Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, and Debt:
For Hive Power Up Day, I staked 69.672 Hive.
Schadenfreude, sweet Schadenfreude: Facebook scrambles to escape stock’s death spiral as users flee, sales drop
Ian inflicts staggering losses on Florida’s growth machine
The Tories Have Become Unmoored from the British People
In a single week, Britain has gone from being one among many nations facing fierce economic headwinds to being a financial basket case, its currency plunging, bond yields and mortgage rates rising and pension funds scrambling to stay afloat.
Coronavirus News, Analysis, and Opinion:
Long Covid: What science has learned about the loss of smell and taste
The Pandemic’s Legacy is Already Clear
Politics:
Judge Cannon Does Trump Another Solid
Do take a moment to reach Josh Kovensky’s report here on Judge Cannon’s latest order. It’s hard to capture just how unheard of and close to unprecedented this is. Trump literally asked for this particular judge to be the Special Master. Now only a couple weeks after his appointment she is jumping in and just overruling him in the most transparently one-sided ways. It’s really not too much to say that she’s essentially acting as Trump’s defense counsel – which is good I guess since he’s had a hard time holding on to them.
Bolsonaro’s Party Attacks Brazil’s Voting Systems
For months, officials in Brazil and across the international community have watched President Jair Bolsonaro cast doubt on Brazil’s voting systems, growing increasingly worried that the far-right leader was setting the stage to dispute an election loss.
Late Wednesday, the president gave them more reason to worry. In a surprise move less than four days before the vote, Mr. Bolsonaro’s political party released a document that claimed, without evidence, that a group of government employees and contractors had the ‘absolute power to manipulate election results without leaving a trace.’
Under Oath, Ginni Thomas Stuck To Big Lie Script
How the GOP weaponized ignorance — and how “smart people acting like dopes” stay in power
Satirist Andy Borowitz on deliberate dumbness in America, and how it became central to the Republican brand
Biden denounces Kremlin’s ‘phony’ move to annex Ukrainian territory
Several former diplomats and historians likened Putin’s strategy to Nazi leader Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, when he seized German-speaking regions of Czechoslovakia and Poland and similarly held predetermined plebiscites.
“The parallels are eerie and, after decades of over-using the Hitler analogies, we finally have a case where they are apt,” said Daniel Fried, a former ambassador to Poland who is now a researcher at the Atlantic Council, a Washington think tank. “Putin is escalating and the future is uncertain and fraught.”
What if We’re Already Fighting World War III?
Putin Pledges to Battle the ‘Satanism’ of the United States
Even by Mr. Putin’s increasingly antagonistic standards, the speech was extraordinary, mixing riffs against Western attitudes on gender identity with an appeal to the world to see Russia as the leader of an uprising against American power.
As Ian batters Florida, Puerto Ricans fear being forgotten
Russia Blows Up Gas Pipelines, Declaring an All-Out Energy War It May Already Have Lost
There may be no clearer sign of an enemy in retreat than his scuttling his own ships, which is what Putin appears to have done on Monday by blowing up the main pipelines for exporting Russia’s natural gas to Europe. Putin may be in effect declaring an all-out energy war by completely cutting off fossil fuel exports to the West, but by waiting seven months after invading Ukraine to do so he has lost the advantage. Although the energy crisis will rage on, Russia has lost the energy war.
Florida Officials Delayed Evacuation
As Hurricane Ian charged toward the western coast of Florida this week, the warnings from forecasters were growing more urgent. Life-threatening storm surge threatened to deluge the region from Tampa all the way to Fort Myers.
But while officials along much of that coastline responded with orders to evacuate on Monday, emergency managers in Lee County held off, pondering during the day whether to tell people to flee, but then deciding to see how the forecast evolved overnight.
The delay, an apparent violation of the meticulous evacuation strategy the county had crafted for just such an emergency, may have contributed to catastrophic consequences that are still coming into focus as the death toll continues to climb.
Serendipity:
Hurricane Ian: When the power grid goes out, could solar and batteries power your home?
So many great gems, as always! Putin's annexation... Ginni Thomas (OMG)... and the very interesting article about loss of smell. I just read that one, and it turns out there are services to help those who have long-term effects from Covid affecting their ability to smell. And of course Ian is all over the news right now. The damage to parts of Florida like Fort Myers Beach is just so shocking.
But this is the best gem of the day, IMHO:
How the GOP weaponized ignorance — and how “smart people acting like dopes” stay in power
I just read his book (linked inside the article) and it's so good. Borowitz is brilliant. The book talks about the history of stupidity in politics and how Trump is a natural progression of it. It's an incredible historical perspective on how it started being cool to be dumb... and now smart politicians actual behave dumb because it's what people want to hear. Unbelievable.
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