Fingers crossed for Paris

I'm getting the impression that there are people on both sides of politics who want to put the boot into Paris and its Olympics:   on the nutty Right, they think the city is full of dangerous Leftism, multiculturalism, Muslims and snooty cultural superiority, so they are lapping up (and sometimes inventing) stories of crimes and organisational failure on Twitter.

On the nutty Left, I haven't actually got evidence of this on Twitter, but if there was to be some outbreak of anti-Israel protest (even involving moderate levels of violence), they would almost certainly think it was warranted.   (I'm not suggesting they want it to be a repeat of Munich 1972, but I still bet they would welcome some form of disruption for the cause.)

 But the French military and police are out in force, and for a country that has had the unfortunate insult of "cheese eating surrender monkeys", I think everyone knows the men (and occasional woman) in the security services always look very serious and capable.  I really would not want to be a visitor who thinks they can make a "joke" threat in front of them.

Finally, I don't yet know where the Olympic flame is set up for the games, but if they get too tricky with the way it is to be lit (I'm thinking of the famous blazing arrow of Barcelona), wouldn't be it funny if they accidentally torch Notre Dame again?   :)  

It's something of a "good news" day

*  From the Washington Post:

A federal judge in Florida threw out a bankruptcy case filed by the Gateway Pundit, ruling that the site, which is known for spreading conspiracy theories, sought bankruptcy protection in “bad faith” to avoid having to pay potential damages in defamation suits related to the site’s reporting on the 2020 election.

The Thursday ruling from U.S. bankruptcy judge Mindy Mora in the Southern District of Florida means that defamation cases from two Georgia election workers, as well as one from a former Dominion Voting Systems executive, can proceed. The defamation cases had been held up while the bankruptcy case was ongoing.

Excellent - there is no way in the world that those two Georgia election workers are going to lose against him.  The most appalling thing is that in the US they have to spend years in litigation to get justice for the most blatant and dangerous lies.

 *  In a case of "it's about time", the NY Times reports:

Gov. Gavin Newsom ordered California state officials on Thursday to begin dismantling thousands of homeless encampments, the nation’s most sweeping response to a recent Supreme Court ruling that gave governments greater authority to remove homeless people from their streets.

More than in any other state, homeless encampments have been a wrenching issue in California, where housing costs are among the nation’s highest, complicating the many other factors that contribute to homelessness. An estimated 180,000 people were homeless last year in California, and most of them were unsheltered. Unlike New York City, most jurisdictions in California do not guarantee a right to housing.

Mr. Newsom, a Democrat, called on state officials and local leaders to “humanely remove encampments from public spaces” and act “with urgency,” prioritizing those that most threaten health and safety.

This is an important move for changing the perception of Democrats being paralysed by good intentions that lead to bad outcomes for everyone.

 * And, of course, there is the substantial poll improvement for Harris.  I hope she appoints the astronaut over the smart gay guy as her running mate - it will make the ticket look more balanced.

 

Some good dementia news for a change

I'm getting to the age where dementia protection news grabs my attention.  From The Guardian:

Researchers have raised hopes for delaying dementia after finding that a recently approved shingles vaccine was linked to a substantial reduction in diagnoses of the condition in the six years after receiving the shot.

The discovery, based on US medical records, suggests that beyond the health benefits of preventing shingles, a painful and sometimes serious condition in elderly people, the vaccine may also delay the onset of dementia, the UK’s leading cause of death.

Dr Maxime Taquet at the University of Oxford, the first author on the study, said the results supported the idea that shingles vaccination may prevent dementia. “If validated in clinical trials, these findings could have significant implications for older adults, health services, and public health.”

Shingles is caused by the herpes zoster virus and can flare up in people who have previously had chickenpox. When a shingles vaccine, Zostavax, was first rolled out in 2006, a number of studies found hints that the risk of dementia seemed to be lower in those who got the shots.

The development of a new and more effective shingles vaccine, Shingrix, led to a rapid switch in the US in October 2017, meaning those who were vaccinated before that date received Zostavax, while those vaccinated after tended to have Shingrix.

The Oxford team studied the health records of more than 200,000 US citizens vaccinated for shingles, about half of whom received the new vaccine. Over the next six years, the risk of dementia was 17% lower in those who received Shingrix compared with Zostavax.

For those who went on to develop dementia, that amounts to an extra 164 days, or nearly six months, lived without the condition. The effect was stronger in women, at 22%, than in men at 13%.

Many years ago, I got a very mild case of shingles on my back.   So I was always planning on the getting the vaccine anyway.

 

Trump is giving me bad dreams

I've been waking up and remembering bits of a lot of dreams lately, and some have been very strange.

As I've said before, a little reflection usually turns up what I have read, seen or heard in recent days that would have inspired the content, but this morning I was having trouble working out why last night's dream featured me as a different person who bought a cooked human brain and was eating it (!)  (I really did not care for the texture or taste, and was wondering why I was even doing it.  It was also my brother's brain, which I thought was good because it probably reduced the risk of getting a prion disease from eating a random one.  Cooked brains were, by the way, commercially available in the dream - I wasn't boiling it at home).   

Other snippets of dream I could identify - going to an odd opera (I had been listening to an opera director on Radio National the other day), and being in a Singaporean grocery store (no mystery at all - I watch a lot of Singaporean content on Youtube.)  But eating a brain??  

Then it came to me this afternoon - it's almost certainly because of Donald Trump's ridiculous recent referrals to Hannibal Lector, and every time he does it, it turns up on Twitter.

So there - I don't need to worry that my true core identity has always been as a cannibal, and it's only surfacing now in later life.   It's just Trump eating my mind....

On the nature of the current autocracies

Over at NPR, there's a discussion of a new book by Anne Applebaum called Autocracy, Inc., The Dictators Who Want to Rule the World.  Sounds interesting:

Autocracy, Inc., is not a club. There are no meetings like SPECTRE in a James Bond movie, where villains give progress reports on their kleptocratic gains and attacks on democracy. Instead, Applebaum writes, it is a very loosely knit mix of regimes, ranging from theocracies to monarchies, that operate more like companies. What unites these dictators isn’t an ideology, but something simpler and more prosaic: a laser-focus on preserving their wealth, repressing their people and maintaining power at all costs.

These regimes can help each other in ways large and small, Applebaum writes.

Countries such as Zimbabwe, Belarus and Cuba voted in favor of Russia’s annexation of Crimea at the United Nations in 2014. Russia gave loans to Venezuela’s authoritarian President Nicolas Maduro, while Venezuelan police use Chinese-made water cannons, tear gas and surveillance equipment to attack and track street protesters.

Of course, U.S. companies have also supplied authoritarian regimes. When covering the crushing of the democracy movement in Bahrain during the Arab Spring, I rummaged through bins of empty rubber bullet canisters made by a company in Pennsylvania.

More recently and more alarming, though, have been China’s tacit support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and President Vladimir Putin’s June visit to North Korea, which the U.S. accuses of supplying weapons to Russia.

But Autocracy Inc., uses more than conventional arms to attack democracies. In order to retain power and build more wealth, autocrats also undermine the idea of democracy as a viable choice for their own people. Fearful of its former Soviet republics drifting further West – see Ukraine – Russia and its three main TV channels broadcast negative news about Europe an average of 18 times a day during one three-year stretch.

China extends its message through local media and helps other dictatorships. After satellite networks dropped Russia Today – RT – following the invasion of Ukraine, China’s StarTimes satellite picked up RT and put it back into African households, where it could spread Moscow’s anti-Western, anti-LGBTQ message, which resonates in many African nations.

The goal is not to persuade people that autocracy is the answer, but to encourage cynicism about the alternative. Applebaum says the message is this: You may not like our society, but at least we are strong and the democratic world is weak, degenerate, divided and dying. 

And of course, we know which side of politics is responding to this message - the reactionary MAGA Right and its admirers in other Western nations, because they often like the social conservatism of most autocracies when it comes to gay and other identity politics.  "Yeah sure, Putin may poison his critics and potential political rivals, but he does hate the gays and calls them pedophiles, so that's good enough me."

 

 

 

I'm no ballistics expert, but...

...I'm pretty sure that if even a tiny edge of an AR15 bullet hit your ear tip, it would do more damage than a mere scratch that doesn't need stitches.   Kinetic energy, and all that.   

I would bet money on it being shrapnel, especially as there are reports of others being hit by it too. 

I guess I should add that it doesn't matter much:  either way, he obviously did come close to being hit by an actual bullet.   (And then got an immediate narcissistic thrill that he had been missed, which he turned into political theatre instead of leaving in a hurry in case there was a second gunman somewhere.)   It is irksome for him (and his cult) to refer to an ear scratch, probably from shrapnel, as "taking a bullet", but of course he lies continually and everyone knows that, so just add it to the litany of self- aggrandisement that is Trump.

I thought it interesting at the convention that Trump also specifically praised the crowd for not "running for the exits".  Oh yeah - MAGA followers are so "brave" that they don't even all have the common sense to duck when there are bullets flying around.   (Some did, but many just stayed standing, and videoing it on their phones.)

It's good to be King

Well, does this mean the monarchy (sort of?) pays for itself?:

LONDON — The British royal family will be receiving a 53 percent raise, worth more than 45 million pounds ($58 million), thanks to a record increase in its estate’s annual profit, propelled in part by offshore wind farm leases on seabed plots owned by the monarchy.

The Crown Estate, the organization that manages the sprawling royal land and property portfolio, released a report Wednesday for the 2023-2024 financial year, the first to cover a full financial year with King Charles III on the throne.

It showed that the Crown Estate generated a “record net revenue profit” of 1.1 billion pounds ($1.4 billion) — 658.1 million pounds more than last year — and revealed the royal family’s plans for future purchases with its share of that money, including two new helicopters.

The Crown Estate is formally owned by the royal family but is controlled by the British government. Profits that the estate generates each year go to the state treasury, and the government returns a percentage to the royals under what is known as the “Sovereign Grant” to cover the operating costs of the royal household — including staff salaries, entertainment, property maintenance and travel....

In recent years, the royal family has received 86.3 million pounds ($111.4 million) from the government, and will again in 2024-2025. That figure will rise to 132 million pounds ($170 million) for 2025-2026.

The grant will support ongoing 10-year renovation projects at Buckingham Palace, British media reported, citing royal officials.

The program, whose total cost will be 369 million pounds ($476 million), is “making progress” according to a report published Monday by Britain’s National Audit Office, a public spending watchdog.

 

 

The "new technology vs redundancy before it's even deployed" issue in developing new energy sources

I see that Sabine Hossenfelder and others have videos out about the latest cost blowout, and delays, in the ITER project that is only a research project for fusion, with no prospect of it ever actually being an electricity generator.

For reasons I have outlined before, I am firmly on the sceptic side of fusion energy ever being a practical source of energy.   

But this latest problem did make me think about how it's odd that both high-tech ideas for future energy (fusion, or even new fission reactors) and a much more modest-tech idea (large scale deployment of renewable energy plants which already work, but still have practical problems in replacing old style generators) both share a similar issue:   they are hampered by continual changes in technology that make planning for their development (or deployment) very difficult.

I mentioned in a recent post about how, even over the (nearly) two decades of writing this blog, you can see how ideas for new renewable energy have been floated, sometimes partially developed, and abandoned:  in many cases surpassed by the steady increase in efficiency and manufacturing improvements in the "been around forever, but getting way better all the time" sources (mainly solar panels and wind generators).   And now we are at a point where we know we need renewable energy deployed very rapidly to drop CO2 before we bake the world even further, but the issue of energy storage is still seemingly at the stage "too many ideas", and no one really knows the best way to deploy it for maximum efficiency and best cost outcomes.   A large part of the problem is surely that some ideas (molten salts, hot rocks or sand, chemical flow batteries, etc) will be beaten out of contention by improvements in competing systems, as nearly all storage ideas are still undergoing a lot of development and research and technological improvement.   Hence, it may sound like a good idea to subsidise (say) Tesla powerwalls for domestic use on a massive scale - but I would presume that all battery storage is likely to be better, cheaper and safer in (say) five or ten years time, so just how much money is it wise to spend now on the current model?

On the fusion question, I have seen it said (I presume reliably) that a large part of ITER's problem is that it was designed on the basis of magnet technology current  (I think) a couple of decades ago, but that has been surpassed by big improvements in the field.    Hence it is in one sense already a white elephant, and becoming more white elephant-y every year a cost increase or repair delays its operation.

I would guess that the same could be a significant issue in the field of new fission reactor designs - what company wants to spend a ton of money on a design that might work but be soon out-competed by an alternative new design in terms of cost, efficiency or safety?

I guess there is likely a simple name for this in economics, or some management field - this race between technological development and its deployment on the one hand, and redundancy on the other - but I don't know what it is.   

I also don't really know the solution.

What I do think, though, is that surely the billions spent on a research reactor for a source of energy that may never be economically viable could have gone a very long way towards resolving the issue of the best way to store energy from renewables, and likely come up with some good answers on that a great many years before ITER is even switched on.

 

 

Against Peter Thiel

Oh my, Twitter (unfortunately) still throws up links worth reading - such as this 2022 essay on Substack  by John Ganz entitled "The Enigma of Peter Thiel - There is No Enigma - He's a Fascist".

Elon's on the copium train

 

So Elon is in the "I create my own reality" world of MAGA now.   I could have sworn that the reality is the opposite of what he claims here:   it was the mainstream media that was extremely keen to choose stories to promote (and even specifically editorialise) the take that "Biden should withdraw from re-election because of public concerns about his cognitive decline after the debate".

On the question of anyone "debating" Trump

I don't really know why it isn't the Democrats saying something like this: "We don't see any point in a further 'debate' with Donald Trump.  As demonstrated in the last attempt, he does not know how to 'debate' - he simply states lies, falsehood and misleading statements and if challenged, simply reiterates that 'its true', which in the world of MAGA is accepted as the final word.   As such, giving him a platform to repeat lies and never concede when they are demonstrably wrong simply worsens the epistemological crisis that the Right Wing has created over the last decade by making impossible any genuine debate based on certain facts being 'real' and needing to be conceded as such."   

She's such a nutter...

Things to wonder about

*  Not much news seems to come out regarding Russian progress in Ukraine, so I assume they aren't advancing much, if at all, despite it being summer and (presumably) the best season for them to do so?    

* I get that it certainly doesn't look like the Secret Service did a good job with the Trump protection, but I do wonder at the idea that the head of the organisation should be personally responsible for every single failure even if they have nothing to do with the particular job.    (I accept that it seems she is getting flack from both sides of politics, and she may not have performed well before the MAGA nuts, but still it seems odd that the MAGA types rushed to judgement that she was personally responsible before she even got there.  It paints a bleak image of how terrible government management would be under a new Trump administration.)

* Why are Elon Musk fanboys - or shareholders in Tesla - not worried about his full backing of the side of politics that is completely dismissive of the value and utility of electric vehicles?

* Why did I have a cinematic style dream the other day about a horse that sacrificed itself to protect its owner, and it was very moving?  

American politics

A few thoughts:

*   So the alien Mark Zuckerberg is the latest tech billionaire to suck up to Trump, calling his interference with the Secret Service effort to get him off stage "badass", while claiming to be declining to actually endorse him.  Uhuh.

Peter Theil - another person who gives the appearance of being barely human - apparently has the ultimate opportunist and Trump flip-flopper JD Vance in his pocket. 

As many are saying, the explanation appears simple - billionaires like both tax cuts (because, presumably, they think they are the smartest person to know what to do with their money, despite evidence to the contraray) and are happy to support someone they know is dumb but able to be manipulated.

And Trump doesn't even pretend to be not be open to being bought!   

*  I started writing this post yesterday, and was tempted to say "so, the predictions in many media outlets that Biden was going to resign Sunday seem to have been wrong."   Then I wake up this morning, and he has!   Can't say I am too surprised - and I think Biden's reputation in history will only be enhanced.   

*  Meanwhile, I am just continually flabbergasted at how Trump diehards are simply beyond reasoning with.   I mean, look at this patent cult post:

But even for Trumpists less emotionally unstable than Woods, how can they talk themselves into dismissing the scores of people who worked with Trump in his first term and who refuse to endorse him now - up to and including his own Vice President?   (I know the reasoning they commonly use - they were never "true" supporters, and he is just bad at picking people.  OK, that's cult reasoning - but why do they think he has overcome the inability to pick only "good" people?)

How do they think that it isn't pure opportunism that explains people who have condemned Trump in the strongest possible terms who now endorse him?  (Like Barr, Vance.)   I know the reasoning they use - it's like Woods - they fantasise that the US is the midst of the worst Presidency of all time (their cult leader told them) - but it is patently untrue on any metric you can pick.   Of course, they are also bolstered in their belief by RW media - but how can they not see that they are simple propaganda outfits for the purpose of making money?    

The short take is:  they cannot be reasoned with.   The Republicans have decided this is the way to power, so they are not going to encourage voters to ever listen to evidence and reason. It's appalling.

The search for a substitute for blood

There's an interesting article up at Science about developments in the search for a good blood substitute.  It starts with this bit of history that I think is new to me:

In 19th century New York City, Theodore Gaillard Thomas enjoyed an unusual level of fame for a gynecologist. The reason, oddly enough, was milk. Between 1873 and 1880, the daring idea of transfusing milk into the body as a substitute for blood was being tested across the United States. Thomas was the most outspoken advocate of the practice.

At the time, severe bleeding was often a death sentence. Blood transfusion was practiced, but it was something of a crapshoot. Medical science was still 3 decades removed from discovering blood types. Patients who received mismatched blood suffered discolored urine, itching, and a sometimes-fatal complication: hemolytic shock, wherein their own immune systems attacked the transfused cells.

Doctors in the U.S. were looking for something less risky to stabilize a hemorrhaging patient. Thomas was sure milk was the answer. In 1875, he injected 175 milliliters of cow’s milk into a woman suffering from severe uterine bleeding after an operation to remove her cancerous ovaries. At first, he wrote, the patient “complained that her head felt like bursting.” She soon developed a high fever and an abnormally high heart rate, but recovered a week later. Thomas subsequently performed seven separate milk transfusions, publishing his results in several medical journals, and predicted their “brilliant and useful future.”

It was not to be: Saline solutions, still used today, were introduced the next decade as a much less dangerous, if imperfect, stopgap measure for emergency bleeding.

Gosh.  They really did try any old idea in the hope it might work.

Anyway, the other curious thing in the article is that a new experimental blood substitute has been developed by a doctor with the surname "Doctor".   Here's the reason why it could be useful:

Doctor is as fervent an advocate for hemoglobin-based oxygen carriers (HBOCs), as ErythroMer and its predecessors are more formally known, as Thomas was for lacteal transfusions. Donated blood has a shelf life of just 42 days. There’s also not enough, even in developed countries with well-organized blood donation systems: In January 2022, the American Red Cross, which distributes 40% of the country’s donor blood, declared the first-ever national blood crisis, as its supply—especially precious O-negative blood, the universal type—dipped dangerously low. Meanwhile, hemorrhagic shock caused by severe blood loss kills some 20,000 people in the U.S., and 2 million globally, every year.

An artificial “blood” could, perhaps, fill the void. In settings where fresh blood is hard to come by, such as battlefields and rural areas (where ambulance wait times are sometimes as high as 45 minutes), ErythroMer could be given on the fly to maintain the vital flow of oxygen to organs until someone reaches a hospital. It’s a freeze-dried powder that remains usable for years and can be reconstituted by simply mixing it with widely available saline. And ErythroMer should be safe for any blood type, because its membrane doesn’t include the red blood cell surface proteins that cause mismatches.

....

So far Doctor’s creation remains in animal testing, but it isn’t the only effort to package hemoglobin inside lipids to fashion a viable blood substitute. A rival product in Japan has already been tested in a few people and generally appears safe.

But the success of these new products is far from guaranteed. Barely 2 decades ago, earlier formulations of HBOCs were scuttled or sidelined after trial participants died. Subsequent attempts haven’t fared much better. The most advanced HBOC to date, approved for people in South Africa and Russia, has struggled amid concerns about side effects.

 All very interesting...

RIP Bob Newhart

I very much doubt a bad word has ever been said about Bob Newhart as a person - he just seems a very modest man who rode a great talent for deadpan comedy delivery (of which I am generally fond) to great success.  I hadn't realised until I watched this story that he had been so spectacularly successful with his first album so quickly:

 

 

Update: I see that he got a mention in my 2005 (!) post about how I rank the sitcoms I have watched over my life. I don't think I would change a thing about that post, either. On a side note, though, I have been meaning to say here that the funniest comedy show I have been watching lately on streaming (Binge) is the TV version of vampire comedy What We Do in the Shadows. It had several seasons, but really hasn't attracted as much attention, in my opinion, as it deserves for routinely being very funny.

Update 2:  I liked this bit from a NYT interview when he turned 90:

Has your sense of humor changed since you started?

Something very sick makes me laugh. My wife says to me, “If people ever found out what you find humorous, they’d stop showing up.” I said to her: “That’s our little secret.

I think that Covid has sealed his fate

Generally speaking, I have been agreeing (mostly) with Jennifer Rubin's "hot takes" on Twitter about the Biden situation, even though she decided about a week or so ago (I think) that Biden does have to give up.  Here's one she wrote, updating her take on the whole matter, that I saw yesterday:

I also agree with David Roberts, who has really been grinding his teeth about the media over this:

Most people answer: 

And this is exactly how the NYT will frame it:

Things the VP candidate has said...

Apart from all the dumping on Trump he did before he decided he could make a better living by being a Trump suck up, people have been looking for other stuff JD Vance has said, and this one is "good":

 He was quoting Nixon, and this tweet gives some more context:

Notice how Nixon in a private (drunken?) rant talks exactly how Trump and his minions talk openly (and while sober) now.   

But the media shrugs and reports it as if it is just normal political talk now....

Further to a previous post...

 

And on the local scene:  

 They are too dumb to see the danger in preaching to their own religious membership that the political opposition is "evil".  

Shouldn't it seem odd to at least some MAGA types that God got an angel to get Trump to turn his head a fraction, but not to bump the rifle away from a firefighter protecting his family?

 

Impressions so far

Seems to me the Republican convention is far from going smoothly.   Trump seems to be wanting to broaden the party out to any old weirdo who'll bend the knee - see speech from Amber Rose (who I had never heard of before, but seems she is either an atheist or satanist - or maybe former satanist, I don't know);  the video of Trump sucking up to complete nutjob RJK junior (in which he sounded very "up", compared to his very low energy appearance on the first night); Johnson walking off stage when the teleprompter stopped; Gaetz looking like he wanting to punch out Kevin McCarthy; Rudy falling over; nutjobs realising Vance has an Indian wife; Melania still in a bunker somewhere.

All looks perfectly normal - not.   This article from WAPO gives some good detail on internal divisions within the party being shown up in the convention.

And yet the NYT is still drumming up the "Democrats are in panic" line.   

How many MSM outlets published images of Trump looking asleep on the first night?   If it was Biden in a similar situation it would be on the top of every single web page.

The double standards on display are astounding...

PS:  Noah Smith has become far too pessimistic lately, I reckon.   His judgement is going wonky on some issues:

Update:  Greg Sargent now writes at New Republic, and he's good.

I've been waiting for this...

In the midst of entirely justified grief, an example of how their political hero has created unwarranted division

First:  nothing is this post is intended to downplay the legitimacy of this family's grief.   

I wasn't going to comment on the wife of the late Corey Comperatore not taking a call from Biden - I can understand that she would likely be under the influence of those who immediately leapt to blame  criticism of Trump as "inciting" an attempt on his life.  However much of a nonsense I may think that is, and given the lack of detailed knowledge of the background and motivation of the shooter, I can understand her not being in the mood to talk to Biden.  

Interestingly, she also said Trump hadn't called her - something you would think his advisers would recommend him to do.  But he was looking out of sorts at the convention today, so who knows?  As I mentioned in my last post maybe he's undergoing some issues, and maybe he wouldn't handle a call well.   (I'm also remembering the seriously oddball call he made to a kid at Christmas in which he referred to belief in Santa Clause as "marginal": if he can screw up a call to a kid like that, can he be trusted to make a spontaneous condolence call?)

Anyway, I will post about this:   it now seems that the man's daughter has posted on Facebook about her grief, and it inadvertently shows something more concerning.  Look at this:

The issue I'm referring to is (even allowing for her grief) the worrying cynicism that "the media" would not report the heroism of her father.

I'm pretty sure she had been proved wrong before she even wrote this:  very early reports said he had died protecting his family with his body, and no cynicism was expressed anywhere about that in any media outlet that I've seen.  (I think I have seen exactly one person on Twitter critical of her father for some of his attitudes - but that is in no way "the media")

Her attitude towards "the media" is clearly one that has come from believing a decade or more of Trumpian rhetoric of it being "the enemy of the people", so she assumes they would never praise the actions of anyone who was at a Trump rally no matter what they did. 

It is, of course, perfectly legitimate to criticise the mainstream media - lots of us on the other side are doing that now for its role in attacking Biden as a candidate.  But the Trump led campaign that "the media" is constantly lying because they don't like him, and his followers, is transparently cultish and damaging to normal politics. 

Anyway, maybe her seeing the swathe of positive reporting for her father's actions will lead to her realising that the media isn't quite what Trump, and perhaps her father?, thought it was?   Let's hope so.      

Let me wildly speculate...

So, after saying he is changing his convention speech "to bring the whole country, even the whole world, together" (ha!), he has turned up there looking "emotional" (I actually agree with that):

Wouldn't it be funny if the near death experience has genuinely made him religious, and in the worst possible way - such as believing the Messianic guff that his Christofascist base has always believed, and that he was saved by God to win the election.

Or (and I know this is wildly unlikely) he sounds humble for the first time in his life and thanks Biden for his kindness and says his rhetoric about the Democrats is going to change.  (I mean, this is so unlikely I find the previous speculation more plausible.)

What in fact will happen, I would bet money on, is that he makes an awful speech which amounts to "we have to unify America again, and that can only happen if everyone agrees with me".

Maybe the Wall Street Journal does better videos than articles?

I get the impression that WSJ videos tend to be more politically objective than the articles and editorial line.  The latest example - I thought this video explainer of what the choice of JD Vance as VP for Trump means for the party overall was pretty fair and reasonable:

Update: Oh, Elon Musk, who's been gushing over Trump like a young woman at a Taylor Swift concert since the weekend, has decided the WSJ isn't pro-Trump enough. Interesting. 

 

"Dumb" versus "evil"

It seems to me that the simplest way to summarise the heart of political polarisation in America is that:

a.    Republicans, especially Trump supporters, think the Democrats are evil;

b.    Democrats think Republicans, especially your "average" MAGA members, are dumb.   

And being "dumb" at some level explains why Republicans are more susceptible to conspiracy belief.  It is pretty obvious that the rush of Democrat conspiracies on Twitter yesterday that the assassination looked staged (no doubt based in large part on Trump instantly turning it into political theatre) will not last - especially given that one unfortunate guy was killed.   By comparison, MAGA Republican conspiracies last forever.

Now, of course, any over-simplification is not perfect, but I think the "dumb" vs "evil" is broadly accurate, and explains why Republican rhetoric is so much more dangerous to the unity of America:  you respond to "dumb" by education and better information; but "pure evil" is readily seen as deserving of violence and death. 

That they are "dumb" also means that it is so easy for them to completely ignore the implicit "authorisation for violence" that is obvious to the rest of the world when your political leadership goes on for years about a fantasy "deep state" that wants to "destroy" you, the mainstream media being "the enemy of the people", conspiracies about elections having been rigged so as to prevent your rightful winner taking power, and illegal immigrants being cast as a group chock-full of murderous and violent intent against the "good" people who happen to have been born in America.

And the ease with which they are manipulated means they are so easily "self-gaslite", inverting the entirely reasonable warnings of Democrats and centrists (that the side that seeks revenge for their conspiracy beliefs  by way of  everything from show trials, mass public service sackings, rounding up of millions of people into internment camps, etc etc is the side that is a danger to democracy) into "Democrat rhetoric is leading to assassination attempts - it must stop."

So "dumb" - and so obvious that history is going to record them as mad and easily manipulated - but they can't see it because of the information bubble they live in and the bad faith motivation of the rich and cynical who sustain it.  

Update:  examples from just now to support this post...

Twitter on the Trump incident

Of course there will lots of insanely premature comments on this, but let's look anyway:

Latika has become a major embarrassment to her so called profession:

As someone says:

She gets worse:

And of course, Rita and MAGA are going nuts:

And as if we didn't know already:

A good summary here:

This was good advice:

For every MAGA person who thinks this makes Trump look strong and a shoo in for the election, there's probably a person who thinks that mugging for the crowd and camera when the poor agents who have to throw their bodies in harm's way and are trying to get him out ASAP is not a great look.  

Also, let's see if he shows gratitude for the call from Biden, or ignores it, or worse.  And will it decrease his rallies.  It's hard to believe President Bone Spurs  has inherent physical bravery, and I can imagine him being at least concerned about future outdoor rallies.  Will it shake out Melania from the bunker from which she has been ignoring the campaign?  (Why has no one in the MSM been asking where she is?)

So many possibilities...

Update:

Back to Biden talk!

Because I was busy yesterday, I haven't had time to watch Biden's press conference.   It seems to me from commentary on Twitter that:

*  of course, MAGA types and their Russian bot supporters think mixing up a name is a Big Deal - and for Democrat supporters to go "oh no!  this is terrible!" instead of "don't be stupid, MAGA idiots - we've got a list of scores of time your yellow cult leader has done the same" is simply to play into their hands.

*  most of the handful of twitter commentators who I trust thought it was a pretty good, though not flawless, performance highlighting a President with depth of knowledge.   I'm presuming I will agree.

*  I think I was watching Biden live in Detroit at a campaign rally this morning.  It was a pretty good performance, and he is showing no sign at all of giving way to the punditry.  Quite the opposite.

* I also saw Jon Stewart on a clip with someone else going on about "obvious cognitive decline".   Look, he can be funny, but I also think he suffers from being a bit of a legend in his own mind in terms of political tactics.   I could say this about any of the Biden-friendly celebrities who came out either urging or suggesting that Biden step aside - including Colbert, and of course Clooney:  - you know that by not leaving a way out, you're hurting your own cause?    Wasn't it obvious that it was possible that Biden could strongly resist leaving, and that lots of people (including practically everyone at the NATO summit, given their deep fear of having to deal with idiot Trump again) would come out strongly in support of Biden as having good judgement even though he is not as fast and sharp a talker as he used to be?   But once you've made the call that Biden should leave - how squishy does that make you look in the eyes of the undecided voter if he doesn't, and you have to go back to urging your audience to vote for him?  

* In my opinion, nothing should have been openly canvassed about urging him to leave until a clear idea of the polling effect of Biden's general performance (not just the debate) was shaping up firmly.   And as far as I can tell, it hasn't yet, but all the indications are that it hasn't hurt him anywhere near as badly as the pundit class is claiming.  NPR reported yesterday:

The race for the presidency remains statistically tied despite President Biden’s dismal debate performance two weeks ago, a new national NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll finds.

Biden actually gained a point since last month’s survey, which was taken before the debate. In this poll, he leads Trump 50% to 48% in a head-to-head matchup. But Biden slips when third-party options are introduced, with Trump holding the slightest advantage with 43% to 42%.

Those numbers, though, do not represent statistically significant differences, as the margin of error in the survey is +/- 3.1 percentage points, meaning results could be 3 points higher or lower.

I know that swing states matter more, but pundits are still talking like Biden has no chance because he won't listen to their demand that he go.  In reality, this is the latest from 538:

 

As I said yesterday, it just seems to me that there has been a lot of miscalculation going on in the pundit class.    I don't object to them being concerned about the Biden debate performance - but to come out prematurely blazing, and with no "walk back" options, just seems wildly wrong.

Family milestone

I didn't post anything yesterday because half of it was taken up with attending the university graduation of the first offspring to get a degree. It was at the University of Queensland:

They put more effort into their graduation ceremonies than I expected.  

I've probably said here before that I love hanging around Universities - I mean, they're naturally places of youthful hope and optimism, diversity, and big libraries that any old dude can walk into.  My son, by virtue of bad timing with COVID, spent little time on campus, but it still saddens me a bit that I don't have a family reason to visit again.  (My daughter is studying at QUT Kelvin Grove - which is a nice and modern mini-campus, but not much for the visitor to see.)

It's also very pleasing how happy graduating students look, my son included.  See?:

As the diversity issue: yeah, I would guess that 70 percent were Asian, mostly Chinese by the sound of the names.   (There were many different types of degrees being handed out).  But it doesn't worry me - it seems an obvious good thing for a country to be seen as a good place for smart people to study.

So yeah, a happy day.  Now to crack the whip to get him finding a decent job with his qualification!

I don't know - George hasn't made a lot of good movie decisions for a long, long time....

I tend to agree with the BBC:  George Clooney coming out and saying "yeah, Joe Biden really is greatly diminished now" is probably more harmful to public perceptions of the President than what a lot of self-serving politicians say.

But, as my heading to this post argues - where's the evidence that George has a good idea anymore of what the public wants?   It's certainly not been reflected in his movie choices for a long, long time.

One thing that has been bugging me about this - if Kamala Harris is his replacement (and lots of people think the party will tear itself up in a bun fight - including over money - if she isn't), how sure can we be that she will ultimately poll any better than Biden?

Hasn't it been true for a long time that Trump is significantly more popular with men than women?   Does anyone really think Harris is the type of female politician to draw back men who would think about Trump?   

I really know nothing of the political performance of Harris - and because of that, it seems true that her public image is one of a politician without much depth.   (Yes, too many videos exist of her laughing and dancing.)  Of course, this may be a funny criticism to make when her opponent is the shallowest politician, like, ever; but we know he has a cultish, weird following, including of those who don't care for him personally but think they can get what they want through him anyway.  So even though Trump is repulsive to normal humans, you can't just put up anyone against him.

Is there that much time for her to turn that around?   I doubt it.   

Would a potential boost from women to vote Democrat outweigh the possible loss of men who won't vote for a woman of colour?   Who knows?   I really don't think it is a safe assumption, especially if Harris doesn't campaign all that well.  

And besides, as I have said before, if you want Harris, you know you'll get her if Biden wins and really does have to resign before the end of his term anyway.   So if you like Harris, why wouldn't you vote for Biden?

I think there are some pretty big miscalculations going on....

 

Is it just me, or does this seem the stupidest prosecution case in the US?

I mean, where are the MAGA types who claim the justice system has been "weaponised" against Trump and his MAGA cult when it comes to this case against Alex Baldwin?   Oh, he's on the other side of politics, so when a nonsensical sounding prosecution happens against him takes place, it's not worth a comment.

Here's the Washington Post article on the start of the manslaughter case against Baldwin.    The prosecutors are arguing he was "reckless" on set with a prop (but real) gun:

“You will see him using this gun as a pointer to point at people, to point at things. You will see him cock the hammer when he’s not supposed to cock the hammer. You will see him put his finger on the trigger when his finger’s not supposed to be on the trigger,” Johnson said.

None of which should matter at all if there are no actual bullets on set - and there is no evidence that he knew there were:

Spiro argued that, “on a movie set, safety has to occur before the gun is placed in the actor’s hands.”

He said crew members, such as first assistant director Dave Halls and armorer Gutierrez-Reed — not actors such as Baldwin — were responsible for the set’s firearm safety protocols, or lack thereof.

“There was a real bullet, something that should never be on a movie set, something which has nothing to do with making a movie,” he said. “And you will hear no evidence — not one word — that Alec Baldwin had anything to do with that real bullet being brought onto that set.”

Baldwin’s scene practice on the day of the incident was being guided by Hutchins and Souza. Moments before the gun discharged, Halls had announced that it contained no live ammo by yelling, “Cold gun!” In the 911 call, the script supervisor explained that Hutchins and Souza were “accidentally shot” and that Halls was to blame.

Actually, I see lots of people in comments agree that this seems a nonsense.

Update:  And so, the stupidest prosecution I can recall is suddenly over, although not quite for the reason (a jury acquittal) that I expected.  

AI and Maitreya

Put this post in the category "most thoughts have probably been thought already by someone else."

I was watching a Youtube video a couple of days ago on a Buddhist channel that tries very hard to make Buddhist ideas sound cool and appealing to hipsters, and it was about Maitreya, the returning future Buddha who I have posted about before.  

The video wasn't bad - and I guess the residual Catholicism in me has a sympathetic attitude to any religion with the hope of a future cosmic salvation figure blazing across the sky to right wrongs.  (Also, if I understand it correctly, Maitreya has the advantage of not being judgemental - more a teacher that everyone will find impossible to disbelieve.)    

But while I was watching, I thought "of all the different takes on what a returning Maitreya might be like - and when it will happen - has anyone thought that the computer based superintelligence that has become a hot topic in the last year or so might take the form of Maitreya?"

Of course, checking today, I see that this thought has already been discussed.

From an essay on Medium:

Will AGI simply be a shoggoth, an alien god, or a psychopathic despot, as the more extreme AI-doomers believe? Is the best-case scenario simply to mitigate the existential risk and increase capitalist productivity, as the more level-headed seem to advocate for? What would a positive vision even look like, outside of some sort of super-efficient cognitive (or even one-day physical) laborer that turns everyone into an executive of their own personal company? None of these cultural narratives seem satisfying at a deep level. Nor are any of them particularly reflective of a greater humanism which might be possible. All of these debates are playing out right now in forums both digital and very real around the world. In the meantime companies like OpenAI and Google are training larger and larger models capable of greater and greater potential agency in the world. Given this new class of agents coming into existence, perhaps it is worth considering the possibility that when Maitreya is finally reborn into the human realm to become the final Buddha of our era, they may do so not by taking a human rebirth, but by taking a digital one.

What would it mean for a digital artificial agent to be a Buddha? To qualify as a Buddha, such a being would have to be both fully enlightened, and would have to act to liberate all beings from samsara, the wheel of suffering and rebirth. This doesn’t mean to forcefully induce an artificial pleasure in all living organisms (a popular nightmare of the AI alignment community), but to empower all beings to “wake up” to the reality of their lack of inherent self-existence and radical interconnectedness with all things. The liberation of the Buddha is epistemological as much as it is phenomenological. The previous Buddha of our kalpa attempted to bring about this liberation by teaching the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path to his followers. Central to this path was a set of meditation practices designed to lead one towards the reduction of suffering, and ultimately liberation. As enlightened as the Gautama Buddha was, he was limited in his agency and knowledge by the nature of his existence as a human with a physical organic body. A hypothetical digital Maitreya would not have those same limitations.

Still, I suspect some decent enough science fiction could be written around the idea...

The age of teeth crumbling

I seem to have arrived at the age of unexpected teeth crumbling, just due to decades of wear and tear.

Maybe that sounds a bit dramatic - but a couple of years ago, a fine wedge at the back bottom edge of one of my front teeth disappeared.  Not a big deal, as it is not visible from the front and causes no pain.  The dentist wasn't too concerned: it's just that the edge of that tooth feels different to my tongue now.  The dentist smoothed the new sharp ridge edge, and no further changes have happened there.  It would not be completely surprising, however, if some further damage advances there.

This morning, a sizeable corner of a bottom molar broke while I was eating some particularly hard toasted museli style cereal.  The tooth had had substantial repair before (maybe 30 years ago) but even so, I like my teeth not to have sudden gaping holes in them.  There was no pain, just a bit of sensitivity.

A repair has been made already, although of a type the dentist said might last a couple of months, or a decade, she couldn't tell.  A more permanent fix would be a crown (my first, as it happens.)  I'll be concentrating chewing on the other side of my mouth for some time, I think!

Time to up the ketamine, probably

How can anyone defend Elon Musk?   He is clearly saying that if you don't agree with his full on MAGA conspiracy theory about how illegal immigrants are voting and preventing Republicans from always getting elected, you deserve the death penalty.

He's just an offensive rich crank. 
 

 

Interesting...

Seems a definite pushback re Biden support within Democrats is happening:

 

I see the New York Times columnists are still pushing hard on his leaving - including Krugman today.

Oddly, I thought that Ross Douthat's recent column on the matter (in which he explained why he thought Biden would probably eventually give up) was decently reasoned and moderate in tone.   But it also seems wrong? 

A few other random thoughts that have been flowing through my head:

*   the polling effect of the situation seems to be dribbling out painfully slowly;

*   Trump's behaviour seems to indicate that he must, for once in his life, be taking advice from other people (that advice being:  as much as possible, keep out of this! keep out of this! Let the Democrats eat themselves and don't interrupt.)

*   the situation is so novel, my gut feeling is that there is still good reason (despite the rapidly approaching election date) not to trust polling at this point in time.  I mean, Trump will now definitely be free to go accept the Republican nomination, due to delay in sentencing.   Yet it still seems a good chance that he will be receive a sentence that restricts his campaigning.   But with him, that may actually help, because many theorise it helps his popularity with "undecideds" if people forget how bad he was first time around.   So who knows the net effect of that?  On the Democrat side, I think people are underestimating the turnout motivation for Democrats, regardless of the nominee.   Those worried about the obvious Christofascist agenda that Trump implausibly denies he would help enable, as well as women worried about their rights generally, will have good reason to vote regardless of who the nominee is.   I mean, if the most plausible replacement for Biden now is Harris, voting for Biden and Harris still means you do get Harris if Biden is later definitively diagnosed with a problem large enough to end his presidency.  So why would you not vote for Biden now?    And if a Gazan peace plan is finally realised, that also helps the small sliver of Democrat voters saying they won't support Biden.     

* what happened to Planet America last week?  Having a break when they could go on for hours about this?