Trump’s Risky War in Venezuela.. By going around Congress, the president is showing contempt for the will of the public.
Trump’s Cuts Are About to Make Health Care Even Worse. Medicaid cuts will make all of America look more like Mississippi, with a shorter life expectancy than Bangladesh.
The words “trust” and “Meta” don’t belong in the same sentence unless that sentence also includes the word “don’t.”
I don’t mean to brag but I just read one page of tvtropes.org for about a minute, and now I’m just going to walk away from the computer.
RIP Isah Whitlock — Senator Clay Davis on "The Wire." Sheeeeit!
RIP Isiah Whitlock, Jr., 71, a prolific and talented character actor whose roles include ultra-corrupt State Sen. Clay Davis on “The Wire.” Davis’s catchphrase was a unique interpretation of the word “shit” — “sheeeeeeeit”
Here’s a YouTube supercut of Whitlock dialogue on “The Wire."
One of my favorite roles of his was a supporting character in the 2011 dark comedy “Cedar Rapids,” which starred Ed Helms. Davis played a nerdy midwestern insurance agent who’s obsessed with “The Wire.”
How to read Patrick O'Brian
I’m re-reading the first volume of the Aubrey-Maturin series, “Master and Commander.” I think I read the first three volumes 25-30 years ago, and then stopped for some reason. I barely remember any of it.
I’m enjoying the book but I also find it overwhelming. The author, Patrick O’Brian, throws out a lot of nautical terms and rarely explains any of it.
So I did a web search on “how to read Patrick O’Brian,” and saw this advice:
First read-through just enjoy the ride and feel the ambience. You can enjoy the story without understanding all details. Looking up everything just makes reading too slow for a first pass.
Next circumnavigation you can start looking up things and understand the subtle jokes. After the tenth round there are still some that you missed.
And that’s what I’m doing.
I don’t know whether I’ll read the series again — let alone ten times!
Manton Reece makes observations and prescriptions for the future of open social networks and the fediverse, which I wholeheartedly agree with. We need to break out of silos. Sure, Facebook and Instagram are silos, but so are Threads, Bluesky, Mastodon, other ActivityPub platforms and Tumblr.
The Truth Physics Can No Longer Ignore
Physics operates on the reductionist principle that the universe can be entirely explained by the interactions of particles and forces. But that principle breaks down for living things, writes Adam Frank at The Atlantic:
Give me a simple cell from the early days of Earth’s history, and I could never predict that some 4 billion years later it would evolve into a giant rabbit that can punch you in the face. Kangaroos—like humans—are an unpredictable, emergent consequence of life’s evolution.
This is an interesting article, but I fear it might also be junk science.
Why A.I. Didn’t Transform Our Lives in 2025. By Cal Newport.
Neal Stephenson explores the fascinating science behind bullwhips. Bullwhips relate to a medical mystery in post World War II Germany, where multiple men went to doctors reporting “floaters” in their eyes that turned out to be nearly microscopic copper filament. P
I don’t get why a person would want to buy an AI recording gadget, for $179. Why not just use your phone?
Now you can read an excerpt of from “Winds of Wycaro," the book-within-a-TV-series whose author, Carol Sturka, is the main character of “Plur1bus.” “She would know that voice anywhere. As smooth as wyld bourbon and deep as the Robrionian Trench.”
"The torture was never ending"
Here’s where you can watch the censored “60 Minutes” report about CECOT, the brutal El Salvadoran prison where the United States is sending migrants to be tortured and abused. Trump supporter Bari Weiss, who now heads CBS News, killed the report, even though it had been approved by strict editorial and legal review. However, the report aired in Canada, and is now all over the Internet.
“There’s a sort of pride around the poor conditions, and around the suffering.”
“It’s the year 2025 and Americans have to watch a bootlegged international version of a news program because it was censored here in our country to protect a criminal president.” — @jojofromjerz
J. D. Vance Fails a Simple Moral Test. The vice president welcomes anti-Semites into the Republican coalition.
Dozens of Flock AI camera feeds were just out there
Anyone with links to the livestreams could view them — no credentials required, as reported by 404 Media.
“I watched a man leave his house in the morning in New York…. watched a woman jogging alone on a forest trail in Georgia. This trail had multiple cameras, and I could watch a man rollerblade and then take a break to watch rollerblading videos on his phone. How? Because the camera’s AI automatically zoomed in on it — just like it zoomed in on a couple arguing at a street market in Atlanta.”
Jewish Christmas
On reddit.com/r/Judaism, I asked what folks are doing for Christmas, and the thread is interesting
I’ve converted my shikse wife to the all-American Jewish tradition of going out for Chinese food. But the restaurant has been packed the past few years. I’m sure they’re not all Jews — the goyim must be catching on.
The big podcast shift to video
I love podcasts. I listen to about two hours of podcasts a day. Most of that is while walking the dog, and I add a few more minutes while driving (which I don’t do a lot of — just a couple of short hops a week) and doing chores.
I’ve been hearing over the past few weeks that podcasts are moving to video and YouTube. It seems alien and unnatural to me. Podcasting is, to me, a listening medium. I guess people have it on as video wallpaper in the background when they do things around the house, or in some kinds of jobs at work, the way stereotypical housewives used to do with daytime TV.
So many of my interests are and always have been niche interests. Science fiction. Books. Blogging. Maybe now audio podcasts are joining that list.