Howdy All, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy –
In this issue –
1. Biden
2. Penn
3. Eggs
4. Innovation
5. Stoves
6. Curry
7. Privilege
8. Fun
9. Rapid Dragon
10. Geoengineering
1. Biden. Last week was the moment that the democrat left decided to rid itself of the brain addled figurehead, Joe Biden. The vehicle appears to be improper handling of classified documents which have been found in at least four locations, including the garage he keeps his Corvette. In near lockstep (when is it every anything else?), the media spun on their heels, and started sounding like Fox News on the story, though there were a few stragglers still defending Biden, looking increasingly foolish as the week went on. By week’s end, even congressional democrats were blasting away at Biden. Most notable of these was House democrat designated liar, Adam Schiff. Why did it happen? My best guess is that his announcement that he was going to run for reelection spooked the Powers Behind the Throne. They made a value judgment and decided that President Kamala was going to be easier to deal with than Biden. A few on the right suggested that the democrats will attempt to elevate O’Bama consigliere Susan Rice into the Vice Presidency. The problem with this is that confirmation of a new VP requires approval of both houses of congress, and democrats no longer control the House, which can simply refuse to act, leaving the position open until the next president is sworn in. Implications of the burgeoning scandal are significant, more so based on Biden’s and Attorney General Garland’s over the top response to the mishandling of classified allegations against former President Trump. Note that Biden’s mishandling difficulties appear to completely undercut the expected case against Trump, removing it as a vehicle to indict, try and convict him.
- The documents were found on Nov 2 – 3 by Biden lawyer(s) who reported the documents to the WH Counsel, who sat on the story for at least two months so as not to impact the midterm elections. Other documents were found in Dec and Jan.
- Biden’s documents were not kept in a secure facility. Trump’s classified were secured at the request of the National Archives.
- No FBI involvement in searching for additional Biden documents. No SWAT team or CNN cameras were filming, nor was there a raid.
- Garland immediately appointed a Special Counsel, indicating the very real need to cover up information flow about the documents. Remember that the Mueller investigation was at its most fundamental a coverup of the Russia hoax.
- Trump and his people have steadfastly insisted he declassified everything in his possession, which he can do as President. Biden as VP has no such authority unless specifically given him by President O’Bama. Will O’Bama hang his backside out to cover for Biden’s ineptitude? Unlikely.
2. Penn. What is a Biden scandal without CCP involvement? One of the locations classified was found was the Biden center for Diplomacy, funded with at least $55 million in anonymous Chinese donations. The University of Pennsylvania (Penn), in turn took some of that money and paid Biden for his time. Think of it as typical democrat money laundering like they do with renewable energy / climate energy grants and anything that benefits unions, some (or a lot) of which show up as campaign donations for democrats. Penn paid Biden around $1 million 2017 – 2019 as a sitting professor for his association with the Biden Center. Think of it as legal money laundering. There were reports of some unnamed Chinese individual(s) with access to the building. This has not been confirmed and seems to have dropped out of coverage. Perhaps the Special Counsel is following this lead (/sarc). Perhaps he is not. Either way, based on the security of storage and complete lack of interest in securing the documents, I expect copies of all are out in the international wild. Remember that Penn led the push to stop FBI investigations of CCP spies in US universities. Probably completely unrelated (/sarc).
3. Eggs. The Next Big Panic unfolded here in ANC last week with the egg and chicken shortage hitting local grocery shelves. Panic buying cleared shelves at local Fred Meyer and Costo stores. Eggs and chickens started showing up in fits and starts as the week progress. The JBER Commissary threw down a one dozen eggs per family per day limit on purchases. The most impressive thing was Costco, which continues to impress as experts in commercial logistics. As an aside, if I were controlling curricula at professional military education schools, I would require everyone to spend a week working at Costco to see how logistics works (and should work) in the real world. The current strain of Avian Flu was first isolated in China (yet another little gift from the CCP) in 1996, though it dates as far back as 1878. Since then, it has triggered the most recent outbreak here in the US in 2022. There have been nearly 50 million birds destroyed or died in the current outbreak. Things are going to be tight for a while.
4. Innovation. Hot Air ran a piece a week or two ago noting that innovation, disruptive scientific research has slowed to a crawl in recent years. Disruptive research is that with outcomes that significantly change the way researchers look at problems. It is the kind of research that changes everything that follows. The number of papers with some sort of disruptive possibility are down by a factor of 5 since 1950. The number of disruptive patents are down by a factor of four since 1980. This despite an exponential growth in the number of research papers published over the period. Recent papers typically consolidate, further developing previous work. The patten holds for all major fields of science, including tech, medicine and social sciences. The obvious problem is that the process that science is funded, and researchers rewarded is broken, with things that are wanted, things that are safe, funded. Things that may deliver results not desired, not so much. Think of Eisenhower’s parallel warning in his final speech on his way out of office. The military – industrial complex was not his only concern. In the very next paragraph, he warned about government funded science, which is the problem today. These sorts of institutional speed bumps have a very real cost, as we as a civilization are falling behind the wealth creation curve. The farther we fall behind, the less rich we become, and the farther away in time the Singularity ends up being. The other obvious problem with the decline of disruptive science is redirecting research from a quest for new knowledge to research in support of political narratives (think of Trofim Lysenko and you are spot on). You need to look no farther than the ongoing federally – led censorship of alternative COVID information and censorship of anything and everything not supportive of the manmade global warming due to CO2 emissions construct to see it in action. And it’s not going to stop any time soon.
5. Stoves. Richard Trumka’s proposed regulatory ban on natural gas stoves finally hit the media fan last week with significant pushback. The reaction was so intense that the entire administration went into reverse, crawfished their way out of the uproar, claiming they never, ever will or even think about such a ban, which of course is a lie. They are getting their way at the state level, with bans on new natural gas hookups for new construction rolling its way through Cali at the county level. Cali passed a ban on new gas heaters by 2030. Bans on furnaces and stoves are being implemented via building code “improvements” that make it all but impossible to put natural gas in new construction. NY Governor Hochul is proposing the same sort of foolishness in NY which is in the process of passing legislation to ban new natural gas hookups, which will quickly morph into a hard, coerced ban statewide. Note the flow here. When the left can’t get what they want, they try legislation. Then they try subsidies (bribes) to make the switch. Finally, when they have gone as far as they can on the legislative and regulatory path, they ultimately default to their favorite, good old-fashioned coercion. Natural gas, the only reason the US is succeeding in cutting emissions, is next up to bat. Beware.
6. Curry. The FBI facilitated censors at YouTube blocked a Heartland Institute live stream (their weekly Climate Change Roundtable) featuring Judith Curry a week ago. They claimed to have found a 2020 episode (293) streamed May 2021 that “violated their terms of service” and the ban on “election misinformation.” That particular episode discussed the Time Magazine piece chortling about “fortifying” the 2020 election so that Joe Biden won. Apparently, someone in the Harris – Xiden WH or Michael Mann himself took exception to Curry, who actually looks at the climate data and makes her own conclusions, as too dangerous for us normies to hear. The problem with Big Tech censorship is that once you get used to doing it, for whatever reason, you start using it more frequently, moving quickly to always. If the climatista’s science was accurate, why do they need to censor? Answer: because they can. Because they like doing it. And because they have zero tolerance for alternative conclusions. Take a look again at the previous item about the collapse of scientific innovation and consider the negative fallout from groupthink and coerced conformity.
7. Privilege. A local jury in Houston found a 33-year-old not guilty of throwing a couple beverage cans at Ted Cruz. One of them hit Cruz in the neck. The arrest for assault was supported by witnesses, video, and statements from the perp. DC is not the only place with leftist privilege these days.
8. Fun. One of the fun stories out of the week-long vote for House Speaker was a tidbit out of Jonathan Turley describing how and why a few Republican anti-McCarthy votes unexpectedly swung his direction following the 14th failed vote. Apparently, House democrats were having a grand old time up to and including selling popcorn. Republicans attempted to make a motion to adjourn, which democrats blocked in an attempt to keep the fun going all night long. Republicans finally took exception to it. A few votes flipped and McCarthy is now speaker. Turley noted a scene out of True Grit where John Wayne threatened to shoot Glenn Campbell because he was having too much fun spanking Kim Darby.
9. Rapid Dragon. I always enjoy it when the CCP worries about something (anything) the US military is doing rather than woke fecklessness. Story this week is about Rapid Dragon, a palletized weapon system shoved out of the back of a C-130, essentially turning it into an air to mud platform. The pallet is slowed down by parachute and launches Joint Air to Surface Standoff Missiles (JASSM). The concept can be used for other air launched weapons systems. It can also be used in C-17s which will make the trash haulers very happy.
10. Geoengineering. Geoengineering is the notion of using human engineering to change something about the planet. MIT Technology Review a few weeks ago ran a piece about an outfit calling itself Make Sunsets releasing sulfur particles from balloons in order to reverse manmade global warming. Volcanic sulfur dioxide (SO2) aerosols have long been blamed for global cooling following massive eruptions. Now we have a startup actually doing it and looking for investors. Obvious question is who is allowing them to muck up the atmosphere on a global basis? My guess is that the Harris – Xiden EPA won’t stop them as they are fellow travelers to our great climate nirvana. The obvious question is: Have these guys ever seen Snowpiercer? That is the SciFi movie / series based on mankind triggering the next great ice age by trying to fend off manmade global warming due to CO2 emissions. It is supposed to be a cautionary tale rather than an instruction manual.
More later –
– AG