SOME POINTS OF SANITY HERE AND THERE:  University of London Professor Loses Racial Discrimination Claim Over a Recommendation of a Local Sushi Restaurant.

AND NONE OF THEM WERE A CONGRATULATIONS CARD, I BET!  NATO, UN, and State Department Offer ‘Condolences’ for Death of Iranian President Raisi.

Or perhaps a very large container of candy, if that ports across cultures to Persians.

I SUSPECT MORE IRANIANS ARE THINKING THIS THAN NOT:  I pray this is the beginning of the end of the Islamic regime and that all Iranians will see the true God.

THIS IS BOKUM FROM WHAT I UNDERSTAND FOR IT TO BE TRULY HARMFUL YOU PRACTICALLY NEED TO SHRINK WRAP THE HOUSE AND STOP ALL VENTILATION:  New research shows gas stove emissions contribute to 19,000 deaths annually.

But, hey, sure, we’re supposed to “trust the science” after all the lies they’ve told.

THERE IS NO WAY TO SPIN THIS AS A STUTTER:  BIDEN: “When I was vice president, things were kinda bad during the pandemic…”

AND AGAIN, BEHOLD HOW SHOCKED MY FACE IS:  Testimony of Top Public Health Official During COVID Is Made Public – This Undermines Everything Fauci Said.

SHOCKED, SHOCKED, SHOCKED, THIS IS MY SHOCKED FACE:  Reuters is reporting that most of the aid coming into Gaza from the U.S. military’s pier since Saturday was stolen by Palestinians as it made its journey to the UN’s warehouse in nearby Deir El Balah.

FLASHBACK: That 1938 Feeling.

OPEN THREAD: Monday, Monday.

ANYTHING YOU PUT ON THAT TELEPROMPTER, RON BURGUNDY WILL READ:

ETHNIC ORIGIN ALERT: Biden ditches the Puerto Rican, Greek and Irish communities, now claims to come from the Jewish community pic.twitter.com/UNmGxCX62l

— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) May 20, 2024

Even the sign language reader seems pretty astonished at Joe’s latest whopper in the above frame capture. Here are flashbacks to some of the Joker’s many other origin stories:

Biden was raised in the Puerto Rican, Greek, Irish, Catholic, Jewish, Italian, Polish, Palestinian, Persian, and Black communities of Delaware. Incredible! pic.twitter.com/O5rX3TYuZi

— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) April 7, 2024

President Peter Lemon Moodring strikes again!

THE NEW SPACE RACE: Beyond blueprints: DoD’s commercial space strategy leaves industry wanting more.

ALL THIS AND WORLD WAR II: The real story of Bauhaus and the Nazis.

This confluence of competing styles was reflected most of all in architecture. The architecture of the Third Reich is generally regarded as reactionary, but the reality is more complex, and Weimar provides one of the best examples. The city’s monumental Gauforum (which now houses governmental offices, and a sombre museum about slave labour in the Third Reich) is one of the largest surviving buildings of the Nazi era. Its style is traditional but streamlined, a blend of old and new. We’re generally inclined to regard Nazi buildings as ugly because the tyranny which made them was ugly. If only life – and art – were so simple. In fact, a lot of Nazi architecture wasn’t so far removed from modernist styles like Art Deco. Hardly surprising really, when so many Bauhaus architects ended up working for the Nazis.

The work of Bauhaus alumni during the Third Reich demonstrates that a lot of artists, then as now, were actually pretty apolitical, happy to focus on the job in hand rather than fretting about the morals of their paymasters. Yet a good many actively embraced the new regime: 188 joined the Nazi party, 15 joined the SA and 14 joined the SS. One SS man, Bauhaus graduate Fritz Ertl, was one of the designers of the Auschwitz concentration camp.

Most Bauhaus biographies are more nuanced. Herbert Bayer, a student and then a teacher at the Bauhaus, designed jolly brochures for the 1936 Berlin Olympics, celebrating the achievements of Hitler’s Reich (he called himself ‘the anonymous favourite of the propaganda minister’). He left Germany in 1937, after his work featured in the Nazis’ infamous ‘Degenerate Art’ show (a crude propagandist display designed to denigrate modern art).

The case of Bauhaus graduate Franz Ehrlich is even more complex. Imprisoned in Buchenwald concentration camp (a few miles from Weimar) after he was caught producing pamphlets for the Communist underground, he was put to work inside the camp, furnishing the commandant’s office and designing the creepy motto on the camp gates. Inmates did what they had to do to survive and only a fool would dare to judge them, but Ehrlich continued working for the SS at Buchenwald even after he was released.

In his 2015 book, Artists Under Hitler: Collaboration and Survival in Nazi Germany, Jonathan Petropoulos wrote that Bauhauslers far higher up on the school’s food chain than Ehrlich were “unexpectedly” more than a little eager to work with the post-Weimar socialists. and very likely they would have, if only the former art student leading the regime hadn’t so hated modernist aesthetics.

IT’S COME TO THIS: Los Angeles County Officially Celebrates an American Traitor’s Contribution to the Communist Defeat of South Vietnam.

In my experience, there are two Americans, whom most Vietnam veterans regard as the most deserving of utter contempt, if not downright hatred, for their role in connection with the Vietnam war. They are LBJ’s Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara and Jane Fonda.

McNamara earned his well-deserved high standing in any Vietnam veteran’s list of despicable Americans because of his, incompetent micro-management of that war at the highest levels, combined with his egotistical refusal to accept professional military advice.

Hanoi Jane and Los Angeles’ Resolution of support for an American Traitor

Jane Fonda earned her place in the Pantheon of American traitors by giving aid and comfort to the enemy while our men were still fighting and dying, and while prisoners of war in the infamous Hanoi Hilton were routinely tortured to force them to meet with visiting American propagandists such as Jane Fonda, Former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark, and other fellow travelers. Despite that record, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors passed a resolution proclaiming “April 30 of each year as Jane Fonda Day.”

As with Earth Day each year, reminding otherwise naive 21st century citizens of Fonda’s early ’70s perfidy isn’t necessarily a bad thing: Jane Fonda’s Vietnam Actions Were Worse Than You Think.

SALON VS. SALON: True patriotism or ugliness is in the eye of… whatever is politically convenient.

2017:

2024:

DISPATCHES FROM AL SHARPTON’S NETWORK: MSNBC: Michael Cohen’s Heist of $60,000 from Trump Was Him “Just Trying to Rebalance the Bonus He Thought He Deserved.”

MSNBC’s @Lawrence O’Donnell defends Michael Cohen stealing from the Trump Org.: “Cohen [was trying] to rebalance the bonus he thought he deserved, & it still came out as less than the bonus he thought he deserved & the bonus he had gotten the year before” pic.twitter.com/UsdEfQUetR

— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) May 20, 2024

Well, we’ve known for almost 15 years that O’Donnell was a big fan of wealth distribution, but now we know it’s on both a macro- and micro-economic level. Flashback: “I am a socialist. I live to the extreme left, the extreme left of you mere liberals.”

THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT WILL NOW RUSH TO FUND “ACTIVIST” GROUPS THAT WILL TIE ITS EXTRACTION UP IN ENVIRONMENTAL CHALLENGES: A Vast, Untapped Source of Lithium Has Just Been Found in The US.

INCREASE YOUR GRIP: Grip Strength Tester Trainer – Dynamometer Handgrip Measurer. #CommissionEarned Glenn and I just used one of these, I have a sad grip strength but his was super strong. You can use this gadget to practice increasing your grip.

(Sorry, I posted this yesterday but the link was wrong.)

THE NEW SPACE RACE: NASA’s VIPER Rover Braces for Ultimate Space Challenge. “NASA’s VIPER team is not only building the rover for the Moon’s South Pole but also preparing for its environmental tests. These tests are designed to simulate the harsh conditions of space travel and lunar operation to ensure the rover’s readiness for its mission.”

GREAT MOMENTS IN RADICAL CHIC: The U.S. Response to Iranian President’s Death Is Disgraceful.

A condensed listing of Raisi’s bloody track record — even before becoming president of the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism — from the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) recaps his barbarism:

Raisi — the deputy prosecutor general of Tehran from 1985 to 1988 — facilitated the regime’s 1988 slaughter of thousands of jailed political dissidents by serving on a four-member panel known as a Death Commission, which decided who would live and who would die. The commission would conduct interviews of prisoners — often just a few minutes long — aimed at determining their loyalty to the Islamic Republic. Questions could include: “What is your political affiliation?” “Do you pray?” “Are you willing to clear minefields for the Islamic Republic?” The wrong answer meant death.

The executions were usually by hanging or by firing squad, and typically took place the same day as the interrogations. The commissions allowed neither lawyers nor appeals. Burials occurred in unmarked mass graves. The regime waited months before notifying the relatives of the victims, refused to tell them the locations of the bodies, and told them not to mourn in public. The victims included women and children as young as 13. Raisi has defended the killings, saying in 2018 that they were “one of the proud achievements of the system.”

What a guy, proud of murdering thousands of innocent Iranians, to mourn. FDD also noted that Raisi’s subsequent posts as deputy chief justice, attorney general, and chief justice allowed him to preside “over the prosecution, imprisonment, torture, and execution of countless detainees.”

Biden’s State Department formally expressed its “official condolences” in a statement Monday afternoon:

The United States expresses its official condolences for the death of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian, and other members of their delegation in a helicopter crash in northwest Iran.  As Iran selects a new president, we reaffirm our support for the Iranian people and their struggle for human rights and fundamental freedoms.

It wasn’t just the State Department that was issuing its condolences to a mass-murderer, of course:

For those keeping track:

U.S. Senate Chaplain
U.S. State Department Spokesman
White House Spokesman
NATO

All offered condolences for the Butcher of Tehran's death https://t.co/ugTiPVD1IV

— John Hasson (@SonofHas) May 20, 2024

Regarding the NATO spokesperson’s response, former California Assemblyman Chuck DeVore put it into sharp perspective:

Our condolences to the people of Germany for the death of Deputy Protector of Bohemia and Moravia, President of Interpol, and Director of the Reich Security Main Office Heydrich, who perished in the car crash. https://t.co/ppOKszLVnt

— Chuck DeVore (@ChuckDeVore) May 20, 2024

THE INTERNET OF THINGS SUCKS: How I upgraded my water heater and discovered how bad smart home security can be.

Being a home automation nerd, and thereby a Home Assistant enthusiast, I searched for a better way. I found an unofficial Rinnai component and installed it, and then I had real control. I could set recirculation to run on whatever schedule I wanted, triggered by anything, at any temperature. If I wanted to start hot water flowing on winter mornings as soon as the bedroom lights came on, but only if the moon was in Aquarius, I could do that (and I am not joking). The future felt warm, but not too warm, and on-demand. . . .

The calls Control-R made to Rinnai’s servers were “very basic,” Barbour said. Digging into the undocumented API calls, Barbour saw something he didn’t think was real: You needed only a registered email address to retrieve information, or change settings, on a connected water heater.

“I thought this was crazy until another GitHub user reached out and we started collaborating and came to the same conclusion. You could control any Rinnai water heater that was connected, as long as you knew the registered account’s email address,” Barbour wrote me.

Bottom line: “Knowing only your email address, I can set your water heater’s temperature to very cold or scaldingly hot. I can put it into recirculation mode continuously so that it uses lots of gas… I can see your home street address that you have entered into the Control-R app when you registered your water heater.”

No thank you. And this kind of thing is, sadly typical, for “connected devices.”

GOOD LUCK, GUYS: Check Out Honda’s Fuel-Cell Big Rig, Part of a ‘Hydrogen Future.’

I drove a GM fuel-cell car for Popular Mechanics over a decade ago. My thoughts: “The car advertises itself as petroleum-free, which is true. But—and here’s my problem with hydrogen cars—it’s not really fossil fuel free. Most hydrogen is made by “steam reformation” of natural gas, which is still a fossil fuel. You can also make it out of water, via electrolysis, but unless you’ve got a non-fossil source of electricity the hydrogen is really just functioning as an energy-storage medium, rather than a source of energy. Of course, build lots of nice, clean nuclear plants, or orbiting solar power plants, or whatever, and that problem goes away.”

But if you don’t do that, it’s basically a gimmick.

PROCUREMENT: GDLS delivers first tranche of M10 Booker vehicles. “Booker will be assigned to the Army’s Infantry Brigade Combat Teams. The vehicle moves rapidly in a variety of terrain conditions to engage and destroy enemy combatants, bunkers, machine gun positions, fortifications and other Armoured combat vehicles.”

It looks like a tank and it’s crewed like a tank but it is not a tank.

AT AMAZON, Shop the Memorial Day Sale. #CommissionEarned

HE’S THE HONEST KIND OF CROOK WHO STAYS BOUGHT: Biden’s ’Inflation Reduction Act’ Enriches Commie China.

WELL, YES: Gun Control Politicians Don’t Just Hate Guns, They Hate You.