Thursday, March 15, 2018

Mansfield in the Morning (photo taken from my upstairs window)


12 comments:

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    1. Not an impeachable offense, but certainly demonstrates he is unfit to be president.

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    2. It occurs to me that Caligula's horse could do a better job, but alas, the story of said horse being appointed consul seems to have been untrue.

      Alan

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    3. It's almost worse that he admitted, er, bragged about it than that he did it. The man is not only a liar and a cheat (and a thief and an adulterer, very possibly a committer of incest), but a braggart and totally without shame. And, oh yes, totally brainless!

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  2. Special counsel Robert Mueller “has subpoenaed the Trump Organization to turn over documents, including some related to Russia,” the New York Times reports.“The order is the first known time that the special counsel demanded documents directly related to President Trump’s businesses, bringing the investigation closer to the president.”

    Hmmmm… The cynic in me suggests there might be a connection between the report above and the one below.—Alan

    Trump Sanctions Russian Spy Agencies
    Washington Post: “The financial sanctions seek to deter Moscow from targeting this year’s midterm elections. It’s a noteworthy step, as President Trump has shown reluctance to blame the Kremlin for tampering with the 2016 presidential race despite the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that Moscow did so.”

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    Replies
    1. Hmmm, my inner cynic suspects the same motivation.

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  3. Cyberattacks Put Russian Fingers on the Switch at Power Plants, U.S. Says
    By NICOLE PERLROTH and DAVID E. SANGERMARCH 15, 2018

    The Trump administration accused Russia on Thursday of engineering a series of cyberattacks that targeted American and European nuclear power plants and water and electric systems, and could have sabotaged or shut power plants off at will.

    United States officials and private security firms saw the attacks as a signal by Moscow that it could disrupt the West’s critical facilities in the event of a conflict.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/15/us/politics/russia-cyberattacks.html

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    Replies
    1. Of course us good guys have never contemplated, much less experimented with or deployed such tools. No, never. Despite it being discussed openly for how long--ten, twenty years? I seem to recall hearing that Iran has tuned up Stuxnet and sent it back to plague its developers. And something like it was rumored to have infiltrated the indigenous North Korean ICBM program--until they simply reproduced an old Soviet ICBM.

      --Alan

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  4. You all may have noticed this story last year:

    Traces of sun storms locked in tree rings could confirm ancient historical dates[Click] A new science, astrochronology, could finally fix precise dates for key events in prehistory using traces of violent solar storms preserved by trees.

    And here is an application:

    Date of ancient volcanic eruption finally pinpointed using fossilised tree rings[Click] The Changbaishan eruption, one of the most violent of the last two millennnia, has been dated to within three months of the winter of 946 AD.

    The Refugee Detectives[Click] “Inside Germany’s high-stakes operation to sort people fleeing death from opportunists and pretenders.” Ah, I suppose they don’t accept refugees from West Trumpistan…

    Why Earth's History Appears So Miraculous[Click] A nice little stroll through observer selection effect to quantum mechanics and consideration of vacuum decay. Just in case the ozone hole doesn’t satisfy your worry quotient any more…

    —Alan

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  5. Listener, over the past few days, I've read two books by Madeleine L'Engle, Dragons in the Waters and The Arm of the Starfish, accidentally in that, reverse, order. Superb books! The Arm of the Starfish is particularly powerful. The denouement really blew me away.

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