2024-07-31
etc
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Butterflies accumulate static electricity to attract pollen without contact
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Why Art Sucks Now - by Devon Eriksen - Devon’s Substack
Great art is not about self-expression. It comes from the self, it is shaped by the self, it is often dredged from the deepest recesses of an artist’s soul, but the truth it expresses is shared and universal. This is why it speaks to others, not just the artist. When we look upon a fine sculpture, we see only David, not Michelangelo. When we read a great story, we do not see Tolkien, and we forget, for a moment, that Frodo and Sam aren't real. We can say Van Gogh painted one white iris because he was lonely, isolated within a crowd, but if we do say that, we care because we have been lonely, too.
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The movement desperately trying to get people to have more babies
Horseshit
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Everything I, an Italian, thought I knew about Italian food is wrong
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Matt Yglesias Considered As The Nietzschean Superman
Nietzsche’s concept of “slave morality” (he writes) is just a dysphemism for the usual morality where you’re not bad and cruel. Right-wing edgelords use “rejection of slave morality” as a justification for badness and cruelty.
Some right-wingers have responded to the piece, but their responses are mostly “but I like being bad and cruel” - which seems to prove Bulldog’s point.
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The Camera Never Moves in Tom Hanks' New Film 'Here' | PetaPixel
says that Here takes place entirely from one single fixed viewpoint. As a result, Zemeckis says that the camera never moves, zooms, or even turns throughout the 104-minute-long film — a feat that has supposedly never been done before in cinema history. “The single perspective never changes, but everything around it does,” Zemeckis tells Vanity Fair.
LimpLicks
Musk
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Tesla asks customers to stop being wet blankets about chargers
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Elon Musk posts deepfake of Kamala Harris that violates X policy
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X Suspends White Dudes for Harris Account After $4M Fundraiser
The X account for the White Dudes for Harris campaign group was suspended on Monday, apparently just minutes after its debut fundraising event raised $4 million for Vice President Kamala Harris’ 2024 presidential bid. Asked on his personal X account why the organization, which boasted over 13,000 X followers, was blocked, organizer Ross Morales Rocketto responded, simply, “Got Elon Musk scared.”
A backup account for the org launched Monday afternoon and wrote in response to inquiries that “@dudes4harris was Ross’ original account that for some reason was suspended.” That backup account was approaching 5,000 at the time of publication. The reasons behind the White Dudes for Harris account being blocked on X are still unknown, but it had many online Monday decrying election interference from the social media platform, particularly considering owner Elon Musk is a vocal supporter of Donald Trump for reelection. The tech billionaire endorsed the former president after his attempted assassination at a Pennsylvania rally earlier this month. “The ‘free speech absolutist’ has now suspended White Dudes for Harris. Presumably for raising $4 million in a few hours. The fascists are terrified. Good,” wrote one verified supporter.
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Musk said Tesla robotaxi skeptics should try FSD. A WS analyst nearly crashed
Electric / Self Driving cars
Info Rental / ShowBiz / Advertising
AI Will (Save | Destroy) The World
Economicon / Business / Finance
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Amazon Pushes Fast Delivery into Rural Areas in Challenge to Post Office (Archive)
The retail giant is expanding its one- to two-day delivery capabilities throughout the country as it seeks to boost sales in less-populated regions. Amazon is ready to tackle rural regions after years of fine-tuning its logistics systems in more dense areas of the country.
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Amazon can be held responsible for faulty goods sold on its marketplace
In a landmark order released Tuesday, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission said the agency unanimously agreed Amazon “fits squarely” within the definition of a distributor of goods, “and therefore bears legal responsibility for their recall.” As part of the agency’s decision, Amazon is required to develop a plan to notify purchasers and the public about the product hazards, as well as offer shoppers refunds or replacements for the affected products.
Gubmint / Poilitcks / Law Making
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U.S. National Debt Tops $35 Trillion for First Time - The New York Times
The leading presidential candidates, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald J. Trump, have said little about the nation’s deficits on the campaign trail, suggesting that the economic problem will only worsen in the coming years. Deep differences between Republicans and Democrats on policy priorities and resistance within both parties to enacting cuts to the biggest drivers of the national debt — Social Security and Medicare — have made it difficult to reduce America’s borrowing.
TBA 2024 / Democrats Demonstrate "Our Democracy"
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Why Kamala Harris’s Progressive Ideas From 2020 Might Hurt Her in 2024 - The New York Times
with Vice President Harris less than a week into another race for the White House, video clips of her old statements and interviews are being weaponized as Republicans aim to define her as a left-wing radical who is out of step with swing voters.
In addition to changing her position on fracking, campaign officials said she now backed the Biden administration’s budget requests for increased funding for border enforcement; no longer supported a single-payer health insurance program; and echoed Mr. Biden’s call for banning assault weapons but not a requirement to sell them to the federal government.
Officials with Ms. Harris’s campaign also said they hoped to utilize the liberal cultural fervor around her candidacy to make the election a referendum on the future versus a past Democrats argue Mr. Trump represents. Mr. Trump and his running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, have themselves been on multiple sides of many issues, not least of which is Mr. Vance’s past stance as a prominent critic of Mr. Trump.
- Kamala Sutra: The book of all the positions Kamala has advocated at one time or another.
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Don't Look Her In the Eye: Father of Harris Intern Recounts Office Horror Stories
The father, Terry McAteer, penned a 2019 op-ed recounting the horror stories from his son Gregory's short time as a public policy intern in Harris's attorney general's office. "Senator Harris vocally throws around 'F-bombs' and other profanity constantly in her berating of staff and others," McAteer wrote. "The staff is in complete fear of her and she uses her profanity throughout the day." He continued: "As Attorney General, Senator Harris instructed her entire staff to stand every morning as she entered the office and say, ‘Good Morning General.' Never once during the month-long internship did Harris introduce herself to our son … and staff was too intimidated by her to introduce him." "Gregory was also given instructions to never address Harris nor look her in the eye as that privilege was only allowed to senior staff members," McAteer wrote. "I don't know about you but this is not the workplace of someone who respects her staff. For a woman of color to have employees stand when she enters the room smacks of a bygone era that we, as Americans, deplore and find demeaning."
Trump / Right / Jan6
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Secret Service delayed Trump from taking Nashville stage after another security lapse: sources
The holdup was caused by two individuals who made their way around metal detectors inside the Music City Center where the 2024 bitcoin conference was held shortly after 3:30 p.m., according to law enforcement sources. The Secret Service said in a statement to The Post Monday night that the two were “credentialed and screened,” but were removed from the premises because they didn’t follow proper entry protocol.
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(Jul 16 2024) Trump assassination attempt: separating fact from fiction
Figuring out the position of the assassin, shows something very remarkable: both sniper teams could not see the assassin, because a tree was in the way. (Look back up, two pictures, the one with the cranes and the bleachers: see the tree, and how it is widest roughly at the height where the shooter would have been?) The shooter, however, had an unrestricted view on the podium, wherever on the roof he would have positioned himself (see dotted red line from edge roof). This explains the fact that neither sniper team did anything. They couldn’t do anything, as they didn’t see anything.
Looking at the above reconstruction, you can see that the other forklift that got hit in the hydraulics, lowering its speaker array as a result while spraying fluid from a pinpoint hole, was almost directly behind the podium, in a straight line with the shooter, further validating my reconstruction above.
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The FBI is now claiming that the Trump shooter Thomas Matthew Crooks had an unspecified "social media account" in 2019/2020 (when he was 14/15 years old) that posted "anti-immigrant and anti-semitic" content. This is not consistent with Gab's understanding of the shooter's motives based on an Emergency Disclosure Request ("EDR") we received from the FBI last week for the Gab account "EpicMicrowave" which, based on the content of that EDR, the FBI appeared to think belonged to Thomas Crooks.
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"This agency NEEDS to change, If not now, WHEN? The NEXT assassination in 30 days?"
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Acting Secret Service Chief Played Key Role in Limiting Resources for Trump | RealClearPolitics
Rowe succeeded former Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle, who resigned last week after bipartisan calls following her widely panned testimony before the House Oversight Committee. But both Rowe and Cheatle were directly involved in decisions denying requests for more magnetometers, additional agents, and other resources to help screen rallygoers at large, outdoor Trump campaign gatherings. It was Rowe’s decision alone to deny counter sniper teams to any Trump event outside of driving distance from D.C., these sources asserted.
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Where J.D. Vance Gets His Weird, Terrifying Techno-Authoritarian Ideas
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Democrats and Republicans met to wargame scenarios they say 'not unrealistic'
World
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Japan plans for more tankers imports to tackle jet fuel shortage
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Washington Post CEO accused of tricking police in UK tabloid scandal
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As for-profit health care expands across Canada, doctors are fighting back
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Radical Islamists raise £3m to buy Scottish island for new ‘homeland.’
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Violent crowd clashes with UK police after young girls killed
A large crowd of anti-Muslim protesters clashed with police on Tuesday in a northern English town where three girls were stabbed to death and five other children critically wounded during an attack at a dance event on Monday. Police said they were supporters of the English Defence League which has previously staged often violent demonstrations against Islam. The police have not given any details about the 17-year-old male suspect, beyond saying he was born in Britain, but hundreds of people gathered in the town on Tuesday. Police vehicles were damaged and set alight, and items were thrown towards a nearby Mosque. One video posted online showed the crowd chanting "we want our country back".
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Anti-Maduro protests spread as Venezuelan opposition says he stole vote.
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Venezuela's military chief claimed Tuesday that the country was facing a coup, as new protests were expected following President Nicolás Maduro's disputed victory in the weekend's election. The country's opposition leaders say they won the vote by a significant margin, and a local NGO has reported at least six people killed in unrest that has followed the official declaration of Maduro's win. Venezuela's attorney general Tarek William Saab said 749 people had been arrested amid the protests, and he warned that number could rise in the coming hours, according to the AFP news agency. Most would be charged with "resisting authority and, in the most serious cases, terrorism," Saab said.
Election officials in the tightly controlled Latin American nation declared Maduro the winner , granting him a third six-year term after the weekend election, despite exit polls that showed him losing by a significant margin, according to challenger Edmundo González and opposition leader María Corina Machado, who have claimed to have proof that Gonzalez received over twice the votes Maduro did.
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Venezuela under “Brutal Capitalism”
Jeffrey Clemens points us to some bonkers editorializing in the NYTimes coverage of the likely stolen election in Venezuela.
For a time it did. But in recent years, the socialist model has given way to brutal capitalism, economists say, with a small state-connected minority controlling much of the nation’s wealth.
Venezuela is now governed by “brutal capitalism” under Maduro’s United Socialist Party!??? The NYTimes has lost touch with reality. From the link we find that what they mean is that some price and wage controls were lifted, including allowing dollars to be used because the bolívar, was “made worthless by hyperinflation,” and remittances from the United States were legalized:
Russia Bad / Ukraine War
China
Health / Medicine
Environment / Climate / Green Propaganda
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Hybrids between two species can produce "swarms" that flourish
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How a livestock industry lobbying campaign is turning Europe against lab meat
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Atlantic current that keeps Northern Europe warm could have new tipping points
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North Sea oil and gas extraction spike pollution by more than 10k%
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Bonsucro Certified Indian Sugar From Abusive Fields - The New York Times
Much of what consumers buy is marked “sustainable,” “humane” or “green.” In the sugar cane fields of India, that papered over the worst abuses.