Mike 03
Mike 03's JournalIt's revolting.
I glimpsed Twitter this morning and saw "Dementia Joe" was trending.
It's like criticizing the allied soldiers liberating the concentration camps in WW2 by saying, "Their uniforms were wrinkled."
This article reminded me of something:
In 2019, the Jair Bolsonaro administration approved 474 new pesticides for use — the highest number in 14 years. Pesticide imports to Brazil also broke an all-time record, with almost 335,000 tons of pesticides purchased in 2019, an increase of 16% compared to 2018.https://news.mongabay.com/2020/03/brazil-sets-record-for-highly-hazardous-pesticide-consumption-report/#:~:text=In%202019%2C%20the%20Jair%20Bolsonaro%20administration%20approved%20474,2019%2C%20an%20increase%20of%2016%25%20compared%20to%202018.
There was concern in the United States over this as well. Maybe the Biden administration should look at our Brazilian imports and see if we are importing produce that is contaminated with these controversial pesticides Bolsonaro pushed through. Just speaking for myself, that reckless orgy of pesticide approval scared the hell out of me.
This is electric third rail stuff:
After consultations with experts, some U.S. officials came to believe this Beijing lab was likely conducting coronavirus experiments on mice fitted with ACE2 receptors well before the coronavirus outbreak—research they hadn’t disclosed and continued not to admit to. In its January 15 statement, the State Department alleged that although the Wuhan Institute of Virology disclosed some of its participation in gain-of-function research, it has not disclosed its work on RaTG13 and “has engaged in classified research, including laboratory animal experiments, on behalf of the Chinese military since at least 2017.” That, by itself, did not help to explain how SARS-CoV-2 originated. But it was clear that officials believed there was a lot of risky coronavirus research going on in Chinese labs that the rest of the world was simply not aware of.
There are some revelations in Bob Woodward's second Trump book Rage having to do with the US/China relationship and the coronavirus that, when I read it, I thought would cause a reassessment of this subject, if not some headlines, but it was ignored, maybe because of all the other bombshells in that book (and I didn't want to write about it either). At the time of the outbreak, China completely shut down domestic travel in and out of Hubei province, but it continued to allow people inside Hubei province to fly to the United Kingdom, Europe and the United States. So, while I really really don't want to believe any of this, there are some strange things.
Salon is kind of getting embarrassing
Lindsey Graham is a lot like the character Tom Ripley in the movie The Talented Mr. Ripley.
He selects people he thinks are powerful, idealized figures and wants to become them and vicariously share their power by hanging around them and becoming their best friends.
Interesting article on Spoliation motions: Spoliation is a Discovery issue...
Spoliation Sanctions Are a Discovery Issue, Not a Last-Minute Trial TacticAct, don’t wait, or the court can refuse to consider an untimely spoliation motion.
https://www.americanbar.org/groups/litigation/committees/pretrial-practice-discovery/practice/2019/spoliation-sanctions-are-a-discovery-issue-not-a-last-minute-trial-tactic/
Here's a story about this that is not behind a paywall
Russian intelligence reportedly used fake news sites to spread misinformation about coronavirus vaccineshttps://www.theverge.com/2021/3/7/22318113/russia-intelligence-fake-news-spread-misinformation-coronavirus-vaccines
The sites, identified as New Eastern Outlook, Oriental Review, News Front, and Rebel Inside, have emphasized the side effects of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine as well as other western pharma companies’ vaccines, stoking concerns about whether the vaccines are effective or had been rushed through the US approval process, the WSJ said.
The sites don’t have large audiences, but officials said their false stories are often picked up and circulated by international media. They typically focus on true news reports about rare side effects of the vaccines, but fail to provide accurate context that shows the vaccines are safe for most people. “Russian intelligence services bear direct responsibility for using these four platforms to spread propaganda and lies,” a State Department spokesman told the WSJ.
In addition to the campaign to discredit Western vaccines, Russia’s state media and Twitter accounts connected to the Russian government are also trying to boost the profile of Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine.
I despise Putin.
Perhaps a 13 minute delay for Hitler and his entourage on November 8, 1939
It's so hard to pick but just off the top of my head I can't resist...
Delay Hitler's 1939 speech at the Bürgerbräukeller by a mere 13 minutes and potentially prevent nearly all of WW2. (Poland had already been invaded). Without a war in the European theater to distract the United States, it's unthinkable Japan would have bombed Pearl Harbor.
Accompanying Hitler that night were Goebbels, Heydrich, Hess, Himmler and others.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georg_Elser
It's a bit of a roll of the dice since we can't know for sure Hitler would have been killed, but you said we could change one event, so I'm changing it to "Hitler and his entire entourage were killed."
Commentator on MSNBC just now:
Paraphrasing: I wish I could tell you there is some deep philosophical reason Kyrsten Sinema has voted the way she has on this, but it's pure survival... She is looking over her shoulder... She's not particularly afraid of being primaried, she's afraid of the moderate Republicans, people in the center right who would ordinarily have supported Martha McSally who came over and voted for her in 2018...
Some key event during WW2
Perhaps the last 3 days in Hitler's bunker.
Or maybe better, to be a fly on the wall at the Yalta Conference.
Or Himmler's bizarre speech of 6 October 1943 at Posen, where he called out to Albert Speer, so I could see with my own eyes if Speer was lying when he later claimed he wasn't actually there and that Himmler's eyesight was so poor that he didn't realize Speer was missing. Speer laughably relied on this claim to demonstrate he knew nothing about the Holocaust.
I know that last one sounds like I'm thinking small, but it is an issue Adam Tooze raises in his book Wages of Destruction and that book really piqued my curiosity to know.
Another might be the death of Stalin's wife, so I could settle once and for all whether she committed suicide or met with foul play!
I heard it, but I'm deferring to experts on this subject. She was talking about how
Governor Cuomo fixated on the fact she was a sexual assault survivor and kept bringing that subject up during unrelated conversations repeatedly. I think she was talking about what she felt was psychological abuse and her feeling that he knew it was a very sensitive topic to her but he would keep bringing it up inappropriately at work in private settings that were supposed to be about something else (like taking dictation) and then using it to segue into personal questions about whether she would be willing to start a relationship with him.
Profile Information
Gender: MaleHometown: Modesto California
Home country: United States
Current location: Arizona
Member since: Mon Oct 27, 2008, 06:14 PM
Number of posts: 16,616
