Herds of Mysterious ‘Glacier Mice’ Baffle Scientists Atlas Obscura
Take an Immersive Journey Through an Ancient Rainforest’s Mycelial Network in ‘Fungi: Web of Life’ Colossal
Things You Don’t See in A Recession Carson Group
Pfizer’s paradox: Albert Bourla walks a fine line as he tries to turn around 2023’s worst-performing big drugmaker Endpoints News. I looked up the collective noun for weasels (cf. “exaltation of larks”), and they’re pretty boring: boogle, confusion, gang, pack, sneak. Perhaps a “bourla of weasels”?
Climate
COP28 climate summit signals the end of fossil fuels — but is it enough? Nature. By Betteridges’s Law….
Figures from the Global Carbon Budget 2023 Robbie Andrew. Many charts, for example:
Russia is an interesting natural experiment. If you really want to reduce emissions, collapse the economy (and crash life expectancy).
How lending-based climate finance is pushing poor countries deeper into debt France24
Never mind politics and partisanship: Climate action is an economic imperative for us all Orlando Sentinel. Great lead: “Irrefutable, undeniable evidence shows climate change is happening, and it’s costing you money.”
Water
Thousands of permits designed to protect Colorado streams are expired Colorado Sun
#COVID19
Anybody who supports the Swedish model should think carefully about the nature and effects of their approach. With subtitles:
The Swedish State Epidemiologist talks about the deaths with Covid that have happened within the last couple of weeks in Sweden.
Swedish Television Morning News, December 11 2023. pic.twitter.com/zzM6HenELy— jorgenponder — om coronavirusepidemin (@jorgenponder) December 11, 2023
Commentary:
Here is a subtitled Ebba Busch, leader of the Christian Democrats and now in government, about what happened. pic.twitter.com/vA9v5Ra1F7
— jorgenponder — om coronavirusepidemin (@jorgenponder) July 16, 2023
Number of Covid-19 cases in Malaysia nearly doubles in a week Straits Times. No new variants, so it is said.
High fusion and cytopathy of SARS-CoV-2 variant B.1.640.1 Journal of Virology (GM). From the Abstract: “SARS-CoV-2 variants with undetermined properties have emerged intermittently throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. Some variants possess unique phenotypes and mutations which allow further characterization of viral evolution and Spike functions. Around 1,100 cases of the B.1.640.1 variant were reported in Africa and Europe between 2021 and 2022, before the expansion of Omicron. Here, we analyzed the biological properties of a B.1.640.1 isolate and its Spike… Altogether, our results highlight the cytopathy [“damages or destroys cells“] of a hyper-fusogenic [“facilitating fusion, especially relating to cells“] SARS-CoV-2 variant, supplanted upon the emergence of Omicron BA.1.” Let ‘er rip!
Study: 4% of US collegiate athletes developed long COVID Center for Infectious Disease and Policy. Probably an undercount, given that administrators (i.e., recruiters) are being interviewed.
China?
Chinese banker jailed for life in US$483 million corruption case, largest ever in country’s history South China Morning. That’s almost real money!
Focus on people not numbers, China told, as it faces unavoidable birth decline Channel News Asia
Why China Is Stepping Up Its Maritime Attacks on the Philippines Foreign Policy
Myanmar
‘Fighting is all around’: Myanmar faces deepening humanitarian crisis Al Jazeera. It’s not a “humanitarian crisis.” It’s a war, an armed popular uprising being the only way to rid Myanmar of the Tatmadaw.
China says peace talks held over north Myanmar conflict, ‘positive results’ Channel News Asia. So China split the Three Brotherhood Alliance (ethnic armed organizations), good job.
Commentary: Vietnam’s ‘bamboo policy’ is an asset as the US, China come calling Channel News Asai
Indonesia calls in army to help farmers plant rice as drought curbs output Channel News Asia
Syraqistan
Israel says it will continue Gaza war ‘with or without international support’ France24
Israel as a Conquering State Bracing Views
Biden administration staffers hold vigil outside White House, urge Gaza cease-fire Anadolu Agency
US Homeland Security staff accuse leadership of turning ‘blind eye’ to Gaza Al Jazeera
Israel admits to “immense” amount of “friendly fire” on 7 October Electronic Intifada
‘Israelis don’t see images from Gaza because our journalists are not doing their job’ Haaretz (the newsletter, because Haaretx give me 403s).
Son of the Ghost of Kiev:
Israeli media was forced to remove an interview with Niko Ostroga, a man who claimed he saw 29 of his friends massacred by Hamas on 10/7 at the Nova Electronic Music Fest after he was exposed as a con artist who never attended the event.
His lie was exposed only because he… pic.twitter.com/06m4uQACUv
— Max Blumenthal (@MaxBlumenthal) December 13, 2023
Yikes (1):
“Thank you for walking through neighborhoods with your terrorist scarf.”
A Harvard graduate student wearing a keffiyeh, was subjected to Islamophobic harassment on campus by Eve Gerber, wife of Jason Furman, professor at Harvard’s Kennedy School and a former Obama Admin advisor. pic.twitter.com/ZNgKhZascT
— The Sparrow Project (@sparrowmedia) December 13, 2023
Musical interlude.
Yikes (2):
This is Professor Ruth Wisse: the Martin Peretz Professor of Yiddish at Harvard.
She’s also an old-school neocon of the Cheney/Wolfowitz variety.
Here she is explaining Israel’s view of the overarching duty of American Jews: to serve in Israel’s information army in the US: pic.twitter.com/N144AtBJxz
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 12, 2023
Try watching this with the sound down first. Somebody needs to check in on Harvard….
Analysis: Is the Houthi threat to world order worse than the war on Gaza? Al Jazeera
By providing a corridor, Armenia can request a road to the Black Sea JAM News
The Revenge Of The Ottoman Empire Gavekal (VS). Well worth a read for some long-awaited, Arrighi-esque historical and economic perspective on multipolarity (in the Fifteenth Century, and now).
What the Ottomans did for science — and science did for the Ottomans Nature
European Disunion
If Hungary blocks EU decision, it will mean Putin vetoed it – Zelenskyy Ukrainska Pravda
New Not-So-Cold War
Zelensky’s fund-raising visit to Washington as seen by Russia Gilbert Doctorow
South of the Border
Industry in Mexico hits its best streak of growth in nearly 10 years Mexico News Daily
Biden Administration
Senate votes to approve mammoth national defense policy bill Scripps. “The legislation is accompanied by an extension of FISA-702, which pertains to a warrantless surveillance program that can keep operating lawfully [sic] until April.”
The GSRA Would Undermine the Utility of FISA Section 702 Just Security. Like that’s a bad thing. The Fourth Amendment:
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
It’s as plain as day, to anybody not a spook or a spook asset, that “papers, and effects” includes digital communications. Hence Bush’s War on Terror program of warrantless surveillance was felonious, retrospectively legalized, and then normalized by [genuflects] Obama. And now it’s bipartisan! Disgusting and shameful. Commentary:
John Fetterman joined the pro-spying wing of the GOP and Dems to renew warrantless domestic spying, despite ample evidence of massive FBI abuse.
A coalition of pro-privacy Dems and GOP had 35 votes against: needed 41 to stop it. The NO votes here opposed unlimited FBI spying: https://t.co/V5xFsfwgXz pic.twitter.com/IQttv1NAPj
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 14, 2023
And:
Many of the same “former National Security officials” who caused the US media to widely spread the lie that the Hunter Biden laptop was “Russian disinformation” are now warning that we”ll all be endangered if we don’t renew NSA/FBI warrantless spying on Americans: https://t.co/fgzbnS3l72
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) December 11, 2023
US agency will not reinstate $900 mln subsidy for SpaceX Starlink unit Reuters
The Supremes
Supreme Court Eyeing Fifth Circuit, But Too Early to Decipher Why Bloomberg Law. Unlocked, oddly.
Antitrust
Polish Hackers Repaired Trains the Manufacturer Artificially Bricked. Now The Train Company Is Threatening Them 404 Media
Supply Chain
The world’s copper supply is suddenly looking scarce Mining.com
Peru’s deadly gold mine attack highlights growing security risk, costs Mining.com
The Bezzle
What Tesla Autopilot does, why it’s being recalled and how the company plans to fix it AP
Driverless cars were the future but now the truth is out: they’re on the road to nowhere Guardian (DL). Unsurprising; see NC here and here. Those two posts are from 2016 (!), so the latest ginormous example of Silicon Valley
fraudcapital misallocation took at least seven years to play out. Let’s hope AI doesn’t take that long to get sorted.
Digital Watch
Boffins fool AI chatbot into revealing harmful content – with 98 percent success rate The Register
Healthcare
Something for Sleep NEJM. Mercifully, there are still some doctors like this.
Prion Disease Rising in the U.S. MedPage Today
Sports Desk
Turf War Slate. All this organizing work. For pickleball….
Xmas Pre-Game Festivities
How Christmas tree farms can help wildlife NYT
Yuletide owl found roosting in Kentucky family’s Christmas tree for days before being found Fox
This Is What Happens to All the Stuff You Don’t Want The Atlantic
Our Famously Free Press
The web floods Nieman Labs
My First Byline: Francine McKenna (interview) Your First Byline
Class Warfare
Preliminary Data on “Unwinding” Continuous Medicaid Coverage NEJM. “As of early October 2023, about 8.7 million people had lost Medicaid coverage, nearly three quarters (72%) of them for procedural reasons. Extrapolation from the 8.7 million figure suggests that roughly 19 million people could lose Medicaid, similar to the federal government’s higher-end estimate (18.4 million).” Listen, don’t say the Biden Administration never did anything for ya.
All the Carcinogens We Cannot See The New Yorker. We confuse, I’m coming to believe, materiality and visibility.
New Cell Atlases Reveal Untold Variety in the Brain and Beyond Quanta. How little we know….
Antidote du jour (via):
Bonus antidote:
Double-bonus antidote:
A group of young people came to the aid of an injured dog seen limping outside of a hospital in Gaza. To patch the pup up, one young man removed his own bandage to give the dog a splint, and against all odds, a wagging tail. 14/10 (via Yosef Basam) pic.twitter.com/2sQDsuF1UC
— WeRateDogs (@dog_rates) December 13, 2023
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
