JEFFREY SINGER: Misdiagnosing The Opioid Crisis.
Archive for 2017
September 28, 2017
NARRATIVE FAIL: Russia Facebook Ads Showed Support For Black Lives Matter, Clinton.
As I’ve written here before: The Kremlin cares much less about picking winners and losers, than it does about discrediting our political system in the eyes of the American people. That’s a Russian game the post-election Democrats have been eager to play along with.
WHY “TAKING A KNEE” IS AN EXAMPLE OF MALE PRIVILEGE. It’s also “ageist and ableist.”
THE 21st CENTURY ISN’T TURNING OUT THE WAY I HAD HOPED:
Shot:
One-party autocracy certainly has its drawbacks. But when it is led by a reasonably enlightened group of people, as China is today, it can also have great advantages. That one party can just impose the politically difficult but critically important policies needed to move a society forward in the 21st century. It is not an accident that China is committed to overtaking us in electric cars, solar power, energy efficiency, batteries, nuclear power and wind power. China’s leaders understand that in a world of exploding populations and rising emerging-market middle classes, demand for clean power and energy efficiency is going to soar. Beijing wants to make sure that it owns that industry and is ordering the policies to do that, including boosting gasoline prices, from the top down. Our one-party democracy is worse….
BUT OF COURSE: Chelsea Manning Inspired Communist West Point Graduate To Infiltrate The Military.
First rule of Communist infiltration? Don’t post pictures of yourself wearing a Che shirt on social media.
AT AMAZON, on sale, Etekcity Digital Body Weight Bathroom Scale With Body Tape Measure.
CHOOSE THE FORM OF YOUR DESTRUCTOR. Tom Brokaw: Trump Wants to ‘Destroy the Prevailing Culture in This Country.’
He says this as if (a) his employer had no role in creating the prevailing culture (or giving Trump a platform for years to further his celebrity status) and (b) it’s a bad thing.
(Classical reference in headline.)
EVERYTHING IS PROBLEMATICAL: The Repressive, Authoritarian Soul of “Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends.”
PRESIDENT TRUMP NOMINATES TEXAS SUPREME COURT JUSTICE DON WILLETT to 5th Circuit. Also former Texas Solicitor General James Ho. “Willett often praises his mother, who supported the family by waiting tables at a truck stop after his father died when Willett was 6 years old. The widow waited tables at a truck struck. Willett graduated from Baylor University, then received his law degree and a master’s degree in political science from Duke. He worked for George W. Bush in the governor’s office and in the White House, then worked for then-Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, now the state’s governor. He initially was appointed to the Texas Supreme Court by then-Gov. Rick Perry, and since has been re-elected. Ho, a naturalized U.S. citizen, moved to this country with his family from Taiwan when he was a young child. He received a bachelor’s degree from Stanford University and his law degree from the University of Chicago School of Law.”
WITHOUT HUGH HEFNER, where would we be now?
RATTLING KIM JONG UN: Insulting a dictator’s “dignity” is a potentially valuable psychological weapon. And Trump uses it. He rattled Crooked Hillary, an arrogant banana republic tin pot if there ever was one. Now he’s working on Rocket Man. It appears even the MSM’s noticed the rattle. (bumped)
THE 21ST CENTURY IS NOT TURNING OUT THE WAY I’D HOPED: Use of Powerful Large-Animal Tranquilizer Rises Among Opioid Addicts.
PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS: After Pretending To Be Scandalized By The Word ‘Boobs,’ CNN Floods The Zone With Hugh Hefner Stories.
MICHELLE OBAMA: WOMEN VOTED FOR TRUMP BECAUSE THEY WERE TOLD TO LIKE HIM.
Michelle Obama has declared that “any woman who voted against Hillary Clinton voted against their (sic) own voice.” In addition to its grammatical error, the former First Lady’s statement seems substantively incoherent. What does she mean by a woman voting against her own voice? How, exactly, does that happen?
Michelle always seemed rather ambivalent during the 2008 election cycle about her husband running for the White House, but it seems a shame to write off his electoral success as mere sexism. Not to mention, this is a tacit reminder that she was apparently powerless to stop him from running against Hillary, and/or that Obama ignored his own wife’s pleas. And what does it say about the church she attended for so long?
Related: Ruth Bader Ginsburg: Sexism was major, major factor against Hillary in 2016 (but 2008?)
ANDREW BRANCA: The Legal Unicorn of the “Stand Your Ground Defense.” “Naturally, the media gets it all wrong in reporting on this story.”
SHAMELESS: Showtime websites secretly mined user CPU for cryptocurrency.
The crypto mining Javascript is called Coinhive, and according to the site, it was made as an alternative to banner ads as a way for website owners to get around pesky ad-blockers. Ironically, some ad-blockers have now included Coinhive on the list of the banned.
The script mines the cryptocurrency known as Monero. Launched in April 2014, Monero is meant to be a more anonymous version of Bitcoin because you can purchase it offline with cash. Thirty percent of the proceeds go to Coinhive, while sites using the service, like Showtime and The Pirate Bay, keep the rest. For its part, The Pirate Bay has apologized for secretly running the script and then asked its users if they preferred ads or CPU mining. Surprisingly, many of the comments indicate a positive reception towards the idea.
Coinhive updated its site to include the statement: “We’re a bit saddened to see that some of our customers integrate Coinhive into their pages without disclosing to their users what’s going on, let alone asking for their permission.” Going forward, the service claims that it will now ask people browsing a site for permission before mining their CPU. Showtime declined to comment.
I’m not sure this is any worse than video ads which also hog your CPU and get in your face.