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.

Wednesday, August 23, 2023

And another day of attempting to block arrests, Trump’s attacks building on history, SC’s all-male Supreme Court, extreme weather, breaking out the masks, commercial jets’ ‘near collisions,’ and smashing eggs comes to a close:

"The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom." -- Isaac Asimov

Judge denies Meadows, Clark attempts to block arrest in Georgia. Though Jones has not yet decided whether the charges must proceed in federal court, his pair of decisions clears the way for Willis to arrest Clark and Meadows if they don’t surrender by Friday.

Why Trump allies are seeking to move their cases from Georgia to federal court. Legal experts note a federal trial would be heard by a different judge and a jury pool less filled with Democrats than one in Georgia’s Fulton County. It would also not be televised. The defendants seeking to move their cases are relying on a statute that Congress first established more than 200 years ago to prevent federal officials from being stymied in carrying out their duties. The mechanism was originally created to combat state court lawsuits filed against customs officers, who were enforcing a trade embargo against England during the War of 1812. Under the current version and Supreme Court precedent, federal officials can move their state criminal prosecutions if the allegations relate to an act taken “under color of such office” and the official shows a “colorable federal defense.” Meadows argues he is immune because the allegations against him — his trip to Georgia following the 2020 election and calls he organized between Trump and election officials — was part of his job in the White House.

How Trump’s attacks on prosecutors build on history of using racist language and stereotypes. Donald Trump’s aggressive response to his fourth criminal indictment in five months follows a strategy he has long used against legal and political opponents: relentless attacks, often infused with language that is either overtly racist or is coded in ways that appeal to racists...The rhetoric is a reminder of Trump’s tendency to use coded racial messaging as a signal to supporters, an approach he has deployed over several decades as he evolved from a New York City real estate tycoon to a reality television star and, eventually, the president. Even if he doesn’t explicitly employ racial slurs, his language recalls America’s history of portraying Black people as not fully human. -- If you support Donald Trump, you are indeed a racist. Own it.

Why Trump and His Supporters Keep Calling Democrats 'Fascists'. But traditionally the labels seemed more ideologically consistent. Democrats have long compared Republicans to fascists, because the term traditionally carried with it the idea of right-wing extremism. Just as Republicans often referred to their partisan rivals as “commies” and “socialists,” terms typically associated with extreme leftism. So to hear Republicans like Trump, Giuliani, and Marjorie Taylor Greene turn the “fascist” and “Nazi” labels on Democrats is a bit more curious...Yet most reputable historians and political scientists would nonetheless classify fascists and Nazis as exemplars of the extreme far-right who were often murderously opposed to groups like socialists and communists and other members of the ideological left. But the average American doesn’t necessarily share that view...How’s that possible? It’s possible because even though the vast majority of Democrats, and most Independents, place fascists and Nazis on the right, most Republicans don’t consider those groups far-right at all. Just the opposite, in fact. In our survey, 76% of Republicans place fascists on the left side of the spectrum, and 44% rate them at 1, as far left as possible. And we see similar numbers for Nazis. Over 68% of Republicans think Nazis are left-of-center and about 43% say Nazis are the pinnacle of leftism. And just in case you think Democrats are dispassionately calling balls and strikes when it comes to history’s “bad guys,” when we asked Americans about “Communists,” roughly half of Democrats said communists were right-of-center and 28% of them rated communists as far-right as possible. Like Republicans, in other words, Democrats are often themselves quite keen on associating politically stigmatized groups with their ideological opponents, even if those stigmatized groups are notoriously on the left—like communists. The major difference, of course, is that Democrats almost never refer to Republicans as “commies.” Certainly not as often as we hear about “fascist Democrats.”...Part of the answer is pure tribal psychology. It is practically first principles in the study of group identity that when we identify with a sports team, religious group, or political party, our self-esteem is bound up with that group. As psychologist Jonathan Haidt has famously shown, our group allegiances take on a deeply moral element. We naturally tend to associate our group and its values with moral goodness and our competition with moral depravity. For Republicans (and Democrats), admitting that fascists and Nazis are on their side of the ideological spectrum—that they have any overlapping worldviews, values, or tactics with “us”—is a tribal psychology no-no. Fascists and Nazis, the exemplars of political evil, must share space with our partisan opponents. It works like a syllogism. Leftists are the bad guys. Fascists and Nazis are also bad guys. So fascists and Nazis are leftists.

South Carolina’s new all-male highest court reverses course on abortion, upholding strict 6-week ban. The continued erosion of legal abortion access across the U.S. South comes after Republican state lawmakers replaced the lone woman on the court, Justice Kaye Hearn, who reached the state’s mandatory retirement age. The 4-1 ruling departs from the court’s own decision months earlier striking down a similar ban that the Republican-led Legislature passed in 2021. The latest ban takes effect immediately.

Wildfires, hurricanes and heat: The U.S. is getting hit by extreme weather from all sides. All told, the various extremes are making for a turbulent week in nearly every corner of the country. Climate scientists also say it’s an all-too-real look at how global warming increases the risks — and consequences — of the deadly events.

It may be time to break out the masks against Covid, some experts say. “Octogenarians comprise the highest-risk group for complications following Covid infection,” Reiner said. “At least until the numbers start to drop again, it would be appropriate for President Biden to take some precautions and wear a mask in crowds.” Other high-risk groups include people with diabetes, cancer, chronic liver, kidney or lung disease, organ or stem cell transplants, HIV or other immunocompromising conditions, a history of heart disease or stroke, dementia or mental health issues.

Early testing suggests variant BA.2.86 has been detected in US wastewater, CDC report says. Preliminary testing of wastewater in the United States has detected the new highly mutated coronavirus variant BA.2.86, according to a risk assessment posted Wednesday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The CDC did not give details on where the positive wastewater sample had been collected but said it was part of routine monitoring through its National Wastewater Surveillance System.

Kentucky school district cancels classes less than two weeks into year due to Covid, flu and strep outbreaks. The district canceled classes Tuesday and Wednesday and will shift to remote learning on Thursday and Friday. Extracurricular activities, including sports practices and games, have been canceled through the week to allow for a deep clean of the school, Schuler said.

A third of adults believe COVID-19 vaccines caused thousands of sudden deaths: poll. The new polling data found that a third of adults believed the COVID-19 vaccines “caused thousands of sudden deaths in otherwise healthy people,” with 10 percent believing that claim to be “definitely true” and 23 percent saying it was “probably true.” Another 34 percent said it was “probably false,” and 31 percent said that claim was “definitely false.”...In the same poll, roughly a quarter of people said they believed vaccinations against measles, mumps and rubella caused autism in children, and that COVID-19 vaccines cause infertility. No evidence has so far been found to indicate that immunization against the coronavirus affects male or female fertility...Regarding reproductive health, about a third of survey participants said they believed sex education would lead to teens being more sexually active, and also that birth control the pill or IUDs make it harder for women to get pregnant after they stop using those methods. Even larger shares of participants believed in misinformation having to do with gun violence, with 60 percent saying they believed “armed school police guards have been proven to prevent school shootings.”...Another 42 percent said they believed people who have firearms in their homes are less likely to be killed by a gun than people without guns at home. In fact, the opposite has been observed, with a 2022 analysis of California adults from 2004-16 finding that overall homicide rates were more than two times higher among people who lived with gun owners than those who didn’t...KFF found that certain groups were more susceptible to misinformation than others, including those with lower levels of educational attainment, those who identify as Republican as well as Black and Hispanic adults.

'Near Collisions' of Commercial Jets Happen All the Time, Horrifying FAA Records Show. The Times analysis shows that such “close calls” are happening multiple times a week—and that there were 46 such incidents reported last month alone. During the most recent 12-month period where data was available, reporters found that there were roughly 300 reported “near collision” incidents involving major airlines, some of which avoided disaster only via last second maneuvering. The concrete details of some of these incidents are laid bare in the Times reporting—and are probably enough to make some readers swear off air travel for the rest of their natural lives. A vast majority of the incidents are said to be the result of pilot or air traffic controller error, and many of them happen in and around airports during take off or landing, the Times reports.

Europe’s sweeping rules for tech giants are about to kick in — here’s how they work. The DSA, which the biggest platforms must start following Friday, is designed to keep users safe online and stop the spread of harmful content that’s either illegal or violates a platform’s terms of service, such as promotion of genocide or anorexia. It also looks to protect Europeans’ fundamental rights like privacy and free speech...Instead, the DSA is more about whether tech companies have the right processes in place to reduce the harm that their algorithm-based recommendation systems can inflict on users. Essentially, they’ll have to let the European Commission, the E.U.’s executive arm and top digital enforcer, look under the hood to see how their algorithms work.

Meta releases an AI model that can transcribe and translate close to 100 languages. Available in open source along with SeamlessAlign, a new translation data set, Meta claims that SeamlessM4T represents a “significant breakthrough” in the field of AI-powered speech-to-speech and speech-to-text.

Parents are smashing eggs on their kids heads in new TikTok prank. Doctors say they should stop. A viral prank in which parents film themselves cracking an egg on their toddlers’ heads is taking over TikTok. But some medical experts say the laughs may not be worth the potential harmful effects the stunt could have on kids...The parents most likely see it as lighthearted fun. But in the comments of the videos and in video stitches, dozens of TikTok users have expressed concern that the children shown are being hurt or humiliated. Several medical experts told NBC News that while they don’t think the parents in the videos seem malicious, the prank could have unintended short-term effects, including bruising a child’s head or spreading germs from the egg. -- Humanity, 2023.

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

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

Monday, August 21, 2023

And another day of unraveling the federal government, Ramaswamy, Tuberville, Paxton, record firearms deaths of children, a fired teacher, LGBTQ resource closures, a right-wing sheriffs group, and the Loch Ness Monster comes to a close:

"If you like to worry about things, this is a great time." — Bill Nye

“He’s skipping the debate because he can’t debate. He has no policies, no policy ideas, no ideas. His whole platform is about him. He doesn’t talk about anything else. He has nothing to give or share.” — Bridget

“Stop saying Donald Trump broke norms and start saying Donald Trump broke the law.” — Don Winslow

GOP presidential candidates all want to unravel the federal government. Yet while the candidates have different positions on major issues facing the country, they broadly agree on the idea of taking a sledgehammer — not a scalpel — to the federal government. The most-covered aspect of this comes from Trump’s plan to slash the federal bureaucracy by reclassifying tens of thousands of employees to make them easier to fire. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy have floated similar plans, both claiming they’d cut the federal bureaucracy in about half. DeSantis and former Vice President Mike Pence have both talked about cleaning house at the top of the FBI. Ramaswamy wants to shut down the FBI down entirely, and namechecked the IRS, ATF, CDC and Education Department as other “government agencies that should not exist” during a speech in Iowa this month. DeSantis, meanwhile, wants to ax the departments of Education, Commerce and Energy, as well as the IRS. Just this week, Pence also proposed to eliminate the Education Department as part of a broader plan that called for federal welfare and housing assistance to be converted into block grants, and to dramatically reshape the Affordable Care Act. -- The Republican plan is to decimate American society. They all support it. They all desire it. They all will do it. Never vote Republican. Vote Democrat from the bottom to the top.

Trump says he will surrender Thursday on Georgia charges tied to efforts to overturn 2020 election. Trump’s announcement came hours after his attorneys met with prosecutors in Atlanta to discuss the details of his release on bond. The former president is barred from intimidating co-defendants, witnesses or victims in the case — including on social media — according to the bond agreement signed by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis, Trump’s defense attorneys and the judge. It explicitly includes “posts on social media or reposts of posts” made by others.

Who is Vivek Ramaswamy, a rising GOP candidate in the 2024 presidential race? Ramaswamy is fervently against the government doing anything to stop climate change. He has called for the U.S. military to be deployed to the border with Mexico in order to halt the flow of migrants. He opposes more aid to Ukraine and wants a federal ban on abortion after six weeks of pregnancy. A lot of his ideas self-consciously recall the proposals that made Trump popular in the first place. Ramaswamy, who calls his agenda "America First 2.0," says he will take “the America First agenda even further than Donald Trump did.” -- And he wants to raise the voting age from 18 to 25. Now see the first story for even more of the things he wants to destroy. That’s who he is. He has told us. And now you know he is someone who should never be in the halls of power in the United States.

Tommy Tuberville no longer owns property in Alabama; senator may be a Florida man, report suggests. As of last month, Tommy Tuberville did not own a single square foot of property in Alabama after selling parcels in Macon and Tallapoosa counties for $1.4 million, according to a Washington Post report published Thursday. And while a spokesman for Alabama’s senior senator maintained to the Post that Tuberville’s primary residence is an Auburn house owned by his wife and son, campaign finance documents and property records suggest Tuberville’s main home is in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida, the paper reported.

Ken Paxton’s team said there was no evidence to support impeachment. The House published nearly 4,000 pages. The Senate, which is conducting the trial, published the exhibits Thursday night. The document dump provides granular detail of how Paxton allegedly abused his office to help Nate Paul, an Austin real estate developer and campaign donor.

Firearms killed a record number of children in 2021, study finds. The alarming statistic clearly indicated that America’s gun violence epidemic has gotten worse, experts say. More than 80% of the gun deaths were among males 19 and younger. Black male children were more likely to die from homicide. White males 19 and younger were more likely to kill themselves with guns.

A Georgia school board fires a teacher for reading a book to students about gender identity. She had been a teacher for 10 years when she got into trouble in March for reading the picture book “My Shadow Is Purple” by Scott Stuart at Due West Elementary School, after which some parents complained. -- So many disgusting people. Soon, no one anywhere in the US will ever want to be a teacher. Goddamn Republicans are destroying that profession.

University of Houston students brace for LGBTQ Resource Center closure in response to Texas’ DEI ban. The announcement confronted students with the impact of a new law that will require all state-funded colleges and universities to close their diversity, equity and inclusion offices. -- We are not the United States of America. Instead, we’re 50 mini-countries. And your rights depend on the mini-country you reside in. “State’s rights” is nothing more than approval for some states to oppress certain groups of people.

Alabama can enforce ban on puberty blockers and hormones for transgender children, court says. A federal appeals court ruled Monday that Alabama can enforce a ban outlawing the use of puberty blockers and hormones to treat transgender children, the second such appellate victory for gender-affirming care restrictions that have been adopted by a growing number of Republican-led states.

Female soldiers in Army special operations face rampant sexism and harassment, military report says. U.S. Army Special Operations Command, in a lengthy study, reported a wide range of “overtly sexist” comments from male soldiers, including a broad aversion to females serving in commando units. The comments, it said, are “not outliers” but represent a common sentiment that women don’t belong on special operations teams.

Angry reaction as Spanish soccer leader kissed a Women’s World Cup star on the mouth without consent. In Spain, acting minister for sports and culture Miquel Iceta told public broadcaster RNE “it is unacceptable to kiss a player on the lips to congratulate her.” A stronger reaction came from Spanish government equality minister Irene Montero. “It is a form of sexual violence that women suffer on a daily basis, and which has been invisible so far, and which we should not normalize,” Montero said wrote Sunday on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.

A right-wing sheriffs group that challenges federal law is gaining acceptance around the country. “The sheriff is supposed to be protecting the public from evil,” the chief law enforcement officer for Barry County, Michigan, said during a break in the National Sheriffs’ Association 2023 conference in June. “When your government is evil or out of line, that’s what the sheriff is there for, protecting them from that.”...The group, known as CSPOA, teaches that elected sheriffs must “protect their citizens from the overreach of an out-of-control federal government” by refusing to enforce any law they deem unconstitutional or “unjust.” “The safest way to actually achieve that is to have local law enforcement understand that they have no obligation to enforce such laws,” Mack said in an interview. “They’re not laws at all anyway. If they’re unjust laws, they are laws of tyranny.” -- Many in this country are so fucked up.

Long Covid symptoms create a greater burden of disability than heart disease or cancer, new study shows. After considering their findings, though, Al-Aly said it really shouldn’t be such a huge surprise that long Covid is so disabling, because it affects so many different parts of the body...The study has some important caveats. On average, the people in the study were older, in their 60s, and almost 90% were male, so the findings may not translate to those who are younger or to women. None of the people in the study were vaccinated at the time they were infected because the vaccines had not been developed yet, and there weren’t yet antiviral treatments targeted to Covid-19.  Studies have since shown that vaccination and early treatment can help curb long covid risk.

CDC and WHO monitoring new Covid variant with large number of mutations. Global disease experts are monitoring a new variant, BA.2.86, that carries a large number of mutations — meaning it looks significantly different from the original version of Omicron and the previously dominant strain targeted by upcoming Covid booster shots this fall. It's still unclear how transmissible BA.2.86 is, though experts said it seems capable of sidestepping vaccine protection to some degree.

Maryland reports state’s first case of locally acquired malaria strain in over 40 years. The unnamed person, who was hospitalized and is now recovering, did not recently travel out of the country or to other states with recent locally acquired malaria cases.

New study warns against risks of ‘time-traveling pathogens’. As the climate warms, scientists have suggested that “time-traveling pathogens” unleashed by thawing Arctic permafrost may pose a risk to modern ecosystems.

Stem cells from one eye show promise in healing injuries in the other. Dr. Ula Jurkunas, an ophthalmologist at Mass Eye and Ear in Boston who was the principal investigator for the study, said the experimental technique involves taking a small biopsy of stem cells from the healthy eye, then expanding and growing them on a graft in a lab at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. A couple of weeks later, they’re sent back to be transplanted into the injured eye. Durst was the first patient to undergo the procedure.

Rare flesh-eating bacteria kills 5 in Florida, 3 in New York, Connecticut. The Vibrio vulnificus bacteria, which can be found in raw or undercooked seafood, saltwater, and brackish water, led to the death of two people since January in Hillsborough County, home of Tampa, according to the Florida Department of Health. An additional person died in each of the surrounding Pasco, Polk and Sarasota counties. Florida has recorded a total of 26 cases statewide this year.

Spain win historic FIFA Women’s World Cup final against England. After 63 games, great goals and agonizing penalty shootouts, Spain are crowned champions in Sydney's Stadium Australia. 

Women’s soccer teams ditched white shorts at the World Cup. Here’s why that matters. The move is part of a growing trend — and one not limited to soccer — aimed at tackling period anxiety among female athletes.

Phillies set to use facial authentication to identify ticketholders. During the Phillies' next homestand, some fans will be able to enter the ballpark by just scanning their faces. Citizens Bank Park will become the first to unveil Go-Ahead Entry, at the First Base Gate, on Monday. The technology, through the MLB Ballpark app, uses a camera that will recognize any opted-in fans as they walk in and automatically scan tickets once they're identified.

Trudeau denounces Meta's news block as fires force evacuations. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau blasted social media giant Meta on Monday over its decision to block local news as wildfires continue to force thousands of Canadians from their homes..."Right now in an emergency situation, where up-to-date local information is more important than ever, Facebook is putting corporate profits ahead of people's safety, ahead of quality local journalism. This is not the time for that.”...Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has blocked Canadians from viewing news from Canadian outlets in response to the Liberal government passing its Online News Act, Bill C-18, in June. Google has threatened similar action.

Meta criticized for making reproductive health an R-rated issue. Female reproductive health experts are calling on Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, to rethink its restrictions on reproductive health content. The company has long faced criticism for removing and restricting female reproductive health information with a prominent report from the Center for Intimacy Justice early last year accusing Meta of systematically rejecting many female and gender diverse reproductive health ads. The CIJ report also accused Meta of having bias algorithms, stating that male reproductive health ads were found to be permitted, including ads that referenced male sexual pleasure...“The policy says that reproductive health is allowed, but in practice their technology is still rejecting it,” Rotman said, explaining that images of uteruses are often mistakenly flagged as nudity, and words like period, menopause, endometriosis and vagina also commonly triggering sexually inappropriate warnings.

More than 20 million Americans enrolled in a federal program for subsidized internet access. US residents can can qualify for the program if they meet certain eligibility requirements, such as participating in other government assistance programs including SNAP or Medicaid, if their income is below a certain level or if they have recently received federal Pell grants.

Looking for a new car under $20,000? Good luck. Your choice has dwindled to just one vehicle. Just five years ago, a price-conscious auto shopper in the United States could choose from among a dozen new small cars selling for under $20,000. Now, there’s just one: The Mitsubishi Mirage. And even the Mirage appears headed for the scrap yard.

AI-Created Art Isn’t Copyrightable, Judge Says in Ruling That Could Give Hollywood Studios Pause. More than 100 days into the writers strike, fears have kept mounting over the possibility of studios deploying generative artificial intelligence to completely pen scripts. But intellectual property law has long said that copyrights are only granted to works created by humans, and that doesn’t look like it’s changing anytime soon.

Loch Ness monster fans prepare for biggest creature hunt for 50 years. “Monster hunters” from as far away as Japan and New Zealand will be tuning in to livestreams of Scotland’s Loch Ness in the hope of settling a longstanding debate as to whether or not the famed monster, affectionately named Nessie, actually exists.

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

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