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tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-191113842016-04-30T13:53:57.905-04:00 Story Bones The secret is to bang the rocks together, guys.Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-2493148769744729972016-04-29T12:19:00.002-04:002016-04-29T12:19:32.005-04:00Linkee-poo is a killer queen, gunpowder, gelatine, dynamite with a laser beam, guaranteed to blow your mindHad checkup today. Apparently I'm still alive. Need to get the 100,000-mile timing-belt change (colonoscopy), and maybe the tires rotated. Also might need new spark plugs. The doctor said, :So for low PSA scores we no longer do digital rectal exams." Never so happy to have scored low on a test in my life. But this old horse is still running.

 A chart of toddler vs CEO. So very much this. (Grokked from Patrick Nielsen Hayden)

 I've always been a numbers guy. Here's 15 interesting mathematics facts. I won't say "coolest" like the headline, because there are many more "cooler" things about numbers. "3. The guy that proved the existence of irrational numbers was murdered for his finding." As well he should have been. (Grokked from George Takei)

 Eat less, exercise more. It's this type of article and this type of science that infuriates me. "We tested the myth that exercising more leads to weight loss." I understand this is a common thought in the populace, but none of my doctors have ever said that (except in a "you need to start exercising/moving" manner, which is also the point of the First Lady's "Move" initiative, get them moving first, then start talking about diet because the moving part is the hardest). Eat less, exercise more. There's a lot of cluelessness going on in this article and it's hard to tease out if it's really the scientists or the reporter's angle that leads to this. Eating less will not lead to permanent weight loss (except for extreme restrictions, like Adkins, and then once you get off that diet there is a high degree of rebound weight). Your body will adapt. We've have millions of years of famine to compensate (traits from our non-human ancestors). Exercise alone will not lease to permanent weight loss. We've had millions of years of fight-or-flight responses to compensate. Your body will always compensate, this ignores the other aspects such as not having as much activity because your dieting, or eating more - and resting more - because you're exercising. Your body wants to be fat, it's been the cultural norm for "healthy" throughout human history except for the last 60 years). Fat helps your digestion in the short term, it's also good for the lean times. Fat is a protective mechanism that leads to successful reproduction. Evolution doesn't give a shit if you look good in skinny jeans. Eat less, exercise more. Can you lose more by just dieting? Sure. That's why there is a whole very vocal industry devoted to that proposition (and it makes a ton more than the exercise industry which is why there are more people in it) that is very willing and successful in taking your money. But exercise will increase your basal rate (which this article says it doesn't because the studies it quotes are not really measuring to see the difference here, but only to see the difference in stress exercising, i.e. the increased calorie burn from the actual exercise). Actual exercise burns minimal calories. As you diet your basal metabolism will decrease (because your body is going into famine mode). As you exercise there is a top limit you'll hit (this is where your basal metabolism won't increase any more because you'll damage yourself, which is why the see a "plateau"). And you're body will want to eat more (because one, more calories out and two, you may need it because you might not be able to eat again, or at least digest as the leopard is chasing you). Eat less, exercise more. Moderation. Go extreme in either direction and your body will react in ways most people don't understand (look at Kwashiorkor babies, huge swollen bellies, which are actually their liver storing fat as their bodies consume theirselves, which leads to cirrhosis, which you wouldn't think would happen because Kwashiorkor Syndrome is the result of starvation). Also, while looking at all those charts in the article, notice the time lines. If your study is less than a year, I wouldn't give it much credence. Oh, and any diet will work as will any exercise, as long as you stick to that diet and exercise. Sticktoitiveness is the factor with the highest degree of success. Eat less, exercise more. "The researchers behind the study (that tracked people for longer than a year) found that people who have had success losing weight share a few things in common: They weigh themselves at least once a week. They restrict their calorie intake, stay away from high-fat foods, and watch their portion sizes. They also exercise regularly." Eat less, exercise more. Also note that for some people, the eat less, exercise more mantra doesn't work, but for most people it does. As you exercise more, and your body becomes more "efficient" (not really, but it's also a good shorthand term) at using calories (and as you lose weight) your basal metabolism will start to lower again (this is why they'll tell you, after a while of exercising, you need to ramp up again). Which kinda sucks. Also note, BMI isn't a measurement of health or ability, it is a very loosely tied metric to total body fat. But it's cheap and easy to measure, which is why it's used. The same thing for the CO2 tests they looked at. (Grokked from Tania)

 "In the southeastern Chinese city of Quanzhou, a well-known Buddhist monk named Fu Hou has been mummified and encased in gold leaf." Like you do.

 "A new study, which sampled xenon from carbon dioxide-rich mineral spring gas from the volcanic Eifel province in Germany, points to an asteroidal origin for part of the volatile elements trapped in Earth's mantle—planetary bodies whose remnants now lie between Mars and Jupiter. The mysterious xenon in the atmosphere came from elsewhere, possibly comets." It wasn't me (points at the dog). The world is weirder than you can imagine.

 Preppers are still big money. Given the recent numerous conversations about peoples' "fears", it's easy to see why (also, it's easy to see who is driving the market).

 To counter my narrative of humans never discovering time travel because we still have Trump, "The Large Hadron Collider, a 17-mile superconducting machine designed to smash protons together at close to the speed of light, went offline last night. Engineers investigating the mishap found the charred remains of a furry creature near a gnawed-through power cable." Well done future masters of Earth, who appear as weasels. Well done. Skynet has been averted. "Although they had not conducted a thorough analysis of the remains, Marsollier says they believe the creature was 'a weasel, probably.'" As they want us to believe. (Grokked from Hannah Bowman)

 "'I think when Donald Trump debates Hillary Clinton she's going to go down like Monica Lewinsky,' (Chairman of the Broward County GOP Executive Committee Bob)Sutton told the Post." What the fuck?! Seriously, WTF?! I would say he's an ignorant hick who doesn't know exactly what he's saying, but I'm pretty sure he does. This is what happens as you throw poorly thought out metaphors together with an attempt to tar the other person with a past event. Your mouth runs faster than your conscious brain can keep up. Your unconscious brain, however, is perfectly fine with it.

 "If we can't puncture some of the mythology around austerity, politics or tax cuts or the mythology that's been built up around the Reagan revolution, where somehow people genuinely think that he slashed government and slashed the deficit and that the recovery was because of all these massive tax cuts, as opposed to a shift in interest-rate policy — if we can't describe that effectively, then we're doomed to keep on making more and more mistakes." President Obama on his economic legacy. Short answer, did some great things, didn't fight hard enough for others, missed some opportunities, some people who should know better are pretty whiney.

 "Former Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) acknowledged in a Wednesday radio interview that voter ID laws help elect 'more conservative candidates.'" This is one of the problems of political chicanery like this, people tend to spill the beans before it's too late to reverse the game.

 "Establishment Republicans have tried to counter (Trump's) appeal by shouting, with growing hysteria, that he isn't a true conservative. And they're right, at least as they define conservatism. But their own voters don't care." Paul Krugman on what happens when the conned get fed up.

 Say, remember the consternation about how protests against the Trumpster at his rallies were stifling his free-speech rights? Yeah, it was bullshit then and it's bullshit now. In Southern California, that anti-rally protest was even more violent than Chicago's, but Trump went on to speak. Funny how someone with the microphone can often speak no matter what the protest.

 Tweet of my heart: @mightymur I'm pessimistic in anticipating if Hillary wins, we'll hear a lot of "sexism is dead; there's a woman in the White House. So STFU bitch."

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-61436602763125005262016-04-28T12:26:00.003-04:002016-04-28T12:46:00.072-04:00Linkee-poo was there and saw what you did, saw it with my own two eyesBrandon Sanderson on being nominated for a Hugo and the S/RP thing. (Grokked from Mary Robinette Kowal)

 But Thomas Mays has already withdrawn from the nomination. (Grokked from Chuck Wendig)

 And the often puppy target John Scalzi has a few thoughts.

 Yeah, I'm sure the river near a Australian fracking site was just naturally flammable. Been that way for years. I'm sure the process of fracturing the bedrock in the area had nothing to do with methane leaks in the river. Nothing at all. (Grokked from Kameron Hurley)

 Freedom of speech is under attack, but it's by the people who say their freedom of speech is under attack. Trying to out do itself and make more legislation that the country can be pissed at, NC's "Lt. Gov. Dan Forest is proposing that the state's 17-campus public university system create a policy that includes punishments for 'those who interrupt the free expression of others.'" Because free speech means those in power should never have to hear our disdain.

 In case you doubted Jim Wright and his post that shared his thoughts on optimism and just exactly where Elon Musk was going, "SpaceX plans to send its Dragon spacecraft to Mars as early as 2018, the company announced today." Shoot for the Moon, and even if you miss you'll end up among the stars. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

 How do you know how much to save for retirement and how to structure the payouts from your 401k? Well, you could think about making sure there are defined beneficiaries in your plan (so if you die before it's all paid out the money will go to someone you want it to) and then plan for the long run. That, of course, means less money to live on. So some people are buying an annuity that kicks in later in life. It's an insurance policy that you'll have money when your money runs out. Of course, these things are not inexpensive.

 Using rice husks to make silicon anodes for lithium-ion anodes. Silicon has superior energy storage capabilities, but so far has been more expensive to produce, has some impractical limitations, and doesn't have the cycling capability (the number of times it can be recharged) needed. Silicon nanoparticles, however, do much better.

 "…the gravitational field of the sun can focus light. Place a telescope at the focal point of this giant lens and it should become possible to study a distant object in unprecedented detail. But how good would such a lens be; what would it reveal that we couldn't see with our own telescopes?… Today we get an answer to these questions thanks to the work of Geoffrey Landis at NASA's John Glenn Research Center in Cleveland. Landis has analyzed the resolving power of the solar lens and worked out just how good it could be." Wow, Geoff, that's some seriously good stuff. Also, noted for the public, Geoff Landis has done a lot of fantastic science (like floating cities on Venus because breathable air is a lifting gas there, you might remember such an idea from Tobias Buckell, guess who helped him with it) and it's good to see him getting a lot of attention for this paper.

 "In an unofficial experiment, Greenman tested scabbed and unscabbed Parma apples, a high-sugar variety native to southwestern Virginia, and found the scarred apples had a 2 to 5 percent higher sugar content than unmarred apples from the same tree. More sugar means a higher alcohol content once fermented, producing a tastier hard cider." Gods but I love science. Also noted in case someone around you says the tired line of "nobody has ever proven organics are better for you." My guess is it isn't just the anti-oxidants that are more plentiful in organic and scarred fruit.

 The biases shaping the sharing economy. Or AirBnB while black can lead to not getting a room (or a car from Uber, or…).

 White kid in ski mask with fake guns running around a neighborhood, police respond to urgent calls, nobody dies. Why? Well, the police officer said the kid immediately complied with his orders to drop the gun and get on the ground (and the article then goes on to say, "always comply with police orders", thanks). My guess is because "…this took place in a really nice neighborhood", and that had a lot to do with it. Also note, the officer approached on foot, from a distance, not driving up over a curb and over a lawn. Yeah, I think that also helped. You know, like the original officer report in the Tamir Rice case stated they did (which the video shows they absolutely didn't, also note no prosecution for falsifying official reports). (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

 In other Baltimore "kid with a toy gun" news, police shot the boy. He's expected to make it. Which is good, since they arrested his mother because she asked if he would live. Or for some reason.

 A long, but well written article on being caught in the hype. This is very much like working in an art/ad/design studio. You have to have the same mental tricks. "It will be months until I call uncle and quit; it will take almost a year to realize I was gaslighting myself, that I was reading from someone else's script." (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 Not like it'll make a bit of difference but, "'And to all those lawmakers out there who are so obsessed with who's using what bathroom and what plumbing they got downtown: Newsflash — you're the weirdos!' (Stephen) Colbert said."

 "Prosecutors and legal experts were outraged and angered by a recent Oklahoma court ruling that determined state law doesn't criminalize forced oral sex with an unconscious or intoxicated victim… 'There is a recognition that social mores have changed, that the law should now try to protect sexual autonomy as opposed to sexual morality,' (assistant district attorney Benjamin) Fu said." Good thing there weren't any activist judges hearing the case or who knows what kind of dystopia we may be living in.

 Note to Self's podcast on eye in the sky. On technology developed for the war coming home and finding new applications. In this case, a specific development to help stop bombing in Fallujah coming back to the states to help fight crime. A persistent eye in the sky, that the operators can then rollback the video footage to locate vehicles or people and follow them. The camera isn't good enough to make out details at the level it needs to fly at (after all, you're covering whole cities with 1 camera), but that's a technological fix (I remember an article on the cameras used, they are incredibly good, top-end tech, but their resolution is much greater than their processing capability). So, to solve some crimes are you willing to be watched 24/7?

 "Walid Phares, one of Trump's foreign policy advisers, said: 'There will be no details in this speech.'" This just in, water is wet. So, basically, it's just like every other speech the Trumpster has given.

 Sure the Trumpster isn't misogynist, he just thinks Hillary is a little shrill when she shouts. I'm sure at the debates he's going to recommend that she "give us a smile."

 There are a few things I learned serving on council and writing laws that affect my community, in this case indirectly (which is the best way to learn these lessons). Never introduce a law (or amendment) meant to be ironic, sardonic, or sarcastic, always have the commitment behind your actions. Because if you don't, sometimes you get your ass handed to you. In this case, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) though he was being so smart about offering an amendment to have women register for the draft (because he hates the idea of women in combat, see how those go together?). Oh how the people on the committee would see what a ridiculous idea it was to allow women into combat roles. Except that his amendment passed the committee vote (my guess is it won't pass a full house vote). Because when you confuse a straw-man for real people you expose yourself as an ignoramus.

 Tweet of my heart: @HooklandGuide 'The mythic never knows how to be uninterestring.' - C.L. Nolan. #FolkloreThursday

 Double dip: @NateSilver538 Take: Trump invalidated a lot of beliefs held by centrist elites about the GOP base, but validated beliefs held by liberal elites about it.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-78280258357391373562016-04-27T12:23:00.001-04:002016-04-27T12:23:45.987-04:00Linkee-poo prays that there's intelligent life somewhere out in space 'cause there's bugger all down here on EarthKameron Hurley's storified tweets on the hard truths of publishing. "(Failure) And that's OK. You get up. You write another one. Careers can withstand a failure or two. But not many more than that, & you start over"

 I know most of the writing links lately are either Kameron Hurley or grokked from her. The reason for that is she's being open about it, and it's easy to find. I still haven't gotten back into reading my RSS feed (where I have lots of writing sites linked in - yes I do see the irony there). There's just only so many hours in the day. So this is another truth in publishing. I refer to Kameron Hurley because 1) she's good and 2) she's easy for me to find and lots of other people in my feed point to her good stuff when I miss it. There's a lesson in there.

 The benign violation theory of humor. Okay, but I've seen some of those "best home video" shows (before I can find the remote to change the channel), and most of what people laugh at isn't benign at all. Or, as Mel Brooks said it, "Tragedy is when I stub my toe. Comedy is when you fall into an open manhole and die." Plus, there's this thing when you explain a joke.

 "But even with the emphasis on being a tech company, it's still hard to shake that nagging feeling that writers should get paid for their work if advertising is being sold against it… Burns says part of what this $25 million investment is for is to build out the monetization of Odyssey, both for the company itself and for writers." Exposure kills. There's an often repeated piece of writing advice to start writing for radio or "for the love" markets, because the bar to entrance is low and you might get some editing. If you're just starting and can afford to give away your time for free, that might not be a bad way to go. However, those markets typically don't make much money (although radio can). When a market is making money (even if it's still VC), they should pay you. Exposure isn't the same as building a brand/audience. Exposure returns very little. I suggest this path only for those who don't feel they could get all the crappy words out some other way. (Grokked from Kameron Hurley)

 Neil Gaiman responds to a letter on the importance of grammar and what it's really all about. Notice I broke one of the "grammar rules" in that last sentence.

 Heck, the sad/rabid puppies have even made slashdot. I know people are gnashing their teeth again, and there's some consternation about their movement gaining ground, and I might totally be ignorant of all the politics and whom was on their slate, but the list doesn't look all that bad to me (mostly because, as I understand it, the S/RPs chose some popular works and authors this year, some of whom don't necessarily line up with their own politics or claim affiliation, but were chosen to ensure the "we win" argument won't be as hollow as it was last year). Sure, there are people on there who shouldn't be, but isn't there always (at least to some people)? And there are enough "legit" candidates that I don't think the "no award" will be necessary. (Grokked from Dan)

 Science-themed quilts. Makes grabby hands. (Grokked from Annalee Flower Horne)

 Why can't we remember how a bike is constructed? Well, because most people don't engineer bikes (many of them don't even assemble them anymore). Also, this is an example of how your brain takes shorthand for what you see and how the models in our head are more silhouette shapes than technical drawings (requires less storage and processing time). Most people get there are two wheels, a cross frame, handle bars, pedals, and seat, and get the general configuration. People also don't read words by reading the letters, they read words by the shape of the words (more accurately, by the shapes of 2 or 3 words together). (Grokked from Dan)

 The AnBot. China's new riot-control, anti-terrorism robot looks a lot like an egg on wheels, or a smooth Dalek. My guess is it doesn't have jump-jets in the base, so, yeah, stairs are going to be a real problem.

 "The fact that women can get periods in space was once used as an argument that women shouldn't be astronauts. However, we now know that periods don't impair an astronaut's ability." Something I've thought about while world building. Good to know I got it mostly correct. Weightlessness doesn't affect a woman's flow (it's mostly muscular anyway). (Grokked from Warren Ellis)

 New commercial facial recognition technology in Russia makes it easier to harass women. This is my shocked face. (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 What's it like to go down with the ship. Yeah, I've been there. Think I am there now with the day thing, although the market dynamics of the government being your major customer is slightly different. Lots of ideas, lots of tactics, none really focused on giving the customer what they want, how they want it. (Grokked from Ferrett Steinmetz)

 BoingBoing! is giving away 5 years of Adobe Creative Cloud.

 Good news, everybody! "Global emissions have now flattened for a second year in a row, according to a recent report from the International Energy Agency (IEA) in Paris. The finding is both encouraging and plausible, given the astounding changes taking place in how the world uses energy." To read the whole thing you need to be a Prime member, which I'm not. But basically it's mostly China's fault.

 The Junior Doctors in Britain's NHS are striking, and the ruling class is having a shit-fit over it (hell, I'm surprised it hasn't come up in our domestic debate over Obamacare). "I sympathise a little with (Jeremy) Hunt – he was born into military aristocracy, a cousin of the Queen, went to Charterhouse, then Oxford, then into PR: trying to get him to understand the life of an overworked student nurse is like trying to get an Amazonian tree frog to understand the plot of Blade Runner. Hunt doesn't understand the need to pay doctors – he's part of a ruling class that doesn't understand that the desire to cut someone open and rearrange their internal organs can come from a desire to help others, and not just because of insanity caused by hereditary syphilis." For some reason I'm reminded of this skit by Eddie Izzard, "Hello, what do you do? Oh, you're a plumber, what on Earth is that?" (Grokked form Terri Windling)

 So, as politicians and ditto-heads deride Common Core, how's our current educational standards doing? About the same as before. "According to research… just under 40 percent of students score at college and career ready levels on NAEP… While overall results are barely changed, it seems that the nation's struggling students in particular are doing slightly worse than they were two years ago, while higher achievers are doing slightly better." Have I ever mentioned that while professors at colleges hate the level of zero-level courses (aka "remedial") their students have to take, college administrators love them, because most grant programs won't pay for them and students must pony up the cash.

 "Virginia McLaurin, the 107-year-old dynamo who danced with President Obama but couldn't obtain a District photo ID, can get one now, thanks to a new regulation announced Tuesday by Mayor Muriel E. Bowser." Well, at least someone in government knows what their job is (waits for Congress to overrule the new regulation).

 And in another example of Alabama leading this country (down the drain), Oxford, Alabama, passes a law that makes it a crime to use a public restroom assigned to a sex different from that on your birth certificate. Good luck enforcing that one. Well, I guess it'll be easy when the only public restroom left will be that in the town hall or police station. I can't see any way this could be abused or misused by public servants (expects the bathroom channel feed to go live in 3… 2… 1…) (Grokked from Fred Clark)

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-76630590144859560302016-04-26T12:32:00.001-04:002016-04-26T12:32:35.175-04:00Linkee-poo says it's your birthday, it's my birthday tooAnn Leckie on omniscient POV. One POV to rule them all, one POV to bind them, one POV to bring them all and in the darkness bind them. That's a response to how she talks about limited 3rd and a commentary on it's preponderance in SF/F. But limited 3rd is the same advice as "verbs in past tense." There are great examples that break those rules, but much of what you'll read fits into those categories. This is sort of why here in the US we like to read text with serifs (although that's changing) whereas in Europe they like sans serif. Why? It's nothing more than how they've been trained to read and what they read the most of. (Grokked from Cat Rambo)

 Mary Robinette Kowal announce the next Writing Excuses Workshop/Cruise.

 Rampant Islamaphobia, it's not just for mosques or no-fly-lists. In this case several communities are opposing Muslim cemeteries.

 A robot joins an ad agency as an art/creative director. Well, it's about as useful as most ADs I've worked under, which "Its one arm is being programmed to write out briefs in Japanese calligraphy – typical of a creative director to write out directions and leave the rest of the work to younger employees, he says." Copy to fit. Note that it doesn't come up with a creative solution, it's just aggregating aspects of winning campaigns. If you can't do that as a first year junior designer you might need to rethink your career choices.

 You know the Right-to-Life people try to portray themselves as reasonable? In Oklahoma they're about to pass a law that makes it illegal to renew the license of a doctor who performs an abortion. No, these people are not reasonable and they are waging a war against women.

 And the Bundy's legal defense boils down to, "Well, actually…" Sigh. It's one thing to use that argument style on Twitter, Facebook or blogs, but I have a feeling in Federal Court that'll lead to a pretty quick spike by the prosecution. Although it may lead to leniency, after all we try to accommodate for the mentally challenged.

 "Apparently about a third of Americans are sleep-deprived. And their employers are probably paying for it, in the form of mistakes, productivity loss, accidents and increased health insurance costs." I so have all the feels for this.

 So how's that new "proof of citizenship required to vote" initiative going? Seems like everything is going according to plan (which means "badly").

 Remember that 107-year-old grandma who danced with the Obamas? Apparently she's unable to get a replacement photo ID that would allow her to travel (and in some places, vote). (Grokked from TPM)

 And former Sen. Jim Webb places himself off the list of VP potentials. Yes, ignorance and racism aren't really confined to one party, it's just a preponderance.

 So, Tom Delay (among others) thinks the court should be lenient on Denny Hastert because "he's a good guy." You know, except for those times he sexually abused boys in his charge (note here there are more allegations than the several people who he has paid hush money to, like setting up a chair to watch the boys shower and pee). You remember Tom Delay, he's the former House GOP Leader who was found guilty of money laundering to avoid campaign finance rules (later his conviction was overturned by the Texas Supreme Court, that bastion of non-partisan legal jurisprudence). Ah, the company you keep.

 Dr. Carson says, "Let us not disgrace Harriet Tubman by symbolically linking her with a nearly bankrupt instrument of slavery and debt." Just how mind-fucked do you need to be to think these thoughts?

 Opps. So, after publicly declaring that Cruz should take Indiana and Kasich will take New Mexico and Oregon, in Oregon the state sent out a pamphlet for voters that "includes Kasich's name among the 2016 GOP hopefuls in the table of contents but notes he chose not to submit a statement." And these people want to run our country. That's just fucking brilliant.

 Tweet of my heart: @DelilahSDawson Querying writers, a reminder: No matter how great your query and story, that literary agent is gonna Google you. So don't be a shitlord.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-64908390918865759562016-04-25T12:18:00.000-04:002016-04-25T12:18:18.585-04:00Linkee-poo and Mrs Jones, Mrs JonesWhat makes a good writing day. With pictures of loverly writing places.

 The stories we tell ourselves. On the meta-narrative, literary study, and the way stories have worked and changed within the culture. (Grokked from Ellen Kushner, I think)

 Quotes from the Arthur C Clarke Award Judges as they developed the short list. (Grokked from Sarah Goslee)

 A map of world mythologies. (Grokked from Christopher Cornell)

 Unscrupulous fucks are gaming the Amazon Kindle Unlimited game? Shocked, shocked I am to find out gambling is going on here. Buy my book to find out how shocked I am. Although I now have a new favorite term, "Crapflooding scammers". (Grokked from Mur Lafferty)

 Twenty-five smiling animals. (Grokked from Jim Hines)

 Researchers accidentally discover how to make rechargeable batteries last 400 times longer. The major questions are, will this work with other conductors than gold nanotubes (which are boku expensive) and can they make it into a production friendly process. (Grokked from John)

 "Rocks on the surface of Mars have yielded the best clue yet that the planet once had an atmosphere rich in oxygen." Or, why we go there. Oh, and yes, that's more evidence that Mars once hosted life.

 On the well-labeled hotel. Oh my yes. You can call it UI (user interface), or wayfinding (a designer term), but whatever you call it if your executive team can't walk into a hotel room and figure out the lighting scheme with the switches available, how the faucets work, how the tub works, how to plug something in on the table next to the beds (and think of having room for wallwart plugs, not just thin two prong plugs), how to adjust the heating/cooling without a briefing, then you need to change it. If your kid can't figure out where your checkin desk is, where the bathrooms are, and where the pool is without you walking them there, you need to change your layout. Seriously people, stop pissing off your guests. Oh, and maybe have a weekly or monthly check to make sure everything is working well. (Grokked from Neil Gaiman)

 "But the ad omits something that most consumers would like to know: There are many older and cheaper treatments that are just as effective." Why consumer advertising for drugs is a really bad idea. But that genie is out of the bottle. So here is a proposal to mandate actual data be given to patients so they can effectively and realistically understand the potential benefits. Yeah, doubt that's going to happen either. "Drug companies have little incentive to make these comparisons. Why? Because a vast majority of 'new' drugs are really not new at all; instead, they are minor tweaks and modifications of older drugs, and therefore unlikely to substantially outperform them." Just keep that part in mind when Pharma rolls out the aging argument of "how costly it is to bring a new treatment to market." Not so much.

 In what I'm sure will be the next case of "Christian Persecution" in the US, the scam of Pastoral Medicine credentials. Well, I guess if they have a Bible on their desk that makes it all okay.

 In what had been a poorly held secret, the concrete "sarcophagus" over Chernobyl Reactor 4 is deteriorating. It was, after all, hastily thrown up by Soviet Era engineers who had no time to actually design the thing let alone oversee construction. The new hull/superstructure that will go over it is almost ready to be shipped. If the sarcophagus fails before it's covered, the resulting release of radioactive dust is estimated to be 3x that of the original explosion (which was mostly directed upward). When it fails under the new superstructure, it's hoped that the vast majority of dust and debris will be contained and any leaks will only recontaminate the local area (which is already off limits). (Grokked from Astrid Julian)

 "The death of a (Flint) Water Treatment Plant foreman, who was found dead at his home on April 16 by a friend who went to visit him, comes amid charges against three men involved in the city's water crisis." Bodies are piling up. (Grokked from Jim Wright)

 Turns out there might be a drug connection on those 8 people shot in Ohio. Yeah, I'm shocked. Not.

 So, could you meet an unexpected $400 bill? On what is middle-class, and how most of us aren't in it (even if we think we are).

 And on that note, "This idea, that sprinkling more dollars over troubled schools won't magically improve test scores or graduation rates, is a common refrain among many politicians, activists and experts. And they have research to back it up." Or, rich people don't think spending more money on poor people is really going to help and because schools aren't able to instantly turn around their districts with more money, well, that's a reason to say the experiment is a failure. Not how real life works. Education is a generational issue. If you want to see if more money will help, you need to fund schools for at least 2 classes (k-12, which would mean 26 years) before making that conclusion. Also, just because one school district spends more per student than the next doesn't mean the money is going to the same place. Such as, in richer districts, most students won't need subsidized meals, where as in poorer districts more students would need those meals (and might need more than just lunch during the week). Want another example? Okay, a local school district in my area raises money to send their kids to Mock UN and other events. At the school where I live, we raise money to buy kids underwear. And we suffer from the problem the NC schools in the article do, because our kids are considered "poor country kids" our school really doesn't challenge them to be better.

 In the not-to-distant past, governments would give (or heavily subsidize the production of) bread to its citizen, forming the first half of the "Bread and Circuses" form of distracting people from their crushing poverty. So it's really not all that much of a stretch to just give people money. In this case they're calling it a "universal basic income." The Swiss are about to vote on a referendum on a domestic plan, and there is a plan to experiment with this in Africa (to see what really would happen if you had a long-term plan in place). So basically you'd roll back most other social welfare programs and give everyone a similar amount of money (regardless of income or employment status). It really isn't against our values as Americans (except for the legacy of Reagan, which continues to screw us over even 4 decades removed). And we already have a form of it in the Earned Income Tax Tax Credit. And while it would be political suicide to try it now in the US, this would actually be a "rising tide that lifts all boats," just not a "market solutions" based one. It's also a way to solve the problem of what do we do when all our jobs are taken by robots. (Grokked from Hannah Bowman)

 Even Chris Wallace see that the various bathroom bills "seems to be a solution in search of a problem."

 The Cruz campaign tries to relaunch their candidate as human. Good luck with that.

 So, that Trump aid that let the GOP elite know that Trump would be changing… he's now backpedaling as fast as he can. Kinda hard to take his words out of context when we have the tape. I think what he meant to say was that wasn't for general consumption. Because the Trumpster hasn't sown up the nomination, yet.

 Well someone finally pays the price for disenfranchising voters and intentionally making the voting process confusing. Unfortunately it's in Brooklyn, NY and not in the many Southern States who have done similar things.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-90769652696643449842016-04-22T12:36:00.002-04:002016-04-22T14:39:49.711-04:00Linkee-poo, so when u call up that shrink in Beverly Hills, u know the one, Dr Everything'll-Be-AlrightI've tried to tell my wife this, mosquitoes really are more attracted to some people. It's my sweet, New Jersey blood they're homing in on. (Grokked from George Takei)

 The NIH is refocusing on patient safety. In the past year several research programs were halted (including, I believe, the research program Jay Lake was involved in), not because they weren't producing promising results, but because safety and sanitary protocols were being skipped or overlooked in the rush to bring in the results and data. This is what happens when sterilization is considered someone else's problem (often relegated to a career officer who isn't involved in the "sexy" research). In health care, keeping the patient safe if everyone's job. As a Rad Tech, I am constantly cleaning equipment and washing my hands and we all know it's not enough. One of our fears is to have an infection traced back to us (which when patients get sick in the hospital, yes they do investigate to find out where the protocols broke down).

 How the Em Drive may actually work. "At very small accelerations, the wavelengths become so large they can no longer fit in the observable universe. When this happens, inertia can take only certain whole-wavelength values and so jumps from one value to the next. In other words, inertia must quantized at small accelerations… McCulloch's theory could help to change (scientist being wary against trusting things they don't have a plausible explanation for), although it is hardly a mainstream idea. It makes two challenging assumptions. The first is that photons have inertial mass. The second is that the speed of light must change within the cavity." I, uh, fuck my brain hurts. (Grokked from Dan)

 The woman leading the lawsuit over lead in Flint's water is found shot to death in her home. I really want this to not be about what that connection makes it appear to be about. Well, really I want the women to be alive. But that kind of coincidence raises the hackles, if you know what I mean.

 Suicide rates are on the rise in the US. Especially among girls between 10 and 14. In most of my shifts at the hospital we have at least 1 bed taken by someone who either tried or checked in before attempting suicide. One night we had 4. It is still my belief that a great many of the overdose cases we see are not accidental, although we don't list them as suicides.

 As it will come up sometime this year (because it always does in an election year), when your conservative friends talk about how the ACLU is a tool of the left, ask them why, then, are they defending a man who is being fined for flying Trump-Make America Great Again flags? Some might have a convoluted conspiracy theory set up, but most won't even believe you.

 Western NY wants to be like Southern California. "The study's authors say the mild temperatures might be one reason some people aren't so worried about climate change." Here in the US, out Summer temps haven't gotten too hot (for the most part, note, offer may not be valid for the south which has been hit by heat wave after heat wave), and it's mostly the Winters which have become "milder." People think this is a good thing because they aren't seeing the hit in food prices that are coming, nor are they seeing a connection to their water quality from lower snowpack levels. It'll catch up to us, don't worry. Unfortunately then it will be too late. There is no Command-Z for climate.

 "During a talk at a Greenville Spartanburg Republican Women meeting April 7, Wright called the NAACP and Ku Klux Klan racist groups. He was responding to a question about the Ferguson, Mo., officer-involved shooting." I blame it mostly on white ignorance of what racism really is. That is, on it's basic level both groups have a racial focus, it's just ignorance to believe a group dedicated to expanding freedoms and opportunities from a privileged class to others is equal to an organization that is dedicated to keeping other races repressed to continue their own unearned privilege. It's not the sheriff's only example of ignorance in that article. (Grokked from TPM)

 National Security Letters, now less harmful to your Constitutional rights. Because after three years, the FBI is supposed to review the case and see if you can be told that the government was interested in your data. Maybe. If it no longer matters. (Grokked from John)

 On the Trumpster campaign, "In a recording of the meeting with Republican National Committee members obtained by AP, senior Trump aide Paul Manafort said Trump would start to reveal 'the real person' behind his outlandish stage presence… While some committee officials welcomed the revelation, others said it raised concerns about Trump's authenticity as a candidate, AP reported." You know, these new politicians are really bad at their jobs. This is Trump's "etch-a-sketch" line. Yes, we all expected a "shift to the center" and this "leak" is intended to signal to everybody who thinks the Trump Campaign is a dumpster fire that it's all been an act, and the Real Trump will be coming out now. So, let me put this bluntly, either he lied then, or he will lie now, but in any case he will be lying to get votes. To the Trumpster's base who wanted someone who will "shake everything up," you're about to be taken for a ride, again. Just like you've been taken for a ride since Reagan. And to the other people who may be swayed by this new face, I want you to compare this to everything you know about Trump since he entered the public stage in the late 70s, including his stint as a reality TV show host. And then think, this is just another mask he's putting on. No, the Trumpster really is like what he's been portraying himself as these past nine months. He's a mook, he just had a lot of money from Daddy. He is the self-centered supremacist that he's come off as.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-87912399727355100692016-04-21T12:31:00.005-04:002016-04-21T12:31:45.075-04:00Linkee-poo your eyes are blue like the heavens above, talk to me darlin' with a message of loveThere is news that Dr. Phil (the real one) Kaldon has passed. I'm kinda in shock. His health wasn't good lately but it looked like he was getting through it. Dr. Phil made it to the Writer's of the Future anthology oh which he was very proud. And his short story in Apex and Abyss, Hail to the Victors. I always expected to see him again. He was an exceptionally kind and supportive person, always generous. I'm going to miss him.

 So, Harriet Tubman on the $20. S'okay. Stands by for the battle of the documentaries (can't wait to see how people justify Andy Jackson's legacy). They have always fought.

 Celebrating the change of seasons in the UK. (Grokked from Ellen Kushner)

 The tradition of the hobby-horse. Note, correct for many definitions of "horse". (Grokked from Terri Windling)

 NASA live feed from the ISS goes down as horseshoe-shaped UFO appears. Um, yeah, Bob. (Grokked from John)

 Somebody going to emergency. Somebody's going to jail. "Three people — two officials with the state Department of Environmental Quality and a water official from Flint — are facing criminal charges as a result of an investigation into the lead-contaminated water case in Flint."

 What do conservatives do when the magical rabbit doesn't appear after they enact their agenda? Why, they say it wasn't their's after all, and cut and run. In Kansas, in the face of a crumbling economy and plunging state revenues after Gov. Brownback pushes through his tax cuts for the rich, the Republican run legislature (that helped pass the tax cuts in the first place) says it's all the governors fault and he needs to figure out how to pay for the government because they're not going to cut the budget one iota. Also note what they've cut so far; education, payments for pensions (say, how do these pensions get underfunded in the first place?), and moving money for infrastructure repairs to other departments. Because all of those always work out well in the end (with stupid citizens who can't compete in the world market, having to "cut" pensions after people have retired throwing them into poverty after breaking your promises, and crumbling roads and bridges). And how have they tried to fill the budget chasm? They raised the sales and cigarette tax, which disproportionately affects the poor.

 Because more guns are always better. Man is shot while videoing people using illegal firing range.

 Suicides in Greenland and the communities, friends, and government's attempts to help.

 The Hidden Brain podcast on Losing Alaska (why humans have difficulty accepting climate change).

 Remember the San Bernardino iPhone that the FBI just had to get into? Turns out there wasn't any there there. (Grokked from Xeni)

 Yougov.com poll shows "over of quarter of under-30s enjoy riling people up online." Damn millennials. Why in my day we'd just piss off our parents. But I guess when you live in their basement, that's not a winning strategy. (Did I make BINGO for someone?) (Grokked from John Scalzi)

 "Ricky Diaz, a spokesman for (NC Gov.) McCrory's gubernatorial campaign, wrote in a statement obtained by The Carolina Mercury that 'it is the height of hypocrisy for these Hollywood elitists to deny their service to customers over a political disagreement.'" I'm confused. Isn't there a law in NC that says if you have a deeply held conviction against providing services to certain people that you are allowed to?

 "The consequence was a shift in liberalism's center of intellectual gravity. A movement once fleshed out in union halls and little magazines shifted into universities and major press, from the center of the country to its cities and elite enclaves. Minority voters remained, but bereft of the material and social capital required to dominate elite decision-making, they were largely excluded from an agenda driven by the new Democratic core: the educated, the coastal, and the professional." On the smug liberal ideology. Not sure I entirely agree, but I can see their point. What I think is mostly their point is that political discourse in this country has gone from standing up and mobilizing people to solve problems to the hashtag culture and pithy memes shared on Facebook that only are seen by the like minded. And with that I agree, even as I am a willing participant in it. But there is a difference between writing an open letter and going to a politician's office or stump speech and shout back or try to make the reasoned argument to the other side. In the hyper-polarized field we find ourselves on, taunting becomes our only option. And I will agree the Democratic Party has gone from the more productive "This is out position, this is why it's our position, and this is what we propose to do about it" to "you agree with us, right?" And in that rarified atmosphere of assumptions, our political body is dying from asphyxiation. But there is a part of this article that is based on "blaming the victim." Some of this is a direct response to the politics of Newt Gingrich and the GOPAC memo and Frank Luntz which forced Democrats into the defensive posture they've been in since the mid 90s. However, "The wages of smug is Trump," and that should send alarm bells ringing through the DNC. (Grokked from Ferrett Steinmetz)

 "Donald Trump Jr. gave a scathing critique of the Republican presidential nominating process and the way delegates are assigned in a radio interview Monday, at one point comparing it to living in 'communist China.'" And that is really all you need to know to grasp the modern conservative mindset.

 "Ohio Gov. John Kasich, normally known for his even-keeled demeanor, lost his temper Saturday when asked how he could keep saying he could win against Democrat Hillary Clinton if he's only won his home state's primary… The governor then snatched the reporter's voice recorder out of his hand to ask 'What do you think?'" See, he can only keep up the pretense for so long, as we in Ohio know all to well.

 "(Rep. Pete) King said… 'I think I'll take cyanide if (Cruz) got the nomination. I think you'll see Donald Trump scoring a big victory tonight. I did not endorse Donald Trump.'" Is there a charity set up to help this poor man get cyanide. I'll support it.

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-7826645228903248512016-04-19T12:36:00.002-04:002016-04-19T12:36:52.845-04:00Linkee-poo, it ain't me, it ain't me; I ain't no fortunate one, no"The Authors Guild has been trying to get a court to shut down Google's book-scanning/book-search program for more than a decade… Today, the Supreme Court settled the question forever, by declining to hear the Authors Guild's appeal." Google Books is here to stay.

 "In keeping with its ambition to become the world's most open institution of its kind, the British Library has released over a million public domain illustrations and other images to the public through Flickr for anyone to reuse, remix or repurpose." I'll be in my bunk. (Grokked from Ellen Kushner)

 There are two ways to respond when you're internet/crowd-sourcing naming event goes awry. The first is to graciously accept you were an idiot for even opening it up to the internet and accept your fate, and then there is the wrong way. So, no HMS Boaty McBoatface, eh? Well people will still call her that. Well I guess you could always call it the HMS Stephen Colbert.

 It's easy, once you know how. "Human skin may be the ultimate multitasker… It's no wonder, then, that it's been tricky and expensive for scientists to create a direct analog for the stuff… But those scientists weren't Muhammad Mustafa Hussain (who's) team just developed a dirt-cheap 'smart skin' that can multitask like the real thing, and they did it with household goods, such as Post-It notes, aluminum foil and tape." Note, while the "skin" is inexpensive there's no cost of what it would be to hook it up to the neural system or provide a processor for robotics. (Grokked from John)

 Ohio man shoots up own home, jumps out second story window to run to neighbors to call 911. All because he thought there were burglars in his home. I'm sure the pot and other drug paraphernalia had nothing to do with it. Wow, Warren is just down the road. And, yeah, this doesn't surprise me at all. (Grokked from Kameron Hurley)

 Why did the FAA take so long to come up with rules for commercial drones and why are they so restrictive? "British police are investigating what could be the first known case of a drone colliding with a passenger aircraft, after a pilot told authorities that he believed his jet hit a drone as it flew into Heathrow Airport from Geneva Sunday." Yeah, that's why.

 Solar roadways get a little more closer to real. (Grokked from John)

 In case you doubted that McDonald's wants to kill you, but take your money first, a new store in Missouri is about to offer "endless fries" (as well as major customization on the sandwiches). (Grokked from John)

 Tennessee lawmaker realizes that her "bathroom bill" would be disastrous, but can't come to tell her constituents that they're wrong. So they punt and say they'll introduce the legislation later. You know, like after the elections. Because they think the uproar will go away then.

 "Rep. Steve King (R-IA) scolded pro-immigration activists on Monday for yelling over him as he spoke outside of the Supreme Court Building, asking them if they were 'an example of the America we can expect' if the high court accepts President Obama's executive actions immigration." Or in other words, "Gee, why won't these people I've railed against using my megaphone be quiet so I can continue to rail against them?" Fuck you, Rep. Steve King.

 Donald Trump supporters take their little-red ball and go home. Or in this case, storm out of a party meeting in Georgia where most of the delegates up for grabs went to Cruz (even though the Trumpster won most of the delegates available in the primary election) and on the way out they grabbed the American Flag. Oh, it's going to be a fun summer in Cleveland.

 "Live-streaming of alleged rape shows challenges of flagging video in real time." One, he was 29, she was 17 and can be heard saying "no, stop", I think we can dispense with the "alleged" part here. Two, no, that's not the real lesson we should take from this. Instead we should look at just how broken our society really is in that rape is so accepted that it's become part of our lives and that the disfunctionality on display here is normal, when it shouldn't be.

 "Fox Business host Stuart Varney on Thursday blasted what he called the 'Yes Means Yes movement,' because it meant that men could be accused of assault if they touched women without permission." In other news, misogynistic old men are misogynistic. And yes, men, even to hold a woman's hand you should probably get some buy-in from the woman first. (Grokked from Emma Audsley)

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-61456622505116292252016-04-19T10:06:00.000-04:002016-04-19T10:06:06.087-04:00Story BoneYou wore me like a knife.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-27692461904082458122016-04-18T12:28:00.001-04:002016-04-18T12:28:32.481-04:00Linkee-poo works in the grocery store, saving his pennies for some dayPro writers respond with the three things that helped them become writers. Besides "skill." Note the commonalities. (Grokked from John Scalzi)

 "And there are two hypotheses to why notetaking is beneficial in the first place. The first idea is called the encoding hypothesis, which says that when a person is taking notes, 'the processing that occurs' will improve 'learning and retention.' The second, called the external-storage hypothesis, is that you learn by being able to look back at your notes, or even the notes of other people." A good look at why taking notes by hand is more beneficial than typing notes. What is missed is that typing notes doesn't provide an extra avenue to learning, whereas physically forming the words by writing (drawing the letters) you create an additional path to that knowledge. You have a physical memory of writing and when you read your notes, you refresh all of those memories.

 "The international Cassini spacecraft has detected the faint but distinct signature of dust coming from outside our Solar System." Bwa?! Damnit, it's not like I don't have enough to vacuum already. (Grokked from Steven Gould)

 Want to know how little we really understand about our food and our bodies? "A new study finds the the dairy fats found in milk, yogurt and cheese may help protect against Type 2 diabetes… And there's some evidence that dairy fat may help adults manage weight as well." And then they go on to say "Researchers can't fully explain these counter-intuitive findings." That's because we think we know things that we really don't. Our relationship with food is quite complex, but we have only a simplest understanding of it. We think we understand calories; carbs, fats and proteins, but there's a whole lot more to food that those (of which we lump most of rest in "flavonoids"). This is one of the reasons I'm highly suspicious of GMO foods. We really don't know how food works, but we're going to mess with it (note famous blunders like the introduction of corn to the European market or the more recent eggs and cholesterol research).

 Sure, we don't need the Voting Rights Act to make sure that minority and low-income voters aren't disenfranchised. Because that would never happen.

 "The legislation currently under consideration in the Republican-led Senate would cut in half a monthly housing allowance for veterans' children who attend college on their parents' GI bill." Fuckers. Pointed to just in case you believe the line about conservatives loving our soldiers.

 Why school funding in this country is so screwed up. The short answer is we rely on local property taxes. So look at the first part of that story, one system spends $9,794 per student and the other $28,639, the national average is $11,841.What that means is more schools are spending closer to that bottom figure than those who are spending at the top. Conservatives call the deficit immoral because we're burdening our progeny with our debt, but what we're actually doing to the next generation is way worse. We aren't giving them the tools to actually succeed.

 Part of the reason China claims most of the South China Sea, fishing rights.

 "The ability to intercept (anyone's) cellphone calls through the SS7 network is an open secret among the world's intelligence agencies — including ours — and they don't necessarily want that hole plugged." Your government at work. (Grokked from Dan)

 "The Pentagon misled Congress with inaccurate and vague information about sexual assault cases that portrayed civilian law enforcement officials as less willing than military commanders to punish sex offenders, an Associated Press investigation found." This is my shocked face.

 What will be very interesting for this election cycle, is there has never been contested political convention in the age of the internet, 24/7 news cycle, and social media. So what had been back (smoke filled) room maneuvering is now out in the open. I wonder what this will do to those machinations.

 "This isn't some back-in-the-day, old-folks-exaggerating type of story… the marsh of Louisiana's fragile coast is disappearing at a mind-blowing rate… A football field of land, on average, falls into the Gulf each hour." I'm sure it'll be okay. "Shortsighted government officials have strangled the Mississippi River with so many dams and levees that it doesn't deliver the soil that's needed to rebuild the marshes… Oil and gas canals and pipelines, meanwhile, have carved up what's left of the marsh… And global warming is delivering the knockout punch… Because as the marsh crumbles, the seas also are rising." I know, let's dredge up sand and rebuild, because that'll work. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 Just in case you don't think Ted Cruz is a delusional whackaloon, he thinks he's have a productive relationship with Congress. You know, the place where people hate him. As in gone on TV shows to say how much they hate him. "Just four of Cruz's colleagues in the Senate have endorsed his presidential bid, including Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who once joked that the Texas senator could be killed on the floor of the Senate and nobody would be convicted." That place.

 Reading the tea leaves on the electorate. And as an added spice, some consternation for what it means in the general. Note that almost any polling at this point means actually diddly for the general election.

 NC Gov. Pat McCrory is confused and bewildered by this late 20th century life he finds himself living in. See, it wasn't the NC State Law that stripped protections from LGBT people that was bad, it was the city of Charlotte that passed a law that would enforce protections for them that was in the wrong. Also the "Human Rights Campaign" isn't playing fair. "'They are putting on a lot of pressure, instead of having good dialogue,' McCrory said." Dear Gov. McCrory, you're an idiot and an asshole. I feel sorry for the people who live in NC who will suffer the economic ramifications of your ignorant and homophobic ideology. The South is about to be left behind, again.

 The House GOP is going to come up with their Obamacare replacement Any Time Now. "'Give us a little time, another month or so,' House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI) told reporters…" Yeah, Fred, sure. You take as long as you need to. In the mean time, we have a working solution. It would be nice if you all were adult and we could fix some of the problems with it, but you keep puttering in your shed. I'm sure you'll get it done. Sometime. Maybe.

 Dear Texas, just fucking go, already. You're like the libertarians always threatening to "Go Gault." Just do it. You're a drain on the national economy, and other states would love to have your military bases and wouldn't freak about Jade Helm. Just go. What would happen if they succeeded from the Union, and the rest of us just didn't care enough to try and bring them back in?

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-71378347875640214442016-04-17T12:31:00.001-04:002016-04-17T12:31:10.619-04:00Linkee-poo will promise you more than the Garden of Eden, then she'll carelessly cut you and laugh while you're bleedingAncient mass grave of 80 men, most with their hands bound in irons, uncovered in Athens. (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 So don't become some background noise, a backdrop for the girls and boys who just don't know, or just don't care, and just complain when you're not there. You had your time, you had the power. You've yet to have your finest hour. Radio. iHeartRadio is circling the drain, CBS Radio is already in it, and Cumulus could also be headed down. I'm sure over-saturation with little differentiation (in my market, there are 3 stations that are within a 10 minute rotation of each other, so if I like a song, I can tune to the next station and hear it again). Also there is very little local market appeal (like there used to be). Much of commercial radio is programmed out of central offices while sharing talent and syndicating many shows that fill the hours. (Insert Old Man Rambling here) When I was a kid, you could call the station (local call) and talk with the DJ that was spinning the records you were listening to. I'm also sure that the business practice of leveraging the shit out of your company to reward the stakeholders (instead of building the product) wasn't involved here. Not at all. (Grokked from Dan)

 "For the sixth month in a row, we've had a month that has broken the global high temperature record. And not just broken it, but shattered it, blasting through it like the previous record wasn't even there." I'm sure it'll be fine. Welcome to the hockey stick. (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 "Researchers have found a 'striking' new side effect from eating fast food… A few hours after publication, (the researcher) called to say that in reading her quote she felt… 'alarming' was too strong a word… Rather, she said 'striking' was more appropriate, because it conveys the magnitude of the findings without assigning a sense of urgency." And that's part of the problem. Also note, it's not just "fast food" by "highly processed food". (Grokked from Chuck Wendig)

 "County officials across Mississippi are warning of job losses and deep deficits as local jails are being deprived of the state inmates needed to keep them afloat. The culprit, say local officials, is state government and private prisons, which are looking to boost their own revenue as sentencing and drug-policy reforms are sending fewer bodies into the correctional system." Hey, maybe this whole "privatize prisons" idea wasn't so hot after all. That and pushing responsibilities for state function down to the local level, yeah, that might not have been so wise either. Say, what is it called when someone derives an economic benefit off the backs of laborers in chains? (Grokked from Mur Lafferty)

 "Sarah Palin went on a bizarre tear against Bill Nye's qualifications to speak about climate change during an event Thursday on Capitol Hill, claiming that Nye 'is as much a scientist as I am.'" I googled "Dunning-Kruger" and it just came back with pictures of Sarah Palin. (Grokked from John Scalzi)

 "Because that terrible future doesn't ask one damned thing of us today." Jim Wright on optimism and selling our future for meager scraps.

 SETI "Wow" signal may have an explanation. Hydrogen gas surrounding periodic comets. Yeah, that sounds a little "light from Venus refracted through swamp gas" to me, but it could be an explanation. (Grokked from Dan)

 Neo-liberalism is blamed for all our ills in this Guardian article sounds an awful lot like Conservatism mixed with Libertarianism. But note the term was coined before the flip in political ideology (which, if you've argued on the internet before, you will note many people arguing the conservative ideology will say, "but the original definition of (the word) means (the exact opposite of what it does now)"). (Grokked from Robert J Bennet)

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-59817607057502909522016-04-15T12:13:00.001-04:002016-04-15T12:13:20.583-04:00Linkee-poo wears my sunglasses at night so I can keep track of the visions in my eyesTerri Windling on how every illness is narrative.

 The 2016 Book Publishing Paths. I haven't had time to thoroughly read this, yet. But it might be good for you. (Grokked from Hannah Bowman)

 Need some help with your book? Saladin Ahmed has some open critiquing slots.

 Calling Dr. Langdon, the Vatican is digitizing their library. I'll be in my bunk. The Vatican wants you to know they're using cookies? Um, okay? That's going to make confession a little more interesting. And they have a pretty obnoxious watermarking scheme. They also seem to think everyone uses a laptop. So, you can take the Vatican out of the 14th Century… (Grokked from Saladin Ahmed)

 A Consumer Reports article on making sure your 401k is working for you. Because I had a discussion last night we people at the hospital. Know the fees your funds are charging you, just a little difference could mount up quickly robbing you of a good retirement.

 "This is a story we are all being fed. A story about overalls, rich soil and John Deere tractors scattering broods of busy chickens. A story about healthy animals living happy lives, heirloom tomatoes hanging heavy and earnest artisans rolling wheels of cheese into aging caves nearby… More often than not, those things are fairy tales." Farm-to-table restaurants are selling a fiction. In fact, most of what you think about food product is probably incorrect as well. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 Solar Impulse 2 is about to resume its flight around the world using only solar energy.

 Think you're having a bad day? Did you accidentally reply all when making a snarky comment to a friend? Did you forget to backup before removing files? Okay, take heart, at least you didn't delete your entire company's data (web hosting, so it deleted all 1000+ client's websites), including backups, with one line of code. (Grokked from John)

 "Researchers have long known that there are rare people who stay healthy despite profound genetic defects. Friend and his colleagues decided to systematically identify such individuals." Is that you, Professor X?

 As I've said, it's like a pogrom. (Yes, I've been spelling it wrong before this, I is a righter)

 Jim Wright's 12th installment of Bang, Bang, Crazy (wherein I'm tangentially name checked). Sometime when I see Jim has a live one on the end of a twitter line, I like to jump in. He usually attracts the best trollage. It's a bad habit, I admit it. This guy was a wet noodle that if there were a national database as he proposed (and then backed away from when Jim made it more real for him), I'd have reported him to it.

 Trump's campaign manager won't be prosecuted for battery. An article that shows much of what is wrong in the system and how perceptions leave us in a world of make-believe. First, just because he won't be prosecuted doesn't mean he's innocent. Also, violence against women is often accepted in our culture (she had visible bruising on her arm but the prosecutors don't believe he meant it to be "caustic" touch).

 "In a Friday morning memo, the Republican National Committee reminded the presidential candidates that the rules for the presidential primary and delegate selection were set in October." :: cough :: Rule 40 :: cough :: Plus there is some delicious irony in the RNC having consternation about "voters" (delegates) for their national convention considering all the work they've done to disenfranchise potential Democratic voters over the last 8 years. I say we make them show ID.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-9036127154638918512016-04-14T12:38:00.002-04:002016-04-14T12:50:24.932-04:00Linkee-poo, everybody got to elevate from the norm, everybody got to deviate from the normWilliam S Burrough's lectures on creative reading and writing. (Grokked from Mrs Tadd)

 Inky makes a break for it. No word if the octopus took Nemo with him.

 Not all financial literacy education is effective. Oh my, yes.

 In the UK, solar begins to surpass coal for electrical production. As the article states, it's largely symbolic as both supply less than 10% of the UK's electrical load, but interesting none the less. (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 And today is misogyny, "One of Harvard University's 'final clubs'—an undergraduate secret society—has broken a 225-year public silence to argue that admitting female members would likely increase sexual assaults." Well, that's one reason to ban the fuckers. (Grokked from John Scalzi)

 The stories we tell ourselves. In this case, the story China has been telling itself for almost a hundred-years about the South Chinese Sea. Note, China sees most of SE Asia as traditionally parts of China.

 Okay, everybody, let's not freak the fuck out here. "The incident began Monday with a pair of Russian Su-24 planes making 20 close passes over the Cook, coming as close as 1,000 yards at an altitude of about 100 feet, according to a U.S. defense official." The captain and crew of the USS Donald Cook kept their heads (as naval people tend to do) and attempted to contact the aircraft (in total 4 Su-24 Fencers and one heavy helicopter) to warn them off. While the aircraft came closer than normal, this used to be old hat during the Cold War. It's a way for Russia to say it didn't like us conducting flight operations 70 nautical miles off Kaliningrad (home of Russia's Baltic Fleet). So, yes they were close, but so were we (even if it's international waters). There are many problems here, though. What if one of the Russian pilots misjudges distance or course of the ship and clips it? What if one of our people lose their cool and illuminate the Russian craft with targeting radar? While weapon's systems have a lot of safeties built in to prevent accidental firings, they're also designed to be easy to intentionally fire.

 Missouri is up next in the "we've got to protect religious freedom to deny rights to teh gays" bill parade (see, I told you it was a progrom that has a severe successions vibe). Sixty businesses join together to oppose that law. See, unlike Mississippi, Missouri has businesses that can apply economic force.

 How much and just whom is helping developing countries more? "Developing countries got $131 billion in official aid in 2015… And they got $431.6 billion in remittances — money sent home by migrants who are working abroad." And now you know why xenophobic politicians like the Trumpster say they're going to stop that. Because they haven't a clue as to real economics and don't give a shit about anyone else.

 And proving the adage that "Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one", an Ohio newspaper publisher of local news says they won't print anything about LGBT people. That's special.

 URL shorteners can enable brute force hacking into cloud servers (and since we're storing more in the cloud, and that info is often synced to your computers, that's a problem).

 "A German train dispatcher was playing a game on his cell phone shortly before he misdirected two trains, causing a head-on collision that killed 11 people, according to prosecutors." I'll bet it was SmashBrothers. Too soon? Okay, so it's a little bit of correlation not equaling causality, so I suggest a test. Here, you play this game while we hold a trial on if we should send you to prison.

 "The sensation that the boundaries between yourself and the world around you are erasing correlates to changes in brain connectivity while on LSD… Scientists gave 15 volunteers either a drop of acid or a placebo and slid them into an MRI scanner to monitor brain activity." Because inside an MRI is exactly where you want to be while tripping. One of the effects is like an artificial synesthesia.

 First Dose: "Now, Jeremy Durham, a Republican legislator from Tennessee who advocated for one of those anti-trans bathroom bills, has been dubbed a 'continuing risk to unsuspecting women' by the state's Attorney General Herbert Slatery." Because "(a)n investigation found that Durham had acted inappropriately toward several women who work in the State Capitol to the point where they don't feel safe in his presence." (Grokked from Cherie Priest)

 Second Dose: Speaker Paul Ryan, former Chairman of the House Budget Committee, having come into office on the heels of a two-year budget deal negotiated by Speaker Boehner, having criticized Democrats for not producing a Budget during the end of the Bush Administration, is now fast approaching the statutory deadline for approving a Budget without an ability to get one onto the floor for a vote.

 Between the two of those, I think I have irony poisoning.

 I'ma just going to leave this here, Periods for Pence. (Grokked from BoingBoing)

 The University of California, Davis paid Nevins & Associates and ID Media Partners $175,000 to help scrub internet mentions of a campus cop pepper-spraying student protesters as they were staging a peaceful sit-in. So, how did that work out?

 Guns don't kill people… oh yeah? "Police said the woman was standing by the vending machine and dropped her purse. The gun went off and a bullet hit the vending machine. The bullet bounced off the machine and grazed her daughter in the right side of her face." Okay, so the kid wasn't killed, but it could have gone so much worse.

 The Trumpster is promising to bring back Joe Paterno. It's either the statue removed from Penn State's stadium after his involvement in the Jerry Sandusky child-sexual-abuse case was fully known, or he's talking about a Zombie Joe Paterno. That whole thing can pretty well sum up the Trumpster appeal.

 Tweet of my heart: @ietyler America doesn't have a problem with being too lenient to rich white folks, it has a problem with brutalizing and dehumanizing everyone else.

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-86192204177807921972016-04-13T12:17:00.003-04:002016-04-13T12:20:39.462-04:00Linkee-poo you're a boy make a big noise, playing in the street gonna be a big man some dayAlpha Centari in a few decades. "Together with a team of scientists, (Physicist Stephen Hawking and billionaire Yuri Milner) suggest that within a generation, humans could send a probe to Alpha Centauri — more than 4.3 light-years away, or 25 trillion miles — on a trip that would take just over two decades." Um, you're catching flies with that open mouth. Hey, look, light sails. I wonder if the Planetary Society is involved? Okay, while the concept is cool, we'll also need ultra-small power supplies, because while the laser may be able to "push" the vehicle, the inverse square law will prevent it from powering the vehicle and any really long distance. Also, you'll need a sophisticated guidance system because if you start with even the millionth of a degree off, if you're unable to correct, you're going to miss the target by a lot four light-years down the line. But, yeah, were's the fucking kickstarter on this puppy?

 In case you thought the Sad (and Rabid) Puppies were just a US phenomena, I give you the rant against the London Book Fair. Someone needs a Snickers bar and a fresh nappy. I'm sure he's mostly pissed because he's not the first entry to come up in Goggle when I searched his name. (Grokked from Mrs. Tadd)

 "It's puzzling that so many Americans are choosing to arm themselves at a time when the FBI tells us violent crime and property crime have been falling dramatically for two decades." It really isn't puzzling. "'I pay attention to different people, weird people, maybe stereotype people,' says Sam Blackburn… What is he looking for, specifically?… 'Gangbanger-looking guys, maybe guys that look like they're up to no good or somebody that may think they're a Muslim extremist or something like that'." And that pretty much wraps it up. "A gun in the home? The owner may have it primarily for hunting or target-shooting. A concealed gun out in public? It goes with the explicit understanding that the owner may kill someone they feel threatened by."

 A study finds almost half of Alzheimer's cases are due to hyperinsulinemia. Whoa. If this holds up, that could be big. As someone who was diagnosed with hyperinsulinemia, fuck. Yes, I use glucophage (metformin) to control it (we're back to normal levels). I think I was diagnosed very early (no other symptoms of Type II have shown themselves) as I went to the doctor within a month of noticing a change in my body. (Grokked from Kameron Hurley)

 A small town in Italy, facing it's own demise, welcomes refugees from around the world. And by doing so, revitalizes their economy and the life of the village. Why? Because they played in reality instead of the politics of fear. Humans have been in a state of migration for the past few millennia. I keep waiting to see if Greece would discover this for themselves (many Syrian refugees hold advance degrees and are highly entrepreneurial). What they think of as a problem could actually be the solution to their other real problem (their economy).

 "Whether you're coming home from an airport fluttering with international germs, a daycare full of sticky-fingered toddlers, or just a grimy office building, scrubbing your hands with bacteria-busting soap seems like a great idea. But the data that have washed up on the cleansers in recent years suggest that they actually do more harm than good—for you, those around you, and the environment." And those Purell type hand "sanitizers" are worse. Hey, remember when we added lead to paint to make it last longer, and to gas to stop the knock? Good times, good times. (Grokked from Sarah Goslee)

 "Warm, wet conditions rapidly kicked off the (Greenland) melt season this weekend, more than a month-and-a-half ahead of schedule. It has easily set a record for earliest melt season onset, and marks the first time it's begun in April." I'm sure it's nothing to be worried about. "'We had to check that our models were still working properly' Peter Langen, a climate scientist at the Denmark Meteorological Institute (DMI), told the Polar Portal." (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

 Democracy Spring. I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this, but I agree with their stated objectives (dark money out of politics, campaign finance reform, restoration of the full Voters Rights Act, and an end to gerrymandering to create "safe" seats). It will be interesting to see if they can keep the pressure on.

 "I'm from Canada, so they think I'm slow, eh." That's one of my favorite quotes from The Simpsons, and I often repeat it in real life (including horrible Canadian accent). But it's not that far from the truth. "Imagine you're back in school, bored to death, with limited academic options. Because you're learning English, everybody assumes you're not ready for more challenging work. What they don't realize is that you're gifted." Very few "gifted" programs test English Learner students (hell, the barely test "non-whites" and those who "aren't the right sort of people" at all in my experience), although that may be (slowly, very slowly) changing. States still aren't fully funding these programs (they're barely funding education at all). And we wonder why our kids are having a hard time and why we're struggling to compete on an international level.

 Fall out from the NC law, "'That's because the law virtually eliminated the North Carolina prohibition on discrimination based on, in Rick's case, age, disability.'" In case you may be wondering why people are calling it a law to endorse discrimination. (Grokked form John Scalzi)

 What's fair and what could happen at this summer's RNC in Cleveland? I wonder when people will start looking into the rules for the Democratic Convention being contested?

 "Longtime Republican activist Phyllis Schlafly says the group she founded 44 years ago to promote a conservative agenda is trying to oust her because she endorsed Donald Trump… 'It's disloyal and it's terribly shocking, and I'm completely depressed about it'…" Yeah, shoes are starting to drop all over. Although this could be rewritten to say, "Longtime GOP operative who pitted conservatives against each other in a race for ideological purity and preserving xenophobia is upset now that people question her ideological purity." This is what's known as having ousted the supposed RINOs and the other moderates, they have no one else to practice those policies and procedures on except each other.

 What happens when the politics of a major party becomes uncoupled from the shared reality. This is what we used to call "the bubble." And it is one sure way to torpedo our future. And understand, while this story is just about that uncoupling within the US, our allies are also wondering just WTF is going on over here.

 "From Indiana to Colorado to Tennessee, those involved in the delegate selection process are receiving harassment and even death threats from Trump fans who believe that the system has been 'rigged' against the real estate mogul." Kinda sucks when those political games are turned on the people who thought they were immune from such actions and that it was okay to do it to those other people. Or, the Röhm Putsch/Great Purge of the ranks is coming. Whom is on the winning side and how bloody it gets depends on when it happens. I don't really expect gangland style killings in the street, but the political aftermath might be as scorched Earth as if there were. History may not repeat, but damn this is a strong rhyme. And is there a difference if the threats of violence bring about the same result (removing internal dissent and making sure the proles keep to the party line)?

 That time Ted Cruz defended the Texas law banning the sale of dildos. Won't that make a fun opposition commercial in the general election? (Grokked from Joe Hill)

 Tweet of my heart: @leeflower Might I suggest that the generation that invented SNORTING PIXIE STIX kindly abstain from judging the youth of today.

 Hahahahaha… wait a second…

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-30459592692239195792016-04-12T11:31:00.001-04:002016-04-12T11:35:46.436-04:00Linkee-poo can't get to sleep, I think about the implications of diving in too deep and possibly the complicationsOkay, I think this is enough to make a post. Yeah, this should be enough.

 The lax regulation of funeral homes and cemeteries often leads to corruption and fraud. Tennessee isn't the only place this is happening. In Ohio, at least, we have a minimum standard and some pretty tough auditing of cemeteries (I used to ride a bus with one of the regulators, you don't want to know the stories he told). But the punishments everywhere are pretty pathetic (other than losing the cemetery and the trust fund that is supposed to operate it).

 Strangely enough, when transgender kids have supportive parents they don't have the issues that many people like to think are a part of being transgender. Okay, well so far the research doesn't show it's "supportive parents", but that transgender kids these days don't have any greater chance of being "emotionally distressed." It's probably from a greater percentage of the populace accepting people as they are instead of who we think they should be. Strange that.

 It's all fun and games until the lawsuits start. Climate-change subpoenas aren't so much fun when the tables are turned. This time, people are investigating the potential of laws being broken by those in the climate change denial camp. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 The USS Zumwalt, so stealthy they're going to attach reflectors to the hull so commercial vehicles don't run into it. Sounds silly, but actually a damn good idea. I'm sure the Russians and others are going to try and image her during peace-time to work out how to defeat her stealthiness. So putting reflectors on her now will not only make her safe for navigation, but will screw with the oppositions' research. Don't think it's important? You do know Russia has adjusted their targeting radars so they're able to accurately see the F-117A (our stealth fighter) and B2, right? (Grokked form Jeff Beeler)

 More than 80% of wells in China produce water that is unfit to drink or bath in. Thank god they don't have a bunch of regulations and government oversight keeping them back from fixing the problem.

 The day thing has a little to do with robotics, so this is very cool (no, not related to my job). Self-healing, conductive and self-powering (solar) plastics that could be used for prosthetics in the place of haptic devices to give the sense of touch. Plus it works on similar principles to your existing neurons (variable signal intensity and speed). Living in the future.

 Kepler is out of emergency mode. Waiting for full telemetry to find out what happened. (Grokked from Dan)

 A second Chinese team announces they've been able to edit human DNA in an embryo. So far, all the embryos the teams have done their research on have been non-viable (or at least would never be implanted in a womb, as extra chromosomes aren't necessarily a death sentence for an egg) and have been destroyed after seeing if the CRISPR patches would work (so far, it's been scatter shot success, but it always is early on). The future is coming faster than we're able to cope with it. the problem is, because of US laws against human cloning or working with human embryos, China is now leading the way. Because someone will. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 GE develops a desktop turbine that could supply 33 megawatts of power. The system uses super-critical CO2 instead of water-steam, which is typically used to generate electricity (nuclear power just supplies the heat to turn water to steam to drive turbines, for instance). So, while interesting and probably a good way to quickly generate a lot of power, anybody else see the fault in the plan? (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 The Schaft robot. Who says bipedal robot assistants must look like humans or other animal types? (Grokked from Dan)

 When your house is the programing default for an unknown address.

 Hayden's 11? This is how rumors start. (Grokked from Hannah Bowman)

 Medicine, the best lies we know. Sure, we may laugh at people believing in "tooth worms" and exsanguination to balance the humors, but in the future many people will laugh at some of the medical "knowledge" we have now (hopefully one of those things will be, "can you believe people used to poison themselves to try and be cured of cancer?").

 Federal securities regulators are charging Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton with civil fraud. What a great "tireless conservative warrior", as Cruz called him when he won over a more moderate conservative. (Grokked from Dan)

 Dear Fox News, for someone who champions "free markets" and the North Carolina law that allows people to not do business with people they have a strong religious or moral conviction against, you don't seem to get what that means. Think of it this way, all these celebrities and businesses that are boycotting doing business in NC (and the other states) are just utilizing the laws those states have enacted. They have a strong moral conviction of not doing business with bigoted assholes. So they're refusing your custom. You should be celebrating that these celebrities and businesses now have the right to refuse. (Grokked from Mur Lafferty)

 Because it'll be needed in the coming months, the twenty cognitive biases that can affect our reasoning. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 Porn site cuts off North Carolina because of discrimination law. Look, when even porn doesn't want your money because they think you've gone too far, that's saying something. I mean, sure, the Bruce cancelling a concert is one thing, but when you deny Southern Conservatives their porn you better watch out. (Grokked from someone, sorry, lost the link)

 And what should come as a surprise to no one, "As part of a series into the rising global phenomenon of online harassment, the Guardian commissioned research into the 70m comments left on its site since 2006 and discovered that of the 10 most abused writers eight are women, and the two men are black." Never. Read. the Comments (unless you're in law enforcement and need evidence). Next up, water is wet. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe wants a law to keep the information on pharmacies who supply "death sentence" drugs to remain secret. Um, no. Hey, remember when he wanted to be president?

 "Trump's campaign is not based on racism!" shouts people in Trump's campaign. "A group of white high school soccer fans in Wisconsin chanted racist slurs and "Donald Trump, build that wall" at black and Latina players on an opposing school's team, WISC-TV reported Saturday." Unfortunately your supporters seem to disagree. But Trumps swears he doesn't hear about it. Every. Single. Time. (Grokked from Dan)

 Facemask, 15 yard penalty, first down. I wonder if anyone explained to this shining example of humanity that what he committed was battery, and just because he wasn't arrested then, doesn't mean he will get out of this free and clear. Also, Mikee, there could be the civil suit.

 Sure Bill O'Reilly isn't a racist, privileged asshole. "Fox News host Bill O'Reilly challenged… Donald Trump Monday night on how he would create jobs for the black community, many of whom he said are 'ill-educated and have tattoos on their foreheads.'" Nope, no racism here. I'm sure Bill will apologize today saying he was speaking figuratively, even though he said on air that it was "the truth". And he can play his "get out of trouble" card while his supporters can all think, "Well, the network made him say that to be PC, but he really believes what I believe."

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-69549768626771412942016-04-11T12:26:00.001-04:002016-04-11T12:26:18.909-04:00Linke-poo hears the horses' thunder down in the valley belowSo, don't know a first reader from a culture you've included in your story, but are not of or have deep experience with? A sensitivity reader may just be the help you're looking for. Or, you know, you could wait for the reviews to start piling up. (Grokked from Kameron Hurley)

 Three restaurants in China "hire" robotic servers. Two are now closed and the third brought back human servers and only kept one of the robots. So, Skynet 0, humans 3. (Grokked from Alex C. Renwick)

 "This is what abortion politics is for. This is what it was designed to do. This is its function and its purpose." The Slactivist with some history and perspective. Also a lot on people who find themselves on the wrong side of history attempting to change the subject.

 You know how emoji's are supposed to be universal communications? Apparently not. :\ (Grokked from Dan)

 Kepler is down. Four years into its extended mission of finding exoplanets, Kepler has gone into emergency mode (you may picture the klaxons sounding, red lights swishing, and people stumbling from one side of the set to the other as someone shakes the camera).

 Why are these bathroom policing laws a horrible idea besides the blatant bigotry. "A Detroit woman has filed a lawsuit against restaurant chain Fishbone's after a frightening incident in which she was mistaken for a man and tossed out of a women's bathroom, reports TV station WXYZ." Yeah, that's one reason. When I had a pony-tail I often got comments in restaurant bathrooms. Including once where I had to ask the guy if he had dated many women with beards, because he may be doing it wrong. (Grokked from Scott Kennedy)

 So, this is a thing. "Guests from two separate Chinese wedding processions fought with knives and batons and hurled flaming fireworks at each other during a violent four-hour dispute, mainland media reports." But I'll bet they didn't have a bitchin' soundtrack to dance to during the fight scenes like they did in West Side Story. (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 Oh look, if you're rich you tend to live longer. Or, why won't the old bastard die and give us his money. Actually, right there you can see the problems in America. If you're rich, and live on the coasts (or in a densely populated area) you have a longer life. However, if you're poor and live in the rural mid-west, you're screwed. Some of it is access to better medical support, some of it is cultural, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say much of it is because of economic opportunity and the related stresses and life-styles.

 "Climate change and a strong El Niño have caused hundreds of kilometres of (Australia's Great Barrier) reef to bleach, as the higher water temperatures stress the coral, and they expel their symbiotic algae. If the bleaching is bad enough, or the temperatures remain high for long enough, the corals die, putting the future of reefs at risk." Good thing that climate change thing is a hoax or this would be very troublesome. I'm sure Rush Limbaugh can explain it all away. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 What happens when the Patriot-Amurika-Fuck-Yeah goggles slip? The disillusion can hit pretty hard. Or, if you like, what happens you you realize the propaganda was just that. (Grokked from Alex C. Renwick)

 I'm sure it was just an innocent error that Spanish language voter guides were sent out with the wrong dates and incomplete information. You know, just like in 2012. I'm sure that the attempts to disenfranchise supposed "non-GOP voters" (i.e. white) had nothing to do with it. Nothing at all. And in other voter registration news, the Trumpster's kids forget to register. Oopsie.

 The Slactivist expounding on the fact that people from the future are not coming to save us.

 But they may give us glimpses into the future.

 "Clare Lopez, the vice president of the Center for Security Policy and a national security adviser to Sen. Ted Cruz's presidential campaign, told a Minnesota radio program yesterday that parts of Minneapolis have become 'no-go zones' where the police 'don't go' and are letting Sharia law take hold." Proving that no matter how much a conservative/religious lie gets disproven, there's always more life in that zombie. (Grokked from Elizabeth Bear)

 The sense of entitlement is amazing. I've long held that the conservative mindset is one that believes it is entitled, even as they point the finger to welfare, social security, medicaid beneficiaries and say they they feel entitled to "free stuff."

 And this just in, immaculate Republican candidate appears to the faithful outside the RNC. Oh Onion, don't ever change. Note Paul Ryan is in the crowd picture looking up, so it ain't him. Also wondering how he could be wearing a shining American Flag pin, and have his sleeves rolled-up (although the description is a fabulous send up of some of the conventions of public address). (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-31966331299920193862016-04-09T20:11:00.002-04:002016-04-09T20:11:19.487-04:00Linkee-poo for the weekendFuck cancer. More and more people are sharing their journey through cancer on social media. Which, IMHO, is a lot better than when I first encountered the word is a whisper.

 So the conservative causes that have found themselves on the fuzzy end of the lollipop stick when it comes to the SCOTUS vacancy are now saying, "DO OVER." "The challengers in a Supreme Court case that sought -- and failed -- to cripple public unions are asking the high court to rehear the case once it has a ninth justice, after the court's 4-4 tie in March meant a lower court ruling against them would stand." Kinda sucks when your own ideology torpedoes your own ideology.

 Angry people in local (UK) papers. In other news, Florida man… (Grokked from Xeni)

 More on the GOP's fight to disenfranchise as many voters who vote "wrong" in their eyes. Anyone still doubting which side is against democracy? Hey ho way to go Ohio. (Grokked from Jim Wright)

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-37698682382624579672016-04-08T12:46:00.001-04:002016-04-08T12:46:07.927-04:00Linkee-poo, and may all your favorite bands stay togetherWriting outlines. Working on this skill right now. As with any writing advice, YMMV and it may be complete bullshit… for you. (Grokked from Ken McConnell)

 The Pew research into reading platforms broken up by age group. You know that line about how "the kids" will be the ones to adopt reading books on e-readers in mass? Turns out, not so much (it's us middle-age farts who are more likely to have an e-reader and a tablet and read an e-book). Kinda interesting breakdowns. Also, kids read more than adults, although adults read mostly for pleasure. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

 Brian McClellan on updating the royalty structure for publishing. One thing I see in an argument against this is that in the past few decades, businesses have been extending their payment time while trying to decrease the time in which they get paid (kinda hard to do when you have a chain of effects that the payments have to go through). Oh, and now many are demanding discounts as a matter of course (and they believe are non-negotiable). (Grokked from Chuck Wendig)

 "Pooling data from 751 studies involving 4.4 million adults, researchers estimated that the number of adults with diabetes in 200 countries has nearly quadrupled, from 108 million in 1980 to 422 million in 2014. And the disease is growing faster in low- and middle-income countries than in high-income countries." And while we don't know exactly what the cause is (other than obesity = more calories), the researchers would like to stress that it isn't fast-food's (ie. highly processed food's) fault. Because, I don't know (mostly because it's also going up where there are no fast-food outlets, but that doesn't mean more of their foods aren't being processed).

 Hiding in plain site, cyclodextrin may help with arterial plaque, cholesterol and atherosclerosis. And the best part, cyclodextrin is cheap and available. But that's also why it hid for so long. Nobody could patent it, so no pharmaceutical company would have thought of (or paid for) testing it, even if they already use it to help deliver other drugs. Basically it's a ring (cyclo-) of sugars (-dextrin). The major things not looked at yet, after clearing plaques from arteries where does that material go? And while helping cholesterol work the way it's supposed to (in our narrow and anthropomorphic view of medicine) does it cause other problems? Not to mention the ever present (and often un-researched) question, does this actually work the way we think it is, or is it affecting something else which the effect we want is just side-effect? (Grokked from John)

 "Renewables are so cheap in some parts of the country that they're undercutting the price of older sources of electricity such as nuclear power." Oopsie.

 Well, someone finally got the memo on incitement to riot and violence. Trumpster now says, "Don't hurt them" as his supporters remove protestors from his rallies.

 And there's the first shoe beginning to fall, Senate GOPers in contested races are losing support, and what support they keep is softening. Mostly because of the potential for a Trumpster or Cruz on the top of the R's ticket, and their refusal to give hearings to SCOTUS nominee. Dun dun duuuuun.

 Alaska votes to not only keep Planned Parenthood out of school (what, I didn't know they were in schools), but also to allow parents to withdraw their children from any content they don't approve of. I'm sure all parents want their children to grow up smarter and more capable than they were. Right? I guess this is what the GOP means when they talk about "fixing" education. (Grokked from Jim Wright)

 That moment you realize the person you're talking with is a whackaloon. "Bolduan and Berman looked at each other with disbelief for a few seconds after (Dr. Ben) Carson suggested Berman had a criminal record." I believe that's called a soft-spit-take. Damn is Carson really bad at this.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-31583902832997281632016-04-07T12:43:00.001-04:002016-04-07T12:43:42.344-04:00Linkee-poo feels summer creepin' in and I'm tired of this town againBecause all the cool kids are talking about it, the Rogue One trailer drops. (Grokked from John Scalzi)

 Eschersketch. Okay, there goes a few lunches. Say, can I get that in vector? (Grokked from John)

 "We are asked to admire what our people once viewed as unforgiveable. The consumption-driven mind-set masquerades as 'quality of life' but eats us from within." Terri Windling shares her research on the Windigo which hunts us from the starving times.

 "… WebMD spokesperson said, 'The strict editorial practices we have in place ensure that the content we produce is unbiased, and the production of such content done so independent of third party control or influence.' …In 2010, Sen. Chuck Grassley sent a letter to the site after finding that a WebMD quiz for depression, sponsored by pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, was rigged to suggest everybody who took the test was at risk for major depression. Naturally, that would make them a potential candidate for antidepressants, conveniently manufactured by Eli Lilly." Plus all the other problems I've had on that site and that pretty much encapsulates why I no longer look at WebMD for information. I'm sure the free market will sort this all out. (Grokked from John)

 There is no greater promise than this, we will bring you home. NPR has been running stories of repatriating US soldiers killed in the Battle of Chosin Reservoir and identifying their remains so families have closure. No, you're crying.

 "Searching for 'unprofessional hairstyles' and 'professional hairstyles' on Google Images exposes a stark racial divide in what's assumed to be appropriate for business settings." Yeah, you can probably see where that train wreck is coming, can't you. But even the deeper data is pretty revealing.

 You know wasps make their nests out of paper pulp. So what happens when you supply them with colored paper for their nest building material. Pretty. And in other wasp nest news, they'll use anything to form their nests, including a mask left in a shed. Well that won't give me nightmares. (Both grokked from John)

 Big seed. Where you're food comes from, now only fewer options and bigger money behind them.

 "California's dental health system for the poor is dysfunctional, according to a report by a bipartisan oversight commission… The department that runs Denti-Cal draws only part of the blame, according to the report. The legislature, the governor's office, and the political culture of California share culpability for decades of neglect and strategic misdirection." What could possibly go wrong? Actually it reminds me of this Simpsons Episode, the Big Book of British Smiles.

 "The state House on Wednesday passed a bill that would allow counselors to deny services to individuals based on sincerely held beliefs, letting them refuse to help gay individuals." It's almost like there's some sinister plot going on. Or some progrom.

 Well, someone thinks the Trumpster's immigration plans don't go far enough. "'I suspect that a good chunk of (remittance payments to Mexico/Central America) is laundered drug money,' the Iowa representative (Steve King) said in a Newsmax interview." Can we just label him a blatant racist now and ignore the little fucker?

 "'As a result of these violations, numerous Ohioans have been disenfranchised in recent elections (through voter record purging), and many more face the threat of disenfranchisement in the 2016 Presidential Election and future elections,' the (Federal lawsuit) said." Do I need to explain which party controls Ohio's government? "According to the complaint, Ohio operates two separate systems for removing voters from its registration rolls. The first, the 'National Change of Address' Process, removes voters based on change of addresses filed with the U.S. Postal Service… the lawsuit mainly focuses on what it is known as the Supplemental Process, which kicks in when a voter doesn't vote in a series of elections… In Cuyahoga County alone, the complaint said, some 40,000 voters were removed from the rolls in 2015 through the Supplemental Process, even though there was no evidence they had not moved to a new jurisdiction… Many of these voters showed up for the November 2015 election only to find out they were no longer registered to vote, the complaint said, and thus were unable to participate in that election." Again, Republicans are reliable voters who always show up. The "they didn't vote recently" laws are specifically targeted against those who vote Democratic.

 More on the Wisconsin Voter ID disclosure.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-78719558640308867432016-04-06T12:43:00.001-04:002016-04-06T12:52:10.579-04:00Linkee-poo doesn't wanna be your hero, doesn't wanna be a big man, just wanna fight with everyone elseThe Hidden Brain podcast on grit and the myth of talent. This is something I've long believed. The best guitarists in high school couldn't beat me in my audition for the Stage Band, because I worked harder. They were better, I played with them. Some of them had picked up the guitar when they could barely hold it. How many of them still play? I don't know, but I do know how many of them went on to form bands after high school. And that is exactly zero. But of the three or four of us who struggled and came to the guitar later, 2 guys formed bands after high school and had local success. With every endeavor you try, there are several levels. The first level is fairly easy to attain (there are exceptions here). The next level requires good education and training. And the upper levels requires devotion and what they're calling "deliberate practice" and is never achieved easily (despite the stories we tell ourselves and the examples of the "savant").

 Pros meeting pros at cons. So very much this. (Grokked from Elizabeth Bear)

 Someone low-balls a call for work, realizes it was a bad move and so ups the rate. I appreciate that they'll be bumping their hourly rate they asked someone to work for, and that's pretty good. Also, this person works in the visual/creative design field, so they understand the value of the work produced (and the quality of the work done). There are so many crappy clients out there, and so many people low-balling their own quotes, that it pretty much turned me off to the online-freelance sites before I even got started on them. What's more telling is someone with those skills accepted that low rate. That's what really bothers me. (Grokked for John Scalzi)

 Chuck Wendig on the show Tiny House Hunters (or something like that). For me, I originally saw articles on the Tiny House fad over a decade ago, so this isn't new to me. But there are people who are very happy in their tiny homes. I also drive by people who have parked camper-trailers on an open lot and call that home (I know it's their home because one build a nice deck off of theirs). But, yeah, what Chuck said. I have a small house, and it's just me and my wife, and it's not enough room for us (it would be seriously nice to have another place with a TV where I could exercise while my wife watches Castle, I'm just saying). But all the room is dedicated for something. It doesn't help that we're both packrats who love to read and learn new things. But really. Part of owning a house is building equity, a mobile home (and that's what a Tiny House is, or at least 90%+ of them are) doesn't develop equity.

 "There's also the highly important question of how transforming school administrators into interrogators informs their view of students. A 2009 study cited by the New Yorker suggests that among police, training in the Reid Technique skewed perceptions of juveniles, making them appear more adult and less trustworthy." Wait, why are teachers being instructed in interrogation techniques? Yeah, I'm sure the "school-to-prison" pipeline has nothing to do with it (note rise of for-profit jails coupled with backlash against growing minority populations).

 Okay, I didn't point to this story before because it seemed a pretty open/shut case of "hostile work environment" which would cost Sony a hellalotta money if the rape victim weren't a "star". And then this. "On Sunday, pop singer Kesha Sebert alleged that she was offered her 'freedom' if she agreed 'to APOLOGIZE publicly and say that I never got raped.' Sebert is contractually bound to Lukasz 'Dr. Luke' Gottwald, who is both the producer behind some of her biggest hits and, Sebert alleges, her abuser and rapist." The main complication here is this, "Sebert has a separate deal with Gottwald's production company, Kasz Money Inc, through which she is signed to Kemosabe." And that's the rub. Sony shouldn't have allowed that in, or bought her out of that contract when they signed her (if the side contract was in place first). So not only is this a horrible situation, it's also another example of just how fuckedup the recording industry (and the "celebrity" industry in general) is. (Grokked from Chip Dawes)

 The new Hewlett-Packard logo. I see two minor adjustments that (for me anyway) would have made it fabulous, but right now I'm "meh". But given the backlash against recent rebranding efforts, it's good to see a positive reception. (Grokked from Dan)

 "European media outlets are reporting that Iceland's Prime Minister Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson has resigned days after a massive data breach known as the "Panama Papers" linked him to secret off-shore bank accounts." Yeah, he was about the only one who didn't see that one coming. Be happy, Sigmundur, they let you leave with your head on your shoulders. A hundred years ago that wouldn't have gone so well for you. And then he tried the "everybody does it" schtick. "Earlier Tuesday, Gunnlaugsson had asked Icelandic President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson to call early elections and dissolve the current parliament, the BBC reports, but Grimsson refused." And the President replied, "Nope, just you, asshole."

 New Treasury rules designed to make inversion less profitable claims its first victim, the Pfizer Allergan merger. I still say that for tax purposes, a company's hq and the determination of where the company is based should be made by where the majority of the C-level officers (or better yet, where the top 10 wage/benefits/option earners) show up for work most often.

 It's A Trap! Man builds giant alien face mosaic in backyard to invite them all down for a chat.

 Retirement investment advisors now have a legal obligation to do what they said they've been doing all along. And boy are they pissed about that. I wonder why? Note again the threat to "burn it all down" unless a certain class gets all the profits they think they're owed. I wonder how this will affect the annual company 401k "relook" to make sure they're offering "the right balance" of portfolio assets? Also an opportune time to remind you to check your own 401k and IRA plans to see what fees you're being charged and I recommend (I am not a retirement advisor, just some schmuck who has been trying to maximize my own retirement savings) index funds with ultra low fees (in the >0.1% range, most of mine are at the 0.05% range which seems to be a minimum). This typically excludes most of the funds based on your retirement date (which tend to charge huge fees in the 5% range) which seem to be popular these days.

 Since the TV drama about the OJ Simpson trial is reopening all those wounds you may have wondered just where that asshat Mark Furman, confirmed white supremacist, ended up at. Did you really have any doubts? (Grokked from Chip Dawes)

 "A Republican congressman on Tuesday night acknowledged that the new law requiring a photo ID to vote in Wisconsin could help Republican candidates at the polls in the general election." Another one caught telling the truth.

 The George Mason University Antonin Scalia School of Law. Aaaannnnddd it took them about 4 days to figure out that wasn't a Good Idea™, so they renamed it the Antonin Scalia Law School. This is why you need diversity, folks. Because if they had someone schooled in satire on their board they would have immediately recognized just how bad that original name was. Besides making the name change because of money (it came with a $30M endowment, $20M from an anonymous donor and $10 from the Koch brothers), since the change is pretty much immediate, some students are quite upset that his name will be on their diplomas. But howdy, do I want to design that sweatshirt (and sell it myself). I wonder what the legal requirements/entanglements that would set up?

 You know, it's like a contest to see which Southern State can be the shittiest to all of it's citizens. Tennessee approves making the Bible the official State Book (they previously made the Beretta .50cal sniper rifle the official State Gun, I see a solution). And then Mississippi's governor goes on to sign their anti-gay law. Say, which party controls all these state's legislatures? Oh, yeah. Didn't even need to look it up, did you?

 I would say the Trumpster just had his Rick Perry moment. But seriously, his supporters would still vote for him even if he shot someone on the street (as he also famously said).

 "We will disclose the hotels and the room numbers of those delegates who are directly involved in the steal (if Trump doesn't get the nomination in Cleveland). If you're from Pennsylvania, we'll tell you who the culprits are. We urge you to visit their hotel and find them." I'm sure Roger Stone didn't mean that as the threat of violence that it certainly comes off as. 'Cause that would mean the Trumpster candidacy is operating like an organized crime syndicate. Or at least borrowing their tactics. "That's a nice little convention you have there, would be a shame if something happened to it." I wonder if he realizes we have a number of trigger-happy cops here?

 There's this movement to increase the number of judges who win seats by direct election. I'm not in favor of these. Why? Because of the collateral damage of the election system. Basically because the dumpster fire that is the Republican 2016 Presidential Nomination this openly homophobic, bigoted asshat won election to Wisconsin's Supreme Court. (Grokked from Chip Dawes)

 A (presumedly Florida) woman confronts Rick Scott on his record. May we all get the opportunity to have such encounters with our own elected officials. Be prepared.

 Tweet of my heart: @ChuckWendig Be the best writer you can be. Online, be the best version of yourself. Have fun, be kind, work hard, have empathy, and hope for luck.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-72950240692699295132016-04-05T11:34:00.002-04:002016-04-05T13:17:35.584-04:00Linkee-poo, it's a trap!Yanni Kuznia is promoted to Subterranean Press' Managing Editor and Chief Operating Officer. Well done, Yanni, well done.

 XCKD is up to something weird. (Grokked from Dan)

 As stated in Little Big Man, sometimes the sun don't shine, the wind don't blow, and the grass doesn't grow. How do you store renewable energy sources for when that happens? Well, here are a few ideas other than industrial batteries and capacitors (store the heat, store the pressure, displacing peak demand).

 "'I found it to be heartbreaking,' Jacobson says. 'I do think it's critical that we draw attention to what's going on with our children and our families here in New Mexico, but I think there's a way to do it that's actionable and that's positive and unfortunately I think they did it in a way that was destructive and divisive.'" Um, I think the time for being nice has passed. Sometimes you have to break some eggs before you can make the omelet. What she (and the NM government) are really upset about is the activist who created the parody of NM Tourism ads to highlight child poverty in NM brought the discussion into the light in an attempt to get real reform. It is, IMHO, someone who is more vested in not doing anything in a position where they should be doing something who would find someone helping their cause to be a distraction.

 "The scientists found, perhaps not surprisingly, that human sacrifice contributed to creating and preserving social hierarchies, and that it increased the chances that societies would have more fixed strata, which were inherited positions, and less mobility." (Grokked from Jason Sanford)

 And NPR's take on the same story. And here's a fun intellectual experiment. Take what you've learned from these two articles, and the presence of human sacrifice in highly stratified societies that are intent on perpetuating those strata and cementing families within those hierarchies, and now compare and then contrast with (the reasons behind the) Black Lives Matter movement.

 "When "affordable" homes in San Francisco are advertised as 'From the low $1,000,000s', it's not just the working poor who are pushed out of the city: it's everyone, except VCs, people living on VC money, and people who've cashed out on VC-backed companies." Do you know what you can get for $1M in Ohio (and NE Ohio isn't all that cheap, but still)? Of course our jobs aren't as glamorous (or as well compensated). And we do have "weather" here. But we also have a lack of affordable low to middle income properties available and practically none in development. This isn't just a coastal problem. This is a nationwide issue. (Grokked from Jason Sanford)

 "'Because I had been born into the British governing class, because I knew a lot of people of influential standing, I knew that they would never get too tough with me. They'd never try to beat me up or knock me around, because if they had been proved wrong afterwards, I could have made a tremendous scandal.'" Privilege. Kim Philby speaks to the Stasi in 1981 in a film just uncovered. Kim Philby is the prototypical mole that security agencies the world over fear and which drive lots of Cold War fiction.

 "TransCanada said Monday it has shut down its Keystone pipeline because of an oil spill in South Dakota, drawing fresh criticism about the risks pipelines pose… Mark Cooper, a spokesman for TransCanada, said a local landowner noticed signs of an oil spill around noon local time Saturday and informed the company." Ah, state-of-the-art leak detection at its best. (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 Now that more and more people are "getting older", there's an attempt to redefine how we live as older people. Well, at least it's not the Boomers' "60 is the new 40" shtick.

 The Trumpster knows nothing. He's apparently trying to get Kasich too quit or be thrown out of the race because he "can't possibly win." And then he says, if that happens, he "automatically wins." Not how it works. Also, the article is pointed to because of the odd insertion of Hillary Clinton and Sanders in the middle. Complete non-sequiturs in a story about Trump. Just bizarre.

 Sarah Palin posts picture of her with a dead boar (that she supposedly shot) in an attempt to help seal the deal for Trump in Wisconsin. I'm sure she didn't do this in an attempt to write off her hunting trip or have it classified by the Trump Campaign as a legitimate election expense. I'm sure that had nothing to do with it. Nothing at all.

 There's the emerging narrative of the Democrats sabotaging themselves and leading to a party schism because the campaign for the nomination has become a real campaign. There are some seeds of truth in there, but I find myself wondering just how much the "pundits" know about actual campaigning and the law versus what they thought was happening all along. Do I think the Democrats could throw the election by shooting themselves in the foot? By golly, yes. It wouldn't be the first time. Does Hillary Clinton have her problems as a candidate? OMG, most certainly. But halfway through the article I found myself quoting Pres. Barlet, "You have to watch the whole board." (Grokked from Ferrett Steinmetz)

 Because while the Democrats are engaging in their typical circular firing-squad (actually, this is just normal politics on a very tough race), the Republicans are talking revolt within the party.

 The Trumpster finally explains how he'll make Mexico pay for the wall. Basically he'll hold private remittances hostage until Mexico ponies up the cash. Yeah, that'll work (side-eye). Because Western Union would be so up for that and smaller banks wouldn't set up low-cost alternatives. Not at all. And the drug cartels already smuggle money south, I'm sure they'd be willing to add to that amount, for a small fee. So basically he wants to punish private citizens (not all remittances are made by aliens here illegally) unless a foreign government concedes to his extortion. That'll go over well in international markets (besides having to break so many treaties that guarantee the free flow of cash between countries that we might find ourselves forced out of our own trade protections).

 "In this tumultuous US election there seems, for once, to be a genuine choice on offer about which kind of ideas will spend four years being thwarted in a congressional logjam." Nobody get's out of this one cleanly, although much of the fire is reserved for Trump who "looks like a pumpkin having a nervous breakdown, talks like the words are being fired out of his mouth by a tennis ball launcher and has the general manner of an arrogant televangelist suspected of murder by Columbo." There are so many great lines in this hit-piece (and make no mistake, the writer here is shouting "a plague upon both your houses", but gets to do it from England), but this maybe my favorite, "It's certainly been entertaining to watch Sanders try to convey a message of hope through the dark prism of the US's Stage 4 corporate media." (Grokked from John)

 Tweet of my heart: @SwiftOnSecurity Next time a vendor screws around on pricing, remind them SpaceX's website has how much they charge to SEND A SATELLITE INTO SPACE.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-3327653593585884112016-04-04T12:26:00.003-04:002016-04-04T12:26:57.472-04:00Linkee-poo is trading in his Chevy for a Cadillac, and if he can't drive with a broken back at least he can polish the fendersSo you're quitting writing. Okay. Yep, been there a few times. (Grokked from Ellen Kushner)

 Video of Blue Origin landing their launch vehicle (from suborbital space) for the third time. I was reminded heavily of the old Lunar Lander game and the strategy of letting the lander fall almost to the ground and then use up all the fuel slowing it to a soft landing. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)

 "Irish American gangs played a central role in attempting to extend the bloodshed (in Chicago's 1919 race riots). Members of Ragen's Colts… disguised themselves in blackface in order to set fire to Polish and Lithuanian neighborhoods… Their hope was to draw the immigrant population into bloody reprisals against African Americans. Two years later, Ragen's Colts again mounted the barricades, hanging in effigy a Ku Klux Klansman… to isolate and drive from Chicago an organization known for violence against southern African Americans, but now focused on Roman Catholics and Jews as threats to American culture and society… Thus Ragen's Colts symbolized the bizarre extremes of racial intolerance and terror in early-twentieth-century Chicago." (Grokked from Chia Evers)

 "Mossack Fonseca is not a household name, but the Panamanian law firm has long been well known to the global financial and political elite, and thanks to a massive 2.6 terabyte leak of its confidential papers to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists it's about to become much better known." An overview of The PanamaPapers everyone is talking about. "Even as the world's wealthiest and most powerful nations have engaged in increasingly complex and intensive efforts at international cooperation to smooth the wheels of global commerce, they have willfully chosen to allow the wealthiest members of Western society to shield their financial assets from taxation (and in many cases divorce or bankruptcy settlement) by taking advantage of shell companies and tax havens." Gee, why would the wealthy and powerful get a break? (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 A Planet Money podcast on just how easy it is to set up an offshore company. There are even consultants that will help.

 Think it's a harmless game for the rich or wondering why you should care? Every dollar they (the people in your country who use these offshoring firms to) hide is another dollar you need to pay in taxes, or a dollar being added to your national debt, or some service that is being cut to make your government more dysfunctional. If this wasn't allowed (and some of it isn't) there could be actual tax reform that would mean something other than sticking it to the middle class, again.

 "Australia's national science organisation planned to stop 'doing science for science sake' and would no longer do 'public good' work unless it was linked to jobs and economic growth, according to internal emails between CSIRO senior managers." Sounds like a sensible plan, until you realize it's just an excuse to cut global climate change research. Also, "basic science" (what they're calling "science for science sake") is the bedrock of progress. Except for actual moon-shot programs, these are the advances that keep up progressing. Like your cellphone, microwave, modern medicine? Without the basic science being done, you'd never have these things (note, the microwave oven is actually from our space program). This is one way to hobble society and put blinders on. In other words, this is the exact rejection that brought about the Dark Ages in Europe. And if you think, "Oh, those silly Aussies" that phrase, "science for science sake" has already cropped up in our American political discourse (and will probably be a small part of the election cycle, as it was last time). (Grokked from Paolo Bacigalupi)

 The Tea Party congressional class of 2010 is getting out. "As it turns out, some people who never harbored ambitions to be career politicians don't love being politicians… Ribble and his retiring colleagues say they are, for the most part, proud of what a Republican-controlled House managed to get done these past six years." That's hilarious. This is like your friend, when hearing your iPod isn't synching properly says they can fix it, then smashes it with a hammer and hands it back to you saying they did all they could do. Say, isn't there something about serving more than 5 years? Why yes, yes there is. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

 "The 'Mississippi Church Protection Act' would allow churches to empower designated members of their congregation as part of a security team with a 'shoot to kill' authority equivalent to a police officer but with less government oversight. The bill contains few restrictions regarding where one may act within this capacity, allowing a church's volunteer security personnel to exercise this authority in public and private venues outside of the church." What could possibly go wrong? (Grokked from Chip Dawes)

 The Trumpster Campaign wheels out Ivana Trump to help. "'As long as you come here legally and get a proper job… we need immigrants. Who's going to vacuum our living rooms and clean up after us? Americans don't like to do that,' Ivana Trump told the New York Post." And then the wheel her back behind the curtain.

Steve Buchheithttp://firstname.lastname@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-34801252404273472262016-04-03T11:34:00.003-04:002016-04-03T11:34:54.575-04:00Linke-poo has felt the coldness of my winterJust wanted to let you know early that this Summer is going to be filled with an unpredictable schedule where I know there will be weeks where I will be unable to post and other times of extended irregular posting. At this point I don't have plans to stop blogging (although I have discussed it with people as a way to claw back time to devote to writing novels). I need to let out all these thoughts and if I stifle them it'll be worse for me. But, I'm not Jay Lake, who was prodigious in person and output (and a damn fast reader). So if it looks like this blog is going dark, just know that I will be back. May and July are looking particularly shaky with time availability. Sorry.

 So, how about that snow, eh?

 Scrivener for iOS goes to limited beta. Let's see, my iPad is 4 years old, purchased in anticipation of Scrivener on iOS. So it's been a long wait. (Grokked from Chia Evers)

 Mary Robinette Kowal owns up to her April Fools prank. As someone who watched it unfold on twitter, I can say, well done, Mary, well done. Stands and salutes. And yes, I saw her misdirection and for about two or three minutes I believed it, but then remembered the past years' April Fools pranks and figured it would be within her wheelhouse to do this and play it this way. But still, highly entertaining and mind/experience expanding. You brought a smile to my face on an otherwise dreary work day. You're an inspiration.

 There are so many things wrong with this story. First of all is the angle of the story, that a father would kill his son for being gay. Not that it's a wrong assumption, but is about one of eight things going on here. Okay, so if the father killed the son (with a shotgun) for being gay, then who killed the mother (stabbing)? I would assume they'll charge the father with both (because given the dynamic in the house, it would be within the realm of possibility). That the father is 69 and the son is 29, and the son was still living at home (okay, that can happen), but the parents were in the process of evicting the son (also possible), and the house was trashed (also possible), but all together is a train wreck of a family dynamic. But there's no exploration of those, just that the father is charged with a hate crime.

 One of the links that got ate in yesterday's brain malfunction. Elon Musk unveils the Tesla 3. Many pundits have said that the only way he could produce his car for less than $50,000 is if he sold tens of thousands. The Tesla 3 is listed at $35,000, and they had preorders over 100k before the launch (Saturday morning there are rumors preorders are now over 230k). That'll do, pig, that'll do.

 Egypt is bringing in the experts to examine of King Tut's Tomb may have another tomb behind it. Which is good, because to access those areas would mean removing some of the walls (with their hieroglyphs and bas-reliefs) to find out. That's a serious endeavor that would forever alter the original tomb (and potential tourist and academic dollars). (Grokked from Mrs. Tadd)

 Google's Project Loon. Ah, the old ballon-as-wireless-internet-tower gag. (Grokked from Robert J Bennett)

 "Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley's (R) campaign committee spent a whopping $1,732.68 on 'cell phones and prepaid wireless' at a Best Buy in 2015, according to campaign finance reports acquired by AL.com." I'm sure there's a reasonable explanation for all those burner phones.

 The just never learn. Mississippi is next up on the "religious liberty bill" chopping block. And the same day their ban on same-sex adoptions was struck down. It's just particularly tone-deaf.

 This is how the conservatives build their infrastructure to support their detrimental policies and give them the imprimatur of legitimacy. They fund colleges and think tanks that can do the heavy lifting. This is the structure that launches people like John Yoo (who wrote the legal opinion that water-boarding isn't actually torture) into public life.

 "Meanwhile, Ted Cruz has been whipping Trump in the quiet, early race to elect his own loyalists to become delegates to the convention, meaning that the Texas senator could triumph through delegates who are freed to vote their own preferences on a second ballot, regardless of who won their state." Been hearing a lot of whispers about this. Cruz has been putting his own people forward as delegates so while they nominally need to vote Trump on the first ballot, they'll switch to Cruz quicker than you can say "switcheroo". See, it still is controlled by backroom deals. (Grokked from John Scalzi)

 "Should Mr. Trump lurch into the convention so fatally compromised with general election voters and a sizable faction of Republicans, it could make it easier for the party to wrest the nomination away from him. But it would also make the consequences of failing to defeat him all the more ruinous if the specter of choosing a seemingly unelectable nominee does not deter Mr. Trump's supporters." While I think the Trumpster would be a yuuge liability to the Republicans this Fall, it all hinges on if the Democrats can leverage the emotions against him into votes at the polls. Something they're not always good at. It involves tying the GOP to the views of their candidate, which the "elite" of the GOP are frantically building space between them and Trumpster. And there are plenty of Republicans who will hold their nose and vote for him to keep Hillary out of the White House. (Grokked from Jason Sanford)

 Tweet of my heart: @LaurenDeStefano a writer's brain is like a chrysalis filled with thousands of shining idea butterflies and their wings are made of razors and they punch you

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-33115449057982751502016-04-01T21:04:00.001-04:002016-04-01T21:04:17.429-04:00Linkee-poo reposted Sorry, lost several links because of my stupidity. Sorry about that.

 "General Electric wants to be removed from the federal government's list of too-big-to-fail financial institutions, arguing that it's no longer a major player in the financial services industry." Good luck with that (actually they probably have a good chance). I'm sure the oversight on salary and bonuses paid had nothing to do with it.

 Well, at least one Senator gets how important digital security is. (Grokked from Vince O'Conner)

 "It's about entrenched behaviors and facing the reality of the system we've created which allows one part of the system to attempt to carry the limitations of the rest." On our American medical fascination with using the Emergency Room/Department for standard care. The problem here, and what I see out there, is the gatekeepers don't have the knowledge to change sending people to the ER. EMTALA should not be repealed (that's the law the an ER can't deny you care for lack of ability to pay). And it's not fully enforced anyway. Also, as suggested elsewhere that EMS should have the right to refuse transport, EMT's don't have the skills to fully diagnose a patient and should not be in the position to determine if they should take a patient to the ER. I've seen patients who have come in with "flu like symptoms" crash (CODE Blue, get the crash cart, baby, it's almost Hammer Time). But I have also seen people come in for really no good reason except they couldn't see their PCP right away. Also, just a bone to pick, the government did fund EMTALA with direct payments to hospitals (which have been reduced under Obamacare). Again I'll float the idea of an integrated ER/Urgent Care unit. The doctor in the ER or UC could refer patients to the other which wouldn't be farther than a walk across the lobby. But that takes money and administration that has it's eyes open (right now, they are providing both through the ER, but they can charge more for ER services). So this is partly self-inflicted pain. (Grokked from Chip Dawes)

 Affordable housing is an issue, again. With house prices rising at pre-collapse rates (>10%/yr), yeah, it's getting tougher out there. Also, as someone who's first house (which we're still in) is small because everybody is building mini-mansions and charging >$260,000 for a home, it was all I could afford. But moving up is also looking harder. I keep wondering just who the hell is buying all those places.

 "The CIA left 'explosive training material' under the hood of a Loudoun County school bus after a training exercise last week, a bus that was used to ferry elementary and high school students to and from school on Monday and Tuesday with the material still sitting in the engine compartment, according to the CIA and Loudoun County officials." The fuck? They did a full inventory on Thursday and found all the material is accounted for. Um, shouldn't that have been done right after the training exercise? (Grokked from Chuck Wendig)

 "The Republican National Committee has launched a website to inform the public about what happens in the event of contested GOP convention, the Washington Examiner reported. The website, ConventionFacts.gop, lists party rules regarding the delegates required for a candidate to be nominated to lead the GOP's 2016 convention, as well as the process if no candidate initially meets the requirement." LET'S GET READY TO RUUUMMMBBBLLLEE! Remember when Preibus and the RNC stated categorically that they were not scheming to get a contested convention sometime back in December/January when they had a meeting to discuss it? Good times, good times.

 "(Chuck) Todd asked (Gov. Kasich) specifically about his efforts to reach out to the black community, and why his state ranks as the sixth worst place to raise a black child in. Kasich responded by saying he didn't believe the statistics, then decided to brag about his efforts to reduce infant mortality, and insisted that the 'minority (black) community' needed to become better partners at helping their babies not die, which he knows because white people have gotten with the program." As the article starts out that he keeps trying to tell people that Kasich "is every bit the toxic slime pile that Trump and Cruz are". Seconded. The only difference is John is a better politician and usually knows how to dog-whistle better than that. (Grokked from Patrick Nielsen Hayden)

 Tweet of my heart: @tomtomorrow If you think your wacky April Fool's joke can outdo whatever's in the news cycle tomorrow, well, good luck with that.

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com:blogger.com,1999:blog-19111384.post-30283575063640821122016-03-31T12:21:00.001-04:002016-03-31T12:22:37.311-04:00Linkee-poo, girl, don't you lie to me, tell me where did you sleep last nightMary Robinette Kowal on the WFC award contest rules and specifications. Ahhhh yep.

 "According to a bunch of fancy linguists, people who are more sensitive to written typos and grammatical errors are indeed the kinds of Type A assholes everyone already suspects them to be." Hahahaha, wait a second… (Grokked from John Scalzi, to whom I once wrote an email pointing out some typesetting "errors" in a book of his)

 "Researchers found that cost — and even high-tech promises of seeing around curves — had little to do with performance" of your car's headlight system. "(T)he Insurance Institute for Highway Safety tested 82 different headlight configurations available on 2016 model-year cars. More than half of these setups (44) earned no better than a rating of 'poor.'" Well, that can't be good. As someone who drives many times on rural, unlit roads, so very much this.

 Sometimes an aircraft carrier is just a cigar. Or something. That's Jim Wright on how we pay it forward with our taxes and how some people only want the aircraft carrier and not educate or keep healthy the people who operate it, do the planning, fly the planes, lube the planes, lube the engines, cook for those who do…

 Marie Vibbert on horny boys, sexual harassment, and chat-bots passing the Turing Test (with a solid dose of the objectification of women).

 Because all the cool kids are talking about it, a ten-year old girl gets the opportunity to design her own prosthetic arm, develops it as a glitter cannon. Because why the fuck not? Okay, I'm starting to warm to this whole "makers community" (3D printing for the masses) idea. (Grokked from Saladin Ahmed)

 The high costs of caring for someone with Alzheimers. And that's on top of the mental and physical strain it makes on the caregivers.

 A hospice in Texas is under investigation that management ordered hospice nurses to increase dosages of drugs to hasten patient's deaths. Two thoughts here, this is the result of badly based insurance incentives and two, fucking business majors. We used to have a joke when I was first in college, if you can succeed at engineering go into the arts, if you can succeed there go into education or communications, and if all else fails, get a business degree.

 "Security researchers have discovered 1,418 vulnerabilities in CareFusion's Pyxis SupplyStation system (used to automagically dispense pharmaceuticals and other medical supplies) that are still being used in the healthcare and public health sectors in the US and around the world." Pyxis systems have the greatest market penetration and if you use a mail-order pharmacy, or a large hospital pharmacy, chances are a Pyxis machine counted out those pills and packaged them. (Grokked from Dan)

 "Until 2008 not a single earthquake had ever been recorded… from the Dallas–Fort Worth area… Since then, close to 200 have shaken the cities and their immediate suburbs. Statewide, Texas is experiencing a sixfold increase in earthquakes over historic levels. Oklahoma has seen a 160-fold spike in quakes, some of which have sent people to hospitals and damaged buildings and highways." I'm sure it can't be man-made. LOOK A SQUIRREL! Another example of the result of conservative politics ("Drill, Baby, Drill!" and weakening regulatory agencies). "The (1969) experiment showed that human-triggered earthquakes could be controlled by adjusting wastewater-injection pressure. Unfortunately, the lessons of Rangely and the Rocky Mountain Arsenal were apparently forgotten by the early 2000s, when fossil-fuel companies embarked on the shale-gas boom." (Grokked from Kameron Hurley)

 The oil business is corrupt? "After a six-month investigation across two continents, Fairfax Media and The Huffington Post can reveal that billions of dollars of government contracts were awarded as the direct result of bribes paid on behalf of firms including British icon Rolls-Royce, US giant Halliburton, Australia's Leighton Holdings and Korean heavyweights Samsung and Hyundai." Shocked, shocked I am… Actually this could be quite interesting, especially for Halliburton who is subject to US anti-corruption laws (which includes clauses for contracts not awarded in the US to foreign subsidiaries). Although the did open a world HQ in Dubia (at the time wonks speculated it was so they could do work in Iran, which is still verboten for US companies). (Grokked from Dan)

 "The question of who shot Brittney Mills is wide open. And the answer could be locked up in an iPhone — her iPhone." Or not. But the police don't have much else to go on. The update since I wrote this is the FBI is now helping more cases with their unlocking scheme, although they haven't promised to help in this case yet.

 "'A 21-year-old kid just sort of dies out in the middle of nowhere and nothing happens?'" Life and death in the Bakken oil fields. But we don't need any regulation. Why? Because (at least on "public land") "requiring such an upgrade (automatic oil level checkers) would cause some companies to shut down." Only their required to have them in Canada and on our off-shore rigs and they seem to still be in business. I don't know, why don't we require the use of a respirator with a gas filter when checking oil tanks manually? Or design some mechanism to vent the gases before someone sticks their head over the thief hole? Again, that would be too much money. Just like properly venting coal mines.

 "After The Washington Post published a lengthy investigation into the origins of Hillary Clinton's email scandal, including the bombshell revelation that 147 FBI agents were looking into her private server, the newspaper corrected its report late Tuesday to note the number of agents looking into Clinton's emails was actually fewer than 50." What's a few hundred people here and there? Liberally biased media my ass.

 "Abortion rights advocates, meanwhile, scoffed at the space anti-abortion groups tried to put between their approach and Trump's." Yep. The Trumpster spilled the beans because he did "study" the issue and he understood exactly what the anti-abortion groups want, but not enough to use the language those groups want their chosen candidates to use. Again, he shows his ignorance on how to dog-whistle correctly. And then Dr. Carson goes on to say that the Trumpster didn't know the question was coming so hadn't prepared. Really? A GOP candidate didn't know the abortion questions would be coming? Do these people believe we all have brain damage?

 Why do I rail so much against the anti-aboritonists? "The doctors and nurses at St. David's Medical Center in Austin cried with them, but said because of Texas law HB2, they could not help speed Taylor's labor. Technically, the baby was healthy and the mother was healthy, so to induce labor (at 20 weeks) would be an abortion, and to do it at this stage in the pregnancy would be illegal." That's one of a few hundred reasons. Not only is this a cruel and painful intrusion into personal lives by placing government between patient and doctor, this can be psychologically damaging (a claim some anti-abortionists make against those who have abortions, for which there is no evidence). These laws damage people's lives for no other reason than pregnancy isn't the wonderfully easy thing it is made out to be in the media. (Grokked from Chuck Wendig)

 Damn autocorrect. "Untied" is a legitimate word.

 "A 15-year-old girl was pepper-sprayed in the face Tuesday during a tense shouting match that erupted after she was groped outside a Donald Trump campaign rally in Wisconsin, local police said." So, just who is doing all the violence at the Trump Rallies?

Steve Buchheithttp://email@example.com