Month: December 2021

Closing Thought–08Dec21

‘Tis the season to be jolly”….and that means the consumption of  booze……

Ever wondered which country has the most drunkedest on this small planet?

Well if you have then look no further than IST for we have the answers for you.

The US made the top 5 list…..

Australians are either the drunkest people in the world or the people most likely to be honest about how often they get drunk, according to the latest Global Drug Survey. The survey of 32,000 people in 22 countries found that while Australians drank alcohol around twice a week on average, they became drunk 27 times a year, more than people in any other country surveyed, Guardian reports. The survey defined drunk as “having drunk so much that your physical and mental faculties are impaired to the point where your balance/speech was affected” and “your conversation and behaviors were very obviously different to people who know you.” The US is the fourth-drunkest country in the world, according to the survey, behind Denmark and Finland but just ahead of the UK.

Caterina Giorgi at the Foundation for Alcohol Research and Education, an Australian nonprofit, said the findings suggest people are “drinking at fairly risky levels.” She noted that Australia also came first in the number of times people reported seeking emergency medical treatment after alcohol use. The survey found that respondents from Ireland got drunk an average of 14.6 times a year, but were the most likely to regret getting drunk, the Journal reports. They regretted getting drunk 28.4% of the time, while those from Denmark and Finland had the least regrets, at 17% each.

Data for the latest report was collected between December 2020 and March 2021. The previous year’s survey was carried out before COVID lockdowns began, and researchers said use of alcohol and almost every other drug in the survey declined year-over-year, Stuff.co.nz reports. Some of the steepest declines were in cigarette smoking and cocaine use. The researchers also found that the pandemic had caused changes in behavior, with a 42% drop in the proportion of cannabis users who shared joints or bongs.

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I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Thoughts On ‘Roe…’

As we await the decision from SCOTUS on Roe v Wade….and I am not optimistic that the court will do the right thing and preserve a right of women to choose……

But the Dems are fighting hard to save the right…..but that has NOT always been the case……

WE need to step into the “way back’ machine to the 1980s…..

For most poor Americans, the constitutional right to an abortion was effectively abolished in 1977 with the passage of the Hyde Amendment. By the late 80s, many states in the Midwest and South had fewer than five clinics statewide and they were so far away and the services so costly that the incidences of self-managed abortions began to rise, often with fatal results.

In order to grasp just how much culpability the Democrats deserve for the steady erosion of reproductive rights, perhaps it will be instructive to revisit Al Gore’s reactionary positions on “choice.” As a “New Democrat” Congressman in the 80s, Gore spoke reverentially of the “fetus’s right to life.” He was a relentless supporter of the Hyde Amendment, banning federal funding for abortions for poor women. In one early version of the Hyde Amendment there was language allowing for exceptions in cases of rape and incest. Gore voted against that.

The most far-reaching measure dreamed up by conservative right of that era to undermine Roe v. Wade was an amendment put forward in 1984 by Michigan Republican Mark Siljander. It carried a one-two punch. First, it defined the fetus as a “person” from the moment of conception. Second, it denied federal funding to any hospital or clinic that performed abortions. Gearing up for a senate run that year, Gore was one of 74 Democrats in the House who voted for Siljander’s ultimately unsuccessful measure.

Those votes returned to haunt Gore as his political ambitions went national. By 1988, he was brazenly trying to rewrite his political biography. He and his staff were well aware that his votes against choice would be brought up against him. “Since there’s a record of that vote,” an aide told US News & World Report in 1988, “in effect what we have to do is deny, deny, deny.”

The problem came to a head in 2000 during a debate at the Apollo Theater in Harlem with Bill Bradley, who used the occasion to flourish and read out a letter Gore had written to a Tennessee constituent in 1984: “It is my deep personal conviction that abortion is wrong. I hope that someday we will see the outrageously high number of abortions drop steeply. Let me assure you that I share your belief that innocent human life must be protected and I have an open mind on how to further this goal.”

(Jeffrey St. Clair)

I am one of the few that did not worship at the feet of the so-called ‘new Democrats’….the only ‘new’ about them is their propensity to screw the average American.

We now wait the announcement of the loss of another right…..

If this right is abolished which will be the next to go?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–07Dec21

This from the files of ‘Can’t Fix Stupid’

I am always on the lookout for news that I can fit into my ‘Can’t Fix Stupid’ files….and this one is perfect….

A Maryland homeowner’s Nov. 23 attempt to use smoke to dispense with a snake infestation was incredibly successful–but they managed to get rid of most of their house, as well. Per Fox 5 DC, Montgomery County fire officials said the owner of the home in the Poolesville area apparently placed hot coals too close to combustibles in the basement, which started the fire. The 3-story home sits in a rural area at the end of a nearly mile-long driveway, and with no hydrants nearby fire officials say fighting the blaze was made especially difficult. Per WJLA, some 75 firefighters responded to the fire, which had already begun to engulf the roof by the time they arrived.

Officials estimate the loss at around $1 million. The homeowners purchased the home for $1.8 million, according to reports. No one was believed to have been home at the time of the fire and no injuries were reported. While it’s unlikely the snakes made it through the inferno, officials urge against using the smoke-out method for snake removal and instead rely on sealing cracks in a home’s foundation and to take precautions that prevent rodent infestations that attract snakes in the first place.

Not much more I can add…..

‘Can’t Fix Stupid’…..

Watch This Blog!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

That ‘Day Of Infamy’

Today is 07 December and the country takes time to remember those that died 80 years ago today(or they should take the time)……

As the ‘Greatest Generation’ slowly slips from our collective memory let us take some time and look at the events around the surprise attack (or was it)……

There has been a debate for decades on whether FDR knew the attack was coming and kept quiet…..and the debate continues……

The rulers of Japan and Germany, rather than Franklin Roosevelt, chose the moment at which the United States would enter the world war. Japan had decided back in early July to undertake the southward advance at the risk of war with the United States, the Japanese Navy had insisted on including an attack on the United States in its military plans, and Hitler had decided to declare war if Japan attacked. But Roosevelt obviously did not shrink from entry into the world war in early December 1941. His administration had adopted the objective of defeating all the Axis powers and had begun the military and the economic planning to achieve it. He had shared that objective publicly with the American people, a large majority of whom now accepted war as inevitable. In October, fully three-quarters of respondents to a Gallup poll said either that the United States would inevitably get into the war in Europe or that the United States was in the war already. Stark’s and Marshall’s last-minute memorandum suggested that the early months of the war might be perilous indeed, but the administration’s Victory Program could not possibly be implemented in peacetime. With the Germans now halted before Moscow, ultimate victory over the Axis seemed at least possible, and the time to enter the war had come.

From Monday, December 1, through Thursday, December 4, new Magic intercepts conveyed Tokyo’s instructions to its diplomatic representatives in London, Singapore, Manila, Hong Kong, Washington, and various Chinese cities to destroy their codes and other publications. On December 6 in Tokyo—December 5 in the United States—the Foreign Ministry told the Embassy in Washington to await the delivery of a long message giving the Japanese reply to Hull’s November 26 note. War was obviously imminent. We must now look at both the manner in which the Japanese had decided to begin it, and the reasons why the key commanders in the Far East disregarded their warnings and so much available evidence and remained almost completely unprepared on the morning of December 7.

https://www.salon.com/2014/04/06/pearl_harbor_did_fdr_and_the_navy_know_what_was_coming/

Any thoughts to share?

Please do not let the sacrifices made by our ‘Greatest Generation’ fade from our memory….take some time today to think about all that was asked and all that was given by the American people.

Remember Pearl Harbor!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–06Dec21

Plastics are everywhere….and these pollutants make into the environment at alarming rates…..I for one try to do my part and recycle as much as possible…..so when I read this news I found it disturbing…..

Recycling will not be able to contain a runaway global plastic waste crisis, experts said on Friday as they called on companies to reduce plastic production and shift more products into reusable and refillable packaging.

Moving away from single-use plastics and towards systems that allow for it to be reused are among the solutions that experts believe could ease the problem, but radical changes to the production system are also needed.

A woman collects plastic bottles for recycling at the garbage dump on the outskirts of Agartala, capital of India's northeastern state of Tripura December 6, 2009. REUTERS/Jayanta Dey

A woman collects plastic bottles for recycling at the garbage dump on the outskirts of Agartala, capital of India’s northeastern state of Tripura December 6, 2009. REUTERS/Jayanta Dey

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SINGAPORE, Dec 3 (Reuters) – Recycling will not be able to contain a runaway global plastic waste crisis, experts said on Friday as they called on companies to reduce plastic production and shift more products into reusable and refillable packaging.

Moving away from single-use plastics and towards systems that allow for it to be reused are among the solutions that experts believe could ease the problem, but radical changes to the production system are also needed.

“We won’t be able to just recycle or reduce our way out of it,” said Rob Kaplan, CEO of Circulate Capital, which invests in emerging markets initiatives to solve the plastic waste crisis.

“It’s a systems problem and needs to combine upstream and downstream solutions,”

https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/world-cant-recycle-its-way-out-plastic-crisis-experts-2021-12-03/

this dire prediction will do not to influence corporations to look for alternative packaging….for that will cost money and that cash is needed for the CEO bonus packages.

At what point is enough enough?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Backsliding Democracies

There was a time when the word ‘democracy’ meant something…..now it is a joke.

In recent years those so-called ‘democracies’ are today backsliding from the principles they once lived by……and the US is one of those democracies…..

The US has been experiencing a “visible deterioration” in its relationship with democracy since 2019, a think tank says. And the organization saw a “decline in the quality of freedom of association and assembly” during the protests after the killing of George Floyd last year. But “a historic turning point,” says the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, arrived “when former president Donald Trump questioned the legitimacy of the 2020 election results in the United States.” For that, AFP reports, the US has earned a place for the first time on the global list of backsliding democracies.

“The United States is a high-performing democracy, and even improved its performance in indicators of impartial administration (corruption and predictable enforcement) in 2020,” said Alexander Hudson, a co-author of the “State of Democracy” report. “However, the declines in civil liberties and checks on government indicate that there are serious problems with the fundamentals of democracy.” International IDEA uses 50 years’ worth of indicators to categorize about 160 countries according to their type of rule: authoritarian, hybrid, or democratic—whether they’re solidly so or backsliding.

The group’s secretary general sees the US influencing other nations, and not in a good way. “The violent contestation of the 2020 election without any evidence of fraud has been replicated, in different ways,” Kevin Casas-Zamora said, “in places as diverse as Myanmar, Peru and Israel.” In fact, one-fourth of the world’s population now lives in a democratically backsliding nation, the report says. The group, which is based in Stockholm, noted the irony of it all, per the Washington Post. “The United States, the bastion of global democracy, fell victim to authoritarian tendencies itself,” the report said.

The beacon of justice and liberty is slowly dimming and will eventually go out.

You, the voter, can change that…..but will you?

That beacon that I mentioned needs to be saved….but sadly….not today.

But Biden has an idea of which I have written several times…..

A Summit For Democracy

The League Of Democracies

Biden still believes that Americas has the moral high ground on this subject…..

Whether or not President Biden has any understanding that today’s geopolitical landscape is very different from the one which he experienced as the “end of history” was being celebrated in 1991, is an open question.

The upcoming global Democracy Summit was driven by the belief that America is still the only global power capable of dictating the terms of the world order.

But that hasn’t stopped Biden and his foreign policy advisors from rallying approximately the half of the world’s nations together for a summit which will be heralded as the historic meeting place of the freedom-loving liberal states. This means that over 100 countries are excluded from the dialogue and some of them believe that it was done because they claim the right to be able to determine their future without having it imposed by other powers. What arrogance on their part!

Biden’ Democracy Summit – Dividing Instead of Uniting the World

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I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Sunday Sciencey Stuff

It is the weekend and as my usual thing I try to give my readers something to think about that they have never had a thought about in the past…..most of it is worthless news…..but that is the point try to take the reader out of their comfort zone.

First…..xenobots……

Tiny “living machines” made of frog cells can replicate themselves, making copies that can then go on to do the same. This newly described form of renewal offers insights into how to design biological machines that are self-perpetuating.

“This is an incredibly exciting breakthrough,” for the field of biologically based robotics, says Kirstin Petersen, an electrical and computer engineer at Cornell University who studies groups of robots. Robots that can copy themselves are an important step toward systems that don’t need humans to operate, she says.

Earlier this year, researchers described the behaviors of the lab-made living robots, called xenobots (SN: 3/31/21). Plucked out of frogs’ growing bodies, small clumps of skin stem cells from frog embryos knitted themselves into small spheres and began to move. Cellular extensions called cilia served as motors that powered the xenobots as they cruised around their lab dishes.

Tiny living machines called xenobots can create copies of themselves

All the talk these days is about abortion….like when is the embryo a person?  Then there is this news…..

The stem cells were no more than a week old when scientists moved them from their slick-walled plastic wells into ones lined with a thin layer of human endometrial tissue. But in that time, the cells had multiplied and transformed, organizing themselves into semi-hollow spheres. Per the instructions of the chemical cocktail in which they’d been steeping, they were trying to turn into embryos.

Video cameras captured what happened next: The balls of cells rotated until they were cavity-side-up, before finally touching down and grabbing onto the endometrial layer, a cellular proxy for a human uterus. Days later, when the scientists dipped paper test strips into the wells, pink lines appeared. Their Petri dishes were pregnant.

“These experiments clearly point out the fact that we are able to model in the dish the first touch between the embryo and the mother,” stem cell biologist Nicolas Rivron told reporters at a press conference.

Most advanced lab-grown human embryos prompt a pressing question: Are they getting too real?

Now this is a subject that needs debate.

Man’s search for nuclear fusion is coming to a head…..

he ancient village of Culham, nestled in a bend of the River Thames west of London, seems an unlikely launching pad for the future. But next year, construction will start here on a gleaming building of glass and steel that could house what many people consider to be an essential technology to meet demand for clean energy in the twenty-first century and beyond.

Long derided as a prospect that is forever 30 years away, nuclear fusion seems finally to be approaching commercial viability. There are now more than 30 private fusion firms globally, according to an October survey by the Fusion Industry Association (FIA) in Washington DC, which represents companies in the sector; the 18 firms that have declared their funding say they have attracted more than US$2.4 billion in total, almost entirely from private investments (see ‘Fusion funding’). Key to these efforts are advances in materials research and computing that are enabling technologies other than the standard designs that national and international agencies have pursued for so long.

https://www.nature.com/immersive/d41586-021-03401-w/index.html

Mars has long been a source of fascination….a shame that it cannot support life as we know…..but that may not be completely true….

Any long term human presence on Mars — colonization, research, visit and travel — that didn’t confine settlers to airtight compounds would rely on a stable atmosphere that doesn’t lose too many particles or fry human bodies with too much radiation.

Now, scientists from a star-studded list of universities and organizations, including NASA’s own chief scientist James Lauer Green, are suggesting that we protect humans on Mars from deadly atmospheric conditions by jumpstarting the planet’s magnetic field.

“For a long-term human presence on Mars to be established, serious thought would need to be given to terraforming the planet,” the team wrote in a new paper that will print in the journal Acta Astronautica in January 2022, first spotted by Universe Today. “One major requirement for such terraforming is having the protection of a planetary magnetic field which Mars currently does not have.”

https://futurism.com/scientists-propose-jumpstarting-mars-magnetic-field

I saved the best news for last….hopefully the reader made it this far…..

The US Air Force will receive an improved in-flight bladder relief device early next month, helping fighter pilots, especially females, to urinate more easily.

A sortie can be up to 10 hours long, F-35A Lightning II pilot Maj. Nikki Yogi said, approximating the duration between her Eielson Air Force Base, Alaska, and Guam. 

Having had a poor experience with her device while deployed as an A-10 pilot in 2017, Yogi added, “A pilot should be focused on taking the fight to the enemy, not on whether their bladder relief device is going to work or be comfortable to use.” 

US Air Force Develops Improved In-Flight Peeing Device

This could be a commercial moneymaker….gamers will spend their hard earned money to go through a game without a pee break.

That wraps up the most worthless news available…..you may thank me later.

Have a good day and be well and safe…..

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Age Of Shaming

WARNING:  This post is a real thing and may be more than some readers want to know….please if talk about the human body disturbs you then this post is not for you.

These days shaming has become an art form…..especially since the invention of social media…..people are shamed for a wide array of issues……like weight, height, fashion, intelligence, etc……but I have to admit that there is one form of shaming I had not heard of or considered…..vaginal shaming.

I admit that I am not an expert by any stretch of the imagination and had to do what I always do….go to the internet…..

So in the spirit of FYI I share what I found……

After I first heard of the concept of “vaginal shame,” I found myself flipping through an educational (read: not sexual) slideshow called The Labia Library. It’s exactly what it sounds like—a collection of close-up photos of labias belonging to various women, which made me realize that I’m a cisgender heterosexual woman in her 30s who doesn’t understand the vast diversity of human female anatomy. “Your experience isn’t uncommon,” gynecologist Jen Gunter, MD, assures me.

Many women typically see so few vaginas in their lifetimes that aren’t in porn—where the preferred aesthetic is decidedly narrow—that they’re often vulnerable to suggestions from their male partners around what’s “normal,” or, more critically for a woman’s self-esteem, “not normal.” “I see so few gay women who are vulnerable to [vaginal shame]—in fact, I can remember just one—simply because they see all kinds of vaginas and vulvas,” says Dr. Gunter, author of The Vagina Bible. “And gay women don’t get that horrible destructive messaging of, ‘You’re not wet enough,’ or ‘What do you mean you can’t orgasm with just my penis?’ And so on, that so many straight women do from heterosexual men.”

Vaginal Shame Is Real—so Here’s a Much-Needed Reality Check

More……

https://www.refinery29.com/en-gb/2018/09/209277/vagina-shaming

Vulva Shaming & Vagina shaming – for real? We need confidence!

https://www.instyle.com/lifestyle/vagina-shame

This is not the first time that I tried to bring this ‘shaming’ technique to my readers…..https://lobotero.com/2016/04/30/lips-are-more-like-a-rose-petal/

I admit as a male I can understand the concern that can be generated….I mean we males have always worried about our penis….but that was in the days before social media.

How does this sort of shaming begin?  Are pics shared and the shaming begins?  If so why would anyone share such photos?

This post is not suppose to be flippant in any way….the shaming is real….and should be a concern…..my sole purpose was FYI and nothing else…..

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The Congressional Con Game

I have heard from both sides about how masterfully the leaders of the House and Senate are at getting the stuff through Congress…..all that is media hype and fanciful BS…..

The truth is that it is autocratic rule….this coming from both parties….

There has evolved a highly centralized, autocratic system in the House and Senate that tolerates meaningful dissent from independently minded legislators in only the rarest and most unique circumstances. Nancy Pelosi and Newt Gingrich led the way in the House. Each extracted compliance from the members of their respective caucuses, Pelosi much more effectively and lastingly than Gingrich. Their demands – their entire strategy – have had one unifying theme: success in the next elections, an effective enticement to re-election hungry members. From selecting a new healthcare system to deciding if it is — or is not — time to impeach a President (remember, in addition to the lunges against Trump, the 2006 diktat against impeaching George W. Bush for starting the second Iraq War on false pretenses), there has been no decision in the Democrat caucus until Speaker Pelosi decided. Under Mitch McConnell, the tactics and goals are profoundly similar, just the positions are different and a little better articulated to the public. But also, of course, the reverses of past positions of declared principle are more than a little gob-smacking.

However, there are some activities that span the party divide: opposition to lifting the national debt ceiling when the other party has the White House, delaying appropriations until well after the start of the new fiscal year no matter who controls what, parceling out scores of billions of dollars for pork especially for compliant caucus members, and using the filibuster to kill any particular bill from the other side in the Senate.

Pelosi and McConnell disallow unapproved legislative alternatives with parliamentary tricks: they allow a vote only if the provision is harmless, sure to support their own position or guaranteed to fail if it is problematic. A controversial vote with an unknown, if not unapproved, outcome is extremely rare. Policy diktats are seldom altered, once decided. Determined nonconformists are isolated from positions of influence, have their pork requests vetoed, are denied party controlled campaign funding, and/or get “primary-ed.” In all cases, the point is to make examples and suppress dissent. The compliant will get goodies (a repaired bridge in the state, a legal loophole for a fundraiser’s profession outside the state, a big check from a formerly unhelpful PAC, or an invite to the White House — or for the Trump boot lickers Mar-a-Lago); whatever it takes to help the leader’s agenda.

Mystery Meat Congress; Clueless Mainstream Press

The illusion of a unified party is a construct of the media….they pretend that their is some sort of actual ‘come to Jesus’ moment…..

These ‘leader’ rule by intimidation of opposition….and as usual the only winner in their unified front is the corporations and the high dollar donors…..the people are of secondary importance .

Until the voter pulls their heads out of  of social media and start thinking like sentient beings this crap congressional record will continue.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–02Dec21

As the police shootings and killings of civilians continues to spiral out of control….there comes a story that is just so disturbing on so many levels……it involves cops and a old fart in a wheelchair……

The Tucson Police Department has swiftly distanced itself from an officer who shot dead a man in a motorized wheelchair. Police Chief Chris Magnus said on Tuesday he was “deeply disturbed and troubled” by what transpired on Monday night: Officer Ryan Remington responded to a report of a man who was allegedly armed with a knife and stole a toolbox from a Walmart. An employee there said that upon asking 61-year-old Richard Lee Richards to show his receipt for the toolbox, he revealed his knife and said “Here’s your receipt.” Police bodycam video shows Remington later going after Richards as he drove his wheelchair toward the entrance of a Lowe’s across the street.

Remington yelled at Richards to keep out of the store, then fired nine shots, striking Richards in the back and side. The Arizona Republic reports Richards was pronounced dead a short time later. The New York Times reports surveillance video from Lowe’s shows Remington handcuffing Richards, who made no movements. “His use of deadly force in this incident is a clear violation of department policy and directly contradicts multiple aspects of our use of force and training,” Magnus said in a press conference. “As a result, the department moved earlier today to terminate Officer Remington,” who has been a member of the Tucson police department for four years. KOLD reports it could take up to a week for the termination to be official.

 

Remington’s lawyer, Mike Storie, described the chain of events as “unbelievable circumstances,” saying, “This event happened roughly 24 hours ago, and we have a chief of police who has fired the officer and the mayor who is calling for his indictment,” per the Times. Storie told the AP that Remington felt he “had no nonlethal options. He did have a Taser, but in his mind, he couldn’t use it because he didn’t feel he had the proper spread to deploy it, with the wheelchair between him and Richards.”

Why is the gun the first response?

Are you saying that the cops could not subdue an old fart in a wheelchair with a pocket knife without shooting him?

This is so disgusting on many levels for me….

Do you think the firing of this officer will change anything?

I do not!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”