‘No Mow May’ encourages homeowners to help bees by letting their lawns grow NBC. Let’s make it year-round!
Call combinations and compositional processing in wild chimpanzees Nature. See also.
PwC races to contain widening Australian tax leak scandal FT
Climate
Waller Says Fed Shouldn’t Let Climate Concerns Distract From Overall Stability Risks WSJ. Eyes on the prize, in this case making sure those deck chairs are properly arranged.
Water
Colorado’s legislative action on water this year was mostly about what lawmakers didn’t do Colorado Sun
#COVID19
Massachusetts sources on MGH’s stupid and lethal partially rescinded* mask policy:
I’m worried about going to hospitals without a mask Commonwealth Magazine
Advocates Raise Concern That Lifting Universal Mask Mandate Leaves Most Vulnerable At Risk Quincy Sun
NOTE * The stupidity of requiring double-masking remains. (You have the choice of using one of MGH’s “Baggy Blues,” or putting one over your own mask, likely to break the seal. It’s really just a compliance measure meant to show the patient that Hospital Infection Control is boss, just like “Let me see your smile!”)
Hollywood’s Covid Protocols, Which End Today, Cost Hundreds Of Millions Of Dollars Deadline
Sick and tired: Casting a long shadow (PDF) Parliament of Australia. Report on Long Covid:
7.14 The Committee recommends the Australian Government establish and fund a multidisciplinary advisory body including ventilation experts, architects, aerosol scientists, industry, building code regulators and public health experts to:
• Oversee an assessment of the impact of poor indoor air quality and ventilation on the economy with particular consideration given to high-risk settings such as hospitals, aged care facilities, childcare and educational settings
• Lead the development of national indoor air quality standards for use in Australia.Cell-Specific Mechanisms in the Heart of COVID-19 Patients Circulation Research.
From the Abstract: “This review seeks to provide an overview of the current understanding of COVID-19 cardiac pathophysiology.” From the Cardiac Vasculature section: ” In its healthy, naive state, the vascular endothelium expresses membrane proteins that inhibit coagulation, maintain vascular endothelial integrity, and exert anti-inflammatory action. With SARS-CoV-2 infection, procoagulant factors like VWF (Von Willibrand Factor) are upregulated and anticoagulant factors like thrombomodulin are downregulated, thereby creating a procoagulant milieu.” From the Myocardium section: “The global impact of long COVID and subclinical COVID-19 cardiac dysfunction may not be fully appreciated for some years to come. The looming tsunami becomes an urgent call for increasing and intensifying the application of single-cell analyses and other novel high resolution, molecular technologies to yield more hypothesis-driven mechanistic studies of both acute and long COVID.”
“Looming tsunami” isn’t the sort of phrase one often encounters in the literature.
End of COVID emergency leaves a black hole of health data Axios. Back to Yankee candle reviews, I suppose.
US Covid emergency status ends as officials plan ‘new phase of managing’ virus Guardian. I’m sure everything will be fine.
China?
How the U.S. Is Trying to Block China’s Control of Ports Around the Globe WSJ
Reported Joint Chiefs pick a boon for China hawks Responsible Statecraft
Liver drug unproven for COVID prevention in high demand in China Center for Disease Research and Policy. Ursodeoxycholic acid (UDCA). The link is from 2022, but the demand seems to be there today:
Italy’s export surge to China
1. Last week we flagged a big rise in Italian exports to China. Here’s the story. Without western vaccines, China’s consumers are buying a generic liver drug made in Italy that’s rumored to prevent COVID. Big thanks to @bancaditalia and @p_ceretti… pic.twitter.com/mlHnJXF6tL— Robin Brooks (@RobinBrooksIIF) May 9, 2023
And:
7. Bottom line: Italy’s export surge to China isn’t about possible evasion of western export restrictions to Russia. It’s about China’s policy on western COVID vaccines and a scramble among Chinese citizens to get the next best thing. Thanks again to @bancaditalia and @p_ceretti.
— Robin Brooks (@RobinBrooksIIF) May 9, 2023
Next China: Catching Spies Bloomberg. Doing due diligence in China.
Myanmar
ASEAN cannot go back to ‘business as usual’ with Myanmar: PM Lee CNN. Then ASEAN should recognize the NUG.
Syraqistan
Yemen Peace Push ‘Serious’ But Next Steps Unclear: Saudi Envoy Agence France Presse
Dear Old Blighty
‘Brits are dying in their tens of thousands – and we don’t really have any idea why’ Mirror. ‘Tis a mystery!
New Not-So-Cold War
About that counteroffensive:
Ukraine SitRep: Delayed Counteroffensive, Russian Defense Lines, Weapon Efficiency Moon of Alabama
Zelensky, Citing Equipment Gaps, Says It’s Too Soon for Counteroffensive NYT. The deck: “Ukraine’s president played down the chance of an imminent military move, but the claim was greeted with some skepticism.” How does a proven liar actually decieve anyone….
Head of Wagner group claims Ukraine’s counteroffensive ‘in full swing’ Anadolu Agency
UK Shipment of Long Range Cruise Missiles to Ukraine Radically Changes the Conflict Gilbert Doctorow
How long-range Storm Shadow missiles could help Ukraine destroy the Crimea bridge The Telegraph
Victory Parade on Red Square President of Russia. Includes brief but pointed speech by Putin.
Prigozhin’s Strange Attack on Russia’s Leadership Stephen Bryen, Weapons and Strategy
The fall of the USSR – a disaster for the West? Intellinews
Death Merchants? New Left Review
South of the Border
Mexico to send more National Guard troops to the southern border Mexico News Daily
Number of Internally Displaced People Worldwide Hit a Record High in 2022 The Wire
Biden Administration
The gathering storm around Title 42 Politico
Top Biden aide tells Chinese diplomat that US wants to ‘move beyond’ spy balloon AP. No doubt!
Washington’s Angriest Progressive Is Winning Over Conservatives – and Baffling Old Allies Politico. From April, still germane. Spoiler: It’s Stoller!
The Supremes
Court throws out conviction of former Cuomo aide SCOTUSblog
2024
Trump appeals jury’s verdict in E. Jean Carroll’s lawsuit Axios
Trump’s pledge for Ukraine peace met with doubt, derision The Hill
Trump’s blast radius Axios. The volume and intensity of liberal Democrat reactance to Trump’s Town Hall on CNN would have been identical no matter how the transcript read.
RFK Jr. says he will ‘make the border impervious’ if elected as Title 42 is set to expire FOX
John Brennan’s closed-door hearing ‘confirmed’ Hunter laptop letter was ‘all political’: Jim Jordan and The walls are closing in on Biden family corruption FOX (press release on the latter (TomW)). Not as bungled as the Benghazi yarn diagrams, but still needs tightening and focus. It may be that for both Republicans and Democrats, the embubblement of operatives charged with making a case to the public is such that they can’t tell what the public needs to hear any more. “Explain it to me like I’m five” is not such a bad trope. For example, if I have this right, it’s pretty amazing that the Biden children (minors?) got wire transfers from some corrupt Hungarian dude, as shown by bank records, but the dude needs a name (hopefully memorable) and what role Biden played needs to be explained in two or three words. The Democrats don’t do this well is shown, ironically enough, by the headline: How often have we heard that “The Walls Are Closing In” on Trump? Well, if the Republican wish to avoid the same ever-receding horizon with Biden, they need to up their already somewhat-upped game. (And don’t tell me to watch any videos where everything is explained.)
Spook Country
Report on the Censorship-Industrial Complex: The Top 50 Organizations to Know Racket News (Rev Kev)x. Eight reporters, so Racket News must be doing OK. Must read, grab a cup of coffee, and keep it well away from your screen. Handy chart (click for full size):
Digital Watch
GitHub, Microsoft, OpenAI fail to wriggle out of Copilot copyright lawsuit The Register
The Surprising Synergy Between Acupuncture and AI Wired. The “synergy,” I kid you not, is that we don’t know how either type of woo woo really works.
End of the Billable Hour? Law Firms Get On Board With Artificial Intelligence WSJ
The likely winners of the generative AI gold rush FT
Healthcare
Drug shortages have worsened and may only increase in the future, experts say Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy
Gunz
Collapsing social trust is driving American gun violence FT
Children and Youth Nearly Twice as Likely to Die in the South as in New England CEPR
Class Warfare
Workers Are Happier Than They’ve Been in Decades WSJ
College Students Are Urging Their Schools Dump Starbucks Coffee Over Shutdowns of Unionized Cafes Bloomberg. Cornell, naturally, called the cops:
Cornell called the police on students who were selling coffee outside the dining hall to raise money for striking Starbucks workers.
Workers and students are protesting the company’s decision to shut down all their stores in Ithaca — all of which are unionized. pic.twitter.com/pPozdhJxyz
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) May 11, 2023
And:
Cornell students are occupying administration offices demanding the university stop selling Starbucks coffee on campus after the company announced it’s closing ALL union stores in Ithaca. Solidarity! Keep up the pressure! @SBWorkersUnited https://t.co/PKKOwp6zRB
— Labor Notes (@labornotes) May 11, 2023
It’s hard to think of administration offices that should not be occupied, at this point, no matter the institution.
Google Insiders Are $9 Billion Richer After AI-Fueled Stock Rally Forbes
A Number System Invented by Inuit Schoolchildren Will Make Its Silicon Valley Debut Scientific American. Neat!
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
