"It's just math. And math doesn't care about your feelings."
~ Liz Dye, Wonkette
https://www.wonkette.com/trumps-bs-pennsylvania-claims-dropkicked-by-demon-math
It's been a week since the election results were projected for Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 election, mainly due to exceeding the number of votes that would trigger a recount and winning Pennsylvania and its twenty electoral votes. Since then Biden has gone on to win Nevada, Arizona, and Georgia; Of the states remaining, Trump only won North Carolina.
Despite all of this winning, despite acceptance speeches and celebrations, despite Biden moving forward with plans to tackle the pandemic as president, to renew America's position among foreign powers, as he accepts congratulations from world leaders, even China, but not from Trump or most of the Republican Party of gutless cowards and hypocrites, assholes whose mothers are ashamed of them.
Not only have the sore losers refused to congratulate the winner, they will not even acknowledge that he actually won as Trump peddles lies that the election was stolen from him and that his baseless lawsuits, unsupported by evidence, will reveal that he actually won when all is resolved. This nonsense would be pathetic enough from Trump, who we know has thinner-skin than even the weakest and frightened school-yard bully, but his toadies and sycophants in the government have been backing his play. Secretary of State Pompeo actually said aloud at a press conference that the government is transitioning to second Trump term of office. And when asked if Trump will attend the inauguration, White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany actually said that the president (meaning Trump) would attend his own inauguration.
This shit is ridiculous.
And so today's Hodge Podge is in part dedicated to this festering pile of bullshit which is the accusation of any election fraud. The current administration's own Department of Homeland Security certified that the 2020 election was the most secure in the history of the country.
The vote turnout was a 100 hundred year record. More people voted for Biden than any other candidate in the history of the country. Though disturbingly, Trump received the second most votes. Sure, population growth since the 1932 election, but still, that's great for Biden and disturbing that so many people voted for Trump.
But this Hodge Podge will also show the total normal and sane decisions of a normal and sane and experienced government leader of a great world power rather than the sociopathic insane bullshit.
But following the juxtaposition of insane election cries of the sky is falling next to rational and well-considered policy decisions, there's the pandemic, which is out of control, while at the same time racism runs wild in our country. Proud boys are terrorizing the nation's capital as I type this, and two weeks ago, a young African-American man from Camas was killed by police.
Then there's some cool science fiction features, including a tribute to Kurt Vonnegut.
And there's some science news.
I think this is a good one.
Thanks for tuning in.
First, this is over a year old but still upsetting and relevant.
Under questioning from @RepUnderwood, Nielsen admits she was broadly unfamiliar with research indicating kids are traumatized by being separated from their parents before DHS implemented its "zero tolerance" policy pic.twitter.com/tGWnIOQm9S
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 6, 2019
.@SecNielsen confirms that she's aware of parents who have been separated from their children & deported without them, but says "there was no parent who has been deported to my knowledge without multiple opportunities to take their children with them." pic.twitter.com/i63tlQkYuN
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 6, 2019
This is gross, but I am just going to link it.
Nazi Dude Hereby Claims 'The Proud Boys' For White Race And Future Of White Children
Black Woman Reaction GIF By BounceLibrary's elimination of overdue fines increases book returns
Last year, the Chicago Public Library quit charging people fines for overdue books. The library lost out on the average $800-$900,000 they collect annually in late fees but the gain was that long overdue books came back to the shelves for someone else to read! — Read the rest
| OBAMA’S MEMOIR |
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THE ELECTION
Election Was Most Secure In American History, US Officials Say (bloomberg.com)
Among the 10 signatories were Benjamin Hovland, who chairs the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, and Bob Kolasky, the assistant director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, part of the Department of Homeland Security. Key officials at the cybersecurity agency, including its head, Christopher Krebs, are stepping down or expecting to get fired as Trump refuses to concede. Krebs, who has enjoyed bipartisan support for his role in helping run secure U.S. elections in 2018 and 2020, has told associates he expects to be dismissed, according to three people familiar with internal discussions. His departure would follow the resignation of Bryan Ware, assistant director for cybersecurity at CISA, who resigned on Thursday morning after about two years at the agency. In addition, Valerie Boyd, the assistant secretary for international affairs at the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees CISA, has also left, according to two other people. Krebs and Ware are both Trump appointees.
The tweet came in response to another Mississippi politician, who was spreading unsubstantiated conspiracy theories about Joe Biden's victory in the 2020 US Presidential Election (as well as the disingenuous and frankly authoritarian-lite claim that the Founding Fathers had no aspirations of democracy but rather went out of their way to establish a Constitutional Republic that does not care for the will of the people).
No, the ‘Hail Mary’ plan for Trump isn’t going to work
By now, it has become overwhelmingly obvious that President Trump will lose most or all his court battles over the phantom voter fraud he’s alleging. But there’s still a scenario for Trump that is rattling around the Internet, one that’s widely called a “Hail Mary."
The attorney general of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, has shot down this idea. In a statement, he flatly noted that “there is no legal mechanism” for the state legislature “to act alone and appoint electors. None.”
That sounds pretty definitive. For a fuller picture, I reached out to Shapiro’s office. And they walked me through the legal reasons that scenario is preposterously far-fetched.
First, note that GOP state legislators themselves have recently been saying that they have no role in this process. And it’s true: By state law, they do not.
As Shapiro’s office explained to me, the relevant state law assigns the role of certifying the final statewide vote count to the Secretary of State, who is a Democrat. And it assigns the role of certifying the electors chosen by that statewide vote count to the governor, who is also a Democrat.
To oversimplify, the state legislature played its role in all this long ago when it passed the law designating this process as the “manner” by which the electors are chosen. The Constitution assigns to each state the authority to “appoint” its electors in a “manner” that the legislature “may direct.”
In all states, legislatures have “directed” that electors are appointed in accordance with the popular vote by passing laws to that effect.
...
For Trump to win in this scenario, numerous states with GOP legislatures would all have to do this extraordinarily rogue act, enough of them to pull Biden down below 270 electoral college votes (this would kick the election in a different sense over to the House, where the relative number of state delegations would decide it).
But for this utterly crazy scenario to work, on top of all that the House would have to relent to that second interpretation in all these cases. Needless to say, that won’t happen. (For the detailed look at this scenario, see this Foley piece.)
...
Everyone absolutely should remain on alert, to be clear. But a Trump win along these lines is absurdly, monumentally implausible.
https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2020/11/joe-biden-won-but-trumpism-didnt-lose/
Think about that: After four years of Donald Trump, only a tiny percentage of the American public switched their votes to the Democratic Party.
At the moment, the evidence is too thin to draw any conclusions about why this is. And given the complete uselessness of the exit polls, it might well be months or years before we can really say what happened. One way or another, though, we shouldn’t fool ourselves: there’s no real evidence that the country showed any increased love for either the Democratic Party or the liberal agenda writ large. We need to figure out why that is.
So far, the Republican response to President Donald Trump’s ludicrous attempt to cling to the presidency through the courts hasn’t exactly been a profile in courage. The legal charade is increasingly embarrassing, but still we get Republicans of all stripes saying things like: “What’s the downside for humoring him?” As their leader shreds through the trust and credibility of American elections, the thinking among the GOP is, essentially, Let the big guy have one last ride. Even the head of the Republican National Committee’s tweet that Kamala Harris would be the tiebreaking vote in a deadlocked Senate warranted a hasty deletion, once again proving that any public acknowledgment of reality is now verboten. The lack of principle is galling; the obsequiousness of GOP legislators has been an utter humiliation. Put together, it makes statements like Republican Sen. James Lankford’s declaration Wednesday that he will “step in” if President-elect Joe Biden doesn’t start to get the presidential daily briefings by the end of the week, resemble courage.
No, Mitch McConnell Can’t Veto Joe Biden’s Cabinet
NOV 13, 20203:01 PM
In 2016, Donald Trump won 3 million fewer votes than his opponent and was seen by a great deal of voters as not merely unlikable, but actively dangerous and horrifying. Yet mediocre turnout and an Electoral College inside straight handed Trump the presidency.
Trump proposed to the Senate a Cabinet built in his own image: inexperienced, unqualified, ideologically extreme, and aligned with the wants of corporate elites. Hence Energy Secretary Rick Perry, who literally didn’t understand his department’s agenda and opposed its existence; Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, a lifelong opponent of public education with no government experience; Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, an anti–public housing surgeon; on and on it went. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, like his whole caucus, tied his political future to Trump and confirmed this Cabinet of unqualified ideologues posthaste.
In 2020, campaigning through unprecedented crises and against an opposition party dead set on disenfranchising as many Americans as possible, Joe Biden still managed to win both the presidency and the largest popular vote mandate in American history. But barring a difficult clean sweep in a pair of Georgia Senate runoff elections, Republicans have already signaled that McConnell thinks he will wield veto power over Biden’s Cabinet nominees.
McConnell has done more than any human being in recent history to destroy Senate bipartisanship entirely, transforming American politics into a naked war for power. Most infamously, McConnell prevented Barack Obama’s final Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, from even receiving a confirmation hearing, much less a vote, in 2016, calling it improper to do so in an election year. He subsequently jammed Amy Coney Barrett onto the court mere weeks before the 2020 election. Imagine the Garland fiasco, but for a full 15 Cabinet secretaries, plus more than 1,000 additional Senate-confirmed appointees. This is what Biden could be up against merely to build a functioning executive branch.
In McConnell, Biden likely faces an opponent ideologically hellbent on sabotaging any government led by someone with a “D” next to their name. McConnell has had ample opportunity to address COVID-19, its accompanying recession, climate change, and other crises facing the country. His inaction speaks for itself.
Biden can, though, simply refuse to play McConnell’s game if he wants. In contrast to Supreme Court vacancies, there are two separate alternative strategies for filling out the executive branch without making the leader of the wildly undemocratic Senate a functional co-president. They are the Vacancies Act and the recess appointment clause of the U.S. Constitution.
The Vacancies Act has been used frequently by presidents of both parties to ensure that the president actually gets to execute the duties of the office to which he was elected. President Donald Trump almost made a sport of using the act to appoint “acting” officials, including two in the current Cabinet. It allows a new president to choose from two groups of people to serve as “acting” secretaries: either any Senate-confirmed official (including dozens of sitting Democrats serving as commissioners at multimember agencies) or any senior civil servant who has served in that agency for 90 days and is paid at the GS-15 level or above. Acting Health and Human Services Secretary Anthony Fauci sounds good, right?
The recess appointment clause, meanwhile, allows presidents to install “acting” officials while the Senate is in adjournment for at least 10 days. It too has been used regularly in the recent past: George W. Bush made 179 recess appointments, 99 of which were to full-time positions. Moreover, Biden can force the Senate into recess if McConnell attempts any blockade of his Cabinet. Under the Constitution’s presidential adjournment clause, if the Senate and House cannot agree on whether or not to adjourn, the president can adjourn Congress “for such time as he shall think proper.” With an allied speaker of the House, Biden can instigate an adjournment standoff, resolve it, and make his appointments in the interim.
These steps are not preferable to regular order in a Senate. Even the savviest practitioner of the Vacancies Act and recess appointment powers may well end up needing two individuals to fill each job within a four-year presidential term. And these officials will lack the gravitas accorded by full confirmation.
This plan B is, though, undoubtedly preferable to the alternatives if McConnell tries to play hardball. At the very least, it can be wielded as a stick to try to force him to back down from any attempted obstruction.
Without the threat of plan B, McConnell might concede some confirmations after extracting a few pounds of flesh, but any such appointees would definitionally have been blessed by a man who giddily blocked economy-saving action during the last collapse, in service of “making Obama a one-term president.” In other words, any nominees who would appease McConnell cannot be expected to have Biden or the American people’s best interests in mind. They would serve only the Wall Streeters, fossil fuel barons, military contractors, tech monopolists, and other corporate elites lobbying Biden on their behalf.
Alternatively, Biden could fill these roles with experienced, dedicated civil servants who care about the public interest. He will already have the power to do so on day one of his presidency.
Acting officials can ensure that Biden fulfills his mandate and launches a transformative agenda, no matter McConnell’s bad-faith maneuvers. An acting treasury secretary could oversee CARES Act implementation—perhaps even funding a massive investment program using monies that have already been appropriated by Congress. An acting secretary of defense could ensure Defense Production Act appropriations go to provision of personal protective equipment, not jet engine parts. They could even lay down the infrastructure for an eventual vaccine’s distribution. An acting secretary of health and human services can dispel fears about an unsafe vaccine approved for the sake of political expediency, by putting the public health experts front and center again. An acting secretary of education can unshackle tens of millions of Americans from student debt peonage. An acting attorney general can prosecute corporate corruption (e.g., Big Pharma), resuscitate civil rights laws, and enforce antitrust laws to help ensure the recovery from the current crisis doesn’t enable corporate acquisitions and exacerbate inequality.
Biden was elected by 78 million Americans and counting because they wanted a government that actually reflects their will and addresses their needs—most immediately, a resolution to the pandemic and accompanying economic woes. Whether or not the Senate cooperates, Biden will have tools to make good on many of his key promises.
Thanks for nothing — exit polls show that 55% of white women voted for Trump in 2020, even more than the 52%… |
Trump Will Lose His Twitter 'Public Interest' Protections In January (theverge.com)
Twitter applies special policies to world leaders and some other officials, leaving rule-breaking content online if there's "a clear public interest value to keeping the tweet on the service." The public interest policy was formalized in 2019, codifying a rule that had been informally enforced for some time... "This policy framework applies to current world leaders and candidates for office, and not private citizens when they no longer hold these positions," a Twitter spokesperson confirms to The Verge.
These changes will cover Trump's personal account. Position-specific accounts like @WhiteHouse, @POTUS, and @FLOTUS are transferred to a new administration after an outgoing president steps down.
Amid Pentagon upheaval, military officers face a fraught few months |
How to cover a coup — or whatever it is Trump is attempting |
GOP leaders’ embrace of Trump’s refusal to concede fits pattern of rising authoritarianism, data shows |
Why the Supreme Court probably won't steal the election for Trump. — Ian Milhiser at Vox
"We're for sure going to be suing our way to a win. Make sure we haven't ID'ed any lawyers and don't have any kind of strategy for it." Fucking idiots. (Wall Street Journal)
Wait, the fraud lawsuits aren't real, they're just about the monster's feelings? Well then. (Talking Points Memo)
Joe Biden's win won't fix America, but it gives us time to try. — Hayes Brown at MSNBC
An outpouring of joy and hope! (The Nation)
Seems like a fine Day One to me! (Business Insider)
Yes please, Kevin Kruse, let's kill the Electoral College! (MSNBC)
"This fucking virus." Inside Trump's stupid reelection campaign. — Politico
Harris will be the first female, Black and Asian vice president. But not the first VP of color.
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| Trump supporter Dana Benson hangs a U.S. flag while demonstrating outside of a vote counting facility in Philadelphia. Photo: Mark Makela/Getty Images |
As the weaknesses of President Trump's legal cases to overturn Joe Biden's win become clearer, Republicans are talking more about the Electoral College — hinting at an extreme last-chance way for Trump to cling to power.
What we're watching: In this long-shot scenario, Trump and his team could try to block secretaries of state in contested states from certifying results. That could allow legislatures in those states to try to appoint new electors who favor Trump over Biden.
- "It's basically hijacking the democracy," one lawyer familiar with the process tells Axios. "They've got nothing else; you'd be trying to deny Joe Biden 270."
- If Trump were to pursue this course, it likely would become apparent the week leading up to Thanksgiving, as states face deadlines to finalize election results.
Between the lines: Trump has not directly said he would pursue this strategy. But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo each noted on Tuesday that the election results don't become official until electors cast their votes next month.
- To date, Biden's status as president-elect is rooted in media projections based on raw vote totals reported by individual states.
- Those totals don't become official, though, until states certify them. The Constitution prescribes that those official results will be used to apportion electors who officially pick the president.
- “At some point here, we’ll find out finally who was certified (the winner) in each of these states, and the Electoral College will determine the winner and that person will be sworn in on January 20," McConnell said. "No reason for alarm.”
- One Senate leadership aide said McConnell was not signaling an elector strategy and was simply noting that it's not uncommon for there to be litigation before the Electoral College results are complete.
- Pompeo, who raised eyebrows with a line about how there would be a "smooth transition to a second Trump administration," independently raised the Electoral College during a State Department news conference. “When the process is complete, there’s going to be electors selected," he said. "There’s a process; the Constitution lays it out pretty clearly.”
- The Trump campaign did not respond to requests for comment.
How it works: If a lawsuit successfully stops certification of results in a state, legislators there could step into the void and pick a pro-Trump slate of electors.
- The lawyer, who requested anonymity to speak about the scenario, said Trump's team now appears to be trying to throw enough dirt at the process for counting late ballots to argue that accurate results can't be ascertained.
- The next step could be to try to get federal or state courts to enjoin secretaries of state from certifying results.
- Any move to provide an alternative slate of electors could force the first real test of the Electoral Count Act of 1887 and could land before the Supreme Court.
- Among the key swing states, Arizona and Georgia have GOP governors and legislatures. Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have Democratic governors but GOP legislatures.
"This is a horrible idea, one that should be morally repugnant to every American," elections law expert Edward B. Foley wrote recently in The Washington Post.
- "For a state legislature to reclaim this power after voters have already cast their own ballots would be an even more egregious intrusion into the democratic process."
But, but, but: Even if the GOP was able to get injunctions, it would be an arduous legal process before legislatures could take the matter into their own hands.
- "How many compliant judges are going to throw themselves on the ground in front of that train?" the lawyer said. "And how many legislatures are going to go along with it?" Instead, he said, Trump may try to "scare the living bejeezus out of everyone to gain leverage and then cut a deal for him and his family."
How Much Will President Cry Baby F**k Up Joe Biden’s Inauguration?
The 2009 inauguration of our last real president, Barack Obama, was a big fucking deal, to quote our next real president. An estimated 1.8 million people showed up to watch Obama take the oath of office. We have just as much, if not arguably more, to celebrate when Joe Biden officially replaces that thing squatting in the Oval Office, but we'll need to do it on the down low. There's a still a pandemic out there, and COVID-19's not showing any signs of slowing down. It's no sleep and no large crowds until a vaccine.
From The Daily Beast:
"Inaugurals always require intricate planning. This one will be a really delicate dance to have that element of accessibility without risk," said Steve Kerrigan, who served as the CEO of the 2013 Presidential Inaugural Committee (PIC). "I cannot see a President-elect Biden, like Trump, putting narcissism or ego ahead of the safety of people."
Biden is a responsible mammal so will likely ask people to stay home and watch the inauguration on their favorite streaming device. (Besides, it'll be cold. If Biden truly loves Black people, he'll reschedule for June.) However, it's almost certain that outgoing, non-recyclable trash Donald Trump will attempt overt sabotage on Biden's big day. He is a petty piece of shit, after all.
The Daily Beast
"What do you do if our people don't show up and his do?" asked one official involved in inaugural preparations. "They probably will and the last thing you want is a MAGA rally on the Mall when Joe Biden is sworn in as president…. I think [Trump] would want to make it as much of a shitshow as possible."
Factcheck: True!
It's not hard to imagine Trump cultists organizing an anti-Biden, pro-Trump protest on Inauguration Day. They would get off on appearing to embarrass President Biden. This becomes more dangerous if Biden supporters still attend in relatively large numbers. Conflict could prove inevitable and violent.
America has always been partisan, but there was usually a brief détente for the inauguration. It was part of the peaceful transfer of power that demonstrated America was a functioning democracy and not one of the many institutions Trump has bankrupted. Sure, I was a petty motherfucker in 2001 and refused to watch George W. Bush's inauguration, but I didn't crash his party and stir shit up. No, my friends Erin, Debbie, and I watched Audrey Hepburn movies all day and ordered pizza.
As of now, virtually no one believes that planners won't end up scaling back. One major fundraiser who has attended—and donated to—multiple Democratic inaugurations suggested that there "won't be grace-and-favor seats in prominent places behind the president-elect" this go around, with the crowded dais instead filled with socially distant Cabinet officials and family members only. Another Democratic fundraiser predicted that the Biden team would push for a "save and celebrate" plan, in which you "save lives and do a mostly virtual event."
Trump supporters should also consider staying home. For once, they should listen to their better angels if they haven't already symbolically burned them in fire.
A lot depends on President Lame Duck's actions on Inauguration Day, which we can assume will be bad. It's inconceivable that he'll behave graciously and perform the same torch-passing duties as every other president, including his Kenyan predecessor. He might actually hold a counter rally, even in DC. He's a horrible person.
However, Trump's former personal lawyer, fixer, and current felon, Michael Cohen told MSNBC's Ari Melber that he'll likely just stay home and pout.
COHEN: After Christmas, he usually comes back January 5th, January 6th. He likes to go to Mar-A-Lago. I suspect he doesn't even come back to Washington. I don't believe he's going to go to the inauguration because he himself fundamentally cannot sit in a chair knowing that the cameras are on him and that the world is looking at him as a loser. He cannot do that.
Yeah, he's right. Trump is a loser.
COHEN: He does not have enough inner strength in him to be gracious. He needs to keep his base rallied around him. He's going to say for the next 30 years that they stole the election from me. I'm the rightful president. He's going to keep his MAGA army active and engaged and going to constantly blow this dog whistle and be a menace.
Let's just hope that for one goddamn day, Trump can avoid egging on his base. We can at least pretend that almost half the country isn't irrevocably damaged.
That probably won't happen but at least Trump will end the day still a crap human being but no longer a crap president.
Follow Stephen Robinson on Twitter.
In yet another sign that his administration will be bad for publishers of shocking tell-all memoirs, President-elect Joe Biden has named veteran Democratic consultant and attorney Ron Klain as his chief of staff. Klain, a non-shouty fixture on cable TV news shows, has served in like nine million important, if not terribly glamorous, supporting positions going back to the late '80s, when he was counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee, which at the time was chaired by a dark-haired guy named Joe Biden.
"Ron has been invaluable to me over the many years that we have worked together, including as we rescued the American economy from one of the worst downturns in our history in 2009 and later overcame a daunting public health emergency in 2014," Biden said in a statement. "His deep, varied experience and capacity to work with people all across the political spectrum is precisely what I need in a White House chief of staff as we confront this moment of crisis and bring our country together again."
By all indications, Klain will actually do what White House chiefs of staff normally do: helping the president get his job done by riding herd on the constant flow of information and issues competing for attention in the Oval Office. And while Joe Biden does indeed have a son-in-law, his daughter Ashley's husband, Howard Krein, a plastic surgeon and otolaryngologist, there's not even the least hint Dr. Krein will ever be in the White House except for family photos. Weird!
As the Washington Post puts it, Ron Klain at times "appears to have worked with every Democratic leader of the past three decades." Under Clinton, he served as AG Janet Reno's chief of staff, and helped win the confirmation of Ruth Bader Ginsburg to the Supreme Court. He also worked as VP Al Gore's chief of staff, and in the 2000 election, led the Gore campaign's recount effort in Florida. (WaPo helpfully notes Klain was played by Kevin Spacey in the movie Recount, too.)
More recently, Klain was Joe Biden's vice presidential chief of staff, helped Biden oversee the economic recovery program, and later was in charge of managing the Obama administration's response to the 2014-16 Ebola outbreak. We suppose it's inevitable some wingnut media outlet will now scream Klain is a dangerous choice, because he was a czar!!!! And what about all that EBOLA VOMIT the Stupidest People on the Internet were so panicked about?
Factcheck: Nobody's insides fell out because of the EBOLA VOMIT because the virus didn't work like that. And yes, now that we do have a deadly pandemic, the Gateway Pundit is among the top sources of misinformation and denial about the disease. Another top source of misinfo? Oh, just this guy:
Also, because There's Always A Tweet,
Yeah, you need someone with experience in infectious disease, so you can ignore them in favor of a radiologist who's on Fox News.
Wingnuts vomiting wildly notwithstanding, Klain was widely praised for keeping the virus in check in the US, and that's one reason he's been a go-to guy for Democratic policy responses to the current pandemic, not to mention cable interviews about what Trump has been screwing up. Former Obama senior adviser Valerie Jarrett told the Post,
It's hard to prove a counterfactual, but I believe that Ron Klain is the reason we did not have an Ebola epidemic in the United States. [...] He is well respected by all the people with whom I have worked.
All in all, Klain seems likely to return the White House to a semblance of order, compared to Trump's multiple chiefs of staff, whom he mostly ignored in favor of letting various sycophants come to the Oval Office and win his attention in gladiatorial combat. Unnamed White House officials tell Wonkette they're still trying to get George Papadopoulos's blood out of the carpet.
And unlike Trump's succession of chiefs of staff, which by Inauguration Day may reach double digits, Klain will never be expected to be the "adult in the room," since Biden is a grown-up who's able to president without supervision. He'll actually be expected to perform as an aide, not a child safety gate.
"Ron's value is that Biden trusts him completely and Ron has no fear of telling him exactly what he thinks," said Jay Carney, a former White House press secretary whom Klain hired previously to work for Biden. "He does it respectfully and bluntly, which is what Biden wants and expects."
Damn. Biden isn't even in office yet and we're already not tired of not hearing everything framed in terms of winning.
[WaPo]
THE PANDEMIC
If you prefer your data in a visual format, here's the current map from COVID Exit Strategy, using data from the CDC and the COVID Tracking Project.
South Dakota’s first-time positivity rate has reached a staggering 68.1%. The governor has refused to issue stay-at-home orders or mask mandates https://t.co/CL5hFnKMT1
— Jon Passantino (@passantino) November 13, 2020
"One in every 47 people in the state is currently battling an active COVID-19 infection"
— Mat Honan (@mat) November 13, 2020
Jesus
Hey, how about that, a coronavirus plan existing enough that Steven Thrasher can joyfully (and I mean joyfully; he is thrilled at most parts of it) critique it! (Scientific American)
So don't know if you guys have seen the news, but we're having a very bad coronavirus wave right now!
CDC revises its mask recommendations, says it does offer protection to the wearer, so fucking WEAR IT. (Daily Kos)
"When Gov. Ron DeSantis needed to hire a data analyst, his staff picked a little-known Ohio sports blogger and Uber driver whose only relevant experience is spreading harmful conspiracy theories about COVID-19 on the Internet." — Miami Herald
Mike DeWine, GOP governor of Ohio, will shut your shit down.
North Dakota's out of hospital beds. Gov allows "asymptomatic" but positive nurses to keep working. He's still not mandating masks, because the president of the United States made it a culture war and now hundreds of thousands of people are dying ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ — Grand Forks Herald
Oregon sex workers and strippers can finally apply for COVID-19 relief — about $600,000 worth of funds are now available. Anyone “who has made income from using their or other people’s sexuality to financially assist themselves” can apply, said the founder of PDX Stripper Strike and Haymarket Pole Collective, which is administering the grant. Priority will be given to Black, Indigenous, and transgender applicants, those with minor dependents living in the household, and those experiencing homelessness. (OregonLive)
| THE VIRUS |
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A fall coronavirus disaster is already here. We can’t wait until Inauguration Day to act.
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At dinner parties and game nights, casual American life is fueling the coronavirus surge
The behind-doors transmission reflects pandemic fatigue and widening social bubbles, experts say — and is particularly insidious because it is so difficult to police and likely to increase as temperatures drop.
The coronavirus pandemic in the USA continues to be the worst it has been since the outbreak began. The Daily Beast decided today to pack all the terrible numbers into a single headline, which we'll leave here in subhead format:
Wednesday's Dire Coronavirus Stats: 1,893 Americans Dead, 65,000 in Hospitals, 144,000 New Cases
If you prefer your data in a visual format, here's the current map from COVID Exit Strategy, using data from the CDC and the COVID Tracking Project.
In short, we're hitting record after record. Yesterday's 144,000+ new cases were a new record high in the US, but the previous record had been set the day before, with 136,000 new cases. Yesterday marked the ninth straight day of more than 100,000 new cases — and in all likelihood, today will be the 10th, and so on, going forward for some time. We're well over a thousand deaths per day, and that number keeps increasing. On just Tuesday and Wednesday, we had yet another 9/11 and then some: more than 3,200 deaths in those two days alone.
That's what happens when national "leaders" throw up their hands and admit they're not trying to contain the virus anymore.
CDC: Wear A Mask, It Protects You Too
The New York Times reports the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has updated its recommendation on face masks, advising that face masks can protect the wearer from the coronavirus. While previously the CDC had called for masks primarily as a way to prevent people spreading the virus when they're infectious but have no symptoms, growing scientific evidence suggests masks protect the wearer as well. However, the agency notes that "The main protection individuals gain from masking occurs when others in their communities also wear face coverings[.]"
Protect yourself, protect your community, and wear a damn mask. You can purchase several nice designs from Yr Wonkette, even!
Florida Governor Hires Virus Denying Sports Blogger To Crunch Numbers
The Miami Herald reports Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has hired a sports blogger and part-time Uber driver with no experience in medical data as a data analyst in the state's Office of Policy and Budget. Kyle Lamb may be from Columbus, Ohio, but he's definitely got what it takes to be a Florida Man, and to be paid $40K a year for his services:
"Fact is, I'm not an 'expert.' I'm not a doctor, epidemiologist, virologist or scientist," Lamb wrote on a website for a subscribers-only podcast he hosts about the coronavirus. "I also don't need to be. Experts don't have all the answers, and we've learned that the hard way."
Lamb is a big fan of whatever bullshit COVID-19 conspiracy is hot on any given day: suggesting it's a Chinese bioweapon, denying it's worse than the flu, insisting masks are useless, and the like. Happily a spokesperson for DeSantis reassured the Herald that Lamb is "not a coronavirus hire," and that he won't focus "exclusively" on pandemic stats, and besides, others in the data department will be there to check Lamb's work. But there seems to be no good explanation of why Lamb even got the job in the first place.
First Caribbean Cruise Cut Short When Passenger Gets COVID-19
You saw this one coming, because we all saw it coming. The first post-lockdown cruise in the Caribbean had to be cut short when a passenger on the small ship, the SeaDream 1, developed symptoms and tested positive. The ship is heading back to port in Barbados, and the 53 passengers and nonessential members of the crew of 66 are confined to quarters. The ship had already made several stops before the passenger fell ill, but only visited empty beaches; no one from the ship had contact with locals.
Here's a photo of the ship's captain, Torbjorn Lund, reassuring passengers that all is well.
Black Market Negative COVID-19 Tests! Get Your Black Market Negative COVID-19 Tests!
Business Insider reports that in several places around the world, people have been caught selling fake negative COVID-19 test results to people trying to get around travel restrictions. Seven people in France were arrested for selling bogus digital certificates after a traveler tried to fly to Ethiopia with their wares, which sold for $180 to $360 a shot. Other similar cases have turned up in Brazil and the UK.
We're now waiting for the inevitable editorial in The Federalist arguing that such incidents simply prove what a wonderful thing the free market can be.
Ohio: Mike DeWine Toughens Mask Order, Will Probably Be Kidnapped By Militia Idiots
Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican even, issued a revised mask order for the state yesterday, with tighter requirements for businesses. Under the new guidelines, all retail establishments will have to post a sign requiring face masks, and will be responsible for ensuring staff and customers wear masks. Further, a new "Retail Compliance Unit" will inspect businesses to enforce the restrictions, with agents drawn from the state's Worker's Compensation bureau.
DeWine tweeted that he means business, businesses, and that those ignoring the order will face consequences:
Ohio has seen exponential growth of the virus recently, with 50,000 new cases in just 13 days. In the early days of the pandemic, it took over three months for the state to see its first 50,000 cases. DeWine also warned he may have to order shutdowns of bars, restaurants, and gyms. As of yet, Donald Trump has yet to encourage rightwing extremists to kidnap and murder his fellow Republican.
Idaho Prefers Overwhelmed Hospitals To Mask Mandate, Because Liberty
The Associated Press reports that healthcare providers in southern Idaho are unable to keep up with the surge in cases. The CEO of Primary Health Group, Dr. David Peterman, says the 20 clinics his company operates are barely able to keep up with the volume of incoming phone calls, let alone care for all the sick people who need help:
"We are at the point where I can't tell you for sure we can answer your phone calls," Peterman said. "Regardless of what political party you're in, you need to be able to see your doctor. I'm telling you, our clinics are being overwhelmed — if we cannot answer our phones, we cannot take care of our patients."
On Tuesday, St. Luke's Magic Valley hospital in Twin Falls had to divert intensive care patients to Boise, about two hours away, and also turned down transfer requests from the overwhelmed hospital in nearby Elko, Nevada. The Elko hospital normally sends its overflow patients to hospitals in Utah, but they're all overwhelmed, too.
Idaho Gov. Brad Little has recommended residents wear masks, but continues to resist calls to mandate masks statewide. In Twin Falls, even though the hospital is unable to treat all the new COVID-19 cases, the City Council nonetheless voted Monday to not issue a mask mandate. City Hall was surrounded by hundreds of pro-infection advocates, many of whom then streamed into the meeting without masks to yammer about unalienable rights and individual choice. Doctors, nurses, and staff from the hospital pleaded for the public's help in controlling the outbreak. Several pointed out that healthcare workers in the area are exhausted and falling ill themselves, which just goes to show how little those out-of-touch elites understand America.
Scientific American Just Happy To Have A Coronavirus Policy To Critique
At Scientific American, Steven W. Thrasher takes a look at the Biden-Harris pandemic strategy and finds a lot to like, particularly its recognition that the public health response needs to be a "dial," not a "light switch," and needs to be scaled to meet the severity and particular needs of communities affected by the virus. He sees room for improvement, particularly in the area of funding: The goals are good, but probably still too little, and he has concerns about the shortcomings of Biden's preference for a public healthcare option instead of universal health insurance. He's especially glad to see the Biden-Harris plan calls for
the establishment of a COVID-19 Racial and Ethnic Disparities Task Force that "will transition to a permanent Infectious Disease Racial Disparities Task Force." To reckon with racialized health disparities is amazing and radically political. While I was concerned to see nothing explicit about incarceration in the plan given that it is a major driver of infectious disease in the U.S., I was thrilled to learn that Marcella Nunez-Smith of the Yale School of Medicine, who has co-authored research on the health disparities caused by imprisonment, will co-chair the overall Biden-Harris COVID task force. She will be excellent.
It's a very good read, and Thrasher's critiques, particularly his concerns about how ableism is still leading to policy shortcomings that will harm people with disabilities, are worth pressing the incoming administration to address.
Stay safe, kids. We're not through the worst of this yet, but at least the grownups are on the way.
[Daily Beast / CBS News / COVID Exit Strategy / NYT / Miami Herald / Business Insider / People / Scientific American / AP / Photo: GoToVan, Creative Commons License 2.0]
Trump rails against ‘medical deep state’ after Pfizer vaccine news comes after Election Day
More on the pandemic
 (Go Nakamura/Bloomberg News) As coronavirus soars, hospitals hope to avoid an agonizing choice: Who gets care and who goes homeNearly every metric is trending in the wrong direction, prompting states to add new restrictions and hospitals to prepare for a potentially dark future. |
CDC wants you to wear a mask. That’s to protect you and others — and to avoid new lockdowns. |
Here’s what you need to know about getting a coronavirus test at the airport  
 ALSO... I am seeing a big discrepancy between the Johns Hopkins data in death totals and WORLDOMETER data, which aggregates data from many more sources. Could this be the slow down due to the change in how the CDC obtains the data, having it filter first through Health and Human Services department. WEEKLY PANDEMIC REPORT - JOHNS HOPKINS Anyway, as usual, here's the weekly links to the data about cases (lower than reality) and deaths (lower than reality, also) due to COVID-19.  Data can be found here, as always: This is also a good data site: Last updated: November 14, 2020, 15:27 GMT
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Some Democrats have spilled tea claiming they couldn't survive the party's limited association with socialists and police defunders. However, non-Trump Republicans seem to have done just fine last week despite party leaders embracing wackjobs Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert, who are just two members away from their own QAnon Squad in the House.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who strongly criticized Greene during the primaries, now says we should give the new representatives from Georgia and Colorado a chance.
Our party is very diverse. You mentioned two people who are going to join our party, and both of them have denounced QAnon, so the only thing I would ask for you in the press — these are new members. Give them an opportunity before you claim what you believe they have done and what they will do."
Yes, the GOP defines “diversity" as two white women with emotional problems.
Boebert has tried to distance herself from the bonkers QAnon conspiracy theory, but she's found a new conspiracy drug: She's combatting the selective "voter fraud" that stole the presidency from Donald Trump but somehow still elected her.
Republicans are very generous with their new QAnon members. All they have to do is recant while continuing to push QAnon garbage. Meanwhile, Republicans ran attack ads claiming every Democrat was a socialist who hated cops, regardless of their actual positions.
McCarthy is also lying about Greene's rejection of QAnon. She still considers it "a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to take this global cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles out."
Shortly after her inevitable, but still disappointing, election to Congress, Greene picked a fight with GOP Rep. Dan Crenshaw from Texas because he dared entertain the notion that Trump might've lost the presidential election. I normally don't care about asshole-on-asshole violence, but Greene seems to have blown her opportunity to prove she's not the person she's always been.
Friday, Greene tweeted about her New Member Orientation at the House of Representatives. This is another instance where I wish the Democrats played hardball. Greene, whose Twitter bio identifies her as “congresswoman-elect," has signed a letter alleging serious “voting irregularities" in Georgia. She was on the same damn Georgia ballot as Donald Trump. Either the election was fixed or it wasn't. She can't attack the credibility of the election but accept her own victory as legitimate. Nancy Pelosi should tell her to keep her raggedy ass home until the recount is complete.
Greene complained that the New Member Orientation focused on COVID-19 and “masks, masks, masks" rather than, I guess, something important like the House's wi-fi password. Coronavirus cases are surging in Georgia. People are dying. But this fool won't wear a mask. She thinks they are “oppressive." In Georgia, she proclaims, “we work out, shop, go to restaurants, go to work, and school without masks." As of Thursday, there were 380,190 confirmed COVID-19 cases confirmed in Georgia, an increase of 2,547 from the previous day, so a lot of Georgians are going to the hospital without masks.
Oh, and she justified her selfish, ignorant, scientifically illiterate decision by co-opting the pro-choice affirmation: “My body, my choice." When a woman chooses to terminate her pregnancy, she doesn't somehow cause dozens of other pregnant women to miscarry while also killing their grandparents. Greene claims she's 100 percent “pro-life," but she won't wear a simple piece of cloth over her face, which is proven to save lives.
Greene is the worst kind of fraud, because she doesn't even believe her bullshit. Cristina Marcos of The Hill reported that Greene did in fact wear a mask inside the House today.
She pushed the hashtag #FreeYourFace while shackling her own with the American flag, just because Nancy Pelosi said she had to if she wanted to come to work. Sad! That's what she thinks of the rubes who elected her. Let's hope they see this and realize that she's a dirtbag but also that it's well past time they took COVID-19 seriously.
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2020-mumbai-dharavi-covid-lockdown/
Normally, Khwaja Qureshi’s recycling facility in Dharavi, the slum in Mumbai, would be no place for three newborn tabby kittens. Before efforts to contain the novel coronavirus idled much of the Indian economy, the 350-square-foot concrete room was a hive of nonstop industry. Five workers were there 12 hours a day, seven days a week, dumping crushed water bottles, broken television casings, and discarded lunchboxes into a roaring iron shredder, then loading the resulting mix of plastic into jute sacks for sale to manufacturers. But during a recent visit, the shredder was silent and the workers gone, decamped to their villages in India’s north. That left the kittens plenty of space to gambol across the bare floor, nap on a comfortable cardboard box, or be amused by the neighborhood kids who came to visit.
The problem, for International Footsteps as well as other businesses in Dharavi, is that “everyone” isn’t who it used to be. Only about two-thirds of the slum’s people are formal residents; the rest are rural migrants who traditionally slept on factory floors or shared rented rooms, returning to their hometowns a few times a year. But there was no government help to cover wages during the national lockdown, and it caused a severe crisis for these laborers. With snack bars and mess halls shut, even those who could afford food struggled to find enough to eat.
This kind of tedious work has none of the technological glitz of an innovative treatment or the silver-bullet promise of an effective vaccine. But as the rain started to pick up again, Bhoyar said she was convinced that, in Dharavi, it would be enough to keep the virus at bay. “Precaution will be our key focus going forward,” she said—“social distancing, awareness related to hygiene, fever screening, and sanitization.” Even with the massive slum slowly coming back to life, Bhoyar added, “I’m not really scared.”
SCIENCE FICTION
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| A student at a “Fridays for Future” protest on May 24, 2019, in Budapest. Attila Kisbenedek/Getty Images |
Imaging a “Future of Opportunity”—and Governing Toward It
A Future Tense event recap.
NOV 11, 20209:15 AM
A polar bear on melting ice: It’s a favorite image of nature documentaries and charity ads alike, never failing to put you in the emotional dumps for a simple reason—it forces you to grapple with a changing world, a darker future.
But that emotion is often temporary, replaced quickly by others, because its effects are not immediately or directly felt, explained Peter Schlosser, the vice president and vice provost of global futures at Arizona State University. Footage of houses on fire in California, Oregon, and Australia alarms us, but falls short of making us understand that our own home may be next.
These “delusions of escape,” in the words of science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson, or “failures of imagination,” in the words of Future Tense academic director Ed Finn, placate us into reactive, piecemeal, short-sighted decision-making.
There’s no simple antidote to the delusions. But storytelling lights the path forward, agreed Robinson, Finn, Schlosser, Future Tense fellow Alexandra Zapata Hojel, and Malka Older, also a sci-fi author. The five discussed the need to mobilize science fiction and imagination to govern for the future in a Future Tense event on Tuesday.
“We’re missing people believing that the way we live now can change,” said Older, who has spent her career watching governments scramble to react to emergencies, rather than anticipating and planning for them. Older—the author of “Actually Naneen,” a Future Tense Fiction story that explores artificial intelligence and caregiving via a narrative about robot nannies—believes storytelling is a crucial part of imagining the consequences of complacency, and importantly, the versions of the future that we can create if we choose a different path.
“We need to be taking risks, because we need different stories, and we need different types of art,” she said.
Information, narratives, and art are fundamentally public goods, said Older, and they deserve robust government support. By the same token, fiction and imagination aren’t fluffy footnotes in our tackling of the climate crisis—they are key to progress, and indeed, survival.
“We have to practice living and thinking and feeling in new ways in order to survive the 21st century,” said Finn, who also directs ASU’s Center for Science and the Imagination.
And to do so, said Robinson, we have to get creative in the ways we imagine and share our blueprints for the future.
“If storytelling itself is going to be adequate to this global situation that is beyond any one individuals’ comprehension,” he said, “then you have to just throw caution to the wind and try to make up new forms and tell stories that actually reflect this dynamic moment that we’re in.”
For example, in his new novel The Ministry for the Future—set in “not a desolate, postapocalyptic world, but a future that is almost upon us”—Robinson employs “fictional eyewitness accounts” that contextualize the universal and individual effects of the climate crisis, framed around the story of an international organization tasked with fulfilling the goals outlined in the Paris Agreement.
One of the big picture problems in addressing the climate crisis, explained Robinson, is the incentives and priorities we’ve cemented into our international economic system.
“Saving the planet is not the highest rate of return. … We don’t value the planet or the future people enough in our current economic system to do justice to them or to dodge the mass extinction event,” he said.
But many of the elements of our international financial systems are themselves imagined, said Finn. We create narratives that shape priorities and sculpt realities. We can choose to change them.
Both politics and the pandemic affect the emerging futures we can imagine and work toward.
In the case of politics, “recent news has made it easier to be a parent, at least for me, in terms of thinking about the kind of policy, policy decisions, and the kind of example that we are setting for future generations,” said Zapata Hojel.
And the pandemic, which has affected some of us in drastic ways but all of us in some way, functions as a sort of “test run for the climate case,” Schlosser said, forcing us to cope with “an extended period of suffering” provoked by sudden disaster.
Ultimately, “reacting is much easier than making a choice,” Schlosser said. But if we don’t imagine and make better choices now, we will eventually create a future empty of them. “What we want to have is a future of opportunity,” he said, “not a future of sacrifice.”
Future Tense is a partnership of Slate, New America, and Arizona State University that examines emerging technologies, public policy, and society.
It is November 11, 2020, and time again for our annual tribute to Kurt Vonnegut, who made me want to be a writer, and to his birthday, which this year falls on the 102nd anniversary of the end of what was optimistically called the War to End All Wars. This is our ninth consecutive Kurt Vonnegut's birthday here at Wonkette, if you can believe that!
Of course, it is mandatory we begin properly, with the quote from Breakfast of Champions that we take down from the attic every year, because what's a tradition without the proper decorations?
So this book is a sidewalk strewn with junk, trash which I throw over my shoulders as I travel in time back to November eleventh, nineteen hundred and twenty-two.
I will come to a time in my backwards trip when November eleventh, accidentally my birthday, was a sacred day called Armistice Day. When I was a boy [...] all the people of all the nations which had fought in the First World War were silent during the eleventh minute of the eleventh hour of Armistice Day, which was the eleventh day of the eleventh month.
It was during that minute in nineteen hundred and eighteen, that millions upon millions of human beings stopped butchering one another. I have talked to old men who were on battlefields during that minute. They have told me in one way or another that the sudden silence was the Voice of God. So we still have among us some men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind.
Armistice Day has become Veterans' Day. Armistice Day was sacred. Veterans' Day is not.
So I will throw Veterans' Day over my shoulder. Armistice Day I will keep. I don't want to throw away any sacred things.
What else is sacred? Oh, Romeo and Juliet, for instance.
And all music is.
-- Breakfast of Champions (1973)
And as I traditionally note, this is simply the most Vonnegut-y thing you could wish for: the time travel, the sentimentality, the affectation (which he used throughout Breakfast and in other novels) of writing out the year, and that beautiful line, "men who can remember when God spoke clearly to mankind" — Jesus, that's nice stuff.
This year, as we celebrate Kurt Vonnegut's birthday and the end of the first modern war — a science fiction spectacle, as we've noted previously — we're faced with the sort of planetary catastrophe Vonnegut often explored in his fiction. In Cat's Cradle, he imagined a terrible new world-ending weapon, "Ice-9," which froze water at room temperature. Let one drop of it get into a waterway, and that would be it for the human race. (Spoiler: the novel does not have a happy ending.)
I can only imagine what Vonnegut would make of the COVID-19 pandemic and the response to it. He'd no doubt be heartened by the kindness people around the world showed to each other, Italians singing opera from their windows, or kids going to a neighbor's porch to play a socially distanced duet.
Columbus Dispatch video screenshot
Vonnegut would have had plenty to say about Donald Trump's deadly mismanagement of the pandemic, and none of it good. It might sound a little like what he wrote about the previous worst president, George W. Bush, in 2007's A Man Without a Country:
I myself feel that our country, for whose Constitution I fought in a just war, might as well have been invaded by Martians and body snatchers. Sometimes I wish it had been. What has happened, though, is that it has been taken over by means of the sleaziest, low-comedy, Keystone Cops-style coup d'etat imaginable. And those now in charge of the federal government are upper-crust C-students who know no history or geography, plus not-so-closeted white supremacists, aka 'Christians,' and plus, most frighteningly, psychopathic personalities, or "PPs."
Not that much different, we suppose, although he might add something about Trump's rank criminality, too. But I think that what Vonnegut would find most horrific is Trump's complete lack of empathy for those who are suffering. For a guy who wrote an entire novel, the not entirely successful Slapstick, about a system of artificial families aimed at reducing loneliness, Vonnegut would have been taken aback by Trump's seeming indifference to other people.
Vonnegut, like his predecessors Mark Twain and George Orwell, believed that people could be decent to each other, even if we're not very good at doing it consistently. It's a theme running throughout his work. In 1965's God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, his sixth novel, the main character offers this benediction to newborn twins:
Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-"God damn it, you've got to be kind."
Vonnegut was still chewing on the very same idea in his final novel, Timequake (1997):
Many people need desperately to receive this message: 'I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. You are not alone.
The idea of a country being led by a man with no interest in other human beings would have broken Vonnegut's heart, I think.
But here we are, with a new president-elect, who promises to turn us back to compassion and taking care of each other. In Timequake, people have been living the same 10 years over and over so long that they're completely numbed, unstuck in time, in a different sense than Billy Pilgrim was in Slaughterhouse-Five. As the time loop ends, Kilgore Trout is one of the only people not lost in a miasma of ennui. He's able to help other people return to reality and shake off their funk by telling them, "You were sick, but now you're well, and there's work to do."
America is still ailing, and there's so much work to do. But we do, at least, have each other, and the madness of the last four years feels like it's lifting. We'll stick with Kurt Vonnegut and the hope that human imagination can be turned toward helping each other. It would be a far better world if we could, now and again, try to remember the good we're capable of.
As ever, we'll close with Eric Bogle's version of "And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda," because music is sacred.
The last living veteran of that war, Florence Green, died in 2012 just two weeks short of her 111th birthday. Let us dream of a world that no longer manufactures any new veterans.
And now it is your OPEN THREAD.
Yr Wonkette is supported entirely by reader donations. You keep supporting us, and we'll keep tinkering with how to remember Kurt Vonnegut.
You Probably Need Books!
Kurt Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions
Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five
Kurt Vonnegut, A Man Without a Country
Kurt Vonnegut, Slapstick,
Kurt Vonnegut, God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater,
Kurt Vonnegut, Timequake
Adam Hochschild, To End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918
Ginger Strand, The Brothers Vonnegut
RACISM, BLACK LIVES MATTER, POLICE BRUTALITY
Majority of American Jews in Full Page New York Times Ad: “Unequivocally: Black Lives Matter.”
Identifying White People as “Caucasian” was used to strengthen the argument for White Superiority
I’m white-skinned and of European origin. Therefore I am considered a Caucasian. But the term, “Caucasian” is rooted in notions of white racial superiority and we’re all unconsciously perpetuating racism every time we use it.
RANDOM AND SUNDRY SHOCKERIES AND AHA MOMENTS
Cheating-detection companies made millions during the pandemic. Now students are fighting back.
Hurricanes Might Not Be Losing Steam As Fast As They Used To (arstechnica.com)
This parameter varies a fair bit from storm to storm depending on weather conditions and terrain, so the researchers compared averages for each half of the 50-year period. They found a pretty strong trend. In the earlier 25-year period, the average storm lost about 75 percent of its strength over the first day. In the latter half, the average storm lost only half of its strength. The researchers also analyzed sea surface temperatures in this area, which have obviously increased over the last 50 years. That means there's a rough correlation between warmer ocean temperatures and hurricanes retaining strength after landfall. But is there a physical reason to believe the former caused the latter?
To test this, the researchers used a computer-model simulation of an idealized hurricane -- that is, a hurricane in a homogenous virtual setting rather than above a specific location on the Earth. They simulated a series of hurricanes over increasingly warm water, with intensity capped at Category 4, and had each one make landfall at exactly the same strength. Landfall was simulated by suddenly cutting off the supply of water vapor at the bottom of the storm. Sure enough, the storms that had grown over a warmer ocean took longer to weaken. That means this isn't a matter of, say, the back half of a storm still feeding on warm water while the front half crosses onto land. Instead, it appears that increased water vapor entrained within the storm itself helped sustain it. Another set of simulations confirmed this by also removing the water vapor at landfall -- in this case, the storms all weakened identically.
https://ew.com/tv/alyson-hannigan-buffy-the-vampire-slayer-spike-angel-debate/
Buffy the Vampire Slayer star Alyson Hannigan definitively ends the Angel vs. Spike debate
Thanks to Alyson Hannigan, the longstanding debate of who was the better boyfriend for Buffy (Sarah Michelle Gellar) on Buffy the Vampire Slayer has finally been settled.
On Wednesday, the former Buffy the Vampire Slayer star — Hannigan played Buffy's BFF Willow throughout the entire run — weighed in on the fan-favorite Angel (David Boreanaz) vs. Spike (James Marsters) topic on Twitter. She was inspired to do so after politician Stacey Abrams, whose efforts helped turn Georgia blue for the presidential election and has previously referenced the series while discussing politics, shared her own thoughts on the matter earlier in the week.
When someone on Twitter mentioned that well-known Buffy fan Abrams "shipped" the titular slayer with Spike, Abrams clarified, "To be fair, Angel was the right boyfriend for Buffy coming into her power. Spike was the right man to be with as she became the power."
And Hannigan agreed. "I’ll vote yes to that!" she wrote before adding this mic drop revelation: "Actually Buffy should have dated Willow."
When another Twitter user tried to argue that Buffy and Willow dating "would have ruined their friendship," Hannigan had yet another perfect comeback. "That’s what @AnthonySHead told me when @AlexisDenisof and I were thinking about dating 20 years ago!" she said, referencing her real-life husband who played Wesley Wyndam-Pryce and who she met while working on the series. "#stillfriends."
You can't argue with those facts! But Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans on Twitter will definitely continue to until the end of time.
Related content:
Martian Dust Storms Parch the Planet By Driving Water Into Space (sciencemag.org)
Ending Greenhouse Gas Emissions May Not Stop Global Warming, Study Says (phys.org)
In an imaginary world where carbon pollution stops with a flip of the switch, the planet warms over the next 50 years to about 2.3 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels -- roughly half-a-degree above the target set in the 2015 Paris Agreement -- and cools slightly after that. Earth's surface today is 1.2C hotter than it was in the mid-19th century, when temperatures began to rise. But starting in 2150, the model has the planet beginning to gradually warm again, with average temperatures climbing another degree over the following 350 years, and sea levels going up by at least three meters. Under the second scenario, Earth heats up to levels that would tear at the fabric of civilization far more quickly, but ends up at roughly the same point by 2500.
The core finding -- contested by leading climate scientists -- is that several thresholds, or "tipping points", in Earth's climate system have already been crossed, triggering a self-perpetuating process of warming, as has happened millions of years in the past. One of these drivers is the rapid retreat of sea ice in the Arctic. [...] Another source is the thawing of permafrost, which holds twice as much carbon as there is in the atmosphere. The third is increasing amounts of water vapor, which also has a warming effect. Reactions from half-a-dozen leading climate scientists to the study -- which the authors acknowledge is schematic -- varied sharply, with some saying the findings merit follow-up research, and others rejecting it out of hand.There is a way to stop the melting process, but it involves sucking CO2 out of the atmosphere and storing it underground, which isn't yet possible at the scale required. The authors also suggest making Earth's surface brighter and planting billions of trees to slow or halt the planet warming gases.
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- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2011.14 - 10:10
- Days ago = 1961 days ago
- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.
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