2021-03-02

Cool

• Mars: Nasa's Perseverance rover sends stunning images - BBC News

• "2021 marks The Lord of the Rings movies' 20th anniversary" Gandalf’s Lord of the Rings death, explained - Polygon

  What was Gandalf always smoking? Everybody who smokes in The Lord of the Rings smokes pipeweed. It’s supposed to be tobacco. It’s tobacco.

• Shilling For Big Mitochondria - Astral Codex Ten

  What was the catch? Well, several catches, really. Many users went blind. Some died horribly, apparently burning to death from the inside. Occasionally the DNP would just explode - the “di-nitro” of DNP is pretty similar to the “tri-nitro” of TNT, and it turns out that’s not a coincidence. As far as I know, DNP is the only substance to be banned by both the FDA and the Department of Homeland Security for unrelated reasons.

  (you can still buy it online for $3/pill, because the 21st century is great)

  DNP – this un-killable daemon soused in Satanic sulphur, dieting's eternal bad penny – will continue to roll back round, cooking its victims from within, cell-by-cell, igniting flesh with its Mephistophelean magic.

• How did dogs get to the Americas? | NSF - National Science Foundation

  • An early dog from southeast Alaska supports a coastal route for the first dog migration into the Americas | Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

Worthy

• Starlit Black Leopard: Capturing my dream photograph - Will Burrard-Lucas Blog

• 9/11 Truth and the Silence of the IR Discipline - David A. Hughes, 2020

  That tradition became weaponized in 2009 when Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein, recently appointed as President Obama’s head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, coauthored a paper advocating the use of anonymous government agents to engage in “cognitive infiltration of extremist groups, designed to introduce informational diversity into such groups and to expose indefensible conspiracy theories as such” (Sunstein & Vermeule, 2009, p. 205). 9/11 truth is the primary target of the paper. “Government agents (and their allies),” the authors propose, “might enter chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups and attempt to undermine percolating conspiracy theories by raising doubts about their factual premises, causal logic, or implications for action, political or otherwise” (p. 224).

etc

• Imperial County, California: 15 killed in major vehicle crash - CNN

  An SUV packed with people crashed into a semitruck in Imperial County, California, on Tuesday morning, leaving 15 dead and others hospitalized, hospital officials said. There were 27 passengers in the SUV that struck a semitruck full of gravel, said Judy Cruz, the managing director of the Emergency Room Department at El Centro Regional Medical Center.

• Vajont Dam - Wikipedia

  Throughout the summer of 1960, minor landslides and earth movements were noticed. However, instead of heeding these warning signs, the Italian government chose to sue the handful of journalists reporting the problems for "undermining the social order"

• NASA Mars Perseverance Rover Uses Same PowerPC Chipset Found in 1998 G3 iMac

  • The Perseverance rover runs on processors used in iMacs in the 1990s

• Randomised trial of coconut oil, olive oil or butter on blood lipids and other cardiovascular risk factors in healthy men and women | BMJ Open

  Two different dietary fats (butter and coconut oil) which are predominantly saturated fats, appear to have different effects on blood lipids compared with olive oil, a predominantly monounsaturated fat with coconut oil more comparable to olive oil with respect to LDL-C. The effects of different dietary fats on lipid profiles, metabolic markers and health outcomes may vary not just according to the general classification of their main component fatty acids as saturated or unsaturated but possibly according to different profiles in individual fatty acids, processing methods as well as the foods in which they are consumed or dietary patterns.

• "OLD AND BUSTED: Rock Star Destroys Guitar. The New Hotness? Guitar Destroys Rock Star!" Steve Vai held a guitar chord for so long he had to undergo surgery | Guitar World

• These 10 companies control all foods you buy

Horseshit

• Are The Recent UFO Disclosures Setting Us Up For A Mass Deception Of Epic Proportions? | ZeroHedge

• Covid is being blamed for an increase in avalanche deaths. Oh, you don't believe me? | Not the Bee

• Navy "Stand down for political correctness eval" order: THIS is just...chilling... - Nobody Asked Me...

• How Covid-19 caused a global shortage of semiconductors and computer ...

• Pandemic pastime: Filling and abandoning e-commerce shopping carts

• Delta Air Lines to pay out thousands of dollars to managers – but not to pilots

Media / Ministry of Truthy

• Election Integrity Partnership

  The 2020 election demonstrated that actors—both foreign and domestic—remain committed to weaponizing viral false and misleading narratives to undermine confidence in the US electoral system and erode Americans’ faith in our democracy. Mis- and disinformation were pervasive throughout the campaign, the election, and its aftermath, spreading across all social platforms. The EIP was formed out of a recognition that the vulnerabilities in the current information environment require urgent collective action.

• Twitter expands 'warning labels' to target misleading vaccine posts

• Dr. Seuss Enterprises Will Shelve 6 Books, Citing 'Hurtful' Portrayals

  • Dr. Seuss's complicated history as a political cartoonist

    • Dr. Seuss Books 'Canceled' Over 'Racist Imagery'

• Twitter cracks down on Covid vaccine misinformation

• Rudy Giuliani's YouTube account just got hit with a 2-week suspension. One more strike, and his channel could get ...

Identity Politics / Race Baiting

• Minneapolis Abandons Plan to Pay Influencers During Officers’ Trials

• Jim Jordan’s Call For ‘Cancel Culture’ Hearing Goes Exactly As You’d Expect | HuffPost

• Former CIA Director John Brennan: ‘I’m increasingly embarrassed to be a white male these days.’

• Cartoon Network’s ‘Anti-Racist’ PSA Tells Americans to ‘See Color.’

• When migrants come, culture migrates too

• Smith College and the Failing Liberal Bargain

• Liberal Media Scream: MSNBC’s Ali Velshi says racism defines America.

• Feb 6 Why I Quit Being a Climate Activist - VICE

  The climate movement is overwhelmingly white. So I walked away.

TechSuck

• Microsoft Confirms Windows 10 Users Can't Uninstall the Edge Browser

  + [Automate tasks with Power Automate Desktop for Windows 10–no
  additional
  cost](https://flow.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/automate-tasks-with-power-automate-desktop-for-windows-10-no-additional-cost/)
  

  • Microsoft Power-Fx: a low-code general purpose programming language

• Prices for Nvidia RTX 3000 Graphics Cards Get Insane on eBay: RTX 3080 for $2000

• Rookie coding mistake prior to Gab hack came from site’s CTO

  • Rookie coding mistake prior to Gab hack came from site’s CTO | Hacker News

  • SQL injections in 2021? That's astoundingly bad.

  • I've been pretty sure for a while that Parler and Gab were both honeypots. This makes it seem even more likely.

• Announcing the Mobile Native Foundation | by Keith Smiley | Mar, 2021 | Lyft Engineering

• Popular Weather Line App Acquired by Unnamed Buyer, Service to Shut Down Next Yr

• Apple Card Disabled My iCloud, App Store, and Apple ID Accounts

  • Apple can brick your computer if you miss a payment on the Apple card

• Yet more "AI Ethics" bullshit Google tried to silence a critic and ignited a movement

• Taco Bell owner Yum Brands buys A.I. business to improve marketing

• Risk Protection Program: Moving from Shared Responsibility to Shared Fate

  Google Cloud is uniquely positioned to change the way customers manage security risk associated with their cloud workloads by creating shared fate around security. The Risk Protection Program introduces a powerful new Google Cloud security diagnostic tool called Risk Manager, which enables customers to measure and manage their risk on Google Cloud and obtain a report on their security posture. Working with their broker, customers can use Risk Manager to send reports to AGCS and Munich Re, who in turn can leverage the reports to assess customers’ security posture and underwriting eligibility for Cloud Protection +.

  • This reads like "everyone's gonna get hacked; we have an excuse for assessing post-breach costs and apportioning them among all our cloud customers".

• Four Companies Control 67% of the World's Cloud Infrastructure

• “someone uploaded ~3500 packages to PyPI that point to a malicious URL” | Hacker News

• Xerox legal threat reportedly silences researcher at Infiltrate security conference | The Daily Swig

• Working at SEGGER Microcontroller: The question of "why?" - SEGGER Blog

  SEGGER Microcontroller stands for two points which significantly influence our future: Equal opportunity and, derived from this, the fight against climate change. I will explain why this is so important and why equal opportunity in particular also drives me personally.

  • They might work with technology there, but such things are far to crass to mention in a "why you should come work with us" pitch.

• Intel Ordered to Pay $2.2B in Damages for Patent Infringement

Economicon

• Bitcoin: Mother of All Bubbles, or Revolutionary Breakthrough

• Nike exec quits after son's trainer resale firm revealed

• What's Going On At Goldman? Another Senior Exec Just Jumped Ship | ZeroHedge

• It's not NFTs you don't understand, it's art

• Hertz Floats Bankruptcy Exit Led by Certares, Knighthead

• New ETF will track social-media-hyped stocks

• Robinhood is facing nearly 50 lawsuits over GameStop frenzy

• Berlin’s Rent Controls Are Proving to Be a Disaster

• Hey Citi, your Bitcoin report is embarrassingly bad

Poilitcks

• Neera Tanden Withdraws from OMB Nomination, Biden’s First Defeat

• Joe Biden is a China patsy - The Spectator - news, politics, life & arts

• National Guard at Capitol hospitalized: metal shavings, feathers found in meals

  Roughly 1 in 5 of the National Guard troops within the Capitol perimeter are from Michigan. Their mandate expires March 12, when Defense Sec. Lloyd J. Austin III said all troops are expected to leave the Capitol grounds.

• Watch: FBI Director Wray Testifies Before Congress For 1st Time Since Capitol Attack

  • FBI Director Wray repeatedly rebuts claims that antifa activists attacked Capitol

    Wray explained that those who participated in the breach of the Capitol fell into two main groups of violent extremists — those associated with militia groups, such as Oath Keepers, and those who advocate white supremacy.

  • another:

  Grassley: "Have you determined the exact cause of death [of Officer Sicknick], and is there a homicide investigation?"

  Wray: "Uhhh, so, I'll take the last part of your question first. There is an ongoing investigation into his death. Umm, I have to be careful at this point at this stage, because it's ongoing, not to get out in front of it. But I certainly understand, uhh, and respect, and appreciate, the keen interest, in what happened to him -- after all, he was here protecting all of you -- and as soon as our information that we can appropriately share, uhhh, we want to be able to do that, but at the moment the investigation is still ongoing."

  Grassley: "So does that mean, since the investigation is going on, that you have not yet determined the exact cause of the death?"

  Wray: "That means we can't yet, uhh, disclose a cause of death. At this stage."

  Grassley: "But you have determined the cause of death."

  Wray: "I, I didn't say that. We're not yet at a point where we can disclose or, uhh, confirm, the cause of death."

• Ethan Nordean was nominated to lead Jan. 6 breach among Proud Boys, U.S. alleges. - The Washington Post

• High Noon For The Future Of The Voting Rights Act At The Supreme Court

  + [Supreme Court Hears Landmark Ballot Harvesting, Polling Location
  

  Case | ZeroHedge](https://www.zerohedge.com/political/supreme-court-hear-landmark-ballot-harvesting-polling-location-case)

• Romney knocked unconscious, suffers black eye during fall

  • Let's Talk About How Mitt Romney Was Knocked Unconscious by Matt Vespa

• Biden hits Russia with sanctions over Navalny's poisoning in another break from Trump

• Biden administration to allow migrant families to reunite in the U.S.

World

• Nigerian governor says 279 kidnapped schoolgirls are freed

• Myanmar's neighbors press for Suu Kyi's release, restoration of democracy

• Welsh Man Arrested, Claims He Was Strip-Searched For Going For A Walk Too Far From Home | ZeroHedge

• Calls for inquiry into the death of complainant in MP rape allegation scandal

• 'Patriotism test' for Hong Kong officials shows China's growing assertiveness

• Althouse: "China Tries To Discredit Female Uighur Witnesses By Releasing Private Sexual Health Data/The officials said the information..."

• China Appears to Warn India: Push Too Hard and the Lights Could Go Out

Health / Medicine / COVID

• MISSISSIPPI GOV. TATE REEVES LIFTS MASK MANDATE FOR ALL COUNTIES

• TEXAS GOV. ABBOTT WILL OPEN STATE ‘100 PERCENT,’ LIFT MASK MANDATE

• One year ago: Officials try to calm nerves as NY reports 1st COVID-19 case

• The search for animals harbouring coronavirus – and why it matters

• The head of the CDC warned of a 'potential 4th surge' of COVID-19 cases, despite progress with vaccine rollouts

• Canada's Quarantine Hotels Backfire As People Starved | ZeroHedge

• Amid Covid-19 pandemic, flu has disappeared in the US

• Benefits from microdosing LSD might be placebo

  + [Citizen scientists show placebo effect may explain benefits of
    microdosing](https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/216134/citizen-scientists-show-placebo-effect-explain/)
  

  • A source for real LSD is hard to find and hard to trust; the market's been filled with Chinese "pLSD" analog chmicals for the last 5 years as far as I've heard.

• Eating meat could raise risk of heart disease, diabetes and pneumonia

Climate / Green Propaganda

• Cities are starting to ban new gas stations

• Bitcoin's 'Staggering' Energy Consumption Raises Climate Concerns

• Volvo to sell only all-electric vehicles by 2030

• Beyond Meat signs global supply deals with McDonald’s, KFC and Pizza Hut

Obit

• Vernon E. Jordan Jr., lawyer and D.C. political power broker, dies at 85