November 2018 Archives

And I am back

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Nothing catches my eye on the internet so it is off to YouTube for a while.

Back up to the farm tomorrow for more packing. Making progress and the Condo garage is getting pretty full. Might be doing two tool sales.

Heading out for dinner

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Mexican for dinner tonight - back in an hour or two.

Corruption in the military

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On the 15th of this month, I posted about how the Pentagon failed its first audit. Now this from The Nation:

Exclusive: The Pentagon’s Massive Accounting Fraud Exposed
On November 15, Ernst & Young and other private firms that were hired to audit the Pentagon announced that they could not complete the job. Congress had ordered an independent audit of the Department of Defense, the government’s largest discretionary cost center—the Pentagon receives 54 cents out of every dollar in federal appropriations—after the Pentagon failed for decades to audit itself. The firms concluded, however, that the DoD’s financial records were riddled with so many bookkeeping deficiencies, irregularities, and errors that a reliable audit was simply impossible.

Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan tried to put the best face on things, telling reporters, “We failed the audit, but we never expected to pass it.” Shanahan suggested that the DoD should get credit for attempting an audit, saying, “It was an audit on a $2.7 trillion organization, so the fact that we did the audit is substantial.” The truth, though, is that the DoD was dragged kicking and screaming to this audit by bipartisan frustration in Congress, and the result, had this been a major corporation, likely would have been a crashed stock.

As Republican Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa, a frequent critic of the DoD’s financial practices, said on the Senate floor in September 2017, the Pentagon’s long-standing failure to conduct a proper audit reflects “twenty-six years of hard-core foot-dragging” on the part of the DoD, where “internal resistance to auditing the books runs deep.” In 1990, Congress passed the Chief Financial Officers Act, which required all departments and agencies of the federal government to develop auditable accounting systems and submit to annual audits. Since then, every department and agency has come into compliance—except the Pentagon.

Now, a Nation investigation has uncovered an explanation for the Pentagon’s foot-dragging: For decades, the DoD’s leaders and accountants have been perpetrating a gigantic, unconstitutional accounting fraud, deliberately cooking the books to mislead the Congress and drive the DoD’s budgets ever higher, regardless of military necessity. DoD has literally been making up numbers in its annual financial reports to Congress—representing trillions of dollars’ worth of seemingly nonexistent transactions—knowing that Congress would rely on those misleading reports when deciding how much money to give the DoD the following year, according to government records and interviews with current and former DoD officials, congressional sources, and independent experts.

Much more at the site - this is a well done report and it will be interesting to see the fallout.

Sanctuary cities - legal decision

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Disgusting - from The Washington Times:

Judge OKs sanctuary cities, rules anti-sanctuary law unconstitutional
A federal judge in New York has ruled the Trump sanctuary city crackdown illegal Friday — but even went further and also ruled the law Congress passed requiring information-sharing is unconstitutional.

Judge Edgardo Ramos‘ decision frees sanctuary jurisdictions in New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Rhode Island, Washington, Massachusetts and Virginia to continue their policies without fear of losing federal money.

The judge said the Trump administration attempted to write new conditions of cooperation, including notifying the feds of illegal immigrants ready for pickup, beyond what Congress had authorized. He said it is up to Congress to decide those conditions.

Two takeaways - first, this is going to be overturned in a higher court. Judge Ramos knows this - he knows that this is a thinly veiled attempt to legislate from the bench which is unconstitutional.

Second - no surprise: Edgardo Ramos

From the website:  Assumed office December 6, 2011 / Appointed by Barack Obama

And Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts? Screw You. There are differences between Obama justices and Trump justices. Don't lie - you put a taint on your office. You are supposed to be above partisan crap like this.

The Caravan - pawns in a political game

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I still want to know who was funding this operation. The poor migrants are pawns for some very wealthy people.
From Mexico News Daily:

Some migrants heading home: ‘They tricked us; our dreams have gone to hell’
For some Central American migrants in Tijuana, the American Dream is over before it even began.

Around 350 members of the first migrant caravan who recently reached the northern border city have decided to voluntarily return to their home countries – Honduras, in most cases – in the face of having to wait for months for the opportunity to file a request for asylum in the United States.

Some migrants who spoke to the newspaper Milenio claim they were misled about their chances of gaining entry to the U.S.

“[Migrant advocacy group] Pueblos Sin Fronteras told us not to worry, that there was going to be transportation, that Mexico was going to open the gates so that we didn’t have to enter [the U.S.] illegally, via the river . . .” Honduran migrant Ulises López said, referring to the attempted border breach Sunday.

“What was offered to the caravan of Honduran migrants was a trap . . . The people that brought us to this place, supposedly [caravan] leaders, took advantage of us, they used us in a horrific way, what they did to us has no name,” he added.

Who is funding Pueblos Sin Fronteras? They need to be put in jail for treating their people like this.

Down to the island

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Drove down after unloading - back to the farm tomorrow.

Back to work

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Done with lunch - time to get crackin' with the packin' - trip two to the condo today.

Now this is very very cool - clocks

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Readers will know that I have a fondness for accurate time measurement and own two Cesium clocks as well as some synchronised GPS clocks. (The Cesium were surplus from a cell tower upgrade). The National Institute of Standards and Technology is responsible for developing more accurate ways to measure time - their latest is pretty amazing. From Motherboard:

This New Atomic Clock Is So Precise Our Ability to Measure Gravity Constrains Its Accuracy
Researchers at the National Institute for Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed an atomic clock that is so precise that our models of Earth’s gravity aren’t accurate enough to keep up with it. As detailed in a paper published this week in Nature , the atomic clock could pave the way for creating an unprecedented map of the way the Earth’s gravity distorts spacetime and even shed light on the development of the early universe.

“The level of clock performance being reported is such that we don’t actually know how to account for it well enough to support the level of performance the clock achieves, ” Andrew Ludlow, a physicist at NIST and the project lead on the organization’s new atomic clock, told me on the phone. “Right now the state of the art techniques aren’t quite good enough so we’re limited by how well we understand gravity on different parts of the Earth.”

For a look at NIST's time keeping, here is a very wonderful interview with the Nation's Time Lord Dr. Judah Levine:

Update on Dick's Sporting Goods

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Last night I posted about how Dick's Sporting Goods had shot themselves in the financial foot by pandering to SJW's - the same SJW's who never camp, fish, hunt, etc... Virtue Signalling never works outside the progressive bubble.

Sebastian at PA Gun Blog comments further:

Dick’s Sporting Goods Looking to Exit Guns
They’ve been taking a beating, and are looking to exit the business. How stupid is Dick’s CEO? Let’s say you’re in a business where part of your business is regulated in such a way that emerging players like Amazon can’t easily compete with you. Lets also say you have some good economies of scale over mom and pop businesses that are your other main competition in that area, and can move product more efficiently and offer lower prices. Do you:

    1. Make every effort to stay in the regulated space and keep those customers happy with your brand, so give your brick and mortar business a business line Amazon can’t touch?
    2. Decide, in the same of Social Justice, to anger your customers in your regulated business and piss it away, leaving you to compete directly against Bezos, who eats brick and mortar stores for breakfast, in markets he finds much more favorable.

If you went with two, you’re about as stupid as Dick’s CEO. Angering gun owners and pissing away that business was about the dumbest things Dick’s could have done. You had a strong presence in a protected industry. Are you nuts?

Very good point - BATFE does not hand out Federal Firearms Licenses out like candy - there are very stringent requirements for buying and selling guns. Amazon will never sell firearms to a private citizen unless there is a major overhaul of the system. They have a major chunk of the market and they are pissing it away just to look good to a bunch of people who would never buy their stuff anyway.

Big quake in Alaska

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Reports of Mag7 earthquake - more as the news comes in.

From the Anchorage Daily News:

Large earthquake, aftershocks, strike Southcentral Alaska, damage reported around region
A large earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.0 struck Alaska near Anchorage early Friday morning, damaging roads and buildings, knocking out power and sending people fleeing from buildings and to safety beneath door jambs.

The epicenter was just north of Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, according to the Alaska Earthquake Center. It violently shook the most populous region of the state as people were settling in to work and school.

There were no immediate reports of injuries.

There were several aftershocks, including a sharp jolt felt widely in Anchorage around 10:26 a.m. and another series of aftershocks just before 11 a.m. At least three of them were 5.0.

Sending prayers out to the Alaskan people and critters. Not fun Temperature is down to 26°F - not a good time to be toosed out of your warm house.

At the farm

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Getting a bite to eat and then out for load two to the condo.

And I am outta here

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Coffee and then back home to pack pack pack.

It never works and you will just lose your regular customers - from Washington Examiner:

Dick's Sporting Goods admits suffering gun policy backlash as sales slide
Sales at Dick's Sporting Goods dropped in the past three months amid backlash against tighter gun-sale restrictions following a mass killing early this year at a Florida high school.

Revenue dipped 4.5 percent to $1.86 billion amid challenges in the company's hunting business during the quarter through Nov. 3. Sales at stores open at least 12 months – a key metric for the retail industry – fell 6.1 percent compared to the prior year.

Dick's raised the minimum age to purchase a gun to 21 and stopped selling AR-15 style rifles, also known as modern sporting rifles, last February. The decision followed a St Valentine's Day shooting in Broward County, Florida, that left 17 students and staff dead. The decision sparked opposition from conservative activists, some of whom had proposed arming teachers in response and threatened to boycott the brand, and prompted at least one employee to resign.

Heh - Dick's engaged in Virtue Signalling trying to appease the Social Justice Warriors but the nimrods in management forgot that SJW's don't camp, shoot, hunt or fish. They are just NPC's living as slaves on the progressive plantation - thinking what their masters tell them to think, saying etc... doing etc... Wonder how Dick's shareholders are feeling right now...

Excellent commentary from John Lott at the Chicago Tribune:

How gun-free zones invite mass shootings
This doesn’t happen anywhere else on the planet,” said California’s Gov.-elect Gavin Newsom. “We stand alone in the world in the number of mass shootings," echoed U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y. These were typical comments after an alleged shooter murdered 12 people in Borderline Bar & Grill in Thousand Oaks, Calif.

People have been acting for a long time like the United States is the world’s hotbed of mass public shootings. Following a 2015 mass shooting during his administration, President Barack Obama declared: “The one thing we do know is that we have a pattern now of mass shootings in this country that has no parallel anywhere else in the world.”

This belief is constantly used to push for more gun control. If we can only get rid of guns in the United States, we will get rid of these mass public shootings and be more like the rest of the world, gun-control supporters preach.

But America doesn’t lead the world in mass public shootings. We’re not even close. Just last month, a school shooting in Crimea, Russia, claimed 20 lives and wounded 65 others. But Americans usually don’t hear about such events.

John then spends a couple paragraphs defining what he considers to be a mass public shooting - an excerpt:

These shootings must claim four or more lives in a public place. Following the FBI definition, the shootings we list are carried out simply with the intention of killing. We exclude gang fights because they tend to be motivated by battles for drug turf. Murders that arise from other crimes are also excluded.

Basic common sense - and now some numbers:

Over the course of 18 years, from 1998 to 2015, our list contains 2,354 attacks and at least 4,880 shooters outside the United States and 53 attacks and 57 shooters within this country. By our count, the U.S. makes up 1.49 percent of the murders worldwide, 2.20 percent of the attacks, and less than 1.15 percent of the mass public shooters. All these are much less than America’s 4.6 percent share of the world population.

Of the 97 countries where we identified mass public shootings, the U.S. ranks 64th per capita in its rate of attacks and 65th in fatalities. Major European countries, such as Norway, Finland, France, Switzerland and Russia, all have at least 25 percent higher per capita murder rates from mass public shootings.

While Americans are rightly concerned by the increased frequency and severity of mass public shootings, the rest of the world is experiencing much larger increases in per capita rates of attack. The frequency of foreign mass public shootings since 1998 has grown 291 percent faster than in the U.S.

That is not what the media would have you believe - doesn't fit the progressive narrative... And the data for gun-free zones:

The attack earlier this month at Borderline Bar & Grill occurred in a gun-free zone. Unlike in 39 states, concealed handgun permit holders in California are banned from carrying permitted concealed handguns into bars. The mass shooting Monday at Chicago’s Mercy Hospital & Medical Center in Bronzeville was at a place where law-abiding citizens were banned from having guns.

Most gunmen are smart enough to know that they can kill more people if they attack places where victims can’t defend themselves. That’s one reason why 98 percent of mass public shootings since 1950 have occurred in places where citizens are banned from having guns.

Pretty damning. Gun-free zones are a totally failed idea and need to be removed from the public consciousness. Experiment failed, time to redact and move on.

Yet another example of progressives (Democrats) doing something that sounds good instead of doing something that does good. How many more innocents have to die because of this stupid and failed idea. Criminals and madmen will not obey your policies while law-abiding citizens will. Criminals and madmen will laugh at your policies and laugh at you for your stupid weakness and blindness of thought.

And back again

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Good time - ran into some friends so talked for a while.

Back for the evening - busy productive day tomorrow. Surf then YouTube

Out the door

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Heading out for a couple pints of cider.

Taking a break from the Nathaniel Drinkwater books (waiting for some more from the library) so reading a great biography of JMW Turner - one of my favorite artists. He predated the Hudson River school in the US which itself was the foundation of the modern Plein Air movement. I love all of this.

Back in an hour or two... Early bedtime - got a lot to do this trip and want to get two trips to Bellingham each day.

Enjoy your twilight - Bill and Hillary

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Schadenfreude writ large - from American Thinker:

Clintons' speaking tour event in Toronto had 83% of the seats empty
Apparently, the Clintons' political life is set to end not with a bang, but a whimper.  I wonder what kind of envy Bill and Hillary Clinton experienced over the jam-packed arenas – with thousands listening outside – that President Trump always has, as they gazed out at the more than 15,000 empty seats facing them last night in Toronto on their stadium speaking tour.  Even though curtains were erected cutting the arena in half, the vacant seats far outnumbered the occupied ones.  The U.K. Daily Mail reports that 3,300 tickets were sold in the Scotiabank Arena, which holds 19,800, 16.6% of capacity.

Perhaps even more humiliating, while ticket prices began at $53 (Canadian), the U.K. Daily Mail reported that "[o]ne ticket was going for $6.55 in the final minutes before the event."

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How can I miss you when you won't go away?

Almost had it spelled right

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Cute:

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This, not this...

Fake News - England's The Guardian

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100% pure Fake News - from Zero Hedge:

The Guardian Faceplants As Manafort's Passport Stamps Don't Match "Fabricated" Assange Story
Further evidence that The Guardian "entirely fabricated" a report that former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort visited Julian Assange in 2013, 2015 and the spring of 2016; his passports...

The Washington Times reports that Manafort's three passports reveal just two visits to England in 2010 and 2012, which support his categorical denial of the "totally false and deliberately libelous" report in The Guardian, which said that Manafort visited Assange in the Ecuadorian Embassy - ostensibly to coordinate on the WikiLeaks release of Hillary Clinton's emails.

The Times does note that Manafort could have conceivably entered the UK from another European country and not received a stamp - however a representative for Manafort insisted to the Times that Manafort has only made those two visits to England since 2008, and that a libel suit against the Guardian is under discussion.

While two of Manafort's passports were entered as evidence at his tax evasion trial - something that The Guardian's Luke Harding and Dan Collyns could have easily looked up - the Times has obtained a copy of his third passport which confirms the two visits.

His attorney explained the passports this way: One was lost, one was used to submit to foreign embassies for visas, and one was used as a backup. Manafort later found the third passport. -Washington Times

WikiLeaks immediately fired back at The Guardian - betting the paper "a million dollars and its editor's head that Manafort never met Assange."

Heh - should have checked your facts before making a claim. The claim might have fit the narrative but it did not fit the reality.

Back to the future Farm

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Take care of some things, nuke the left-over pot roast (planning to have it over wide egg noodles) and then out for a couple of pints of cider.

Up here for a couple of days - got some major moving to do - large machines.

High Tide - 11/29/2018

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The tide came up about 18" higher than normal. Still perfectly fine - the house is set back a bit. Grace does a walk-on, Bear was camera shy.

Sorry for the poor video quality - my computer for video editing is shut down and packed up at the farm for now. Will repost when I bring it down here. Got some really nice shots of the salt marsh - will wait to post those when I get the "good" computer set up. Running an older laptop right now.

Back home (island)

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Got some impressive footage - doing a rough edit and will post in a bit. Got a couple of things to do here and then head up to Bellingham and then to the farm for a couple of days.

Time for coffee

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Heading out for the day - cameras packed up and ready to roll.

Sunspots - the numbers

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A great little chart from NASA's Spaceweather:

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 3 days
2018 total: 197 days (59%)
2017 total: 104 days (28%)
2016 total: 32 days (9%)
2015 total: 0 days (0%)
2014 total: 1 day (<1%)
2013 total: 0 days (0%)
2012 total: 0 days (0%)
2011 total: 2 days (<1%)
2010 total: 51 days (14%)
2009 total: 260 days (71%)
2008 total: 268 days (73%)
2007 total: 152 days (42%)
2006 total: 70 days (19%)
Updated 29 Nov 2018

Really shows the progression of the solar cycle and how low the sunspot numbers have been getting. Sunspots are a great proxy for solar output and our sun has been getting very very quiet.

Another cycle or two of this decline and we will be in very cold territory.

From The Washington Free Beacon:

Dem Campaigns Paid SEIU-Owned Bank $2.2 Million in Fees, Interest This Cycle
A bank owned by the SEIU labor union earned over $2 million during the midterm election cycle through bank fees and interest payments from Democratic campaigns and committees, Federal Election Commission filings show.

Amalgamated Bank continued to grow its political operation during the cycle, with clients ranging from new candidates such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in New York and Jon Ossoff in Georgia to political veterans such as Claire McCaskill in Missouri and Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts. Amalgamated was the bank used by both the Democratic National Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, which spent $146.8 million and $117.2 million, respectively, this cycle. It was also the bank for super PACs such as the League of Conservation Voters Victory Fund and American Bridge 21st Century, which both spent about $20 million working to elect Democrats.

All together, Amalgamated Bank was paid $2,188,765.63 by Democratic campaigns and election groups. Most of the money earned comes from simple bank fees, which are frequent due to the highly transactional nature of campaign finance, but a sizable portion also comes from interest payments. Both the DNC and the DSCC took out large loans, which remain largely unpaid.

The DNC has $2.5 million worth of outstanding loans with Amalgamated, a smaller sum than the DSCC, which took out a $20 million loan from Amalgamated in August and is still paying off a nearly $5 million loan it took out in 2015.

The massive midterm election client list continues a trend for Amalgamated, which only started to cater to political clients in 2012 but has since made it a focus.

Democrats - it is always the Democrats who are involved in these crooked and shady transactions. They have nothing else to offer - just consolidating the money and the power for themselves and their cronies. No crumbs for us normals. Only benefiting the elites and keeping the proles subdued with bread and circuses and free government shit.

Up early this morning

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Woke up about an hour ago - puttering around the house and let the pups out for a run.

Heading out for coffee in a bit and working here until around 10AM - tide will be high (King tide) by then so taking a camera to look at the salt marsh a few miles away.

Bellingham after and then to the farm.

Found this on my travels - very well done:

YouTube and then to bed

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Want to be up to catch high tide tomorrow - do a couple things here first and then head out for coffee and post office and then take some photos. There is a nice salt marsh near the bridge over the Stilliguamish River on the way to Camano Island. That has been flooding a lot more than usual and I want to get some photos/video of that at high tide.

About that Global Warming

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Great article at The Next Grand Minimum:

Professor Valentina Zharkova Confirms “Super” Grand Solar Minimum
Professor Valentina Zharkova gave a presentation of her Climate and the Solar Magnetic Field hypothesis at the Global Warming Policy Foundation in October, 2018. The information she unveiled should shake/wake you up.

Zharkova was one of the few that correctly predicted solar cycle 24 would be weaker than cycle 23 — only 2 out of 150 models predicted this.

Her models have run at a 93% accuracy and her findings suggest a Super Grand Solar Minimum is on the cards beginning 2020 and running for 350-400 years.

The last time we had a little ice age only two magnetic fields of the sun went out of phase.

This time, all four magnetic fields are going out of phase.

Here is the Professors full presentation: https://youtu.be/M_yqIj38UmY

The presentation is a bit long at 1:33 hours but really well done. We are in for some interesting times. More people die from cold than from heat and agriculture is going to be severely impacted.

President Trump - funny

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Not only a great leader, he is funnier than hell - this tweet for instance:

Looks like Ms. Daniels is trying to distance herself from Creepy Porn Lawyer - from The Daily Beast:

Stormy Daniels: Michael Avenatti Sued Trump For Defamation Against My Wishes
Michael Avenatti sued Donald Trump for defaming Stormy Daniels against her wishes, Daniels told The Daily Beast in a statement on Wednesday.

Avenatti also started a new fundraising site to raise money for her legal defense fund without telling her, Daniels said. She said she is not sure whether or not she will keep Avenatti on as her lawyer.

Here is her full statement, provided to The Daily Beast:

“For months I’ve asked Michael Avenatti to give me accounting information about the fund my supporters so generously donated to for my safety and legal defense. He has repeatedly ignored those requests. Days ago I demanded again, repeatedly, that he tell me how the money was being spent and how much was left. Instead of answering me, without my permission or even my knowledge Michael launched another crowdfunding campaign to raise money on my behalf. I learned about it on Twitter.

More at the site - she hitched her wagon to that deadbeatwoman-beating moron who is now without a law office to practice in. You do not jump off in mid-stream. She is trying to do damage control and stay in front of the cameras. Has been... Her 15 minutes of fame are over.

Remember Big Mouth Billy Bass from about eighteen years ago? He just got updated - from the Amazon website:

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Big Mouth Billy Bass – Compatible with Alexa

    • Big mouth Billy bass is back and better than ever. Everyone's favorite talking and singing fish is now programmed to respond to Alexa voice commands.
    • Pair big mouth Billy bass with your preferred device in the Echo family and let the fun begin.
    • Responds to Alexa voice commands
    • Lip syncs with Alexa spoken responses
    • Responds to inquiries about the weather, your commute, the news, random facts, and more
    • Reacts to timers, Notifications, and alarms
    • Dances to the beat with music. This is a hilarious gift!
    • Includes the original song “fishing’ time”
    • Pairs with Alexa via Bluetooth/automatically updates with Alexa upgrades
    • Includes Power adapter/battery compartment also available (batteries not included)

Only $40 - I have issues with always-on electronics in my living spaces so am not going to be getting Alexa at any time but this is a fun idea for someone whose sense of privacy is not as finly tuned (or anal depending on how you look at it).

Off to dinner

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Got a bite in Bellingham this afternoon so not super hungry. Getting a burrito at the local Mexican place - great little store. Family run, kids playing in the kitchen while the parents whip up amazing food. Really nice people.

Ho. Li. Crap is that ever tiny

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4K Video at 60 fps, three-axis gimbal with image stabilization for $350.
From Drone maker DJI check out their new Osmo Pocket:

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And it is to the island for a day

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Had some stuff to pick up in Burlington so down to the island for the night. Tomorrow is the last day of the King Tides so wanted to see how high the water reaches on my cement bulkhead. Normal high tide is just lapping at it. Should be interesting. The maximum low tide is at 2:50AM so forget it this time. High is 10:50AM which is reasonable.

Take some video if the weather is good.

Now this is an interesting project

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But the results are a bit creepy - from PathoMap/About:

The idea for PathoMap began in 2010 when Dr. Christopher Mason, the project’s principal investigator, picked up his young daughter from daycare. She was playing with all the toys, putting them in her mouth, and then her friends would come and put the toys in their mouths. This launched Dr. Mason’s question, “What is on those toys, and the surfaces in this environment, and all the other environments, and how much is my daughter absorbing every day?” Thus, PathoMap was born.

The molecular profiling initiative launched in the summer of 2013 with the help of undergraduates from Cornell University and Macaulay Honors College. The study launched with two core objectives.

    • The primary goal was to study the microbiome of an urban, metropolitan environment. This was the first study of its kind to be launched at such a large scale and to comprehensively map the microbiome and metagenome on the surfaces of a city.
    • The second objective is to eventually develop a pathogen monitoring “weather map.” The map would be able to monitor the city and send alerts whenever a potential outbreak is detected, and also serves as a long-term view of the dynamics and health of the city at the molecular level.

From their main website: PathoMap:

Creating a Molecular Portrait of New York City
One swab at a time
PathoMap is a research project by Weill Cornell Medical College to study the microbiome and metagenome of the built environment of NYC.

Check out the full findings here.

The creepy part? From the full findings:

Almost half of all DNA present on the subway’s surfaces matches no known organism.

And an interesting bit - talk about persistant:

One station flooded during Hurricane Sandy still resembles a marine environment.

Hurricane Sandy was six years ago. Science in the raw - I love it!

Mittens was right - auto bailout

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From the Goldwater Institute:

Romney Was Right, the GM Bailout Goes Bust, and Taxpayers Pay the Price
“Let Detroit go bankrupt,” former presidential candidate Mitt Romney wrote in 2008, arguing that the federal government should not bail out the failing domestic auto industry for their poor management decisions. Vilified for turning his back on America’s autoworkers, Romney lost the argument, Barack Obama won the election, General Motors got its way, and U.S. taxpayers got stuck with an $11.2 billion bill to keep the company alive.

Today’s announcement from General Motors that it will close two plants in Metro Detroit and lay off 14,700 workers helps prove Romney right, albeit ten years later. Romney wrote that with a bailout, the American automotive industry’s demise “will be virtually guaranteed” because it would not be forced to undergo radical restructuring to be competitive in the marketplace. By subsidizing failure, the federal government would be gambling with taxpayer dollars and forestalling the inevitable.

This wasn’t the first time the government had bet heavily on General Motors at citizens’ expense. In a story much like recent efforts by state and local governments to give away billions of dollars to win a new Amazon headquarters, the cities of Detroit and neighboring Hamtramck teamed up in the early 1980s to win a new General Motors factory, chasing the promise of jobs and renewal of depressed and blighted neighborhoods. The Detroit News reports:

General Motors and Detroit Mayor Coleman Young hatched a plan: If the city would get the land, the auto company would build a state-of-the-art plant, crossing the border with Hamtramck, employing 6,000 people and providing a glittering example of what the auto companies and their suppliers could do in the city of their birth.

Residents who had lived in the targeted neighborhood would be given offers to sell their homes and move to make way for “progress,” but as the Detroit News reports, not everyone wanted to sell. In the face of protests and a legal challenge, the city moved forward with the plan, and a Michigan Supreme Court decision upheld the city’s decision to raze the site for General Motors. The factory was built, and decades later the court decision was overturned, but today, some 37 years later, that factory will be closed as General Motors fights to save costs.

One of the reasons that I love Ford so much is that they did not need to take any federal bailout money in 2008 - they are a well run company and turn out a really good truck. In hindsight, I am glad that Romney lost and that we got eight years of Obama - this set us up for President Trump and the people to follow him.

Another day

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Another $0.72 (adjusted for inflation)  Heading out for coffee and then to load the van for another trip.

Back home again

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Another load to the condo tomorrow.

Here is a 25 second shot of the North Fork of the Nooksack river this morning around 10AM - around milepost 30 on SR-542

I have gone from couch potato to YouTuber.

And I am back

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Just one trip today but I got a lot of totes packed to load tomorrow and a lot of stuff put aside to throw out. Heat up yesterday's pot roast and then out for a couple pints of cider at my local.

And I am off to the Condo

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Got the van packed up and ready to roll. Get a bite to eat in town and then back to pack up some more. Feels good to be lightening my load and expecting to make some decent money with the sale.

I continue to be amazed at just how much crap I have accumulated over the 15 years of living here. Having a 40' by 100' barn did not help...

General Motors - meet President Trump

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I do not think that they fully understood the consequences of betting against our President - this will be fun to watch:

A perfect example of Fake News

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From the pinnacle to which other media aspire - the New York Times:

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Tip of the hat to Power Line

Another day in paradise

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Heading out for coffee. Had about a half inch of precip last night. Temperature is cooling off (52°F) so the atmospheric river has passed. Still very humid at 92%

The Nooksack River has hit its peak flow and just nudged into flood level - will take a look when I am out for coffee:

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And it's YouTube for a bit

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Early bedtime - got a lot to do next couple of days.

Reading the market - the Chevrolet Volt

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Looks like General Motors is hitting the skids. They should read their customer base better to see what people are buying instead of trying to "nudge" us to purchase vehicles that fit the narrative.

From Breitbart:

Watch: Six Years Ago Obama Promised to Buy a Chevy Volt. Now It Is Dead
Six years ago, President Barack Obama promised to buy a Chevy Volt after his presidency.

“I got to get inside a brand-new Chevy Volt fresh off the line,” Obama announced to a cheering crowd of United Auto Workers activists. “Even though Secret Service wouldn’t let me drive it. But I liked sitting in it. It was nice. I’ll bet it drives real good. And five years from now when I’m not president anymore, I’ll buy one and drive it myself.”

Now it looks like Obama will not get his chance to make good on the promise. General Motors announced Monday that it would cease production of the hybrid electric plug-in Volt and its gas-powered sister car the Cruze. The announcement came as part of a larger restructuring by the car company as it seeks to focus production around the bigger vehicles in favor with U.S. consumers.

The Volt and the Cruze were two of the signature achievements of the partnership between the Obama administration and General Motors following the auto-industry bailout. Although the Volt was long-planned by GM executives, it received a lot of support from the administration. Obama described the Cruze as “the car of the future.”

Both cars reflected the policies of the Obama administration but never really caught on with the car-buying public. They initially enjoyed a brief bout of enthusiasm from consumers but this was short-lived. Particularly after the price of oil fell dramatically, American consumers moved on to larger vehicles such as SUVs.

Heh - follow the narrative instead of the numbers and you will get burned. Always. I love my Toyota Highlander and my Ford Truck.

Visit Portland Oregon

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Heh...

And I am back

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Ran into a dear friend of 15 years who is heading back to NY State to take care of her aging Mom. We have occupied the same food-service circles for as long as I have lived here - she managing restaurants and bars, me managing the bakery and the store. Glad that I went out tonight.

Still waiting for the deluge - air has cooled off about five degrees and we are still at 0.10" of precip since last midnight. The Nooksack is showing discharge almost 3X above normal (the yellow triangles):

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The Flood Watch was updated at 5:10PM and it seems that the bulk of the rains will hit the Olympic Peninsula but the Nooksack is specifically called out. See what it is tomorrow morning.

I will be spending tomorrow packing up totes and will try to get two runs in to the condo. Fun fun fun...

Done with dinner

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Heading out for a couple pints of hard cider at my local. The pot roast came out really good and there are leftovers for a couple of days.

Shooting arcs

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I do welding and was wanting to take some videos. Found two great resources for filtering the camera:

Your Day in the Sun: A Guide to Solar Filters - more for astronomers wanting to directly observe the sun but the principle is the same

How do welder's glass shades translate to stops when used as an ND filter?

Good stuff!

An interesting bit of technology - RISC

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There are two schools of thought regarding computers. Complex instruction sets that run at a given speed or reduced instruction sets that - because of the simpler design - are able to run much faster. CISC v/s RISC. They both had their pluses and minuses but in the marketplace, CISC won out.

Now, it seems that RISC is back - for a very good reason. From manufacturer Raptor Computing Systems:

Q: Why POWER9? Why not just package a cheap ARM SoC or x86 processor on a libre-friendly mainboard?
A: As you may be aware, both of the main x86 manufacturers have decided to require non-free, unreplaceable, highly privileged firmware "black boxes" (blobs) in order for their CPUs to function. These blobs are cryptographically signed and verified by the CPU hardware; as such, there is no way to replace them or remove them. Because of their tight integration with basic system operation, even a complete mainboard redesign will not remove them. Worse, public hacks into this system management firmware have already been demonstrated on at least one occasion--and are unpatchable without full vendor cooperation. As a result, some developers have turned to ARM, only to find that ARM does not have the computing power required for many development tasks. ARM-based machines also tend to lack upgradability and expandability, and, unfortunately, ARM is going through its own gradual lockdown regarding higher-performance devices. POWER9 does not have any of these concerns, and brings a wide array of modern technologies to the table without requiring you to give up any of your freedom.
When you look at the complete price of a comparable build-it-yourself x86 bundle--even though POWER9 has state-of-the-art technologies, like PCIe 4 and CAPI 2, that no x86 machine offers-- the Talos™ II bundles are similar in cost. Why lock yourself into the proprietary, insecure x86 ecosystem with hacks on the rise and GDPR-related data breach penalties on the horizon? Make the smart decision and invest in a truly open platform, even if it means relying on open-source applications -- your lower TCO and provable compliance will justify the initial investment.


Q: Wait, so even coreboot won't help me? Why haven't I heard about this?
A: The management firmware in question--the "Management Engine" (ME) on Intel and the "Platform Security Processor" (PSP) on AMD--is a somewhat poorly kept secret, but only a small percentage of users, executives, and organizations are aware of its existence, let alone the danger that the associated centralized control actually poses. Coreboot is unable to boot modern x86 without at least two blobs involved, one of which is mandatory per the hardware-enforced signature checks; while coreboot may be a step in the right direction, it is far from a fully auditable solution on x86. Unfortunately, this situation is permanent, given the current hardware available; it is one of the main reasons for our switch from x86 to OpenPOWER.

Very interesting - big fan of Linux. Had no idea that there was such an embedded back door. Microsoft used to compile Windows for RISC machines - notably DEC Power PCs but stopped with Windows XP or thereabouts. Linux runs fine on these.

A bit of corruption to our North

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From Canada's Global News:

Secret police study finds crime networks could have laundered over $1B through Vancouver homes in 2016
The stately $17-million mansion owned by a suspected fentanyl importer is at the end of a gated driveway on one of the priciest streets in Shaughnessy, Vancouver’s most exclusive neighbourhood.

A block away is a $22-million gabled manor that police have linked to a high-stakes gambler and property developer with suspected ties to the Chinese police services.

Both mansions appear on a list of more than $1-billion worth of Vancouver-area property transactions in 2016 that a confidential police intelligence study has linked to Chinese organized crime.

The study of more than 1,200 luxury real estate purchases in B.C.’s Lower Mainland in 2016 found that more than 10 per cent were tied to buyers with criminal records. And 95 per cent of those transactions were believed by police intelligence to be linked to Chinese crime networks.

Big drug problem out here around the farm - we are only four miles from the border as the crow flies. There is an area nearby that has the last of the really cheap housing in this county so it is a haven for tweakers and druggies.

Congratulations NASA and InSight

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From the National Arrows and Spears Administration:

NASA InSight Lander Arrives on Martian Surface
Mars has just received its newest robotic resident. NASA's Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) lander successfully touched down on the Red Planet after an almost seven-month, 300-million-mile (458-million-kilometer) journey from Earth.

InSight's two-year mission will be to study the deep interior of Mars to learn how all celestial bodies with rocky surfaces, including Earth and the Moon, formed.

InSight launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California May 5. The lander touched down Monday, Nov. 26, near Mars' equator on the western side of a flat, smooth expanse of lava called Elysium Planitia, at 11:52:59 a.m. PST (2:52:59 p.m. EST).

NASA doing what it should. Not climate bullshit or social justice.

Jim Acosta v/s the reality

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Brilliant short video - Jim Acosta's hectoring President Trump, claiming one thing and then video showing something completely different. Acosta is clueless - CNN is Fake News:

Get 'em hooked early

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This is disgusting:

The parents are using the phone as a cheap pacifier for their baby and are setting the kid up for significant problems later in life.  Not good at all.

At the farm

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Driving past the Nooksack (native name meaning noisy water) river I could see that it was quite high. Checking my home weather station I can see that the temps went from 47°F at midnight up to 63°F right now. The Pineapple Express is on its way. About a tenth of an inch of rainfall so far but that is due to change really soon. This just came in about 15 minutes ago:

Flood Watch
National Weather Service Seattle WA
229 PM PST Mon Nov 26 2018

...FLOOD WATCH NOW IN EFFECT THROUGH TUESDAY EVENING...

The Flood Watch is now in effect for

* A portion of northwest Washington, including the following counties, Clallam, Skagit, and Whatcom.

* Through Tuesday evening

* Heavy rain has been falling and periods of heavy rain will continue through early Tuesday over the Olympics and north Cascades. This amount of rain will lead to the potential for flooding in those counties including the Bogachiel, Skagit and downstream points on the Nooksack Rivers later tonight or Tuesday.

In other words, it is winter in the Pacific Northwest. Cliff Mass has all the circles and arrows.

Unpacking the van and starting some pot roast for dinner.

Done here, coffee and points North

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Made sure that the fireplace is cold, ready to head out for coffee, library and the farm.

More posting later this afternoon/

Thank you President Trump - North Korea

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Further progress on a lasting peace between the two Koreas - from ABC News:

North Korea detonates DMZ guard posts at southern border
North Korea blew up 10 of its front-line guard posts in the Demilitarized Zone separating the two Koreas on Tuesday in accordance with agreements made with South Korea earlier this year.

The explosions were carried out simultaneously within a four-minute time frame after the North notified the South of the project, according to South Korea’s Defense Ministry.

North Korean soldiers have been destroying the brick structures over the past couple of weeks. Analysts said they most likely decided to demolish the guard posts all at once to meet the Nov. 30 deadline.

Most excellent - they have a timetable and they are following it. A bit more:

“We aim to verify the dismantlement, and ultimately withdraw all guard posts in both North and South Korean border military demarcation line,” Choi Hyun-soo, South Korea’s defense ministry spokesperson said during a briefing Tuesday.

The demolition of guard posts on both sides of the border at the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) is part of a series of moves that South Korean president Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un had agreed to completely ‘demilitarize’ the joint security area during the third inter-Korean summit in September.

Looks like Kim is wanting to join the rest of the world. He went to school in Switzerland and has traveled the world. He wants what is best for his people - a McDonalds :)

A bit of a blow

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Lost power last night but although the wind is fresh this morning, it is not gusting to 60MPH.

The Snohomish and Puget Sound utilities are showing scatered outages - the wind warning is still in effect through midnight tonight:

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That is it for the night - YouTube

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Heading over there for an hour or so before sleep. Nothing much happening on the internet.

Still raining, still air.

Interesting news - Mexico

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Looks like Mexico is stepping up to the plate - one paragraph from Reuters:

The Mexican government said it had retaken control of the border crossing after nearly 500 migrants tried to cross the U.S. border “in a violent manner,” and vowed to immediately deport Central Americans who attempt to enter the United States illegally.

Way to go, Mexico. Kudos to incoming President AMLO - due to begin his six year term in six days (December 1st, 2018).

Preparedness

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I am a prepper and have been involved in groups teaching other people how to prepare for emergencies. A few simple things can make a big difference between riding out an event in comfort and being totally unprepared.

This upcoming storm is a perfect example - I know that I have heat, water and some form of light. If the power goes out I have a small generator that will keep my fridge and freezer running for as long as needed. If the internet is down, I have a book I am half-way through and two more waiting (the local library system is awesome). I do not have a means of cooking as the range is electric - when I remodel the kitchen, that will be switched to propane.

I can see the forecasts and know that I will be warm, secure, comfortable and intellectually occupied. If things get too out of control, I have a ham radio to use to call for help. Our local repeater has backup power for a couple of days and I can use that to contact people outside of the affected zone.

Best definition I have heard for "an emergency" is "an event that outstrips your ability to cope".

Back from dinner

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Starting to rain pretty heavy but no sign of the wind at this time. Regardless, it is not forecast to arrive for another four hours.

To make things even more interesting, we have this:

Hydrologic Outlook
WAC057-061-073-261345-

...THREAT OF FLOODING WILL INCREASE ON SOME RIVERS DRAINING OFF THE WEST SLOPES OF THE NORTH CASCADES MONDAY NIGHT AND TUESDAY...

Periods of heavy rain will fall on the southwest facing slopes of the north Cascades Monday afternoon through Monday night. Total rainfall amounts of 4 to 7.5 inches is forecast during the 24 hour period ending at 4 AM PST, Tuesday. This amount of rain could drive the Nooksack, Samish, and Stillaguamish Rivers to or near flood stage late Monday night or Tuesday.

The Nooksack is in the farm's back yard and the Stilly is in Camano's

Happy happy joy joy

Checking the forecast before heading out to dinner and ran into this little nugget from the National Weather Service:

...HIGH WIND WARNING IN EFFECT FROM MIDNIGHT TONIGHT TO MIDNIGHT PST MONDAY NIGHT...
The National Weather Service in Seattle has upgraded the High Wind Watch to a High Wind Warning, which is in effect from midnight tonight to midnight PST Monday night. The High Wind Watch is no longer in effect.

* WIND...Winds of 30 to 40 mph with gusts to 60 mph possible.

* SOME AFFECTED LOCATIONS...Highest winds in the areas nearest the waters.

* TIMING...Winds will increase late tonight with the strongest winds Monday afternoon and evening. Winds will diminish late Monday evening.

* IMPACTS...Winds could cause some tree damage with associated power outages.

Got candles and the water system is gravity fed and has a backup generator so no worries there. The fire has the house nice and toasty so I can go without HVAC for a long time. Have plenty of flashlights and two camp lanterns too. I got this covered.

King tide is at 7:30AM tomorrow with 12.43 feet. That puts the ocean right at the base of my bulkhead. I'm going to take some photos and video.

The island wins again

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I have noted before that Camano Island can be very sticky at times. Got back from my errands, filed the paperwork, puttered around the shop, did a load of laundry and decided to spend one more night here. Got a fire going, the house is nice and warm, it is raining outside and just feel like holing up here. Heading out for dinner soon but will camp here for the rest of the evening.

Farm tomorrow for sure!!!

Bookkeeping done

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Run out to the post office, take the dogs for a run at the off-leash park and then back home to do filing. Up to the farm later this afternoon.

Yikes - Russia and the Ukraine

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From Sky News:

Russia 'fires at Ukraine ships and captures three vessels' amid rising tensions off Crimea
Ukraine says Russia has opened fire on its ships in the Black Sea and captured three vessels.

Two sailors have been wounded after two artillery boats were hit in the strikes, the Ukrainian navy said.

Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko has called an emergency session of his war cabinet after a day of rising tensions off the coast of Crimea.

A statement from Ukraine's ambassador to the UK said Russian special forces had captured three ships in an "act of aggression".

Ukraine is a very rich nation compared to Russia - Russia wants (needs) the industrial base. From InfoGalactic:

Natural resources
Significant natural resources in Ukraine include: iron ore, coal, manganese, natural gas, oil, salt, sulfur, graphite, titanium, magnesium, kaolin, nickel, mercury, timber, and arable land.

From the CIA World Factbook:

After Russia, the Ukrainian Republic was the most important economic component of the former Soviet Union, producing about four times the output of the next-ranking republic. Its fertile black soil accounted for more than one-fourth of Soviet agricultural output, and its farms provided substantial quantities of meat, milk, grain, and vegetables to other republics. Likewise, its diversified heavy industry supplied unique equipment such as large diameter pipes and vertical drilling apparatus, and raw materials to industrial and mining sites in other regions of the former USSR.

And, reading this next paragraph, it looks like the deep state was firmly entrenched there too. The elites did not want to give up their power or their corruption:

Shortly after independence in August 1991, the Ukrainian Government liberalized most prices and erected a legal framework for privatization, but widespread resistance to reform within the government and the legislature soon stalled reform efforts and led to some backtracking. Output by 1999 had fallen to less than 40% of the 1991 level. Outside institutions - particularly the IMF encouraged Ukraine to quicken the pace and scope of reforms to foster economic growth. Ukrainian Government officials eliminated most tax and customs privileges in a March 2005 budget law, bringing more economic activity out of Ukraine's large shadow economy. From 2000 until mid-2008, Ukraine's economy was buoyant despite political turmoil between the prime minister and president. The economy contracted nearly 15% in 2009, among the worst economic performances in the world. In April 2010, Ukraine negotiated a price discount on Russian gas imports in exchange for extending Russia's lease on its naval base in Crimea.

Screw the little people, I want MINE! But they seem to be turning themselves around quite nicely:

Ukraine’s oligarch-dominated economy grew slowly from 2010 to 2013, but remained behind peers in the region and among Europe’s poorest. After former President YANUKOVYCH fled the country during the Revolution of Dignity, Ukraine’s economy fell into crisis because of Russia’s annexation of Crimea, military conflict in the eastern part of the country, and a trade war with Russia, resulting in a 17% decline in GDP, inflation at nearly 60%, and dwindling foreign currency reserves. The international community began efforts to stabilize the Ukrainian economy, including a March 2014 IMF assistance package of $17.5 billion, of which Ukraine has received four disbursements, most recently in April 2017, bringing the total disbursed as of that date to approximately $8.4 billion. Ukraine has made significant progress on reforms designed to make the country prosperous, democratic, and transparent, including creation of a national anti-corruption agency, overhaul of the banking sector, establishment of a transparent VAT refund system, and increased transparency in government procurement. But more improvements are needed, including fighting corruption, developing capital markets, improving the business environment to attract foreign investment, privatizing state-owned enterprises, and land reform. The fifth tranche of the IMF program, valued at $1.9 billion, was delayed in mid-2017 due to lack of progress on outstanding reforms, including adjustment of gas tariffs to import parity levels and adoption of legislation establishing an independent anti-corruption court.

There is a large population of Ukranians near where my farm is - it will be interesting to hear what they have to say about these events.

From Investor's Business Daily:

Here's One Global Warming Study Nobody Wants You To See
A new study published in a peer-reviewed journal finds that climate models exaggerate the global warming from CO2 emissions by as much as 45%. If these findings hold true, it's huge news. No wonder the mainstream press is ignoring it.

In the study, authors Nic Lewis and Judith Curry looked at actual temperature records and compared them with climate change computer models. What they found is that the planet has shown itself to be far less sensitive to increases in CO2 than the climate models say. As a result, they say, the planet will warm less than the models predict, even if we continue pumping CO2 into the atmosphere.

From Real Clear Markets:

Did You Know the Greatest Two-Year Global Cooling Event Just Took Place?
Would it surprise you to learn the greatest global two-year cooling event of the last century just occurred? From February 2016 to February 2018 (the latest month available) global average temperatures dropped 0.56°C. You have to go back to 1982-84 for the next biggest two-year drop, 0.47°C—also during the global warming era. All the data in this essay come from GISTEMP Team, 2018: GISS Surface Temperature Analysis (GISTEMP). NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (dataset accessed 2018-04-11 at https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/). This is the standard source used in most journalistic reporting of global average temperatures.

The 2016-18 Big Chill was composed of two Little Chills, the biggest five month drop ever (February to June 2016) and the fourth biggest (February to June 2017). A similar event from February to June 2018 would bring global average temperatures below the 1980s average. February 2018 was colder than February 1998. If someone is tempted to argue that the reason for recent record cooling periods is that global temperatures are getting more volatile, it's not true. The volatility of monthly global average temperatures since 2000 is only two-thirds what it was from 1880 to 1999.

Another one from Investor's Business Daily:

Another Global Warming Study Casts Doubt On Media's Climate Change Fairy Tale
With climate change activists and the big media still in high dudgeon over President Trump pulling out of the Paris Climate Deal, yet another study shows no acceleration in global warming for the last 23 years. Piece by piece, the church of global warming is being dismantled.

The University of Alabama-Huntsville study, conducted by climate scientists John Christy and Richard McNider, shows that not only is the temperature rising far more slowly than predicted, but that the Earth's atmosphere appears to be less sensitive to changing CO2 levels than previously assumed.

And lastly, again, from Investor's Business Daily:

Global Warming: Who Are The Deniers Now?
Global warming is "settled science," we hear all the time. Those who reject that idea are "deniers." But as new evidence trickles out from peer-reviewed science studies, the legs beneath the climate change hypothesis — that the earth was doing just fine until carbon-dioxide spewing human beings came along — is increasingly wobbly.

A new study published in the journal Nature Geoscience purports to support action by global governments to reduce carbon dioxide output in order to lower potential global warming over the next 100 years or so. But what it really does is undercut virtually every modern argument for taking radical action against warming.

Why? The study admits that the 12 major university and government models that have been used to predict climate warming are faulty.

"We haven't seen that rapid acceleration in warming after 2000 that we see in the models," said Myles Allen, professor of geosystem science at Oxford and one of the authors of the study. "We haven't seen that in the observations."

And, of course, he's quite right. As we've noted here numerous times, the much-feared "global warming" trend seems to have halted somewhere around 1998. We know this is true because satellite temperature readings — the most accurate temperature gauge since it takes in the entire atmosphere, not just parts of it — show there's been virtually no change.

I find it specifically telling that the skeptical reports are showing up at respected financial websites. The overall effects of general warming or cooling trends are - at heart - economic. People who do economics on a daily basis are not stupid and they need uncensored and unbiased data to operate.

Sufficiently caffeinated

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Got a bowl of oatmeal in my belly so sitting down to do bookkeeping and filing. Then, to points north.

And I am off

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Up and getting dressed - heading to the farm today - coffee first though...

And it is off to YouTube for the evening

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Want an early start tomorrow.

Interesting conditions  - from the Stanwood Camano News:

Year's highest tides on the way
The highest tides of the year, called king tides, are forecast to hit area shorelines Monday.

King tides are extreme high tides that occur during the winter, when the moon is closest to Earth.

They present an opportunity to preview what the state’s shoreline areas may look like in the future as sea level rises, according to the King Tides Program coordinated by the state Department of Ecology and Washington Sea Grant, which is a research and education program out of the University of Washington.

And how much rise are we talking about?

Sea level is predicted to rise about 2 feet in Skagit County by 2100, according to a report released in July by the Washington Coastal Resilience Project.

NASA says that sea level is rising about 3.2 millimeters each year.
2100-2018=82
82*3.2mm=262.4mm
262.4mm = 10.33 inches  (Bull *cough* shit)

Set your calanders:

King tides are forecast for nine days: Monday through Wednesday, Dec. 25-27 and Jan. 23-25.

Each of those king tides is forecast to occur between 7 and 10 a.m.

We do live on an interesting planet...

Now this is interesting - MI6

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From the England's The Telegraph:

MI6 battling to stop Donald Trump releasing classified Russia probe documents
MI6 chiefs are secretly battling Donald Trump to stop him publishing classified information linked to the Russian election meddling investigation.

The UK is warning that the US president would undermine intelligence gathering if he releases pages of an FBI application to wiretap one of his former campaign advisers.

Christopher Steele was an MI6 agent and he was the one who presented the phony dossier on President Trump's actions. The compilation of said dossier was paid for by the Hillary Clinton campaign. MI6 is afraid that their involvement in the deep state's attempt to swing the 2016 election for Hillary will be revealed. The deep state is global in scope.

Don Surber nails it - the media

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I am going to quote this in full because it is worth reading - from Don Surber's Blog:

The gratitude of reporters
The Associated Press did not mention it. Neither did The Hill, nor the Palm Beach Daily News, nor the Washington Times, nor CBS, nor CNN, nor Newsweek.

The only outlet I could find that reported that President Trump provided a Thanksgiving dinner for reporters at Mar-a-Lago was Breitbart. Even Fox News did not mention the generosity.

President Trump offered a kindness to a people who have been unfair, unseemly, and often incorrect in their mean-spirited effort to oust him from the presidency.

The annual dinner for White House reporters has turned into virulent attacks on a president they hate. A media that was silent when Obama wiretapped and subpoenaed some of them sued President Trump for taking away a press privilege from a CNN employee who refused to follow the unwritten rules of a press conference.

The rules are in writing now. Good luck.

Days later, the president shared his Thanksgiving bounty with them.

The Hill reported, "As reporters were briefly brought into the ballroom, a man performed 'Music of the Night' from the musical 'Phantom at the Opera' at the president's request."

So he shared the entertainment with them as well.

The Hill reported, "The menu for the dinner was a lengthy one and included a full salad bar and a chilled seafood display with crab, oysters, jumbo shrimp and clams.

"There was also a carving station with turkey, beef tenderloin, lamb and salmon, while the entrees for the dinner were Chilean sea bass, red snapper and ribs. Whipped potatoes, sweet potatoes, vegetables and stuffing were among the sides."

This is what wealthy people eat, although President Trump also eats Big Macs, KFC and of coure, the best Taco Bowls in the world.

I am pretty sure this was what reporters ate at their own table in an adjoining room.

Their assignment meant they were away from home for the holidays. President Trump took care of them. This is their gratitude.

The president offered a cease-fire. The reporters ignored it. Sad.

That is very telling - they all reported on how the Trumps celebrated their Thanksgiving dinner but they failed to mention that they were included in the celebration and although they were in a seperate room, they ate from the same sumptious menu and were greeted by POTUS and FLOTUS. I guess they didn't want to be seen as being friendly with the Trumps. Might hurt business.

Back on the island

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Got a lot done - went up to Bellingham for a couple of hours to work at the condo and get some things from Trader Joe's and Hardware Sales. Did the dump run but didn't get to the paperwork. Do that tomorrow (bills and filing) and head up to the farm. Heading out for some tacos in a little bit. I'll start using the second file cabinet - got two coats of paint on it and looks almost new.

It's what socialists do - raise taxes

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And sometimes, We The People get pissed off about it. From Scotland's Express:

PARIS BURNS: Riot police fire tear gas as 30,000 protestors furious at Macron hit France
Tear gas and water cannons have been fired by riot police in France amid a desperate struggle to control violent protests of more than 30,000 residents angry at President Emmanuel Macron over rising fuel prices.

A bit more:

A poll this week indicated that 73 percent of people in France have expressed support for the protests, which have been characterised as a grassroots movement lacking in clear leadership.

The price of diesel has risen 23% over the last 12 months and was scheduled to rise even more.

An excerpt from Reuters:

The unrest is a dilemma for Macron who casts himself as a champion against climate change but has been derided as out of touch with common folk and is fighting a slump in popularity.

Despite calls for calm from the government, the yellow vest protests have spread to French territories abroad, including the Indian Ocean island of Reunion, where cars were set on fire.

The unrest has left two dead and 606 injured in mainland France, the Interior Ministry said on Thursday.

Of course Macron is out of touch with us Normals - he is an elite.

An excerpt from Associated Press with some numbers:

The anger is mainly over a hike in the diesel fuel tax, which has gone up seven euro cents per liter (nearly 30 U.S. cents per gallon) and will keep climbing in coming years, according to Transport Minister Elisabeth Borne. The tax on gasoline is also to increase four euro cents. Gasoline currently costs about 1.64 euros a liter in Paris ($7.06 a gallon), slightly more than diesel.

Diesel costs about $3.50/gallon here or about half. This also makes the cost of everything go up as everything in your grocery store got there via a truck and the freight costs are going to be passed on to the buyer. The socialists saw a pool of money there for their use, they implemented a tax and are now finding out where people's tipping points are. Not good optics...

About the border - part two

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Here are two stories that cover current conditions: 

From the Chicago Tribune:

Deal with Mexico would make asylum seekers wait outside U.S. border
The Trump administration has won the support of Mexico's incoming government for a plan to remake U.S. border policy by requiring asylum seekers to wait in Mexico while their claims move through U.S. courts, according to Mexican officials and senior members of president-elect Andrés Manuel López Obrador's transition team.

The agreement would break with long-standing asylum rules and place a formidable new barrier in the path of Central American migrants attempting to reach the United States and escape poverty and violence. By reaching the accord, the Trump administration has also overcome Mexico's historic reticence to deepen cooperation with the United States on an issue widely seen here as America's problem.

Good - these people were paid to come here. They are political pawns in someone elses game. To make this point, here is this from The Washington Post:

For Central Americans, children open a path to the U.S. — and bring a discount
CHANMAGUA, Guatemala — To mark attendance in Diana Melisa Contreras’s kindergarten classroom, students place tongue depressors into little white cups painted with their names.

There were 29 cups at the start of the school year. Then Contreras’s students and their parents began leaving their small village in the coffee-growing hills of southern Guatemala, joining the torrent of migration to the United States. With more families preparing to depart in the coming weeks, Contreras has been told her class will only have five students next term, and she will be transferred to teach at a different school.

And a bit of the story:

This is happening because Central Americans know they will have a better chance of avoiding deportation, at least temporarily, if they are processed along with children.

The economics of the journey reinforces the decision to bring a child: Smugglers in Central America charge less than half the price if a minor is part of the cargo because less work is required of them.

A long and interesting article - no word about who is organizing the caravan or funding it but an interesting insight into the local operations.

About the border

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All the news footage of illegals climbing over the border fence - Fake News - from President Trump:

Back from coffee and post office

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Woke up a couple hours ago so back to a normal sleep schedule - doing a trip to the dump and then some paperwork and then up to the farm for a few days.

The joys of socialized medicine

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A very revealing look at the difference between socalized medicine and free-market medicine.
From the Foundation for Economic Education:

Cuba’s Exit From Brazil’s “More Doctors” Program Reveals the Exploitative Nature of Socialism
One of the many propaganda claims made by advocates of socialism is that in free markets, health care is just a privilege instead of a human right. Socialist candidates routinely demonize profit and private initiative and promise a “humanized” cost-free health care system for everyone.

And of course, it’s one thing to promise health care to everyone and quite another to actually deliver it. In Venezuela, health care is declared a right, but it’s one of the last places on earth anybody would want to go to get it.

Myth versus Reality
A few remaining dictatorships such as Cuba’s still sponsor state doctors to go on mission trips to sell socialized medicine across the globe. Besides using these missions to make money for their unsustainable state-run economies, they take every opportunity to criticize capitalism and lure young people into the socialist orbit. This strategy relies upon the myth that only socialism can get individuals to manifest their virtues and “help” others, but Brazilians are now realizing that these are just empty words.

After five years of participating, the Cuban government has just withdrawn from “Mais Médicos” (“More Doctors”), a Brazilian public health program designed by former socialist President Dilma Rousseff back in 2013. At the time, she promised that by partnering up with foreign countries, the program would increase the number of medical professionals in underserved areas of Brazil.

The socialist regime in Havana saw a money-making propaganda opportunity and dispatched nearly 20,000 Cuban medical professionals to Brazil—by far the largest contingent that various countries sent. More than 8,300 are in the country as of early November. But, unlike physicians from other nations, Cuban medics did not directly receive their salaries from the program. Instead, the government skimmed 74 percent of those salaries right off the top. Moreover, Cuban medics were not allowed to bring along their family members with them to Brazil. Why? The families were essentially kept as hostages to ensure their doctor relatives wouldn’t go to Brazil and defect from Cuba’s socialist “workers’ paradise.”

Socialist Greed
Just days after his election in late October, Brazil’s incoming President Jair Bolsonaro announced some new but long overdue conditions for the program. To maintain the partnership, including validation of certificates to offer medical care in Brazil, full payment for services would have to be sent straight to the doctors themselves, and their families would have to be permitted to accompany them to Brazil if they so wished. Bolsonaro also offered asylum to Cuban doctors who wished to stay in the country.

The Cuban Ministry of Public Health immediately rejected the new terms, alleging that the “dignity” and “altruism” of Cubans could not be questioned. But of course, Havana’s very action itself raises those questions. It also answers them: The socialist regime beats its collectivist chest espousing discredited Marxist concepts like “surplus labor” and “worker exploitation” but rips off its own workers and imprisons their families in the same breath. When their “humanitarian” ventures no longer provide cash or propaganda value, they’re “outta here!” (to borrow an American expression).

If socialism is so great, why are the socialist nations such corrupt sh*tholes. Why are their citizens trying to flee and move to the United States. Socialism is only good for the ruling elite - it is hell on Earth for the citizens. That damned narrative again...

Told 'ya - Global Warming Cooling

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From Investor's Business Daily:

Don't Tell Anyone, But We Just Had Two Years Of Record-Breaking Global Cooling
Inconvenient Science: NASA data show that global temperatures dropped sharply over the past two years. Not that you'd know it, since that wasn't deemed news. Does that make NASA a global warming denier?

Writing in Real Clear Markets, Aaron Brown looked at the official NASA global temperature data and noticed something surprising. From February 2016 to February 2018, "global average temperatures dropped by 0.56 degrees Celsius." That, he notes, is the biggest two-year drop in the past century.

"The 2016-2018 Big Chill," he writes, "was composed of two Little Chills, the biggest five month drop ever (February to June 2016) and the fourth biggest (February to June 2017). A similar event from February to June 2018 would bring global average temperatures below the 1980s average."

Isn't this just the sort of man-bites-dog story that the mainstream media always says is newsworthy?

In this case, it didn't warrant any news coverage.

In fact, in the three weeks since Real Clear Markets ran Brown's story, no other news outlet picked up on it. They did, however, find time to report on such things as tourism's impact on climate change, how global warming will generate more hurricanes this year, and threaten fish habitats, and make islands uninhabitable. They wrote about a UN official saying that "our window of time for addressing climate change is closing very quickly."

Reporters even found time to cover a group that says they want to carve President Trump's face into a glacier to prove climate change "is happening."

In other words, the mainstream news covered stories that repeated what climate change advocates have been saying ad nauseam for decades.

Of course the media are not going to cover stories like these - they do not fit the narrative and as everyone knows, you have to protect the narrative. Pesky numbers be damned.

Back home again - no tacos

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My favorite Mexican restaurant took an extra day off so I had pasta for dinner instead. Oh well...

Surf for a little bit and then an early bedtime - screwed up my sleep schedule by overdoing it with the turkey yesterday. Want to get back on track. There are so few daylight hours these days, I want to make the best use of each and every one of them.

Pro Publica is an excellent consumer watchdog site. They are taking a look at Healthcare in the United States and not liking what they find. There have been a lot of revelations regarding the FAANG corporations harvesting consumer data and using it to place targeted advertising and also selling this data to other companies. Looks like the medical business is just as involved. (FAANG - Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google)

They have a couple of articles so I will link to them with clickable headlines - not surprised but really not happy:

More at the site - this is totally legal but it is really morally wrong and unethical.
Big tip 'o the hat to Bayou Renaissance Man for the link -  a great find.

Back home - long day

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Since I was in the area, I stopped at a couple stores to see what "Black Friday" deals they were offering. Harbor Freight had some nice pricing on welding sticks and gloves - picked up some of each. Their gloves are actually pretty decent for the price - you need very flexible leather so you can feel what is going on. You also need to have the seams very carefully sewn with a strip of leather covering the holes. Welding creates a LOT of ultra violet light and it does not do well to give your hands a bad sunburn.

I remember this very well as a friend of mine and I went in on a small MIG welder 20 years ago. I wear open shoes and at that time was exclusively wearing TEVA's. I didn't have a suitable surface to work on (didn't want to scorch my wood workbenches) so spent the afternoon hunkered down on my haunches creating pieces of scrap metal from pieces of scrap metal and having a wonderful time. Next morning, the tops of my feet were bright red. They blistered. I learned my lesson.

Went to WalMart to get a box fan and some groceries. The guy in front of me was planning to buy a toaster but he had the shelf model in his cart, not a boxed unit for sale. The display unit had no power cord and had the plastic shelf talker glued to its bottom. He was in his 30-40's and didn't seem impaired but sheesh.

Heading out for tacos and then back home to surf. Farm sometime tomorrow.

Slept in late today

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Normally wake up around 8AM or so. The dogs kept bugging me - when on the island I sleep on an air mattress on the floor so they nuzzle my head or my hand. Finally woke up and saw that it was 10AM - slept in for two hours. All that turkey.

Staying down here for the day running some errands, doing paperwork and paying bills and back to the farm tomorrow. Coffee and post office first.

Time for YouTube

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Switched to my jammies and opening a bottle of red wine. House is nice and warm from the earlier fire so feeling very comfortable and slightly drowsy. Nothing really of interest in the internet. Slow news day as they say...

An interesting discovery - tea

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Tea has a lot of chemicals that are beneficial to us humans. Unfortunately, the process of decaffeinating the tea also removes a lot of those chemicals so although you do not get the jitters, you do not get the health benefits when drinking decaffeinated tea.

Which brings us to this interesting paper at the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry:

Hongyacha, a Naturally Caffeine-Free Tea Plant from Fujian, China
Hongyacha (HYC) is a type of new wild tea plant discovered in Fujian Province, China. This tea is helpful to the healing or prevention of disease in its original growing area. However, research on this tea is limited. Our results showed that HYC displayed obvious differences in its morphological characteristics compared with Cocoa tea (Camellia ptilophylla Chang), a famous caffeine-free tea plant in China. Theobromine and trans-catechins, but not caffeine and cis-catechins, were the dominant purine alkaloids and catechins detected in HYC. HYC might contain abundant gallocatechin-(4 → 8)-gallocatechin gallate, 1,3,4,6-tetra-O-galloyl-β-d-glucopyranose, and (−)-gallocatechin-3,5-di-O-gallate, which were not detected in regular tea. We also found that the TCS1 of HYC was distinct, and the responding recombinant protein exhibited only theobromine synthase activity. The obtained results showed that HYC is a new kind of caffeine-free tea plant and may be used for scientific protection and efficient utilization in the future.

And I bet that they are working on sequencing the genome, finding what makes it caffeine free and doing a bit of CRISPR with conventional tea plants.

Back home from dinner

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Got to the casino around 5PM and was told that there was a 90 minute wait. Got a text on my phone 60 minutes later so that wasn't bad. Have a good book so parked myself in the bar and nursed a pint of lager.

Dinner was really good. The turkey was a bit overcooked but in a commercial kitchen, you tend towards safety and make sure that the poultry is well above 165°F. It was nicely seasoned and they brined it first. Went through the buffet line three times so feeling quite stuffed - literally. Roast beef (one slice), six slices of turkey, lots of cranberry (fresh made) sauce, a nice sage dressing, some oven roasted brussels sprouts and a little bit of mashed potatoes and gravy. Dessert was hot apple crisp with soft-serve vanilla ice cream and hot caramel sauce. Happy camper.

Feeling a bit drowsy so surf for a bit and then YouTube and bed.

Book? Been reading the Nathaniel Drinkwater series by Richard Woodman - I am on book 4 and there are 14 in the series. They are set in the British Royal Navy of the late 1790's and cover the advancement of Nathaniel Drinkwater from Midshipman to Lieutennant and his advancement. Historical fiction so the major characters, ships and events actually happened. Not as good as Patrick O'Brien but nothing could be as good as him.

Just gorgeous - Prairie Wind

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Prairie Wind | 16K HDR Film from Martin Lisius on Vimeo.

More at Vimeo:

Prairie Wind | 16K HDR Film
Imagine standing on a grassy hill overlooking the prairie in western Nebraska. It’s early summer and you are surrounded by yellow fields of Goldenrod, and whipped by a warm wind from the east. A storm approaches from the west. It’s getting bigger and darker. Soon, the sky above you is filled with swirling black clouds and you are lifted upward, light as a feather, tossed by the storm.

I’m fortunate to have grown up on the Great Plains of America where I can touch the sky often. A storm there can transform you. It’s a conduit to God, an interaction with Wakinyan, the Lakota thunder spirit. While you are part of the storm, the bonds of earth are lifted, and you are free.

Finding new ways to convey this experience to others is important to me. In early 2018, I embarked on a mission to capture storms on the highest resolution motion picture format I could reasonably acquire, which for me was 16K (15,985 x 5792 pixels). It didn’t actually exist, so I had to create it. After much testing, I decided on using two 50MP cameras fixed to a custom-made calibrated mount. It was a daunting task, but I was able to make it work.

When you watch this short film, you will see just one, large, beautiful picture. But, you are actually watching two carefully stitched images. If you swear it’s just one image, then I have succeeded.

Please like, share and comment if you enjoy the film.

Simply gorgeous work - be sure to go to the Vimeo website to see it in its full glory.

Getting ready to head out for dinner

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Last load is in the dryer, fire has the house nice and warm and it is raining pretty heavily now. Forecast to keep going until around 3AM or so.

Out for dinner in about an hour. I ordered some wire baskets to organize my deep freeze - they came in so will do that tomorrow. Got a half a cow in there so it will be nice to be able to segregate the meat by cut. Organized OK now but wasting a lot of space.

From Bloomberg:

Texas Is About to Create OPEC's Worst Nightmare
The map lays out OPEC’s nightmare in graphic form.

An infestation of dots, thousands of them, represent oil wells in the Permian basin of West Texas and a slice of New Mexico. In less than a decade, U.S. companies have drilled 114,000. Many of them would turn a profit even with crude prices as low as $30 a barrel.

OPEC’s bad dream only deepens next year, when Permian producers expect to iron out distribution snags that will add three pipelines and as much as 2 million barrels of oil a day.

“The Permian will continue to grow and OPEC needs to learn to live with it,’’ said Mike Loya, the top executive in the Americas for Vitol Group, the world’s largest independent oil-trading house.

There is more at the site - the two maps show four pipelines opening in 2019 with an estimated delivery from 2,085,000 to 2,670,000 barrels/day with three more pipelines coming online in 2020 with an estimated delivery of more than 2,000,000.

This chart is very telling - plus, it makes me smile. The more energy independent we are, the better for our Nation.

20181122-oil.jpg

Aaaaand - it is raining

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Pouring down - heavy but not in the buckets catagory. Got a fire going, doing laundry and cleaning the house.

Grace is blowing her coat so there are epic tufts of hair everywhere. Thank you Mr. James Murray Spangler (invented the first vacuum cleaner out of which grew the Shop Vac).

The United Nations is a bunch of corrupt bureaucrats. Take it's environment chief, Erik Solheim for example. From The Guardian:

UN environment chief resigns after frequent flying revelations
The UN’s environment chief, Erik Solheim, has resigned following severe criticism of his global travels and internal rule-breaking which led some nations to withhold their funding.

The Guardian understands Solheim was asked to resign by the UN secretary general, António Guterres. Sources at the UN Environment Programme (Unep) said that countries unhappy with Solheim’s conduct were holding back tens of millions of dollars, threatening a financial crisis at the body.

A draft internal UN audit leaked to the Guardian in September found Solheim had spent almost $500,000 (£390,000) on air travel and hotels in just 22 months, and was away 80% of the time. The audit said this was a “reputation risk” for an organisation dedicated to fighting climate change.

A UN staff union leader called some of the revelations “mind-blowing” and a prominent climate scientist accused Solheim of “obscene CO2 hypocrisy”.

I ranted about the corrupt climate scientists at the end of my post on Brazil yesterday. This just underscores what I was saying. Self perpetuating and zero accountability. We have about 200 years of very accurate climate data (ships record weather conditions / sea temperature several times/day). You put this climate data into their computer models and the results have no bearing on what is happening outside now. The (in)famous hockey stick of M. Mann  was based on a model so flawed that you can put in statistically random numbers and the output will be a hockey stick.

A Thanksgiving two-fer

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First from A.F. Branco at Legal Insurrection, second found on the web - no attribution.

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20181122-quiet.jpg

Interesting find in Jerusalem

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From The Times of Israel:

Straight from the Bible: Tiny First Temple stone weight unearthed in Jerusalem
An extremely rare, minuscule biblical stone weight inscribed in ancient Hebrew script with the word “beka” was discovered in rubble taken from excavations at the foundations of the Western Wall.

Only a handful of similar stone beka weights have been unearthed in Jerusalem, said archaeologist Eli Shukron, who directed the excavations on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority. He told The Times of Israel that none had previously been found with this exact inscription.

The “beka,” a First Temple-period weight measure used by pilgrims paying their half-shekel tax before ascending to the Temple Mount, was recently discovered by a volunteer in the City of David’s wet sifting project in Jerusalem’s Emek Tzurim National Park.

Talk about an historical find - mentioned in the Bible too: Exodus 38:26

“A bekah for every man, that is, half a shekel, after the shekel of the sanctuary, for every one that went to be numbered, from twenty years old and upward, for six hundred thousand and three thousand and five hundred and fifty men.”

The location of the find is important too - from archaeologist Eli Shukron:

What is key to Shukron is the location of the find: right next to King Solomon’s Temple.

“This is a word that is used both inside and outside of the Bible. You don’t need to ask too many questions, just open the Bible and see it. It’s very simple. You can see beka written in the Bible and what it was used for, and there you have it,” he said.

20181122-beka.jpg

How easy it would have been to overlook this little pebble. Wonderful link to 2,000+ year old history.

On the island - no rain so far

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Arrived on Camano after dropping a load at the condo. Was raining up there but don't see anything here. Heavy overcast but that is it.

Cleaning the garage, doing laundry and general pottering around - heading out for dinner around 4:30 or so.

Out for coffee and Bellingham

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Packed up and ready to roll.

And it is off to YouTube for the night

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Want to get an early start tomorrow - packing, coffee, Bellingham and then down to the Island. Having T-Day dinner at a local casino - they do really decent food and are having a special Thanksgiving buffet tomorrow. Eat all the turkey and cranberry sauce I want and not have to clean up after: WIN/WIN

I love it - Brazil

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Now that would be a fun place to visit now that they have a sane government in power. From Watts Up With That:

New Brazilian Foreign Minister: Climate Change is a Plot by Cultural Marxists
The new right wing Brazilian government is demonstrating they have no fear of shooting green leftist sacred cows.

Brazil’s new foreign minister believes climate change is a Marxist plot
Ernesto Araújo has called climate science ‘dogma’ and bemoaned the ‘criminalisation’ of red meat, oil and heterosexual sex

Jonathan Watts Global environment editor
Fri 16 Nov 2018 04.13 AEDT

Brazil’s president-elect Jair Bolsonaro has chosen a new foreign minister who believes climate change is part of a plot by “cultural Marxists” to stifle western economies and promote the growth of China.

Ernesto Araújo – until recently a mid-ranking official who blogs about the “criminalisation” of red meat, oil and heterosexual sex – will become the top diplomat of South America’s biggest nation, representing 200 million people and the greatest and most biodiverse forest on Earth, the Amazon.

His appointment, confirmed by Bolsonaro on Wednesday, is likely to send a chill through the global climate movement.

Emphasis mine - no sh*t sherlock. I love it - someone who calls a spade a spade.

Yes, we have been going through a modern warming period that started around 1970 but we are coming out of it and entering what could be a significant 300+ year cooling period. This is serious and all these morons are doing is flying around to various luxury locations to have conferences where they do a massive circle-jerk and confirm each others false computer models. These models fail to coorelate with the measured data, they cannot forecast, they cannot hindcast. They are useless.

More guns - less crime

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Great article using numbers collected by the FBI regarding armed citizens at the scene of active shootings - from Concealed Carry:

Armed Citizens Are Successful 94% Of The Time At Active Shooter Events [FBI]
After seeing John Lott from the Crime Prevention Research Center publish a rebuttal to a recent FBI report on Active Shooter events I decided to dive deeper into the data and do some analysis of my own. WARNING, this is a long article/report with a lot of images but I am confident it is worth your time!

The Original FBI Data Source
The FBI has published 3 reports that collectively detail active shooter events from 2000-2017. The first report covered events from 2000 to 2013, the second covered 2014-2015, and the third and most recent covered 2016-2017.

It is important to note that the FBI has no specific system in place for finding and cataloging active shooter events. They manually search for and include them in their reports the same way anyone else might Google it which of course means there is room for error particularly in missing events that should have been included.

The FBI definition of an Active Shooter event is: “One or more individuals actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area.”

It is a long article. The author - Jacob Paulsen - is being very careful to dot his i's and cross his t's. Here is a distillation of the FBI data:

20181121-carry.jpg

18.2+75.8 = 94%
Jacob also looks at the numbers for gun free zones as opposed to guns allowed. Given a shooting incident with eight or more fatalities, these shootings occurred 77.8% in gun free zones and 16.7% in gun allowed zones with the 5.6% not having data.

Armed (and trained) citizens make the whole population much safer and gun free zones are almost five times more dangerous than zones where citizens are allowed to be armed.

The a**hole who shot up the Colorado movie theater in 2012 specifically went to that theater because it was gun free. He did not go to another theater showing the same movie closer to his house because that theater allowed armed citizens to attend.

Defending the border

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Looks like we are not blinking - from Military Times:

White House approves use of force, some law enforcement roles for border troops
The White House late Tuesday signed a memo allowing troops stationed at the border to engage in some law enforcement roles and use lethal force, if necessary — a move that legal experts have cautioned may run afoul of the Posse Comitatus Act.

The new “Cabinet order” was signed by White House Chief of Staff John Kelly, not President Donald Trump. It allows “Department of Defense military personnel” to “perform those military protective activities that the Secretary of Defense determines are reasonably necessary” to protect border agents, including “a show or use of force (including lethal force, where necessary), crowd control, temporary detention. and cursory search.”

Good - if we do not do a show of force, these people will continue to come and come and come. It is not just this one convoy, I am sure that there are a lot more being planned and funded at this time. Time to let them know that we welcome legal immigration but will not countenance an illegal crossing of the border.

Insider trading? George Soros

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He may be a manipulative sociopath but he knows the markets - wonder if he had insider information? From Barrons:

George Soros Sold Facebook, Netflix, and Goldman Stock Just Before They Tumbled
Billionaire investor and liberal activist George Soros has been known for investing moves that have succeeded wildly —and also for ones gone horribly wrong.

Chalk up three recent moves in his win column.

Soros Fund Management, which Soros founded and chairs, exited social-network giant Facebook (FB) completely in the third quarter, while also slashing positions in Netflix stock (NFLX) and Goldman Sachs Group stock (GS). Those three stocks have tumbled in the fourth quarter so far, with Facebook and Goldman setting new lows Tuesday. They are down almost 20% and 15%, respectively, so far this quarter. Highflying streaming-content giant Netflix has tumbled almost 29% since the end of September.

Soros saved a chunk of cash by selling: Barron’s estimates that, had he maintained positions in those stocks, he would have unrealized losses of about $17.7 million so far in the fourth quarter.

Everyone knew that these prices were a giant bubble but the popping sure surprised a lot of them.

Interesting times for the Clintons

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Great post from Don Surber:

Left dumps Clinton for Paula Jones
Forget sex is private.

Forget everyone lies about sex.

America's left is purging itself of the House of Clinton, and embracing Paula Jones 20 years after the fact.

Great story - it is the 20th anniversary of Bill Clinton's impeachment. Don closes with this observation:

Bill and Hill stayed on the stage too long. Other presidents usually serve and go home. Jimmy Carter busied himself with a worthy charity building houses for the poor. Say what you want, but the man walked the talk.

But for 16 years, Hillary stayed on stage in DC.

The penalty for not going away is severe.

Let that be a warning to the House of Obama.

Very true - a lot of post-Obama fatigue building out there. His 'legacy' is being dismantled and ridiculed but he still tries to stay in the public eye.

Back

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Heading out to pack some more and then get a bite to eat.

Coffee, store and then farm

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Working at the farm today and tomorrow - packing totes and bringing them to Bellingham for the sale.

Looking forward to this - National Weather Service:

Winter Storm Watch
URGENT - WINTER WEATHER MESSAGE
National Weather Service Seattle WA
923 AM PST Wed Nov 21 2018

...WINTER STORM WATCH IN EFFECT FROM THURSDAY MORNING THROUGH FRIDAY EVENING ABOVE 3000 FEET...

* WHAT...Heavy snow possible above 3000 feet. Total snow accumulations 8 to 16 inches, with over 2 feet possible near mountain summits. A trace to 6 inches of snow will be possible above 2500 feet by Friday evening.

* WHERE...Cascade mountains and valleys above 3000 feet from Mount Rainier to the Canada border. This includes Snoqualmie Pass (I-90), Stevens Pass (US-2), White Pass (US-12), Washington Pass (SR-20), Mount Baker Ski Area, Crystal Mountain Ski Area, and Paradise on Mount Rainier.

* WHEN...From Thursday morning through Friday evening. The heaviest snowfall is expected Thursday evening through Thursday night with snowfall rates up to 1 inch per hour. Snow showers, some potentially heavy, will persist through Friday.

Maybe an early opening for Mt. Baker? That would be wonderful.

Wonderful news - from The Hill:

House GOP to hold hearing into DOJ’s probe of Clinton Foundation
Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) said Tuesday that House Republicans plan to hear testimony on Dec. 5 from the prosecutor appointed by former Attorney General Jeff Sessions to probe alleged wrongdoing by the Clinton Foundation.

Meadows, who is chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Subcommittee on Government Operations, told Hill.TV’s “Rising” that it’s time to “circle back” to U.S. Attorney John Huber’s investigation with the Justice Department into whether the Clinton Foundation engaged any improper activities.

“Mr. Huber with the Department of Justice and FBI has been having an investigation — at least part of his task was to look at the Clinton Foundation and what may or may not have happened as it relates to improper activity with that charitable foundation, so we’ve set a hearing date for December the 5th,” he told Hill.TV during an interview on Wednesday.

Meadows, who is also the chairman of the conservative House Freedom Caucus, said the committee plans to delve into a number of Republicans concerns surrounding the foundation, including whether any tax-exempt proceeds were used for personal gain and whether the foundation complied with IRS laws.

Time to light a fire under the FBI and get them moving. See what the Clinton's have been doing and nail them for it. Their foundation was just a pay for play scam and not a charitable institution.

Yikes - no Romaine for you

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From the Centers for Disease Control:

CDC is advising that U.S. consumers not eat any romaine lettuce, and retailers and restaurants not serve or sell any, until we learn more about the outbreak. This investigation is ongoing and the advice will be updated as more information is available.

    • Consumers who have any type of romaine lettuce in their home should not eat it and should throw it away, even if some of it was eaten and no one has gotten sick.
      • This advice includes all types or uses of romaine lettuce, such as whole heads of romaine, hearts of romaine, and bags and boxes of precut lettuce and salad mixes that contain romaine, including baby romaine, spring mix, and Caesar salad.
      • If you do not know if the lettuce is romaine or whether a salad mix contains romaine, do not eat it and throw it away.
      • Wash and sanitize drawers or shelves in refrigerators where romaine was stored. Follow these five steps to clean your refrigerator.
    • Restaurants and retailers should not serve or sell any romaine lettuce, including salads and salad mixes containing romaine.
    • Take action if you have symptoms of an E. coli infection:
      • Talk to your healthcare provider.
      • Write down what you ate in the week before you started to get sick.
      • Report your illness to the health department.
      • Assist public health investigators by answering questions about your illness.

Place I was at this evening was using spinach for their salads. Nobody seemed to mind.

Heh - Acosta

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Spot on:

@FARM

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Ran some errands in Bellingham, got a bite to eat and then stopped for two pints of cider on the way out. Ran into some friends so spent some time catching up. At the farm for two days and then condo and island for Thanksgiving. A local (island) casino has pretty decent food and they are doing a Thanksgiving buffet so planning on gorging on tryptophans there.

Surf for a bit and then to bed - air temp is 33°F and there is a skim of ice on the stock tanks - time to dig out the heaters and get them plugged in tomorrow...

Off to the dump and then to the farm

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Done with lunch - heading out to the dump and then up to the farm. Passing through Bellingham on this trip.

Looks like Governor Brown of California agreed with President Trump on the problem of poor management of California's forests. From the Santa Cruz Sentinel of August 31st, 2018:

Gov. Jerry Brown proposes easing logging rules to thin forests
Faced with the worst summer fire season in 10 years, Gov. Jerry Brown is proposing broad new changes to California’s logging rules that would allow landowners to cut larger trees and build temporary roads without obtaining a permit as a way to thin more forests across the state.

The proposal — which has the support of the timber industry but is being opposed by more than a dozen environmental groups — would represent one of the largest changes to the state’s timber harvesting rules in the past 45 years.

The legislative session ends for the year next Friday. On Thursday, the details were still being negotiated by legislative leaders and the governor’s office behind the scenes and had not yet been formally introduced in a bill or put up for a vote.

“They are trying to get to some kind of a deal,” said Rich Gordon, the president of the California Forestry Association, a timber industry group. “They are looking at what can get done politically.”

If he was doing this as recently as last August, why did he hammer President Trump when Trump said the cause was poor forest management? He could have pointed to this legislation and say - I knew and I was trying.  A perfect out. But no, Brown had to play the Global Warming card and say that President Trump didn't know what he was talking about.

The Camp Fire started on November 8th - this news article is from eight days prior.

This is my surprised face - Chicken Pox

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From FOX News:

Chickenpox outbreak at North Carolina school with high anti-vaccination rate leaves dozens sick
At least 36 students at a North Carolina school with a heavy anti-vaccine population have been sickened following an outbreak of the chickenpox virus, health officials said.

The outbreak, formally known as varicella, hit Asheville Waldorf School in Ashville, according to a news release from Buncombe County Health & Human Services.

That can lead to Shingles later in life. How widespread is the anti-vax lunacy?

Of the school's 152 students, 110 have not received the chickenpox vaccine, the news outlet reported.

Yikes - do not forget that the initial study linking the MMR vaccine and autism was published in the British medical journal Lancet. It was subsequently retracted and the author had his medical degree stripped away for fraud. From a purely numbers standpoint, his sample size was only 12 children - pathetic size for any statistical calculation. No connection, no correlation. Pure bunkum.

A long but fascinating read - cults

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From Stella Morabito writing at The Federalist:

How To Recognize The Cult Mindset In Yourself And Others
“How many more Jonestowns and Wacos will have to occur before we realize how vulnerable all humans are to influence?” That is the key question of cult expert Margaret Thaler Singer’s excellent book, “Cults in our Midst.” Her work serves to prevent the tragedy of people being psychologically manipulated into blind obedience that harms and even kills. It should be required reading for everybody, because too many people are ill-prepared to resist undue influence and coercive persuasion.

In my retrospective of the Jonestown Massacre, I noted that Americans don’t seem to have seriously contemplated the harsh reality and consequences of coercive thought reform. It can easily destroy lives and rob people of the capacity for independent thought if we are not vigilant about how it works. Yet many are loath to admit that brainwashing is an actual reality to which we are all vulnerable.

A bit more - Stella gets in to the heart of her thesis:

The Cult of Political Correctness
Consider for a moment today’s culture, which is saturated with the constant agitation of political correctness. It rarely allows for any real discussion or debate without automatic vilification of those deemed politically incorrect. Sadly, this is especially true in the very place where there is a tradition of people expecting to engage in real debate: the college campus.

We can’t deny that political correctness has a lot of disruptive effects on discourse, such as inducing self-censorship that can cause us to feel socially and mentally isolated; manipulation of our basic fear of ostracism through the threat of smears; promotion of mob rule; and an authoritarian nature that promotes the power elites who use it.

Wait, those features are all rather cult-like, no? This acceptance of the anti-thought nature of political correctness is pretty much everywhere: 95 percent of the mass media promote it, 95 percent of celebrity culture promotes it, and obviously, on college campuses, the academics are 95 percent in compliance with political correctness.

You can’t deny that cult-like tribunals against “wrongthink” are pretty much everywhere––in the media, in celebrity culture, in our legislatures, among judges, in human resource departments all over the corporate world, and most obviously, on college campuses, where youth are scared to death of being ostracized for expressing a politically incorrect thought.

Consider also how many Americans mindlessly parrot the perceived popular opinion along with its empty talking points that are never up for debate. In fact, there’s very little debate happening today. When real debate happens, it gets shouted down or pushed into a corner of the internet dubbed the “intellectual dark web.” Increasingly, our minds seem to be operating in a dangerous state of isolation, especially with increasing censorship and control over our conversations by mass media and tech titans. How is such constant censorship not cult-like?

A long read but well worth your time - a lot to think about given today's culture and times.

Never been politically correct. I can shut my mouth and do when needed but I refuse to buy into the groupthink that passes for intellegent discourse these days. People these days are slaves living on the progressive plantation. They think what their masters tell them to think, they say what their masters tell them to say, they do what their masters tell them to do. We will have an awakening at some point in the future and it will be a lot of fun to see. I think that the coming cycle of global cooling will be a wonderful wake-up clarion.

Just wonderful - the caravan

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Just what we need here, an activist Judge who ignores our Constitution - from The Washington Times:

Judge blocks Trump asylum changes: Caravan can demand protections even after illegal entry
A federal judge blocked President Trump’s new asylum crackdown policy early Tuesday, ruling that federal law allows anyone — including illegal immigrants who jumped the border — to demand protections once they reach U.S. soil.

The decision is a major dent to the administration’s efforts to derail the migrant caravan camped out on the U.S.-Mexico border, undercutting Homeland Security’s efforts to funnel those people to the legal border crossings.

Under U.S. District Judge Jon S. Tigar’s ruling, they can demand asylum no matter how they enter, and even if they don’t have a real claim, which the administration fears will restore the enticement to attempt to sneak in.

Let's check InfoGalactic - Jon S. Tigar:

Federal judicial service
On June 11, 2012, President Obama nominated Tigar to be a judge on the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, taking the seat vacated by Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong, who took senior status on March 23, 2012.

Thought so. Of course, this ruling will be overturned by a higher court. Justice Tigar is just virtue signalling but this will take time and right now, we need to move quickly to stem the flood. Besides, the Judicial branch of the government has no say over matters of national security.

What a narcissist - President Obama

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This is unbelievable - from Breitbart:

Obama Suggests Trump Has ‘Racism’ and ‘Mommy Issues’
Former President Obama suggested that President Trump is not solving the world’s problems because he has “racism” and “mommy issues.”

Obama, who famously wrote an entire autobiography called Dreams from My Father as a means to work through his lifelong daddy issues, is certain we can solve all the world’s problems — “climate change, education, agriculture and so on” — quite easily because they are “not nearly as complicated as they are made out to be.”

A bit more:

The Daily Mail first reported the former president’s remarks from the Obama Foundation in Chicago on Monday and added that there was another dig at Trump:

And in another dig at Trump on Monday, Obama suggested the US was a better place before he was sworn into office.

In a conversation with author Dave Eggers, Obama also repeated his belief that if you could choose a time and place to be born, you would choose the US.

But he amended that thought and said: “You’d choose now – or maybe two years ago.”

There is no record of Eggers asking Obama why it would be so easy to fix the world and not the former president’s hometown of Chicago, where Obama spent more than a decade working as a community activist and legislator. Democrats have enjoyed unrivaled control of that city for decades. It is a place where nothing is stopping them from realizing their political goals, and, as a result, Chicago is a nearly bankrupt war zone.

Clueless and out of touch. Jimmy Carter is really happy now - Obama kicked him out of the running for the worst president.

Another day in paradise

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Heading out for coffee, post office, dump run and then up to the farm.

Frost on the ground but not as hard as before and the sky is overcast - got some weather moving in.

Looks like the stock market is making an overdue correction - four headlines this morning - clickable links to the stories:

It's called a bubble. These form, grow beyond sustainability and pop spectacularly. Nothing new.

John McAfee sums it up with this wonderful tweet:

Over to YouTube

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Heading over for 45 minutes of video or so - see what has been posted today. Been watching welding stuff, ham radio and other electronics and some music (how to, not MTV).

Go Spartans!

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The high school students here are known as the Spartans. From the Stanwood Camano News:

Spartans claim state FFA tractor driving title
Three Spartans teamed up to win the state FFA tractor driving competition Thursday, Nov. 15, at the Columbia Basin Technical Skill Center in Moses Lake.

Chris Whisman, Shawn Moyer and Jordan Koster placed first out of 44 teams from around the state. Individually, Koster finished third, Whisman took sixth and Moyer took ninth. FFA Advisor Darryl Main was their coach.

Participants completed an exam that tests their knowledge of tractor safety and operation, navigated their vehicle and trailer through an obstacle course, and participated in a team activity that challenges their problem-solving skills.

Very cool. That is the one thing I will miss when I sell the farm this spring and move down here permanently. Buttercup the Tractor. It is impossible to feel down when driving a tractor. There is an old adage that you never see a Harley parked at a psychiatrist's office. You can say the same for a tractor. Puts a smile on my face...

Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez demonstrates her understanding of the structure of our Federal Government in this short video from a conference call:

The three BRANCHES are Legislative, Executive and Judicial - quite a fundamental error on her part.

President Trump - prison reform

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Good stuff - from FOX News:

Trump backs sentencing reform bill he says will give ex-inmates 'a second chance at life'
President Trump threw his support behind a bipartisan bill to reform federal sentencing guidelines Wednesday, which he said would "reduce crime while giving our fellow citizens a chance at redemption."

"We’re all better off when former inmates can receive and re-enter society as law-abiding, productive citizens," Trump said in brief remarks in the Roosevelt Room of the White House. "And thanks to our booming economy, they now have a chance at more opportunities than they’ve ever had before."

The so-called First Step Act, the first major rewrite of the nation's criminal justice sentencing laws in a generation, will boost rehabilitation efforts for federal prisoners and give judges more discretion when sentencing nonviolent offenders, particularly for drug offenses. In particular, the bill lowers the mandatory minimum sentence for non-violent repeat drug offenders from 25 to 20 years, reduces mandatory minimums for other crimes from 20 to 15 years, and makes no distinction between powder cocaine and crack cocaine.

Good - the draconian sentences do nothing to deter criminal activity. The conditions that promote criminal activity need to be addressed first. Also, an interesting bit of history:

The Senate package overhauls some of the mandatory sentencing guidelines that have been in place since 1994 legislation approved by Congress and signed into law by then-President Bill Clinton. Trump made a point of mentioning that fact in his remarks Wednesday, adding that the Clinton-era guidelines "disproportionately hurt the African-American community." He also noted that several law enforcement organizations supported the effort, saying: "In many respects, we’re getting very much tougher on the truly bad criminals, which, unfortunately, there are many. But we’re treating people differently for different crimes."

There is not a one-size-fits-all way to deal with criminality. President Clinton's law tried to do this and failed.

The fires themselves are being gradually contained and there is heavy rain forecast for later this week but the shelters just got really nasty really fast - from the Butte County, CA website:

Norovirus/Gastrointestinal Illness in Butte County Shelters
The Butte County Public Health Department has been using public health measures to stop a gastrointestinal illness (GI) outbreak in all monitored shelters. Since the shelters opened to house Camp Fire evacuees, 145 people have been sick with vomiting and/or diarrhea. As of Wednesday evening, there were 41 people experiencing symptoms at the following shelters:

    • Neighborhood Church: 179 total evacuees at the shelter, 21 currently experiencing illness
    • Oroville Nazarene Church: 352 total evacuees at the shelter, 10 currently experiencing illness
    • Butte County Fairgrounds: 142 total evacuees at the shelter, 9 currently experiencing illness
    • East Avenue Church: 200 total evacuees at the shelter, 1 currently experiencing illness

The number of sick people is increasing every day. Twenty-five people have been to the hospital for medical support. Staff serving the shelters have also been sick. The outbreak has been identified and confirmed by the Butte County public health laboratory to be the Norovirus which is highly contagious. Norovirus spreads through touching surfaces contaminated with the virus, close contact with someone who is infected, or eating contaminated food or drink.

You do not want to catch this disease - it passes within 48 hours or so but you are squirting from both ends and feeling pummeled all during that time. It hurts and in the confines of a contained population, it can spread like wildfire. Outbreaks are common on cruise ships.

Needless to say, prayers are going out to these poor people.

Looks like California's senators are trying to get their own judges appointed. From The Washington Times:

Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris push White House for deal on judicial nominees
Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris, both members of the Judiciary Committee, called on the White House Monday to make a deal to fill court vacancies.

The two California senators asked Pat Cipollone, tapped to be the acting White House counsel in October, to broker a deal over three 9th Circuit Court of Appeals positions.

“While we continue to oppose the slate of nominees the White House put forward on October 10, we remain hopeful that you will work with us to reach a bipartisan agreement in a timely manner,” they wrote.

They offered accepting Judge James Rogan, a Trump pick, as long as their choice — Judge Lucy Koh — is also confirmed. They also proposed that each party select a nominee from the other’s list to confirm.

'Scuse me but that is not constitutional. It is the job of the President to nominate a person for a Judicial post and the Senate votes to confirm by a simple majority. That is the way it is done.  The 9th Circuit Court is the most liberal and has had quite the history of having their judgments overturned by a subsequent Supreme Court hearing (over 75%). President Trump is trying to appoint Justices who will follow the letter of the law and the liberals are running around with their hair on fire.

Jim Acosta smackdown

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Sarah Sanders is a national treasure - from Breitbart:

Sarah Sanders Outlines Conduct Rules for White House Reporters
White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders outlined new rules for White House reporters, after restoring CNN reporter Jim Acosta’s press pass on Monday.

“We have created these rules with a degree of regret,” Sanders said in a statement.

She lamented that Acosta’s behavior at the president’s most recent press conference and subsequent lawsuit required the White House to set standards for conduct in place.

“We would have greatly preferred to continue hosting White House press conferences in reliance on a set of understood professional norms, and we believe the overwhelming majority of journalists covering the White House share that preference,” she said. “But, given the position taken by CNN, we now feel obligated to replace previously shared practices with explicit rules.”

Sanders warned that if journalists continued to flout common decency at the White House, more rules would be created.

I love her smackdown - letting Acosta know that he spoilt it for everyone.

The rules in question:

(1) A journalist called upon to ask a question will ask a single question and then will yield the floor to other journalists;

(2) At the discretion of the President or other White House official taking questions, a follow-up question or questions may be permitted; and where a follow up has been allowed and asked, the questioner will then yield the floor;

(3) “Yielding the floor” includes, when applicable, physically surrendering the microphone to White House staff for use by the next questioner;

(4) Failure to abide by any of rules (1)-(3) may result in suspension or revocation of the journalist’s hard pass.

Seems perfectly reasonable to me and is what everyone (well, almost everyone) was doing all along.

Cleaned out the Augean driveway

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It was three full barrow loads and a partial fourth - done and stacked. Looks great. Have a fire going and it raised the room temp to 62°F - it is 51°F and falling so the fireplace is nice and efficient for heating the house. Until I get the foundation leveled and repaired, I am holding off on any other infrastructure work so the mini-splits will have to wait for another couple of months. There is a nice electric hydronic heating system but when I ran it on very low setting for a month, I was rewarded with a utility bill of more than $400. Heat pumps are the way to go!

Heading out for a couple of errands, a bite to eat and then back home for the night - driving up to the farm tomorrow after coffee, post office and dump run.

Classical reference in the title: Augean

Back to the farm today tomorrow

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The weather is so gorgeous here that I am spending one more day here - Lord knows I have enough projects to do.

Taking a lunch break (hummus sandwich and diet coke) and finishing off the firewood - about four more wheelbarrow loads to go. Got a nice fire going so the house is warm enough to paint the file cabinet (badly scratched and some rust) The fireplace has a huge masonry structure around it so once that heats up, it will radiate heat for a long long time. The back wall of it is one wall of the bedroom so it will be nice and cozy. That wall has sheetrock on it but tempted to peek behind and see what is there - brick would be gorgeous, cinder block not so much.

Supposed to be quite the storm moving in later this week - Thanksgiving will be a day of wind and rain.

Back to the farm today

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Heading out for coffee, post office and breakfast and then back home to do a couple hours work - trip to the dump, putting the log racks together and stacking the last of the firewood, painting a used filing cabinet I bought the other day and some paperwork.

Heading up to the farm later this afternoon for a couple of days sorting and packing.

And there is nothing on the internet

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YouTube for an hour or two and then an early bedtime. Picked up two more log racks at the farm store in town so spending tomorrow putting them together and finishing off stacking the firewood. Dump run too.

She is gone - from Florida's Sun Sentinal (lots of pop-up advertising):

Brenda Snipes submits resignation as Broward elections supervisor
Just hours after finishing a tumultuous election recount, Broward Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes submitted her resignation, ending a 15-year tenure full of botched elections, legal disputes and blistering criticism.

And a bit more:

Norris-Weeks said she saw an early draft of the letter. In the version she saw, she said Snipes, 75, expressed a desire to spend more time with her family.

Emphasis mine - more like wanting to avoid prosecution. They should charge her anyway - what she did for fair and open elections is detestable. She was taking home about $150K/year for just showing up and being incompetent.

Ding dong...

And off to dinner

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Still have a bunch more firewood to stack - filled up two log racks so swinging by the farm store to get another - keeps the wood off the ground and makes it dry out faster. Looks way better too.

Farm tomorrow...

Another day on the island

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Heading out for coffee and then back home to clean the house, do a dump run and finish the firewood stacking.

Maybe head to the farm today if I get everything else done but probably head out tomorrow afternoon.

Gorgeous weather - clear skies. Hard frost on the ground this morning.

Nothing happening on the internet for now.

And it is YouTube

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Heading up to the farm tomorrow for another round of packing totes and toting them in to Bellingham.

Close-up magic

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I love it. This guy is incredible. Obviously, there secrets at play under the baize but the end result is pretty freaking awesome:

Eric has a YouTube channel - no website that I could find.

Nice work if you can get it

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From the Federal Government job website: FedBizOpps.gov:

Preparation and Distribution of Research Drug Products
The National Institutes of Health (NIH), through the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), seeks capability statements from qualified Small Business organizations (NAICS code 541715, small business size standard is 1000 employees. For details of Small Business Size Standards, see http://www.sba.gov).

This is a SMALL BUSINESS SOURCES SOUGHT NOTICE to determine the availability of ALL small businesses (e.g., 8(a), Veteran-owned small businesses, service-disabled Veteran-owned small businesses, Historically Underutilized Business Zone (HUBZone) small businesses, Small Disadvantaged Businesses (SDB), women-owned small businesses, and other small businesses) to fulfill the needs of NIH and NIDA for this future requirement.

Under the upcoming solicitation, NIDA seeks qualified organizations having capability to analyze and characterize various drugs of abuse including cannabinoids and other research chemicals. Organizations will be able to produce drug dosage forms, such as delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol (delta-9-THC), methadone, morphine, and naltrexone pellets. Furthermore, they will acquire, develop, and produce marijuana and nicotine research cigarettes of varying strengths and specifications and maintain an inventory and supply of various DEA scheduled and unscheduled chemicals and drugs.

Listed in the specifications:

Manufacture standardized marijuana cigarettes within a range of varying concentrations of delta-9-THC and analyze strength and stability of them at various intervals while having the capability to maintain a secure shipping facility and to ship marijuana cigarettes to research investigators.

Heh - get paid by Uncle Sam for rolling joints... No mention of salary or compensation.

From Breitbart:

Broward’s Brenda Snipes Searches Her Office for Over 2,000 ‘Missing’ Ballots
Embattled Broward Elections Supervisor Brenda Snipes is personally overseeing the search within her headquarters here for purportedly missing ballots to account for the 2,040-vote discrepancy in the number of votes cast in her county during the Midterm Elections.

The discrepancy came in the difference of total votes registered from the initial machine count and the results from the machine recount numbers reported earlier today.

Ms. Snipes is either the living embodiment of Hanlon's Razor or highly corrupt - either way, she needs to be removed from her office and if the latter,  jailed.

Hanlon's Razor? From InfoGalactic:

Hanlon's razor is the following aphorism"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity". It recommends a way of eliminating unlikely explanations for a phenomenon (a philosophical razor).

A logistic mistake - the caravan

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I would not want them camped out in my back yard either - from Monica Showalter writing at American Thinker:

That one little thing the caravan organizers got caught flatfooted on...
Pueblo Sin Fronteras, the open-borders group that organized the migrant caravan, has had an easy time of it, racking up propaganda victory after propaganda victory as its group snaked through Mexico.

They put the tiny number of women and children in the group up front for the news cameras with the media obliging them to create the perception that the entire group was just women and children fleeing gangs instead of largely military-aged unemployed young men.

They brazenly waved the Honduran, Guatemalan, Mexican and Salvadoran flags in a bid to signal they aren't looking for 'mercy' from the U.S., they consider entering the U.S. a matter of right as nationals of those countries.

They busted down the gates of Mexico's southern border to signal to the world that Mexico's efforts to enforce its own border are utterly useless.

They kept the group together when there were signs it was splitting apart, the better to retain their power of numbers in order to make demands.

They got the Mexican authorities to feed, house, bed, medicate, and escort them throughout their journey to the U.S. border, signalling their clout over that sovereign nation. And it helped that like revolutionaries swimming among fishes, as Mao used to say, they got the Mexican locals to offer aid as well in the hopes that the group would continue on their way away from them.

The list goes on. Arriving in Tijuana, they hopped the border fence and danced around in plain view of U.S. lawmen, daring them to stop them, presumably through opening fire, and then when they didn't, they racked up another propaganda victory by exposing U.S. powerlessness to stop them. After that, they hopped back into Mexico with no consequences.

There's just one thing they didn't calculate for: The rage of Tijuana's locals, whose anger is growing at the prospect of migrants camping out all over their city streets and neighborhoods, bringing crime, garbage, homeless encampments and disorder. Here's a screengrab from KGTV and you can see the whole confrontation at this link here:

20181117-border.jpg

Tijuana is a pretty orderly and prosperous place in Mexico, much more so than Mexico's impoverished south (where Mexico's government cordially invited the migrants to settle), and the prospect of caravan migrants setting up camps for months in TJ as they await to be processed for their fake asylum claims into the U.S, is bringing about the same reaction you'd expect to see from the Rancho Bernardo or La Jolla areas of San Diego, were the thousands of migrants to set up camp there instead.

Heh - sucks to be you Pueblo Sin Fronteras - you spent everyone's money (Paging Mr. George Soros - Mr. Soros to the White Courtesy Phone please) organizing this caravan but you have no exit strategy. Now, the lives and well being of several thousand people are at risk and the ball is in your court.

Back from dinner

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A plate of tacos. Good food for a cold night. They make their own sauces so especially tasty.

Long day today - no geese though

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Had enough stuff down here to take to the condo so loaded up the van and headed North after coffee and post office. Needed to stop at Hardware Sales so that made for an afternoon. Drove South on I-5 and took the HWY 20 exit to drive into Burlington to get some stuff from the welding store. Took the back roads and traffic was really bad - slow. This was around 2:00PM or so.

Turns out, getting off I-5 was a smart move - from Seattle's KOMO News:

6 hurt in massive 23-vehicle pileup near Mt. Vernon
A massive Saturday morning pileup involving nearly two dozen vehicles injured several people and clogged traffic on I-5 near Mount Vernon.

The crash happened near northbound exit 224, just south of the scene of the fatal shooting that occurred earlier Saturday morning.

Trooper Mark Francis with the Washington State Patrol said 23 vehicles -- including a semi-truck -- were involved in the crash. The investigation is in its early stages, but it appears a semi carrying 80,000 pounds of gravel was heading southbound when it crossed the median and started the pileup.

Bobby Grace and Peter Franssen were sitting in traffic when they saw a semi heading "way too fast" in the southbound lane.

"It was bumper to bumper traffic, and then all the sudden it was like the semi just flew over the whole median and there was dirt everywhere," Grace said. "So much dirt, it was like a sand storm. It was astonishing. I can't believe it happened."

More at the site - glad I got off the freeway when I did. Anyway, to get back on to I-5 I had to go over an overpass and I saw that traffic was flowing freely in both directions so I got on and drove down a couple of exits to Mt. Vernon and got onto Beaver Marsh Road. I was there at the same time as last Thursday when I saw all the Snow Geese but where there were several hundred birds all flying around, there were only about 20 already settled in for the evening. The light was incredible but there were so few birds, I did not even stop to take a still photo.

Stopped at the library to return a book and request a couple more (reading the Nathaniel Drinkwater series) and now home. Heading out for dinner in a few moments.

Nature did throw me a bone - when I went outside into the back yard, there was the cutest family of three otters playing about 15 feet off the shoreline. They were looking at me and the dogs but went back to getting dinner - there is a fairly large shellfish bed off my back porch. Going to have to keep one of my cameras by the back door for such events.

A gorgeous day on the island

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Woke up to a hard frost on the ground and clear blue skies. Looks like I am on for a wild goose chase later today. We start to get good light around 3:00PM which is when the snow geese start to look for nesting spots for the night. Will be driving up to the Skagit River flats with my video camera - should be fun and a nice break from all the moving.

Heading out for coffee and post office now - a trip to the dump is on for today as well as finishing stacking the firewood and building the stand for my belt grinder.

And it's YouTube

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More posting tomorrow...

About that blue wave

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A couple of stories - first from Zero Hedge:

Gillum's Dramatic Decision To Un-Concede Didn't Work Out As He Expected
Florida's Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum may regret his decision to un-concede to his GOP opponent Ron DeSantis, after the final tally netted Gillum just one additional vote

Last week Gillum took his previous concession to DeSantis off the table, announcing "I am replacing my words of concession in an unapologetic call that we count every vote," after DeSantis led by just .41% of the vote, or around 33,600 votes out of more than 8 million votes cast.

"The margin was 0.41 percent out of more than 8 million votes cast, outside the 0.25 percent threshold needed for a manual recount," reports the Sun-Sentinel. The former Tallahassee mayor stopped short of filing a lawsuit to try and force the recount to continue, however despite picking up just one vote - Gillum still hasn't conceded despite what appears to be an insurmountable lead by DeSantis.

And then from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

Abrams ends run for governor against Kemp
Stacey Abrams halted her run for Georgia governor Friday, but the Democrat said she would not concede the contest to Republican Brian Kemp and planned to launch a voting rights group to file “major” litigation challenging election policies.

As state officials prepare to certify the vote, Abrams acknowledged the law “allows no further viable remedy” to extend her quest to be the nation’s first black female governor. But she laced her speech with biting criticism of Kemp, whom she accused of leveraging his role as the state’s top elections official to suppress voters.

“I will not concede,” she added, “because the erosion of our democracy is not right.”

And this (and Broward County) is just a fraction of the bullshit that they will try in 2020.

Again, the Democrats have nothing to run on so they are forced to cheat. We really need to deny them this. Positive Voter ID - you need to show positive photo ID when buying a beer or an airplane ticket, why should voting be any different.

Back from dinner

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Very clear night - very cold. Down to 39° and dropping. Sure to be hard frost on the ground tomorrow morning. Weather Channel has it down to 33°.

Nice and clear tomorrow for the wild goose chase. Driving up to the farm for a few days tomorrow after filming.

Creepy porn lawyer in the news

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Michael Avenatti is not having a very good couple of months. I wrote about his last couple of problems - domestic violence arrest and several judgments against him for over $4.8 million dollars: Creepy porn lawyer arrested for domestic violence

Now, this little bit from the Los Angeles Times:

Judge affirms order evicting Michael Avenatti’s law practice from office in Newport Beach
Michael Avenatti, the lawyer for adult film actress Stormy Daniels, lost a last-ditch appeal Friday to block the eviction of his law practice from its Newport Beach offices.

In a brief hearing at Orange County Superior Court in Santa Ana, Judge Robert J. Moss affirmed his Oct. 22nd order that Avenatti and his staff vacate their ocean-view suite in a building across from the Fashion Island mall. He ordered them to leave by Monday.

Avenatti’s longtime law firm, Eagan Avenatti, skipped $213,254 in rent payments due over four months, leading the landlord, the Irvine Co., to sue for eviction.

After the landlord won the case last month at a one-hour trial that Avenatti skipped, the Orange County Sheriff’s Office posted a notice at the law office ordering the firm to vacate the premises by 6 a.m. on Nov. 1.

Avenatti requested a reprieve that won him a delay until Friday’s hearing, which he also did not attend.

He knew the gravity of what was happening and still blew off the two hearings? What a bozo.
Tip of the hat to Don Surber for the link to this wonderful story.

This is my surprised face - The Caravan

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A filmmaker has embedded with the caravan of supposed refugee families and discovered the truth - from Legal Insurrection:

Filmmaker Ami Horowitz: The Caravan is ‘Highly Organized,’ ‘Paid for by a Number of Organizations’
Filmmaker Ami Horowitz traveled to Mexico and mingled inside the caravan headed to America. He revealed his findings to Tucker Carlson (emphasis mine):

“What we do know is this thing cost millions and millions of dollars. The mainstream media, and there are so many layers [of] onions to peel back, it’s hard to know where to begin. One of the lies the fake news if you will, media is trying to propagate is the fact that all this weird organic thing and all the water and the food and medicine, all dropped from … manna from heaven. It’s bologna. It’s all highly organized. It’s paid for by a number of organizations, we don’t know exactly where the money is coming from.”

A bit more:

The Daily Wire provided a transcript (emphasis mine):

“The caravan is a giant group of people that emanated, for the most part, in Honduras and are heading up to the U.S.,” Horowitz explains. “A lot has been said about this caravan, so I decided to go down, check it out for myself, and figure out what is the reality versus the fiction.”

Horowitz took his crew down to the base camp for the caravan in the southern state of Oaxaca, which he describes as “an area of Mexico which is riddled with narco-crime and cursed with extreme poverty.”

“Despite the framing of the caravan as being full of women and children, the reality on the ground is quite different. Approximately 90 to 95% of the migrants are male,” notes Horowitz, over footage of rows and rows of men.

And:

“There’s a massive logistical effort underway, akin to moving an army,” he explains, over footage of all of the manpower and resources required to keep the caravan operational. “And it’s clearly costing someone millions of dollars for transportation, food, water, medicine and services that are being provided for members of the caravan.”

It’s a supply chain that’s being delivered by an army of trucks, which are all necessary to keep this enormous group moving forward,” he continues over video of trucks filled with supplies and transport vehicles crammed with migrant men.

This is classic Cloward-Piven strategy to overwhelm and collapse the system and in the ensuing turmoil, try to take it over and install your own apparatchiks. The greasy fingerprints of the deep state are all over this.

Great news from the United Nations

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From Bridget Johnson at PJ Media:

Haley Announces Flip from Longstanding U.S. Abstention on Golan Heights Resolution to 'No'
For the first time, the United States plans to vote "no" today instead of abstaining on an annual United Nations resolution slamming "continued Israeli military occupation" of the Golan Heights.

In past years, the resolution has called upon Israel "to desist from changing the physical character, demographic composition, institutional structure and legal status of the occupied Syrian Golan and in particular to desist from the establishment of settlements."

It also calls upon Israel "to desist from imposing Israeli citizenship and Israeli identity cards on the Syrian citizens in the occupied Syrian Golan, and from its repressive measures against the population of the occupied Syrian Golan."

The U.S. Mission to the United Nations cited as the reasons for the change from abstention to "no" the "resolution’s anti-Israel bias, as well as the militarization of the Syrian Golan border, and a worsening humanitarian crisis."

Good - finally showing some backbone. Syria attacked Israel in 1981. The war lasted six days and ended with Israel being spectacularly victorious. They captured the Golan Heights fare and square but the palestinians and their sponsors in Syria are still chafing. They want it back.

Here is one article from 2005 that shows how intelligent the palestinians are - from NBC of 09/13/2005. Israel had just ceeded a bunch of land on the West Bank - giving it to the palestinian leaders for their use:

Looters strip Gaza Greenhouses
Palestinians looted dozens of greenhouses on Tuesday, walking off with irrigation hoses, water pumps and plastic sheeting in a blow to fledgling efforts to reconstruct the Gaza Strip.

American Jewish donors had bought more than 3,000 greenhouses from Israeli settlers in Gaza for $14 million last month and transferred them to the Palestinian Authority. Former World Bank President James Wolfensohn, who brokered the deal, put up $500,000 of his own cash.

Palestinian police stood by helplessly Tuesday as looters carted off materials from greenhouses in several settlements, and commanders complained they did not have enough manpower to protect the prized assets. In some instances, there was no security and in others, police even joined the looters, witnesses said.

They want their own state? Let's give it to them. Plasma is a state.

Back home - no wild goose chase today

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Woke up to diffuse cloudy sky with a miserable flat light. Not what I want for photography so ran a few errands and did some work around the house.

The clouds burned off about an hour ago with gorgeous warm directional light but it is a bit too late to go shooting geese today - by the time I got up to the Skagit flats, they would already be bedded down for the night - I want to film them swarming around as they settle into their nesting areas.

These conditions were forecast yesterday so I was expecting them - tomorrow is forecast to be clear so will finish stacking the firewood, head up to the flats around 2:00PM or so and then wait for the good light.

Coming up on my new (to me) van's 30K service - I used to own them and drove them a lot when I lived on the East coast. They are very easy to maintain so will be doing this service myself instead of paying the dealership a lot of money. I will have them do the big one at 60K miles but I can do the intermetidate ones for about 1/3rd the cost and it only takes an hour.

Surf for a bit and then out for Mexican.

Heading out for the day

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Coffee and post office and then get some breakfast - planning to finish stacking the firewood and want a little ballast in my belly.

Got some paperwork to do and also do some more work on the stand for my new belt grinder. Got the design figured out so time to start cutting and welding.

Last night's meeting was a good one - tired so went right to bed when I got home.

Our variable sun - global cooling

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I have been saying for a long time that the whole campaign demonizing carbon dioxide and seeking to limit industrial development is a political manouver and not a scientific one. Our climate is naturally variable and to think that us humans can have a significant effect is pure blind hubris. We are simply do not have that big a footprint.

Now it seems that our sun is entering a major period of coolinng off and the effects are becoming very obvious - here are a couple instances:

From NASA's Space Weather:

The Chill of Solar Minimum
The sun is entering one of the deepest Solar Minima of the Space Age. Sunspots have been absent for most of 2018, and the sun’s ultraviolet output has sharply dropped. New research shows that Earth’s upper atmosphere is responding.

“We see a cooling trend,” says Martin Mlynczak of NASA’s Langley Research Center. “High above Earth’s surface, near the edge of space, our atmosphere is losing heat energy. If current trends continue, it could soon set a Space Age record for cold.”

And, wonder of wonders, Dr. Mlynczak is talking about actual observed data and not the output of some dodgy computer model:

These results come from the SABER instrument onboard NASA’s TIMED satellite. SABER monitors infrared emissions from carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitric oxide (NO), two substances that play a key role in the energy balance of air 100 to 300 kilometers above our planet’s surface. By measuring the infrared glow of these molecules, SABER can assess the thermal state of gas at the very top of the atmosphere–a layer researchers call “the thermosphere.”

Much more at the site - this is some very well thought out and interesting science.
Next up - from Boston MA station WBZ:

Will The Snowiest Decade Continue?
Despite the snow blitz of 2015, many baby boomers still insist that, overall, we don’t get the harsh bitter cold and deep snowy winters like we did in the good ole days.

Weather records prove that just isn’t the case and despite the ongoing claims that snows are becoming rare and hurting winter sports, this millennium has been a blessing to snow lovers and winter sports enthusiasts.

Just as the Saffir-Simpson and Fujita Scales were devised to categorize hurricanes and tornadoes, the Northeast Snowfall Impact Scale (NESIS) was created by Paul Kocin and Louis Uccellini of the National Weather Service to rank high-impact Northeast storms. This scale has 5 categories including extreme, crippling, major, significant and notable. In addition to meteorological measurements, the index uses population information which provides an indication of a storm’s impacts on society. The NESIS scores are a function of the amount of snow, the area affected by the snowstorm and the number of people living in the path of the storm. The aerial distribution of snowfall and population information are combined in an equation that calculates a NESIS score which varies from around one for smaller storms to over 10 for extreme storms.

And here is the NESIS chart. Each bar represents ten years starting at 1958 to present:

20181116-nesis.jpg

Finally, it is not just cold in the Eastern USA - from David Middleton writing at Watts Up With That:

Antarctic temperatures recently plunged close to the theoretically coldest achievable on Earth!
This story was previously discussed here at WUWT… But, why wasn’t this headline news in the Washington Post, New York Times, etc.? Yes… That was a rhetorical question.

Ultralow Surface Temperatures in East Antarctica From Satellite Thermal Infrared Mapping: The Coldest Places on Earth
T. A. Scambos, G. G. Campbell, A. Pope, T. Haran, A. Muto, M. Lazzara, C. H. Reijmer, M. R. van den Broeke
First published: 25 June 2018

[…]

Plain Language Summary
The lowest measured air temperature on Earth is −89.2 °C (−129 F) on 23 July 1983, observed at Vostok Station in Antarctica (Turner et al., 2009, https://doi.org/10.1029/2009JD012104). However, satellite data collected during the Antarctic polar night during 2004–2016 reveal a broad region of the high East Antarctic Plateau above Vostok that regularly reaches snow surface temperatures of −90 °C and below. These occur in shallow topographic depressions near the highest part of the ice sheet, at 3,800 to 4,050‐m elevation. Comparisons with nearby automated weather stations suggest that air temperatures during these events are near −94 ± 4 °C or about −138 F. Ultracold conditions (below −90 °C) occur more frequently when the Antarctic polar vortex is strong. This temperature appears to be about as low as it is possible to reach, even under clear skies and very dry conditions, because heat radiating from the cold clear air is nearly equal to the heat radiating from the bitterly cold snow surface.

The paper in question can be found here: Ultralow Surface Temperatures... Dr. Middleton then goes on to cite two other papers on low temperatures in the Antarctic.

Global cooling is at our doorstep and there is little we can do about it. When I think of the billions of dollars that have been completely wasted on this - money that came out of our wallets and could have been put to better use (electricity and clean water in 3rd world villages for example) it makes me sick.

Time for dinner and a meeting

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Back in a couple of hours...

From Lifezette:

Hillary Must Answer Key Email Questions, Federal Judge Orders
A federal judge ordered former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to answer five questions she has avoided for years about her use of a private email server to conduct official U.S. diplomatic business.

U.S. District Court Judge Emmett Sullivan on Wednesday gave Clinton 30 days to respond under oath to five questions.

These questions were all put to her nearly four years ago in a lawsuit filed by the nonprofit government watchdog Judicial Watch.

The five questions are:

    1. Who decided to create the clintonemail.com system?
    2. When was it created?
    3. Why was it created?
    4. Who set it up?
    5. When did it become operational?

This will be interesting to follow - District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan was originally a Reagan appointee (1984). A small start but a good one.

Great quote about Progressives

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Progressivism is weaponized infantilism. It’s like giving a tantrum-throwing toddler access to the levers of social and political power. Nothing but lunacy and sadism will follow.

This was a fragment of something I saw on the web - no idea who originally said it but it certainly nails it.

Can't get no respect - Occasional-Cortex

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Heh - from The American Mirror:

OCASIO-CORTEZ: They’re mistaking me for an intern!
New York Democratic Representative-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez may be a big hit with the media and younger crowd, but she’s not receiving any special treatment on Capitol Hill.

The 29-year-old socialist is in Washington, D.C., this week for orientation. She and other newly elected officials are touring the Capitol building, meeting with lawmakers, and learning the ins and outs of Congress.

So far, Ocasio-Cortez has stormed the office of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi for a protest, complained that everyone is confusing her an intern or spouse, and was captured in a photo standing alone and being excluded from a conversation between several older Democrats.

On Wednesday, a photo of Ocasio-Cortez standing all by herself like a child waiting for her parents to finish talking scorched across Twitter.

Prior to that, the socialist complained that she keeps being mistaken for an “intern or spouse” while touring Capitol Hill.

Just because she is the media darling, she still has to work hard - being an elected official is all about grabbing as much power as you can. She has gone to the District thinking that she will advance by the force of her Marxist ideas. It will be interesting to see if she matures any...

Looks like President Trump is doing excellent management as usual - got to see what we are dealing with before we can make decisions.
From Yahoo/Reuters:

Pentagon fails its first ever audit, official says
The Pentagon has failed what is being called its first-ever comprehensive audit, a senior official said on Thursday, finding U.S. Defense Department accounting discrepancies that could take years to resolve.

Results of the inspection - conducted by some 1,200 auditors and examining financial accounting on a wide range of spending including on weapons systems, military personnel and property - were expected to be completed later in the day.

"We failed the audit, but we never expected to pass it," Deputy Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan told reporters.

A bit more:

A 1990 federal law mandated that U.S. government agencies be audited, but the Pentagon had not faced a comprehensive audit until this one was launched in December.

That President would be George "Read my lips" H. W. Bush - a great one for ideas but zero balls to get them implemented. Glad that we finally have a President who will get things done.

Back home again

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One of my errands took me to the town of Mt. Vernon and I had some extra time so I drove home via the back roads through the Skagit flats to Conroy. The Snow Geese are starting to arrive from their summering grounds in the Russian arctic. Around 3:00PM or so (when I was there) they start looking for a roosting spot - dug out my video camera and have the batteries charging up as it was gorgeous with the reflections of the sunlight off their wings. Would make a nice video with the right light which we maybe will get tomorrow and definitely Saturday.

I was watching them flying and thinking that this was a lot like what storm chasers go through when trying to get the pest photography of the storms. Realized that when I do this, I will be going on a wild goose chase...

Heading out in a few minutes for dinner - Ham radio meeting at 7:00PM tonight.

Heading out for coffee and some errands

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Back in a couple of hours.

This from North Carolina State University:

NC State Education Adds Ph.D. Program Specialization in Social Justice Education
The NC State College of Education has added a Doctorate of Philosophy in Teacher Education and Learning Sciences with an emphasis in Social Justice Education that will prepare scholars to serve and lead in championing educational success for all. Applications are now being accepted for this specialization area, which will enroll its first students in Fall 2019. The deadline to apply is Dec. 1, 2018.

“The goal of the program is to help educators recognize and disrupt systems of oppression by helping to foster and create equitable learning environments,” said Jessica DeCuir-Gunby, a professor of educational psychology and Director of Graduate Programs for the Teacher Education and Learning Sciences Department.

The Ph.D. in Social Justice Education Program will be housed in the Department of Teacher Education and Learning Sciences, and its core faculty will come from a variety of focus areas within the field of education, including educational psychology, literacy education, multicultural studies, social studies, English Language Arts education and special education. Their research focuses on social justice teacher education, multicultural education and literacy, education and immigration, and diversity and equity in schools and communities.

Talk about useless. A waste of money and the only place that these graduates will find employment is in the academic sector. Needless to say, for every hundred graduates, there will be one job opening. For the other 99, you can start practicing this: "Would you like fries with that happy meal?"

And it is off to YouTube

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Watch for a little bit and then to bed. Long day tomorrow with some errands, working here (finishing off the stand for the belt grinder and making a rack for my ladder (bolt to the outside of the house).

Earth shattering Ka-Boom

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From Science Advances:

A large impact crater beneath Hiawatha Glacier in northwest Greenland
We report the discovery of a large impact crater beneath Hiawatha Glacier in northwest Greenland. From airborne radar surveys, we identify a 31-kilometer-wide, circular bedrock depression beneath up to a kilometer of ice. This depression has an elevated rim that cross-cuts tributary subglacial channels and a subdued central uplift that appears to be actively eroding. From ground investigations of the deglaciated foreland, we identify overprinted structures within Precambrian bedrock along the ice margin that strike tangent to the subglacial rim. Glaciofluvial sediment from the largest river draining the crater contains shocked quartz and other impact-related grains. Geochemical analysis of this sediment indicates that the impactor was a fractionated iron asteroid, which must have been more than a kilometer wide to produce the identified crater. Radiostratigraphy of the ice in the crater shows that the Holocene ice is continuous and conformable, but all deeper and older ice appears to be debris rich or heavily disturbed. The age of this impact crater is presently unknown, but from our geological and geophysical evidence, we conclude that it is unlikely to predate the Pleistocene inception of the Greenland Ice Sheet.

Wonder what they will find when they start poking around Antarctica...

From CNN:

Michael Avenatti arrested on suspicion of domestic violence
Attorney Michael Avenatti has been placed under arrest on suspicion of felony domestic violence and was booked early Wednesday evening.

Los Angeles Police Department officer Jeff Lee said the domestic violence report was taken on Tuesday in West Los Angeles and the arrest was made Wednesday.

"We can confirm that today LAPD Detectives arrested Michael Avenatti on suspicion of domestic violence. This is an ongoing investigation and we will provide more details as they become available," the LAPD Twitter account posted Wednesday.

In other news, from CNN for October 23rd, 2018:

Michael Avenatti is ordered to pay $4.8 million to former law partner
Michael Avenatti's week is off to a bad start, at least in court.

On Monday, a California judge hit Avenatti with a $4.85 million judgment for failure to pay the debt owed to his former Newport Beach law partner, a court representative told CNN.

The order stems from an agreement that allowed Avenatti's law firm, Eagan Avenatti, out of bankruptcy in 2017. As part of the agreement, Eagan Avenatti LLP agreed to a settlement with his former non-equity partner Jason Frank's law firm and the IRS.

The firm agreed it would pay $4.85 million in two installments. If a payment was missed, that amount would balloon to $10 million.

And then there is this from Business Insider of October 15th, 2018:

Trump scores a 'total victory' after federal judge dismisses Stormy Daniels' lawsuit and orders her to pay his legal fees
President Donald Trump's attorneys scored a victory in court when a federal judge dismissed adult film actress Stormy Daniels' defamation lawsuit against Trump on First Amendment grounds and ordered her to pay Trump's legal fees.

"No amount of spin or commentary by Stormy Daniels or her lawyer, [Michael] Avenatti, can truthfully characterize today's ruling in any way other than total victory for President Trump and total defeat for Stormy Daniels," Charles Harder, an attorney for Trump, said in a statement to Business Insider.

Looks like Mr. Avenatti is having a hard couple of months. Hope he is enjoying his fifteen minutes because he is going to be "Who?" in another six or eight months.

Aaaand, I am on the island

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Had a couple of totes with tools for the island so headed down here after dinner. Got a meeting tomorrow and have some things to do while I am down. Back to the farm for the weekend.

Hitting the road

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Heading in to Bellingham with a full van. Back in a couple of hours - will probably get a bite in town.

From The United States, Department of Justice:

DOJ and DHS Issue New Asylum Rule
Applies President’s authority to suspend entry to asylum
Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen today announced an Interim Final Rule declaring that those aliens who contravene a presidential suspension or limitation on entry into the United States through the southern border with Mexico issued under section 212(f) or 215(a)(1) of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) will be rendered ineligible for asylum.

The Acting Attorney General and the Secretary issued the following joint statement:

“Consistent with our immigration laws, the President has the broad authority to suspend or restrict the entry of aliens into the United States if he determines it to be in the national interest to do so. Today's rule applies this important principle to aliens who violate such a suspension or restriction regarding the southern border imposed by the President by invoking an express authority provided by Congress to restrict eligibility for asylum. Our asylum system is overwhelmed with too many meritless asylum claims from aliens who place a tremendous burden on our resources, preventing us from being able to expeditiously grant asylum to those who truly deserve it. Today, we are using the authority granted to us by Congress to bar aliens who violate a Presidential suspension of entry or other restriction from asylum eligibility.”

Section 212(f) of the Immigration and INA states that “[w]henever the President finds that the entry of any aliens or of any class of aliens into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may by proclamation, and for such period as he shall deem necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate.”

More at the site. The border is now closed regardless of what activists might say. This will be the foundation for getting them sent back.

Oops - Ocean warming? Not so much

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From the San Diego Union-Tribune:

Climate contrarian uncovers scientific error, upends major ocean warming study
Researchers with UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Princeton University recently walked back scientific findings published last month that showed oceans have been heating up dramatically faster than previously thought as a result of climate change.

In a paper published Oct. 31 in the journal Nature, researchers found that ocean temperatures had warmed 60 percent more than outlined by the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

However, the conclusion came under scrutiny after mathematician Nic Lewis, a critic of the scientific consensus around human-induced warming, posted a critique of the paper on the blog of Judith Curry, another well-known critic.

“The findings of the ... paper were peer reviewed and published in the world’s premier scientific journal and were given wide coverage in the English-speaking media,” Lewis wrote. “Despite this, a quick review of the first page of the paper was sufficient to raise doubts as to the accuracy of its results.”

Co-author Ralph Keeling, climate scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, took full blame and thanked Lewis for alerting him to the mistake.

This is the problem with much of so-called climate science these days. They are relying too much on various computer models for their work and we are getting the classic Garbage In, Garbage Out.

The authors could have simply measured the ocean temperature and found out that their model did not jive with reality. How would they measure the temperature of the ocean you ask?
Say hello to Project Argo:

Brief History of Argo
The name Argo was chosen to emphasize the strong complementary relationship of the global float array with the Jason satellite altimeter mission. In Greek mythology Jason sailed in a ship called "Argo" to capture the golden fleece.

Together the Argo and Jason data sets are assimilated into computer models developed by GODAE OceanView that will allow a test of our ability to forecast ocean climate. For the first time, the physical state of the upper ocean is being systematically measured and the data assimilated in near real-time into computer models. Argo builds on other upper-ocean ocean observing networks, extending their coverage in space an time, their depth range and accuracy, and enhancing them through the addition of salinity and velocity measurements. Argo is not confined to major shipping routes which can vary with season as the other upper-ocean observing networks are. Instead, the global array of 3,000 floats will be distributed roughly every 3 degrees (300km). Argo is the sole source of global subsurface datasets used in all ocean data assimilation models and reanalyses.

Here is a map of the current position of the floats:

20181114-argo.jpg

I would call that very good coverage. The floats are clever - they are neutrally buoyant with a small motor and a piston to pump in/out seawater. When they pump in seawater, the float sinks. When it hits 2,000 meters, the motor reverses and the float starts to ascend. As it does, it measures temperature, salinity and pressure (depth). When it bobs to the surface, it acquires a satellite, gets its position, uploads the data and acquires any programming changes. It then waits on the surface until it is time for its next dive. The program started in 2000 so we have 18 years of very solid data that is freely available to the public or any researcher.

The dodgy paper in question is here: Quantification of ocean heat uptake from changes in atmospheric O2 and CO2 composition and Resplandy et. al. should be ashamed of themselves. Very bad science.

FEMA National Preparedness Report

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Looks like some good reading - from the FEMA website:

National Preparedness Report
The National Preparedness Report evaluates progress and challenges that individuals and communities, private and nonprofit sectors, faith-based organizations, and all levels of government have faced in preparedness. The 2018 National Preparedness Report takes a revised approach that includes an in-depth analysis of five core capabilities that have been identified in past National Preparedness Reports as facing persistent challenges: Operational Coordination, Infrastructure Systems, Housing, Economic Recovery, and Cybersecurity. Refining the report’s scope to focus on these recurring challenges concentrates the discussion on what the whole community needs to accomplish to have the most impact on increasing the Nation’s preparedness.

The 2018 edition also provides an overview of key developments in national preparedness, incorporating findings and lessons learned from past incidents from the 9/11 attacks to the 2017 Hurricane season. Although the response operations in 2017 were among the largest and most complex in history, lessons from these disasters show there is much more to do to help people prepare for disasters. Future incidents will yield additional lessons learned, underscoring the fact that national preparedness is an ongoing effort and requires continuous improvement, innovation, and action to build the capabilities needed to address the Nation’s evolving risks.

Ten meg, 62 page PDF download here: National Preparedness Report

People sometimes ask why I am a prepper - there is so much uncertainty out there that it just makes sense. A small disaster can be dealt with by Police and Fire crews. Eventually though, you reach a point where they are overwhelmed. I feel a lot better knowing that I have a month of food and water plus the ability to communicate through amateur radio. The best definition that I have heard for the word DISASTER is "An event which outstrips your ability to cope"

Packing up and heading out

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Taking a quick break from loading totes - cold and wet. Probably do just one load in today - do another load tomorrow when I head to the island tomorrow for the meeting.

Just wonderful - California fires

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This little bit of joy from Zero Hedge:

SoCal Fire May Have Ejected "Incredibly Dangerous" Radioactive Particles Into The Atmosphere
The 95,000 acre Woolsey fire which has coated Southern California with an apocalyptic orange glow may have released a toxic stew of radioactive particles and toxic chemicals into the air, after scorching the land on closed-down government weapons testing facility in Simi Hills known to be heavily contaminated from decades of experiments.

Commencing operation in 1947 for Rockwell's Rocketdyne Division, a government contractor for the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), the Santa Susana Field Lab (SSFL) has a checkered safety record, to put it lightly. In addition to several nuclear accidents - including the worst nuclear meltdown in US history, toxic materials have accumulated on-site from years of dumping, just miles from thousands of residents.

It was the site of several nuclear accidents, including the worst nuclear meltdown in US history when, in 1959, facility operators intentionally vented nuclear material from the site’s “Sodium Reactor Experiment” to prevent it from overheating and exploding. By the time the leaks were closed, the site had released 459 times more radiation than was leaked during the better-known 1979 meltdown at Three Mile Island.

The lab property, now owned by airplane manufacturer Boeing, stretches for 2,800 acres in the Simi Hills, and remains contaminated with toxic materials. Thousands of people live within two miles of the site, and roughly half a million live within 10 miles, according to an investigation by NBC 4 Los Angeles. -Quartz  

California officials with the state's Department of Toxic Substances Control said that as of Friday, November 9, an area of the SSFL site which was scorched by the Woolsey fire posed no danger, stating "Our scientists and toxicologists have reviewed information about the fire’s location and do not believe the fire has caused any releases of hazardous materials that would pose a risk to people exposed to the smoke." 

Time will tell. Amazed they didn't do a superfund site.

Just no - the partial receiver problem

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There is a fun little loophole in firearms regulations where you can purchase a partially completed receiver, do a few very simple machining operations and have yourselves a fully operational gun or rifle. The receiver is the part that receives the barrel, the stock, the magazine holding the bullets and it holds the firing mechanism. This is the part of the gun that has the serial number and is considered to be the "heart" of any firearm. Because you are purchasing an uncompleted receiver, you do not have to go through the usual background checks. You can purchase all of the other components (barrel, stock, trigger mechanism, etc...) freely on the open market as they are not regulated.

This little odious bill needs to be throttled in its cradle - from the US Congress website:

H. R. 7115
To prohibit the sale, acquisition, distribution in commerce, or import into the United States of certain firearm receiver castings or blanks, assault weapon parts kits, and machinegun parts kits and the marketing or advertising of such castings or blanks and kits on any medium of electronic communications, to require homemade firearms to have serial numbers, and for other purposes.

And, as usual, they get a lot of stuff wrong:

(a) In General.—It shall be unlawful to market or advertise, on any medium of electronic communications, including over the Internet, for the sale of any of the following:

(1) A firearm receiver casting or firearm receiver blank or unfinished handgun frame that—

(A) at the point of sale does not meet the definition of a firearm in section 921(a) of title 18, United States Code; and

(B) after purchase by a consumer, can be completed by the consumer to the point at which such casting or blank functions as a firearm frame or receiver for a semiautomatic assault weapon or machinegun or the frame of a handgun.

(2) An assault weapon parts kit.

(3) A machinegun parts kit.

Specifically, (2) - there is no such thing as an assault weapon. This is a distinction made on a purely cosmetic basis (ie: black and using metal or composites for construction) and (3) machine guns manufactured after 1968 are already highly illegal (Gun Control Act of 1968 and Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act)

Time to fire off a few emails to my representatives.

A new day at the farm

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Heading out for coffee and then back to the farm to load up for the first run into Bellingham. Raining heavily - warm. Over a half inch of precip with more on the way.

Got nuffin'

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Nothing on the web caught my eye - time for another jar or two of red wine and some YouTube videos.

Back home again - fun outing

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That was fun. Had two pints of excellent hard cider and ran into a couple people I have not seen for many months (a year?) - got caught up.

Feeling sleepy - surf for a bit, some videos and then an early bedtime. Want to get two trips in to the condo tomorrow. Planning to return to Camano Thursday afternoon for an evening meeting. Rain has been forecast for the next three days and it is starting to come down hard.

Dinner was good

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Done for the day - heading out for a pint or two of cider and then back home. Got enough totes packed for two trips to the condo tomorrow.

The Art Renewal Center

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Gorgeous and deep website - check out the Art Renewal Center:

From their Philosophy page:

The Philosophy of ARC - Why Realism?
Fine art at its best has the power to move one to tears, or grab your sensibilities and rivet you in the moment with an overwhelming sense of beauty and excitement. People often report the sensation of cold chills going up and down their spine. It may be the rare work that accomplishes this, but for those who have had this experience, many have credited it as the stimulus that set them on a personal lifetime quest; whether as an artist, collector or art historian. Other human activities can create a similar experience, whether in poetry, literature, dance, theatre, or music, but it is the experience of beauty in fine art and beauty and its relationship to fine art that is the focus of this essay.

If you are reading this, in all probability you are one of the millions of art lovers who in the 21st Century are disillusioned with the Modernist paradigm which for more than a century has been the dominant way the concept of art has been taught and presented in nearly all institutions of higher learning throughout the world.

If you are like us, it seems more than a little self-evident to you that works of art have infinitely more to say and communicate if they portray the real world, or use figures and objects from the real world even when portraying fantasies and dreams. You experience such "realist" works as infinitely more successful than any Modernist works. The success of Modernism seems like a form of mass insanity, a nightmarish anomaly from which we pray the art world will finally soon awake.

Speaking truth to power - this is a site I will be visiting again and again. I am a big fan of plein air and the landscapes of TurnerMoran and Bierstadt.

Light rail in New Mexico

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Light rail works in dense urban areas - Seattle, New York, Boston, San Francisco. Less dense areas like Portland and Albuquerque, New Mexico? Not so much. It is a very visible public works project and has a certain "cool" cachet but it is a money pit. From The AntiPlanner:

Riding the Rail Runner
After speaking about Romance of the Rails in Albuquerque Friday night, I took advantage of a day off between engagements to ride the New Mexico Rail Runner to Santa Fe and back. This train is costing the state close to $800 million in capital costs including interest (which works out to annual payments of about $30 million a year) plus another $30 million a year in operations and maintenance costs, while it is bringing in slightly more than $2 million a year in fares. The federal government also recently gave the state another $30 million to install positive train control.

I love it - $60 million dollars spent each year and it brings in $2 million of income. What doofus signed off on that? A bit more:

Average weekday ridership in 2017 was 2,825, which means 1,413 round trips. Ridership peaked in 2011 and has declined by 37 percent since then. This compares with Albuquerque bus ridership, which peaked in 2012 and has since declined by 25 percent, and transit ridership nationally, which peaked in 2014 and has since declined by 8 percent.

Due in part to low ridership, the Rail Runner uses more energy and emits more greenhouse gases per passenger mile than driving an average SUV. This is typical for most commuter-rail lines that started up in the last two decades or so.

They could sell off the land and the equipment and still come out multiple hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in the hole. Way to go bureaucrats!

The AntiPlanner is a great website. From their About page:

About
Welcome to the Antiplanner, a blog dedicated to ending government land-use regulation, comprehensive planning, and transportation boondoggles.

Filling the Bret Kavanaugh vacancy

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When Justice Kavanaugh was sworn in as a member of the Supreme Court, his old job became available. Today, President Trump announced his selection - FOX News:

Trump announces 'regulatory czar' Neomi Rao as nominee to take Kavanaugh's seat on D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals
President Trump announced Tuesday he will nominate Neomi Rao, who has spearheaded his administration's effort to cut down and reform federal regulations as head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, to take the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals seat vacated by new Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Trump, speaking at a White House event marking Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, indicated that a formal announcement is slated for Wednesday, but said that tipping his hand early "gives me a big story."

"We were going to announce that tomorrow and I said you know, here we are Neomi -- we're never gonna do better than this. I thought it was an appropriate place," Trump said, as attendees at the ceremony clapped and Rao smiled.

"I won't say today that I just nominated Neomi to be on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, the seat of Justice Brett Kavanaugh," Trump continued. "She's going to be fantastic -- great person."

She will be perfect for the position. Strong conservative with a great track record.

Wonderful news - the synagogue shooting

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From Philadelphia's The Inquirer:

Why Philly Jews are arming themselves: ‘I’m going to go down fighting’
On Friday afternoon, with just a few hours before sundown and the start of the Sabbath, David Parvey hurried to a South Philadelphia gun shop called Firing Line to get his new 9-millimeter pistol.

To Parvey, who attends an Orthodox Jewish synagogue in Center City, it felt like the only rational response to the Oct. 27 mass shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh, where 11 congregants were killed.

"I legally have the right to at least be able to match evil with some sort of response, and in my mind I would be dumb not to," said Parvey, who on Wednesday went to the Philadelphia Police Department's Gun Permit Unit to apply for a concealed-carry license. "I don't want to hide behind the bimah waiting for my turn to get shot."

Parvey is not the only one to reach this conclusion. A simmering conversation about safety in the face of anti-Semitic violence that began several years ago with attacks on Jewish targets in France — a yeshiva in Toulouse, a kosher supermarket and the Bataclan theater in Paris — has boiled over in the last week. While some are responding with prayer and peaceful protests, there are those who feel that a pistol is just more reliable.

Good news - people standing up for themselves and their friends. Seconds count in a shooting and the police are minutes away at very best.

Taking a break for now

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Getting dinner on the stove (rice and beans with ham) - surf for a bit and then head back out. Got about 20 totes ready to go.

The California fires

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An article from just before - Sacramento Bee, October 3, 2018:

Is PG&E going too far in cutting trees for fire safety? A Sacramento group says yes
Criticized for its role in several catastrophic California wildfires, state utility giant Pacific Gas & Electric is on a mission to clear trees near power lines that could topple and hit lines causing fires.

But is the giant utility going too far? A group of Sacramentans is saying yes.

Some members of the Save the American River Association and the American River Parkway Coalition and others are fighting to stop PG&E from cutting down what they estimate could be 100 cottonwood and oak trees near a major electricity transmission line that runs through the parkway near Discovery Park.

A bit more:

The utility company has been criticized in the last year by residents and state officials after a bevy of wildfires tied to downed power lines swept through the state in October 2017.

Investigative reports in May and June from the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection linked PG&E to 16 fires in 2017 that killed 18 people and destroyed thousands of homes and other buildings. The PG&E service area covers much of northern and central California, and includes 18,000 miles of power lines. It will spend up to $70 million this year to clear vegetation near those lines, a spokesman said in an email.

Those clueless environmentalists again - they do not see the big picture, just their personal agenda.

Done with lunch

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Time to get to work...

Slept like a log - finishing off breakfast, heading out for coffee and then spending the day packing totes to take to the condo in Bellingham.

Well crap - Douglas Rain R.I.P.

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Douglas Rain? The voice of HAL9000 - from National Public Radio:

R.I.P. HAL: Douglas Rain, Voice Of Computer In '2001,' Dies At 90
Douglas Rain, a Shakespeare actor who provided the eerie, calmly homicidal voice of HAL in Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, has died at the age of 90.

The Canadian actor died Sunday morning, according to the Stratford Festival, where Rain spent 32 seasons acting in such roles such as Othello's Iago and Twelfth Night's Malvolio. He was also a founding member of the company. The Winnipeg-born actor had dozens of theater, film and television credits.

However, Rain's biggest mark on pop culture was less Shakespearean, but perhaps just as much a classic: as 2001's HAL 9000, a sentient, rogue computer in a film written in collaboration with science-fiction author Arthur C. Clarke and widely regarded as Kubrick's masterpiece. The American Film Institute ranked HAL as the 13th greatest movie villain of all time.

Kubrick was reportedly inspired to cast Rain after viewing Universe, a 1964 animated documentary narrated by the actor.

A great movie - especially compared to the 90% dreck being pushed by clueless Hollywood these days.

Heh - interesting bit of history from the Canada Free Press:

CA Gov. Jerry Brown Vetoed 2016 Wildfire Management Bill While CA Burned
Every governor has signed regretful legislation, or made a disastrous pardon he or she would like a chance to re-do. California’s whacky outgoing Democrat governor has spent the last eight years trying to convince the people of California that we are to blame for droughts, wildfires and “extreme weather,” and that climate change is an existential threat to the California way of life. Showing no regrets, Gov. Jerry Brown calls the people “freeloaders,” and “deniers,” and has mocked our “little green lawns.” Brown even spitefully signed legislation subjecting every man, woman and child to 50 gallons of water a day in the near future… despite the state’s 189,454 miles of rivers, and that large body of water California sits on.

Last year, as California residents were burned out of their towns, homes, neighborhoods, schols, hospitals and businesses, Gov. Jerry Brown was jetting around the world spouting climate change propaganda, and calling the fires California’s “new normal.” Gov. Brown had many chances to sincerely and realistically address California’s increasing wildfires since his election in 2011, but instead chose to play politics, placing his new friends at the United Nations over the people of California.

What many do not know, is that California Gov. Jerry Brown vetoed a bipartisan wildfire management bill in 2016, despite unanimous passage by the Legislature, 75-0 in the Assembly and 39-0 in the Senate. SB 1463 would have given local governments more say in fire-prevention efforts through the Public Utilities Commission proceeding making maps of fire hazard areas around utility lines. In a gross display of politics, this is especially pertinent given that Cal Fire and the state’s media are now blaming the largest utility in the state for the latest wildfires.

Details details... These piddling details are getting in the way of my Great and Powerful agenda.

Back at the farm for a few days

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Had dinner on the road, stopped off at a local for two pints of cider and now at the farm.

Sleepy from my early morning so just a quick surf and then a couple of YouTubes - packing tomorrow.

Paperwork done - back to work

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An hour or two of moving firewood and then up to the farm.

Terrierman's Daily Dose is a daily read for me and today, he reminds us of California's weather history with a quote from John Steinbeck - East of Eden:

Fire, like drought, is a failure of memory and a longage of people.

In East of Eden, Nobel-prize winning author John Steinbeck's (1902-1968) put it well:

I have spoken of the rich years when the rainfall was plentiful. But there were dry years too, and they put a terror on the valley. The water came in a thirty-year cycle. There would be five or six wet and wonderful years when there might be nineteen to twenty-five inches of rain, and the land would shout with grass. Then would come six or seven pretty good years of twelve to sixteen inches of rain. And then the dry years would come, and sometimes there would be only seven or eight inches of rain. The land dried up and the grasses headed out miserably a few inches high and great bare scabby places appeared in the valley. The live oaks got a crusty look and the sagebrush was gray. The land cracked and the springs dried up and the cattle listlessly nibbled dry twigs. Then the farmers and the ranchers would be filled with disgust for the Salinas Valley. The cows would grow thin and sometimes starve to death. People would have to haul water in barrels to their farms just for drinking. Some families would sell out for nearly nothing and move away. And it never failed that during the dry years the people forgot about the rich years, and during the wet years they lost all memory of the dry years. It was always that way.

The ignition of the Camp Fire was from a malfunction at a PGE electrical tower. The reason the fire escalated so rapidly is because of the huge fire load caused by poor forest managment. We should have learned our lessons from the Yellowstone conflagration thirty years ago but noooooooo...

More 'fun' from Florida

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I really hope that President Trump and our new temporary A.G. move to squash this - from Zero Hedge:

Provisional Ballot Boxes Discovered Inside AVIS Rental Car At Ft. Lauderdale Airport
Provisional ballot boxes from the Broward County Supervisor of Elections Office were reportedly discovered in the back of an AVIS rental car at Fort Lauderdale Airport on Sunday night, as first reported by investigative journalist Laura Loomer.

Attorney and Broward GOP State Committeeman Richard DeNapoli says he received a call from an AVIS employee informing him of the found ballot boxes after sheriff's deputies were initially unwilling to investigate. Approximately 20 minutes after receiving the tip, however, a heavy police presence arrived and blocked off traffic to the airport, and a bomb threat was announced.

So the popo are complicit in this corruption. Lots more at the site - photos, video, links to other stories of corruption and vote tampering. These people need to be facing serious jail time - ten years at the minimum.

I find it ironic that the Democrats have nothing to offer us Normals so they have to use free stuff to win the low-information voter and cheat to block the informed majority.

Well crap - Stan Lee R.I.P.

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From TMZ:

STAN LEE DEAD AT 95
Stan Lee, the man responsible for much of the Marvel Universe, has died ... Stan's daughter tells TMZ.

We're told an ambulance rushed to Lee's Hollywood Hills home early Monday morning and he was rushed to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. We're told that's where he died.

Lee had suffered several illnesses over the last year or so -- he had a bout of pneumonia and vision issues.

Stan started Marvel with Jack Kirby in 1961 with The Fantastic Four. He went on to create Spider-Man, Black Panther, The Incredible Hulk, X-Men, Iron Man and The Avengers.

Stan made cameo appearances in all of the Marvel movies.

95 is a good run and he had fun doing what he wanted.

Breaking for lunch

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Can of soup and a dinner roll - do a bit of paperwork, shift some more firewood (the pile is getting smaller) and then head up to the farm around 3:00PM or so.

This looks good:

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Will have to check the Bellingham movie theaters - want to see this on the big screen.

Up earlier than usual

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Usually wake up around 8:30AM. My eyes popped open about 30 minutes ago so getting a two hour start to the day.

Get a bite to eat, stack some more firewood (almost done) and then head up to the farm for a few days of packing.

And it is off to YouTube

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Up at the farm for a few days tomorrow. Back down for a meeting Thursday.

Nothing much on the web - Florida will be interesting to follow.

Sky is very clear - would not be surprised to find a hard frost on the ground tomorrow morning.

Illegals in the news - sanctuary county

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Heartwarming story from The Washington Times:

'Sanctuary' refuses to take blame after triple homicide, says ICE responsible for illegal immigrant
An illegal immigrant released by a “sanctuary city” county in New Jersey was charged last week with a triple homicide halfway across the country in Missouri, authorities said Friday.

Luis Rodrigo Perez stands accused of being the gunman in a shooting rampage last week that claimed the lives of two men and one woman at two homes.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said it had tried to deport Perez after he was arrested on domestic violence charges in Middlesex County, New Jersey, last year.

But the county, which has a noncooperation policy with ICE, refused to alert federal agents when it released Perez in February, ICE said.

“Had ICE’s detainer request in December 2017 been honored by Middlesex County Jail, Luis Rodrigo Perez would have been placed in deportation proceedings and likely sent home to his country — and three innocent people might be alive today,” said Corey Price, acting ICE executive associate director.

Horrible enough that three people are now dead by this goblin. Even worse that he had already been arrested on domestic violence charges. The New Jersey police knew this but they still failed to allert ICE.

And of course, the local government and the media do not hold anyone accountable for their actions. I really despise progressives with their self-deluded thought processes and failure to make a stand, call a spade a spade. We are not getting the brightest and the best from these countries - they flood into our Nation and immediately go on welfare - our tax dollars are paying for this.

Done with the day

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Heading up to the farm tomorrow morning for a few days.

Surf and then to bed.

Remembering our Veterans this day

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From Michael Ramirez:

20181111-ramirez.jpg

From Terry Kelly

On November 11, 1999 Terry Kelly was in a drug store in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. At 10:55 AM an announcement came over the stores PA asking customers who would still be on the premises at 11:00 AM to give two minutes of silence in respect to the veterans who have sacrificed so much for us.

Terry was impressed with the stores leadership role in adopting the Legions two minutes of silence initiative. He felt that the stores contribution of educating the public to the importance of remembering was commendable.

When eleven oclock arrived on that day, an announcement was again made asking for the two minutes of silence to commence. All customers, with the exception of a man who was accompanied by his young child, showed their respect.

Terrys anger towards the father for trying to engage the stores clerk in conversation and for setting a bad example for his child was channeled into a beautiful piece of work called, A Pittance of Time. Terry later recorded A Pittance of Time and included it on his full-length music CD, The Power of the Dream.

President Trump being Presidential

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The wildfire problem we have is not one of climate change, it is very poor forest management by the individual states. The policies have been to stop fires at all costs which results in an overgrowth of the fire load (available fuel) so when conditions are right, you get a huge conflagration instead of frequent small forest fires.

We had a major Mene Mene Tekel Parsin message in the fires at Yellowstone National Park 30 years ago but some state "management" bureaucrats have not learned from this.

Enter President Donald John Trump - from the Wall Street Journal:

Trump Threatens Funding to California Over Wildfires
President Trump blamed the California wildfires on poor forest management, and threatened to cut off funding to the state unless stewardship of forests improved.

“There is no reason for these massive, deadly and costly forest fires in California except that forest management is so poor,” the president tweeted from Paris, where he is attending a 100-year commemoration of the end of World War I.

“Billions of dollars are given each year, with so many lives lost, all because of gross mismanagement of the forests,” the president added. “Remedy now, or no more Fed payments!”

California is a beacon to homeless people, professional grifters and economic migrants (legal or not). California's infrastructure is rotten. I spoke to someone a few days ago who had driven up from Los Angeles and I-5 is in horrible shape. It was in horrible shape ten years ago when Jen and I drove down there. They spend so much money on stuff that sounds good but they spend no money on stuff that does good.

Time to wean them off the fed.gov teat and get them standing on their own two feet. Let them set their own priorities for spending and take responsibility for their own decisions good and bad. Ownership is a very powerful force for reason and logic.

Good meeting - time for YouTube

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Planning meeting for an excercise. Tired - long day so watching a few welding and radio videos and then to bed.

Got a social event tomorrow afternoon and then heading back to the farm - there for a few days. Been slacking off and need to get the last of the stuff moved to the condo for the tool garage sale.

160 miles later...

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I am back. Got the wheelbarrow and will finish the firewood pile tomorrow. Got a meeting tonight so heading to the grocery store and post office and then having a can of soup and a dinner roll for dinner.

Costco makes some really nice "artisan" rolls so I freeze them, microwave them for two minutes and pop them in the toaster oven for five and they are really good. Just the right amount.

Points North

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Heading out soon - stopping for coffee and then to the farm, condo, Hardware Sales (an amazing place) and back to the island. Meeting tonight and an event tomorrow afternoon.

And it's off to YouTube for the night

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Running up to the farm to get some tools for down here tomorrow - meetings tomorrow evening and Sunday.

Great idea - Speaker of the House

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From Chris Lynch:

In a show of bipartisanship new House Speaker (assuming that happens) Nancy Pelosi should throw Hillary Clinton to the wolves over the email server investigation. I think this would secretly please many people on the Left who just want Hillary to go away and it would make Pelosi look evenhanded in any moves against Trump regarding the Mueller Investigation. Just saying... 

Broward County in the news

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Back from dinner

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The joys of clean bedding. Switched over to the flanel sheets and got an electric blanket running. Been getting very cold in the mornings and until the house gets the foundation fixed, I have no heat except for a small heat pump in the room I am camping in and a space heater in the bathroom. Camping out by the seaside.

Driving up to the farm tomorrow for a few things so long day - surf for a bit, YouTube and then to bed.

From the Acoustical Society of America posting at Phys Org:

How beatboxers produce sound: Using real-time MRI to understand
Beatboxing is a musical art form in which performers use their vocal tract to create percussive sounds. Sometimes individual beatboxers perform as a part of an ensemble, using their vocal tracts to provide beats for other musicians; other times, beatboxers perform alone, where they might sing and beatbox simultaneously or simply make sounds without singing.

A team of researchers is using real-time MRI to study the production of beatboxing sounds. Timothy Greer, a doctoral candidate at the University of Southern California, will describe their work showing how real-time MRI can characterize different beatboxing styles and how video signal processing can demystify the mechanics of artistic style. Greer will present the study at the Acoustical Society of America's 176th Meeting, held in conjunction with the Canadian Acoustical Association's 2018 Acoustics Week in Canada, Nov. 5-9 at the Victoria Conference Centre in Victoria, Canada.

The team is interested in using real-time MRI data to observe the vocal tracts of beatboxers just before they make a sound to see if those movements are different from speech. The real-time MRI data provides a dynamic view of the entire midsagittal vocal tract and at a frame rate high enough to observe the movement and coordination of critical articulators.

There is a short video at the site - fun stuff.

The meeting sounded (arrrrgghhh...) really interesting - if it had been in Vancouver I would have seriously thought about driving up and crashing it. Here is its website: Acoustics Week in Canada 2018

Look up - chance of aurora tomorrow

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From NASA's Spaceweather site:

CHANCE OF GEOMAGNETIC STORMS: A large hole in the sun's atmosphere is facing Earth, sending a stream ofsolar wind toward our planet. Estimated time of arrival: Nov. 10th. NOAA forecasters say there is a 55% to 60% chance of minor G1-class geomagnetic storms when the stream arrives. High-latitude sky watchers should be alert for auroras tomorrow night.

Nothing much going on with the Planetary K-Index but stay tuned. Weather is supposed to clear up for a bit tomorrow so we might have good seeing.

Heh - two headlines

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Curious - small earthquakes

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A flurry of small (2.9 to 4.9) earthquakes along the subduction zone spread out over a thousand miles:

20181109-quakes.jpg

Probably just coincidental but...

Planning on driving up to the farm tomorrow for a quick trip. I have a sweet wheelbarrow that will make moving the firewood a lot easier. It has a wheel on either side of the barrow so nice and stable. Doing laundry now. Heading out to the dump in 40 minutes or so.

Here is a close picture I found on Google - not mine but close:

20181109-wheelbarrow.jpg

Having two wheels makes a big difference in stability and ease of use.

Seems that the voting process in Broward County, Florida has had a several-decades long history of failure.
From the Washington Examiner:

Broward County's election division is a national disgrace: A history
We are now three days beyond the election, and votes have yet to be counted in Broward County, Fla. Election officials in the South Florida county are still discovering and still counting ballots that could determine who becomes governor and who the state sends to the Senate. They won't say how many votes are left, even though the law requires it.

But there is little reason for confidence in the outcomes, because Broward has long been a national disgrace. Voting is the hallmark of democracy, and Broward, because of the way it has practiced elections for the last two decades, is the picture of incompetence.

This Florida story starts with hanging chads and butterfly ballots and a Supreme Court ruling stopping a recount and ending the presidential election between then-Texas Governor George W. Bush and then-Vice President Al Gore. Heavily Democratic then, as it is now, Broward was 1 of 4 counties where the Gore campaign requested a hand recount of disputed ballots.

The iconic picture of Judge Robert Rosenberg intently studying a punch-card ballot through a magnifying glass defined the fiasco. It unsurprisingly came from Broward. This mess would continue for more than a month, until the Supreme Court mercifully ended it with its decision in Bush v. Gore.

And that episode, which plagued more than just Broward, seems tame compared to what kept coming next. Miriam Oliphant, the City Link paper would note at the time, was “a rising political star” when she was elected Broward County Supervisor of Elections in 2001. Two years later, Oliphant would be walked off of government property by sheriff’s deputies.

This excerpt is just scratching the surface - a long history of cronyism, vote manipulation and outright fraud. Time for some sunlight...

Democrat victory

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Say hello to  TX state Representative Ron Reynolds - from Austin, TX station KXAN:

Texas House member wins re-election from a jail cell
A re-election celebration is underway in Pod 2 of the Montgomery County Jail after inmate number 232573 claimed victory in Texas House District 27. That inmate is known as Rep. Ron Reynolds, D-Missouri City, to the people on the outside.

Reynolds was unopposed in the race for District 27 and the latest vote totals show Reynolds garnered 47,305 votes in Tuesday's election.

Reynolds was booked into the county jail on Sept. 7. He's serving a year-long sentence after a 2015 conviction on five misdemeanor counts of using a middleman to chase ambulances in order to solicit clients for Reynolds’ law firm.

After the 2015 conviction, a county judge handed down the jail sentence to the sitting lawmaker, but Reynolds spent the last three years appealing the conviction. Reynolds’ law license was suspended on May 2, 2016.

Reynolds is also one of many Texas lawmakers, judges and attorneys owing ethics fines totalling $1.3 Mil.

As they go for our guns

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This will be interesting to watch - from The Wall Street Journal:

Democrats Plan to Pursue Most Aggressive Gun-Control Legislation in Decades
Democrats say they will pass the most aggressive gun-control legislation in decades when they become the House majority in January, plans they renewed this week in the aftermath of a mass killing in a California bar.

Their efforts will be spurred by an incoming class of pro-gun-control lawmakers who scored big in Tuesday’s midterm elections, although any measure would likely meet stiff resistance in the GOP-controlled Senate.

Democrats ousted at least 15 House Republicans with “A” National Rifle Association ratings, while the candidates elected to replace them all scored an “F” NRA rating.

“This new majority is not going to be afraid of our shadow,” said Mike Thompson, a California Democrat who is chairman of the House Gun Violence Prevention Task Force. “We know that we’ve been elected to do a job, and we’re going to do it.”

Mr. Thompson, who represents a district in the Napa Valley north of San Francisco, said he plans to introduce legislation mandating universal background checks in the opening weeks of the new Congress.

Emphasis mine - classical liberal cluelessness. Doing something that sounds good instead of doing something that does good. Mr. Thompson obviously does not know that every gun sale (except for private exchanges) is preceeded by the buyer filling out an ATF Form 4473 - Firearms Transaction Record. That information is telephoned into the ATF and the purchaser is either sold the gun directly, told to come back in seven to ten days or the sale is denied. We already have universal background checks in place and the system works.

The problem is mental illness and how the American government deals with it. Owning a spoon has no bearing on a person's weight.

Breaking up the deep state in Florida

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From the Miami, Fl CBS affiliate:

Judge Rules In Gov. Scott’s Favor In Broward Elections Records Request
A Broward judge has ruled in favor of Gov. Rick Scott and says Broward Supervisor of Elections Brenda Snipes must “allow immediate” viewing and copying of records that have been requested.

The judge added that it must be completed by 7 p.m.

The lawsuit in Broward filed against Snipes claimed that her office was withholding crucial voter information and has blocked access to the office. At the emergency hearing on Friday, Scott’s lawyers said this was a “simple” case about access to Broward ballots. It’s not about how votes are counted or inspecting ballots.

“This information Supervisor of Elections should have already compiled and saved,” he added, “It should take 10 minutes to do.”

Snipes' position is a political appointment - she was not elected. In fact, she was appointed in 2003 by !Jeb¡ This is just plain partisan obstructionism.

Breaking for lunch

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It was pouring buckets this morning so got my coffee and then hit the road to Burlington for some errands - Costco, the welding store, harbor freight (they have really good and cheap casters for the stands I am building). It has pretty much stopped raining now so moving firewood - got the Toyota dug out. Still a lot more to do.

Feeling a lot less sore now that I am moving.

Time to make some popcorn

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And sit back and enjoy the show - from President Trump:

Stiff and sore as planned

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Heading out for coffee and post office and then start moving firewood. Starting off slowly until I limber up.

Off to the tube of you

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Will probably wake up quite stiff and sore tomorrow - moved a lot of firewood today but it felt good to be physically active.

Finish off tomorrow and start building the metal stand for my new belt grinder.

Obama's legacy

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Another of his toys is being taken away - initial stages for now but this is great to hear. From Forbes:

Newly Unsealed Documents Show Top FDIC Officials Running Operation Choke Point
Last week brought new revelations regarding Operation Choke Point, the Obama administration’s effort to freeze politically disfavored businesses out of the financial system. Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-Mo.), who helped lead a multi-year effort to shut the program down, highlighted some of theses newest findings and pointed out that stopping Operation Choke Point is not a partisan issue.

Luetkemeyer’s legislation to prevent a redo of Choke Point – The Financial Institution Customer Protection Act of 2017 – overwhelmingly passed the House, with only two nay votes. Operation Choke Point was an egregious affront to the rule of law, so it is good to see that so many lawmakers want to prevent a repeat.

For those unfamiliar, Choke Point consisted of bureaucrats in several independent federal agencies taking it upon themselves to shut legal businesses – such as payday lenders and firearms dealers – out of the banking system. Given the nature of the U.S. regulatory framework, this operation was easy to pull off.

Officials at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), for instance, simply had to inform the banks they were overseeing that the government considered certain types of their customers “high risk.” The mere implication of a threat was enough to pressure banks into closing accounts, because no U.S. bank wants anything to do with extra audits or investigations from their regulator, much less additional operating restrictions or civil and criminal charges.

Banks are incredibly sensitive to any type of pressure from federal regulators, and they know that the regulators have enormous discretion. The new revelations are quite scary because they show exactly what federal regulators can do with that discretion – even to law-abiding citizens.

Slowly but surely, the deep state is undone. Wonderful news.

Voter fraud - Florida

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Expect nothing less from the Democrats - from FOX News:

GOP Senate candidate Rick Scott files bombshell lawsuits accusing Dem Florida election officials of trying to 'steal the election'
Accusing Democrats of conducting a coordinated effort to "steal" elections in a campaign of possibly "rampant fraud," Republican Senate candidate Rick Scott filed explosive lawsuits late Thursday against the top election officials in two heavily Democratic counties, as they continue to report new votes and three major races in the state appear headed for recounts.

In their lawsuit against Broward County, Scott and the National Republican Senatorial Committeee (NRSC) allege that officials there are hiding critical information about the number of votes cast and counted. And in a parallel suit against Palm Beach County, Scott and the NRSC charge that the election supervisor there illegally used her own judgment to determine voter intent when reviewing damaged absentee ballots, while refusing to allow witnesses to monitor the process.

"I will not stand idly by while unethical liberals try to steal an election," Scott, who is currently Florida's governor, said at a press conference outside the Governor's Mansion, as he slammed potential "rampant fraud" in the race.

And the outcome of this will be interesting to say the least:

Also late Thursday, President Trump announced on Twitter that "Law Enforcement is looking into another big corruption scandal having to do with Election Fraud in #Broward and Palm Beach." He did not elaborate.

Democratic meddling in the election process is well documented. This from 2016:

In 2016, Brenda Snipes’ office posted election results half an hour before polls closed – a violation of election law," Scott said. "That same year, her office was sued for leaving amendments off of ballots. In 2014, Brenda Snipes’ fellow Democrats accused her of individual and systemic breakdowns that made it difficult for voters to cast regular ballots. All Floridians should be concerned about that.

Much more at the site. Democrats have nothing to offer - that is why they have to cheat to get elected. Ideas so great they have to be mandatory.

Larry King talks about CNN

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The money quote: "CNN stopped doing news a long time ago"

From Zero Hedge:

Well crap - long range weather forecast

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Looks like another warmish winter with reduced snow. The economy in my old area is driven by camping, hiking and general tourism in the summer (our biggest season) and by skiing in the winter (our second biggest season). Looks like winter will not be as good as I was hoping. From Cliff Mass:

El Nino is Strengthening
We have known for a while that the tropical Pacific was transitioning from a neutral situation (near normal surface and subsurface temperatures in the tropical central/eastern Pacific) to an El Nino (above normal tropical ocean temperatures). But during the past month, the warming has revved up and we will be officially in an El Nino very soon.

And we care about this, because El Ninos tend to make it warmer than normal in the NW with less snow, with the effect stronger as the sea surface temperature warms.

He follows up with some current measurements and forecasts. Bummer...

Productive day

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The firewood came in. It is not a full cord - I am guessing about 30% short. I have it partly stacked and will take photos when it is fully stacked and go into the vendor's office as they assured me that I was buying a full 4' X 4' X 8' cord.

Living in a rural area, I have probably purchased over 30 cords of wood and I know what a cord looks like even when lying in a pile on the driveway.

Had a hot dog for dinner with some fries and two pints of beer. Lots of kraut and some dijon mustard. Good dog too.

Cold morning - hard frost on the ground and a lot more snow visible in the mountains. Very clear tonight so expecting another hard frost tomorrow.

Another day on the island

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Heading out for coffee and the post office. Back home to do a couple of projects and wait for the truck with the firewood.

Then, I get to stack a cord of firewood (1 cord = 4' X 4' X 8' = a lot of wood!)

It's late...

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Time for a couple of YouTubes and then bed. Long day tomorrow.

Heh - do not mess with President Trump

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From The Hill:

White House yanks press pass from CNN's Acosta
The White House on Wednesday suspended the press credentials of CNN Chief White House Correspondent Jim Acosta after he engaged in a heated back-and-forth with President Trump.

The move is a dramatic escalation of Trump's ongoing battle with the news media and comes one day after the president's party lost control of the House.

In a statement, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders justified the decision by claiming that Acosta became physical with a young female intern during his exchange with Trump.

Trump at a Wednesday news conference grew frustrated with Acosta's line of questioning about a migrant caravan and cut him off by saying “OK, that's enough.”

That's when a White House intern approached Acosta and tried to take the microphone out of his hand. The CNN reporter said “pardon me, ma'am” and refused to let go of the mic. Acosta's hand appeared to brush the intern's arm during the exchange. The woman then crouched down and away from Acosta.

“President Trump believes in a free press and expects and welcomes tough questions of him and his administration,” Sanders said. “We will, however, never tolerate a reporter placing his hands on a young woman just trying to do her job as a White House intern. This conduct is absolutely unacceptable.”

That is what happens when you let agenda drive your actions instead of intellegence. You get caught up in the heat of the moment. Good that Trump had the balls to call Acosta on it and to kick him out.

Home for the night

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Good meeting, nice people. Surf for a bit, some YouTube and then to bed. Got a cord of firewood being delivered tomorrow - weather is supposed to be nice so it will be good to do some physical labor stacking it.

All this moving stuff is getting me back in shape again - the totes with the fasteners and hand tools weigh 40-60 pounds each.

Great news - Jeff Sessions is gone

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He was a decent lawyer but he had zero backbone and allowed Rod Rosenstein to roll over him with the whole phony Russian Collusion charge. Now President Trump has the chance to appoint someone who will work to defang the deep state.

On island - productive day

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Meeting starts at 6:00PM so heading out for an early dinner soon. More later...

Out for coffee

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Head back to the farm to finish loading up and then to the condo and then down to the island. Meeting tonight and having some firewood delivered tomorrow.

Election results

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Law Professor Glen Reynolds says it best - from USA Today:

Election results 2018: Forget the blue wave and behold the purple puddle
Well, it wasn’t the huge Blue Wave we were promised, a change in Congress on a par with the Tea Party’s “shellacking” of President Barack Obama in 2010, or President Bill Clinton’s big midterm losses in 1994. It looks more like a Blue Slosh. Or maybe a Purple Puddle. The Democrats regained some ground, but it wasn’t the overwhelming repudiation of President Donald Trump and the Republicans they were hoping for.

As I write this, it looks as if Democrats will control the House of Representatives by a narrow margin, while the GOP keeps control of the Senate. What does that mean? Gridlock.

Is that good? It just might be.

The idea that gridlock is good is based on the notion that most of what Congress does is probably bad, and that when Congress can’t do much we’re better off. As Bill Kort wrote in 2017, “Gridlock is good because when Congress is tied up in knots they can’t do anything to hurt us. This idea has been verified by the market many times over the past 25 years.”

Gridlock in Congress can be a good thing
Kort notes that the economic boom of the 1990s took place after Clinton was forced to moderate his approach post-1994, and that times of government unity often lead to bad decisions. Under divided government, things have to appeal to both parties or they don’t pass. That will take a lot, given how divided the parties are.

But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said that "divided government is the perfect time to do big things." Pointing to Social Security reform in 1983, the 1986 Tax Reform Act, and the Clinton-era welfare reform program, McConnell said, “None of those things in my view would have occurred in unified government."

There are a lot of things that need to be done, ranging from infrastructure, to trade, to a health care fix that will get us past the Obamacare debacle. They won’t get addressed unless the two parties can come together. I think there’s room for them to work together — and former Democratic National Committee Chair Ed Rendell was saying the same thing on election night on Fox News. It’ll be interesting to see whether President Trump can bring some of his famed “Art of the Deal” skills into play.

More at the site. All the Democrats have to do is to stop being crazy. Is that too much to ask? 2020 should be very interesting.

Back home again

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Ran into two people I knew - had some fun talk and some good local cider (blackberry/ginger - nice and tart)

Election results are mixed. Us Normals kept the Senate but it looks like the Elites have the House. We will know more tomorrow when the dust settles.

Turning it off and watching Welding videos on YouTube for an hour. Got about 15 totes packed up (I had a lot of fastners!) and will pack some more tomorrow and then head in to the condo and then to Camano for a meeting tomorrow. Firewood delivery on Thursday afternoon.

Finished with dinner - heading out

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Heading out for a couple pints of cider at my local. Should have a better picture of the election results later tonight - even better tomorrow.

Illegal aliens voting in Texas

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And they have a video - from Zero Hedge:

Non-Citizens Voting In Texas? "We Got Tons Of Them" Admits Polling Official On Undercover Veritas Video
A new video from James O'Keefe's Project Veritas shows a Texas poll worker admitting that "tons" of non-citizens have been voting.

The video features an undercover Veritas operative asking whether or not her non-citizen boyfriend can vote in Tuesday's midterm election.

One poll worker, Deborah Brooks-Wims tells the operative "If he has his ID that's all he needs. If he's registered."

"It doesn't matter that he's not a citizen?" asks the Veritas journalist. "No! No, if he's registered, he has a... honey, it might not be that he's registered. If he's giving you all this trouble it may not be that he's registered."

The journalist then says: "He's saying he saw some mess on the internet saying that it's not legal for him to vote since he's not a [unintelligible]," to which the poll worker responds "Don't pay attention to that. Bring him up here."

Another poll worker, Pam Nash, was told that the undercover journalist's boyfriend was "really nervous" and "out in the car" waiting to vote. Nash says "No, you tell him no, we got a lot of 'em," adding "Go get him, bring him in."

The video is pretty damning.

Science rules! - pizza

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Interesting paper - from the Abstract:

The Physics of baking good Pizza
Physical principles are involved in almost any aspect of cooking. Here we analyze the specific process of baking pizzas, deriving in simple terms the baking times for two different situations: For a brick oven in a pizzeria and a modern metallic oven at home. Our study is based on basic thermodynamic principles relevant to the cooking process and is accessible to undergraduate students. We start with a historical overview of the development and art of pizza baking, illustrate the underlying physics by some simple common examples, and then apply them in detail to the example of baking pizza.

Pretty solid paper - they look at the dynamics of heat transfer and the effects of water in the dough and toppings (vegetables carry a lot of water).

PDF download here: The Physics of baking good Pizza

Fixing dinner - early results

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Still waaay to early to tell - a lot of polls are still open but the initial results are wonderful:

20181106-vote01.jpg

Done with lunch - off to work

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Heading out to the shop

Green's Dictionary of Slang

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Amazing resource - 500 years of English language slang. Check it out: Green's Dictionary of Slang

At the farm - packing

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Pulled up to the farm a few minutes ago. Heading out tot he barn to start packing. Doing nuts and bolts and fastners today - I have a lot of them. Keeping some standard sizes but selling everything else off.

Ho Li Crap - Mike Olbinsky

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Mike is one of the better weather photographers out there and his latest is truly epic:

Tip of the hat to Cliff Mass for the link. He offers a nice explanation for some of the phenomena in the video.

Nothing on the internet

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It's all silly season what with the election tomorrow. Vote people - this is an important one.

And it's Camano Island yet again

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So much for best laid plans. By the time I got everything to the dump and done a couple of things here, it was 4PM and getting time for dinner. Spending the night here and driving up tomorrow morning.

Besides, last Saturday was my birthday so I get a couple of days to fsckoff and do whatever I want...

Heading out for the day

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Coffee, post office, dump and then up to the farm for a few days.

Got a meeting down here on Wednesday so planning on being here for that.

Pack pack pack sort sort sort...

Back home from dinner

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Feeling a bit sleepy - time change. K-Index is still high but didn't see any aurorae. The seeing is really good so close to the water - it is patchy clouds and light pollution from some small towns on the island across the way but I can still see the Milky Way with my naked eye. I brought my old scope up here - need to get the mount dialed in but it should be fun to do some skygazing on clear nights.

YouTube for a little bit and then to bed. Long day tomorrow.

The Lawrence Welk Show:

Out for dinner

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Took care of some things (paperwork) here on the island and heading out for dinner in a few minutes. Grace seems a lot better but still keeping an eye on her.

Farm tomorrow - probably spend the night there as I need to pack up some more of the totes. Really glad that I bought 300 of them - I wasn't sure what I was going to do with them when I bought them but the price was stupid cheap and I am sure using them now.

The Georgia governors race

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Getting interesting. A three-fer:

From The Daily Caller:

KEMP OPENS PROBE INTO DEMOCRATIC PARTY FOR ALLEGED ATTEMPT TO HACK VOTING SYSTEM
Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, a Republican running for governor, is opening an investigation into the state’s Democratic Party for allegedly attempting to hack the state’s voter registration system.

Kemp’s office made the announcement in a Sunday morning news release but did not provide any details on why it is investigating the Democratic Party for the failed hacking. The party is being probed for engaging in a possible cyber-crime.

Kemp's opponent in the race is Stacey Abrams - from The Federalist:

Georgia’s Democratic Candidate For Governor Calls For Banning AR-15s
In an interview on “The View” Tuesday morning, Stacey Abrams, the Democratic candidate for Georgia governor, called for AR-15 rifles to be banned.

When asked if she supports banning AR-15-style rifles, Abrams said civilians should be banned from using them.

“I do not believe like weapons of mass destruction like the AR-15 belong in civilian hands,” she said. “I think it should be prohibited from civilian use. I have shot an AR-15, and I think you probably have too, and while it’s an amazing amount of power, it also is an amazing amount of destruction, and there is very little that can be done to protect vulnerable communities when the AR-15 is present.”

AR-15s are the most popular gun in America. When asked if she supports confiscating weapons already in the hands of civilians, Abrams dodged the question and repeated talking points about wanting to ban “assault weapons.”

Meanwhile - she has some interesting people campaigning for her. The Daily Caller again:

ARMED WITH ASSAULT RIFLES, BLACK PANTHERS MARCH FOR STACEY ABRAMS
Members of the Black Panther Party marched through the city of Atlanta, strapped with assault rifles and brandishing Stacey Abrams campaign signs.

In a video posted on the group’s Facebook page on Saturday, members of the Black Panther Party are seen marching through the West End neighborhood of Atlanta in support of Stacey Abrams gubernatorial campaign. As they marched, the Black Panthers carried assault rifles and continually shouted slogans such as “black power” and “power to the people.”

Nice to have the support of a known racist and anti-semetic group who has no problem with active voter intimidation.

What if - political correctness

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Two people I really like talking about a wonderful "what if"

Wipe out the whole political correctness movement in a few days - what a wonderful world that would be...

Hat tip Vanderleun - go and read the rest of his post.

Back on the island

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Did another load and drove down after. Turned out to be a nice (if very windy) day today. These round trips are about 160 miles - very do-able.

Look to the North tonight - the Planetary K Index is spiking:

20181104-k-index.gif

Six or over guarantees an Aurora display at these latitudes (Pacific Northwest - 48.1740° N where I am). NASA's excellent Space Weather site has the information:

GEOMAGNETIC STORM IN PROGRESS: Almost a day later than expected, Earth is entering a stream of solar wind flowing from a large hole in the sun's atmosphere. G1-class geomagnetic storms are in progress. Such storms are considered minor, but they can cause auroras in the USA as far south as a line between Maine and Washington. High-latitude sky watchers should be alert for the glow of geomagnetic activity in the midnight sky.

Maybe a chance of seeing an aurora tonight - all too rare at these latitudes.

A lazy day

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Heading out for coffee, run a few errands and then up to the farm to do another load in to the condo.

Grace (my older shepard) is a bit under the weather so keeping an eye on her - maybe a trip to the vet if needed.

Does not surprise me - the Caravan

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Looks like the Democrats are allowing anyone to join their little political farce. From the Washington Examiner:

DHS: Caravan migrants from 20 countries, include 270 convicted criminals
The Department of Homeland Security claimed Thursday people from at least 20 countries make up the two caravan groups, not just citizens of Guatemala and Honduras.

In a release called "Myth vs. Fact: Caravan," the department also states more than 270 people in the caravans are either known gang members or have criminal backgrounds.

DHS did not cite its sources for the information and a department spokesperson said that information is law enforcement sensitive.

Yeah - it's called protecting your sources. They probably have any number of embeds in that group. Who is funding this? Moving several thousand people over a long distance is a very large logistic problem requiring lots of planning and money.

This is not grass roots, it is pure astroturf.

An interesting idea from Musings from the Chiefio:

A Modest Suggestion: Fixing Honduras et. al.
We are being told that the Governments and economics of Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala and El Salvador are so horrible, that the citizens must flee murder, violence and more. They must flee to the USA.

The reasonable question to then ask is “Why don’t they fix their governments?”. This is met with statements that they have not the power to do so.

OK, let’s run with that.

Clearly any “fix” must come from outside, then. The USA doesn’t need to be perpetually occupying Central America, so is there an alternative?

Why, yes!

Turns out all those countries were at one time part of Mexico. They speak the same languages, eat similar foods. It’s a natural match. We just need to let Mexico restore them to The Mexican Empire.

To quote from the above link with comments from The Chiefio:

In 1822, Mexico annexed the Federal Republic of Central America, which includes present-day Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and part of Chiapas.

They’ve done it before, they can just do it again!

We can get rid of a half dozen embassies, and lots of “Aid” payments.

Those States would be getting better governments (even if not as good as ours) and we’d get fewer “caravans”. “Win-Win”. Problem solved. Then all those poor Honduran’s and Guatemalan’s can get jobs in Mexican factories making Fords & Chevys and such…

Makes perfect sense. Costa Rica actually has a functional government so they might not want to buy in to this plan but all the other nations would benefit greatly.

Fun Bugs Bunny mashup

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Hat tip Vanderleun - got to love the classics.

A quiet birthday night on the island

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Went out for Mexican - back home now. Surf for a bit and then back to the farm tomorrow to pack.

Two loads in to the condo today. A lot of stuff - looking forward to the cash these sales will bring in.

Probably spend tonight on the island and head up to the farm again tomorrow.

Out for the day

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Had a power outage this morning but it is back on - excellent line crews in this area.

Coffee and the usual routine.

Today marks my 68th circuit around our Sun - feel the same as I did when I was in my 40's

Heading out for a couple pints of cider

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Calling it an early evening tonight - want to get a full day in tomorrow.

From The American Spectator:

Tester Takes a Torpedo Below the Water Line
Ever wonder how Senator Jon Tester, a Beltway swamp creature who voted against the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh and famously stays in lockstep with his fellow Democrats on immigration and gun control, keeps getting elected in a state like Montana? The answer is simple: the Libertarian Party usually nominates a spoiler who siphons enough votes from Tester’s GOP challengers that he wins by the skin of his teeth.

In 2012, for example, Libertarian Dan Cox garnered enough of the vote to allow Tester to eke out a 4 percent win. This year was no different — until yesterday — when Libertarian Rick Breckenridge decided to endorse Republican Matt Rosendale. The Libertarian has been pulling enough support in the polls to enable Tester to slither back to the swamp again. Why did Breckenridge throw his support to Rosendale? AP reports:

The Libertarian candidate in Montana’s U.S. Senate race threw his support behind his Republican opponent Wednesday in a surprise move that came in response to an election mailer from an unknown group that appeared aimed at undermining Rosendale’s support among conservatives.

Getting some great people in the Senate. Should be fun to see what happens on Election night.

From The Daily Caller:

BRAZIL’S PRESIDENT-ELECT VOWS TO MOVE ISRAELI EMBASSY TO JERUSALEM
Brazilian President-elect Jair Bolsonaro announced Thursday that his country plans to relocate its embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, following in the footsteps of the United States.

Like U.S. President Donald Trump, the decision to move the country’s embassy to Jerusalem was also a campaign promise of Bolsonaro’s.

“As previously stated during our campaign, we intend to transfer the Brazilian Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem,” the president-elect announced on Twitter. “Israel is a sovereign state and we shall duly respect that.”

Good - maybe the nations surrounding Brazil will see the economic growth that will happen in the next couple of years and re-think their commitment to socalism.

Great headline from gCaptain:

World’s Biggest Dry Dock Sinks Holding Russia’s Only Aircraft Carrier
Russia’s only aircraft carrier was damaged while undergoing repairs in the north of the country after the floating dock holding it sank in the early hours of Tuesday and a crane crashed onto its deck, tearing a gash up to 5 meters wide.

The Admiral Kuznetsov has seen action in Russia’s military campaign in Syria in support of President Bashar al-Assad with its planes carrying out air strikes against rebel forces.

It was being overhauled on one of the world’s biggest floating docks in the icy waters of the Kola Bay near Murmansk close to where Russia’s Northern Fleet is based and was due to go back into service in 2021.

Maria Kovtun, Murmansk’s governor, said in a statement that a rescue operation had been launched and 71 people evacuated after the floating dock holding the ship had begun to sink.

An Obituary - Mario A. Segale

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A Seattle man with a curious history - from The Seattle Times:

Mario A. Segale
Mario A. Segale, from Tukwila, WA passed away surrounded by his family on October 27, 2018. He was born April 30, 1934 in Seattle, WA to first generation Italian immigrant farmers, Louis and Rina Segale and was their only child. It was a humble beginning for a man who, with sheer determination and unbelievable self-taught business acumen, created a remarkable legacy.

And the curious history?

While he was the inspiration for the name of Nintendo's 'Super Mario' from when they were tenants in his business park in the 1970's, he always ducked the notoriety and wanted to be known instead for what he accomplished in his life.

So there really was a Super Mario...

Barry shows off his thin skin

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From FOX News:

WATCH: Protesters Interrupt Obama as He Stumps for Gillum, Nelson in Florida
Former President Barack Obama was interrupted by protesters as he rallied for Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) and Democratic Florida gubernatorial candidate Andrew Gillum in Miami on Friday.

Obama was speaking about the importance of Tuesday's midterm elections, saying America is at a "crossroads," when he was interrupted by a man who began yelling and blowing a whistle.

As the protester was escorted out, the audience drowned him out with chants of "bring it home!"

Not to mention that cantidate Gillum is facing some legal issues (clickable headlines):

FBI investigation looms over Gillum campaign in Florida

Gillum failed to disclose more than $400K in mortgage debts

State Attorney to Investigate Andrew Gillum Illegal Email Scandal

Corruption probe looms over Democrat’s historic campaign for Florida governor

From the wonderful medical website Stat News:

Despite criticism and concerns, FDA approves a new opioid 10 times more powerful than fentanyl
In a highly controversial move, the Food and Drug Administration approved an especially powerful opioid painkiller despite criticism that the medicine could be a “danger” to public health. And in doing so, the agency addressed wider regulatory thinking for endorsing such a medicine amid nationwide angst about overdoses and deaths attributed to opioids.

The drug is called Dsuvia, which is a tablet version of an opioid marketed for intravenous delivery, but is administered under the tongue using a specially developed, single-dose applicator. These “unique features” make the medicine well-suited for the military and therefore was a priority for the Pentagon, a point that factored heavily into the decision, according to FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb.

Although an FDA advisory committee last month recommended approval, the agency was urged by critics not to endorse the drug because it is 10 times more powerful than fentanyl, a highly addictive opioid. Among those who opposed approval were four U.S. senators and the FDA advisory panel chair, who could not attend the meeting, but took the rare step of later writing a letter to the agency.

Despite all the nice language, this will find its way to the street in six months.

Done with lunch - heading out to the equipment barn for another round of packing.

One of the biggest online forums for Role Playing Games is RPG.NET - they just had a policy update:

New Ban: Do Not Post In Support of Trump or his Administration
The following policy announcement is the result of over a year of serious debate by the moderation team. The decision is as close to unanimous as we ever get. It will not be the subject of further debate. We have fully considered the downsides and ultimately decided we have to stay true to our values. We will not pretend that evil isn’t evil, or that it becomes a legitimate difference of political opinion if you put a suit and tie on it.

We are banning support of Donald Trump or his administration on the RPGnet forums. This is because his public comments, policies, and the makeup of his administration are so wholly incompatible with our values that formal political neutrality is not tenable. We can be welcoming to (for example) persons of every ethnicity who want to talk about games, or we can allow support for open white supremacy. Not both. Below will be an outline of the policy and a very incomplete set of citations.

Clueless ninnies. Social Justice Warriors More reading here, here and here.

From FOX News:

Migrants traveling to US sue Trump, government; claim violation of constitutional rights
A dozen migrants traveling by foot from Honduras to the U.S. to seek asylum filed a class-action lawsuit Thursday against President Trump, the Department of Homeland Security and others, claiming a violation of their due process under the Fifth Amendment.

The Fifth Amendment states that, "no person… shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law."

Yeah - the Fifth Amendment says that and a lot more - packs quite a lot into one paragraph:

Amendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

But (wait for it) it applies only to Citizens of the United States. It does not apply to Citizens of another Nation. The left is flinging poo whenever and wherever they can trying to stay in the public eye. They have nothing to offer so they do things like pay for a big caravan.

At the store

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Everything is fine here - heading up to the farm in a few minutes. The rain has stopped for a while - actually nice and sunny. Rivers are really high though and there was one place driving up that had standing water over the roadway. Only a few inches but still...

Packing all day today. Left-over Feijoada for dinner and then out for a pint or two of cider. Aiming to get several van loads in the totes so I can be efficient tomorrow and get as many runs into the condo.

Off to the farm

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Swing by the transfer station and then get coffee and it is up to the farm for a couple of days.

Having a quiet b'day celebration tomorrow - nothing planned.

This is a train in Arazona heading South towards the border:

Got another one - Project Veritas

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James O'Keefe is doing wonderful work. His latest from Project Veritas:

“Nobody needs to know” Beto Campaign Appears to Illegally Spend Funds on Supplies for Caravan Aliens, Campaign Manager Says “Don’t Worry”
Project Veritas Action Fund has released undercover video from current Congressman and US Senate candidate Beto O’Rourke’s campaign. The video exposes how his campaign staff appear to be illegally using campaign resources to buy supplies and help transport Honduran aliens. This is the eighth undercover video report Project Veritas has released in a series revealing secrets and lies from political campaigns in 2018.

Said James O’Keefe, founder and president of Project Veritas Action:

“Charity and helping your fellow man are things we applaud at Project Veritas Action. The problem is, you can’t break the law when you do it.”

“Don’t ever repeat this”
Featured in this report are campaign staffers who work on Congressman O’Rourke’s US Senate campaign discussing how they use campaign resources to help Honduran aliens and transport them to airports and bus stations. Said Dominic Chacon and AnaPaula Themann, who work on O’Rourke’s campaign:

Chacon: “The Hondurans, yeah… I’m going to go get some food right now, like just some stuff to drop off…”

Themann: “How did they get through?”

Chacon: “Well I think they accepted them as like asylum-seekers… So, I’m going to get some groceries and some blankets…”

Themann: “Don’t ever repeat this and stuff but like if we just say that we’re buying food for a campaign event, like the Halloween events…”

Chacon: “That’s not a horrible idea, but I didn’t hear anything. Umm, we can wait until tomorrow for that.”

Themann: “Well that’s exactly the food we need. And I will just mark it as, I do have dozens of block walkers.”

That is 100% illegal. Of course, the elites of the deep state do not see that. They are doing whatever they can do to remain in power and they are attempting a Cloward-Piven collapse of the system to do so.

Beto is worth millions and his wife's family are big-time developers. His father in law is worth over a billion. He is painting himself as a man of the people when in fact, he is a member of the 1%.

Curious happenings - San Andreas Fault

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From the Los Angeles Times:

A San Andreas fault mystery: The 'slow-moving disaster' in an area where the Big One is feared
The San Andreas fault begins its dangerous dance through California at the Salton Sea, at a spot that seismologists long have feared could be the epicenter of a massive earthquake.

But in recent months, this desolate location where the North American and Pacific plates rub together has become the focus of intense interest for a type of movement that is less the Big One than the Slow One.

A muddy spring mysteriously has begun to move at a faster pace through dry earth — first 60 feet over a few months, and then 60 feet in a single day, according to Imperial County officials.

More at the site. The acceleration of movement is curious and vexatious - it stands to take out a major rail line as well as a major fiber optic cable and a highway.

Island life again

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Unloaded the van and headed South.

Two things today. Saw my first Bald Eagle of the season today - was driving out of Maple Falls and it was perched in a tree about 20 feet from me. Very close - usually they do not hang out that close to the road. They migrate down from Alaska this time of year and winter over.

Got that rain moving in - I was at the condo around 5PM and it got very warm and the air pressure dropped. The smell of the decaying leaves suddenly got a lot stronger. Warm air. It felt pregnant with rain. Not raining appreciably now but it is on its way here.

The flow of the Nooksack River plainly shows the two atmospheric rivers we have had and we are ramping up to the "big one"

20181101-nooksack.png

Finished lunch

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Van is loaded and ready to head out for another day of schlepping my horde. So looking forward to getting rid of it.

Pouring buckets... And then, there is this little nugget from the National Weather Service:

Hydrologic Outlook
WAC057-061-073-012215-

Hydrologic Outlook
National Weather Service Seattle WA
315 AM PDT Thu Nov 1 2018

...POTENTIAL FLOODING ON RIVERS FROM SNOHOMISH COUNTY NORTHWARD
FROM LATE FRIDAY MORNING THROUGH SATURDAY...

Flooding is possible starting as early as late Friday morning
through Saturday from Snohomish County northward to Whatcom
County. This flood potential includes but is not limited to
Stillaguamish, Skagit, and Nooksack Rivers. If any flooding does
occur it is expected to be minor.

Three to as much as six inches of rain is expected in the North
and Central Cascades in the next 30 hours. The heaviest rain is
expected late tonight into early Friday morning and will occur
north of Stevens Pass. In addition to the heavy rain, snow levels
will be moderately high. This amount of rainfall will cause rivers
to rise quickly beginning later today with the rises continuing
into early Saturday with some of the rivers flowing off the North
and Central Cascades rising to near flood stage.

Emphasis mine - a pineapple express.

And I am outta here

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Coffee, post office, storage unit and then farm. More posting later.

Interesting times - President Trump

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This shows what having good and effective leadership can do - two stories:

Kim Jong Un to visit Seoul 'soon,' South Korean president reveals
North Korea leader Kim Jong Un will "soon" visit Seoul, South Korea, President Moon-Jae in said Thursday.

Moon revealed the news during a speech on the economy given before parliament. He didn't elaborate on further details.

President Moon-Jae visited Kim last September in Pyongyang. And this from the Jerusalem Post:

SAUDI ARABIA, BAHRAIN AND QATAR CONDEMN PITTSBURGH SHOOTING
In an unusual move, the Palestinian Authority, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Qatar have all made official statements on Sunday condemning Saturday's mass shooting in a synagogue in Pittsburgh.

The Palestinian Authority and Turkey also spoke out, calling it an act of terrorism.

The Saudi Embassy in Washington tweeted, “The Embassy expresses its sincere condolences to the American people and to families of victims of the violent incident at a synagogue in Pittsburgh today. Houses of worship are meant to provide safe and spiritual refuge. Those who desecrate their sanctity attack all humanity.”

And this is especially interesting:

PLO Ambassador Husan Zomlot, who heads the PA mission to the United Kingdom tweeted in English.

“This murderous attack is pure evil & must unite Jews, Christians and Muslims for an uncompromising fight against all forms of hatred and racism. My heart goes with the families of the victims and the American people,” Zomlot said.

Peace for our time? The first time that was said it was said by an incompetent progressive - maybe this time it is finally true.

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