T is for Trump and also for trash

Torching the country,  its burning to ash.    

My impromptu couplet on the corruption.

Saturday Night Radio Drama - Gordon Pengilly - Bailey's Way: Simply Judy

 Simply Judy 

 

Written by Gordon Pengilly, Bailey's Way stars Esther Purves Smith as Tanis Bailey, a young rookie constable on the the Calgary Police Service determined to make’Detective’ just as soon as she can. 

David LeReaney as Sergeant Mann 
Grant Linneberg as Detective Donaldson

Introduced by Bob Boving 

I was going through some thumb drives and found the mp3 of Gordon Pengilly's excellent radio play,  Seeing in the Dark which won a prize from the BBC.  Unfortunately the transfer of the recording of the BBC production was taken down so I can't repost that.  I'd like to. 

I also can't post any of his plays that I've only read but never saw a production of, a number of them for radio, which is my favorite form. I'd love to hear some of those I haven't heard.   I have always liked his work.  He wrote the series Bailey's Way for the CBC's Mystery Project so I've decided to post those over the summer, starting tonight.  

I Suppose It's Too Much To Hope For What With Our Stupidly Written First Amendment In The Hands Of Our Corrupt Supremes

THERE IS A FAINT GLIMMER OF HOPE for those of us who value the truth and honesty and just basic correct information against lies,  self-interest and online slop, not that it will survive the US Supreme Court's usual BJ prostitute servicing of the billionaires, millionaires and "corporate persons" but a court in Germany has held that the part of Google that is giving even we the unwilling "AI" search results are liable for lies it throws out to the world.

Potentially impacting all AI search engines and chatbots known to poorly paraphrase source links, a German court has ruled that Google is liable for false statements in AI Overviews.

The preliminary ruling came in a case flagged by The Decoder, where two publishers found that Google’s AI Overviews incorrectly linked them to scams and other sketchy business practices. After smearing publishers by making affirmative statements like “Yes, [it] is known for dubious business practices and is often perceived as a scam,” Google failed to correct the misleading output, even after the publishers sent a cease-and-desist letter earlier this year.

Google tried the usual arguments to shield itself from liability for false statements in AI Overviews, such as arguing that most users understand that AI outputs aren’t always accurate and must be verified.

But the court found that, unlike traditional search engines that merely present lists of links to third-party statements, Google’s tool made “independent, new, and substantive statements” based on its own misinterpretation of links on the Internet.

That’s a problem, the court said, because while publishers may have been able to sue to stop third parties from publishing defamatory statements appearing in Google search results, only Google can correct the underlying algorithm and outputs displayed in AI Overviews. And because, at least initially, the company did not, it therefore “must be held accountable,” the court ruled. Beyond that, Google’s argument was deemed particularly weak, since the AI overview in this case “contains statements that do not appear in the search results at all.”

All but the most tech savvy of those who have favored so-called "artificial intelligence" and those they have gulled among the public have the most magical and unrealistic view of it and its potential and that includes virtually every tech billionaire, individually or clustered into malignant herds of them and their tech goons.  Their view of it more influenced by sci-fi, sci-ranger cultism, scientistic, atheist-materialist ideology or just the typical greed that has fed many a stock market bubble.   

Other than the successful use of "AI" for some highly technical things, like scanning cell samples and imaging to look for signs of pathology, most of it is commercial crap fueling the approaching and disastrous pop or the current bubble the world economy is sitting on.  That is concerning but, as I've noted, the use of "AI" to destroy real information in favor of slop, truth in favor of lies,  oligarchic propaganda over everything else, is destroying equality and democracy as well.   

Whatever parts of Google who still care about responsibility and not being evil - remember that slogan? - should buck the "AI" mania and shut it down and get it out of their search engine.   I might go back to using it if they did that, with it, no.   They're going to take a hit when the bubble bursts which,  I think, given the eagerness of the tech billionaire oligarchs trying to dump their stocks in IPOs all at once, is about to happen, they might want to at least mitigate the disaster for their company by publicly trying to get shut of it.   

But back to "AI" that libels companies and, no doubt, individuals making the corporations, billionaires and millionaires liable for their algorithm's lies here in the land lorded over by the lawyer-liars on the Supreme Court,  I wouldn't suggest you wait up nights or hold your breath.   Those Supremes love them some billionaire-millionaire lying.   They have for at least sixty four years.   I hope in other countries without our out of control Court they can keep the truth alive because it's got little chance here. 

Note:  You can, of course, use it to tell the truth or, at least, something closer to the truth than, for example, the American "free press'" version of things.   I would, by the way, include the Iranian use of "AI" generated cartoons to hurl against Trump in that.   Though they certainly wouldn't be interested in turning it against the dictatorship in Iran, once the Israeli-American war on them stops.   If we live that long. 

Hey, Anyone Working For The Platner Campaign

 you have my full permission to use this or a snappier variation of this, informally or formally, to get him elected.

ANOTHER UPPITY BLUE COLLAR MAINER FOR PLATNER

Considering The Media Were OK With Trump's Known Adulteries And Those Of Countless Other Rich Women And Men

including Susan Collins' maybe their going after Graham Platner is a class issue.

After writing this, I wondered how many stories per day have been filed about the "scandals" of Graham Planter as opposed to past and proven sex scandals with an added boost of hypocrisy, like Henry Hyde's adulterous affair as he was chasing after Bill Clinton's sex life,  Newt Gingrich's dumping of his first wife for the woman he was having an affair with as she was fighting cancer.   And that's not to mention the many, many stories that are never touched in the media when it's a member of their own profession posing as a moral arbitor.  

I wrote about Mika Brezinski's hypocrisy in questioning whether given his known minor issue of talking dirty with consenting adults online, if Graham Planter had the moral purity to go after Donald Trump for his Epstein involvement.   She could have certainly asked Susan Collins that same question,  Susan Collins is known to have been involved with her husband as his previous wife was fighting cancer which is a lot sleazier than the "scandal" that has blown up against Graham Platner's online sexy TALK.  Which his wife and he have reportedly worked through PRIVATELY and he stopped doing it.    It's reported that Collin's husband, who she was seeing for quite a while before, divorced his wife while she was ill.  Exactly what Newt Gingrich did to his first wife. 

And then there's the reemergence of Donald Trump's old pro liar, Kellyanne Conway who lied about what he's accused of WHILE WORKING FOR THE KNOW EPSTEIN CLASS #1 GUEST STAR IN THE EPSTEIN FILE,  THE MAN WHO MIKA AND JOE GAVE PHONE CALL SEGEMENTS TO ON THEIR MORNING SHOW AS HE WAS A KNOWN ADULTERER RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT AT A TIME HIS KNOWN FRIENDSHIP WITH EPSTEIN DURING THE PERIOD OF EPSTEIN'S KNOWN CRIMES  WERE PART OF THE PUBLIC RECORD.  

And, as mentioned last night, the media who is going after Graham Planter to put a general sense of unease around him IS FULL TO THE TOP OF REPORTERS, OPINION SCRIBBLERS, EDITORS, PUBLISHERS AND RIGHT ON UP TO OWNERS WHOSE OWN MORAL HISTORIES DISQUALIFIES THEM FROM THROWING THE FIRST NOT TO MENITION THE NEXT STONES IN THAT REGARD.   Everyone from David Brookes and his dumping his first wife for a far younger woman, to the likes of Rupert Murdoch whose fortune was, in no small part, built on peddling pornography,  the soft core titty pics to the hard core stuff.  And with his known history.  

I remember while I was studying medieval and later history in high school and college that it was striking how the monarchs and nobility and aristocracy and, yes, the clergy were such notable adulterers, fornicators, rapists, etc. whose sexual sins were known but who seldom to never suffered the consequences  meted out when the same became known of among the peasants.  The same is certainly true in American history in which the rich and famous and connected had sex with whomever they wanted to,  most famously Thomas Jefferson who raped at least one of the young girls he kept in slavery - the very crime of Epstein and Trump and the billionaires Epstein serviced - but who will be lionized as he is every 4th of July.   And what he, as a member of the Southern aristocracy did, was common practice, so common that it was remarked on how many of the children among the enslaved looked like family members of their enslavers - one of the reported attractions of the girl Sally Hemmings to Jefferson was that she was almost the spitting image of his late wife - we can be in little doubt as to why that may have been. 

But the same thing that is commonly accepted and acceptable when it is known to be done by the rich,  both men and Women,  certainly in the media class - itself now an appendage of the show-biz industry which is like a pack of dogs or herd of cats in perpetual heat is presented as having no moral disqualification at all.   It's hilarious for Republicans of any kind to be pretending to get the vapors about this, considering how many of its biggest figures have really sordid histories,  Ronald Reagan and his Hollywood past, Newt Gingrich who, like Trump, seems to have committed adultery with all of his wives - the present Mrs. Gingrich was screwing him while he was married and while she was a choir member at the National Cathedral - several of Gingrich's replacements as Republican Speaker's of the House including Denny Hastert who is known to have been a serial pedophile sexual abuser who is the highest member of the government to have ever served a prison sentence.   The present Republican caucus as well as the Trump regime are full of sexual sinners, likely sexual criminals as a number of them are either suspected of or known to have been in the Epstein class.   Then there's their gentleman's agreement policy on the likes of Lindsay Graham and many others who, if a Democrat shared their sexual history, they'd go after hammer and tongs. And don't forget the several accusations that the current Judiciary Chairman, Jim Jordan knew about the sexual harassment going on against his wrestling team members at Ohio State while he did nothing about it.   I'd like to know the monthly percentage of stories about that as compared to the coverage that Graham Platner has faced.   I'd put years to weeks that the media firestorm over Platner has been far heavier and more concentrated. 

I think they're going after Graham Platner on the basis of him being a blue collar man from a small state, someone who from an early age grew up doing physical labor, who went into the military as a means of advancement and who went back to physical labor.   It's certainly an issue of class and, not improbably, him not coming from a place like New York or California or Virgina or even Ohio.  Certainly a likely issue in the NYT's  treatment of him.   It was one of the things that was certainly part of the media's sandbagging of the man who may well have been our most moral president,  Jimmy Carter whose Georgian farmer origin was likely an issue for the media elite, as certainly was Bill Clinton's Arkansas origin was in their willingness to make his history an issue.   Susan Collins, as a guaranteed to never vote against the financial interests of the Epstein class and the big media moguls, is given a pass in that regard.  

There is more than a little it of outrage among the national media that their hit job on Graham Platner doesn't seem to have worked and, if my observation, shared with many others may well have driven up the Planter vote in Maine, it increased his support. It also may be the final hurrah of the influence of the traditional big media outlets like the Times and the cabloids.   I hope that's right because it will certainly mean that at least a lot of Mainers have seen through their games and their self-interest and snobbery.   Maybe it's because we've experienced the snobbery of so many elites from away who have colonized Maine.  Especially those from the NYC area.   I think they look on Graham Platner as an uppity rustic.  One who doesn't aspire to be their handmaid like Susan Collins has so reliably been. 

Mika and Joe And The Rest of The Mainstream Media Had No Trouble With Their And Trump's Adulteries As They Gave Him Free Air Time In 2016

HEARING THE ADULTERESS MIKA trying to push the "scandal" of Graham Platner and consenting adults talking dirty online WHEN SHE AND HER HUSBAND AND COUNTLESS OF THOSE IN POLITICS SHE AND THEY HAVE NOT GONE AFTER FOR THEIR ADULTERIES AND MUCH, MUCH MORE makes me think maybe Graham Platner should only go on TV to be interviewed with only those who are not only celebate but who have led lives of total chastity. 

Good luck finding anyone in the media or in politics who isn't an actual adulterer.   

I'm not going to wait for Graham Platner to make us in Maine giving a giant FUCK YOU! to the mainstream media a plus for his campaign,  I'm going to leave no opportunity to push that as one of the things we can accomplish by voting him into the Senate by a landslide.    So, fuck you, Mika, Joe, NYT, etc. all of you FILTHY RICH Republican-fascist oligarch tongue bathing hypocrites. 

The Things I Do For This Blog!

SOMEONE WANTED ME TO look at a video of the guy I used to call The Blessed Virgin Benny,  that annoying, screechy voiced dweeb,  Ben Shapiro.   I won't bother with the content,  it's racist crap.  

Now, I don't listen to those who annoy me very often, especially those whose content is worthless and predictable,  so I hadn't noticed before.   He very much reminds me of another massively annoying Republican-fascist adjacent vidiot,  who has very similar style and look and presentation and total wave of BS content.   

Is it just me or has anyone else noticed that Little Benny and Nick Fuentes have a hell of a lot in common?  I mean other than the racism and generally fascist adjacency?   Maybe it's the incel vibe with both of them.  

Take Into Account That All Of This Is A Product Of Speech HATE SPEECH And It's Freely Allowed Under Liberal Democracy

 

It's January 6 style organized goons attacking neighborhoods and cars and,  as Owen Jones says,  it's spread freely by the Reform fascist party, other facsists,  in the British media and on Musk media. 

Imagine what they could do if they had a Second Amendment and the level of gun ownership that we have here.  

Going No-Tech As A Way To Fight Back? Big Tech Will Try To Keep You Endentured

JUST READ about a small tractor manufacturer in Alberta,  Canada that is making the kinds of tractors that everyone I know would like to have,  one which has no computer tech in it that makes you, in effect, a renter of a tractor you paid for, in full, because John Deere or some other big name in tractors put such proprietary computer code in it which you have to buy back to fix the damned thing.   All farmers who own such equipment are, in a way, tenant farmers.  Anyone with any experience of tractors know that a farmer spends a good deal of time having to fix a tractor or, if they'r unfortunate enough to have one new enough,  paying a tech working for the company they bought it from because no one else is authorized to fix it and you can get into a lot of trouble if you bypass that crooked monopoly.   I hope that the Alberta company, or others taking their cue from them, start making tractors for smaller scale farmers who don't have a hundred thousand or so to drop on buying their tractors.  Things are tough enough for farmers without that problem.

The same goes for car manufacturers and everything else that crooked, billionaire acquired companies have done to turn ownership into subscription,  one of the reasons that I'd never have owned a Mac and one of the reasons I dumped Windows after one of their Windows 10 mandatory "updates" that completely crashed my computer, that of all of the other Windows users I talked to the same day.   And that was before the Windows 11 subscription enslavement of Windows users. 

Looking at the rumblings around Linux these days,  I get the feeling that big-tech is trying, through controlled politicians here and elsewhere, trying to thwart and destroy the alternatives to the big tech operating systems and freeware.    California's "Age verification" legislation has supposedly good goals of protecting underage computer users,  though it's an absurd idea and about as easily skirted by the minimally savvy computer users under the age of 16.  What it really does is place ruinous burdens on Linux operating system developers who are generally doing it for nothing with minimal to no resources, and Linux developers of low cost or freeware applications.   Buffy Wicks, the California Assembly member behind the legislation, who allegedly wrote it,  has taken lots of big tech oligarch's campaign money, as well as those from such scams as the "charter school movement."*   

I don't think it's paranoid of Linux developers and those of us who use Linux to be deeply suspicious of such legislation,  which I will bet most of the legislators voting on it gave minimal attention to.  All they had to hear was that they'd be tarred with not "protecting children" and that was enough for them to vote for it.   You can be certain that when the financially interested corporations and their oligarchic owners and their hirelings among lawyers and PR flacks and other associated liars are planning things like this,  if they can wrap it in "protecting children" or "free speech" (ha!) or other knee jerk words, they can get politicians to vote for them out of fear of what their next campaign opponent or some troll farmer can spread about them.  These days they don't have to farm trolls, they can do it with bots. 

But I'm not going to point out that the biggest reason for all of the dirty money pushing dirty laws, such as those that don't allow farmers to fix their own tractors or get independent - and far less expensive - technicians and mechanics to fix THE TRACTOR THEY BOUGHT TO OWN is the Supreme Court's corruption of a. making corporations "persons" with all rights and privileges of, you know, real, natural, limited People and b. such things as making money = "speech" one of the biggest reasons that PACs and Super PACs have corrupted our law and our politics to the extent that it has.   If that original clean-elections legislation passed more than fifty years ago had stood, the oligarchs might have come up with other means of corrupting our elections - they still had the original corruption of Sullivan that invented the media's "right to lie" - but the ones that dominate us now wouldn't exist or, at least, wouldn't dominate as they do.   As Buffy Wicks' career shows,  if you have billionaires and multi-millionaries and they can give freely,  the politician can pretend they're not taking dirty money but getting it from the oligarchs directly.   

Did they write the legislation she introduced, what is their motive for doing that?   Does anyone really believe it's going to protect children from online porn and hate speech and online crooks?   That is apart from the corporations that have their hand in the pocket of anyone who, in reality,  rents their software or equipment.        

*Here, from the East Bay Democratic Socialists' FAQ about her.

What does Buffy mean when she says she takes no contributions “from corporations”?

Buffy’s campaign is awash in corporate cash. That includes money from the bank accounts of:

• Corporate billionaires (like LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman)
• Corporate employees who make concerted donations (like Ron Conway and other employees of SV Angel)
• Corporate trade associations (like the California Association of Realtors)
• IEs funded with corporate cash (like “Govern for California”)

That’s why the audience at the October 2 League of Women Voters debate broke out in laughter when Buffy said “Jovanka and I are, I think, two of very few candidates in the state of California who have chosen to take no corporate money in this race.”

What Buffy actually means is that she hasn’t taken money directly from the bank accounts of corporations. Her website makes a far narrower claim: “I have not accepted contributions from corporations in our campaign.”

That’s a dodge—as The Atlantic explains, “more of a political maneuver than anything else.” Like many corporate Democrats who have begun rejecting checks from corporations and their PACs, Buffy isn’t “actually rejecting corporations’ resources”—as this website illustrates in detail.

We don't think it matters much whether a donation comes from a corporation’s checking account or its CEO's personal bank account. We're concerned about the billionaires spending big to change the outcome of our elections, and about what policies—anti-worker, anti-tenant, anti-patient or anti-student—they hope Buffy will support in their interests.

Red Norvo Trio - Move

 

Red Norvo - Vibes
Tal Farlow - Guitar
Charles Mingus - bass

For some reason Tal Farlow videos started showing up in my sidebar yesterday.    

They Don't Know Us

 

You Know Of Course I Have To Pursue It

I HAVEN'T BEEN ABLE to find the late Stephen Jay Gould's review of Jeremy Rifkin's book Algeny,  I've got some of Gould's books but the one in which that review is reprinted, Urchins In The Storm,  I read my brother's copy of.  He's not sure if he still has it, if he does it's in some box of books somewhere.   I couldn't find it online.

The thing I saw in the Wiki article on Rifkin yesterday that set off my curiosity was this:

Rifkin's work is controversial due to a purported lack of scientific rigor in his claims as well as some of the tactics he has used to promote his views. These include claims that the theory of evolution is a product of "19th century industrial capitalism" . . . 

I don't know if Gould's criticism of Rifkin has anything to do with that but if you clean up the all too common confusion which conflates "evolution" with Darwinism* (and I'd bet you easily 95% of evolutionary scientists regularly conflate them) there can't be any case made that Darwinism, that is the theory of natural selection IS NOT a product of 19th century capitalism.   Darwin, himself made the connection as strongly as possible by saying 

"I happened to read for amusement Malthus on Population, and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on from long-continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under these circumstances favourable variations would tend to be preserved and unfavourable ones to be destroyed."

From his Autobiography

As can be seen all through Darwin's and his disciples' scientific writings, the notions of what is "favourable" and what "unfavourable" is everywhere tied in their imaginations to human ideas of economic utility, often mistaking that as everything to do with nature.   Darwinism, natural selection, is inescapably a product of a very specific kind of human imagination since its working and presence and even existence is entirely invisible.   It has not, once, been seen to be at work in the divergence into a new species in nature (nor could it, the time that would take) apart from some story made up by some scientist or popular writer or the like.   There is a reason Gould accurately criticized his scientific and ideological opponent's Sociobiology and, worse, evo-psy as "Just-so stories."  though those he favored did that all the time, too.

Malthus, who gave the good news to the aristocracy that they were favored by nature,  was one of the most influential economists in early capitalism, both in academic scribblage and babbleage and in the fomenting of some of the worst law and policy ever since,  and one whose theory, which was based entirely on the artificiality of human made laws and not on the observation of nature,  couldn't be more tied to the creation of the theory of natural selection.   Though it is reported online that Darwin's co-inventor of natural selection, A.R. Wallace was influenced by Malthus' theory in HIS line of evolutionary theory, at least at the end of his life he was decidedly not a Malthusian nor was he a eugenicist.  If you read the interview with him,  The Last Great Victorian, you'll see that his line of theory was entirely swamped by the Malthusian-Darwinist line of it.  No doubt Darwinists would see that as natural selection at work, no matter how artificial it is in reality. 

The Malthusian nature of most of the dominating strains of evolutionary science, all the various "Darwinisms" that have risen, briefly flourished and then been carted off to the boneyard of discontinued science, is deniable only if you're determined to be willfully ignorant of that fact.  I will pursue trying to find out if Gould was at times that willfully ignorant.  He was certainly a vigorous critic of the consequences of that fact being a dominant one in his own science but the idea that it wasn't the dominating factor in all Darwinian theory and its application in eugenics - even today in the putrid and absurd recapitulation of it in "Darwinian economic" theory that got lots of People killed during the Covid pandemic - was as wrong when he wrote that passage in the 1980s as it has been ever since Darwin wrote his On The Origin of Species. 

I'm loathe to buy a copy of Algeny and would bet any copies that were in any of the public libraries I have access to would have probably gone where even such important books do, into a book sale.  I used to love to find little circulated books that didn't have a return date stamped on them for a century while looking in the stacks but that's not how modern libraries are run these days.   You want a book to be available, put it in Archive.org or Project Gutenberg or some such online source.   

* What is pretty securely certain is that modern species and untold numbers of species in the past evolved from other species, though what is and what isn't a closely related "specie" is hardly well defined, though those farther separated in "evolutionary time" are very well defined as at least different species.  Evolution is as firm a fact as exists in science, natural selection is not, at all, a fact nor even securely defined as a theory.  I have come to believe it is entirely a product of human imagination, one based, in fact, on late 18th and early 19th British aristocratic economic theory.  

Wish I'd Said That

 "AI is this years Beanie Babies for billionaires."  

I HATED THE BI-CENTENNIAL hype and hoopla fifty years ago.   We'd just come off of a terrible war and a terrible scandal in Watergate, and Ford had pardoned Nixon so the biggest criminal in both was getting off.   His associated criminals were, to some extent, getting some punishment for their part in Watergate though the bigger criminals, such as Kissinger, weren't even in any real danger for their war crimes and genocidal scale killing.   1976 was not a year for celebrating the "American experiment" as it was called.   I already saw the real nature and potential disaster of Buckley v Valeo, one of the landmarks in the destruction of American democracy - after all I'd seen the role that media lies and campaign ads had played in putting Nixon in the presidency in 1968.  That year was my start in understanding the real nature of "free press-free speech" which included media lying for profit with impunity. 

When one of my mother's cousin's housebreaking was breaking up as he went into a nursing home - they had no children and no siblings and my family were the ones they turned to - some odds and ends came my way.  One was a fake leather folder with a $2 bill in it from the bicentennial year - the kind of crap they peddled in the Parade Magazine - they were suckers for such touted investments.   Her mother read the Record American (aka "the little picture paper") after all.  Loved aunt May but she would believe anything.  I looked up the value of it last year,  yeah, it was worth $2 in 2026 dollars so, according to an online calculator of the value of money:

$2 in 2026 is worth $0.34 in 1976

I wish I knew the amount that my mother's cousin paid for postage and handling and the, no doubt as advertised "real leatherette display folder."   I don't know if that enhances the worth of it as an object, though I doubt it. 

About the only good thing I can think of that came from what the surprisingly still active Jeremy Rifkin called "the buy-centennial" was the New World Records lable, which started to put out many fine and some not as fine, LPs of American music, classical, jazz, "experimental."  It somewhat diminishes my pleasure in it that it was started with a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation - I don't much trust anything with that name associated with it but it was only a grant.   And they took in the sadly discontinued Composers Recordings Inc, the venerable CRI label which issue many fine and fascinating recordings of American composers.  And some not as fine though interesting in an antiquarian way, if you're interested in now obscure American composers.   Some of that obscure music is very good and would enrich the musical scene if it was played from time to time.   I wonder if any of my old CRI LPs have increased in value.  I took good care of them. 

Update:  I never read Rifkin's controversial book Algeny which apparently got even the leftist Darwinists like Stephen Jay Gould pissed off at him - the Wiki article on Rifkin quotes his scathing review.  I'd be curious to see if his critique of Darwinism has any relevance to mine and how the claims of the scientists who objected to his book match current biology.  Forty years ago they were making all kinds of claims in evolutionary biology that have fallen into a state of desuetude as much as much of the conventional biology in my high school bio textbook - many of those which became the reigning ideology of biology  Gould, himself, was in the business of debunking.   

The Legacy Of Charlie Kirk In One Motormouth Moron

 

An Answer On The Clintonization Of Platner To Get Susan Collins Back In

The corporate media, from the New York Times down through the TV networks, the cabloids and right down to the neo-Nazi online garbage is an engine for inventing Democratic "scandals" of exactly this kind.  And they wonder why fewer and fewer normal People trust them.   Scott Pelley is acting like what Weiss and the Ellisons are doing at CBS is some new outrage - as the more than $100 million dollar, three decades and counting "investigations" of Hillary Clinton WHICH HAVE PRODUCED NOT ONE INDICTMENT OR CONVICTION OF HER proves,  they've ALL been doing it for decades now.   And that case is only one in dozens I could name. 

As Great A Speech As Has Been Given In The United States

 

I Have A 19th Century

Irish nun's pectoral cross that has a skull and crossbones on it that looks like that.  Unfortunately,  I don't know what order my great, great aunt belonged to and anyone in my family who could have told me that is long, long gone to their final rest- it came down through my maternal grandfather's side of the family so the only thing I can tell you is it would have been an order in Ireland.  

It looked a lot like this, one of literally hundreds of antique nuns' pectoral crosses with a skull and crossbones in that position you can buy online, except there is black wooden inlay that forms the cross, the metal work sign, nimbus and skull and crossbones look identical to the one on my great-great aunt's cross.

There was no Nazi party when it was made and worn,  that may have been as much as a generation after her.  I have no idea what my grandfather's aunt thought about anything,  but I know it was nothing like that. 

I recalled seeing skull and crossbones associated with American military companies and units and looked that up.   Holy shit!  It would have been virtually impossible for any young, callow person in the American military, or that in many, many other countries to have not been surrounded by such images.  This Wiki article "Skull And Crossbones (Military) had many interesting things in it, INCLUDING THAT THE BRITISH SUBMARINES OFTEN FLEW THE "JOLLY ROGER" AFTER THEY'D SUNK A NAZI VESSEL!   No doubt the sophisticates at the NYT would call them crypto-Nazis, at least they would if they figured they could get a Republican-fascist Senate that would lower their taxes or give them other things they want. 

The Nazis took over that symbol which had previous German use in the military,  but it hardly had any patent or copyright on it.  

This is a response. 

UPDATE:  One of the things I am absolutely certain of, absolutely positive about is that since being called out on this is embarrassing to the "reporters" and editors and owners of the New York Times they will not drop it, they will double down, maybe drying out Modo* long enough so she can get in on it, or Bret Stephens or any of the other "opinion journalist" lying hacks at that rag.   They may not destroy Platner's chances in the election, other than the minority of voters her "from away" who think the NYT is sacred and hallowed,  I think most of us would be more inclined to believe it was lying for Collins and a Republican Senate than to believe it.  What they're hoping is that they will create an aura, a vibe of unrespectability surrounding him which will, they hope, thwart his chances of success, either in the election or, if elected, in the Senate.  Like the dopey 30 something kid I know who doesn't know anything much but knows he's not supposed to like Hillary Clinton, though when pushed to say why, he couldn't so much as bring up e-mails or  Benghazi, and he'd certainly never heard of Whitewater or, probably even how SHE was held to be at fault when Bill got a BJ FROM AN ADULT WHO SAID SHE WENT TO DC TO GIVE HIM ONE. 

By the way,  just for those two fake Republican-fascist-NYT and other media "scandals" for which Hillary Clinton was investigated FOR YEARS,  it cost us way more than $30 million dollars TEN YEARS AGO!

And that was just what we know the Congress and other government agencies spent on that.  

I briefly looked for an estimate into what the investigations into the ginned up Whitewater affair was and was surprised to see a figure far higher than the $40 million I remember reading:

From its inception in 1994 to its conclusion in 2000, the Whitewater investigation, spearheaded by a series of special prosecutors and independent counsels, accrued immense costs. Estimates suggest that the total expenditure neared $70 million, a figure reflective of the extensive legal efforts, staffing, and administrative overheads required to sustain the investigation over six years. This exorbitant sum included substantial payments to legal experts, independent counsels, and numerous other administrative expenses.

It's impossible to figure out if that includes the money that was spent on Ken Starr and other's chasing after Bill's womanizing.  And it doesn't seem to include all of the Congressional, FBI, Do"J" spending.    

And that's only official government spending.  Billionaires and millionaires hired and paid off many to investigate and make claims against her and her husband, for whose cheating on her SHE WAS BLAMED!

And in the past three and more decades of these investigations - apparently the current Republican-fascists in Congress want to reopen them - NOT A SINGLE CRIMINAL CHARGE HAS BEEN LAID AGAINST HER, NOT A SINGLE CONVICTION AGAINST HER HAS BEEN GOTTEN.  

She is, beyond any doubt, the most investigated, most exonerated human being in American history and I would bet, human history.   And the goddamned New York Times was in thick as thieves with the Republican-fascists the whole time. 

By the way, this satirical send up of Dowd after her self-reported pot bender is about as perfect an example of parody as I know of.   I detest that skank. 

This Is About The Republican Political Operative Who Worked For the Heritage fascist Foundation And Helped

Susan Collins make her excuses for voting for Brett Kavanaugh  upon whom the NYT based its sandbagging reporting about Graham Platner.

You can hear it in her own words. 

The NYT has to be held accountable for its Republican ratfucking now and for literally decades in the past.   If it were 1972, they'd probably be doing it for Nixon working with Gordon Liddy and his goons. 

Graham Platner Could Soon Be The Most Vetted Member Of The Senate If This Keeps Up

THE WORD UP HERE IN MAINE is that the woman who made the NYT published allegations about Graham Platner being "rough" with her is a Susan Collins supporter but it wouldn't surprise me.   According to the Bangor Daily News, hardly famous as a liberal paper here:

Platner campaign has called Fifield, who works for a conservative group, “a longtime GOP operative who’s dedicated her career to electing Republicans.”

“She’s the person who’s been telling people this from the beginning,” Platner said on Thursday, referring to the claim that he knew about his chest tattoo.

If that is accurate,  the NYT basing any part of its reporting on what she claims just shows what a rag the NYT is and that its credibility should have gone with its history of sandabagging Hillary Clinton shortly before the 2016 election WITH FALSE REPORTING as it should have decades earlier with its similar reporting of lies and innuendos and clearly Republican favoring "reporting" and "opinion journalism."    I have pointed out for decades now that Hillary Clinton, among her other accomplishments, IS THE MOST THOROUGHLY INVESTIGATED AND EXONERATED PERSON IN AMERICAN HISTORY,  the goddamned NYT was some of the worst of those hurling everything they could against her and it all proving THROUGH TENS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS OF CONGRESSIONAL AND "JUSTICE" DEPARTMENT INVESTIGATIONS, PROVING IT WAS FALSE.   They're doing the same thing, in a smaller way, against Graham Platner. 

What them trying to get Susan Collins back in is protecting the Sulzberger's and other mega-rich NYT connected millionaires and billionaires stake in the Republican-fascist tax giveaways, as, indeed, their role in sandbagging Joe Biden with lies and innuendo were.   

Graham Platner has, also, released the fact that he exposed his infamous tattoo, which he and I'll bet easily 99% of normal American's would think was a "skull and crossbones" at his brothers' wedding to a Jewish Woman, in front of her Jewish family, and pointed out that he'd never have done that if he knew that it was also associated with Nazism.    To most Americans a skull an crossbones are more likely to be associated with pirates and, or so I was told BY SOMEONE FROM MAINE WHO'D NEVER HEARD OF A TOTENKOPF

WITH AMERICAN FOOTBALL TEAMS!

Army, 

Nebraska, 

East Carolina,

I could go on, and on with the use of a skull and crossbones in American logos, symbols, play, etc. without any of it having any implications of Nazism. 

In looking online to see something I've never looked into before,  what those suggesting kew-el tattoos are representing a skull and crossbones as meaning, here is what the young, callow and, by his own admission, drunk soldier may have thought it was saying:

The skull and crossbones tattoo is a classic design that has stood the test of time.

This tattoo often represents danger or a rebellious spirit, appealing to those who want to showcase their edgy side.

The image depicts a striking skull with crossbones beneath it. The clear lines and dark ink give it a traditional feel, reminding us of pirate lore and adventure on the high seas.

Many people choose this design for its symbolism of mortality, strength, or even just a love for the pirate aesthetic.

Platner points out that with their full knowledge of his tattoo - something which was checked for - the military and American government cleared him of having no such implications.   

The goddamned corporate media outlets, OF WHICH THE NYT IS ONE, is gunning for Graham Platner because they don't want Democrats to take the Senate and put their further moneygrabs at risk.  They also don't want any kind of Court reform that will risk the most openly corrupt and corporate and oligarchic and racist Supreme Court since the 19th century having its New Taney Six majority swamped or investigated for its blatant, quid-pro-quo selling of decisions - NOT that that was ever really in question from the Leonard Leo, Federalist fascist Society listed New Taney Six.  

Anyone who puts any trust in the NYT is as stupid as anyone who would put any trust in FOX Lies or the Sinclair group.   They're taking dictation from Republican operatives, for fucksake. 

Gildas Boclé Nelson Veras "How insensitive"

Radio plays aren't the only thing I've neglected to post much of since Trump II began.   

The other day I was thinking about how Andrew McCabe was about the only G man I could think of who I respected at all,  and today I realized that he kind of looked like one of the men I found very attractive, Gildas Boclé who is also one of my favorite bass players.  I don't think that's the reason I respect Mr. McCabe, that was because of his integrity and honesty.   Though the looks don't hurt.  I look at them and think,  oh, to be younger, sort of, again.   I guess that's a pride month themed post, if not a true confession.   My personal life doesn't get much more tabloidy than that. 

I also found on an old drive three much earlier Youtubes of duo performances of Gildas Boclé and the spectacularly fine guitarist Nelson Veras,  which aren't online anymore.   Back then Nelson Veras was playing with an enormously long thumbnail on his right hand.  It's kind of strange looking but he played spectacularly well.   I didn't buy one of the wonderful Godin nylon string electrics that he played but I did buy one of their much less expensive parlor guitar models, the Motif.   If you buy one, string it with lighter gague strings than it comes with, it's a great guitar but my bridge came off during a dry spell.   It's a good guitar but that was a real pain in the neck. 
 

Landon Reid Has Given Me So Many Laughs This Year That I'm Featuring Him for Pride Month

HERE IS HIS instructional video on how to reproduce Kristi Noem's makeup look.

As you may remember, when those pictures of Bryon Noem's play time balloon breast pics were made public,  I said that if he watched Landon Reid's videos he'd have done what is so seldom done in drag, managing to look classy.   I've learned more about makeup in the past several months than I ever knew (or wanted to know) and it's pretty impressive how much someone so young does know about that and many other things.   I've also posted from his series of creepy conservative men who go into his direct messaging because they mistake him for a woman.  I'll post some of those too over the next few weeks. 

Just for the record, he identifies as a gay man who dresses in drag, not a Transwoman.   I used to wonder why drag artists so seldom went for a classy look or, even more so, why they never went for the "woman who wears sensible shoes" look.   I'd like to see what he'd do in that latter regard as he has mastered the classy drag look.   For the record, you find those in his "Creepy Conservative Men Who Come Into My DM Because They Think I'm A Woman" series.   Not in this one where he reproduces the look of right wing Women and men, most of whom are rich or would be rich trash.  

Many Happy and SOBER Returns Of The Day Hunter Biden

I LOVE HUNTER BIDEN  and have nothing but contempt for Jake Tapper.   

Keith Edwards' video from late last night, in which he reads Hunter Biden's tweets saying he recently celebrated his seventh anniversary of sobriety,  for which I will praise Mr. Biden for publicizing.   With all the cultural AND EVER MORE SO COMMERCIAL encouragement to use addictive substances and engage in addictive behaviors,  I SAY WE NEED ALL THE POSITIVE PRESENTATION OF SOBRIETY AND NON-ADDICTION AS POSSIBLE.   Figured I should say that after the topic of yesterday's first post. 

Many happy and sober returns of the day,  Hunter Biden.  Sobriety is such a better life than the opposite.  We need for everyone to hear that truth being told.  

He also goes after that asshole, Tapper, who went after Dr. Jill Biden for her book which contradicts his piece of crap that claimed Joe Biden was mentally disabled,  something that asshole, Tapper, doesn't do in the same way that the media doesn't do much for the most clearly mentally ill, and now also demented and dangerous president the United States has ever had. 

Before going on more, here's the video. 

If he used a 2028 run to go after Republicans and hammer them in his generally clear headed way,  and he promised at the start to support whoever DEMOCRATS chose to run,  I'd be in favor of it.   We need someone to run other than Gavin Newsom, who does not have the backs of the destitute and the poor and wouldn't be good on clawing back the jillions given to billionaires.   That's a deal breaker for me.  Though I will vote for whoever the Democrat is because I know whoever the Republicans run will be far, far, entirely far worse.   Something the legacy media, including cabloid crap, would only be too happy with,  aged expat Hollywood heartthrobs who have the money to bug out to a vineyard in Provence, too.  

Jasmine Crockett Knows How To Handle Lying Hucksters And Will Be Missed Due To Supreme Court Encouraged Gerrymandering

 

Libertarianism Was Tried And Found To Be A Disaster, That's What's Known As The 18th And 19th Centuries

Thrasaline -   What if a toy take 'em i'th' heels now, and they run all away, and cry the Devil take the hindmost?*  Beaumont and Fletcher: Philaster; Or, Love Lies a Bleeding

AS A CRITIC of the kind of "classical liberalism" which takes its meaning from the 18th century "enlightenment"  instead of the earlier Scriptural meaning which was based in liberal provision for the destitute and poor and unfavored, the weak of mind, etc.  one of the things I most despise about it is the lie that people are to always be taken as "rational actors" or "rational agents" and that the law, the legal system and politics is to always pretend that they are and every choice they make is to be considered in terms of a formal contract.   

What that is is lawyer-lies to argue that those their wealthy clients entrap, rob, destroy through unillegalized theft and enslavement are merely giving those pretended to be rational agents what they want.   Well, in some cases that is arguably the case though in those cases when corporations and individuals use that most notably successful but not all that insightful areas of psychology, the PR industry, to tempt, lie, gull, entrap and fleece People who are vulnerable, lawyers, judges and, ultimately that most corrupt body of all US lawyers, "justices" pretend to not understand exactly what is going on.  They simply take the attitude "not my problem" a they act for the crooks and con men, those whose business is based on even the worst of conning, entrapping, robbing and destroying those on the basis that those vulnerable to those consciously used tactics are "rational agents" even though the entirety of human history proves that is a lie.   That was understood from time immemorial as the story of Eve being gulled by the snake and Adam, the dope, going along with it is the quintessential model of that.  

I have told you about the People in my family destroyed by alcoholism,  I suspect nearly every family has closer or more distant relations about whom that same story could be told.  I didn't tell you of my sister whose death was certainly hastened and made worse by her inhalation of second-hand smoke from her husband and, tragically, enough, her children.   And now I have another family member, an adoptive nephew,  who I found out yesterday has fallen victim to online gambling to ruinous, perhaps eventually, suicidal effect - we're worried about that.   I won't go into details except to say that I strongly suspect he's not going to pull out of it,  he's the kind who is vulnerable to such things.   I know this won't get back to him so I'll tell you that much. 

That was one of the things I disagreed with the late Barney Frank about more strongly than many other things we disagreed about, in looking for quotes from him in support of his notable and, I hold,  infamous support for that dangerous, non-productive, and known to be addictive industry, a quick Duck Duck search for that showed that gambling sites and magazines widely noted his passing as a champion of their industry.   I'll pass by most of what I read to give you some of this article that show what I mean in terms of such "classical liberalism."

Barney Frank, the former Congressman known for his push to legalize online poker, has passed away. His efforts sparked debate among advocates and detractors alike, revealing differing views on his impact and methods during his tenure.

A Divided Legacy

Frank's history in Congress is marked by his controversial lobbying efforts. Supporters hailed him as a pivotal figure in making online poker accessible, but critics accused him of being more of a con artist than a true crusader. "He took cash to lobby; he wasn't very effective," one commentator noted.

Despite this, his legacy in gambling legislation remains significant. The regulation of online poker and betting has progressively shaped the industry, moving it closer to legitimacy.

Note that sentence "He took cash to lobby; he wasn't very effective,"   I would like to know how much of that cash was in the form of campaign donations,  a direct consequence of the corruption that the ACLU and NYCU and other "civil liberties" groups had a hand in bringing when they supported the Supreme Court decision that made "money=speech" and destroying CLEAN ELECTION legislation in Buckley vs Valeo.  I recall Frank noting in his witty way that politicians were pretended to be the only group of human beings who were, the Court and "civil libertarians" pretended were to be expected to take large amounts of money without giving anything in return.  Only, unlike me, I don't recall Frank ever admitting that it was the Court and "civil libertarians" who were peddling that lie.   I don't, by the way, think it enhances Frank's moral reputation that he clearly saw that lie but went along with it when it came to the gambling industry.   Such are the moral compromises that come with such liberalism as opposed to the older form of it, such "classical liberalism" such "liberty."  

And later the article points to more of how that corruption is baked into our "liberal democracy."

A New Era for Online Poker

As the online poker landscape continues to evolve, discussions around regulation are expected to gain traction after Frank’s passing. There's speculation that additional states might push towards legalization to tap into potential tax revenue. Expect state legislators to rethink their positions as public interest increases.

I'm old enough to remember that it was the one state that my state borders,  New Hampshire, that used to be the only state that had a state lottery.    And that was to "support education" because, famously lacking both a state income and sales tax, all of the support for government fell onto things like the state liquor store monopoly and local property taxes.   As politicians started running exclusively on "cutting taxes"  - and never forget,  New Hampshire is probably the most Republican of the New England states - this is the kind of thing they have turned to.   And it certainly didn't remain just to fund "education."  But, then, these days my state is as much in the thick of that as any, with state approved casinos.  I'm told the one close to me, which we were told would bring in lots and lots of out of state gamblers has pretty much only Maine license plates in the parking lot. 

Crossover from History: The Shift in Civil Rights

Looking back, the civil rights movement offers an interesting parallel. Just as figures like Barney Frank sparked discussions on gambling, civil rights leaders illuminated the ethical ambiguities in politics. Both movements reveal tension between progressive changes and pushback from more traditional factions.

First, the use of "progressive changes" to describe a libertarian position on gambling is historically ironic and journalistically inept because gambling, along with such things as prostitution and drinking,  was one of the foremost targets of the progressive era's political attempt to regulate it, if not wipe it out.   That was a reaction, in all three cases, to the actual destructive consequences in real lives of all three.   The "tradition" in the United States, at least in so far as alcohol and gambling, had been hard libertarian.   I have, of course, generated some heat by pointing out there is nothing about the certain consequences of such things,  sexually transmitted diseases, sexual enslavement, alcoholism, the consequences that come with drinking even among those who aren't alcoholics, which can be considered to be a matter of a "right" to suffer them.   And even more so when those and similar issues are combined as they so often are in the prostitution and porn industries,  the incidence of addiction and suicide and murder in that bastion of "civil liberties" championship is really rather telling as to the actual character of that ideology. 

In American history, it was those who insisted on having a realistic view of such "liberties" such ""rights"" who were the ones who weren't in any way tied to tradition.   I've seen all three fairly closely, in those I've known,  I've know people who were part of the porn industry, one of the first men I knew who died of AIDS was a porn "model."  I have a grand-niece who became an addict and, as her own mother told it to me, "a blow-job prostitute living beneath a bush in the Fens, in Boston."  She was one of the luckier ones, though it did result in her contracting hepatitis C, she has, so far, successfully been treated for her opiate addiction and is under treatment and working a job.   She is, by the way, the only one in my very large family who has had a serious addiction problem who has succeeded in staying off of it for, now, more than a decade.  The alcoholics in my family, with possibly one exception,  have, uniformly, only stopped when they died from it.  I thank God with some regularity that none of them have killed anyone in a car accident.   We don't have a lot of experience with gambling addictions in my family,  the superstitious belief in luck isn't notably strong in the strain of Irish Catholicism we were brought up in.   At least not to the extent we'd bet money on it.  

And getting back to the role that such liberties-loving law-making is peddled, we were told all kinds of yarns in that regard,  one of them which I believe I remember Barney Frank repeating was that "it's better to legalize it and regulate it."  If he didn't say it someone else certainly did because I've heard it continually since I started paying attention to politics in my infancy.   Well, if there's one thing you can count on in the intrinsically corrupt,  "civil liberties" "corporate person-hood" "money=speech" dirty money politics that the "civil liberties" industry and the most corrupt of all the branches of the Federal government, the Supreme Court have brought us to, it is that any attempt at regulation will either not be allowed at all, or will fall, whether under Supreme Court ruling or by a more corrupt Congress and executive, as the industry involved seeks to get ever more favorable conditions for their money making.    You can bet on even the most dangerous and ruinous and addictive activity tied to profits being ever more able to do that without having to worry much about regulation.   THAT IS HOW TOTALLY CORRUPT OUR CONSTITUTIONAL SYSTEM IS.    

* You hardly ever hear the answer to that.

Dion-  Then the same Devil take the foremost too, and           sowce him for his breakfast.

The consequences for libertarianism eventually hurt everyone, you can't depend on your "rational agency" to escape that for yourself.   Don't be a sucker for that superstition. 

Update:  A lot of the current increase in addiction and its consequences is a direct result of the Supreme Courts "civil liberties" legislating from the bench.  I haven't looked to see if the ACLU or other "civil liberties" lawyer groups weighed in on the case.  That makes it a consequence of the Constitutional order and, worse the Marbury type of Supreme Court usurpation of law making (nullification being a part of law making) from the bench. 

In 2018, a Supreme Court ruling struck down a federal sports betting ban, and gambling skyrocketed in subsequent years. Today, about 22% of Americans—and 48% of men ages 18–49—report having at least one online sportsbook account, according to the Siena Research Institute. As of December 2025, 31 states, plus Washington, D.C., allow for some form of online sports betting.

“We’re referring to it as the largest and fastest explosion of gambling the country has ever seen,” says Cait Huble, MA, MBA, director of public affairs for the National Council on Problem Gambling. “We’re a decade behind other addictions in terms of public understanding, which is going to lead to a lot of real-world harm.”

Gambling disorder falls in the same diagnostic category as drug and alcohol use disorders. One in five people with a gambling disorder attempt or complete suicide, an even higher risk than with other substance use disorders. Gambling tends to occur alongside other behavioral health conditions, such as problem alcohol, tobacco, and drug use, adds Christopher Welsh, MD, medical director of the Maryland Center of Excellence on Problem Gambling. Plus, mobile sports betting skews heavily toward younger male users, a population already facing higher rates of suicide and loneliness. 

Identifying someone with disordered gambling can be tricky, and many people don’t know how or when to seek help, says University of Nebraska-Lincoln drug and alcohol educator Jon Gayer, PhD. 

“You know when someone’s drunk,” he says. “You don’t know when someone’s stepped away and placed a $100 bet on the phone and then come back to dinner.”

But those behaviors can quickly devolve into problematic outcomes, says Elizabeth Thielen, LPC, a gambling counselor in Illinois. She’s listened to numerous accounts of students gambling away financial aid awards or blowing off their classes. Underage students will log on under a parent’s account or ask an older classmate to funnel bets through their app. 

“They’re losing sleep, their attendance is slipping, and they’re being harassed and threatened if they owe money,” she says. 

More About The Crisis That Depending On "AI" Slop As The Truth Is Bringing

 

That one example I gave yesterday is one drop in an ocean of false responses and inaccuracy presented as authoritative reliability.   Even if you believe the hype of a 9% inaccuracy rate, and I have no reason to believe it, the entire thing has disastrous results, not only for the individual who buys it BUT FOR THE ENTIRE ENTERPRISE OF PROVIDING ACCURATE INFORMATION.   It is killing off the suppliers of accurate research, news gathering and information in general 

This Is Why The Republican Fascists Have Targeted Graham Planter And Why He's Caught On I Maine Politics

 Taking it right to Susan Collins' voting record and her disgraceful deflection when that's put in her face.  Blaming those who chose to serve instead of her many votes to support Republican-fascist wars of profit no matter how wrong, criminal and ruinous they were. 

None of the previous Democrats who ran against her, some of them good politicians, would have been indelicate enough to say it this plainly.    It's why many of the more genteel Democrats are nervous about him but most of us here are glad to hear it.   

This Is Why The Wall Street Journal And Corporate Democrats Are Attacking Graham Platner

 

Watching The Latest Billionaire Rocket Phallic-Symbol Crash

 leads me to wonder if the destruction of the NASA rocket program, resulting in dependence on Elon and, he hopes,  Bezos, was a product of Nixon's really, really, really stupid idea of the space shuttle, the design of which was altered by such things as the self-interest of Utah's Senator Orrin Hatch and industry based in Utah.  I seem to remember one of the chief designers quit when such pressures got them to change the design from being made with titanium to aluminum, which is why they needed those ceramic tiles that caused the deaths and disasters and delays and cost overruns.   I recall reading that such Senatorial involvement with things led to that decision. 

After being kind of a space geek up until the end of the Apollo years,  I can't say I've kept up much with it.  So I don't really know the territory.   It's the kind of thing you might think I'd depend on "AI" to help me research in a fraction of the time it would take me to do it the more reliable and old fashioned way, but, no.   

Anyone know of any such reliable research into why we are depending on Elon and Bezos to such disastrous and ruinous and dangerous effect?   Those billionaires and their fixation with their own junk!  

In glancing over the earlier post

on a larger screen to see what needed editing,  I saw something that, to my shame, I hadn't noted before.

Notice how he put it, Oliver Ellsworth,  CHIEF "justice," notable lawyer, jurist, framer and diplomat when he was talking of human beings IN TERMS OF THEM BEING ENSLAVED AND WORKED TO DEATH IN SUCH NUMBERS. 

As slaves also multiply so fast in Virginia & & Maryland that it is cheaper to raise than import them,

"cheaper to raise than import them,"  like you'd say about radishes or lettuces.  Literally human lives as commodities,  the trade in which is to be a matter of economic advantage for the aristocrats, both financier and slave-holder-driver.   Human beings as herd animals and objects for use and trade.  

whilst in the sickly rice swamps foreign supplies are necessary, 

"FOREIGN SUPPLIES" are necessary where so many of them die from being worked to death in the "sickly rice swamps," the death rate exceeding the birth rate. 

if we go no farther than is urged, we shall be unjust towards S. Carolina & Georgia.  Let us not intermeddle. 

"Unjust towards S. Carolina and Georgia"   UNJUST!  TOWARDS THE SLAVE-HOLDERS IN THE TWO STATES!  IF THEY DON'T ALLOW THEM TO IMPORT HUMAN BEINGS KIDNAPPED AND HUMAN TRAFFICKED, THE WHITE ARISTOCRATIC ELITE OF GEORGIA AND SOUTH CAROLINA, THE RICE BARONS ON THEIR WAY TO BEING AMONG THE RICHEST HUMAN BEINGS ON THE PLANET DUE TO THEIR SLAVING.  

That is the kind of thinking that went into the founding, the framing the writing and adoption of the Constitution of the United States.  

"Let us not intermeddle," in the same way the Roberts Court's New Taney Six doesn't want too "intermeddle" as the descendants of the slavers in the slave states prevent Black People, the descandants of the slaves who were treated that property from the possibility of getting their due representation in the Congress.   No doubt on their way to giving a green ligtht to the full range of Black voter suppression that was the practice of the antebellum period and the Supreme Court sanctioned Jim Crow,  now being revived in John (Roberts) Crow.    Every one of the New Taney Six, Roberts, Alito, Thomas Goresuch, Kavanaugh and Coney-Barrett should have their names and reputations tied to Taney's and his Dred Scott majority every single time they're mentioned, individually and collectively. 

"AI" Seems To Have Poor Reading Comprehension and Research Skills

 I GOOGLED "what did James Madison say about slave revolts"  and in glancing at the "AI" which I would rather not come up as it is an abominable use of resources and often just reguritates bad research from most often-clicked on sites and saw something that looked both familiar and a little dodgy. :

Kind Treatment as a Deterrent: Rather than just relying on force, Madison suggested to the Constitutional Convention in 1787 that the "danger of insurrections from foreign influence" should actually act as a "motive to kind treatment of the slaves". He believed avoiding excessive cruelty would reduce the likelihood of mass rebellions.

If the "AI" had the research skills of an intelligent high school Sophomore, he'd have looked for the primary document   and read that. though it had been included in Madison's notes on the deliberation of the drafting of the Constitution,  it wasn't something he said but was was part of what should be considered an infamous statement by Oliver Ellsworth (the drafter of much of Article 3 of the Constitution, the Judiciary Act, which gives us some the now more regrettable aspects of the judiciary,  and the second Chief "justice" of the Supreme Court) in support of the importation of slaves because so many of them were worked to death in the rice swamps of South Carolina and Georgia.   Essentially endorsing an act that would gain infamy when it was such as the Krupps and Farbens and others who worked slaves to death for their profit during WWII.  It should be common knowledge that such thinking and intent as that went into the framing of the Constitution.*

Mr. ELSWORTH. As he had never owned a slave could not judge of the effects of slavery on character: He said however that if it was to be considered in a moral light we ought to go farther and free those already in the Country. -As slaves also multiply so fast in Virginia & & Maryland that it is cheaper to raise than import them, whilst in the sickly rice swamps foreign supplies are necessary, if we go no farther than is urged, we shall be unjust towards S. Carolina & Georgia. Let us not intermeddle. As population increases poor laborers will be so plenty as to render slaves useless. Slavery in time will not be a speck in our Country. Provision is already made in Connecticut for abolishing it. And the abolition has already taken place in Massachusetts. As to the danger of insurrections from foreign influence, that will become a motive to kind treatment of the slaves.

Oddly, the "AI" links to the White House Historical Society website in a rather revealing article about how James and Dolly Madison treated the slaves held by them,  it's not pretty reading though it's presented in probably as pretty a way as they dared to present it during the last decade.   But in my quick reading of it I didn't find any reference to the passage quoted. 

*  Another reference given by "AI" in that search went to an NPR article dealing with the fact that the Second Amendment, far from being anything to do with freedom in the face of an oppressive government, was actually written for the benefit and safety of slave-holders in slave states who were afraid of slave rebellions.  

It was in response to the concerns coming out of the Virginia ratification convention for the Constitution, led by Patrick Henry and George Mason, that a militia that was controlled solely by the federal government would not be there to protect the slave owners from an enslaved uprising. And ... James Madison crafted that language in order to mollify the concerns coming out of Virginia and the anti-Federalists, that they would still have full control over their state militias — and those militias were used in order to quell slave revolts. ... The Second Amendment really provided the cover, the assurances that Patrick Henry and George Mason needed, that the militias would not be controlled by the federal government, but that they would be controlled by the states and at the beck and call of the states to be able to put down these uprisings.

The drafting of the "Bill of Rights" included such "rights" as the right of slave-holders to suppress those held in slavery from attempting to do what the founders and framers had done,  or rather the free Black men and landless white and recent immigrant men who formed the backbone of the Revolutionary Army had done for the slave-holders and aristocrats,  fight for THEIR rights. 

Maybe in the month leading up to the massive lie of the 250th, I should do more on the founding and framing.  When you look at it with an eye to the fact that most of the framers and founders were deeply morally corrupt - as all slave-holders and financiers are - you can see why we are living with such corruption now.