Category: Kulka

Monday: Hili dialogue

July 31, 2023 • 6:45 am

Welcome to the last day of July: Monday, July 31, 2023, and National Cotton Candy Day, a day to eat unadulterated spun sucrose.  You can buy the stuff from vending machines in Japan. This one seems to cost about 100 yen, which is 71¢ in U.S. currency:

It’s also National Avocado Day, National Raspberry Cake Day, Shredded Wheat Day, National Jump for Jelly Beans Day, and National Mutt Day.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the July 31 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Ukraine seems to be making slow but steady progress in reclaiming territory and attacking Russian targets.

Ukraine brought the war far from the front line into the heart of Russia again Sunday in drone penetrations that Russian authorities said damaged two office buildings a few miles (kilometers) from the Kremlin and a pig breeding complex on the countries’ border.

The attacks, which Ukraine didn’t acknowledge in keeping with its security policy, reflected a pattern of more frequent and deeper cross-border strikes the Kyiv government has launched since starting a counteroffensive against Russian forces in June. A precursor and the most dramatic of the strikes happenned in May on the Kremlin itself, the seat of power in the capital, Moscow.

Sunday’s was the fourth such strike on the capital region this month and the third this week, showing Moscow’s vulnerability as Russia’s war in Ukraine drags into its 18th month.

The Russian Defense Ministry said three drones targeted the city in an “attempted terrorist attack by the Kyiv regime.” Air defenses shot down one drone in Odintsovo in the surrounding Moscow region, while two others were jammed and crashed into the Moscow City business district.

. . .Ukrainian officials didn’t acknowledge the attacks but President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address: “Gradually, the war is returning to the territory of Russia — to its symbolic centers and military bases, and this is an inevitable, natural and absolutely fair process.”

A Ukrainian air force spokesman also didn’t claim responsibility but said the Russian people were seeing the consequences of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

“All of the people who think the war ‘doesn’t concern them’ — it’s already touching them,” spokesperson Yurii Ihnat told journalists Sunday.

Pig breeding farms? And are they going after civilian targets? That again is a war crime, and if Ukraine is actually doing this, they’ll lose international support.

You can see a dramatic video of a drone attack on a Moscow building on CNN.

*Both the NYT and the Washington Post have pieces about a neglected aspect of the movie “Oppenheimer,” and about the Trinity test in particular: the spate of diseases that afflicted people near the test explostion in 1945. From the Post:

What happened here in the aftermath, surviving “downwinders” and their relatives say, is a legacy of serious health consequences that have gone unacknowledged for 78 years. Their struggles continue to be pushed aside; the new blockbuster film “Oppenheimer,” which spotlights the scientist most credited for the bomb, ignores completely the people who lived in the shadow of his test site.

Yet for all their ambivalence about the movie’s fanfare — the northern New Mexico city of Los Alamos, where J. Robert Oppenheimer located the Manhattan Project, just threw a 10-day festival to celebrate its place in history — locals also have hope that the Hollywood glow may elevate their long quest to be added to a federal program that compensates people sickened by presumed exposure to radiation from aboveground nuclear tests.

. . . The Trinity site, about 60 miles northwest of tiny Tularosa, was chosen in part for its supposed isolation. Nearly half a million people lived within a 150-mile radius, though. Manhattan Project leaders knew a nuclear test would put them at risk, but with the nation at war, secrecy was the priority. Evacuation plans were never acted upon. The military concocted a cover story: The boom was an explosion of an ammunitions magazine.

. . . TheJuly 16, 1945,blast was more massive than Oppenheimer and his fellow scientists expected, equivalent to nearly 25,000 tons of TNT, according to recent estimates. Witnesses said the plutonium ash fell for days, on areas where people grew their own food, drank rainwater collected in cisterns and cooled off in irrigation canals that made the arid region fertile.

According to a new study, the fallout floated to 46 states, Mexico and Canada within 10 days. In 28 of 33 New Mexico counties, it estimates the accumulation of radioactive material was higher than required under the federal compensation program.

And the injuries?

. . . Proving that radiation caused the cancers that have afflicted New Mexico’s downwinders is extremely difficult. A major study published in 2020 by the National Cancer Institute concluded that Trinity fallout may contribute to as many as 1,000 cancers by 2034, most in people who lived very near the test. There is “no evidence to suggest” cases among subsequent generations were related, the study noted.

But RECA does not require claimants to establish causation, only to show that they or a relative had a qualifying disease after working or living in certain locations during specific time frames.

They could have tested elsewhere, like an island, and they couldn’t have warned local inhabitants in New Mexico, as that would be revealing a big secret. The only fair thing to do is compensate those who were injured according to the rule limned above

*Talk about Rip van Winkle! Scientists report the resurrection of nematode worms frozen in the permafrost for 46,000 years.  (h/t: Ron)

At a time when the mighty woolly mammoth roamed the Earth, some 46,000 years ago, a minuscule pair of roundworms became encased in the Siberian permafrost.

Millennia later, the worms, thawed out of the ice, would wriggle again, and demonstrate to scientists that life could be paused — almost indefinitely.

The discovery, published this week in the peer-reviewed journal PLOS Genetics, offers new insight into how the worms, also known as nematodes, can survive in extreme conditions for extraordinarily long periods of time, in this case tens of thousands of years.

In 2018, Anastasia Shatilovich, a scientist from the Institute of Physicochemical and Biological Problems in Soil Science RAS in Russia, thawed two female worms from a fossilized burrow dug by gophers in the Arctic.

The worms, which were buried approximately 130 feet in the permafrost, were revived simply by putting them in water, according to a news release from the Max Planck Institute of Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics in Germany.

Called Panagrolaimus kolymaensis, after the Kolyma River in Russia, where they were found, the worms were sent to Germany for further study. The creatures, which have a life span measured in days, died after reproducing several generations in the lab, researchers said.

Using radiocarbon dating, researchers determined the specimens were frozen between 45,839 and 47,769 years ago, during the late Pleistocene.

The roughly millimeter-long worms were able to resist extreme low temperatures by entering a dormant state called cryptobiosis, a process researchers at the institute have been trying to understand.

The females were triploid and parthenogenic, and so produced offspring asexually. This means that one can’t test them or their descendants against living species to see if they’re still cross-fertile, implying that 46,000 years of time (temporal isolation) would be sufficient to produce reproductive barriers. But in theory, were this species cross-fertile with others, one could do this kind of test. But they at least know, from DNA analysis of the descendants, that these worms are more closely related to some nematodes than to others.

This also raises a philosophical problem: were those worms dead or alive while they were frozen? Clearly no metabolic processes could have been going on during cryptobiosis: the systems shut down and then restarted. Dead or alive?

*Time to pay attention to the Women’s World Cup, where, in a stunning upset, Colombia beat Germany 2-1.  Here are the results from today (the tournament is in New Zealand), which include the host team being eliminated (click to read at the NYT):

The most remarkable game of the World Cup was won and then it wasn’t, until it was won again in the last minute. It was a game so good that what may have been the goal of the tournament was not even the most important goal of the night. It was a result so stunning that one needs to go back almost three decades to find another one like it.

The simple summary is this: Colombia defeated Germany, 2-1, in Sydney to take a surprising but fully deserved lead in Group H. The fuller, richer version contains so much more flavor than that.

There’s the opening goal, a stunning bit of control and footwork by the Colombian teenager Linda Caicedo that is already being called the goal of the tournament.

See that goal at 1:19 in the video below.

How stunning was it all? The defeat was the first time Germany had lost a game in the group stage of a World Cup since 1995. To put that loss, a 3-2 defeat to host Sweden in Helsingborg, in perspective, consider that Pia Sundhage, the 63-year-old coach of Brazil in this World Cup, scored in the match.

Sundhage may not remember that day. But the Germans probably do, and they will definitely remember Sunday, a night, and a win, the Colombians will never forget.

Yesterday’s results:

Here are the highlights from the Germany-Colombia match. Germany got one point on a penalty kick, but the two Colombia goals were great, especially the first at 1:21 (the second was  a header).

And the luckless kiwis:

New Zealand never scores much, and it never scored again at the World Cup, eliminated quietly on Sunday in Dunedin after a 0-0 tie with Switzerland that was the home team’s ninth goalless outing in 12 games this year.

The U.S, takes on Portugal tomorrow.

*Heterodox news of the week: An American woman is suing her company for discriminating against white men.  (h/t Luana)

A former employee of a large food service corporation is suing the company in federal court after it fired her for refusing to participate in a program that discriminates against white male employees.

. . . Courtney Rogers worked for Charlotte, North Carolina-based Compass Group USA Inc. from her home office in San Diego, California.

. . .Ms. Rogers was hired in August 2021 and given the job title of “Recruiter, Internal Mobility Team.”

Her responsibilities included the processing of internal promotions, which encompassed posting job listings, reviewing applications, conducting interviews, writing and sending offer letters, carrying out background checks, ordering drug tests, initiating and reviewing onboarding, and ensuring that personnel updates were reflected in the system.

Compass created a program it called “Operation Equity” in March 2022, a purported diversity program that offered qualified employees special training and mentorship and the promise of a promotion upon graduation, according to the legal complaint that was filed in Rogers v. Compass Group USA Inc.

The lawsuit was filed on July 24 in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California under the auspices of the Thomas More Society, a national public interest law firm headquartered in Chicago that organized the legal action.

But participation in the program was restricted to “women and people of color.” White men were not allowed to participate and receive the associated benefits of training, mentorship, and guaranteed promotion.

By calling it “Operation Equity,” the company “used a euphemistic and false title to hide the program’s true nature.” The program would more accurately be called the “White-Men-Need-Not-Apply” program because it is an example of “‘outright racial balancing,’ which is patently unlawful,” and is the kind of program “promoted by people … who harbor racial animus against white men,” according to the legal complaint.

Ms. Rogers claims she informed management that high-level employees said of the program, “This is the direction the world is going, jump on the train or get run over,” and “We are not here to appease the old white man.”

Ms. Rogers claims she also informed management that the program was illegal and requested that she be allowed an accommodation because the program “violated her ethical beliefs.” Management assured her she would be exempted from participating in it and that she would not be retaliated against for sharing her concerns with management.

Then they fired her. “Operation Equity” was clearly illegal, violating nondiscrimination acts, and I hope Rogers gets a big pot of money from the company. I predict a hushed-up settlement

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili makes a rare admission of error:

Hili: I was wrong.
A: A human thing.
Hili: Feline as well.
In Polish:
Hili: Myliłam się.
Ja: Ludzka sprawa.
Hili: Kocia też.

. . . and a picture of Baby Kulka:

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From Lorenzo the Cat, “Barbie, the sequel”:

From somewhere on Facebook:

. . .and from Merilee:

From Masih, another small but telling act of rebellion against the Iranian government by activists.

Ricky Gervais is well stocked:

From Malcolm: a cat fracas in an open car:

From Barry, who calls this “The greatest thread in the history of Twitter” (I think he means “in the history of X”).

From the Auschwitz Memorial: it’s the birthday of a survivor:

I suspect the fly’s offspring is parasitic on the bee’s offspring, but I haven’t been

Matthew says, “Watch the vid – look at all the birds chilling while one of their (vast) number is eaten… ”

A chimp sees marvels in a camera viewer (and knows how to scroll). It’s very intent!

Tuesday: Hili dialogue

July 11, 2023 • 6:45 am

Welcome to The Cruelest Day: Tuesday, July 11, 2023, and National Blueberry Muffin Day.  Do any other countries have these? Remember, a big blueberry muffin has about 500 calories.

Source and recipe

It’s also National Rainier Cherries Day, Bowdler’s Day, in honor of the great censor Thomas Bowdler, who censored Shakespeare (the origin of the verb “bowdlerize”), National Swimming Pool Day, Cow Appreciation Day, National Mojito Day, Free Slurpee Day (check out your local 7-Eleven to see if they’re giving them away, and World Population Day, raising awareness of population issues.

I rescued a small orphan duckling yesterday that had somehow gotten into the fenced garden of a dormitory. It could have been one of Amy’s brood, as it was very young. It was a tough catch since I had to find it in an area about half the size of a football field, filled with bushes. But I got it and took it to rehab.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the July 11 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*The NYT reports that Putin met with Yevgeny V. Prigozhin just a few days after the Wagner leader staged his abortive mutiny.  Apparently Prigozhin is in Russia and not dead—yet.

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia held a lengthy meeting with Yevgeny V. Prigozhin just five days after his Wagner private military company launched a brief mutiny, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri S. Peskov said on Monday, noting that “further employment options” for the mercenary group were among the matters discussed.

It is the first known contact between the two men since Wagner’s uprising, which posed the most dramatic challenge to Mr. Putin’s authority in his more than two decades in power. But the Kremlin’s account of the meeting left a host of unanswered questions about the mercenary group’s future.

Mr. Putin invited 35 people to the three-hour meeting on June 29, including Mr. Prigozhin and all of Wagner’s top commanders, the Kremlin spokesman said. He did not specify where the meeting took place. The details of any agreements reached at the meeting remain unclear, and Mr. Prigozhin hasn’t said anything about it since the failed mutiny.

“The only thing we can say is that the president gave his assessment of the company’s actions” during both the war in Ukraine and the uprising, Mr. Peskov said.

But wait—there’s more!

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia held a lengthy meeting with Yevgeny V. Prigozhin just five days after his Wagner private military company launched a brief mutiny, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri S. Peskov said on Monday, noting that “further employment options” for the mercenary group were among the matters discussed.

It is the first known contact between the two men since Wagner’s uprising, which posed the most dramatic challenge to Mr. Putin’s authority in his more than two decades in power. But the Kremlin’s account of the meeting left a host of unanswered questions about the mercenary group’s future.

Mr. Putin invited 35 people to the three-hour meeting on June 29, including Mr. Prigozhin and all of Wagner’s top commanders, the Kremlin spokesman said. He did not specify where the meeting took place. The details of any agreements reached at the meeting remain unclear, and Mr. Prigozhin hasn’t said anything about it since the failed mutiny.

“The only thing we can say is that the president gave his assessment of the company’s actions” during both the war in Ukraine and the uprising, Mr. Peskov said.

This is in the face of Putin’s pledge earlier to harshly punish those who mutinied, and in the knowledge that the Russian defense establishment despises Prigozhin. “Keep your friends close and your enemies closer,” goes the old saying. I still think that Prigozhin’s days are numbered.

*The WaPo tells you to keep your hands off the thermostat, resisting the urge to turn it down as it gets hot. But what do you do instead? As they say, “Here’s what you need to know.” First, this bad nooz:

Nearly 50 million Americans are set to face triple-digit temperature this week amid a sprawling dome of heat that will engulf most of the southern United States. Heat advisories are in effect in Florida, Texas and New Mexico, while excessive heat watches and warnings blanket much of Arizona, Southern California and Nevada.

In addition to its magnitude, which will be dangerous for some, the heat will be notable for its longevity. Phoenix, for example, has already logged 10 days in a row at or above 110 degrees — the seventh-longest streak on record — and the forecast calls for highs in the 111-to-117-degree range until further notice. That could catapult the heat-prone city into its longest ever streak above that level.

As for turning down the thermostat:

a. “Definitely don’t do that,” said Jennifer Amann, senior fellow in the buildings program at the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, a nonprofit group. “It’s not going to really cool your home any faster.” [Strains your A/C and uses electriity.]

b. “If a person was in their house and they’re going to be there all the time, they could maybe turn up to 76 or 77 or so,” said Thomas Lawrence, a professor of practice emeritus at the University of Georgia who co-wrote the peer-reviewed paper. The study’s results suggest “most people will be fine with that.”

c.) And when you’re not at home for extended periods of time, Amann suggested setting your thermostat 5 to 10 degrees warmer than what would normally be comfortable for you.

d.) “The most critical times to be thinking about really managing your AC load is in those peak hours in the middle of the day, those really hot afternoon hours” when electricity demand is high, she said. “That’s when it can be particularly important to do a setback if you can.”

e.) Ceiling fans, for example, can be a huge help, and typically require little energy to run.

f.)  Make sure your blinds or shades are closed during the hottest parts of the day, particularly if you don’t have updated windows.

And keep the blinds down and curtains drawn! Feel better now?

*Larry Nassar, serving a very long sentence (effectively a life sentence) for molesting girls on the USA Gymnastics Team, was seriously attacked in prison.  For some reason, pedophiles are especially singled out for such attacks.

Disgraced sports doctor Larry Nassar, who was convicted of sexually abusing Olympic and college female gymnasts, was stabbed multiple times by another inmate at a federal prison in Florida that is experiencing staffing shortages.

The attack happened Sunday at United States Penitentiary Coleman, and Nassar was in stable condition on Monday, two people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press.

One of the people said Nassar had been stabbed in the back and in the chest. The two officers guarding the unit where Nassar was held were working mandated overtime shifts because of staffing shortages, one of the people said.

Apparently he was stabbed ten times. I’m always surprised how well people survive after multiple stabbings. Don’t attackers know to go for the throat? But I digress. . .

The people were not authorized to publicly discuss details of the attack or the ongoing investigation and spoke to the AP on the condition of anonymity.

Nassar is serving decades in prison for convictions in state and federal courts. He admitted sexually assaulting athletes when he worked at Michigan State University and at Indianapolis-based USA Gymnastics, which trains Olympians. Nassar also pleaded guilty in a separate case to possessing images of child sexual abuse.

. . . The federal Bureau of Prisons has experienced significant staffing shortages in the last few years, an issue thrust into the spotlight in 2019 when the convicted financier Jeffrey Epstein took his own life at a federal jail in New York.

None of his victims are rejoicing about the stabbing, which, some say, retraumatized them. I suspect they’d rather see him die in jail. He’s 59 now, and is serving multiple sentences adding up to as much as 250 years.

NOTE: The summery between the asterisks, written yesterday afternoon, is now obsolete: Turkey has dropped its objections to Sweden joining NATO! The first sensible thing President Erdogan ever did! The update:

NATO leaders arrived in Lithuania for their annual summit on Tuesday, bolstered by Turkey’s abrupt reversal to clear the path for Sweden to join the military alliance, a decision that resolved a central sticking point and set the stage for the group to demonstrate a unified front in supporting Ukraine against Russia’s invasion.

The two-day summit in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, will instead focus on discussions of Ukraine’s pathway to potential membership in the alliance and member states’ support for Kyiv in the war, including weapons and training.

The 11th-hour shift from Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on Monday came after intense pressure from President Biden and other allies. The decision will enable President Biden to proclaim at the gathering that in invading Ukraine, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia has brought about the exact outcome he was trying to thwart: an expanded NATO alliance at Russia’s doorstep.

************

*Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan is holding NATO hostage, refusing to okay Sweden’s joining the alliance (unanimous consent of all members is required) unless Turkey get its own perk.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, in an unexpected move, said on Monday the European Union should open the way for Ankara’s accession to the bloc before Turkey’s parliament approves Sweden’s bid to join the NATO military alliance.

Turkey’s bid to join the EU has been frozen for years after membership talks were launched in 2005 under Erdogan’s first term as prime minister.

The ties between Ankara and members of the bloc soured several years ago, especially after a 2016 failed coup attempt in Turkey, but have since improved. The bloc depends on the help of NATO ally Ankara, particularly on migration.

In a surprise change of tack, Erdogan on Monday linked Ankara’s approval of Sweden’s NATO bid to Turkey finally joining the EU.

“I am calling from here on these countries that are making Turkey wait at the door of the European Union for more than 50 years,” Erdogan said, speaking ahead of his departure for the NATO summit in Vilnius.

“First, come and open the way for Turkey at the European Union and then we will open the way for Sweden, just as we did for Finland,” he said, adding that he would repeat his call during the summit.

Erdogan is a nasty piece of work but apparently many Turks love him. But this is like a kid threatening to take his ball and go home. What does Turkey and the EU have to do with NATO? Bupkes!

********

*CNN reveals, thanks to leaked documents and photos, that Putin has a fancy “luxury train” in which he travels fully pampered. Massage and skincare! Get a load of this:

Remarkably little is known about Putin’s private life. His public image is carefully manicured, as has been evident in the days since Yevgeny Prigozhin’s short-lived mutiny. But a trove of paperwork and photographs obtained exclusively by the London-based Russian investigations group the Dossier Center, and shared with CNN, Süddeutsche Zeitung, and German public broadcaster NDR and WDR, reveals details the Kremlin shrouds from public view, and the extent to which Putin’s paranoia has created a cloistered existence.

The fact that Putin uses a train is well known. The Kremlin itself has released images of meetings held on board, in an ornately decorated boardroom. The contents of the train’s other 20-odd cars, however, have been a closely guarded state secret.

The Dossier Center says the leaked documents came from an insider at Zircon Service, a Russian company tasked by Russian Railways, the state-owned rail operator, with outfitting the cars intended for the office of the Russian president.

Among the parts of the train detailed is car number 021-78630. A glossy brochure made by Zircon itself shows a luxurious gym and spa on wheels designed for Putin, the Dossier Center says.

Among the documents obtained by the Dossier Center are letters tying the outfitting of the rail cars, including the gym car, directly to officials at the highest levels of Putin’s administration.

The Kremlin flatly denies the Dossier Center’s findings, telling CNN: “President Putin does not have such a car in his use or in his ownership.”

CNN also reached out to Zircon Service and Russian Railways for comment but has not heard back.

. . .According to a former engineer and captain in the FSO, Gleb Karakulov, who defected from the country last year and was interviewed by the Dossier Center under extreme secrecy, Putin has increasingly turned to train travel as a way to avoid being tracked.

“The plane, as soon as it takes off, it immediately crosses flight radar,” Karakulov said in the interview, which was recorded last December. “The train, it is used in order to somehow hide these movements.”

Karakulov said that he first began working on the train, installing communications equipment, around 2014. It came into much more frequent use, according to his account, in the second half of 2021, as Russia was gearing up for its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Russian transpotters can identify the train because it not only has two locomotives,

. . . . and in part by a feature identified in the brochure made by Zircon Service. A characteristic white dome, said by the Dossier Center to contain advanced communications antennae, is plain to see on one of the carriages.

But really, is this such a big deal? After all, American Presidents have the fancy Air Force One, which has this:

Air Force One is a large airplane. Not only does it have three levels and a whopping 4,000 square feet of floor space, but the president can enjoy an extensive suite that includes a large office, gym, bathroom (with shower) and conference room.

And it probably costs more to maintain and fly Air Force One than it does Putin’s “ghost train.”

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn,  an out-of-focus Hili (but with her tongue out) is up to no good.

Hili: Are you sure?
A: What of?
Hili: That when the cat’s away, anything goes.
In Polish:
Hili: Czy jesteś pewien?
Ja: Czego?
Hili: Że jak kota nie ma to wszystko wolno?

And a photo of Baby Kulka:

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From Thomas, a Dave Blazek cartoon:

From Divy, who says that this is her new post office:

From Nicole:

From Masih, just vindicated by a federal court, which found Iran guilty of wrongfully arresting her brother—to put pressure on Masih to shut up, of course.

From Titania:

From Barry, who says, “Get a room!”

From Luana. Keep watching!

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a woman who died at 23:

Tweets from Dr. Cobb. First, a rare shot of a shark swimming in its egg case:

I’ll take his word for it. But I have a collection of odd names, including former Chicago resident Roosevelt McKnuckles.

Oy! This is a nightmare worthy of Little Nemo!

Here it is on YouTube:

Monday: Hili dialogue

July 3, 2023 • 6:45 am

It’s Monday, July 3, 2023, and tomorrow’s a holiday: Independence Day.  It’s also National Chocolate Wafer Day.  Have one:

It’s also American Redneck Day, National Eat Beans Day, National Fried Clam Day, Plastic Bag Free Day (all plastic bags are free today!), Emancipation Day in the United States Virgin Islands, Independence Day in Belarus, celebrating the liberation of Minsk from Nazi occupation by Soviet troops in 1944,  and the start of the Dog Days according to the Old Farmer’s Almanac but not according to established meaning in most European cultures.

Why are they called the Dog Days? Wikipedia is here to help:

The dog days or dog days of summer are the hot, sultry days of summer. They were historically the period following the heliacal rising of the star system Sirius (known colloquially as the “Dog Star”), which Hellenistic astrology connected with heat, drought, sudden thunderstorms, lethargy, fever, mad dogs, and bad luck. They are now taken to be the hottest, most uncomfortable part of summer in the Northern Hemisphere.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the July 3 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*The NYT highlights another way that schools may be able to promote ethnic diversity without running afoul of the new laws: use “adversity scores.” This is based on a rubric used by the University of California at Davis Medical School.

In his role at the medical school at the University of California, Davis, Dr. Henderson has tried to change that, developing an unorthodox tool to evaluate applicants: the socioeconomic disadvantage scale, or S.E.D.

The scale rates every applicant from zero to 99, taking into account their life circumstances, such as family income and parental education. Admissions decisions are based on that score, combined with the usual portfolio of grades, test scores, recommendations, essays and interviews.

The disadvantage scale has helped turn U.C. Davis into one of the most diverse medical schools in the country — notable in a state that voted in 1996 to ban affirmative action.

. . .Last week, President Biden called adversity scores a “new standard” for achieving diversity.

Word has gotten out about the U.C. Davis scale. Dr. Henderson said that about 20 schools had recently requested more information. And there are other socioeconomic measurements, including Landscape, released in 2019 from the College Board, the nonprofit that administers the SATs. That tool allows undergraduate admissions offices to assess the socioeconomic backgrounds of individual students.

But skeptics question whether such rankings — or any kind of socioeconomic affirmative action — will be enough to replace race-conscious affirmative action. And schools that use adversity scales may also find themselves wandering into legal quagmires, with conservative groups promising to fight programs that are simply stand-ins for race.

I favor this for several reasons, one being that it seems fairer, taking into account life circumstances instead of ethnicity. It also seems to create more diversity than just assuming that each ethnic group has a homogeneous outlook.  But is it fair to penalize those who haven’t experiences as much adversity? And how do you rank adversity versus “merit” as measured by tests? Finally, if this is just a proxy for race, it’s illegal. Still, if you have two equally-meritorious students, you should have a rule that you generally favor the one with the higher “adversity” score. But my thinking about this is all over the place.

*The riots in Paris continue about the police killing of Nahel Merzouk, a 17 year old North African shot during a traffic stop near the capital. And it’s not just a one-off incident: les flics have a history of racism and bad treatment of minorities:

Police treatment of minorities in France has come under scrutiny in recent years. A 2017 study by France’s independent civil-rights watchdog found that men perceived to be of African or Arab origin were about three times more likely than white men to have experienced a police identity check in the previous five years.

The murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2020 fueled new debate in France about police tactics, with tens of thousands of protesters taking to the streets. The government of Macron denied there was a problem of racism in the police. Later that year, police were filmed on video beating Michel Zecler, a Black music producer, at his studio in France. Zecler said one of the officers called him a “dirty n—” in French, while striking him.

Despite the criticism, French police kill far fewer people than their counterparts in the U.S. The French national police and the gendarmes, which police France’s rural areas, killed a total of 26 people in 2019, according to BastaMag, a French media organization. U.S. police forces killed 1,098 people that year, according to Mapping Police Violence, a group that tracks police killings. That is more than eight times as many police killings as France on a per-capita basis.

Yes, that’s true, but it’s not just the murders that count; it’s the more brutal treatment of minorities as well as closer police scrutiny. I once saw, in a French subway station, a bunch of cops beating up a black man with nightsticks. I don’t know what had happened, but that frightening image has remained in my mind for over thirty years.

*In an analysis in the Washington Post, Anne Marimow suggests that the latest Supreme Court Justice, Keanji Brown Jackson, while remaining on the liberal side, is actively carving out her own niche on that side.

Jackson on Friday completed her rookie term as the first Black woman to serve on the nation’s highest court, making a forceful debut from the bench and in writing while showing signs of an independent streak. As anticipated, she was most often aligned with the court’s two other liberal justices — Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan — putting her on the losing side of high-profile, contentious decisions involving affirmative action in college admissions, gay rights and President Biden’s student loan forgiveness program.

But Jackson also demonstrated a willingness to part ways with her liberal colleagues, even when they were on the same side of an issue, to express her own vision of the law. She authored more solo dissenting opinions —three — than any of the three most recent justices to join the court did as newbies.

And Jackson surprised some observers by teaming up several times with conservative Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, typically in cases involving a conflict between government power and the rights of individuals.

“She was not going to sit on the sidelines. She dove in and made her presence known,” said New York University law professor Melissa Murray, who also was among the attorneys Biden considered nominating to fulfill his promise to name the first Black female justice to succeed Stephen G. Breyer.

. . .Jackson responded directly to Thomas’s interpretation of a colorblind Constitution and his harsh critique of what he described as Jackson’s view that “almost all of life’s outcomes may be unhesitatingly ascribed to race.”

Jackson answered in a pithy, rhetorical style to what she called Thomas’s “prolonged attack” on a “dissent I did not write.”

“With let-them-eat-cake obliviousness, today, the majority pulls the ripcord and announces ‘colorblindness for all’ by legal fiat,” Jackson wrote. “But deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life.”

This mixed metaphor doesn’t strike me as particularly percipient, as the issue of whether race is irrelevant in life doesn’t automatically lead one to favor affirmative action. And several of her questions during the affirmative-action hearing struck me as misguided.  There’s more:

Sean Marotta, an appellate attorney and close watcher of the court, said Jackson appears to be positioning herself as a “thought leader” for the left wing of the court in the way that Thomas has for years done on the right. Thomas led the court in dissents this term, writing a total of nine.

What will be will be, but I really should spend more time reading the decisions, and also listening to the questions from the bench. Sadly, life is short, and there are many things competing for our attention.

*Cranky People of the Week Award. Yes, there are some Americans who won’t celebrate the Fourth of July because it’s not “inclusive.” There are other reasons given for not celebrating, too (crowds, fireworks, etc.), but those are more sensible. America’s not perfect, but there are people all over the world fighting to become Americans, so there’s something good about being here, and something, at least to me, worth celebrating about our birth as a nation.

Others disagree:

Growing up in Benton, Ark., Malaya Tapp loved celebrating the Fourth of July with her family. “We would go to parades and see firework shows and hang out with friends,” she said. “It was always such a fun holiday.”

But now that she is an adult — she’s 18 and entering college next year — commemorating the holiday isn’t so simple.

It started in 2020 when the Black Lives Matter movement spotlighted many of the injustices across the country. “I lost a lot of my patriotic feelings,” she said.

. . . [Melissa Vivori] also has political qualms with the holiday. “Last summer Roe v. Wade was overturned, and that really made me less inclined to celebrate,” she said.

Even if she wanted to celebrate, she would worry about the message it sent.

So this year she is leaving U.S. soil altogether and heading to Italy and Britain instead. “I’ll be in London for the actual Fourth,” she said, laughing. “The irony is not lost on me.”

What kind of message does it send to watch fireworks and eat hot dogs on the Fourth? Does that mean you approve of the Dobbs decision? One more:

Conner Miskowiec, 28, a content creator in Phoenix, decided to do a video series in which he asked strangers if they were going to celebrate Independence Day.

“I got everything from, ‘America is the greatest country in the world, and we have to celebrate the American dream,’ to ‘This country has a lot to work on, and America isn’t so free, and I don’t feel like celebrating,’” he said. “I honestly didn’t expect to get the variety of answers I got.”

“I think a lot of people think America isn’t for everyone anymore, and so it’s not an inclusive holiday,” he said.

I’m not a jingoist, nor do I think America is the best country in the world, but it’s been a pretty good experiment, albeit with some bumps, and it’s sure as hell better than it was two hundred years ago. Eat your hot dog and enjoy!

*This is a sad story about one man’s dedication to botany, and how it led to his death.

For four years, Gabriel Trujillo trekked the breadth of the United States and south into Mexico in search of a flowering shrub called the common buttonbush.

The plant is native to the varied climates of Canada, the U.S. and Mexico. Trujillo, a 31-year-old Ph.D. student at the University of California, Berkeley, wanted to know why it thrived in such a range of places, and whether the evolution of the species held possibilities for future habitat conservation and restoration efforts.

The research was tragically cut short last week in Mexico, where Trujillo’s father said he was shot seven times. Authorities discovered his body on June 22 in the state of Sonora, in northwest Mexico, days after his fiancée reported him missing.

. . .. His family begged him not to go to such a dangerous place: Sonora recorded 518 homicides through May, according to federal government data. But Trujillo believed the trip was crucial to his research.

And his research had beneficial social consequences for Mexico.

. . . Drawn to Sonora, Trujillo hoped to connect with his Opata Indigenous roots through the group’s ancestral lands in the dry, mountainous region. He ultimately wanted to apply his research to building a garden in Mexico and using the buttonbush for wetland restoration. His planned trip included three potential sites to make a final choice.

I’ve known botanists with that kind of obsessive curiosity, and I admire it. It’s tragic that someone so possessed met such a senseless end. Here’s his photo from the AP:

Credit: Roxanne Cruz-de Hoyos via AP

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is challenging Baby Kulka, whom she hates.  “Are you looking at me?”

Hili: Did you want to say something?
Kulka: Of course not. I’m a cat of peace.
In Polish:
Hili: Chciałaś coś powiedzieć?
Kulka: Ależ skąd. Jestem kotem pokoju.

********************

From Merilee, a Scott Metzger cartoon:

From the Absurd Sign Project 2.0 Facebook page:

From Not Another Science Cat Page:

Masih’s pinned tweet, which is very good (sound up):

From Titania: a speech in favor of a hate speech law.  Restrict freedom of speech for the common good! This is Irish Green Party Senator Pauline O’Reilly:

Really interesting animals found by reader Malcolm:

From Barry. I don’t understand why they’re hiding the video, but the tweet is here also.

From Merilee. Who’s the staff now?

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a girl gassed upon arrival, not yet two years old.

Tweets from Professor Cobb. First, a wry comment:

Apparently the hen really has brought up these ducklings. Sound up.

Oy! The Otter Poo Dance:

Saturday: Hili dialogue

July 1, 2023 • 6:45 am

First, the air quality in Chicago is improving. When I took this photo at a out 5 pm yesterday, the AQI was 89, in the moderate range, and I could make out the skyscrapers downtown from my crib. The air is still not clear, but it’s not dangerious, either.

It’s July!!!  To be precise, CaturSaturday, July 1, 2023, and cat shabbos. It’s also National Gingersnap Day, and I’ll eat any confection that has ginger (candied ginger is the best). Here’s the best value for candied ginger on Amazon (click photo for source):

It’s also these food months:

National Baked Bean Month (just one bean???)
National Culinary Arts Month
National Hot Dog Month
National Ice Cream Month
National Picnic Month
National Pickle Month

It’s also American Zoo Day, International Joke Day, U.S. Postage Stamp Day, Zip Code Day, International Chicken Wing Day, International Reggae Day, Canada Day (formerly Dominion Day), and International Cherry Pit Spitting Day, and, for some reason,  Bobby Bonilla Day in the U.S.

First, here’s a video of the National Cherry Pit Spitting Competition from several years ago.  The world record is a long 93 feet!

And here’s a Jewish joke in honor of Joke Day. I’m allowed to tell it because I’m Jewish, but this isn’t anti-Semitic; it’s just TRUE:

What’s the difference between a Jewish pessimist and a Jewish optimist?
The Jewish pessimist says, “Things can’t possibly get any worse.”
The Jewish optimist says, “Sure they can!”

Readers are invited (indeed, strongly urged) to put a joke in the comments:

Further, Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the July 1 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*First, reader Reese informs us, and it seems to be true, that you can no longer view anybody’s tweets without having your own Twitter account.

If you’re not logged into your Twitter account and try to view a tweet, you’ll be presented with a sign-in screen. And if you don’t want to have an account on the bird app, too bad!

Twitter hasn’t commented on this change, and given how sloppy the platform has been since Elon Musk’s takeover, it might just be a glitch. However, in a time when Twitter is struggling to grow its user base, it’s possible that this is a tactic to force silent lurkers into creating an account.

*Legal news from reader Ken:

The Court just ruled in favor of the Colorado web designer who refused to provide services for same-sex marriage couples. The vote was 6-3. You can guess the rest.

From the NBC site:

The justices, divided6-3on ideological lines, said that Lorie Smith, as a creative professional, has a free speech right under the Constitution’s First Amendment to refuse to endorse messages she disagrees with. As a result, she cannot be punished under Colorado’s antidiscrimination law for refusing to design websites for gay couples, the court said.

The ruling could allow other owners of similar creative businessesto evade punishment under laws in 29 states that protect LGBTQ rights in public accommodations in some form. The remaining 21 states do not have laws explicitly protecting LGBTQ rights in public accommodations, although some local municipalities do.

Clearly they felt that religious freedom outweighed civil rights laws.

“The First Amendment envisions the United States as a rich and complex place, where all persons are free to think and speak as they wish, not as the government demands,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote for the court.

Gorsuch, who wrote a 2020 ruling that expanded LGBTQ rights in an employment context, said that public accommodation laws play a vital role in protecting individual civil rights.

“At the same time, this court has also recognized that no public accommodation law is immune from the demands of the Constitution. In particular, this court has held, public accommodations statutes can sweep too broadly when deployed to compel speech,” he added.

Smith, who opposes same-sex marriage on religious grounds and runs a business designing websites, sued the state in 2016 because she said she would like to accept customers planning opposite-sex weddings but reject requests made by same-sex couples wanting the same service. She was never penalized for rejecting a same-sex couple — and it’s unclear if she ever did — but sued on hypothetical grounds.

I have mixed feelings about this, but tend to lean more towards the civil liberties side than the religious accommodation side. FIRE, however, feels differently:

Today’s decision in 303 Creative v. Elenis is a resounding victory for freedom of expression and freedom of conscience. The Court’s opinion reaffirms decades of precedent protecting our First Amendment rights to speak and think free of government compulsion.

Freedom of conscience is a fundamental individual right: The First Amendment protects our right not to speak, too, and the government cannot force Americans to voice its preferred message on pain of punishment. Today’s decision recognizes that just as the First Amendment protects students in our public schools from discipline for refusing to pledge allegiance to the flag, so too does it protect the right of artists to voice only those messages they wish to express, without risking government-imposed fines and “remedial training.”

*At the Weekly Dish, Andrew Sullivan reacts to this decision (and the one on affirmative action).

The decisions this past week — and the reactions to them — are clarifying. In the affirmative action case, the evidence was overwhelming that Harvard was actively and consciously discriminating, sometimes crudely, against Asian-Americans. You might imagine that would embarrass my alma mater, even shame them, exposing their admission methods as systemically racist. Yet Harvard’s response did not mention this at all. That’s how strongly they despise race discrimination: if it’s against Asian-Americans, they don’t despise it at all.

Similarly, the New York Times was able to write a long editorial without mentioning Asian-American students, the key group at issue, once. They are actually lamenting a decision that upholds the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Because like the old racists, they want to establish a systemically racist country which privileges some races over others: a mirror image of the old white supremacy, in a vastly more complicated and diverse ethnic population. And it’s a population that opposes race in  college admissions with a three-quarters majority, including 60 percent of Democrats.

On the Creative v. Elenis case:

In the free-speech case, 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, the issue was whether the state could compel an individual — through public accommodation laws — to create expressive messages which violated her religious conscience. How, I wonder, is this even a question? The idea of compelling someone to express views she does not hold and violate her deepest convictions should be utterly anathema in a free country. This is emphatically not a question of refusing service to same-sex couples in general; it’s about freedom of speech and conscience. I helped pioneer the campaign for marriage equality, I have lived it, I believe in it as passionately as anyone, and I have not a scintilla of a desire to compel someone to celebrate it in their own words if it goes against her conscience.

To repeat, because so many outlets are distorting this so badly, this is not anti-gay. It’s pro-freedom of expression. It’s written by Neil Gorsuch, who gave trans and gay people full equality under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, asserting that “an employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender defies the law.” And if we are to live in a free society, respect and toleration goes both ways. Gay and lesbian freedom is inextricable from religious freedom. And the right to speak freely was the only right gay people had for centuries. We’d now take it away from someone else?

*The Supreme Court is really busy changing laws this week. As I am looking at news pieces on Friday afternoon, I learned that the Supreme Court just rejected Biden’s plan to forgive some student loans (to be exact, forgiving $10,000 for students that make over $100,000. The vote? 6-3 of course.

The Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority struck down President Biden’s proposal to cancel at least some student debt for tens of millions of borrowers, saying it overstepped the powers of the Education Department.

In a 6-to-3 decision, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote that a mass debt cancellation program of such significance required clear approval by Congress.

Chief Justice Roberts declared that the administration’s logic — that the secretary of education’s power to “waive or modify” loan terms allowed for debt cancellation — was a vast overreach. “In the same sense that the French Revolution ‘modified’ the status of the French nobility,” he wrote, quoting a previous court decision.

Citing the same authority the Trump administration used to begin the pause on student loan payments during the pandemic, Mr. Biden promised in August to forgive $10,000 in debt for individuals earning less than $125,000 per year, or $250,000 per household, and $20,000 for those who received Pell grants for low-income families.

Nearly 26 million borrowers have applied to have some of their student loan debt erased, with 16 million applications approved. But no debts have been forgiven or additional applications accepted in light of the legal challenges.

The decision — a day after the court struck a blow against affirmative action policies in college admissions — effectively ended what would have been one of the most expensive executive actions in U.S. history.

This would have cost the American taxpayers about $430 billion. Here’s Sullivan’s take on that decision, clearly written at the last moment:

On the third Court question, student loans, it seems equally astonishing to me that the Democratic Party, which rightly decried Trump’s penchant for exceeding the bounds of presidential power, should now believe that the president, by executive action alone, can waive away $400 billion of student debt. If temporary forgiveness during the emergency of the Covid pandemic was permissible, that emergency is now over. And if the Congress wants to devise other ways to ease the pain of former students, they have every right to do so. Restraining executive overreach is what the Supreme Court is designed for. And it did the right thing.

I agree.

*Nellie Bowles is back with her ever-entertaining weeklynews summary, this week called “TGIF: Going to Supremes.” As usual, I’ll steal three items from her:

→ Affirmative action has been struck down: The Supreme Court struck down affirmative action in college admissions on Thursday, ending a decades-long battle. If you’re upset about this, I wouldn’t worry. Schools will find a way (to ensure that Asian students don’t succeed too much). In the court’s decision you’ll find the line: “nothing prohibits universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected the applicant’s life.” In a response to the decision, Harvard cites that exact carve-out, while noting that they will “certainly comply with the court’s decision.” So there can’t literally be a big minus-10 for children of Indian descent. But all the Korean kids will just get very bad marks for their essays, you see. Harvard finds a way (to keep out Asians). For those applying to schools this upcoming college admissions cycle, make sure to include anecdotes about your lived experiences making pupusas with your abuela, regardless of your race.

Yes, expect some cringe-making (and uniform) essay topics from American universities this fall.  Next, don’t neglect the piece Nellie singles out; it’s heartbreaking.

→ If you read anything about disasters at sea: Let it be this deeply reported piece about the fishing boat that wrecked off the coast of Greece, and the 750 migrants who were on board. We give the mainstream media a lot of flak here, but this piece in the Washington Post reminds us of how great the old newspapers can be.

→ Martha’s Vineyard accepts four (4) migrants, gets glowing NYT story: After those bad mean Southern red-state governors sent migrants to liberal cities, Martha’s Vineyard residents looked inside their hearts. They found their strength. They harnessed their love. They spoke their truth. And they accepted exactly four migrants under their wing, who have stayed in the region and found odd jobs. How gracious! How good! In honor of this big-hearted embrace, The New York Times arrived to document the kindness of these Martha’s Vineyardians. Those four migrants are shacked up in the Vineyard and it’s not even a big deal, except that there’s a New York Times profile of them. From the story:

“Ms. Cauro is one of at least four migrants who have quietly stayed behind on the island, forming bonds with a community that opened what doors it could. Ms. Cauro, 25, is working as a landscaper. Her brother, Daniel, 29, and her cousin, Eliud Aguilar, 28, found jobs in painting and roofing.”

“A community that opened what doors it could.” Four doors, to be exact. If you’d like to see these four migrants simply thriving in their new community, there’s a lovely, understated $13 million house for sale nearby (six beds, no doors).

Nellie’s piece is especially good this week, so go over there and read all the items.

*And, not really news but advice for coffee lovers from the Wall Street Journal:

For the last umpteen years I’ve used only a Breville espresso machine, but the article touts pour-over coffee as the apotheosis of Java:

IN PURSUIT of the perfect cup of coffee, Dorothy Weinstein has tried almost every method of brewing.

The 62-year-old adjunct professor of clinical research and leadership based in Bethesda, Md., has reached one firm conclusion: No drip machine, AeroPress, Keurig, percolator, French press or moka pot can compare to the $7 plastic Melitta pour-over cone she began using in college. To get the best results with such a device, or the ubiquitous hourglass-shaped Chemex, you must heat the water yourself, precisely weigh, then grind your coffee—and then stream the heated water over those grounds with finesse.

I am dubious. But now Dr. Weinstein is thinking of going high end:

Last year, she decided to splurge on one of a growing class of machines that promise pour-over-quality joe with press-a-button convenience: the Chemex Ottomatic 2.0 ($350). Though pricey, the Ottomatic might seem a bargain compared to similar machines that range from $645 to $799, including: the Ratio Eight, which debuted in 2012; the xBloom, released last year; and the Brew by Balmuda, new this May.

. . .Pour-over devotees might point out smugly that a cone like Melitta’s costs little more than a latte with tip. As any good barista will tell you, though, getting the most from one of these drippers does require some skill. Every decision you make while brewing a cup of pour-over leads to small, but discernible, changes in flavor. It’s not just water temperature that matters, but the rhythm, motion, and speed with which it’s poured over the grounds.

These automatic pour-over machines promise to simulate the motion of a human barista, extracting all the coffee’s particular flavors and hidden notes, without making it too bitter or acidic. But, according to Jon Freihofer, 34, the director of coffee services for Joe Coffee Company, these further degrees of control aim to “add a level of replicability that’s hard to achieve as a human.”

. . .  I was drawn to the sleek, compact design of Balmuda’s the Brew, and some of its extra features, including its ability to make cold brew concentrate. Mostly, though, I wanted to see if it was worth the absurd cost: Could it brew a transcendent cup of coffee?

Author Max Cea tested the pricey machines SCIENTIFICALLY, using blind testing:

To help test if its results beat those from my drip machine, I invited my sister over for a blind, but certainly not peer-reviewed experiment. Using beans from two favorite New York roasters—Brooklyn’s Abbotsford Road and Tarrytown’s Coffee Labs Roasters—I brewed coffee three ways: with a manual Hario V6 pour-over; with my Bonavita Connoisseur drip machine; and with the Brew.

The differences were small but noticeable. Each time, my sister favored the manual pour-over, closely followed by the Brew, with the standard drip ranking a relatively distant last. “The manual pour-over was the Goldilocks cup, not too burnt or bitter, something I could drink every day,” she said.

There you go, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends: if you drink regular Joe, the cheap funnel and filter paper is the way to go. As for me, I need espresso, and a funnel won’t get you that.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili’s becoming the Greta Thunberg of cats:

Szaron: Scientists say that the world will end in three years.
Hili: I’ve heard that it can be prevented if we become vegetarians.
In Polish:
Szaron: Naukowcy twierdzą, że za trzy lata będzie koniec świata.
Hili: Słyszałam. Podobno możemy temu zapobiec przechodząc na wegetariańską dietę.

, . . and a picture of baby Kulka:

********************

From Divy:

From Stash Krod, a Gary Larson Far Side cartoon, and a sad one for duck lovers:

From the Absurd Sign Project 2.0:

From Masih:  Jamshid Sharmahd, an Iranian-German journalist, was kidnapped from Dubai in 2020, taken to Iran, and sentenced to death on bogus charges.

Titania clears up a misunderstanding:

From Malcolm: a kitten falls asleep standing up:

From Barry: a crazy creationist. (Plus we have plenty of evidence for macroevolution: many fossil “transitional forms” between current major taxa, for instance (reptile—>mammal, reptile—>bird, for instance).

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a 7-year-old girl gassed upon arrival:

Tweets from Matthew. This one, which he just posted, is, I think, his daughter’s graduation from the University of Cambridge.

I posted this audio illusion on Twitter and it works most of the time for me, but not all the time. I have no idea why it works at all!

This is a fantastic lineup:

Friday: Hili dialogue

June 30, 2023 • 6:45 am

It’s Friday, June 30, 2023, and my sister Susan’s birthday (she’s exactly 2½ years younger than I, so it’s also my half-birthday). Happy birthday, sis! Here’s our passport picture with mom, taken when we went to Greece in about 1955:

We’ll toast her birthday with a tropical drink, since it’s National Mai Tai Day. a drink made with rum, orange curaçao, fresh lime juice and orgeat.

Source and recipe

It’s also Cream Tea Day (with scones and raspberry jam, I hope), National Corvette Day, National Food Truck Day, National Meteor Watch Day, International Asteroid Day, and Social Media Day.

My Twitter photo is always Hili, but it changes from time to time:

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the June 30 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*All the buzz is about the Supreme Court’s striking down affirmative action, which is as unexpected as snow in Antarctica.

Leaders of American business and public institutions warned in friend-of-the-court briefs that a ruling against affirmative action would deprive the nation of leaders who reflect the population’s racial diversity. The watershed decision sets new parameters for the continuing national debate over what criteria are permissible to admit people to the country’s elite institutions and hire them at its biggest companies—crucial springboards for upward mobility in America.

University officials have insisted no substitute for racial preferences exists that can ensure that a representative share of minority applicants—particularly Black students—gains admission to selective institutions.

If no substitute exists, does this mean that affirmative action can never end? If so, then there is no endpoint beyond which racial preferences needn’t exist.

“Eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it,” Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the court, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. “The student must be treated based on his or her experiences as an individual—not on the basis of race. Many universities have for too long done just the opposite,” he wrote.

The court’s three liberals dissented. Society “is not, and has never been, colorblind,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson. “The Court ignores the dangerous consequences of an America where its leadership does not reflect the diversity of the People.”

Lee Bollinger, Columbia University’s president, expects five years of chaos before higher education fully adjusts to the new legal landscape, as committees and task forces—already in place at many schools—explore ways to employ income levels, socioeconomic factors and other race-neutral factors to maintain diversity.

Note that what has to be done is maintain the status quo, but take actions that will maintain it legally. We have to admit, though, that no race-neutral factors will ever maintain diversity at the levels universities want. How could that work.

*Well, various workarounds, surreptitious or not, have been proposed. One, suggested in an op-ed in the NYT by Stephanie Saul, is the admissions essay, “The college application essay will become a place to talk about race.” But that, of course, would lead to every college in America asking for essays about race, which is not only tedious, but is in effect a kind of DEI statement for students: a way to show their ideological bona fides as well as reveal their own race. Saul:

The college essay may become more important after the Supreme Court’s decision, and a place where students can highlight their racial or ethnic backgrounds — but with a big caution sign from the court.

In the decision striking down affirmative action policies at Harvard and the University of North Carolina, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. wrote, “Nothing prohibits universities from considering an applicant’s discussion of how race affected the applicant’s life, so long as that discussion is concretely tied to a quality of character or unique ability that the particular applicant can contribute to the university.”

But that distorts the purpose of the essay, which is to show a student’s writing ability, thoughtfulness, personality, and imagination. The University of Chicago is famous for asking weird essay questions; go here to see a few. I’ll pick two (inspired by students) and ask you if you can work racial issues into them:

The seven liberal arts in antiquity consisted of the Quadrivium — astronomy, mathematics, geometry, and music — and the Trivium — rhetoric, grammar, and logic. Describe your own take on the Quadrivium or the Trivium. What do you think is essential for everyone to know?
—Inspired by Peter Wang, Class of 2022

You are on an expedition to found a colony on Mars, when from a nearby crater, a group of Martians suddenly emerges. They seem eager to communicate, but they’re the impatient kind and demand you represent the human race in one song, image, memory, proof, or other idea. What do you share with them to show that humanity is worth their time?
—Inspired by Alexander Hastings, Class of 2023, and Olivia Okun-Dubitsky, Class of 2026

But John Roberts is way ahead of these strategies:

However, the chief justice also took a shot across the bow at anyone who might be thinking that the essay could be used as a surreptitious means of racial selection.

“Despite the dissent’s assertion to the contrary, universities may not simply establish through the application essays or other means the regime we hold unlawful today,” he wrote, underscoring, “What cannot be done directly cannot be done indirectly.”

And now groups like Students for Fair Admissions, which represented the plaintiffs in the Harvard and UNC suit, will be able to monitor how colleges are admitting students, and look for “proxies for race”, like Harvard’s “pesonality score.” It won’t be easy to do an end run around the Court’s decisions.

As for nice essay questions like the ones Chicago uses, we won’t see many like these from now on. No, here’s what we’re in for:

Some education officials had already strategized on how to use the essay. In a recent presentation sponsored by the American Council on Education, Shannon Gundy, the director of undergraduate admissions at the University of Maryland, said students should tailor their admissions essays to describe how race had affected their lives.

Can you imagine? Every essay topic pretty much the same, with companies springing up that, for a fee, will help a student craft an admissions-winning essay.

*For an eclectic but sensible take on affirmative action, read Freddie de Boer’s Substack piece, “Affirmative action thoughts in an inelegant format.” Here are three of his many points:

  • All things being equal, I’m fine with some race-conscious admissions in our actually-existing university system, though under a theory of reparations for slavery, not the bizarre jerry-rigged “diversity” sham. [JAC: this is my own rationale, too]
  • I am much, much more worried for the vast number of Black people who don’t even apply to college than I am about a theoretical Black student who would get into Harvard with a racial preference but wouldn’t without. The former is in worse shape by absolutely any metric. This whole conversation rests on weird priorities.
  • It remains profoundly weird that people who want to defend affirmative action can’t straightforwardly say what it does. Affirmative action is a system in which students of color who would not ordinarily gain entry to a given college are given a slot thanks to consideration of their racial background, on grounds of diversity or addressing systemic bias. But if you say “these college kids got in because of affirmative action,” that’s a horrible, racist thing to say. I can’t think of another progressive program where the defenders of that program have forbidden people from saying that the system is working as it is intended to work. Very strange.

*Nine states, including California, have already banned affirmative action in college. In the WaPo, Janice Kai Chen and Daniel Wolfe note that “State affirmative action bans helped White, Asian students, hurt others.”

In states with bans, Hispanic and Native Americans were less represented

Where race-based admission policies were banned in 2021, already underrepresented racial groups had even lower representation when compared to states without bans.

Black representation increased a bit, but didn’t reach parity. The data are complex, though; in some schools diversity increased after affirmative-action bans. In general, though, minority representation decreased after these bans. Do read the piece for yourself if you’re interested.

*The AP reports reactions of various people to the affirmative-action decision, including Biden and some Justices themselves. There are really no surprises, but it’s interesting to hear.

Chief Justice John Roberts said that for too long universities have “concluded, wrongly, that the touchstone of an individual’s identity is not challenges bested, skills built, or lessons learned but the color of their skin. Our constitutional history does not tolerate that choice.”

From the White House, President Joe Biden said he “strongly, strongly” disagreed with the court’s ruling and urged colleges to seek other routes to diversity rather than let the ruling “be the last word.”

Besides the conservative-liberal split, the fight over affirmative action showed the deep gulf between the three justices of color, each of whom wrote separately and vividly about race in America and where the decision might lead.

Justice Clarence Thomas — the nation’s second Black justice, who had long called for an end to affirmative action — wrote that the decision “sees the universities’ admissions policies for what they are: rudderless, race-based preferences designed to ensure a particular racial mix in their entering classes.”

Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the court’s first Latina, wrote in dissent that the decision “rolls back decades of precedent and momentous progress.”

In a separate dissent, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson — the court’s first Black female justice — called the decision “truly a tragedy for us all.”

Jackson, who sat out the Harvard case because she had been a member of an advisory governing board, wrote, “With let-them-eat-cake obliviousness, today, the majority pulls the ripcord and announces ‘colorblindness for all’ by legal fiat. But deeming race irrelevant in law does not make it so in life.

Biden, who quickly stepped before cameras at the White House, said of the nation’s colleges: “They should not abandon their commitment to ensure student bodies of diverse backgrounds and experience that reflect all of America,” He said colleges should evaluate “adversity overcome” by candidates.

Well, that’s one workaround, but somehow I don’t think it’s going to guarantee diversity. After all, not every minority student overcame adversity, and many non-minority students did. And I bet almost everyone can write an essay about a major obstacle they overcame.

Finally, statements from two former Presidents:

Former Presidents Donald Trump and Barack Obama offered starkly different takes on the high court ruling. The decision marked “a great day for America. People with extraordinary ability and everything else necessary for success, including future greatness for our Country, are finally being rewarded,” Trump, the current Republican presidential frontrunner, wrote on his social media network.

Obama said in a statement that affirmative action “allowed generations of students like Michelle and me to prove we belonged. Now it’s up to all of us to give young people the opportunities they deserve — and help students everywhere benefit from new perspectives.”

It’s interesting that Obama says that both he and Michelle were beneficiaries of affirmative action. I didn’t know that, and never took the trouble to check.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, the Princess is going to rest:

Hili: Something is pushing me towards the bed.
A: Either tiredness or hedonism.
In Polish:
Hili: Coś mnie pcha w kierunku łóżka.
Ja: Albo zmęczenie, albo hedonizm.

. . . and a picture of Baby Kulka:

********************

From Not Another Science Cat Page:

From Ginger K.:

From the Absurd Sign Project 2.0:

From Masih: another brave doffer of the hijab fights back against those who call her a “prostitute”:

From Titania: truth is stranger than fiction:

From Merilee. Three stray kittens get a forever home!

From Barry, two happy snails. Look at that guy chowing down on the green bean! (Or is it asparagus?)

From the Auschwitz Memorial. a boy marched to death at age 17:

Tweets from Matthew. I wonder if there are any British Jews living in Ham?

Look at that manta ray flap! (Doesn’t do it much good in the air, though.)

This is adorable:

Thursday: Hili dialogue

June 29, 2023 • 6:45 am

We’re almost into July! It’s Thursday, June 29, 2023, and National Almond Buttercrunch Day. (Who thinks up these days? Nobody’s going to eat almond buttercrunch today, even though it’s pretty good.)

source

It’s also National Camera Day, The Feast of Saints Peter and Saint Paul, National Handshake Day, National Waffle Iron Day, and, in India, National Statistics Day. Here’s a statistic from India: the population was   as of today. You can see India’s real-time population clock here, and boy does it move fast! It includes births and deaths. Or click on the icon below.  India now almost the same population as China (China’s real-time clock is here.)

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the June 29 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*The WSJ reports that Wagner leader Yevgeny Prigozhin had planned to capture Russian military leaders as part of his march on Moscow last week.

Mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin planned to capture Russia’s military leadership as part of last weekend’s mutiny, Western officials said, and he accelerated his plans after the country’s domestic intelligence agency became aware of the plot.

The plot’s premature launch was among the factors that could explain its ultimate failure after 36 hours, when Prigozhin called off an armed march on Moscow that had initially faced little resistance.

Prigozhin originally intended to capture Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Gen. Valery Gerasimov, the chief of Russia’s general staff, during a visit to a southern region that borders Ukraine that the two were planning. But the Federal Security Service, or FSB, found out about the plan two days before it was to be executed, according to Western officials.

Gen. Viktor Zolotov, commander of the National Guard of Russia, a domestic military force that reports directly to President Vladimir Putin, also said authorities knew about Prigozhin’s intentions before he launched his attempt.

“Specific leaks about preparations for a rebellion that would begin between June 22-25 were leaked from Prigozhin’s camp,” Zolotov told state media on Tuesday.

Western intelligence agencies also found out early about the plans by Prigozhin, Putin’s former confidant, by analyzing electronic communications intercepts and satellite imagery, according to a person familiar with the findings. Western officials said they believe the original plot had a good chance of success but failed after the conspiracy was leaked, forcing Prigozhin to improvise an alternative plan.

. . . Prigozhin’s plot relied on his belief that a part of Russia’s armed forces would join the rebellion and turn against their own commanders, according to this intelligence. The preparations included amassing large amounts of ammunition, fuel and hardware including tanks, armored vehicles and sophisticated mobile air defenses days before the attack, according to Western intelligence findings.

And so ends Prigozhin’s plans to depose Putin and take over the Russian Army. He’s toast now, and even in Belarus his life isn’t worth a plugged nickel. Russia will send someone to take him out with either a gun or an umbrella that inserts tiny a poisoned sphere into his leg.

*Russia keeps striking civilian targets in Ukraine with missiles, and then denying it’s aiming at civilians. This time a missile killed 11 (including three teenagers) at a pizza restaurant in Kramotsk,a city  in eastern Ukraine. And the Ukrainians think it was an inside job, with one of their own pointing out the target to the Russians.

Ukrainian authorities on Wednesday arrested a man they accused of helping Russia direct a missile strike that killed at least 11 people, including three teenagers, at a popular pizza restaurant in eastern Ukraine.

The Tuesday evening attack on Kramatorsk wounded 61 other people, Ukraine’s National Police said. It was the latest bombardment of a Ukrainian city, a tactic Russia has used heavily in the 16-month-old war.

The strike, and others across Ukraine late Tuesday and early Wednesday, indicated that the Kremlin is not easing its aerial onslaught, despite political and military turmoil at home after a short-lived armed uprising in Russia last weekend.

. . .In Kramatorsk, two sisters, both age 14, died in the attack, the city council’s educational department said. “Russian missiles stopped the beating of the hearts of two angels,” it said in a Telegram post.

The other dead teenager was 17, according to Prosecutor General Andrii Kostin.

The attack also damaged 18 multistory buildings, 65 houses, five schools, two kindergartens, a shopping center, an administrative building and a recreational building, regional Governor Pavlo Kyrylenko said.

. . . The Security Service of Ukraine said the man it detained, an employee of a gas transportation company, is suspected of filming the restaurant for the Russians and informing them about its popularity.

It provided no evidence for its claim. Russia has insisted during the war that it doesn’t aim at civilian targets, although its air strikes have killed many civilians. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov repeated that claim on Wednesday.

I don’t know if this was an inside job, but it’s pretty bloody obvious that the Russians are targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure. That’s a war crime, but it will be a cold day in July when Putin is called to account for it.

*It’s really hazy in Chicago today, and once again we top America with most hazardous air (see below). The smoke from Canadian wildfires has hit the Midwest at last.

Here’s the ranking yesterday morning. “300” is hazardous but all day today (I’m writing on Wednesday afternoon) we had the world air quality in the world. Top of the world, Ma!

This morning it’s down to a mere 168, or “unhealthy”. And we may get some rain to lower it further.

The smoke is the result of one of Canada’s worst wildfire seasons in decades — nearly 500 active wildfires were burning in Canada early Wednesday, according to the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre, and more than 250 were burning out of control.

Climate change has turned once improbably high temperatures into more commonplace occurrences and intensified conditions that fuel catastrophic wildfires and their effects on air quality. Wildfire season in Canada usually doesn’t even begin until early July, and the blazes are likely to grow, said David Brown, an air quality meteorologist at the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, meaning dangerous air quality could threaten the northern United States for weeks to come.

But the Canadians aren’t getting off easy, either:

As smoke from Canadian wildfires billowed into the United States and as far as Europe this week, millions of Canadians on Wednesday were grappling with poor air quality that is quickly becoming an unfortunate way of life in the fire-battered country.

Over the past month, the wildfires have forced the evacuation of tens of thousands of people from their homes, while underlining that environmental hazards do not obey borders. On Wednesday, the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre said there were 479 active wildfires in the country.

Environment Canada said on Wednesday that high levels of air pollution were expected in northern Quebec and Ontario, including in Toronto, the country’s largest city and its financial center, as well as in Windsor and London, Ontario.

*Here’s omething else connected with global warming, as well as environmental damage. The NYT reports scientists’ scary finding that the earth’s axis—the imaginary rod through the planet around which it spins—started wandering around pretty quickly since 2000.

For decades, scientists had been watching the average position of our planet’s rotational axis, the imaginary rod around which it turns, gently wander south, away from the geographic North Pole and toward Canada. Suddenly, though, it made a sharp turn and started heading east.

In time, researchers came to a startling realization about what had happened. Accelerated melting of the polar ice sheets and mountain glaciers had changed the way mass was distributed around the planet enough to influence its spin.

Now, some of the same scientists have identified another factor that’s had the same kind of effect: colossal quantities of water pumped out of the ground for crops and households.

“Wow,” Ki-Weon Seo, who led the research behind the latest discovery, recalled thinking when his calculations showed a strong link between groundwater extraction and the drifting of Earth’s axis. It was a “big surprise,” said Dr. Seo, a geophysicist at Seoul National University.

. . .Between 1960 and 2000, worldwide groundwater depletion more than doubled, to about 75 trillion gallons a year, scientists estimate. Since then, satellites that measure variations in Earth’s gravity have revealed the staggering extent to which groundwater supplies have declined in particular regions, including India and the Central Valley of California.

I’m not surprised that it would have an effect” on Earth’s spin, said Matthew Rodell, an earth scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. But “it’s impressive they were able to tease that out of the data,” Dr. Rodell said, referring to the authors of the new research, which was published this month in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. “And that the observations they have of the polar motion are precise enough to see that effect.”

The wobbling axis doesn’t threaten us, but what makes it wobble does. Beyond more evidence of anthropogenic damage to our planet, we can now use the wobbles to further study climate change.

*I couldn’t resist this at the Washington Post: “What’s the best vanilla ice cream? We tried 13 popular brands.”Here are the rankings from best to worst:

  1. Ben and Jerry’s Vanilla
  2. Kirkland Signature Super Premium Vanilla (Costco)
  3. Tillamook Vanilla Bean
  4. Trader Joe’s French Vanilla
  5. Häagen-Dazs Vanilla Bean
  6. 365 Vanilla (Whole Foods)
  7. (tie) Blue Bell Natural Vanilla Bean and Great Value Vanilla Bean (Walmart)
  8. Turkey Hill Vanilla Bean
  9. Blue Bunny Vanilla Bean
  10. Halo Top Vanilla Bean
  11. Edy’s Vanilla Bean
  12. Breyer’s Natural Vanilla

But the ranking of Ben and Jerry’s and Costco’s Kirkland are both high and close to each other AND Kirkland, which comes as two half-gallons, costs only 15¢ per ounce  as opposed to 44¢ per ounce for Ben and Jerry’s. I’ve had Costco’s and it’s good, and cost only a THIRD as much as the high-prices brand. This is a no brainer. PLUS, Costco’s is made with great ingredients and comes in (a pack of two) honest half-gallons as opposed to a meager 48 ounces that replaced what used to be a half-gallon for most major brands. Buy at Costco!

*Here’s a video of the guy who carved his name, and that of his squeeze, into the wall’s of Rome’s Colosseum. The story is here, and the Italians are royally peeved, as they should be.

The footage, captured by a fellow bystander, shows  a smiling man sporting a backpack allegedly using his keys to engrave “Ivan+Haley 23” onto the walls of the 2000-year-old Roman monument, also known as the Flavian Amphitheater.

The culprit’s actions prompted disbelief from the bystander recording the video, who can be heard in the YouTube video titled: “A**hole tourist carves name in Colosseum in Rome 6-23-23”, as they say: “Are you f**ing serious, man?”

. . .The identity of the alleged vandal remains unknown. If identified by police, the defacer could face hefty fines upwards of $16,000 and potentially a prison sentence of up to five years, according to the Italian news agency ANSA.

Echoing Sangiuliano’s sentiments, Italy’s Minister of Tourism, Daniela Santanche, has expressed her hopes for the man to face stern punishment “so that he understands the gravity of the gesture.”

He shouldn’t be hard to catch. His name is Ivan, that of his girlfriend is Haley, and here’s a good video of what he looks like. He’ll probably leave Italy before he’s caught, but I bet they’ll never let him into the country again once they identify him.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is enigmatic, but Malgorzata explains: “Hili dislikes the idea of ‘influencers’ on the Internet so she decided to fight the phenomenon with their own weapon.”

Hili: I’m an agent of influence.
A: Whose influence?
Hili: Mine.
In Polish:
Hili: Jestem agentką wpływu.
Ja: Czyjego?
Hili: Mojego wpływu.
And a photo of Baby Kulka:

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From the Absurd Sign Project 2.0.  I guess this product isn’t meant to be served to guests:

From Beth:

From Jesus of the Day:

Masih is back tweeting again. Another woman defies two Hijab Police, one of which is a woman.

From Titania, a speech from a woman who’s reverted to three years old:

From Merilee. This is wrong in so many ways! I hope they paid the cat a lot of money.

From Barry, who says “NOT a good boy!”

I guess you’ll have to go see it on the site as for some reason it won’t embed. Just paste it in your browser.

https://twitter.com/_Islamicat/status/1673275165436674048

A bonus tweet from Malcolm:

From the Auschwitz Memorial: A six-year old girl gassed with her brother upon arrival:

Tweets from Matthew. The first one is a new version of an amazing case of crypsis (camouflage) that I’ve pointed out before:

A tweet emitted by Matthew, who says, “From the Guardian. I assume it was deliberate.”

And a paper to skip:

Monday: Hili dialogue

June 26, 2023 • 6:45 am

Good morning at the start of the work week: June 26, 2023, and National Chocolate Pudding Day (for me this will always conjure up the tarnished image of Bill Cosby, who advertised the Jell-o brand).

It’s also National Canoe Day (in Canada), Tropical Cocktails Day, International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking, International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, World Refrigeration Day, and Ratcatcher’s Day inHamelin, Germany.  The latter, of course, refers to the famous story “The Pied Piper of Hamelin” (read the summary on Wikipedia; it’s pretty grim, like many early children’s stories).

From Wikipedia: “Postcard ‘Gruss aus Hameln’ featuring the Pied Piper of Hamelin, 1902″

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the June 26 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*First, the WaPo explains, “Just what happened in Russia? The Wagner crisis explained.”

For the moment, things appear to be calming down, as the forces answering to Prigozhin, the Wagner Group chief, have halted their march toward Moscow and turned around. The development came after an agreement between Prigozhin and Putin was brokered by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, according to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov. Criminal charges previously started against Prigozhin will be dropped, and the Wagner boss will go to Belarus, Peskov said.

Still, the dispute represents a significant challenge to Putin’s leadership, the potential loss of one of Putin’s most successful field commanders, and a possible shift in the course of the war in Ukraine.

How did the dispute start? Internal tensions between Prigozhin and Russian military leaders have been simmering for months over what Prigozhin believed were leadership failures within the military. Prigozhin accused Russian generals of stonewalling his ammunition requests and, as a result, blamed them for his fighters dying “in heaps” in Ukraine.

What exactly did Prigozhin do? Prigozhin said he had taken control of the main Russian military command base in the southern region of Rostov and told two Russian military commanders that he would blockade Rostov and send his forces to Moscow unless he could confront his enemies: Shoigu and Gerasimov.

What deal was brokered? Many analysts predicted that Prigozhin would be killed or arrested as Wagner forces moved toward Moscow. But the sudden about-face of Prigozhin’s troops appeared to have eased the crisis for now.

The agreement for Prigozhin’s forces to turn around was brokered by the Belarusian president, who spoke with Putin before negotiating with Prigozhin, according to the Belarusian state-owned news agency Belta and the Kremlin. With security guarantees for Wagner on the table, Prigozhin reportedly agreed to stop his dash to Moscow.

How is Ukraine responding? Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening address Saturday that the events inside Russia show “that the bosses of Russia do not control anything.”

“Nothing at all. Complete chaos,” Zelensky said. “And it is happening on Russian territory, which is fully loaded with weapons.”

The Ukrainian military continued pressing its offensive Saturday, though there were no immediate signs that the rebellion next door had eased the Ukrainian path to victory.

That is all ye know on Earth, and all ye need to know. Except I want to know what the deuce Wagner is going to do futzing around in Belarus. Are they going to become that country’s private army. Are they going back to attacking Ukraine. We’ll know soon.

*The news is full of speculations about what the short “revolt” of the Wagner group means for Putin’s authority in Russia. Here’s one such article from the NYT:

A day after an armed rebellion by Wagner mercenaries against Vladimir V. Putin’s government was defused at the last minute, neither Mr. Putin nor the mercenary leader made a public appearance, adding to the sense of uncertainty and confusion pervading Russia.

. . . But in many ways, the 24-hour uprising punctured Mr. Putin’s strongman authority. The ability of Mr. Prigozhin to stage an armed mutiny that threatened to reach Moscow raised uncomfortable questions inside Russia: What did Mr. Putin’s failure to prevent the revolt mean for the country’s security — and his staying power? Even Russians with ties to the Kremlin who expressed relief that the uprising did not spark a civil war agreed that Mr. Putin had come off looking weak in a way that could be lasting.

A day after Mr. Putin gave a short national address condemning Mr. Prigozhin’s actions as “treason,” the Russian president maintained a low profile. Mr. Prigozhin’s location also remained unknown.

This weekend, Russian stability was nowhere to be found, and neither was Mr. Putin, who after making a brief statement on Saturday morning vanished from sight during the most dramatic challenge to his authority in his 23-year reign.

In his absence, he left stunned Russians wondering how the leader of a paramilitary group, Yevgeny V. Prigozhin, could stage an armed mutiny on Saturday that threatened to reach Moscow. And it raised uncomfortable questions about the Russian president’s future: What did his failure to prevent the revolt mean for their security — and his staying power?

Russians with ties to the Kremlin expressed relief on Sunday that Mr. Prigozhin’s uprising did not spark a civil war. But at the same time, they agreed that Mr. Putin had come off looking weak in a way that could be lasting.

Konstantin Remchukov, a Moscow newspaper editor with Kremlin connections, said in a telephone interview that what once seemed unthinkable was now possible: that people close to Mr. Putin could seek to persuade him not to stand for re-election in Russia’s presidential vote next spring. With Saturday’s events, he said, Mr. Putin had conclusively lost his status as the guarantor of the elite’s wealth and security.

*Finally, the Wall Street Journal speculates about what is the fate of Wagner.

A day after Wagner’s mutiny showed the unexpected fragility of President Vladimir Putin’s regime, all the main players in Russia’s worst political crisis in decades stayed out of sight—leaving Russians, and the world, to wonder whether the drama was really over.

Key unanswered questions include the future of Wagner’s 25,000 heavily armed troops, of the paramilitary group’s owner Yevgeny Prigozhin and of Russia’s military leadership, which failed to stop his rapid advance toward Moscow. The details of agreements brokered by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to halt looming bloodshed have yet to be made public.

The whereabouts of Prigozhin, who according to the Kremlin had agreed to relocate to Belarus, were also unknown on Sunday. His company told a Russian TV network that he “will answer questions when he will have access to proper communications.” Flying Russian flags, large Wagner columns on Sunday were driving south on the Moscow-Rostov highway—away from the capital and away from Belarus.

Prigozhin, who showed Wagner’s strength by marching two-thirds of the way toward Moscow with little opposition, ended up aborting the rebellion and accepting, at least for now, exile. The Russian army and security forces, meanwhile, displayed little glory as their troops proved reluctant, if not outright afraid, to try stopping Wagner.

I’m wondering what would have happened if the Wagner forces kept going. Could they actually have deposed Putin? Now that would have been something! And the mystery deepens because Prigozhin has disappeared. I’m going to make a prediction: Prigozhin, and the Wagner forces will not resume fighting against Ukraine. What is in it for them except wrecked territory and more loss of lives. They don’t have a country any more, and they’re not fighting for Russia; but will Prigozhin be satisfied cooling his heels in Belarus?

*According to the AP, the House of Representatives, controlled now by Republicans, is quietly trying to make laws to further restrict women’s access to abortion. Just what we need: more religiously inspired restriction of women’s freedom.

In a flurry of little-noticed legislative action, GOP lawmakers are pushing abortion policy changes, trying to build on the work of activists whose strategy successfully elevated their fight to the nation’s highest court.

In one government funding bill after another, Republicans are incorporating unrelated policy provisions, known as riders, to restrict women’s reproductive rights. Democrats say the proposals will never become law.

“This is not just about an attack on women’s health,” Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, said Friday. “I view it as an attempt to derail the entire process of funding the federal government by injecting these riders into the appropriations process.”

Rep. Kay Granger, the Texas Republican who heads the committee, said during a hearings this past week that the riders that were included continue “long-standing pro-life protections that are important to our side of the aisle.”

And look at this!

Nearly a dozen anti-abortion measures have been included so far in budget bills. In the agricultural one, for example, Republicans are looking to reverse a recent move by the Food and Drug Administration that would allow the contraception pill mifepristone to be dispensed in certified pharmacies, as opposed to only in hospitals and clinics.

Anti-abortion proposals have found their way into the defense bill, where GOP lawmakers are aiming to ban paid leave and travel for military service members and their family members who are seeking reproductive health care services. Rep. Mike Rogers, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said he warned Defense Secretary Llyod Austin about it.

But Republicans, knowing that national sentiment isn’t exactly on the side of the stringent restrictions that many states are putting on abortion, are still wary about this, and must surely realize that any bills affection the country will have to pass the Democratic Senate (not a chance), and even if they did they’d be vetoed by Biden and require a two-thirds vote of both House and Senate to override that veto. There’s simply no chance of this happening, so I’m not all that worried. Where we should be worried is about the state legislatures.

*Here are some of Richard Dawkins’s thoughts from a recent visit to New Zealand. They’re on his Substack site in a post called “There’s only one ‘Way of Knowing’: Science“. The topic, of course, is the New Zealand push to bundld indigenous “ways of knowing”, which include not only practical knowledge, but also legend, religion, morality, and superstition, in with science.

To grasp government intentions requires a little work, because every third word of the relevant documents is in Māori. Since only 2 per cent of New Zealanders (and only 5 per cent of Māoris) speak that language, this again looks like self-righteous virtue-signalling, bending a knee to that modish version of Original Sin which is white guilt. Mātauranga Māori includes valuable tips on edible fungi, star navigation and species conservation (pity the moas were all eaten). Unfortunately it is deeply invested in vitalism. New Zealand children will be taught the true wonder of DNA, while being simultaneously confused by the doctrine that all life throbs with a vital force conferred by the Earth Mother and the Sky Father. Origin myths are haunting and poetic, but they belong elsewhere in the curriculum. The very phrase ‘western’ science buys into the ‘relativist’ notion that evolution and big bang cosmology are just the origin myth of white western men, a narrative whose hegemony over ‘indigenous’ alternatives stems from nothing better than political power. This is pernicious nonsense. Science belongs to all humanity. It is humanity’s proud best shot at discovering the truth about the real world.

My speeches in Auckland and Wellington were warmly applauded, though one woman yelled a protest. She was politely invited to participate, but she chose to walk out instead. I truthfully said that, when asked my favourite country, I invariably choose New Zealand. Citing the legacy of Ernest Rutherford, the greatest experimental physicist since Faraday, I begged my audiences to reach out to their MPs in support of New Zealand science. The true reason science is more than an origin myth is that it stands on evidence: massively documented evidence, double blind trials, peer review, quantitative predictions precisely verified in labs around the world. Science reads the billion-word DNA book of life itself. Science eradicates smallpox and polio. Science navigates to Pluto or a tiny comet. Science almost certainly saved your life. Science works.

I feel completely in synch with those sentiments. I love New Zealand, but I hate how the government is truckling to anti-science forces, and how cowed the populace is. I don’t want Kiwi science to go down the drain, but the anti-colonizers seem more interested in grabbing power than in promoting scientific advances.

Richard appended a PS:

Postscript on the flight out: Air New Zealand think it is a cute idea to invoke Māori gods in their safety briefing. Imagine if British Airways announced that their planes are kept aloft by the Holy Ghost in equal partnership with Bernoulli’s Principle and Newton’s First Law. Science explains. It lightens our darkness. Science is the poetry of reality. It belongs to all humanity. Kia Ora!

Air New Zealand has some great safety videos online, but they’re really becoming “decolonized” now. I’m suspecting that the one Richard watched was this one:

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Her Highness makes a necessity into a profundity.

Hili: Everything depends on the point of view.
A: And that means…
Hili: It means that the heart of the matter may hide in the grass.
In Polish:
Hili: Wszystko zależy od punktu widzenia.
Ja: To znaczy?
Hili: To znaczy, że istota rzeczy może ukrywać się w trawie.

. . . and a photo of Baby Kulka:

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Here’s a strange but also heartening video sent by reader Jez.   As the BBC noted: “Following the withdrawal of a team-mate Belgian shot putter Jolien Boumkwo competes in the 100m women’s hurdles to gain important points for her nation at the European Athletics Team Championships in Poland.” (You may be able to watch the video at the BBC link—if you live in the UK.

Jez added this after finding a Tik Tok video:

Shot putters aren’t really built for the hurdles and the poor woman finished a l-o-n-g way behind everyone else (the winner finished in 13.21 seconds, the shot putter in about 32!) She had to virtually stop and step over each of the hurdles, but she was clearly enjoying herself. The Belgian team would have been disadvantaged if they hadn’t entered a competitor at all, but I’d have thought they would have had a better contender than the shot putter.

@sports.illustrated

Jolien Maliga Boumkwo helped her team earn two points by participating 👏 (via @TopatletiekLive | Twitter) #hurdles #belgium #europeanchampionship #shotput #run

♬ original sound – Sports Illustrated

From Jesus of the Day: what a clever (but nasty) trick!

From the Absurd Sign Project 2.0:

From Masih. The Google translation of Masih’s Farsi caption is:

The statement of the students of the University of Arts who said to the persecutors: “We have nothing to say to you, except one word: #نه ” [“#No] is the words of a wounded but resistant Iranian heart and addressed to a corrupt government. And this is not only the voice of the brave students and their protest against the mandatory hijab, but also the big “no” of the Iranian people to forty-four years of destruction of the Islamic Republic. “No” to the workers whose tables have been emptied, the teachers who have been imprisoned and the people who have been oppressed because of their religion, language and beliefs. The complete crystallization of this big “no” was the revolution #زن_زندگى_آزادی  [#Woman_Life_Freedom], We all continue this path together and do not back down from our dreams and ideals for a moment.

From Malcolm, who said he knew I’d like this one. Of course I do, but that’s a very loud purr for a kitten!

From Simon, a tweet from Bill Kristol. Trump would be SO popular in Belarus!

I found this one:

From the Auschwitz Memorial: a 7-year-old girl gassed upon arrival:

Tweets from Dr. Cobb. The first one I retweeted from Matthew. Notice how closely Russel’s style resemble that of Anne Elk (whose theory was hers):

 

When I see something like this, I always think of natural selection acting on tiny, incipient mutations that make it go just a bit deeper into the soil:

The quote is apparently from Richard Rhodes’s The Making of the Atomic Bomb:

Saturday: Hili dialogue

June 17, 2023 • 6:45 am

Good morning on cat shabbos: it’s Saturday, June 17, 2023, and a day of cultural appropriation: National Apple Strudel Day. This photo is from a site giving you the top five places in Vienna to eat the pastry. You must have whipped cream and coffee (preferably an Einspänner):

It’s also Dog Dad’s Day (does only one male own a d*g?), Global Garbage Man Day, World Croc Day (the reptile, not the shoe), National Eat Your Vegetables Day, World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought, and Icelandic National Day, celebrating the independence of Iceland from Kingdom of Denmark in 1944.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the June 17 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Obituaries first: Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked what became known as the Pentagon papers, has died at 92. He was a hero to my generation:

Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the voluminous, top-secret history of the Vietnam War known as the Pentagon Papers, a disclosure that led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling on press freedoms and enraged the Nixon administration — serving as the catalyst for a series of White House-directed burglaries and “dirty tricks” that snowballed into the Watergate scandal — died June 16 at his home in Kensington, Calif. He was 92.

The family confirmed his death in a statement. Mr. Ellsberg announced in an email to friends and supporters on March 1 that he had pancreatic cancer and had declined chemotherapy. Whatever time he had left, he said, would be spent giving talks and interviews about the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the perils of nuclear war and the importance of First Amendment protections.

. . . He went on to embrace a life of advocacy, which extended from his 1971 leak of the Pentagon Papers — a disclosure that led Henry Kissinger, Nixon’s national security adviser, to privately brand him “the most dangerous man in America” — to decades of work advocating for press freedoms and the anti-nuclear movement.

Mr. Ellsberg co-founded the Freedom of the Press Foundation and championed the work of a new generation of digital leakers and whistleblowers, including Edward Snowden and Chelsea Manning. He also continued to release secret government documents, including files about nuclear war that he had copied while working on the military’s “mutually assured destruction” strategy during the Cold War, around the same time he leaked the study that made him perhaps the most famous whistleblower in American history.

“When I copied the Pentagon Papers in 1969,” he wrote in the email announcing his cancer diagnosis, “I had every reason to think I would be spending the rest of my life behind bars. It was a fate I would gladly have accepted if it meant hastening the end of the Vietnam War, unlikely as that seemed.”

That, ladies and gentlemen, brothers and sisters, comrades and friends, is a brave man. Ceiling Cat made the wrong choice, letting Kissinger live while killing Ellsberg at the young age of 92.

*The Justice Department has issued a damning report on the Minneapolis Police Department, accusing it of systemic biases that culminated in the highly publicized murder of George Floyd.

The Minneapolis Police Department engaged in the systemic use of excessive force and discriminated against racial minorities in the years leading up to the police killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in 2020, federal authorities said Friday.

In a scathing 89-page report released after a more than two-year federal civil rights investigation, the Justice Department excoriated the Minneapolis police force as an agency that put officers and local residents at unnecessary risk and failed to act upon repeated warnings about biased behavior.

Specifically, the report criticizes the Minneapolis police for: using “dangerous tactics and weapons” — including neck restraints and Tasers — against people for petty offense or no crimes; punishing residents who criticized the police; patrolling neighborhoods differently based on their racial makeup; and discriminating against those with behavioral health disabilities.

The report called the department’s accountability structures “fundamentally flawed,” with internal misconduct investigations getting lost in an “opaque maze” as senior managers dismissed legitimate complaints without investigation. At times, investigators also routinely mischaracterize the allegations, the report said.

Here we have a barrel at least half full of rotten apples, and it’s good Garland undertook this investigation. Although Floyd’s friends and relatives were distraught, I hope it’s consolation that he spawned a huge movement to promote civil rights (and reform police). Also, it will help people start to trust the local cops.

*Nellie Bowles is back with her engaging weekly news summary at The Free Press. This week’s is called “TGIF: Fortune does not favor the brave,” and I’ll steal the usual three items:

→ Student loan payments to resume: The years-long pause on paying back student loans is lifting, sending the White House into spasms. You see: Biden staffers’ favorite constituency is educated cultural elites with student loans. Which is why this line in the Politico story stood out to me: “White House officials have described the agreement as a relatively narrow one, noting that it ends only the current payment pause. They’ve noted, for example, that it would not prevent the Education Department from pausing payments in response to future national emergencies or if it’s otherwise justified under existing law.” Thank god! I think the climate emergency is calling, and it says it needs debt-free modernist literature PhDs and all mortgages (in Fort Greene, Rockridge, and Silverlake) to be forgiven.

→ “The power, it’s just not comparable”: This week a trans athlete named Austin Killips, who was competing in a women’s cycling match, won by a full five minutes, winning $5,000. In May, Austin won the top prize in another women’s cycling race—taking home $35,000. Austin calls critics “ghouls.” Obviously anyone critical of this is a “bigot.”

I recommend watching the video of the woman, Paige Onweller, who came in second place describing the race right afterward: “Yeah, just kind of couldn’t match Austin. You know, the power, it’s just, not comparable.” As my lesbian tennis leader Martina Navratilova says: “What a joke.

If you’re interested in studying trans participation in women’s sports, get ready to get a big F on your paper, which is what happened to a young woman last week. Her mistake? Using the term biological women in a paper on women’s sports. Last bit on this: public opinion is changing here, per a new Gallup poll out this week.

Here’s victor Austin, and then Paige Onweller, who refers only obliquely to Austin’s “power”:

This is hilarious:

→ Anti-cop ice cream shop sues Seattle for not having enough cops: This week, Molly Moon’s Ice Cream filed a lawsuit against Seattle for allowing antifa to take over a neighborhood and claim it as their own—they called it CHOP—while the city cheered and agreed to give it to them. A lot of shops have sued Seattle for this, but Molly’s Moon is the best one because they were hardcore in favor of CHOP. The new autonomous zone was “beautiful” and “peaceful,” Molly Moon’s Instagram account wrote at the time. And Molly, the shop’s founder, still wants to make it really clear that she loves antifa and hates cops but also antifa made her life hell (city, give Molly money please) and there were no cops when there should have been cops (more money, thank you). From the lawsuit:

*Robert G. Bowers, 50. the man who killed 11 people and wounded 7 in a 2018 attack on the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, has been found guilty on 63 counts, and the verdict makes him eligible for the death penalty.

A 12-member jury in federal court in Pittsburgh convicted Robert G. Bowers, 50, of Baldwin, Pa., on all 63 counts, including hate crimes and weapons violations, after two weeks of searing testimony from dozens of prosecution witnesses. Among those who testified were survivors, including police officers, who had been shot during the attack.

Prosecutors also played haunting 911 emergency calls, during which victims could be heard screaming and struggling to breathe before dying amid rapid gunfire from Bowers, who used an AR-15 assault rifle and three handguns.

Five police officers were wounded as they attempted to apprehend Bowers during the attack on Oct. 27, 2018, in the Squirrel Hill neighborhood, a longtime Jewish enclave. Bowers fatally shot six victims in the head and fired about 100 rounds of ammunition in all, prosecutors said.

“The defendant turned this sacred ground of worship into a hunting ground,” prosecutor Mary Hahn told the jurors in her closing arguments Thursday, according to local news accounts.

The jury deliberated for a total of about five hours over two days before reaching the verdict.

As always, I’m opposed to the death penalty, even in Bowers’s case. Lock him up for life without parole instead (unless for some bizarre reason he can be rehabilitated).

*In his Substack column this week,  “The fault is not in their stars but in themselves“, Andrew Sullivan ponders parallels between the bad behaviors of Donald Trump and Boris Johnson.

And now we have Donald Trump and Boris Johnson. And the ghost of Bill Bennett seems to have a point, doesn’t he? This past week saw two official reports into the abuse of their respective offices, and their lavish lying about it. The Smith indictment alleges that Trump knew full well that the documents he took from the White House and stored haphazardly at Mar-a-Lago and Bedminster were highly classified and not his own. But rather than hand everything back, Trump ignored the best legal advice, lied to his own lawyers, ordered an underling to move boxes to conceal them from the FBI, and threw out his usual barrage of excuses, distractions and falsehoods.

In an eerily similar fashion, the British parliamentary committee set up to investigate whether Boris Johnson lied to the House of Commons about his breaking of social distancing rules during Covid, published its final report this week. It’s as authoritative as the Trump indictment — first-hand witnesses, photos, sworn testimony, due process. And it too focuses on a very basic fact: just as Trump knew he was not authorized to keep top secret documents, so Johnson knew that crowded office-parties were quite clearly banned across the UK. But this awareness of the rules did not stop either man from flagrantly breaking them — and then complaining of a “witch-hunt” when called to account.

. . . And it’s deeply telling that the bulk of the charges against Johnson are about how he responded to the investigation, just as much of Smith’s case rests on what Trump did after he was told there was legal scrutiny of his official records. These two citizens start with a presumption that they are exempt from all rules, and then compound it with perjury and clumsy obstruction because they simply cannot admit guilt. (And neither was framed. A majority of the parliamentary committee were Tories; and the chief accusers of Trump are the national security apparatus and the FBI, which ten minutes ago were regarded as GOP-leaning institutions.)

Overwhelming self-entitlement is just at the core of who Trump and Johnson are. It is their character. . . . .

. . . And as with Trump and his bizarre behavior with “his boxes,” it’s very hard to see some profound, malign motive here in pursuit of something important. It’s just mindless egotism, married with an infinite capacity for deceit.

. . . And there is almost nothing in the narrative of these men’s late careers that isn’t exactly replicated in every previous episode of their lives. A mature democracy will throw up these characters every now and again, and use them. But a healthy one will also test them, and cast them out if they threaten the integrity of the system as a whole. The Brits and Tories have done that, in the end, with Boris — and it speaks well of the remaining integrity of their democracy.

The GOP needs to do the same with Trump. And soon.

Nope; won’t happen. If it does, it will be because Trump is convicted. And I still say that Trump is more horrible than Johnson, even if both were determined by the laws of physics (their environments and their genes) to be horrible.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is actually being HELPFUL!

Hili: There will be plenty of raspberries.
A: You are not eating them.
Hili: But I know that you like them.
In Polish:
Hili: Będzie dużo malin.
Ja: Ty ich nie jesz.
Hili: Ale wiem, że wy je lubicie.

And a photo of Baby Kulka:

 

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A bed I’d like to have from Pet Jokes & Puns:

From the Absurd Sign Project 2.0:

From Jesus of the Day:

From Masih, the power of religious dogma that is Iranian law:

From Malcolm: a new world record solving a Rubik’s cube. This guy is amazing!

From Pyers, who gives an intro:

There has been a highly entertaining Twitter thread where a game developer for the NYT announced proudly that she had devised a game where words in a 4 x 4 grid have to linked together with some connection. Red herrings are present to confuse etc etc …There is one slight problem.  This game is identical to a round in the fiendishly difficult BBC quiz called “Only Connect”…For info: Victoria Coren Mitchell  (who replies) is the host of the BBC show…

I found this one, a wonderful man rescuing an eagle:

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a ten-year-old Jewish girl from Italy gassed upon arrival. Today would have been her 90th birthday. You can see the full photo by clicking the picture.

Tweets from Matthew, the first one shows a release of Scottish wildcats, though I’ve never been completely convinced that the “Scottish wildcat” is a genuinely wild subspecies of Felis silvestris rather than feral tabbies:

Another bird rescue, an emu as far as I can tell. Sound up.

Okay, you can read about the rector here:

Monday: Hili dialogue

June 12, 2023 • 6:45 am

It’s the top of the work week: Monday, June 12, 2023, and National Peanut-Butter Cookie Day. Perhaps, if you’re in Alabama, you can have a yellowhammer cookie, the new Official State Cookie made with peanuts, walnuts, and peanut butter:

It’s also Magic Day, Red Rose Day, National Jerky Day, Women Veterans Day, World Day Against Child Labour, and Loving Day, the anniversary of the 1967 Supreme Court decision (Loving v. Virginia) that legalized mixed-race marriages throughout America. (I can’t believe that mixed-race marriages were still illegal in some places the year I graduated from high school.)

Here they are in life. Mildred and Richard Loving:

And they rest together in death:

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the June 12 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*The NYT reports that Ukraine expelling all Russians from their territory is an “unlikely” outcome of their spring offensive.

Much rides on the outcome. There is little doubt the new military drive will influence discussions of future support for Ukraine as well as debates about how to guarantee its future. What remains unclear, though, is exactly what the United States, Europe and Ukraine view as a “successful” counteroffensive.

Publicly, American and European officials are leaving any definition of success to President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. For now, Mr. Zelensky has not laid out any public goals, beyond his oft-stated demand that Russian troops must leave the whole of Ukraine. He is known as a master communicator; any perception that he is backing off that broad ambition would risk undermining his support at a critical moment.

Privately, U.S. and European officials concede that pushing all of Russia’s forces out of occupied Ukrainian land is highly unlikely. Still, two themes emerge as clear ideas of “success”: that the Ukrainian army retake and hold on to key swaths of territory previously occupied by the Russians, and that Kyiv deal the Russian military a debilitating blow that forces the Kremlin to question the future of its military options in Ukraine.

Does that qualify as winning? Not if you’re left with less than you had before.

Some battlefield success, whether by decimating Russia’s army, claiming some territory or both, could help Kyiv secure additional military aid from Europe and the United States. It would also build confidence in allied capitals that their strategy of remaking Ukraine’s forces into a Western-style military is working. And most importantly, such an outcome would build more support in Europe for some sort of long-term security guarantee for Kyiv and strengthen Ukraine’s hand at a bargaining table.

Success is not guaranteed. Throughout the war, the Ukrainian army, with deeply motivated troops, creative military operations and advanced Western weaponry, has outperformed Russia’s military. But the Ukrainians have also found it difficult to dislodge the Russians from their entrenched defensive positions in the last few months, with the front lines barely moving.

The report adds that American analysts think that victories would be smaller: retaking parts of the Dobas, retaking the nuclear plant at Zaporizhzhia, and, importantly, retaking the land bridge between Ukraine and Russian-controlled Crimea, cutting off Russia’s access to resupplying that once-Ukrainian land that’s now a fortress.

*The WaPo explains why Trump has been charged with possessing secret government documents, and Pence and Hillary Clinton were not (and why Biden surely won’t be as well). We went over that a bit yesterday but here’s some additional news:

Notably, however,the indictment does not charge Trump with the illegal retention of any of the 197 documents he returned to the archives.

That shows that if Trump had simply returned all the classified documents he had, he probably never would have been charged with any crimes, said Robert Mintz, a former federal prosecutor.

“This is not a case about what documents were taken, it’s about what former president Trump did after the government sought to retrieve those documents,” said Mintz, who noted that willful-retention cases often hinge on how much evidence prosecutors can find that a person deliberately hid material or refused to give it back.

The indictment offers anecdote after alleged anecdote charging that the former president sought to hide and keep some of the classified papers, so much so that Trump and Nauta are accused of conspiring to obstruct the investigation and scheming to conceal the truth not just from the government, but even from Trump’s own lawyer.

“This is not a case about what documents were taken, it’s about what former president Trump did after the government sought to retrieve those documents,” said Mintz, who noted that willful-retention cases often hinge on how much evidence prosecutors can find that a person deliberately hid material or refused to give it back.

The indictment offers anecdote after alleged anecdote charging that the former president sought to hide and keep some of the classified papers, so much so that Trump and Nauta are accused of conspiring to obstruct the investigation and scheming to conceal the truth not just from the government, but even from Trump’s own lawyer.

To my great dismay, the NBC News reported last night that even if convicted, Trump is unlikely to spend any time in jail. That’s because, they said, there’s no way the Secret Service could protect an ex-President, which they’re required to do, if he’s in jail.  I suggest solitary confinement with rotating Secret Service agents sitting outside the Donald’s cell.

Let’s have a poll! (Please vote.)

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*Affirmative action (race-based admissions) will soon be declared illegal by the Supreme Court, but they’re already illegal in California. How did a Democratic Party core issue get overturned in that state?

Mr. Romero was one of millions of California voters, including about half who are Hispanic and a majority who are Asian American, who voted against Proposition 16, which would have restored race-conscious admissions at public universities, and in government hiring and contracting.

The breadth of that rejection shook supporters. California is a liberal bastion and one of the most diverse states in the country. That year, President Biden swamped Donald Trump by 29 percentage points in California, but Proposition 16 went down, with 57 percent of voters opposing it.

. . .But Proposition 16 suggests the politics of affirmative action are different. The results exposed a gulf between the party establishment and its voters.

To make sense of its failure, The New York Times analyzed the 2020 vote, focusing on Los Angeles County, the nation’s most populous county, and spoke to dozens of voters across demographic groups.

Los Angeles voters, an ethnically diverse and liberal lot, passed the proposition by a mere whisker, 51 percent to 49 percent. And the Times analysis of electoral precincts found across all races, support for the referendum fell well short of support for Joe Biden on the same ballot.

This was true across majority Black, Asian, Hispanic and white precincts.

. . . the Times analysis and interviews showed support for Proposition 16 is often divided along racial lines, with Black voters supporting it, while Asian voters rejected it. In fact, nearly all majority Asian precincts in Los Angeles voted against the proposition. And across racial and ethnic groups, support for the referendum fell short of support for Mr. Biden.

This was true even of majority Black precincts in Los Angeles, which supported Proposition 16 by wide margins. Mr. Biden outpaced that support by an average of about 15 percentage points

. . .Valerie Contreras, a crane operator, is a proud union member and civic leader in Wilmington, where half the voters were against the referendum. She had little use for the affirmative action campaign.

“It was ridiculous all the racially loaded terms Democrats used,” she said. “It was a distraction from the issues that affect our lives.”

Asian voters spoke of visceral unease. South and East Asians make up just 15 percent of the state population, and 35 percent of the undergraduates in the University of California system.

Affirmative action, to their view, upends traditional measures of merit — grades, test scores and extracurricular activities — and threatens to reduce their numbers.

. . . He was not surprised, however, that many Asian Americans balked. “The notion that you would look at anything other than pure academic performance is seen by immigrants as antithetical to American values,” he said.

Overall, blacks favor affirmative action, but make up such a small proportion of the population (less than 6%), and there are a lot of Hispanics and Asians, who aren’t so keen on race-based admission.

*It’s been reported that Ted Kaczynski, the “Unabomber”, who was found dead in his cell on Saturday, actually committed suicide. I figured he was terminally ill when I heard that was transferred from Florence ADX, America’s toughest prison, to a prison hospital in North Carolina. And, to be sure, his illness is likely the factor that caused him to kill himself:

Ted Kaczynski, known as the “Unabomber,” who carried out a 17-year bombing campaign that killed three people and injured 23 others, died by suicide, four people familiar with the matter told The Associated Press.

Kaczynski, who was 81 and suffering from late-stage cancer, was found unresponsive in his cell at the Federal Medical Center in Butner, North Carolina, around 12:30 a.m. on Saturday. Emergency responders performed CPR and revived him before he was transported to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead later Saturday morning, the people told the AP. They were not authorized to publicly discuss Kaczynski’s death and spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity.

Kaczynski had been held in the federal Supermax prison in Florence, Colorado, since May 1998, when he was sentenced to four life sentences plus 30 years for a campaign of terror that set universities nationwide on edge. He admitted committing 16 bombings from 1978 and 1995, permanently maiming several of his victims.

In 2021, he was transferred to the federal medical center in North Carolina, a facility that treats prisoners suffering from serious health problems. Bernie Madoff, the infamous mastermind of the largest-ever Ponzi scheme, died at the facility of natural causes the same year.

*Two giant inflatable ducks were released in Hong Kong’s harbor on Friday. By Saturday, one of them had deflated.

 Two giant inflatable ducks made a splash in Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbor on Friday, marking the return of a pop-art project that sparked a frenzy in the city a decade ago.

The two 18-meter-tall yellow ducks by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman resemble the bath toys many played with in their childhood. Shortly after their launch, dozens of residents and tourists flocked to the promenade near the government headquarters in Admiralty to snap photos of the ducks.

Hofman said he hopes the art exhibition brings joy to the city and connects people as they make memories together.

“Double duck, double luck,” he said. “In a world where we suffered from a pandemic, wars and political situations, I think it is the right moment to bring back the double luck.”

Double duck, double luck! After the launch

(from AP): Members of the public photograph an art installation called “Double Ducks” by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman at Victoria Harbour in Hong Kong, Friday, June 9, 2023. Two giant inflatable ducks made a splash in Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbor on Friday, marking the return of a pop-art project that sparked a frenzy in the city a decade ago. (AP Photo/Louise Delmotte)

One of the two giant inflatable ducks floating in Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbor deflated on Saturday, just a day after they were unveiled to revelers.

Crowds of residents and tourists flocked in the scorching heat to the promenade near the government headquarters in Admiralty to snap photos of the ducks by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman. But many who arrived in the afternoon only found one duck intact, with the other reduced to a puddle of yellow plastic.

Organizers said their staff found one of the ducks was overstretched due to the hot weather and rising air pressure.

Duck and tourists both deflated!:

(From AP): An art installation called “Double Ducks” by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman as one of the duck is deflated at Victoria Harbour in Hong Kong, Saturday, June 10, 2023. (AP Photo/Louise Delmotte)

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is spouting bromides:

Hili: Nature is like a book.
A: In what sense?
Hili: Sometimes fascinating, sometimes boring.
In Polish:
Hili: Natura jest jak książka.
Ja: W jakim sensie?
Hili: Czasem fascynująca, a czasem nudna.

And a photo of a cute but sleepy Baby Kulka:

********************

From Doc Bill:

From Pet Jokes & Puns:

From Mark:

A tweet from Masih, showing another protestor who was killed. The Google translation:

IRGC officers shot and killed Kian’s mother’s cousin#Poya_MolayiRad today on his birthday. Khamenei and his agents are responsible for all the crimes and destruction of this land. Let’s not let them fill our innocent children one by one. It is the duty of all of us to stand by the Kian family and against the murderers and demand their innocent blood. #Woman_Life_Freedom.

From reader Jez and his wife:

From Barry: a firefly taking off. “Lights on?” “Check.”

 

The British Library apparently removed this tweet. Do you suppose it realized that sequential hermaphroditism in fish has nothing to do with either human transsexuality or homosexuality? Or did the tweet get “ratioed”

From the Auschwitz Memorial, a woman who escaped, was eventually recaptured and sent to another camp, but survived and was liberated!

Tweets from Dr. Cobb, still in Norway, I believe. If you EVER get to Boston or Cambridge, go see the glass flowers at Harvard’s Museum of Comparative Zoology. They are the most stunning glass objects I’ve ever seen, so realistic that you have trouble distinguishing them from real plants. They are a fantastic and underappreciated wonder.

This is really scary!

We’re seeing this fantastic conjunction as it looked 160 million years ago!

Sunday: Hili dialogue

June 4, 2023 • 6:45 am

Happy Sabbath to all Christian humans and cats: it’s Sunday, June 4, 2023, and National Cheese Day (my favorite is Comté aged for three years—until it has a granular texture):

It’s also National Cognac Day, National Cancer Survivors’ Day, National Frozen Yogurt Day, Hug Your Cat Day, International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression. and Memorials for the Tananmen Square Protests of 1989, which began to be suppressed on June 4.

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this by consulting the June 4 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

First, some pictures of graduation (called “convocation” here). It was a glorious, sunny day for the rite. I don’t care who you are; if you’ve been through the ceremony, it does choke you up a bit to see these inchoate adults launched into the world. Here they are lined up ready to march into the quad before their parents and relatives:

Marching under the arch; my building is to the right. Note the gargoyles climbing up the arch:

Through Hull Gate and into the quad, which is set up with a big open tent under which the dignitaries sit:


Faculty waiting to march in after the students. These are faculty who didn’t get their Ph.Ds here, and are supposed to wear the cap and gown of the school where they got their doctorates (I don’t have one). Some of the foreign academic regalia are particularly attractive.

And the U of C faculty who graduated from here (mostly), wearing their maroon caps and gowns:

Faculty are traditionally marched in with bagpipes:

*In his eponymous website, Jonathan Turley discusses the new political-correctness kerfuffle in which John Cleese is embroiled. Cleese is definitely anti-woke, but is up against the Pecksniffs. They’re doing a stage version of “Life of Brian, and of course you know immediately what the problem is: it’s politically incorrect, mocking a lot of things considered taboo today. One bit in particular is problematic: (h/t Rosemary)

One of the favorite targets of the Monty Python troupe was political activists who lacked any humor or self-awareness. That was the thrust of scenes in Life of Brian involving Cleese’s character, Reg, the leader of the “People’s Front of Judea” who faced endless demands for countervailing causes — so many that the group never actually gets anything done beyond meetings.

In one scene, an activist named Stan announces that he wants to be a woman and have a baby:

Reg: “You want to have babies?!?!”
Stan: “It’s every man’s right to have babies if he wants them.”
Reg: “But … you can’t HAVE babies!”
Stan: “Don’t you oppress me!”

Some actors reading the script urged that the scene be cut, and producers now face a dilemma after Cleese refused to drop it.

For the most part, the war on comedy is working. For nearly a decade, many leading comedians have avoided performing on college campuses because they simply have no material that will avoid triggering one group or another. Six out of ten students in a 2020 survey said offensive jokes can constitute hate speech.

Activists are converting much of the world into their own humorless, ticked-off image. It is hard to enrage others through identity politics if some comedian is making fun of different identities. So the message has become that there’s nothing funny about identity. Satire is now viewed by some as a vehicle for objectification, subjugation and alienation.

These are the modern versions of the Puritans and Victorians, imposing their own rigid demands on artists and writers to conform to their own social values.

When comedians become afraid to tackle subjects largely considered taboo, then the art loses its edge—and its ability to make us think. Imagine having to listen to Bob Hope forever!

*Over at The Weekly Dish, Sully is beefing about “The Unstoppability of Mass Migration.”

Or, of course, we could be living on the precipice of something much worse — a reactionary lurch toward authoritarianism fueled by native replacement and resentment. That’s what my reading of history and human nature inclines me to think. Replacement and resentment were the inchoate forces behind 2016; and some of the factors that made it happen — elite estrangement and the torrid pace of mass immigration — have only worsened since 2016. In Britain, the Tories could lose what’s left of any trust they once had — leading a far-right party to gain a serious foothold. In the US, Trump could soon seem like the beginning of something much darker. This week he renewed his pledge to ban birthright citizenship and described migrants as “some of the toughest, meanest people you’ll ever see,” arriving from “mental institutions” and “jails.” And he continues to froth at the mouth on Truth Social: “TITLE 42 EXPIRES NEXT WEEK. This date will go down in infamy!!!”

Immigration remains his strong card. A Gallup poll in February showed that public satisfaction over immigration had fallen six points in a year, down to 28 percent — “the lowest reading in a decade.” An AP poll that month found that 44 percent of Americans want immigration reduced and only 20 percent want more. And Biden is under water: 58 percent of voters in seven key battleground states disapprove of how he’s handled the issue, and another recent poll showed just 26 percent approval.

And by a critical measure — official systemic discrimination in favor of non-whites and non-Asians across corporate America, government and academia, i.e. “equity” — things have gotten a lot worse from the perspective of the “deplorables.” Throw in truly bewildering cultural change — sex changes for children, abolishing all distinctions between men and women — and it’s as if the left is almost testing the conditions for a far-right revolt. Just read some Edsall, and you’ll get the picture.

This is the fear I’ve had since 2016 knocked me out of my complacency. And it’s a lot more intense today than it was a couple of years ago. Trump is a lot stronger, and Biden is somewhat weaker. Immigration is surging again. White nationalism is resurgent. Inflation still eats away at the ordinary American’s sense of security. The left elites are incorrigible — now targeting children for re-education in the core concepts of critical race, gender and queer theory. Target was selling girls’ swimsuits with a pocket for penis-tucking. Whose brilliant idea was that?

The result is a truly disturbing and metastasizing irrationalism on the right that only seems to get more unbounded over time — an irrationalism that really cannot be represented by anyone but the Great Orange Id of them all. That’s why he’s on the march again. That — and because his strongest issue keeps getting stronger.

The refusal of Democrats to say anything about restricting immigration is definitely hurting them given the data that twice as many Americans want less immigration than want more of it; and we’re all aware that immigrants are supposed to be fleeing persecution but are admitted for any reason, and that seems to be what the Dems want. What we need is bipartisan immigration reform, for  and if both parties enact it, neither can really be blamed. Right now, the immigration issue is primarily hurting the Democrats and helping Trump., and Ceiling Cat help us if anything helps him.

*As the saying goes, “hoist with their own petard.”  That’s what Brian told me when he sent me this BBC news item about Utah primary schools banning the Bible.

A school district in the US state of Utah has removed the Bible from elementary and middle schools for containing “vulgarity and violence”.

The move follows a complaint from a parent that the King James Bible has material unsuitable for children.

Utah’s Republican government passed a law in 2022 banning “pornographic or indecent” books from schools.

Most of the books that have been banned so far pertain to topics such as sexual orientation and identity.

. . . The Utah decision was made this week by the Davis School District north of Salt Lake City after a complaint filed in December 2022. Officials say they have already removed the seven or eight copies of the Bible they had on their shelves, noting that the text was never part of students’ curriculum.

. . .The committee did not elaborate on its reasoning or which passages contained “vulgarity or violence”.

According to the Salt Lake Tribune newspaper, the parent who complained said the King James Bible “has ‘no serious values for minors’ because it’s pornographic by our new definition”, referring to the 2022 book-ban law.

It was only a matter of time!

*The train is the cheapest way to get around in India, but if you’ve ridden in any class lower than first (and I always travel second class), you can see why 288 people were killed in a three-way rail crash in India last week. The trains are old, overcrowded, (people often stand packed like sardines, or, if there’s room, sit or sleep on the floor), and they’re best avoided if you can find a decent bus. What happened in the state of Odisha is a terrible tragedy:

Rescuers worked with excavators to untangle crushed train cars on Saturday at the scene of India’s worst rail disaster in decades, as relatives of the victims searched for their loved ones at local hospitals and a makeshift mortuary in a nearby school.

At least 288 people were killed and more than 700 others injured in what officials in a preliminary government report described as a “three-way accident” involving two passenger trains and an idled freight train in the eastern state of Odisha. Officials said they were investigating signal failure as a possible cause of the crash.

The toll, exceptionally large even in a nation with a long history of deadly crashes, has renewed longstanding questions about safety problems in a system that transports more than eight billion passengers a year.

At least 17 cars of the two passenger trains had derailed, some so twisted in the subsequent collision that teams of rescue workers with dogs and cutting equipment were still laboring to recover the bodies. Together, the two passenger trains had been carrying at least 2,200 people, according to railway officials.

And, reading through the piece, I found what I suspected:

Survivors at two hospitals in Balasore said that many of the 288 people who died were packed shoulder to shoulder in three “general compartments,” coaches where passengers buy inexpensive tickets to travel without seats allotted to them and find themselves standing.“It was full of people,” said Sayel Ali, who was admitted to a hospital near the site of accident. “You could only see heads. When the accident happened, I couldn’t see anything. I don’t know how I reached the hospital.”

Not only that, but passengers will ride on the top of trains or hold onto the outside or even stand between cars.  I once saw a train that was so covered with humans on the outside that it looked like a moving ball of people: the train itself was barely visible.

The suspected cause of the three-train crash was a signal failure.

*Tennessee reently passed America’s first “anti-drag” law, which, according to the AP,

. . . would have banned adult cabaret performances from public property or anywhere minors might be present. Performers who broke the law risked being charged with a misdemeanor or a felony for a repeat offense.

Just that description makes me worry that this law violates the First Amendment, and, indeed a judge—one appointed by Trump—ruled the law unconstitutional.

Tennessee’s first-in-the-nation law designed to place strict limits on drag shows is unconstitutional, a federal judge says.

The law is both “unconstitutionally vague and substantially overbroad” and encouraged “discriminatory enforcement,” according to the ruling late Friday by U.S. District Judge Thomas Parker, who was appointed by former President Donald Trump.

“There is no question that obscenity is not protected by the First Amendment. But there is a difference between material that is ‘obscene’ in the vernacular, and material that is ‘obscene’ under the law,” Parker said.

“Simply put, no majority of the Supreme Court has held that sexually explicit — but not obscene — speech receives less protection than political, artistic, or scientific speech,” he said.

. . .[Judge] Parker used the example of a female performer wearing an Elvis Presley costume and mimicking the iconic musician who could be at risk of punishment under the drag law because they would be considered a “male impersonator.”

Friends of George’s, a Memphis-based LGBTQ+ theater company, filed a complaint in March, saying the law would negatively impact them because they produce “drag-centric performances, comedy sketches, and plays” with no age restrictions.

“This win represents a triumph over hate,” the theater company said in a statement Saturday, adding that the ruling affirmed their First Amendment rights as artists.

This one’s headed to the Supreme Court for sure. Although I wouldn’t characterize parents who worry about the effect of “sexually explicit” performances on young kids as riddled by “hate” (a word used too often), I do think the law as written is indeed unconstitutionally vague. We’ll see what the conservative Supreme Court does with it—if it agrees to handle an appeal.

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili is enigmatic again. I asked Malgorzata what Hili meant, and got this reply:

Elephants are always in somebody else’s room, not in ours. I think she meant it as a version of Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye;and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye. But who knows with Hili?

The dialogue:

Hili: An elephant in the room.
A: Our room?
Hili: No, the neighbour’s.
In Polish:
Hili: Słoń w salonie.
Ja: W naszym?
Hili: Nie, u sąsiadów.

And a photo of baby Kulka:

********************

From Divy:

From David:

A bad spelling mistake from America’s Cultural Decline Into Idiocy:

From Masih. I don’t understand Parsi, but I know that “freedom” is ɑzɑˈd̪i, and that’s what you hear

 

Matt Walsh doesn’t seem to be an amiable human being, but he’s calm and knows how to ask questions. (He’s also a diehard conservative.) But the 1.25 hour movie in the tweet below, “What is a Woman?” is worth watching. The documentary was originally banned on Twitter as “hate speech,” for Walsh goes around asking various people (including Masai), “What is a woman?” He doesn’t get many answers, mainly because the Leftish people he talks to don’t want to define “woman” in a way that excludes trans women. Many wind up saying that “a woman is anybody who identifies as a woman.” But that kind of definition is recursive, and doesn’t work very well. (Try it with any other noun.)

From Malcolm, cats being cats:

An adorable baby seal getting swimming lessons from humans:

From the Auschwitz memorial, a Polish athlete who died of “exhaustion” in the camp:

Tweets from Matthew. The first one is beautiful:

A not-too-great magic trick:

Cat pwned by a duck: