” Hickson told CNN. “It quickly became clear that the pattern that existed was that they (parents) did not like books that had LGBTQ+ themes.” -- Time to read the 13 books on this list.

Alabama wants to be the 1st state to execute a prisoner by making him breathe only nitrogen. Nitrogen hypoxia is caused by forcing the inmate to breathe only nitrogen, depriving them of oxygen and causing them to die. Nitrogen makes up 78% of the air inhaled by humans and is harmless when inhaled with oxygen. While proponents of the new method have theorized it would be painless, opponents have likened it to human experimentation.

Schoolkids in 8 states can now eat free school meals, advocates urge Congress for nationwide policy. Minnesota, New Mexico, Colorado, Vermont, Michigan, and Massachusetts will make school breakfasts and lunches permanently free to all students starting this academic year, regardless of family income, following in the footsteps of California and Maine. Several other states are considering similar changes and congressional supporters want to extend free meals to all kids nationwide.

A Washington Special Education School That Was Accused of Harming Kids Is Now Barred From Taking New Students. The state Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction launched the investigation after a Seattle Times and ProPublica series last year revealed that the Northwest School of Innovative Learning had long been the subject of allegations that it abused students, misused isolation rooms, let unqualified aides lead classes, and lacked basic educational materials, including textbooks.

Why failure is your child’s best tool. Similar to exercising to become physically stronger, failing makes us emotionally stronger. Also, like exercise, failure operates on a Goldilocks principle. You need to experience “just the right amount” of setbacks to feel pain, learn from it, repair and become stronger...Many parents and guardians keep checking to see whether their child is OK or if they’re going to make the same mistake again. Don’t. At a certain point, it benefits your child more to understand from you that their bad experience, whether by their own bad decision or someone else’s, doesn’t define who they are. It’s time to see new things in them.

This 17-Year-Old Invented A Blockchain-Enabled Fingerprint Scanner To Address The Global Identification Crisis. Her solar-powered fingerprint scanning device enables users to create unique biometric digital identification without relying on internet access.

Simone Biles wins a record 8th US Gymnastics title a full decade after her first. Biles is all but assured of returning to the gym where she captured her first world title in 2013. Over the course of two electric nights at the SAP Center, she served notice that even after a two-year break following the Tokyo Olympics, in gymnastics there is the one referred to as the GOAT and there is everyone else.

Meet the man who thinks he ‘screwed up’ college football with a Supreme Court win. Andrew Coats, the lawyer who convinced the Supreme Court in 1984 to allow universities to maximize football revenue, leading to a sweeping upheaval today, looks back with regret on the landmark case he successfully argued...These massive deals have caused the value of televised college football games to skyrocket in recent decades, largely at the expense of student-athletes who, in all sports, regularly travel thousands of miles for routine games once within reach of short plane rides or bus trips. -- College sports is not about, you know, sports. It’s not even about student-athletes or education. It’s all about making money. Bring in the athlete, chew ‘em up, then spit ‘em out. Then bring in the next one and repeat. Stop watching football. All of it. At all levels.

RIP Bob Barker. He was 99.

Life’s short. Live, love, create, and help others.

Until next time, my friends. Stay safe and stay sane. Good night.