Althouse: Sunrise

February 26, 2023

Sunrise — 6:30.

Write about whatever you want in the comments.

36 comments:

Lyle Sanford, RMT said...: That new camera is amazing!; 2/26/23, 6:18 PM
Narr said...: Here comes the sun! Congrats on the return to the outside.; 2/26/23, 6:27 PM
wildswan said...: I am just so impressed by the phone's camera. Of course the mind's eye composes the picture but it just seems that what that eye saw is better conveyed by this new camera.; 2/26/23, 6:57 PM
Tommy Duncan said...: This is a wonderful time of year to take your dog out and explore a marsh. I'm fascinated by springs, which become very easy to find as temperatures hover around freezing during the daylight hours. The trick is to find the small patches of open water that springs create without stepping into them. The springs are usually associated with loon muck, which is a close cousin to quicksand.; 2/26/23, 6:57 PM
madAsHell said...: Has anyone else noticed the return of Wind Chill Factor in the local weather reports??

I thought SNL did multiple skits that shamed that to death!!; 2/26/23, 7:35 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Is Scott Adams Catholic?

He can always give up racism for lent.; 2/26/23, 7:44 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: There’s light everywhere in that photog.

I’m going to start paying attention to these.; 2/26/23, 7:49 PM
Jupiter said...: Interesting report out of Arizona. Testimony at a meeting of the Arizona Senate and House Elections Committees, to the effect that a large number of elected and appointed officials have been the recipients of bribes from the Sinaloa cartel. The bribes mostly took the form of sham mortgages, so their is a paper trail. Katie Hobbs received 9 of them, starting back in the 90's. Kyrsten Sinema is also on the list.; 2/26/23, 7:56 PM
Humperdink said...: In western NY, the Seneca Nation has quite a presence. Following the lead of their American counterparts, they have opened a monstrous gambling casino near Salamanca. It is a huge building on I-86. This weekend the casino had a gun show. A friend reported the line to enter wrapped around the casino and the parking lot was full. Made me laugh. The Seneca Nation encouraging the sale of "repeating" rifles to Americans. It would make John Wayne proud. In addition to separating them from their money at the casino.; 2/26/23, 8:11 PM
James said...: It's hard to tell exactly from the picture, but is that bit of water in the foreground a "vernal pool", i.e. a pond that doesn't have fish in it (usually because it dries up for at least part of the year)? If so, and if the surrounding woodlands are the right type, then it's perfect for certain very cool salamander species, especially those of the Ambystoma genus. On any warm night (45-50+ F, as long as it's been relatively warm during the day too) in March or early April you could be in for a treat to watch them migrate from the woods down to the vernal pond to breed. With any luck, you'll see spotted, blue spotted, or tiger salamanders in Wisconsin. Spotteds especially are one of those cool species whose default resting face is an adorable grin. (Okay, just looked it up, according to Wisconsin DNR, Dane County is just outside of spotted range, but in tiger salamander range. They're happy-looking little fellas too.)

Not sure what the frog situation is in Dane County, but at the very least the spring peepers should be out soon.; 2/26/23, 8:33 PM
tim in vermont said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 2/26/23, 8:52 PM
tim in vermont said...: That article on Instapundit purporting to debunk the Sy Hersh story on the pipeline just served to convince me that it is probably the actual report of. what happened.

First he says that the Norwegian Navy doesn't fly any P3 Orions, but then he points out that they have a couple that they are bringing on line, and he shows some tracks for training flights of this aircraft. I guess what he is trying to say is that there is no way that the Norwegians could have flown this plane on a top secret mission turning off the transponder, and also not until the plane was officially commissioned, so therefore open source records that no P3s flew the mission is proof that it didn't happen.

He then points out that a US P3 did overfly the spot of the explosion, within an hour of it happening... Well isn't that a coincidence... Almost as if we knew exactly where to look to see if anything had happened.

He makes a big deal about Sy Hersh correcting himself mid-sentence in an interview to hold him to the exact transcript of it, and claims that Hersh made a stupid mistake. Well, he then concedes that there was an Alta class ship during the exercises over both spots, but that it wasn't over one of them long enough, as if the CIA would find it impossible to alter an open source database that tracks our military ships. Hasn't he read the Twitter Files, as to the lengths that the CIA will go to to cover their tracks? He presents a satellite snapshot of the ship in the position that the open source track said it was at, as if that proved that the track was correct the whole time, and not just workmanlike tradecraft from the CIA.

He says that the ship had no decompression chamber to enable the dive, but Hersh said that the compression chamber was flown in by the CIA. So that's a push, at best.

He makes a big deal about Norwegian gas sales not going up, but Hersh only presented this as a possible motivation for Norway, he provided other motivations, such as the Secretary General of NATO is a former top Norwegian politician with, presumably, connections there.

He makes a big deal that the inner circle of planners were "surprised" at the idea of using acoustic controls for pipelines, when this is standard industry practice, but why would we expect top level political executives in a very tightly controlled and limited circle of people to be experts in the day to day operation of undersea pipelines?

Everything he says that can't be obviously refuted in his "debunking" comes down to nitpicking about tone of Hersh's article. I am more convinced than ever that Hersh got it right.; 2/26/23, 8:52 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: RNC Tweet claims Biden has spent 303 days — 40% of his presidency — on vacation.

"I had a stand-in, a front man... I could deliver all the lines... I'd be fine with that"; 2/26/23, 8:56 PM
tim in vermont said...: So now Burns, our beloved CIA director says that China may be willing to provide Russia with long-range drones and artillery shells.

Right now NATO is struggling to provide ammo to Ukraine, they use it ten times faster than we can manufacture it and we have already tapped stockpiles that were pre-positioned in Israel and South Korea, and are already facing 10 Russian shells for every one shell Ukraine launches. If China provides the Russians ammo, our efforts to match it are doomed from the start. China can obviously manufacture virtually unlimited numbers of artillery shells and ship it to Russia by rail.

Similar issues apply to long-range drones, which China can undoubtedly supply in massive quantities.

Will they? IDK, I am laying my bet that China is going to tell Europe and the US that if we don't stop pouring weapons and ammo into Ukraine while claiming that we are not a party to the conflict, China is going to start helping Russia, and say that they are not parties to the war either, because those are the rules, and this is a "rules based order."

China just issued a "position paper" on the war, and it was a scorching denunciation of US actions.

Europe cannot sanction China, due to the huge economic cost to itself, and it would be no picnic for the US either. Sanctions against Russia simply aren't working. Why should China fear them?

Joe Biden has blundered into a catastrophe for Ukraine, and it may be a disaster for the US as well. It didn't need to be, but he keeps doubling down as Ukraine loses. I tried to link to a substack making this point the other day that was banned by Twitter as "harmful", but I am pretty sure that blogger disappeared my comment, unless Althouse deleted it, which I doubt. These are not the actions of a confident government.; 2/26/23, 9:08 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: BTW Scott Adams says (via his tweeter acc) there's another act 3 to follow.

Apparently, the "racist rant" release has been planned and thought out.

It must be an attempt at persuasion... or something.

A trap? I love traps.

He certainly has my attention. At least for the next few days.

I'm not looking froward to having to unfollowing him, though.

I mean I've given up so much for the cause.

I can't wear khaki pants. I can't wear a red hat. I can't go near any tiki torches. I had to give up Tea because it starts with a T and you know T stands for Trump.

This racism business is really getting out of hand.; 2/26/23, 9:15 PM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: License to vandalize: "Ian Fleming is the latest author whose work will face revisions once his 'James Bond' novels are edited to remove racist language"

It's little wonder why they want to whittle down the population to a more manageable size.; 2/26/23, 9:20 PM
Caroline said...: So many layers of texture…and with light dawning, a sense of anticipation.; 2/26/23, 9:23 PM
Owen said...: Unreal depth of field. It allows you to illuminate the scene (as if with a big aperture) and yet show in sharp focus the stuff —near and far— that usually requires a small aperture.

The result is visually arresting, somehow dramatic (as if the subject were highlighted with Broadway lighting technology: look here! Look at this!).

I imagine the tech is only part of the story. The photographer’s eye, framing, patience, other skills, might matter as well.

Whatever: a lot of fun to watch, thanks.; 2/26/23, 9:42 PM
rehajm said...: Rewriting the books is way worse than burning them.; 2/27/23, 3:36 AM
tim maguire said...: madAsHell said...Has anyone else noticed the return of Wind Chill Factor in the local weather reports??

Where I am, they never went away. The latest neat new toy in weather hysteria is the cell phone emergency weather notification. Every time they’re expecting a little extra cold or more than a dusting of snow, I get a warning on my screen (that won’t go away until the “emergency” is over) to take extra precautions and stay home if I can. And I live in Canada! It’s pathetic.; 2/27/23, 4:27 AM
Lem the artificially intelligent said...: Blogger rehajm said... “Rewriting the books is way worse than burning them.”

I completely agree.; 2/27/23, 4:39 AM
wendybar said...: Lem Former Twitter Aficionado said...
RNC Tweet claims Biden has spent 303 days — 40% of his presidency — on vacation.

"I had a stand-in, a front man... I could deliver all the lines... I'd be fine with that"

2/26/23, 8:56 PM

DING, DING, DING!!! There it is...in a nutshell.; 2/27/23, 5:47 AM
Owen said...: What rehajm said. Digital tech makes the source document unstable. We are writing in water.; 2/27/23, 6:03 AM
wendybar said...: Saint Obama had a question planted to try to make the Trayvon case full of RACISM. THIS is the man who spewed, forced and made RACISM have a comeback that won't stop. YOU can THANK Obama for what he fundamentally changed America into. A Race hating divided country. HE is the one responsible, whilst he hides behind the walls of his many mansions he got for spewing his hate.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/02/valerie-jarrett-reveals-obama-had-trayvon-martin-question-planted-with-reporter-at-if-i-had-a-son-press-conference/; 2/27/23, 6:12 AM
tim in vermont said...: The Three Penny Opera is a 20th century rewritten version of The Beggars Opera from the 18th century. Discuss.; 2/27/23, 6:25 AM
tim in vermont said...: Unfortunately, AI is going to make the ideological sanitation of old works easy as pie, while dumbing them down for modern audiences, so only the most determined will read the originals.; 2/27/23, 6:37 AM
donald said...: I’ve been following the Alec Murdaugh trial. I know the area pretty well and a biker that crossed their path. He did a little courier work for the family, if you know what I mean. I had just assumed that they were your basic scumbag plantation lords that ruled over a poor local fifedom and I was right. What I was wrong about was political affiliation. I had assumed that they were typical SC Republican or Strom Thurman change of heart (That’s where the money and votes are). I was wrong. Way wrong. They’re people are the Biden’s and Clinton’s x a thousand. That’s why they were free to murder their oldest son’s gay lover, their house keeper and yeah the wife and kid.; 2/27/23, 7:05 AM
tim in vermont said...: I was a child in the '60s, and there were still remnants of the pre-automobile age around, a disused livery stable, iron post tie ups for horses along the main streets, beautiful old houses built for large families and servants. So if you read somebody like Booth Tarkington, the Indiana bard, you can get an idea about what life was really like in those days, but it does take a strong stomach to get past the racial stuff. The question is, is it better to paint it over and pretend that it never happened? I don't think so, I think that the truth is always the best option, it's not like the perception of the black characters created in the modern reader's mind by his writing is negative. In fact they end up far more sympathetic than probably Tarkington planned to make them. It's Tarkington and white society that ends up looking bad.

But try explaining this to the modern bowdlerizers.; 2/27/23, 7:25 AM
Mike of Snoqualmie said...: The Norwegians fly P-8 Poseidons, not P-3 Orions. Boeing has sold them to a number of different countries, including the U.K, India and Norway.; 2/27/23, 7:26 AM
planetgeo said...: If Ray Bradbury were alive today (I knew him) I believe he would be writing "Fahrenheit 450" as a sequel to "Fahrenheit 451," realizing that that it would be far more ominous. If the books aren't actually burned, but altered just enough to make them not quite worth burning, exactly who would be sufficiently moved to commit their life to preserving them? Nay, becoming them.; 2/27/23, 8:10 AM
NKP said...: "Ian Fleming is the latest author whose work will face revisions once his 'James Bond' novels are edited to remove racist language"

One ponders the fate of Pussy Galore. Oh, the humanity...; 2/27/23, 8:14 AM
BUMBLE BEE said...: Woody's first Covid-19 statement...
https://twitter.com/i/status/1629896607947735043; 2/27/23, 8:22 AM
tim in vermont said...: "The Norwegians fly P-8 Poseidons, not P-3 Orions."

That was my mistake, not Hersh's, from the article:

Norwegian air force a fleet of Boeing-built P8 Poseidon patrol planes to bolster its long-range spying on all things Russia.

Then he links to this article, but the link doesn't work from Hersh's substack, oddly enough. What are they afraid of? It's a lot easier to go in a futz around with "Open Source Intelligence" databases than it is to keep people from seeing stuff on the internet, and yet they try.

https://www.arctictoday.com/norway-takes-delivery-of-boeing-p-8-submarine-hunter-aircraft/

And funnily enough, this little nugget is in the above article.

"The five aircraft will replace the Royal Norwegian Air Force’s current fleet of six Lockheed Martin Corp P-3 Orions and two Dassault Aviation DA-20 Jet Falcons."

Hersh has them dead to rights, and the "debunking" posted in Instapundit in fact just strengthens Hersh's case.; 2/27/23, 8:38 AM
Rusty said...: Still going with incompetence. Until somebody can come up with definitive proof that all three were sabotaged. "Un-named sources don't cut it.; 2/27/23, 9:13 AM
tim in vermont said...: "Still going with incompetence."

Sweden did a forensic examination:

The blasts at the Nord Stream pipeline in September were caused by an act of sabotage, Swedish prosecutors said Friday after evidence of explosives was discovered at the sites by investigators.

In a statement, Mats Ljungqvist, the prosecutor leading the preliminary investigation, described the incident as “gross sabotage,” adding that “traces of explosives” were found at the scene. - CNN

https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/18/business/nord-stream-explosive-traces-sweden-intl/index.html

At this point, if you are sticking to the "incompetence" story, you are just choosing to believe disinformation in the face of evidence to the contrary. I know guess it's that hard to believe that Joe Biden would be that reckless for some people. That's Lindsay Graham's argument too, that Joe Biden is too steady a hand to have done something this stupid. If you are of the belief that Russians are too stupid to run a pipeline, you have to realize that it was 49% owned by the Germans who also ran it.

At least you are not buying the story that Russia blew it up on purpose, but that story is intended for whosoever will believe it too, just like the "incompetence" story, and the purported debunking from Instapundit.

The purpose of disinformation and agitprop is not to get everybody to believe a single false story, it's about putting enough false stories out there that appeal to different people to form a majority that reject an obvious truth. I owe that insight to Buwaya, who once made the comment about propaganda "If you don't believe it, it's not aimed at you."; 2/27/23, 11:26 AM
Jupiter said...: "Still going with incompetence. Until somebody can come up with definitive proof that all three were sabotaged. "Un-named sources don't cut it."

You know, the pipeline pairs were far enough apart that there is no way the failure of one could cause the other to fail. And yet three of the four failed at the same time, at the same place. That's some high-precision incompetence.

I'd say the only "incompetence" on display is that one of them didn't fail.; 2/27/23, 3:28 PM