A propaganda effort backfires on its originators

I can't help laughing cynically at the outrage expressed by US Congressional representative Bobby Rush (D - Illinois) and Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot (christened "Groot" by the always useful Second City Cop blog, which has chronicled her missteps and foibles since she took office, including some rather revealing history).

The story begins with this news report.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot and U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush on Thursday condemned images they said depicted Chicago police officers making popcorn, drinking coffee and sleeping on a couch in the congressman’s campaign office while nearby businesses were being looted amid unrest nearly two weeks ago.

The revelation came at an unusual City Hall news conference where the former political enemies stood united, with Rush praising Lightfoot’s leadership and the mayor apologizing to the veteran congressman on behalf of the city.

“That’s a personal embarrassment to me,” Lightfoot said of the scene that played out inside Rush’s Fuller Park political office. “I’m sorry that you and your staff even had to deal with this incredible indignity."

. . .

Lightfoot pledged to hold them accountable for their actions.

“Not one of these officers will be allowed to hide behind the badge and go on and act like nothing ever happened,” she said.

There's more at the link.

Sounds bad, doesn't it?  I wasn't surprised to read it, though.  When the Mayor and her city administration spend most of their time bad-mouthing the police (and blaming them for problems largely caused by their elected and appointed administrators), it was no surprise to me that officers would prefer to remain somewhere peaceful rather than risk being publicly pilloried yet again for trying to do their jobs.

However, the story didn't end there.  Second City Cop confirms that the officers were assigned to Congressman Rush's office, to protect it after it had been burglarized (presumably by rioters).  They weren't sheltering from the riots or ignoring them - they were where they were supposed to be, on duty.  As SCC notes, "The officers were wrong in availing themselves of popcorn and coffee that wasn't theirs, but they were ordered to hold that position with no relief and, tactically, no ability to stop hundreds of persons bent on mayhem."  Puts a different complexion on the matter, doesn't it?

Now the news media are becoming aware of the real story.  For example:

Second City Cop notes, "It was an assigned detail. Rush has been lying his entire life, from the "racial profiling" that didn't happen, to being the insider who set up Fred Hampton. Groot's hatred of the CPD has blinded her to this fact."

I think there's a whole lot more to this case than meets the eye.  It looks very much as if Rush and Lightfoot were trying to manufacture more "dirt" with which to smear the Chicago Police Department.  I await further developments with interest, and I'll be reading Second City Cop to get the inside story.  If you're not familiar with Chicago, and want the lowdown on its crime and law enforcement situation, SCC is the place to go.

Peter

Heh

Fellow blogger Eaton Rapids Joe says he's "just installed our new security system at the end of the driveway".

Yes, that should give low-lifes pause for thought!  You'll find a larger version of that placard at the link above, if you want to print it out for your own use.  (The phone number, needless to say, is not his - but I like where it directs callers!  Look it up online for yourself.)

Nice one, Joe!




Peter

Saturday Snippet: what you believe is what you do, not what you say

I've said for years (to the discomfort of many of my listeners) that I'm not interested in hearing what you believe.  Words are cheap.  One can profess almost anything, but be lying.  No, I want to see what you believe:  and that means I want to see what you do, how you live, how you behave.  The old truism that "actions speak louder than words" remains as valid today as it ever was.

Rudyard Kipling wrote a long poem about that sort of thing.  It speaks volumes to our society today, where faith is honored far more in the breach than in the observance, but those breaching it will still argue hotly that they belong to this, or that, or the other faith, because they say they do.  The reality is, their actions (or, sometimes, the lack thereof) demonstrate clearly that they have no faith at all.

Here's "Tomlinson", from 1892.

Now Tomlinson gave up the ghost in his house in Berkeley Square,
And a Spirit came to his bedside and gripped him by the hair -
A Spirit gripped him by the hair and carried him far away,
Till he heard as the roar of a rain-fed ford the roar of the Milky Way:
Till he heard the roar of the Milky Way die down and drone and cease,
And they came to the Gate within the Wall where Peter holds the keys.
"Stand up, stand up now, Tomlinson, and answer loud and high
The good that ye did for the sake of men or ever ye came to die -
The good that ye did for the sake of men in little earth so lone!"
And the naked soul of Tomlinson grew white as a rain-washed bone.
"O I have a friend on earth," he said, "that was my priest and guide,
And well would he answer all for me if he were by my side."
"For that ye strove in neighbour-love it shall be written fair,
But now ye wait at Heaven's Gate and not in Berkeley Square:
Though we called your friend from his bed this night, he could not speak for you,
For the race is run by one and one and never by two and two."
Then Tomlinson looked up and down, and little gain was there,
For the naked stars grinned overhead, and he saw that his soul was bare:
The Wind that blows between the worlds, it cut him like a knife,
And Tomlinson took up his tale and spoke of his good in life.
"This I have read in a book," he said, "and that was told to me,
And this I have thought that another man thought of a Prince in Muscovy."
The good souls flocked like homing doves and bade him clear the path,
And Peter twirled the jangling keys in weariness and wrath.
"Ye have read, ye have heard, ye have thought," he said, "and the tale is yet to run:
By the worth of the body that once ye had, give answer - what ha' ye done?"
Then Tomlinson looked back and forth, and little good it bore,
For the Darkness stayed at his shoulder-blade and Heaven's Gate before:
"O this I have felt, and this I have guessed, and this I have heard men say,
And this they wrote that another man wrote of a carl in Norroway."
- "Ye have read, ye have felt, ye have guessed, good lack! Ye have hampered Heaven's Gate;
There's little room between the stars in idleness to prate!
O none may reach by hired speech of neighbour, priest, and kin
Through borrowed deed to God's good meed that lies so fair within;
Get hence, get hence to the Lord of Wrong, for doom has yet to run,
And...the faith that ye share with Berkeley Square uphold you, Tomlinson!"

. . . . . . . . . . . . .

The Spirit gripped him by the hair, and sun by sun they fell
Till they came to the belt of Naughty Stars that rim the mouth of Hell:
The first are red with pride and wrath, the next are white with pain,
But the third are black with clinkered sin that cannot burn again:
They may hold their path, they may leave their path, with never a soul to mark,
They may burn or freeze, but they must not cease in the Scorn of the Outer Dark.
The Wind that blows between the worlds, it nipped him to the bone,
And he yearned to the flare of Hell-Gate there as the light of his own hearth-stone.
The Devil he sat behind the bars, where the desperate legions drew,
But he caught the hasting Tomlinson and would not let him through.
"Wot ye the price of good pit-coal that I must pay?" said he,
"That ye rank yoursel' so fit for Hell and ask no leave of me?
I am all o'er-sib to Adam's breed that ye should give me scorn,
For I strove with God for your First Father the day that he was born.
Sit down, sit down upon the slag, and answer loud and high
The harm that ye did to the Sons of Men or ever you came to die."
And Tomlinson looked up and up, and saw against the night
The belly of a tortured star blood-red in Hell-Mouth light;
And Tomlinson looked down and down, and saw beneath his feet
The frontlet of a tortured star milk-white in Hell-Mouth heat.
"O I had a love on earth," said he, "that kissed me to my fall,
And if ye would call my love to me I know she would answer all."
- "All that ye did in love forbid it shall be written fair,
But now ye wait at Hell-Mouth Gate and not in Berkeley Square:
Though we whistled your love from her bed to-night, I trow she would not run,
For the sin ye do by two and two ye must pay for one by one!"
The Wind that blows between the worlds, it cut him like a knife,
And Tomlinson took up the tale and spoke of his sin in life:
"Once I ha' laughed at the power of Love and twice at the grip of the Grave,
And thrice I ha' patted my God on the head that men might call me brave."
The Devil he blew on a brandered soul and set it aside to cool:
"Do ye think I would waste my good pit-coal on the hide of a brain-sick fool?
I see no worth in the hobnailed mirth or the jolthead jest ye did
That I should waken my gentlemen that are sleeping three on a grid."
Then Tomlinson looked back and forth, and there was little grace,
For Hell-Gate filled the houseless Soul with the Fear of Naked Space.
"Nay, this I ha' heard," quo' Tomlinson, "and this was noised abroad,
And this I ha' got from a Belgian book on the word of a dead French lord."
- "Ye ha' heard, ye ha' read, ye ha' got, good lack! and the tale begins afresh -
Have ye sinned one sin for the pride o' the eye or the sinful lust of the flesh?"
Then Tomlinson he gripped the bars and yammered, "Let me in -
For I mind that I borrowed my neighbour's wife to sin the deadly sin."
The Devil he grinned behind the bars, and banked the fires high:
"Did ye read of that sin in a book?" said he; and Tomlinson said, "Ay!"
The Devil he blew upon his nails, and the little devils ran,
And he said: "Go husk this whimpering thief that comes in the guise of a man:
Winnow him out 'twixt star and star, and sieve his proper worth:
There's sore decline in Adam's line if this be spawn of earth."
Empusa's crew, so naked-new they may not face the fire,
But weep that they bin too small to sin to the height of their desire,
Over the coal they chased the Soul, and racked it all abroad,
As children rifle a caddis-case or the raven's foolish hoard.
And back they came with the tattered Thing, as children after play,
And they said: "The soul that he got from God he has bartered clean away.
We have threshed a stook of print and book, and winnowed a chattering wind
And many a soul wherefrom he stole, but his we cannot find:
We have handled him, we have dandled him, we have seared him to the bone,
And sure if tooth and nail show truth he has no soul of his own."
The Devil he bowed his head on his breast and rumbled deep and low:
"I'm all o'er-sib to Adam's breed that I should bid him go.
Yet close we lie, and deep we lie, and if I gave him place,
My gentlemen that are so proud would flout me to my face;
They'd call my house a common stews and me a careless host,
And - I would not anger my gentlemen for the sake of a shiftless ghost."
The Devil he looked at the mangled Soul that prayed to feel the flame,
And he thought of Holy Charity, but he thought of his own good name:
"Now ye could haste my coal to waste, and sit ye down to fry:
Did ye think of that theft for yourself?" said he; and Tomlinson said, "Ay!"
The Devil he blew an outward breath, for his heart was free from care: -
"Ye have scarce the soul of a louse," he said, "but the roots of sin are there,
And for that sin should ye come in were I the lord alone.
But sinful pride has rule inside - and mightier than my own.
Honour and Wit, fore-damned they sit, to each his priest and whore:
Nay, scarce I dare myself go there, and you they'd torture sore.
Ye are neither spirit nor spirk," he said; "ye are neither book nor brute -
Go, get ye back to the flesh again for the sake of Man's repute.
I'm all o'er-sib to Adam's breed that I should mock your pain,
But look that ye win to worthier sin ere ye come back again.
Get hence, the hearse is at your door - the grim black stallions wait -
They bear your clay to place to-day. Speed, lest ye come too late!
Go back to Earth with a lip unsealed - go back with an open eye,
And carry my word to the Sons of Men or ever ye come to die:
That the sin they do by two and two they must pay for one by one -
And. . .the God that you took from a printed book be with you, Tomlinson!"

According to the Kipling Society:

On his arrival in England in October 1889 Kipling took an instant dislike to the followers of the so-called Aesthetic Movement, who tended to go in for long hair, affectation of speech and manner, and eccentricity of dress. In a poem ("In Partibus") which he sent to the Civil and Military Gazette in the following month he wrote -

"But I consort with long-haired things
In velvet collar-rolls
Who talk about the Aims of Art
And 'theories' and 'goals',
And moo and coo with womenfolk
About their blessed souls."

Tomlinson is one of these.

I'm obliged to the New Zealand blogger at Bright Darkness for reminding me of this poem.  Food for thought, isn't it?

Peter

Flushed with (varying) success

Following my question a couple of days ago, a reader e-mailed me the link to this video clip.  It's kinda fun.

I'm not going to test our new toilet (whatever it turns out to be) quite as thoroughly, but it's nice to know what will (and won't) work (sometimes).




Peter

A sheriff with the right idea

Sheriff Grady Judd of Polk County, Florida, has the right idea about demonstrators versus rioters.

Sheriff Judd said ... he does not believe Polk County residents were the ones creating problems.

He said there’s a difference between a protester and a rioter and rioting will not be accepted.

Judd said they received information that law enforcement would come under attack at 8 p.m. near Interstate 4 and Highway 27, but the Polk County Sheriff’s Office and Florida Highway Patrol were ready.

Judd said the Highway Patrol did a “marvelous job” helping stop the few who showed up for that alleged effort.

“We are going to hunt you down and lock you up if you engage in any criminal conduct,” Judd said.

Judd said there were rumblings on social media that rioters planned to bring violence into the neighborhoods of Polk County.

“I would tell them, if you value your life, they probably shouldn’t do that in Polk County. Because the people of Polk County like guns, they have guns, I encourage them to own guns, and they’re going to be in their homes tonight with their guns loaded, and if you try to break into their homes to steal, to set fires, I’m highly recommending they blow you back out of the house with their guns. So, leave the community alone,” Judd said.



The sheriff encouraged anyone wishing to express their First Amendment right to free speech to keep the focus on George Floyd, who Judd said was a victim who should be honored.

"All of that ugliness has taken away from what we're united about," the sheriff said. "We're united about the conduct that you saw with George [Floyd]."

There's more at the link.

I couldn't agree more.  As I said right at the start of this rioting, I'll gladly join any street protest or demonstration against the way George Floyd met his death.  It cries out for judicial action, and it seems that action is being taken.  However, that's no excuse for rioting - particularly pre-planned, organized riots such as those we're currently seeing.

A riot is no longer a protest:  it's thuggery, looting, mayhem, anarchy and chaos.  Peaceful protests and demonstrations are lawful, and as such are protected by the First Amendment.  Riots are criminal, and are therefore prime candidates to be dealt with using the provisions of the Second Amendment.  Any violence offered by rioters to citizens like you and I needs to be resisted to the utmost, right from the start.

As the late, great Jeff Cooper once said:

One bleeding-heart type asked me in a recent interview if I did not agree that 'violence begets violence.' I told him that it is my earnest endeavor to see that it does. I would like very much to ensure - and in some cases I have - that any man who offers violence to his fellow citizen begets a whole lot more in return than he can enjoy.

Well said, sir!  It looks like Sheriff Judd got the message.

Peter

Shakespeare's influence on the things we say

I was interested to find this graphic on MeWe the other day.

I knew of Shakespeare's immense influence on the English language, of course, but it's intriguing to see how many expressions that we take for granted can be found in his plays and verse.  Without him, expressing ourselves would be much more difficult.

Peter

Pun of the week

From Stephan Pastis, who likes puns almost as much as I do.  Click the image for a larger view at the "Pearls Before Swine" comic strip Web page.

Peter

Miss D.'s new book is out!

My wife has just published her third novel, "Going Ballistic".  I think it's her best yet.

Dorothy is a pilot, and it shows to good advantage in this book.  She's able to describe the minutiae of flying, and the typical interactions of a pilot with airport and airline personnel, in a way that's authoritative, entertaining, and holds one's interest without becoming too technical.

A few other authors in the North Texas Writers, Shooters and Pilots Association, including yours truly, were consulted about the finer details of aircraft security, assault tactics, and other interesting military bits and pieces, so we were drawn into the action early on.  Some of our collective and individual memories of the loud-noises variety may be found in these pages, thinly disguised as fiction.

The blurb reads:

When her plane tries to come apart at apogee during a hijack, ballistic airline pilot Michelle Lauden handles the worst day she could imagine. After getting down without losing any passengers or crew, though, she finds her troubles have just begun!

The country she's landed in has just declared independence from the Federation. The Feds intended her passengers to be the first casualties in the impending war - and they're not happy she's survived to contradict their official narrative in the news.

The local government wants to find her to give her a medal. The Feds are hunting her to give her an unmarked grave. As they both close in, Michelle's running out of options and time. The only people able to protect her are an accident investigation team on loan from the Federation's enemies... the same enemies who sent her hijackers in the first place.

And they have their own plans for her, and the country she's in!

At present the novel is available in an e-book edition.  A print edition is in preparation, and will follow (God, the Internet and Amazon.com willing) within a month or so.

Peter

Your feel-good video of the month

A construction operator took a few moments to make two kids very happy.

I don't know if his employer gives a public relations award to worthy employees, but if they do, his name should be on it.  Well done, sir.

Peter

True dat!

Found on Gab:

And that's why we're having so many problems getting out of "this" together - because with very few exceptions, those managing "this" aren't part of what the rest of us are experiencing.  I reckon most of them need replacing, at once if not sooner.




Peter

A fascinating tale of obsession, teamwork and undersea exploration

The New Yorker has a very interesting (and very long) article about a man's obsession with reaching the bottom of the deepest point in every ocean, and how he set about it.  In the process, he built - as a private venture, using his own money - the only vessel in existence certified to dive to any depth, anywhere on Earth.

Here's a short excerpt.

Most submarines go down several hundred metres, then across; this one was designed to sink like a stone. It was the shape of a bulging briefcase, with a protruding bulb at the bottom. This was the pressure hull—a titanium sphere, five feet in diameter, which was sealed off from the rest of the submersible and housed the pilot and all his controls. Under the passenger seat was a tuna-fish sandwich, the pilot’s lunch. He gazed out of one of the viewports, into the blue. It would take nearly four hours to reach the bottom.

Sunlight cuts through the first thousand feet of water. This is the epipelagic zone, the layer of plankton, kelp, and reefs. It contains the entire ecosystem of marine plants, as well as the mammals and the fish that eat them. An Egyptian diver once descended to the limits of this layer. The feat required a lifetime of training, four years of planning, a team of support divers, an array of specialized air tanks, and a tedious, thirteen-hour ascent, with constant decompression stops, so that his blood would not be poisoned and his lungs would not explode.

The submersible dropped at a rate of about two and a half feet per second. Twenty minutes into the dive, the pilot reached the midnight zone, where dark waters turn black. The only light is the dim glow of bioluminescence—from electric jellies, camouflaged shrimp, and toothy predators with natural lanterns to attract unwitting prey. Some fish in these depths have no eyes—what use are they? There is little to eat. Conditions in the midnight zone favor fish with slow metabolic rates, weak muscles, and slimy, gelatinous bodies.

An hour into the descent, the pilot reached ten thousand feet—the beginning of the abyssal zone. The temperature is always a few degrees above freezing, and is unaffected by the weather at the surface. Animals feed on “marine snow”: scraps of dead fish and plants from the upper layers, falling gently through the water column. The abyssal zone, which extends to twenty thousand feet, encompasses ninety-seven per cent of the ocean floor.

After two hours in free fall, the pilot entered the hadal zone, named for the Greek god of the underworld. It is made up of trenches—geological scars at the edges of the earth’s tectonic plates—and although it composes only a tiny fraction of the ocean floor, it accounts for nearly fifty per cent of the depth.

Past twenty-seven thousand feet, the pilot had gone beyond the theoretical limit for any kind of fish. (Their cells collapse at greater depths.) After thirty-five thousand feet, he began releasing a series of weights, to slow his descent. Nearly seven miles of water was pressing on the titanium sphere. If there were any imperfections, it could instantly implode.

The submarine touched the silty bottom, and the pilot, a fifty-three-year-old Texan named Victor Vescovo, became the first living creature with blood and bones to reach the deepest point in the Tonga Trench.

There's much more at the link, including many photographs.

It's a pretty amazing story about a man driven to achieve what had never been done before, and the team he assembled to do it.  It's very long, but I think it's worth the time it'll take to read it.  Highly recommended.

Peter

The Babylon Bee hits one out of the park

I had to laugh out loud when I read this satirical, snarky "report".

Clever Texans have implemented a new strategy to stop Californians from fleeing their terrible state and ruining Texas with the same policies. Sneaking up to Oklahoma in the middle of the night, brave defenders of the Lone Star State installed "Welcome to Texas" signs atop the "Welcome to Oklahoma" signs surrounding Texas's neighbor.

Californians, whose minds have been slowed from years of marijuana, sushi, and the patchouli of hippies, won't be smart enough to notice the difference and will settle down in Oklahoma, not realizing they moved to the wrong state.

. . .

Oklahomans, annoyed by their new Californian neighbors constantly saying "dude" and "bro," have hatched a plot to move the Welcome to Texas signs to Nebraska.

There's more at the link.

The funniest thing is that everyone around here (North Texas) with whom I've shared that is entirely in agreement with it as a strategy!  No matter what their political perspective, they agree about "the California problem".  I try to point out that there are good, balanced, worthy Californians too, but they still look dubious . . .  The liberal/progressive city government and ethos in Austin (which even tried to ban smoky barbecue joints - of all things!) has convinced many Texans that we don't need more of them around here.




Peter

Thinking for ourselves, rather than being told what to think

Last week, we talked about "The corruption of the 'news' media into the 'propaganda' media".  In that context, I was interested to come across an article by my friend in meatspace and cyberspace, author Cedar Sanderson.  I think she makes a very good point.

The death of critical thinking and logic in our culture has become more and more evident in the last few years, reaching a feverish peak during the recent crisis ... if we do not start exercising our abilities to think clearly, skeptically, and seek truth, we can and are giving up much of what our ancestors fought and worked so hard to gain.

We have got to figure out how to think for ourselves again. And it seems the first step toward doing that is to reach over to the remote and turn off the news. Also, switch off Youtube if you’re trying to use that for ‘news’ and definitely flee the flaming dumpster that is Twitter.

What’s left?

That’s a good question. A very good question, and one I don’t fully have an answer for ... When I hear some tidbit of information, I spend a few minutes to track it back and verify it. Yes, this is a lot harder than simply letting the talking heads fill my mind with what they want to allow me to hear and think. On the other hand, with the world wide web of information at my fingertips, and a little knowledge of how to read critically, I can be a lot closer to the facts and finding the truth than I ever can if I rely on the mass media to think for me.

There's more at the link.

Cedar quotes from an article by William Lehman, in which he considers the damage done to human society by the increasingly-cut-off-from-reality press.

There once was a time when the “traditional” press was in service to the community.  Seems for the most part, that ship sailed.  Newspapers, the oldest mass media existent, are going the way of the dodo… well, they helped themselves become extinct, and I shall not much mourn their passing.  When the news existed to serve the community, and SURE, to expose corruption, and malfeasance, they served their purpose.  After Watergate though, it seems like the press got drunk on their own power.

. . .

Where once there were thoughtful articles weighing both sides of an issue, the “USA TODAY” and others of their ilk developed the Splash box, the Text box in a box, and all of the other things designed in a most P. T. Barnum way to excite, to stir the emotion, to catch your attention for mere seconds and then on to the next thing, in the style of “THIS WAY TO THE EGRESS!” “SEE THE EGRESS!” “THE EIGHTH WONDER OF THE WORLD, THE EGRESS!” until you find yourself dumped out at the end having passed through to “the egress” which of course, means EXIT, knowing no more than you did when you started, and wondering, “just what happened here?”

In short, they forgot their roots.

. . .

I desperately want you to question.  Take nothing, including what I say, at face value.  Always assume there’s a motive, an agenda.  My personal agenda I will be quite clear about, I want freedom, freedom for my nation, freedom for my people, and for my family.  I want people to THINK.  If I am trying to win your thoughts, it’s to cause you to question, to examine, and to reason. And I want you to question, including questioning me.

Again, more at the link.

I think both articles have the right of it.  Recommended reading.

Peter

Practical, effective ways to combat the COVID-19 virus

In mid-March, I cited Tomas Pueyo's article "Coronavirus:  Why You Must Act Now".  It was a clarion call to politicians and business leaders to take immediate action to slow the spread of the coronavirus, and listed various measures that would help in that process.

I was interested to learn that a number of experts in their field have since joined with Mr. Pueyo to study the matter further.  They've published four more articles, which I recommend to your attention, and will be publishing more (you can sign up for notifications here).  The articles analyze what's happened around the world, what's worked, and what hasn't.  Those so far published include:

Coronavirus: The Hammer and the Dance

What the Next 18 Months Can Look Like, if Leaders Buy Us Time

Coronavirus: Learning How to Dance

Part 1: A Dancing Masterclass, or What We

Can Learn from Countries Around the World

Coronavirus: The Basic Dance Steps

Everybody Can Follow

Part 2 of Coronavirus: Learning How to Dance

Coronavirus: How to Do Testing

and Contact Tracing

Part 3 of Coronavirus: Learning How to Dance

They've also produced a more formal, scientific article titled "Evidence-based, cost-effective interventions to suppress the COVID-19 pandemic: a rapid systematic review".  Click on that link to go to its summary page, then click "Preview PDF" to read the text.

I find these articles interesting in that they're analyzing events "on the ground" and recommending ways to make dealing with the pandemic easier for all of us.  They're not politically motivated, and don't seem to have any particular special-interest agenda to push.  They appear to aim to provide as much useful, practical information as possible.  For example, from their latest article:

Many countries are enduring the Hammer today: a heavy set of social distancing measures that have stopped the economy. Millions have lost their jobs, their income, their savings, their businesses, their freedom. The economic cost is brutal. Countries are desperate to know what they need to do to open up the economy again.

Thankfully, a set of four measures can dramatically reduce the epidemic. They are dirt cheap compared to closing the economy. If many countries are enduring the Hammer today, these measures are the scalpel, carefully extracting the infected rather than hitting everybody at once.

These four measures need each other. They don’t work without one another:

• With testing, we find out who is infected
• With isolations, we prevent them from infecting others
• With contact tracing, we figure out the people with whom they’ve been in contact
• With quarantines, we prevent these contacts from infecting others

Testing and contact tracing are the intelligence, while isolations and quarantines are the action.

There's much more at the link.

The thing is, of course, that these measures aren't "one-size-fits-all" like the total shutdown of the economy currently being experienced.  They require good judgment, careful administration and constant monitoring of the health care workers in the field doing the work.  That's anathema to bureaucrats, who'd rather use a single mold and force everyone into it, because it's easier to administer that way.  (The bureaucrats will also have to get out of the way of those who can produce solutions - such as, for example, cheap, accurate easy-to-use tests for COVID-19 - rather than micromanage every aspect of the problem.)  Politicians also won't like it, because it demands that they use their heads rather than react with a knee-jerk.  (For an example of the latter, note the number of states whose governors have extended the lock-down, some into July, rather than proactively seek to restart their economies while protecting citizens so far not affected by the virus.)

Kudos to Mr. Pueyo and his team for producing these articles.  It's good to have all the information pulled together and synthesized, to provide a detailed overview of successes, failures, and potential next steps.  I look forward to seeing what they have in mind in future.  Thanks to them and those like them, the rest of us are better informed, and have options to consider - and to recommend to our elected leaders.

Peter

Just for once - don't be shocked! - I'm actually going to recommend a Michael Moore movie

In the past I've had very little time for Michael Moore and his deliberately confrontational, far-left-wing perspective, expressed in his movies (Bowling for Columbine and Fahrenheit 9/11 being probably the best known).  I still disagree profoundly with his politics:  but I must, however grudgingly, doff my hat to his willingness to slaughter sacred cows in his latest documentary, Planet of the Humans.

The New York Post, hardly a left-wing rag, says of it:

Memo from Moore to those who think they are driving green: You may indulge your illusions if you prefer. But all you’ve really done is transfer your emissions from the tailpipe of your car to the smokestack of the local power plant.

Maybe you think solar power is the answer?

Moore treats you to a visit to a showy solar array that covers an entire football field. The power-company executive present admits that it can only power ten homes, and then only when the sun shines.

Powering the nearby city of Lansing, Mich., he says with a grin, would require 15 square miles of panels. You want to talk about “footprints?”

We follow local environmentalists as they hike up a mountain where a site has been clear-cut for 21 mega wind turbines. They deplore the destruction of the natural beauty of the landscape and the scattering of the wildlife it once supported.

The engineer in charge ticks off the hundreds of tons of concrete, steel, aluminum, carbon and other products that go into the construction of each and every mega wind turbine. Industry requires huge inputs of energy to produce such things, a total energy deficit that the spinning blades of the wind turbine will not begin to pay back over its projected lifetime.

Moore ends the segment with a shot of broken and rusted wind turbines littering the landscape.

We visit plants that generate electricity by burning “biomass” rather than fossil fuel. But as we see one diesel-powered machine after another felling, hauling and chipping logs for burning, the absurdity of the entire enterprise comes into focus. In the final scene we see a clear-cut forest and learn that we would need to burn every tree in America to power the country for just one year.

By the midpoint of the movie, Moore has already revealed that each and every form of green energy is a fraud, surviving on popular naivete, government subsidies and the products of industrial civilization.

. . .

He ... [takes] us to a green concert, where the organizer has just announced to cheers from the crowd that it is powered by “solar energy.” Going backstage, however, we learn that the tiny solar array is only for show. The actual power for the lights, amplifiers and electric guitars comes from a portable diesel generator.

Then he moves on to the big boys. He exposes the massive funding that the Sierra Club, 350 and other environmental groups receive from the energy industry, and exposes the connections between leading environmentalists like Al Gore and Wall Street financiers.

For now, you can still watch Moore’s epic take-down of “green energy” on YouTube, but you’d better move fast. There’s a campaign underway to remove it from that service as well.

If you do tune in, bear in mind that Moore is no friend of free markets or individual liberty. His “solution” to reducing humanity’s use of energy is a throwback to twentieth-century population control ... But you can fast forward through that part. Otherwise, it’s a joy to watch Moore skewer one “renewable energy” fantasy after another.

There's more at the link.

On April 21st, Moore put the movie on YouTube, free to watch for 30 days.  We're about halfway through that free watching period right now, so you've got about two weeks to see it at no expense, if you wish.  I highly recommend that you do.  Like the reviewer above, I don't hold with Moore's proposed solution:  but the documentary nevertheless provides an honest look at the frauds and confabulations of the eco-warrior clique, and shows how many of their most favored projects and plans are essentially nothing but frauds.  Meanwhile, of course, they're making a very great deal of money out of them.  "Follow the money" remains a very reliable method to find out what's really motivating almost any agenda or policy.

Here's a teaser trailer for the movie.

And here's the movie itself.  Enjoy it while you still can!

Kudos to Mr. Moore for his objectivity and honesty in this documentary.  Frankly, I wouldn't have believed him capable of it, based on his past movies.  I still don't agree with his progressive views, but I'll gladly give credit where credit is due.

Peter

A McLaren sports car versus an F-35?

I was amused to discover this video clip from the British TV program Top Gear.  In it, a McLaren Speedtail sports car is pitted against one of Britain's STOVL F-35B strike aircraft.  It's a lot of fun.

Boys and their toys indeed . . .




Peter

Oh, I wish . . .

. . . this wasn't just a comic!  Click the image to be taken to a larger version at the "Pearls Before Swine" Web page.

The only improvement I can think of would be to have the CEO try to call 911 to complain - only to find it's been outsourced to India, and the staff there speak English with an accent so heavy it's almost indecipherable.




Peter

Saturday Snippet: The Book of Heroic Failures

Back in 1979, Stephen Pile published "The Book of Heroic Failures".  It was billed as "The Official Handbook of the Not Terribly Good Club of Great Britain", and was riotously successful.

He followed it in 1988 with "The Return of Heroic Failures".  A third volume, "The Ultimate Book of Heroic Failures", came along in 2011, with a fourth (containing selections from the first two, which are long out of print), "The Not Terribly Good Book of Heroic Failures", in 2012.  The last two are available in e-book format as well as print versions.

Mr. Pile observed:

“Success is overrated. We all crave it despite daily evidence that our real genius lies in exactly the opposite direction. Incompetence is what we are good at. It is what marks us off from the animals. We should learn to revere it. All successful people are the same. You know, drive, will to win, determination … it is just too dull to contemplate, whereas everyone who messes up big time does so in a completely individual way. Doing something badly requires skill, panache, genius, exquisite timing and real style.”

I thought you might enjoy a few of the tales from the first book in the series.  It, and its sequel, are part of my library.

THE LEAST SUCCESSFUL SECURITY OPERATION

Worried that ground staff were stealing miniature bottles of whisky from a Pan-Am aircraft, security guards set a trap.

In the summer of 1978 they wired up a cuckoo clock inside the drinks cabinet, so arranged that it would stop whenever the door was opened.  This, they said, would reveal the exact time of the theft.

They omitted, however, to tell the plane's crew, with the result that a stewardess, Miss Susan Becker, assumed it was a bomb.

She alerted the pilot of the Boeing 727, who made an emergency landing at Berlin where eighty passengers left in a hurry through fire exits.

A Pan-Am spokesman said afterwards that the miniature bottles of whisky on the plane cost 17 pence each.

The cost of the emergency landing was £6,500.


THE VET WHO SURPRISED A COW

In the course of his duties in August 1977, a Dutch veterinary surgeon was required to treat an ailing cow.  To investigate its internal gases he inserted a tube into that end of the animal not capable of facial expression, and struck a match.  The jet of flame set fire first to some bales of hay and then to the whole farm, causing damage estimated at £45,000.  The vet was later fined £140 for starting a fire in a manner surprising to the magistrates.  The cow escaped with shock.


THE WORST CANAL CLEARANCE

In 1978 workers were sent to dredge a murky stretch of the Chesterfield-Stockwith canal.  Their task was to remove all the rubbish and leave the canal clear.  They were soon disturbed during their tea break by a policeman who said he was investigating a giant whirlpool in the canal.  When they got back, however, the whirlpool had gone, and so had a one and a half mile stretch of the canal.  In its place was a seamless stretch of mud thickly punctuated with old prams, bedsteads and rusting bicycle accessories.  In addition to this the workmen found a flotilla of holidaymakers stranded on their boats in a brown sludge.

Among the first pieces of junk they hauled out had been the 200-year-old plug that alone ensured the canal's continuing existence.  "We didn't know there was a plug," said one workman, explaining that all the records had been lost in a fire during the war.  "Anything can happen on the canal," a spokesman for the British Waterways Board said afterwards.


THE FASTEST FAILURE OF A DRIVING TEST

In the early 1970s Mrs Helen Ireland of Auburn in California failed her driving test in the first second.

She got into the car, said "Good morning" to the tester and started the engine.  However, she mistook the accelerator for the clutch and shot straight through the wall of the Driving Test Center.

(In 1969 an accelerator/clutch confusion enabled Mrs Beatrice Park to drive into the River Wrey at Guildford during her fifth test.  She and her examiner climbed onto the roof and waited to be rescued.  The examiner was later sent home in a state of shock, still clutching his clipboard.  When Mrs Park asked if she had passed her test, she was told:  "We cannot say until we have seen the examiner's report.")


THE WORST PRISON GUARDS

The highest number of convicts ever to escape simultaneously from a maximum security prison is 124.  This record is held by Alcoente Prison, near Lisbon in Portugal.

During the weeks leading up to the escape in July 1978 the prison warders had noticed that attendances had fallen at film shows which included 'The Great Escape', and also that 220 knives and a huge quantity of electric cable had disappeared.  A guard explained, "Yes, we were planning to look for them, but never got around to it."  The warders had not, however, noticed the gaping holes in the wall because they were "covered with posters".  Nor did they detect any of the spades, chisels, water hoses and electric drills amassed by the inmates in large quantities.  The night before the breakout one guard had noticed that of the 36 prisoners in his block, only 13 were present.  He said this was "normal" because inmates sometimes missed roll-call or hid, but usually came back the next morning.

"We only found out about the escape at 6.30 the next morning when one of the prisoners told us," a warder said later.  The searchlights were described as "our worst enemy" because they had been directed at the warders' faces, dazzled them and made it impossible to see anything around the prison walls.  When they eventually checked, the prison guards found that exactly half the jail's population was missing.  By way of explanation the Justice Minister, Dr Santos Pais, claimed that the escape was "normal" and part of the "legitimate desire of the prisoner to regain his liberty."

There are plenty more stories in the books.  They're a lot of fun.

Peter

First look: KelTec P17 pistol

Sitting on my desk as I type these words is a KelTec P17 .22LR pistol.  The company has very generously made it available to me for testing, for which my thanks.  I promise I won't softball the review, either.  As most of you know, I've taught many disabled and/or handicapped shooters to use a handgun to defend themselves, including a number who can't handle the recoil of larger cartridges due to their physical limitations.  They rely on .22LR for defensive use, and on pistols like the P17;  so I'll be testing it to a pretty high standard - namely, would I trust my life to this gun?  If not, I'll say so, and tell you why.  We'll see.

The P17 has all the usual features, plus some that are unique at this price point:  its suggested retail price is only $199.  That's by far the cheapest .22LR pistol that I've seen in gun stores.  Kudos to KelTec for pulling out all the stops to make this a full-featured offering at an irresistible price.

The pistol ships with a threaded muzzle and an adaptor for muzzle devices and/or a suppressor;  three (yes, three!) 16-round magazines (it holds 17 with one round in the chamber, hence its name of P17);  a wrench for removing the muzzle adaptor;  and a safety lock.  The sights are standard rear and green fiber-optic front.  I particularly like the fact that the green fiber-optic strand is embedded inside a traditional square-shaped front sight, so that if one wants to ignore the green dot and carefully line up the top of the front sight with the top of the 'ears' of the rear sight, that's easy to do.  Bonus points to KelTec for that.

I've only fired one quick magazine through the P17 so far.  Accuracy was good, recoil no more than any other .22LR pistol (which is to say, minimal), and handling very easy.  The pistol's frame and grip are made of hard plastic, with a textured pattern on the grip.  It's nicely shaped;  a teensy bit too small for my large hands, but it's not a problem to adjust my grasp to compensate.  I think it should fit most shooters very comfortably.  At only 14 ounces fully loaded, the weight is easily managed.

Here's KelTec's quick start guide to unboxing the P17.

I'm going to put this pistol through an extended test over the next few weeks, including (if I can line up the shooters, the range and the ammunition) shooting a thousand rounds in a day as a "torture test".  If the P17 lives up to its initial promise, and if it proves reliable, it's going to be a game-changer in the entry-level pistol market.  It's at least a hundred dollars cheaper than any comparable pistol I've seen.  It's light and easy-handling enough that the entire family can learn to shoot with it, and seventeen rounds of .22LR hollow-point ammunition is nothing to sneeze at if it comes to defensive use.  (If you doubt that, refer to my earlier article on .22LR as a defensive round, particularly the training routine I recommended there.  Once you've achieved that standard, you'll find the .22LR round to be eminently usable for personal security.)

What's more, .22LR ammunition is still relatively easy and affordable to buy, although it's getting more scarce by the day.  If you don't already have a stash of the stuff, now might be a very good time to buy a few hundred (or a few thousand) rounds to tide you over until the current ammo drought eases.  It's a very useful and low-cost way to keep your skills and training up to the mark.  (If you can afford to buy in bulk, my favorite online dealer, SGAmmo, still has plenty in stock.  I've already got mine, thank you very much!  No, SGAmmo isn't paying me or recompensing me in any way for recommending them.)

I'll have a more detailed review and shooting report in due course, but I'm initially favorably impressed by KelTec's P17.  The company may have a winner here.

Peter

Yep . . .

In the light of my first post this morning, these two memes on MeWe kinda jumped out at me.

Word.  (Or, in this case, pictures.)

Peter