Open Thread for February 25, 2022

 Posted by at 6:40 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 252022
 

Yesterday, The sun came out and the snow started to melt. It’s already somewhat warmer inside, though not back to what I had gotten used to. But that will come. Also yesterday, before sawn here, Putin invaded Ukraine.

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I am not qualified to write helpfully about the events in Ukraine (about the tonly thing I consider myself qualified to say is that Putin’sRepublican Party is a bunch of traitors, who should all be interned.) Someone who is qualified to do that reporting is Beau of the Fifth Column (whose videos I put in the video thread regularly.) He is not a veteran, but has been a defense contractor in war zones – the kind of looker-on who really does see more of the game than the players – and has supplemented that knowledge with specialized reading and study. I cannot possibly do justice to his Ukraine reporting in the video thread, where I limit any given source to one video per day, while he puts up two videos every day, three yesterday, and I would not be surprised if he went to three a day every day while this is going on. So I am just putting a link here to his YouTube page – not the home page but the one that just has all the videos in reverse chronological order. You will get solid news from hom as well as guidance how to dig in further, if such is available. Even if he does go to three videos daily, in usually under a half our a day you can get a lot of clarity.  Click through and save or bookmark.

Wonkette – Neo-Nazi Plan To Destroy US Power Grid Foiled By Lost Phone
Quote – In this case, they themselves were the terrorists they provided material support to, along with several juveniles they had recruited online, as the three men intended to attack regional power substations for the purpose of causing civil unrest and perhaps “the next Great Depression,” which they imagined would lead to a race war or provide an opportunity for white leaders to rise up…. And they would have gotten away with it too, were it not for the many times they had been stopped by law enforcement and the fact that one of the juveniles they recruited to help them lost their phone.
Click through for full story. I’d say “unbelievable,” but sadly, it’s all too believable there would be people this stupid.

Black History – National Women’s Health Network – 4 Astounding Facts About the First Black Woman Doctor in the US
Quote – 1. Rebecca’s undeniable talent and the need created by the Civil War earned her a place in medical school. Crumpler was able to start at the New England Female Medical College for two reasons. First, she’d worked for five years as a nurse, and had developed such a strong reputation that she won a competitive scholarship as well as the personal recommendation of all the doctors who she worked with.
Click through for the other three. (You may want a barf bag for #3. But the photo is beautiful.)

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Open Thread for February 24, 2022

 Posted by at 6:53 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 242022
 

Greetings from the Deep Freeze! Yesterday, our overnight low was -4°F with a windchill of -7°F. Tuesday night it was -10°F with a wind chill of -24°F. It is expected to warm up today to a high of +22°F. There is very little snow on the ground – it’s just cold. By this time next week we should have a couple of days of highs in the 60’s before it goes down again. Never a dull moment. I did finish up my haircut … such as it is LOL.

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Cal Matters – Meth, a mother, and a stillbirth: Imprisoned mom wants her ‘manslaughter’ case reopened
Quote – Since her guilty plea, Perez’s story has drawn national attention for her rare plea to manslaughter of a fetus – a charge that doesn’t exist in California law. Abortion rights advocates believe her case has broad implications for abortion access in California, potentially opening the door to criminal prosecutions of people seeking to terminate pregnancies. (Emphasis mine.)
Click through for details. This would not surprise me in many states. It does surprise me in California. And, with everything else going on, it scares me.

HuffPost – Rick Scott Releases Far-Right Plan For GOP Senate Majority
Quote – Scott’s plan starts off with requiring children to recite the Pledge of Allegiance at school and disallowing teachers from portraying American history in a negative light, following state GOP legislatures in their efforts to ban the teaching of critical race theory. “Public schools will teach our children to love America because, while not perfect, it is exceptional, it is good, and it is a beacon of freedom in an often-dark world,” it says.
Click through for more. Mother Jones also covered this, calling it a “fever dream.” The only good thing I see about it is that it should be very helpful in getting Democrats to turn out. (If they can use imaginary fears, surely we can use real ones.)

Black History – Wikipedia – Charles R. Drew
Quote – He spent time doing research at Columbia’s Presbyterian Hospital and wrote a doctoral thesis, “Banked Blood: A Study on Blood Preservation,” based on an exhaustive study of blood preservation techniques. It was through this blood preservation research where Drew realized blood plasma was able to be preserved, two months, longer through de-liquification, or the separation of liquid blood from the cells. When ready for use the plasma would then be able to return to its original state via reconstitution.
Click through for bio. If you have ever had a transfusion, or had a loved one who has, you are in debt to Drew for his work. And so, of course, are thousands if not millions of others.

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Open Thread for February 22, 2022

 Posted by at 7:17 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 222022
 

Today is Twos-day: whether you write it 2/22/2022 or 22/2/2022 or 2022/2/22, it’s more twos than we can expect to see for 200 years (and I for one do not expect to be around.) And, to top it off, it’s also Tuesday. And, yesterday, it was a slow news day. So I just posted two short takes (and two videos on that thread) and took the rest of the day off. If Ukraine explodes, it will have to wait until Wednesday. (Not that you won’t hear about it elsewhere.)

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The Nib – Breathless
Quote – When I moved to Calcutta for college, the second largest and one of the most poluted cities in India, I could not see the stars any more. And I could not breathe. One night I stayed up coughing till the sun rose. The following week I was diagnosed with asthma.
Click through for graphic article. I have been somewhat vaguely aware of how much fighting climate change as an individual depends on having money and health and other privilege. But this brings it home in ways no other medium has done for me.

Black History Month – The New Yorker – Henry Louis Gates Jr.
Quote – Perhaps his most important and lasting role has been as a teacher and an institution builder. Gates arrived at Harvard in 1991, and he swiftly recruited an extraordinary concentration of Black scholarship—William Julius Wilson, Cornel West, Lawrence D. Bobo, Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham, Suzanne Blier, and others—all while reinvigorating the W. E. B. Du Bois Research Institute, which is now part of the Hutchins Center. Gates proved a dynamo of both intellectual energy and fund-raising finesse.
Click through for full interview. Skip is sometimes called “the Black Ken Burns,” and certainly no one has any better right to tht title. But he is also so much more.

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Open Thread for February 21, 2022

 Posted by at 7:00 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 212022
 
Yesterday, I worked on cutting my hair – not for appearance particularly, but to prevent it from landing in my eyes, or (in soe ways worse) in my mouth. I made progress … but it’s still a work in progress.

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engadget – QAnon founder may have been identified thanks to machine learning
Quote – With help from machine learning software, computer scientists may have unmasked the identity of Q, the founder of the QAnon movement. In a sprawling report published on Saturday, The New York Times shared the findings of two independent teams of forensic linguists who claim they’ve identified Paul Furber, a South African software developer who was one of the first to draw attention to the conspiracy theory, as the original writer behind Q. They say Arizona congressional candidate Ron Watkins also wrote under the pseudonym.
Click through for more. This story made the New York Times, but I didn’t have a gift link to read it there. This was the best I could find.

The Conversation – Physics abd psychology of cats – an (improbable) conversation
Quote – We’ve had cats as pets for, like, 14,000 years. And in 14,000 years, the cats have told us that they want to live with us, and that they would like a comfortable bed, and they want food, and they want us to snuggle with them. In other words, the cats have really communicated all of their interests and needs such that we’re running around doing whatever they have in mind. So they’re doing a very good job.
Click through. You may remember I mentioned that a webinar was scheduled with the IgNobel Prize paople on this subject. It was held, and it was taped in full. And a snippet of it has been transcribed here, with a link to the full video (with CC).

Black History – Wikipedia – Bessie Coleman
Quote – She was the first African-American woman and first Native American to hold a pilot license. She earned her license from the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale on June 15, 1921, and was the first Black person to earn an international pilot’s license…. She then became a high-profile pilot in notoriously dangerous air shows in the United States. She was popularly known as Queen Bess and Brave Bessie, and hoped to start a school for African-American fliers. Coleman died in a plane crash in 1926. Her pioneering role was an inspiration to early pilots and to the African-American and Native American communities.
Click thrugh for article. These days, Earhart gets all the attention as a pioneering aviatrix, yet Coleman actually preceded her. (And Earhart did not have to travel to France – twice – to get her flight instruction.) In their own day, during the overlap of their careers, they were about equally prominent.

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Open Thread for February 20, 2022

 Posted by at 6:34 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 202022
 

Yesterday, the opera radio broadcast was “Boris Godunov” by Mussorgsky. The title role is for basses what the role of “Norma” is for sopranos – the pinnacle which everyone wants to reach but few can. Having just written about Ryan Speedo Green, and notoced that one of his teachers said his voive is still growing and will be growing for years, I wondered whether one day he would sing this. He was actually in this production in a supporting role. That gave me a smile.

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Crooks and Liars – ‘Freedom Convoy’ Leader Pat King Arrested While On Facebook Live
Quote – He was told he was being arrested for counselling to commit the offence of mischief, counselling to obstruct police and counselling to commit the offence of disobeying a court order. King told the officer he would like to call his lawyer. “I have the right to a lawyer?” he asked, to which the police officer responded: “Of course you do.”
Click through. Police in the United States should watch this to learn how it’s supposed to be done. (And I love Canada’s use of he term “counselling” where we would say “inciting.’

Letters from an American – February 18, 2022
Friday is supposed to be a slow news day, but Heather cites four stpries, any one of which could be fron page news:
1. Yes, there was classified information in the documents Trump** took to Mar-a-Lago. And that’s not all.
2. Fake special counselJohn Durham alleges that RWNJ frenzy caused by hs reporting is not his problem.
3. In addition to the Humpty Dumpty – 1984 lawsuits, another Judge (Amir P. Mehta) declined to dismiss three other lawsuits against Trump** et al filed by member do Congress for conspiring to obstruct them in the performance of their duties.
Finally, President Biden’s address on Ukraine prompted political scientist (and journalist) David Rothkopf to point out that, in this address, Biden was speaking as the leader of the free world – and that ““It has been a long time since a U.S. president filled that role.” Sadly, the speech also made it clear that the president is pretty sure Russia will attack Ukraine.
Click through for details. Her letters are long-ish, but this one is unusually juicy.

Black History – Wikipedia – James Armistead Lafayette
Quote – In 1781, after getting his enslaver’s consent, Armistead volunteered to join the army under Lafayette. Lafayette utilized Armistead as a spy, with the latter posing as a runaway slave. Armistead joined the camp of Brigadier General Benedict Arnold, the turncoat who was leading some British forces in the area. Pretending to be a spy for them allowed Armistead to gain Arnold’s confidence to the extent that Arnold used him to guide British troops through local roads. After Arnold departed north in the spring of 1781, James went to the camp of Lord Charles Cornwallis and continued his work. He moved frequently between British camps where the officers would speak openly about their strategies in front of him.
Click through for everything we know about him. I wish it were more. I would have loved to quote the entire sections on “Emancipation” and “Later Life” but then it would not have been a short take. At least he was appreciated in his lifetime.

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Open Thread for February 19 2022

 Posted by at 6:39 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 192022
 

Yesterday, I watched Ari Melber  Claire McKaskill, and a third person discuss a judge calling Trump’s lawyers arguments Humpty-Dumpty-esque for over 14 minutes – and NOT ONE of them mentioned what the judge must have meant by that. It’s clearly a reference (and they did mention Alice in Wonderland) to Through the Looking Glas where Humpty Dumpty said, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.” As Alice pointed out, it doesn’t work that way (though he was not convinced and babblrd on about how he was paying them to do his bidding.) It’s quite a conversation – and it is exactly like Trump** and Trump** lawyers. But they all seemed to think the judge was alluding to Humpty Dumpty’s fall. I think not. Anyway, I also got my groceries in and mostly put away. The frozen and refrigerated stuff immediately, of course, but the rest could wait longer (for me to be rested between trips.) I didn’t receive everything – but at least there were no substitutions.

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Mother Jones – My Family Lost Our Farm During Japanese Incarceration. I Went Searching for What Remains.
Quote – The anti-Japanese sentiment that allowed for such a drastic action to take place did not spring up suddenly after Pearl Harbor, but had been simmering for decades, stoked by white labor and business groups resentful of Japanese workers and farmers. Japanese Americans who were forced off their land lost property worth an estimated $3.7 billion in today’s dollars, and $7.7 billion worth of income.
Click through.  Today is the day. The eightieth anniversary of that executive order. And, yes, it was racism, but specifically the fear aspect of racism. Who benefits from keeping people in fear? Certainly not the people who are terrified.

HuffPost – Child Poverty Spiked After Tax Credit Expired, Early Research Suggests
Quote – Democrats failed to extend a credit late last year, due to the opposition of Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.). The last monthly check was paid out to parents on Dec. 15. After this tax season, the credit will return to its previous $2,000 level and parents with no income will no longer be eligible. Manchin told colleagues and constituents he thought parents wasted the money on drugs. Though he avoided taking a clear public position on the policy, he suggested it should have a “work requirement.”
Click through for details/ I would file this under “No shit, Sherlock.” And it really frosts me when people, especially in the media, say “Congress” when what they should be saying is “Republicans” (and, in this case, a DINO.)

CBS News – Ryan Speedo Green: From juvenile delinquency to opera stardom
Quote – As a 12-year-old in Virginia, Ryan Speedo Green was the author of an impressive rap sheet. He was so violent he was banished to a class for delinquents. And when he couldn’t be contained there, he was sent to a juvenile lockup. Those who knew the boy with the unusual name, could see that the child was writing a tragedy. Now, as a man, tragedy has become the dominant theme in his life, but in a way that no one could have imagined.
Click through for bio. Or, if you’re in a hurry, click here for this video from September 28, 2016, the night before he opened the season at the Met (hanky alert). I just didn’t want to ley the month go by without sharing this remarkable story.

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Video Thread 2/18/2022

 Posted by at 11:59 am  Open Thread, Politics
Feb 182022
 

Glenn Kirschner – Rep. Raskin, Jan 6 Committee Member, says Trump is “Guilty as Sin” & “Will Get His Comeuppance.”

Lincoln Project – Putin’s Allies

Meidas Touch – Steve Schmidt: President Biden needs to say THIS during the State of the Union

American Bridge 21st Century Launches Bridge to Democracy

Thom Hartmann – Is There Time To Stop Sneaky Attack on Medicare?

MSNBC – Pentagon All Ears For Ideas On How Bunny Penetrated Security To Access Inner Courtyard

Beau – Let’s talk about the CRT Republicans love….

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Open Thread for February 18 2022

 Posted by at 6:49 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 182022
 

Yesterday, I actually finished one of the “buttonhole neckline” sweaters I’ve been working o. Sorry no picture yet. I’m not fluent in photography. But I do remember that has been requested and will be working on it. I found a brand new Rocky Mountain Mike parody (based on Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline”) – it’ll be in Saturday’s video thread.-  And, I placed a grocery order to be delivered today.

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Letters from an American – February 16, 2022
Quote – Parker’s Washington Post story showing the Freedom Convoys as the expression of a radical fringe was an important reality check to the breathless stories from the American right hailing the Freedom Convoys as a popular movement. The story that former secretary of state Hillary Clinton allegedly spied on then-candidate Trump’s campaign in 2016 illustrates the importance of the sort of reality-based corrective the Washington Post published about the Canadian truckers.
Click through for both stories. We may never be able to reach loony-tunes RWNJs, but it’s still important – maybe even more important – for sane people to have access to the truth.

The 19th – How Ketanji Brown Jackson’s pursuit of success as a lawyer and parent got her a potential Supreme Court nod
Quote – After another stint in private practice, Jackson was nominated by then-President Barack Obama to serve in a full-time capacity on his Sentencing Commission. She was confirmed to that post in 2010. It was the first of three times that she has gone through a Senate confirmation process. “This for me was an opportunity of a lifetime, and it was well worth enduring what I can only say was the extremely nerve-wracking nomination and confirmation process,” she said at the University of Georgia. “I actually taught myself to knit as a way to channel my nervous energy during that time. If anybody wants a scarf, I’m your source.”
Click through for details. It is far from certain who will actually be nominated, but she is a top contender, and has ahown good judgment (pun intended) in some of the 1/6 trials. Not only that, she has a sense of humor.

NBC News – Scientists have possibly cured HIV in a woman for the first time
Quote – An American research team reported that it has possibly cured HIV in a woman for the first time. Building on past successes, as well as failures, in the HIV-cure research field, these scientists used a cutting-edge stem cell transplant method that they expect will expand the pool of people who could receive similar treatment to several dozen annually. Their patient stepped into a rarified [sic] club that includes three men whom scientists have cured, or very likely cured, of HIV. Researchers also know of two women whose own immune systems have, quite extraordinarily, apparently vanquished the virus.
Click through for story, including caution from Dr. Fauci. We have ONE cure from this treatment. It’s definitle hopeful, but at best hopefully definite.

Footnote: Tuesday I featured Rober Smalls. Turns out Keith Knight (“Ye Olde Gentleman Cartoonist”) is a big fan of his.

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