Althouse: At the Sunrise Café...

May 8, 2020

At the Sunrise Café...

... you can talk 'til dawn.

207 comments:

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Darkisland said...: Booka-Fe First Responder!!!

When I was downloading all the Nevil Shute books, I found a new biography of him. Shute: The engineer who became a prince of storytellers by Richard Thorn. Ann won't make a lot of money on this book at $6.99 but buy it through her portal anyway. It is a very good value.

I am aware of 4 bios of Shute including this one. Julian Smith wrote one one in, I think, the 70's. It is pretty good but focuses on Shute the writer rather than Norway the man. Somneone in Australia wrote one in the 00s but I've never read it. John Anderson wrote a pretty good one about 10-15 years ago. And this one in 2017.

This may be the best of the lot, as a general bio. Lots of detail but I wish it were a lot longer so he could have discussed a lot more. But if you want to know about Shute the writer AND Norway the engineer, he does a very good job. He refers to him as "Norway" throughout which I found a bit disconcerting at first. But, as he ixplained, Norway was his actual name. Shute, by which we know the writer, was his middle name. He was pretty well known in the aviation industry and, by 1938, head of a pretty respectable aircraft manufacturing company, Airspeed Limited. (Built more than 10,000 planes for the4 RAF in WWII) He thought a reputation for writing novels in his spare time would harm his reputation as an engineer.

I also reread The Chequer Board which was a pretty good look at race and how we think about it. Not particular heavy, it is something of a light novel with Jackie Turner going off to Cornwall and Burma to track down 3 men he had briefly been in hospital with. I had mentioned that Trustee from the Toolroom was about a quest last week. Again, I had not thought about it but it occurred to me that it is a quest book too.

What's everyone else reading?

John Henry; 5/8/20, 7:25 PM
Mark said...: Wherein we learn that Adama probably started the Cylon War that decimated humanity.; 5/8/20, 7:34 PM
Josephbleau said...: Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air:
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on.

This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper.

Thus the FBI Coup of 2016.

Sorry I put this on the wrong thread.; 5/8/20, 7:35 PM
narciso said...: I mentioned one historical horror tale by jasper kent about the battle of moscow and 1812; 5/8/20, 7:38 PM
narciso said...: Its part of a series that extends to the crimean war and the russian revolution, i only got to the second one; 5/8/20, 7:40 PM
Bob Boyd said...: I watched the first 2 episodes of the limited series, Waco on Netflix. So far, it's very well done. The actor playing David Koresh gives an amazing performance. Check it out.; 5/8/20, 7:41 PM
Darkisland said...: I am also reading 2 other books;

Cooper Creek by Alan Moorehead is about the ill-fated, but well-feted, Burke-Wills expedition. They set out with a large party to cross the Australian continent south to north from Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpenteria.

On reaching Cooper Creek, well beyond the black stump, they left much of the party and Burke, Wills, King and Grey set off for the Gulf saying they would be back in 3 months or not at all. The 3 month's having expired, the Cooper's Creek party left, assuming Burke et al had perished. In reality, the party made it to the Gulf, and back in 3 months and 1 day. Gray died on the way back. Burke, wills and King were in survivable but not very good shape when they returned to find that they had missed the main party by 1 day.

Burke and wills starved to death. King was befriended by a group of aborigines but, since aborigines lived normally on the verge of starvation, he was in really terrible shape when a search party fund him.

In the Shute bio it had mentioned Moorhead as a friend and mentioned one of his books. I couldn't find it but did find this one. I'd heard of Burke Wills expedition, it sounded interesting and is. OTOH, I probably could have found out everything I really wanted to know about it by reading the Wikipedia entry. It is in the vein of some of Burton's, Stanley'sm and some other exploring books. Not as captivating, though.

I stumbled across Manning Coles several years ago. Manning Coles is the nom de plume of English writers Manning and Coles. Many of their books are about Tommy Hambledon who is employed in some capacity by some British secret agency. Not James Bond or Scorpion. More like Buchan's Richard Hanay type.

Amazon had 4-5 of the books (there may be as many as 20 or so) and I read all of them avidly. I just found that they have put several more on Kindle. I am currently reading Dangerous by Nature and about 15% in. Tommy is in the South American country of Esmeralda and has just won a super lottery that someone else was supposed to win. The fix was in nd I don't know how tommy won, what he is up to or what will happen.

Enjoying the book immensely. 99 cents on Amazon.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 7:44 PM
narciso said...: Oh manning coles was referred in festermans long index in the gentlemen game; 5/8/20, 7:45 PM
robother said...: Can anyone explain what's happened to Drudge? He currently has about the ugliest image of Trump's mother up on his site, his Mothers Day gift to Trump. Is he a Never Trumper? Or did Soros make him an offer he couldn't refuse? It's pretty much a vehicle for MSM anti-deplorable views across the board.; 5/8/20, 7:49 PM
Birkel said...: https://www.yahoo.com/news/apocalyptic-hospitals-losing-millions-treating-100100863.html?soc_src=community&soc_trk=fb&guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly9wam1lZGlhLmNvbS9pbnN0YXB1bmRpdC8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAFPFEi8_XvTKBWSLpB5f3Wg-rLSeGgt_Ppk2FK4fV9gSkWiUVRxIMfQWQkpwjagzJliO1qqrROoOyj0NDSc70mWATgmTQs8kv8dvLUjMQKg2iLVsAn_FOihV9co44RB_fG1ekXONj8PBTtZ-B4xT9tKVynDoDiR29MEvO4Wt0fkO

Hospitals are losing billions.
We have to destroy doctors' practices and hospitals.
In order to protect the health of people.

Defend it.; 5/8/20, 7:50 PM
narciso said...: He sold out, might as well be a cylon.; 5/8/20, 7:50 PM
Jon Ericson said...: Wikipedia sez:

Business model and viewership

Revenue for the Drudge Report -- estimated in 2019 to be as high as $30 million dollars per year -- is driven by advertising that was managed for 20 years by Intermarkets, Inc. During the summer of 2019, after many years of being known for "changing nothing" about the website, Drudge advertising shifted to a "new and unknown" company by the name of Granite Cubed which is owned by Margaret and Adrian Otto. Mr. Otto is a technical director at Google Cloud. In 2017, the Ottos acquired Refdesk, a website whose founder is Bob Drudge, Matt’s father; after the purchase, the elder Drudge retired and had no further involvement with Refdesk. The current ownership, strategy and outlook for the Drudge Report is held close as private information.[56]

In the period following the changes of 2019, traffic metrics for the Drudge website were down substantially—from a 90 day-ago ranking of #632 in global internet engagement to #844 and declining in December 2019.[57] The site's readership rebounded in March 2020 as the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic escalated.[58]; 5/8/20, 7:58 PM
Josephbleau said...: I finished " The Fifth Sun" Aztec/Spanish stuff, good. Re-read the Brotherhood of War, and Corps books, they re-read well. Reading a bit about the Korean War my father in law was an infantry company commander in the 1 btn 38 inf rgt 2nd inf div Sharrah is ok in this. Like Scotty when confined to quarters for fighting Klingons, I have been catching up on my technical journals. Read the new "revealed" Heinlien, loved Deety, Hated the Martians. Got 2 A's in my part time PhD program. Will probably have no work due to cronodeath destruction of the economy. Will early retire or go booming to the gold fields.; 5/8/20, 7:59 PM
Darkisland said...: I watched two series this week

After Life is season 2 of the Ricky Gervais show that we discussed last year. I liked season 1 OK but it did not do that much for me. Season 2 I found really moving. He is still something of an asshole but he tries to be a good person. His dead wife, via video, has a lot more screen time and her character develops more. I could see why he would be so devastated.

Two thumbs up.

A Very English Scandal on Amazon had Hugh Grant as Jeremy Thorp, an up and coming British pol who is expected to become prime minister. He is gay, falls in love with a, non-gay at the time, stable boy and buggers him. He sets the stable boy up in a flat, gives him money and so on for several years. Somehow related to the affair the stable boy loses his National Health Insurance card. For reasons I don't understand he cannot be legally employed without the card and can't get it replaced.

Anyway, Thorp moves on but the stable boy keeps bugging him for a new card. Thorp won't do it because he does not want anything tieing them together. This goes on for about 15 years, it's the mid-70s, Thorp is close to becoming PM and the boy is an embarassment threating to share love letters that Thorp had written to the police.

Thorp decides that the only way out is to murder the boy. So he hires the most incompetent bunglers in history to do the job.

They all get caught, are put on trial and in a miscarriage of justice get off.

Thorp's political career is over.

But, in Wikipedia it says that in the 2010's he made something of a comeback as a senior statesman in the party.

In the epilogue, the stable boy is living somewhere with 20 cats and still does not have his National Health Insurance card.

It is rather a funny movie, well played by all. All the funnier because it seems to be mostly true.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 8:01 PM
narciso said...: In the british mysteries category

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21903372-a-song-from-dead-lips; 5/8/20, 8:05 PM
Darkisland said...: Blogger Josephbleau said...

Re-read the Brotherhood of War, and Corps books, they re-read well.

See, I knew you are a man of exquisite taste.

I am a big fan of both, though the last 2 Corps books didn't do much for me. I've read and reread the rest of them numerous times.

Ditto Brotherhood of war, though not as much.

Griffin's other books are OK but just. I wanted to like his police series but couldn't even finish the first one.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 8:06 PM
narciso said...: A fellow i knew who was with the philadelphia pd in the 70s said it was much on point, he passed on before he told me who was matt payne for instance.; 5/8/20, 8:09 PM
narciso said...: His last series was like mash in the early years of the cia in berlin theres a character roughly like the author theres a thinly disguised kissinger manque.; 5/8/20, 8:11 PM
Josephbleau said...: I never touched the Web g police books, never interested me.; 5/8/20, 8:13 PM
gilbar said...: I'm reading a book called
New Horizons
(I think )
It was made by some Cal Tech guy, for the chief of the air force, in 1948, or so
It is basically a wish list/blue print for the military industrial complex

Basically, they postulate that
A) america Always started out with No army
B) America would always wait until a war was Well underweigh before entering
C) Russia won't give us that option
BECAUSE there was no one else to fight (in 1949) , but us
D) they'd Crush us before we got going
So
E) we need an air force with Global Reach, and Global Power; 5/8/20, 8:14 PM
narciso said...: Thats why bertrand russell wanted ti preemptively nuke the soviets; 5/8/20, 8:17 PM
Lurker21 said...: Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years; 5/8/20, 8:19 PM
narciso said...: Patton also was very proactive on the matter, that may have been why they killed him; 5/8/20, 8:19 PM
gilbar said...: Prophecy Fulfilled: "Toward New Horizons" and Its Legacy,; 5/8/20, 8:20 PM
narciso said...: one of herman kahns future associates; 5/8/20, 8:24 PM
Josephbleau said...: McArthur wanted to nuke the chi coms, got him fired, all careers of substance end in failure. He should have been fired, and the Chicoms should not have been nuked, it would have empowered the deep state.; 5/8/20, 8:24 PM
FullMoon said...: Bob Boyd said...

I watched the first 2 episodes of the limited series, Waco on Netflix. So far, it's very well done. The actor playing David Koresh gives an amazing performance. Check it out.

WACO:Rules of Engagement Documentary (1997)is on Prime. Actual people,voices ,communications and video . Ya better have a strong stomach.; 5/8/20, 8:25 PM
stephen cooper said...: My guess is the biggest fish in Lake Mendota is a catfish but maybe a sturgeon.; 5/8/20, 8:26 PM
FullMoon said...: Ca Gov Newsome has determined virus started in hair salon. No shit, he actually said it.; 5/8/20, 8:26 PM
chuck said...: Caliban to the Audience

If now, having dismissed your hired impersonators with verdicts ranging from the laudatory orchid to the disgusted and disgusting egg, you ask and, of course, notwithstanding the conscious fact of his irrevocable absence, you instinctively do ask for our so good, so great, so dead author to stand before the finally lowered curtain and take his shyly responsible bow for this, his latest, ripest production, it is I–my reluctance is, I can assure you, co-equal with your dismay–who will always loom thus wretchedly into your confused picture, for, in default of the all-wise, all-explaining master you would speak to, who else at least can, who else indeed must respond to your bewildered cry, but its very echo, the begged question you would speak to him about."; 5/8/20, 8:28 PM
Andrew said...: The video of Biden's Tampa rally is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. Comedy gold.

If you haven't seen it yet, you can go to 37:00 on this video to see Biden's grand entrance. Eventually he is drowned out by a bird.

https://youtu.be/ABEE2PEfbb8; 5/8/20, 8:42 PM
Grant said...: Currently I’m reading Shalamov’s Kolyma Stories—so bleak I’ve had to take many long breaks—Metaxas’ biography of Luther, and a book of Alfred Brendel’s collected writings on music. Plus I recently went through most of Ruth Reichl’s memoirs, well written but I wound up disliking her, so there’s that. Coming up: McCullough’s Pioneers, Slezkhine’s Jewish Century, and whatever Waugh I need for a palate cleanser. Funny, Waugh used to make me feel bad, but he’s light and air compared to Shalamov,; 5/8/20, 8:47 PM
narciso said...: I read bulgakov, some puskhin some tolstoy grokked enough dr zhivago but that one.; 5/8/20, 8:49 PM
Jon Ericson said...: Chain reaction; 5/8/20, 8:50 PM
Ken B said...: I watched Waco on Netflix. It is really excellent. Clear-eyed that Koresh was a manipulative nutter but also brutal about the FBI and ATF. Just brutal, as is deserved.; 5/8/20, 8:54 PM
gilbar said...: Narciso,
Yes! i OWN a copy of Herman's On Thermonuclear war
I'd STRONGLY RECOMMEND that No read it,
If you want to keep thinking no one can win a nuclear war; 5/8/20, 8:54 PM
Ken B said...: Grant
I loved Slezkhine's House of Government.; 5/8/20, 8:56 PM
narciso said...: I read some of his later work, the point is the soviets thought nuclear weapons integral to their war fighting and so do the pla ruling councils, thats just a fact.; 5/8/20, 8:58 PM
Grant said...: Ken, I did too, that’s why I’ve teed up the Jewish Century.; 5/8/20, 8:58 PM
narciso said...: I read europa central by vollmam thats close enough tour of the bloodlands; 5/8/20, 8:59 PM
Maillard Reactionary said...: chuck: Let's see Althouse diagram that.; 5/8/20, 9:00 PM
Ken B said...: Grant
I added it to my list just now ...; 5/8/20, 9:09 PM
John henry said...: Blogger Ken B said...

manipulative nutter

Yeah, he probably was. But don't forget that our country was founded my manipulative, religious nutters. Penn, The Pilgrims, the Puritans and so on. Later Joseph Smith and the Mormons and a whole bunch of others along the way, including the founder of Koresh and my church. Elena White. Koresh did not see eye to eye with the main SDA church but he was an Adventist.

Scientoligists and global whatsit gaia wosrshipers are two other bunches of religious nutters.

I don't see what harm Koresh was doing anyone at all. All the members were there willingly. As far as I could tell they were free to leave at any time.

I've been to the site. It is waaaay out of town the townsfolk didn't have to see them or have anything to do with them.

What our government did to them was inexcusable and never should have happened.

Shame on them.

I've been thinking of watching, everyone says it is good. I see it as a suggestion whenever I go to Netflix. I haven't yet. It seems like one of those things that is going to wind me up even tighter than I already am and I don't really want that. I'll watch eventually I suppose. But I'm going to need to be in a special mood.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 9:13 PM
John henry said...: Just a reminder:

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Not few laws, NO law.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 9:15 PM
Birkel said...: The governor of New Jersey says if you don't like the way he is governing, you can leave.

I imagine the people of New Jersey are going to let him know just what a Ken B he is.; 5/8/20, 9:18 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: Blogger Darkisland said...
I watched two series this week
After Life is season 2 of the Ricky Gervais show that we discussed last year. I liked season 1 OK but it did not do that much for me. Season 2 I found really moving. He is still something of an asshole but he tries to be a good person.
. . .

I watched the first season of After Life about six months after my wife passed from cancer. I think they got the general emotional tone right. I did not become a jerk like the Gervais character, but it did take me some time to figure out how to live as a single person again. For months, the first thing I felt when I awoke in the morning was the ache of knowing she, and her love, were gone and would never return, at least not in this life.; 5/8/20, 9:25 PM
PluralThumb said...: https://youtu.be/wb_vaRGa9Ic

- Speechless; 5/8/20, 9:27 PM
John henry said...: Why are nuclear weapons so horrible as to be in a separate class to themselves?

I've never understood that.

Look at pictures of Tokyo after the Feb 1945 raids. 100m dead. Put them side by side with pictures of Hiroshima after the bomb. 90-150m dead. Not much difference between the two.

Read stories from the survivors of Tokyo. Read stories from the survivors of Hiroshima. Not much difference between them either.

It took a bunch of B-29's dropping incendiaries to destroy Tokyo. It took one, carrying one bomb to destroy Hiroshima.

Seems to me that the main difference is in degree, not in kind. And because nuke's are easier to use, 1 plane vs many or 1 missile vs many, the temptation may be greater.

I don't see much qualitative difference between nukes and conventional. Just quantitative ones.

And a stat that we should keep in mind: Every Purple Heart medal awarded since 1944 has been from the inventory built up in preparation for the invasion of Japan in 1946. And we still have a couple hundred thousand left.

As Manchester said, sitting in the mud of Okinawa, "Thank god for the atom bomb"

John Henry; 5/8/20, 9:28 PM
J. Farmer said...: @John Henry:

Not few laws, NO law.

But it also says "Congress shall pass..." When did the first amendment start constraining state governments? And through what mechanism did it apply?; 5/8/20, 9:28 PM
narciso said...: Exactly john henry, koresh was a nut a well armed cult leader, guess who didnt get the same level of scrutiny sheikh omars cell, they had an undercover agent emad salem but they left him in the dark for months 6 dead how many wounded.

Another side by side april 2000, a tendition operation against the family of a six year old boy; what was happening side by side bin ladens teams were arriving from germany from afghanistan, some were already training at flight schools 3,000 dead misplaced priorities.; 5/8/20, 9:28 PM
narciso said...: How goes it on the isle of misfit toys john henry?; 5/8/20, 9:32 PM
Inga said...: “For months, the first thing I felt when I awoke in the morning was the ache of knowing she, and her love, were gone and would never return, at least not in this life.”

That ache, that is almost a physical pain. I’m still feeling it acutely every day when I think of my son, forever 35 years old. I do find solace in the knowledge that I will see him again in the hereafter.; 5/8/20, 9:32 PM
Big Mike said...: @John Henry, if Koresh and some of his disciples really had been converting AR platforms to fully automatic fire then the ATF had a legitimate reason to execute a search warrant on the Branch Davidian compound. Except, of course, that they didn’t just show up with a search warrant, they had to stage a huge, armed raid in force with press presence (the press cost the ATF the element of surprise, by the way). And then things got out of hand, agents died, Koresh and Branch Davidians died, and children were crushed to death or burned to death. I never did read that any fully automatic weapons were found in the ruins of the compound. Except perhaps for the FBI’s guns.; 5/8/20, 9:34 PM
John henry said...: Blogger J. Farmer said...

When did the first amendment start constraining state governments? And through what mechanism did it apply?

When the 14th Amendment was passed.

When we changed from "These United States", a collection of sovereign entities "States" in diplomatic parlance to "The United States", a single country with the "states" becoming less and less sovereign and more and more like provinces.

Basically after the War Between the States, often mis-called the "Civil War".

You may or may not like it. I have mixed feelings but generally wish the states were states again and sovereign. But like it or not, that is the way it is.

PDJT seems to be trying to change that a bit. Or maybe not. He would need another 5-6 terms to make much difference in this regard even if he was trying.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 9:37 PM
Quayle said...: Ruby Ridge was also about that same time, wasn’t it?; 5/8/20, 9:40 PM
wildswan said...: Glad to hear about Manning Coles. I've checked every now and then to see if he made it onto Kindle but missed him. I'm in an English mystery frame of mind - Agatha Christie, Patricia Wentworth. I know a lot of the plots but that leaves me free to concentrate on the details of the scenes - English village life, a vanished life. Interesting and yet it was a lot like being on lockdown, only acceptable and basically more varied since they were all in place, not out of place.; 5/8/20, 9:41 PM
narciso said...: So im just comparing an contrasting btw there was a follow on plot in 93 that targeted the diamond district the fbi regional office (the inspiration for the siege, released 5 years later); 5/8/20, 9:41 PM
John henry said...: Blogger Big Mike said...

@John Henry, if Koresh and some of his disciples really had been converting AR platforms to fully automatic fire then the ATF had a legitimate reason to execute a search warrant on the Branch Davidian compound

The FBI, ATF and other federal law enforcement agencies have a 100 year history of riding roughshod over the law.

This is just another example.

General Flynn is far from unique. He is merely the most visible recent example.

Narciso mentioned Elian Gonzalez, who was another. The murder of Randy Weaver's wife was another. And on and on and on.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 9:42 PM
narciso said...: Ruby ridge was the summer before out an attempt to draw randy weaver into a sting operation, his refusal forced the summons; 5/8/20, 9:42 PM
narciso said...: Thats my shorthand you can correct any misimpressions, so how did the vaunted security services protect us, in that instance.; 5/8/20, 9:45 PM
walter said...: Blogger FullMoon said...
Ca Gov Newsome has determined virus started in hair salon. No shit, he actually said it.
--
I heard on KFI it was a nail salon...Newsome saying that's why salons can't open yet.
I wonder if that's a little too convenient...and not necessarily logical.
If it had started at a grocery store?
On the other hand, was the nail salon in Chinatown?
Looks like to get into phase 2 according to Newsome, a county needs to have 2 weeks of zero covid deaths.
LA county had 51 reported today.
Ohh kee doke then....; 5/8/20, 9:50 PM
narciso said...: How about the rest of the state santa clara county for instance.; 5/8/20, 9:52 PM
John henry said...: Still just playing with our puds, Narciso.

Still on lockdown. But at least 2 weeks ago she who must be obeyed did remove the even-odd license plate restriction. This was an order that only even license plates could be on the road M-W-F and odd plates on T-T-S. Nobody on the road on Sunday.

We still can't be on the road between 7PM and 5AM.

I have a project in Yauco next week, about a 3 hour drive each way. I am trying to find a hotel but may wind up staying with my son who lives about half-way. Not legal but I doubt he'll snitch.

I had to get a letter to let me be on the road after 7.

This whole plannedemic thing, it is a monstrous pain in the ass.

My wife, a schoolteacher, sits at home watching the TV all day. She won't even go out in the yard without a mask and the nearest house is 50 yards away. I go to the post office and come home, she makes me take a shower and put my clothes in the wash.

A couple times a day she tells me "They found another case in (town name)." She is convinced she is going to get it.

I'm convinced it doesn't really exist in any dangerous amount. The more I find out, the more pissed I get.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 9:52 PM
The Godfather said...: I've been reading:

S. Wilentz, No Property In Man -- a good antidote to the 1619 Project. It's a bit academic and not a fun read, but worthwhile if you are interested in the pre-Civil War slavery issues.

J. Scott, Against the Grain: A Deep History of the Early States. Also kind of academic, and I'm not conversant with the scholarship in the field, but it's very interesting and worth the effort.

E. Larson, The Splendid and the Vile. Churchill's first year as Prime Minister. I thought I'd read all there is about that year, but Larson brings in lots of details about what Winston's family and other close associates were doing, a lot of which was new to me. I highly recommend it.

A. Schlaes, Great Society. Note that it's not "THE Great Society". It covers that, of course, but it's really an economic/political history of the US from the 1950's through the 1970's. An excellent book. Don't miss it.

D. Epstein, The Loyal Son. Benjamin Franklin and his (illegitimate but fully acknowledged) son William, the Royalist Governor of New Jersey, who continued as a Tory throughout the Revolutionary War. An excellent book.

W. Allen, Apropos of Nothing. Woody Allen's autobiography. A disappointment (to me, anyway).

We're just starting to watch "Suits", the series that made Meaghan Markel a star. As a survivor myself of a huge law firm, I find the details of the series to be absurd, but it's much more engrossing than "Mad Men". But that's after only two episodes.; 5/8/20, 9:53 PM
Michael K said...: This may be the best of the lot, as a general bio.

If you are interested in Neville Shute Norway, you should read "Flight of Fancy" by James Riddell.

It is long out of print but worth a search. It makes the plot of most of his later novels. Riddell was a friend, not a pilot, and Norway convinced him to go along as a passenger on "Item Willy," his small plane that he flew from England to Australia. The stories in "Round the Bend" and "A town like Alice" are especially based on their experiences. "In the Wet" has some plot points, as well although that has never been a favorite. After that trip, Norway moved to Australia and the plot of "The Far Country" was another from his move. After his death, his wife moved back to England but I think his daughter stayed.

I assume you know about the society. which meets most years at a location from his life.; 5/8/20, 9:55 PM
walter said...: narciso,
Santa Clara cty had 127 reported today.; 5/8/20, 9:56 PM
narciso said...: Were relatively sane in florida weve opened beaches now stores and restaurants at 25% next hair salons and beauty parlors i know barbarians but those types of risks are what made this country. The schools are still closed a remnant of dempanic.; 5/8/20, 9:56 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: J. Farmer said...
@John Henry:
Not few laws, NO law.

But it also says "Congress shall pass..." When did the first amendment start constraining state governments? And through what mechanism did it apply?

Doctrine of incorporation, the mechanism was the 14th amendment's federal guarantee of due process. It took about 80 years for all of the bill of rights to be incorporated, I understand that the 9th & 10 amendments are in a gray area or are not applicable.; 5/8/20, 9:57 PM
walter said...: John Henry,
Sorry you can't escape the madness even at home.
And that bizarre license plate thing gives certain 2 car families a win.
Weird.; 5/8/20, 10:00 PM
Michael K said...: English village life, a vanished life. Interesting and yet it was a lot like being on lockdown, only acceptable and basically more varied since they were all in place, not out of place.

Have you discovered Andrew Wareham ? A good start is his The Privateersman, which starts a long series about the industrial, revolution. Wareham taught economic history in England for 10 years. His other series are excellent.; 5/8/20, 10:01 PM
narciso said...: Yes pearson spector was the most dysfunctional law firm since the one in la law in the 80s, mike ross was just the tip of the iceberg; 5/8/20, 10:04 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: john henry said...
. . .
Seems to me that the main difference is in degree, not in kind. And because nuke's are easier to use, 1 plane vs many or 1 missile vs many, the temptation may be greater.
. . .

I once had a dvd of the cartoons Disney made to help the war effort. One was called "Airpower" (IIRC). It came out in '44.
It was really bloodthirsty, dearth and destruction porn. It claimed the military was working on earthquake bombs that could destroy entire cities by knocking down the buildings and setting them on fire. Several approving scenes were shown of a city being demolished and set aflame. The US public was out for blood during the war.; 5/8/20, 10:04 PM
AZ Bob said...: Obama got his spin out without any push back.

He needs to be asked about the Oval Office meeting on Jan. 5, 2017, where he revealed his knowledge of Flynn’s calls.

The media is ignoring the prosecutor misconduct in the Flynn case and running to their Democrat blowhards for comment about the dismissal. The judge should hold a hearing about the failure of the US Attorney to reveal Brady evidence.; 5/8/20, 10:04 PM
narciso said...: Ah isikoff, the blind squirrel in the carter page matter.; 5/8/20, 10:06 PM
Michael K said...: I watched Waco on Netflix. It is really excellent. Clear-eyed that Koresh was a manipulative nutter but also brutal about the FBI and ATF. Just brutal, as is deserved.

I would trust nothing on NetFlix. Koresh went into town several times a week to get his mail. The FBI could have arrested him any time.

It was ATF budget time and they needed a sensation.

Same thing with Randy Weaver. Pure entrapment and the jury agreed.; 5/8/20, 10:06 PM
Arashi said...: John Henry,

I think the big difference between nuclear and conventional is that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were done by a single plane, with a single bomb. The fire bombing of Tokyo took hundreds of planes and thousands of bombs. It seems to be a scale thing. This is of course, ignoring the radiation effects of the nukes and just looking at relative destruction.; 5/8/20, 10:08 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: No new cases in the state of Hawaii today, first time in 8 weeks.
The health dept. people are saying that a 2nd wave is "inevitable," since we are slowly reopening, but I am not so sure.
On the Big Island we have two active cases, both quarantined at home, we've had no deaths. One elderly gentleman with covid-19 went to the hospital & was released the next day.; 5/8/20, 10:08 PM
Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...: Karma--Chewy, Chewy Karma!

watch a Murder Hornet get its just desserts; 5/8/20, 10:09 PM
narciso said...: We were just getting to that, next the spider hornets fron the first season of aliders; 5/8/20, 10:11 PM
narciso said...: Shirley

https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/obama-gave-pearson-publishing-350-million-to-create-commoncore-text-and-pearson-gave-obama-a-65-million-dollar-book-deal-in-return/; 5/8/20, 10:13 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: I think people get the wrong idea about the past was really like by being immersed in pop culture history.
I have a Cherokee ancestor who was in Georgia during the time of the Trail of Tears. He didn't have go, because he owned a small plot of land & paid taxes on it. He kept a few slaves. He freed and married one of them. His social status was not high, but it wasn't like he spent his life avoiding lynch mobs.
The high water mark of government-enforced racism in the US was in the 1920s, not the 1820s. Look up the history of Virginia's "Pocohantas law" sometime.; 5/8/20, 10:13 PM
Arashi said...: So the west coast is going to stay locked down until a vaccine or we get to herd immunity (Gov Newsom, who is being followed by Oregon and sadly Washington govs). But if we stay locked down, we won't get to herd immunity, and there may never be a vaccine - no one has made one for a corona virus yet.

Se we stay locked down forever? I thought we only get to herd immunity by going the Sweden route.

This is confusing, and since we do not have the best people on this, I think we maybe screwed.

At least the weather is really nice here in pugetopolis the last few days, and the vegie garden is doing well.; 5/8/20, 10:14 PM
narciso said...: Engaging in the stupidest most counterproductive strategy possible, i call it the pax strategy from serenity; 5/8/20, 10:18 PM
William said...: I think the strategy behind the terror bombing of German and Japanese cities was that it would cause the civilian populace to rise up against their government. Never happened. It may even have hardened the resolve of the populace. It seems that the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the only two bombs that had any effect on the war effort, and we've taken more flak for those bombs than for all those other bombs. Personally I'd rather be vaporized with a nuke than perish in one of those napalm firestorms, but tastes vary.; 5/8/20, 10:19 PM
AZ Bob said...: The lock down will bankrupt California if it goes on as long as Newsom wants.; 5/8/20, 10:19 PM
William said...: I think the strategy behind the terror bombing of German and Japanese cities was that it would cause the civilian populace to rise up against their government. Never happened. It may even have hardened the resolve of the populace. It seems that the atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the only two bombs that had any effect on the war effort, and we've taken more flak for those bombs than for all those other bombs. Personally I'd rather be vaporized with a nuke than perish in one of those napalm firestorms, but tastes vary.; 5/8/20, 10:19 PM
madAsHell said...: Roy Horn of Siegfried and Roy has died…….again.

  Doesn’t he always die in even years without an Olympics?; 5/8/20, 10:22 PM
I'm Not Sure said...: My wife, a schoolteacher, sits at home watching the TV all day. She won't even go out in the yard without a mask and the nearest house is 50 yards away. I go to the post office and come home, she makes me take a shower and put my clothes in the wash.

You're not alone. The wife of one of the guys I work with is just like that. He gets undressed in the garage after work and the clothes go right into the washing machine. His shoes aren't allowed in the house.; 5/8/20, 10:22 PM
narciso said...: Stargate a few years in, introduced the trust, an even deeper state than the sgc think of them as evil shield, more dangerous than the gouald. Talk about murder snakes; 5/8/20, 10:22 PM
narciso said...: Babylon 5 had a much more deeply conceptualuzed world which strazynski had sketched out for the full five year cycle.; 5/8/20, 10:25 PM
Sebastian said...: Another honest prog, Linda Hirshman:

"I’ll take one for the team. I believe Ms. Reade, and I’ll vote for Mr. Biden this fall . . . Weigh it: Won’t the good for all the Americans who will benefit from replacing Donald Trump with Joe Biden, including the masses of women who will get some crumbs, count for more than the harm done to the victims of abuse?"

#BelieveAllWomen, as long as it's useful. Useful for the real goal: prog power.; 5/8/20, 10:28 PM
Ingachuck'stoothlessARM said...: where's Pientka?
where's Atkinson?

dont say 'west coast', etc. You know what we mean.; 5/8/20, 10:32 PM
Inga said...: “My wife, a schoolteacher, sits at home watching the TV all day. She won't even go out in the yard without a mask and the nearest house is 50 yards away. I go to the post office and come home, she makes me take a shower and put my clothes in the wash.”

Wow, and they called me a panicker. What is she afraid of in the yard, in the fresh air? It must cause her tremendous anxiety when you bring groceries in the house or get a delivery. I go outside daily multiple times a day, never wearing a mask. If I go into a store I wear a mask and use hand sanitizer as soon as I’m back in the car. I have zero anxiety. News reports don’t make me anxious, neither does reading about Covid. It pays to be informed.; 5/8/20, 10:34 PM
J. Farmer said...: @John Henry:

When we changed from "These United States", a collection of sovereign entities "States" in diplomatic parlance to "The United States", a single country with the "states" becoming less and less sovereign and more and more like provinces.

Pretty amazing to think that in 1789, thirteen colonial governments created a political and economic union to facilitate free trade between the member states, represent the member states in foreign affairs, and provide for the member states collective security. It achieved these goals through rule-making, rule-enforcing, and rule-adjudicating bodies, staffed by representatives chosen in various ways by the member states.

For all the talk of the "genius" of the Constitution, it was a failure. The differences in culture and economic arrangements between the member states resulted in sectionalism and repeated political crises at the union level. These crises had already resulted in a foreign war less than 25 years after the Constitution was ratified and continued throughout the first half of the 19th century. When political reconciliation failed, the southern states began removing themselves from that union, only to have their state governments invaded, destroyed, occupied, reorganized, and then readmitted to an even more powerful union.; 5/8/20, 10:37 PM
Narr said...: City bombing by all sides in WWII eventually became a matter of terror and dehousing. Every country expected the other side's civilians (weaklings and wankers, don't you know) to freak out and give up. But nobody did, really, despite the theorists' predictions.

Overy's The Bombers and the Bombed is good on this. FWIW most critics of the Allied CBO and bombing of Japan don't really seem to grasp the essentials.

I've often mused, lost in whatiffery, about a Japanese surrender w/o A-bombs. I don't consider that likely, but imagine if you will something like a Korean War, with US and SK forces reeling back . . . and someone says, "Hey, what about those atom bombs? We could use those!"

Narr
Better to use as war-enders, I think; 5/8/20, 10:37 PM
narciso said...: In what sense were we in the majority

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2020/05/08/matt-gaetz-goes-full-wolverine-on-trey-gowdy-exposes-gowdy-and-paul-ryan-working-on-coup-effort/; 5/8/20, 10:37 PM
narciso said...: The war that arose out of the wholesale kidnapping of american citizen you blame the constitution on that, now ill grant you the invasion of canada has some shortcomings.; 5/8/20, 10:41 PM
I Have Misplaced My Pants said...: I feel so sorry for the guys with crazy wives. Mr. Pants’ boss’ wife hasn’t allowed anyone in their family to cross their front threshold for seven weeks. She reluctantly allows the children into go into the backyard. He blew the boss’ mind when he told him I’d flown with our oldest to her out of state college to clean out her dorm room.

Monday the mister gets a haircut and I get a pedicure. On the way to pick up takeout for dinner (and I’ll note the restaurant’s dining room definitely was at 25 percent; maybe a smidge over) we saw both a pickup kids football game and a teeball practice. Lots of traffic out. Our no visiting order expired and my babysitter is coming over next week so I can go to the office and get some work done. Happy that in the Republic of Texas life is slowly grinding back in the direction of normal. Just have to ignore the hysterics and panic addicts. That’s the key.; 5/8/20, 10:42 PM
narciso said...: Ok then look at the 75 years of jim crowe when we allowed that state to linger including here in florida?; 5/8/20, 10:43 PM
narciso said...: Kurt schlicter turned out to be disturbing on point, and it didnt even take a major cataclysm all we may be in one regardless.; 5/8/20, 10:48 PM
J. Farmer said...: I think the strategy behind the terror bombing of German and Japanese cities was that it would cause the civilian populace to rise up against their government. Never happened. It may even have hardened the resolve of the populace.

I agree. But I think also there was an effort to prove the efficacy and utility of using air power. It was only a little more than 20 years ago that the nations of Europe were taking their stock of young men, at the height of their creative and reproductive powers, and charging them by the thousands into a barrage of machine gun and artillery fire.

And what really annoys me is the way that this is blamed on "nationalism." Every single one of the major combatants were colonial empires. The most proximate cause was the crumbling, consanguineous Hapsburg empire desperately trying to hold onto a sphere of influence in the Balkans.; 5/8/20, 10:49 PM
John henry said...: I assume you know about the society. which meets most years at a location from his life.

Oh, I do. I founded it. It is actually no longer the Nevil Shute Society, though. Dan Telfair and some others got really into it in 2002 or so and incorporated it legally as the Nevil Shute Foundation. www.nevilshute.org

In about 96, when the web came along, I wanted to do a business website but wanted to practice on something first. There was a fellow that had some usenet pages on Nevil Shute that he was not doing anything with so I took over for him and built a website.

Then I wanted to start a newsletter so started a Nevil Shute Society Newsletter to figure out how to do it.

In 98 I mentioned that perhaps some of us could get together for dinner to honor his birthday. I figured maybe half a dozen people in some restaurant in Chicagoland.

Dan Telfair said we ought to think bigger and he organized a 3 day Centennial with 120 people from as far away as England, Australia and New Zealand.

At the grand dinner I had the privilege of sitting between his daughters Heather and Shirley. Richard Bacch and David Stephens who directed the Town Like Alice mini-series were sitting across from me.

Shirly brought, from Nebraska, a propeller that Shute had made as a student project in 1920 or so as well as the desk he wrote at and a bunch of memorabilia such as his pilot's license.

Dan Telfair did a nice writeup here http://www.nevilshute.org/abq1999.php

Yeah, I seem to recall having heard something about some sort of organization for Norwegians.:)

John Henry; 5/8/20, 10:50 PM
John henry said...: A bit of trivia:

One of the things Dan did was organize a movie festival. He tracked down copies of every movie made of Shute's books and we watched them on successive nights.

One of the movies, Landfall, has a single known copy. In the British Museum, I believe.

Someone went to the museum, convinced them to screen the movie for him, and he filmed it with a video camera.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 10:54 PM
Yancey Ward said...: "But it also says "Congress shall pass..." When did the first amendment start constraining state governments? And through what mechanism did it apply?"

The first section of the 14th Amendment, second sentence:

"No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Some people disagree, but I think this is pretty clear language- the states can't deny to its citizens the rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.; 5/8/20, 10:55 PM
Birkel said...: For all the talk of the "genius" of J Farmer, he is a failure.

I like this game.; 5/8/20, 10:57 PM
narciso said...: I only knew of him from on the beach, i didnt know his wider body of work.; 5/8/20, 11:00 PM
J. Farmer said...: @narciso:

The war that arose out of the wholesale kidnapping of american citizen you blame the constitution on that, now ill grant you the invasion of canada has some shortcomings.

The War of 1812 revealed a lot of the sectional tension that would only increase as new states were added to the union.

Ok then look at the 75 years of jim crowe when we allowed that state to linger including here in florida?

Yes, southern states implemented obstacles to black voter enfranchisement. I can sympathize with the ends, if not the means. Between the Supreme Court, the Voting Rights Act, and the Civil Rights Act, southern politics were completely realigned. A lot of the partisan sorting and hyper-polarization we see today had its origin in that event.; 5/8/20, 11:02 PM
J. Farmer said...: @Yancey Ward:

Some people disagree, but I think this is pretty clear language- the states can't deny to its citizens the rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution.

But the Supreme Court didn't realize this until the 1920's?; 5/8/20, 11:03 PM
narciso said...: No its not about partisan or hyperpolarization, this is what a laissez affaire stance to jim crowe a generation after the civil war wrought. It makes that sacrifice futile.; 5/8/20, 11:04 PM
J. Farmer said...: For all the talk of the "genius" of J Farmer, he is a failure.

I've never heard of any such talk, but that is a good example of your ceaseless battle against phantoms.; 5/8/20, 11:06 PM
Narr said...: James Loewen's "Sundown Towns" is a nice overview of the national scope of Jim Crow.

Narr
And with that I bid you a good evening; 5/8/20, 11:08 PM
John henry said...: Blogger William said...

I think the strategy behind the terror bombing of German and Japanese cities was that it would cause the civilian populace to rise up against their government. Never happened.

the British strategy in particular was to "dehouse", in either Churchill or Air Marshal Harris' words. The Brits did nighttime bombing with horrendous losses. They bombed cities because they could not hit anything smaller. Very few of their bombs got closer than a mile or two of the intended target.

It was a counterproductive policy in many ways. One thing that always puzzled me was Churchill's belief that the German "Blitz" of London and other cities made the Brits get pissed off and buy more into the war effort. Kind of the natural human reaction.

But somehow this same man expected it to have the opposite effect on the German populace.

The US, with the Norden and Sperry bombsights thought they could get closer to the target and considered the Brits barbaric for focusing on civilians.

We went after factories and military targets in daylight raids. We did get closer to the targets, half a mile instead of a mile. We killed an awful lot of civilians going after military targets. But not on purpose so it was OK.

In the daylight raids over Europe the 8th Air Force lost over 50,000 killed and many more wounded.

In the entire Pacific War the US Marines lost about 25,000 killed.

I have no moral qualms about the 8th Air Force and area bombing. Other than the fact we had no business in that war at all. But if we are in it, I am Ok with whatever it takes.

OTOH, having read quite a bit about the WWII US and British bombing campaign I have doubts about it's effectiveness as a warfighting tool. It certainly didn't put any kind of dent in German production of tanks, plane, artillery etc if production figures in the Strategic Bombing Survey are correct.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 11:08 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Just because it was an amendment doesn't mean a majority agreed with it. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it is the truth.; 5/8/20, 11:09 PM
J. Farmer said...: @narciso:

No its not about partisan or hyperpolarization, this is what a laissez affaire stance to jim crowe a generation after the civil war wrought. It makes that sacrifice futile.

The hyper-polarization was referring to the the changes in the mid-1960's. I agree that Reconstruction failed, and I don't advocate laissez-faire. But I wouldn't say Jim Crow made the Civil War futile. It achieved its two primary goals: reversing secession and abolishing slavery.; 5/8/20, 11:09 PM
buwaya said...: That you get such characters running your departments is no surprise. As governing systems of all kinds grow and get more complex, internal goals - politics - become more important than effectiveness at whatever was the purpose of the system.

That's true whether the system is public or private or a mixture of the two. It's long been recognized for instance that enterprises have great diseconomies of scale, that can persist only if there is some externally imposed competitive advantage.

You have what is probably the most complex system of governance on earth, in the usual sort of complexity, but also in many ways that have no good analogues anywhere.

This complex terrain is the natural habitat for that troublesome caste of yours. They actually expanded or created most of this complex terrain over the decades, or you can say they colonized your lands with conceptual architectures alien to its nature.

This was all a communal enterprise. Individuals don't really matter. Your problems are the result of two generations of an enemy people.; 5/8/20, 11:11 PM
Clark said...: I have just started reading Black Out, one of the Oxford Time Travel books by Connie Willis. Doomsday Book was a very good read. I had no idea it involved a pandemic when I picked it up. (It was a Christmas gift given to me by a friend who could have had no idea there was a pandemic coming. Or could she herself have learned about it from a time traveler?) The events of 1348 put our little pandemic in perspective. With the black death in mind, I am sympathetic to our attempts to flatten the curve.

I am optimistic about our county's plan to start opening up county offices. (I need to get into the Office of the Recorder to search some old deeds.); 5/8/20, 11:11 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Yes, I also am only familiar with "On the Beach". I tried starting "A Town Like Alice" soon after I had read "On the Beach", but I didn't make it far into it. This would have been when I was in the 8th grade.; 5/8/20, 11:11 PM
Yancey Ward said...: Andrew,

Please tell me that Joe Biden virtual rally is a parody of some kind? That was utterly ridiculous.

I think Biden needs to pull a Fredo and fake a COVID-19 diagnosis.; 5/8/20, 11:13 PM
narciso said...: More day walkers on the trail, today anne?; 5/8/20, 11:13 PM
J. Farmer said...: @Yancey Ward:

Just because it was an amendment doesn't mean a majority agreed with it. I know that sounds ridiculous, but it is the truth.

Especially considering that the Confederate states were forced to ratify it. A loose reading of the 14th amendment has been the source of much of the "activist judges" conservatives tend to complain about. From my limited knowledge of constitutional jurisprudence, I imagine I would be persuaded by the originalist and textualist arguments, but how exactly to apply it I haven't the faintest idea.; 5/8/20, 11:14 PM
John henry said...: Blogger Narr said...

James Loewen's "Sundown Towns" is a nice overview of the national scope of Jim Crow.

I seem to recall that Appleton WI, just up the road from Madison was a "Sundown town".

If you were black, you better not be in the town after sundown.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 11:17 PM
Sprezzatura said...: “For all the talk of the "genius" of J Farmer, he is a failure.”

Here’s three more failures for ya:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Si4iyyJDa7c; 5/8/20, 11:18 PM
J. Farmer said...: @buwaya:

You have what is probably the most complex system of governance on earth, in the usual sort of complexity, but also in many ways that have no good analogues anywhere.

Indeed. Most Americans don't even understand the system of governance. If we used a taxonomy like France's, you could say we're living in the Fifth or maybe the Sixth American Republic.; 5/8/20, 11:19 PM
narciso said...: Biden is an absurdis even pirandello wouldnr attempt; 5/8/20, 11:20 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: Clark said...

I have just started reading Black Out, one of the Oxford Time Travel books by Connie Willis. Doomsday Book was a very good read. I had no idea it involved a pandemic when I picked it up.

Doomsday Book was published in 1992 & the main action takes place around now, that is, 2020. It's funny what SF writers get wrong about the future. In Willis's 2020 there were time machines, but not cell phones. The plot hinges on episodes where certain people could not contact other people because they weren't at their desk or otherwise missed phone calls.
Willis is a very good writer. There is a plague going on in 1348 that might kill the protagonist, and the same plague, introduced by an archaeological dig, was going in the "present" of the novel. What a clever way to tie the dual plots together.; 5/8/20, 11:23 PM
John henry said...: Blogger Yancey Ward said...

I tried starting "A Town Like Alice"

A Town Like Alice is really 2 different stories. The first time I tried to watch ATLA on Masterpiece Theatre, I only made it to the 2nd ep before giving up.

The second time it came around, I stuck it out and was richly rewarded for doing so.

The first half is about a group of interned women and children being marched up and down the Malay Peninsula because the Japanese had no camp for them.

The second half takes place out in the back of beyond in Oz.

The first part is critical to the second and the book as a whole. Once I understood that, I fell in love with the mini-series and the book.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 11:23 PM
narciso said...: I would culture has degenerated much beyond politics and its a matter not of ethnicity but common courtesy and good manners, those were comsidered signs of repression.; 5/8/20, 11:24 PM
Birkel said...: If a new rule was passed that only Smug may say things that are untethered to logic or reason, I was unaware.

There is no talk of J Farmer being a genius for obvious reasons.

Better?; 5/8/20, 11:26 PM
buwaya said...: We are partially off our lock down over here. At least we can take a walk when we feel like it, though the bars are closed so no wandering around of a rainy evening half soused on Rioja, and no tapas/pinxos in a warm crowd.

When the reins are loosed, the plan is to run up the Basque coast again, to San Sébastien and Biarritz, and points between, this time in the season, which may well be one without crowds. And from there as opportunities appear.; 5/8/20, 11:26 PM
John henry said...: The second half takes place out in the back of beyond in Oz.

Where one of the interned women is reunited with an Australian POW that she thought she had seen killed in Malaya for giving the women one of the colonel's prized chickens.

It is much, much, better than I make it sound. That's why he is Nevil Shute and I am not.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 11:28 PM
John henry said...: /pinxos

Are those what we call "pinchos" here? Meat, onion, pepper, perhaps some plantain grilled on a stick?

Is that the correct spelling or is it a typo? Like Color in the US, colour in the UK.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 11:31 PM
buwaya said...: Why did San Sebastian come out in French? This is certainly a plot. The local nationalists are right. It shall be Donostia to me from now on.; 5/8/20, 11:32 PM
J. Farmer said...: @Birkel:

Better?

Well, I guess if popping in to hurl childish insults at someone because they typed something you take issue with is "better," then yeah sure. I guess we can do our usual dance of me asking you what it is I've said that you take issue with, but then I'd have to wait for you to come back and tell me it's not worth your time, you can't be bothered, blah blah blah, I'm already bored.; 5/8/20, 11:33 PM
buwaya said...: Basque spelling, x is ch

Pinxos=tapas more or less, though the selection can be different. It's more of a category than a style.; 5/8/20, 11:33 PM
John henry said...: Blogger Yancey Ward said...

Please tell me that Joe Biden virtual rally is a parody of some kind? That was utterly ridiculous.

I thought having an ear growing out the face of the woman introducing Joe was a nice touch.

I also liked the way they desynched the audio and video to force us to pay attention.

For those who didn't see it, the audio is about a half second behind the mouth. Very interesting effect.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 11:35 PM
Narr said...: Damn it--one last thing in re: John Henry's comments regarding German war production.

Yes, the Germsn were able to produce a lot of stuff despite the bombings. Partly that was because German war production did not get mobilized for Total War until Speer took over and found a lot of unused capacity. It's a myth that the German factories ran full-tilt early in the war; the Nazis allowed a lot of consumer good production, even luxuries, as long as they could and probably longer than they should have.

And what was produced was still woefully insufficient--the vaunted Tiger tanks? 1800 max.
Panther tanks? 4000 maybe. Artillery, sure, and about 50% of it pointed upward by 1944, tended by close to a million male and female soldiers. Factories dispersed and dug underground at enormous cost, and overall strategic mobility lost forever. (The US made about 49,000 tanks, and the USSR about 40,000 for comparison.)

Look at it this way. In January 1945, say, the Brits and Germans produced the same number of aircraft. The British planes were largely four-engined bombers; the German planes were single-engine fighters, with not enough fuel or pilots. In only two years (1939 and 1944) did German aircraft production exceed British anyway, and often lagged by a good margin.

And since we can't know how much the Germans might have produced without our bombing, we can't know it didn't dent their production.

Narr
Good night. Really.; 5/8/20, 11:36 PM
Birkel said...: The Founders failed.
That is untethered to reality.
The United States has outperformed every other country of which there is history.
And you call that failure.
That's dumb as dirt.

The Founders failed to (what?)
List the thing that is achievable by humans that they failed doing.; 5/8/20, 11:37 PM
William said...: I've made significant progress in my lifetime goal of finishing Chernow's bio of Grant. Slow and steady wins the day. I finished reading about his Presidency. It seems that Grant was on the right side of most issues. In his first term he made strenuous and partially successful efforts to suppress the Klan and other violent white supremacist groups. By the end of his second term, the Republican Party with the exception of a few Stalwarts had lost interest in fighting for the rights of black men in the south. Horace Greely opposed Reconstruction. Rutherford B. Hayes, Grant's successor, made a sotto voce bargain to remove federal troops from the south in return for Democratic support of his electoral college victory. Thus began the serfdom of black people in the south......Random thought: The Democrats are the party of outsiders. At that moment in time, the outsiders were the immigrants, white southerners, small farmers, etc, Black people were too far out to be outsiders. They were like furries in the LGBQT community. Blacks had only tepid support from white Republicans and none from Democrats. It wasn't their time, but Grant was resolutely on their side.; 5/8/20, 11:37 PM
narciso said...: Its like those dubbed japanese monster movies, lol. Or the ones dubbed in spanish with entirely the wrong intonation for the character.; 5/8/20, 11:37 PM
Clark said...: J. Farmer: Bruce Ackerman's We the People, Volumes 1 and 2 are must reading for gaining an understanding of why it is that we recognize the 13th and 14th Amendments as part of our constitution in spite of the fact that their adoption is hard to square with—no, that is not strong enough—in spite of the fact that their adoption did not comply with Article V. They also provide some insight into the incorporation of the Bill of Rights and why that took so long. I would not be surprised to hear that you have read these books, but if you haven't, I recommend them. (I have Volume 3, but I have not read it.); 5/8/20, 11:38 PM
J. Farmer said...: @narciso:

I would culture has degenerated much beyond politics and its a matter not of ethnicity but common courtesy and good manners, those were comsidered signs of repression.

I think this sentence may be missing a couple of verbs, so apologies in advance if I'm misreading it. The issue with our racial problem is that there are no solutions that are morally tenable and likely to be effective.; 5/8/20, 11:39 PM
buwaya said...: "Doomsday Book" is very good. It deserved its awards.

They aren't like that anymore, though the recent "Three Body Problem" is worthy.; 5/8/20, 11:39 PM
narciso said...: A test

https://dailycaller.com/2020/05/08/california-churches-reopen-defy-governor-gavin-newsom/; 5/8/20, 11:41 PM
narciso said...: Yes i saw that one as intruguing, an interesting world building exercise that isnt too polemical.; 5/8/20, 11:44 PM
John henry said...: Blogger Narr said...

And since we can't know how much the Germans might have produced without our bombing, we can't know it didn't dent their production.

We discussed this a couple weeks back when talking about Freedom's Forge and American mass production in WWII.

The Germans were never that productive, as you note.

The point I was making was not that they made a lot, but that production numbers increased every year, even into 1945.

Would they have increased even more without the bombing? Maybe. But the Strategic Bombing Survey conducted after the war posited that, by destroying the capacity to make consumer goods it allowed the Germans to increase production of war materials.

Not by enough, as you point out.

John Henry; 5/8/20, 11:45 PM
J. Farmer said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/8/20, 11:50 PM
narciso said...: They found a black hole a mere 1,000 light years away.; 5/8/20, 11:50 PM
J. Farmer said...: @Clark:

I would not be surprised to hear that you have read these books, but if you haven't, I recommend them. (I have Volume 3, but I have not read it.)

Thanks for the recommendation. I've heard of them but never read them. I read Randy Barnett's constitution book a long time, and I've read through parts of Philip Bobbitt's Constitutional Fate.; 5/8/20, 11:52 PM
narciso said...: E plebnista pluralities no longer recognize or care about civil liberties.; 5/8/20, 11:53 PM
Original Mike said...: "They found a black hole a mere 1,000 light years away."

Do you know its designation? The article I read said it was naked eye but only gave the constellation.; 5/8/20, 11:56 PM
J. Farmer said...: @Birkel:

The Founders failed.
That is untethered to reality.
The United States has outperformed every other country of which there is history.
And you call that failure.
That's dumb as dirt.

The Founders failed to (what?)
List the thing that is achievable by humans that they failed doing.

What I said was: "For all the talk of the "genius" of the Constitution, it was a failure." The primary concern with its ratification, as indicated by the federalist versus anti-federalists debates, was the power of the central government, which they feared would usurp the rights of states. They devised a variety of mechanisms, such as a bicarmeral legislature, a system of checks and balances, and a Bill of Rights, in order to constrain the size and power of the federal government.

The outcome the anti-federalist opponents of the Constitution feared is exactly what happened.; 5/8/20, 11:57 PM
Original Mike said...: https://nypost.com/2020/05/07/astronomers-find-closest-black-hole-to-earth/; 5/8/20, 11:58 PM
Birkel said...: John Henry,
The issue of resolve is an interesting one. Sure, the winners will always have been resolved to fight back. And the losers also for a time. But what lesson(s) can be drawn as to how resolve makes things better or worse for the losers or the winners?

I liked your initial comments above, that the Germans also exhibited resolve. It's an interesting point because encourages the reader to consider more than the Allied side. So thank you for that.

But the argument can be used to prove too much. It could prove no offensive strikes are worth it because it strengthens the resolve of the enemy. But that cannot be true because the cumulative effects will eventually weaken that same resolve. And as we cannot know which hair removed from the head of a man makes him bald, we cannot know which bomb won the war. But at the end we know a bald man to be bald.

Now, the number of deaths from the air campaign is a separate matter, I suppose. The costs might not have justified the limited successes of the air raids. I don't know enough about that.

Still, I do not see that precision bombing and unfettered air supremacy wins wars either. It seems that only happens after the resolve is broken. And that usually requires killing 30% of all fighting age men on the other side.

In any case, I appreciate reading your comments.; 5/8/20, 11:59 PM
Churchy LaFemme: said...: I once had a dvd of the cartoons Disney made to help the war effort. One was called "Airpower" (IIRC). It came out in '44.
It was really bloodthirsty, dearth and destruction porn. It claimed the military was working on earthquake bombs that could destroy entire cities by knocking down the buildings and setting them on fire. Several approving scenes were shown of a city being demolished and set aflame. The US public was out for blood during the war.

Victory Through Airpower; 5/9/20, 12:00 AM
narciso said...: Hr 6819, you think they would come up for a better name for it; 5/9/20, 12:00 AM
Birkel said...: Your argument that the Founders failed to fix things for all time is noted.
It falls within the "impossible to do given that humans run a government" category.

What else have you?; 5/9/20, 12:03 AM
Birkel said...: Better than all the others is just not good enough for Smug.; 5/9/20, 12:06 AM
Anne-I-Am said...: JF

Good evening. I hope you had a good day. I am envious of you going back to work soon. We just got notice that we can have no customer interactions in real life until at least 7/1. I may commit seppuku by then.

Just read the last few posts. I think failure is a strong term. Even though I am inclined to see things the way you do. When you use the world failure, it implies (to me) despair.

Maybe we can salvage things?; 5/9/20, 12:09 AM
effinayright said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/9/20, 12:11 AM
Lewis Wetzel said...: "Victory Through Airpower."
Thanks, Churchy LaFemme!; 5/9/20, 12:11 AM
Vonnegan said...: Blackout and All Clear are wonderful books! To Say Nothing of the Dog is one of the same group of Oxford time travel books and is also quite good - lighter and funnier than her other works. I confess to being a bit verklempt at the end of All Clear, but the story does draw you in.; 5/9/20, 12:13 AM
effinayright said...: Original Mike said...
"They found a black hole a mere 1,000 light years away."

Do you know its designation? The article I read said it was naked eye but only gave the constellation.
****************

Oh, for fuck's sake! Why would a black hole be visible with the naked eye! At night, to boot!!!?; 5/9/20, 12:14 AM
narciso said...: Well the singularity siphoned enough matter to make it visible or ot would be from 1020 ad they called gargantua in interstellar; 5/9/20, 12:17 AM
Original Mike said...: HR is a stellar catalog. HR 6819 is also QV Telescopii

QV Telescopii is a 5th magnitude Variable Star appearing in the constellation Telescopium. It is 760 light years from our solar system. It is a blue-white giant of spectral type B3IIIep. Its surface temperature is 20600 Kelvins - 3.6 times hotter than the Sun's - and it is 3.4 times the Sun's diameter in size. This star's total energy output, or luminosity, is 1850 times the Sun's, and it has a mass of 12.2 Solar masses.

QV Telescopii is an eruptive, Gamma Cas-type variable star of type BE. Its magnitude varies from +5.3 to +5.4, with an irregular or unknown period.

So it is naked eye, but no mention of the companion mentioned in the article. Have to look into this tomorrow.; 5/9/20, 12:17 AM
J. Farmer said...: @Birkel:

Your argument that the Founders failed to fix things for all time is noted.
It falls within the "impossible to do given that humans run a government" category.

My argument is that by the ratifier's own arguments and intents, their efforts failed. They attempted to create a system that would constrain centralized power, and it did not work. Jefferson himself did not believe he had the constitutional power to make the Louisiana Purchase. And the federal government the Constitution created ended up launching a military assault and occupation of the states.

Better than all the others is just not good enough for Smug.

It's an historical question. Why are you taking this shit so personally?; 5/9/20, 12:19 AM
Original Mike said...: "Oh, for fuck's sake! Why would a black hole be visible with the naked eye! At night, to boot!!!?"

Read the article.; 5/9/20, 12:19 AM
Lewis Wetzel said...: Birkel said...
John Henry,
. . .
I liked your initial comments above, that the Germans also exhibited resolve.
. . .

Until a week or so before VE Day, the Germans were still sending Heinkels out to bomb Britain, or try to. They had no fighter cover. Few of them made it as far as the channel. They were suicide missions, with no hope of success. But the crews still boarded their planes and went. They didn't think of themselves as Nazis out to conquer the world for the master race. They thought of themselves as patriots.
The real history of the world isn't just sticking labels on groups of people.; 5/9/20, 12:22 AM
J. Farmer said...: @Anne:

Just read the last few posts. I think failure is a strong term. Even though I am inclined to see things the way you do. When you use the world failure, it implies (to me) despair.

Maybe we can salvage things?

Like a lot of people, when it comes to the constitution, I'm pretty opportunistic about it. So for example, I think incorporation of the Bill of Rights against the states is kind of convoluted as a matter of history. But I'm fine with the Supreme Court striking down prohibitions on speech, because I am pretty close to a free speech absolutist.; 5/9/20, 12:22 AM
narciso said...: It wasnt an effective tactic, across the world there was a similar phenomenon with the shinto control regime without the a bomb downfall would have been a meat grinder.; 5/9/20, 12:28 AM
narciso said...: It goes to what is your standard, perfection is impossible because if men were perfect they wouldnt need govt consider other european powers were republics succumbed to invasion or usurpation; 5/9/20, 12:30 AM
Churchy LaFemme: said...: Well hey, apparently a nice development while I took an evening nap:

Restaurants can soon offer indoor service during COVID-19, McMaster says. What to know. Outdoor seating has been open all week, but of course this caused a cold snap that made it unpleasant. Apparently there may be another order on Monday about barbers.; 5/9/20, 12:37 AM
William said...: The salubrious effects of saturation bombing were not truly felt until after the war. Those Germans and Japanese who survived the war looked about their ruined cities and decided that maybe militarism was not the best way to make their war in the world....The Germans in WWI were not conquered militarily but rather by the starvation imposed after the Armistice. The Junkers were never discredited and were left to fester for another generation in their dueling scars.; 5/9/20, 12:37 AM
narciso said...: The germans may have overdone it, with a shortfall of training aircraft and training with wooden guns; 5/9/20, 12:40 AM
Anne-I-Am said...: JF,

I am an absolutist's absolutist. 1A, 2A. I agree with Thomas that the 2A is a 2nd class right--compared to "abortion's" penumbras and emanations, where judges are just making shit up.; 5/9/20, 12:43 AM
Churchy LaFemme: said...: The Guns Above: A Signal Airship Novel by Robyn Bennis

More flintlock-punk, though this one brings in just a bit of steam too. Think Mundy & Leary in the air, but this time Mundy is in command.

Some years ago, Josette Dupre donned male clothes and enlisted in the Signal Airship corps. Apparently this, while not common, happened often enough that the powers that be decided to semi-regularize the situation by establishing an "Auxiliary" officers rank tree beside the normal ranks, and put the women in it. The auxiliaries are strictly forbidden from flying the airships, and are supposed to be set on the ground before any ship enters combat. As the rules are completely impractical, they are widely ignored, unless someone with pull has a beef.

As our story opens, Auxiliary Lt. Dupre, her captain having been shot, has put her failing airship down, deliberately, on the enemy ranks and having squashed enough troops to turn the battle has made a bit of a name for herself in the press, which she dreads as it inevitably brings her to the attention of the commanding general in the context of stealing his thunder. In fact there is very little thunder to steal as the pointless conflict over a resource rich territory which changes hands every time a contending country recovers from the last war is going only so-so, and mostly that's his fault. Still he is fully prepared to cashier Dupre and make an example of her, and by extension all the Auxiliaries (which program he adamantly opposes), and would have done so by now if Dupre hadn't also come to the King's attention. The King is playing his own game (apparently) and personally awards Dupre a *regular* commission, and an airship to go with it.

Meanwhile young aristocrat "Lord Bernat Manatio Jebrit Aoue Hinkal" comes on screen and we aren't quite sure what to make of him. He seems like an airhead when he tries to explain local politics to a foreigner, and we first meet him in bed with a hooker. On the other hand, he kisses her as she's sleeping, and leaves her a gold coin as a tip, neither of which he has to do. In fact, he's pretty nearly broke and that tip leaves him just about enough money to semaphore to his mother to send money, and have lunch. The reply to that missive is not as satisfactory as it might be as his mother advises him to seek out his uncle, who will take care of him. Needless to say, his uncle turns out to be the commanding general and after a harrowing few minutes of almost not being able to avoid being sworn into the Army as an ensign, "Bernie" wangles an assignment to fly on Dupre's ship as an observer, and gather enough dirt on her to let his uncle end her career despite the King's aegis.

To complicate matters, the ship is, those three words designed to strike fear into any airman, a 'revolutionary new design' and the enemy is about to open a second front, a prospect totally unexpected by the commander, and not one the generally ramshackle defenses of the country can easily counter.

I quite enjoyed this, which is the start of a series (and the only one currently available). My only real complaint would be that "Bernie" wises up more quickly than is realistic. On the other hand, you wouldn't want the airhead version center stage for too
long..; 5/9/20, 12:43 AM
Jon Ericson said...: Did somebody say book thread?; 5/9/20, 12:45 AM
William said...: Sherman's March to the Sea was devastating for its era but not patch on what was inflicted on Germany and Japan. The Southerners were not truly defeated. The planter class retained its mystique. They retained their old ways and customs after serfdom was reintroduced....Total, devastating defeat can lead to a healthy attitude adjustment. After the Mongols, after they conquered Baghdad, killed every living soul in that city. Then they moved on Damascus. The Imans of Damascus after studying their holy book decided that there were no great religious objections to being ruled by unbelievers and welcomed the Mongols as their new rulers.; 5/9/20, 12:46 AM
J. Farmer said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/9/20, 12:48 AM
effinayright said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/9/20, 12:48 AM
J. Farmer said...: @Anne:

I am an absolutist's absolutist. 1A, 2A. I agree with Thomas that the 2A is a 2nd class right--compared to "abortion's" penumbras and emanations, where judges are just making shit up.

But if you take an absolutist position, then you can't hold that the 2nd amendment even applies to the state governments ;-)

I'm generally supportive of gun rights but don't have any real problems with restrictions on certain classes of weaponry (e.g. automatic weapons, RPG's, etc.). But at the same time, I think a lot of those gun nuts who think they're arsenal is going to protect them from a tyrannical government are basically casting themselves in a role-playing game.; 5/9/20, 12:53 AM
Lurker21 said...: The Constitution didn't work in so far as it didn't resolve the slavery question or prevent civil war. It also didn't work in so far as it didn't anticipate the development of a party system and create procedures that could make that work smoothly. And if the intent was to forever establish an aristocratic republic run by wealthy, disinterested gentlemen, that didn't work out either.

On the other hand the Constitution did prevent tyranny from being established here - no small achievement that. And it did work as well as could be expected to contain the growth of federal power. Does anyone seriously expect that the federal government would still be as small as it was in 1800 or 1850 or 1900? The Founders or Framers expected that we would become a nation, not a loose league of independent states. They may not have understood what becoming a nation would entail in the modern world.; 5/9/20, 12:54 AM
J. Farmer said...: @Lurker21:

I pretty much agree with your take, though I think the Union's behavior against the Confederacy was pretty tyrannical. From my perspective, a lot of the problems with the national government are similar to some of the problems with the EU. It created an internal free trade zone and put states with divergent economic interests into a single currency and foreign policy. I think it was also pretty inevitable that the nation would move westward in territorial acquisition. It could never countenance such insecurity on its western border.; 5/9/20, 1:05 AM
Anne-I-Am said...: JF,

I vacillate between thinking you are right with the role playing game and thinking, "Shit. We may need these guns." Especially given the actions of some of the Democrat governors. At any rate, from what I know of the Americans who own a lot of guns...I am not worried about those people. They may be kinda weird and role-playing geeks? But, they're not going to go around shooting people.

I am a lot more worried about our government, which has moved from Ruby Ridge and Waco to framing members of Trump's administration in order to preserve their privilege and status. Probably we will never need guns against these people. But I would rather have the people who do have those guns, including me.; 5/9/20, 1:06 AM
effinayright said...: J. Farmer said...
@Anne:

I am an absolutist's absolutist. 1A, 2A. I agree with Thomas that the 2A is a 2nd class right--compared to "abortion's" penumbras and emanations, where judges are just making shit up.

But if you take an absolutist position, then you can't hold that the 2nd amendment applies to the state governments. Incorporation of the Bill of Rights against the state governments is something that has arisen through judicial doctrine
********************

"For a long time, the federal judiciary held the opinion that the Second Amendment remained among the few provisions of the Bill of Rights that did not fall under the due process clause of the 14th Amendment, which would thereby apply its limitations to state governments. For example, in the 1886 case Presser v. Illinois, the Court held that the Second Amendment applied only to the federal government, and did not prohibit state governments from regulating an individual’s ownership or use of guns.

But in its 5-4 decision in District of Columbia v. Heller, which invalidated a federal law barring nearly all civilians from possessing guns in the District of Columbia, the Supreme Court extended Second Amendment protection to individuals in federal (non-state) enclaves."

Two years later, in McDonald v. Chicago, the Supreme Court struck down (also in a 5-4 decision) a similar citywide handgun ban, ruling that the Second Amendment applies to the states as well as to the federal government.

In the majority ruling in that case, Justice Samuel Alito wrote: “Self-defense is a basic right, recognized by many legal systems from ancient times to the present day, and in Heller, we held that individual self-defense is ‘the central component’ of the Second Amendment right.”

https://www.history.com/topics/united-states-constitution/2nd-amendment

QED; 5/9/20, 1:22 AM
J. Farmer said...: @Anne:

They may be kinda weird and role-playing geeks? But, they're not going to go around shooting people.

Oh, I agree. It's pretty hilarious how rural white gun enthusiasts are presented as some terrifying threat despite the fact that they commit practically no violence. Our gun problem is largely driven by young, urban black men. Nonetheless, I find revolutionary talk pretty laughable. If it ever got to the point of direct armed confrontation, the armed citizens wouldn't stand a chance. The state can simply deploy too much power. I think secession and separation would be a more likely outcome.

I am a lot more worried about our government, which has moved from Ruby Ridge and Waco to framing members of Trump's administration in order to preserve their privilege and status.

Remember, though, of the violence the state deploys against its citizens, a very tiny fraction of it comes from the federal government. Most of it is at the state and municipal level (e.g. police, sheriffs, corrections' officers, etc.).; 5/9/20, 1:25 AM
walter said...: Sheriffs stepping up to stand down against enforcement some of these ill informed state edicts will hopefully give the govs some badly needed pushback.; 5/9/20, 1:33 AM
J. Farmer said...: @wholelottasplainin':

https://www.history.com/topics/united-states-constitution/2nd-amendment

QED

Yeah, I have no problem with Heller. And I have no ideological opposition to incorporation, I just think it demonstrates that any manner of constitutional interpretation will include an element of opportunism. It seems to me a phrase like "nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law," involves a very broad range of interpretations.; 5/9/20, 1:36 AM
Anne-I-Am said...: JF,
You and I agree totally. My hope lies in the fact that many of the police in local jurisdictions actually are more sympathetic to the "subjects" than to the "masters."

And given that, I am really disturbed by the murder of that black man in Georgia by the ex police and his son. Really disturbed.; 5/9/20, 1:40 AM
effinayright said...: Original Mike said...
"Oh, for fuck's sake! Why would a black hole be visible with the naked eye! At night, to boot!!!?"

Read the article.
******************

I did. It says :

"Before this discovery, the closest known black hole was about 3,000 light-years away in the constellation Monoceros.**** Naturally, you can’t see the HR 6819 black hole with even the most powerful telescopes in the world.**** However, you can see the two stars with the naked eye, provided you’re in the southern hemisphere."

https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/310280-astronomers-discover-closest-black-hole-to-earth-yet

Variable stars are NOT black holes. Many variable stars are close/bright enough to us to perceive with the naked eye that their brightness changes over time. The star Algol is a good example.

The point is: a variable star is bright. A black hole is black. Using a powerful telescope we've recently observed the "shadow" of one such object for the first time. But it is NOT visible to the naked eye.: it's in a galaxy 53 million light years away:

https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/the-appearance-of-a-black-holes-shadow/; 5/9/20, 1:43 AM
J. Farmer said...: @Anne:

And given that, I am really disturbed by the murder of that black man in Georgia by the ex police and his son. Really disturbed.

I was as well. But one of the problems with hypersensitive racial activism for decades is that people become totally desensitized to accusations of racism. Add on top of that an endless parade of hate hoaxes or aggressors lie Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown turned into martyred victim of hate, and you realize that people aren't interest in injustice, per se. They're interested in standing on a dead body to make a political point.; 5/9/20, 1:53 AM
walter said...: 96% increase of Milwaukee homicides during COVID restriction.
So meh.; 5/9/20, 2:13 AM
gadfly said...: What to do for entertainment during the viral epidemic? So far, I have blown through all 62 worthwhile episodes of the "The Wire," the lastest season of "Harry Bosch," three seasons of reruns of "Fargo" - the black comedy TV series about "Minnesoota" with the Cohn Brothers plastered in the credits and a whole bunch of disappointments that I cannot now name. Prime and Hulu have gunnysacks full of junk series and movies destined to disappoint. Without current sporting events, Youtube TV has become a waste of $50 a month - but Xfinity was a $200 ticket not long ago.; 5/9/20, 2:53 AM
walter said...: You should try "Hands clean".
Right for the times.; 5/9/20, 3:04 AM
Quaestor said...: Been catching up on movies I let slide.

Watched Midway Wednesday night. It was pretty good, but Roland Emmerich very nearly ruined it with his balls-to-the-wall CGI. I was happy LCDR Edwin M. Layton got recognized for his role in that pivotal clash of arms.

Last night out of sheer boredom I ran a very minor John Wayne flick called Big Jim McLain which co-starred James Arness. The production date was 1952, so Arness was just coming off his film debut, another of my favorites, The Thing from Another World in the title role. The script takes many opportunities to point out the Duke's imposing height, ergo the title. However, Arness was evidently at least four inches taller than Wayne, even Wayne wearing a Bogart-style fedora. It's a completely forgettable flick about cops and commies action shot on location in Hawaii, which easily convinced me the whole megillah was an excuse for a long island vacation for Duke and Company. But it had one thing going for it — amongst the cameos of real Hawaiian personalities playing themselves was Captain Edwin M. Layton, the real McCoy portraying himself as the chief Naval Intelligence Officer of Pearl Harbor, basically, the same job he had June 4th through the 7th, 1942. The coincidence of seeing an actor in the role of Layton on Wednesday night and the real man in the role of himself on Thursday night was quite Jungian in its scope. Synchronicity happens to me with astonishing frequency.

Getting back to Midway, as usual, Hollywood takes some pretty gross liberties with history, showing us a version of the battle with Nagumo as the inept and jaded villain who gets his fleet deservedly sunk and Enterprise's VB-6 squadron (Dick Best, really) taking the hero's laurels singlehandedly. Thankfully there's still room for a real movie about Midway, something along the lines of Richard Fleischer's Tora Tora Tora. Watch it and enjoy, but read some real history, will ya? Professor Gordon Prange did a good job, but he relied on Mitsuo Fuchida far too much. Also, read Shattered Sword. Not as well-written as Prange's Miracle at Midway but more accurate.

The third movie I've watched this week was a wonderfully surreal and bittersweet comedy about a fully indoctrinated ten-year-old Nazi with a very special imaginary friend. Do see JoJo Rabbit. It's a Quaestor Number One with a Bullet pick.; 5/9/20, 3:08 AM
Kassaar said...: Sunrise, sunset
Sunrise, sunset
Swiftly fly the years

Zeer vrij naar het Chinees

De zon komt op, de zon gaat onder.
Langzaam telt de oude boer zijn kloten.

- Cees Buddingh’ (1918-1985)

Very freely rendered from the Chinese

The sun rises, the sun goes down.
Slowly the old farmer counts his balls.; 5/9/20, 4:15 AM
buwaya said...: All episodes of the 1960's "Combat" are free on Youtube. It holds up today especially in the quality of its scripts, though not quite so much in the production. This thing was much more about the people than the bang-bang though. Vic Morrow was a great actor who should have done more.

And Amazon Prime has the Spanish "Alatriste" TV series. These are based on Perez-Reverte's novels about his 17th century swashbuckler. There was of course a 2006 film with Viggo Mortensen, and the series does overlap a lot with that. Generally, the film was much better produced, and had better actors (Viggo's Spanish is excellent, but slow; he makes a better Alatriste per the novels, a silent smoldering sort), but as it squashed together from three novels so its rather busy. The TV show isnt bad at all though.

The "Alatriste" film is complete and free on Youtube btw.; 5/9/20, 4:25 AM
Mark said...: 'Sheriffs stepping up to stand down against enforcement some of these ill informed state edicts will hopefully give the govs some badly needed pushback.'

Funny, when people talk about sanctuary cities here, ignoring the law for tour political beliefs is not cited as a good thing.

Hypocrisy has funny bedfellows; 5/9/20, 4:43 AM
Rory said...: "Hypocrisy"

Again, the Constitution specifically reserves power over matters related to naturalization to Congress.; 5/9/20, 5:34 AM
Rory said...: Batman has the classic "Hizzoner the Penguin" this morning. Batman runs for mayor.; 5/9/20, 5:52 AM
Iman said...: Basque spelling, x is ch

Pinxos=tapas more or less, though the selection can be different. It's more of a category than a style.

Any chance those pinxos are culinarily focused on ovine testicles?; 5/9/20, 7:18 AM