Scattershots – 3dec20 (updated 8dec20)

George Rebane

SCOTUS finally ruled against Gov Cuomo on the religious freedom case.  The 26nov20 NYT reported, “The Supreme Court late Wednesday night barred restrictions on religious services in New York that Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo had imposed to combat the coronavirus. … The vote was 5 to 4, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and the court’s three liberal members in dissent. The order was the first in which the court’s newest member, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, played a decisive role.” (more here)  Justice Barrett was the crucial vote for the 5-4 majority, with Chief Justice Roberts (the court’s new ‘swing vote’) going limp again and voting with the liberals.  Justice Gorsuch wrote the excellent majority ruling (here) wherein he states, “It is time — past time — to make plain that, while the pandemic poses many grave challenges, there is no world in which the Constitution tolerates color-coded executive edicts that reopen liquor stores and bike shops but shutter churches, synagogues and mosques,”

‘This is why Yuja Wang is Wonder Woman’.  Ms Wang is unquestionably one of the greatest piano virtuosi to come along in many a year.  Take a listen to a five minute sampling of what this woman can do with a piano – truly a celebration and vindication of western culture and how it has contributed to the shaping of global cultures.

‘Big Companies Urge Biden, Congress to Address Climate Change’ - Amazon, Citigroup, Ford and others support a U.S. return to the Paris accords from which Trump withdrew.  Well, whouda thought?  (more here)  With the advent of the Biden administration we are going to see a return of corporatism on steroids.  Cash rich corporatists have always been lobbyists and supporters for all kinds of new regulations and fees that can be levied on their respective industries and business sectors.  We recall that a corporatist is a big corporation that can no longer effectively compete in free markets without some kind of government support.  Increasing costs for their smaller competitors and raising the barriers to entry for newcomers is always best achieved by established corporatists who can pay off legislators and regulators to do their assigned duties – all for the benefit of the consumer, of course.  These are the naïfs who ultimately will get it in the shorts, and pay for the whole thing.  (In case we have some new readers here, please recall that corporations pay no taxes or fees; they just pass those costs on to their customers.  But that’s a whole ‘nother story.) 

[4dec20 update]  Cutting the unemployment bonus again proved that the Left doesn’t do economics.  Writing unemployed low-wage workers checks with an added $600 bonus was supposed give the economy a boost and lower unemployment according to progressive economists like the socialist sage Paul Krugman.  Wrong again.  Workers got paid more for not working and the economy didn’t go anywhere.  When President Trump had to compromise eliminating the bonus to just lowering it to $300, then, lo and behold, unemployment plummeted and the economic growth set decades-long records.  As the song says, ‘When will they ever learn?’

Marc Andreessen, web browser pioneer and venture capitalist, years ago claimed that ‘software will eat the world’ (here).  AI has now achieved the ability to automatically generate code for some very structured applications, and soon will become smart enough to write programs from only verbal instructions, thereby promising to make legions of programmers redundant.  Some interpret this coming state of affairs with the claim that “Software Ate the World, and Soon It Will Write Itself”, going on to conclude that “developers are in short supply, but their products may acquire the capacity to replace them.”  Well no, that’s not quite true.  Most non-techies still believe that ‘line programmers’ create the wondrous systems that dazzle and deliver us.  But learning to code in a programming language, and learning to conceive and design a system to do what has never been done are two different skill sets – the first any smart high schooler can accomplish, the second takes a bit more education in one of any number of specific fields.  Bottom line, software is no more ‘eating the world’ than did movable type in days of yore – you still had to have something more to become an acknowledged wordsmith than what was needed to learn how to smith the words into print.  In the same way today, it will take more from fewer to come up with novel things the software must do, than the larger number who can learn how to make the software do it.  It’s the latter who should soon tremble.

Ever hear of ‘emotional support animals’?  Well, they’re a couple of steps beyond ‘service dogs’ in what they apparently provide to their owners.  And there’s more to be said about the portents of such critters, the humans they emotionally support, and the crumbling culture that now puts up with such nonsense.  This morning we awoke to news of a passenger bringing his peacock into the passenger compartment of an airliner.  Now those of you who know peacocks can readily conceive of the pandemonium that such an aggressive animal with non-existent toilet discipline will create attempting to come down the aisle and be confined to the middle seat.  Today’s laws do not allow anyone to question the legitimate and beneficial purpose that such arbitrarily selected support animals satisfy for those emotionally short-changed.  On that flight the pilot was astute enough not to take off with a cabin catastrophe in the making, but we were not told how the gathered authorities adjudicated the affair.  From my semanticist’s perch, it is clear that our language has not evolved at a sufficient pace to provide adequate adjectives to describe the depths of insanity that today’s progressive ideology is inflicting on our society.

[5dec20 update]  Check out the report on the anti-viral Ivermectin in 'Mismanaging Covid-19 ...'.

[6dec20 update]  Andrew Cuomo – talk about scumbag politicians lying to the public.  This political hack is one of the few in the nation to whom hundreds of Covid deaths can be directly attributed – recall his tragically misguided care facility diktat.  Now he tells the country that Trump’s Operation Warp Speed had nothing to do with the early development, testing, and approval of C19 vaccines; the big pharmas would have developed it anyway since they’re only interested in profits.  He believes his audience to be appropriately ignorant of what Warp Speed did to pave the path and lower the financial risk to the pharmas for them to put a very expensive full court press on their vaccine developments.  We know from decades of data how long it would have taken doing the same ol’ same ol’.  But that don’t make no never mind to another Democrat Big Liar telling people another Big Lie.

"Inside Every Progressive Is A Totalitarian Screaming To Get Out", David Horowitz here aligning with Rebane Doctrine.

[8dec20 update]  Cringing capitalists and the great Cocoa Collusions.  The cocoa growers of Ghana and Ivory Coast (61% of world supply) decided to collude and raise the price of cocoa by almost 20%, claiming to alleviate worker poverty.  Naturally candy producers like Hershey and Mars don’t want to pay more for their prime ingredient, so they are working together trying to find ways to pay less for cocoa (what a concept!).  In this crazy world of progressive pandemics, virtue signaling has become a de rigueur for both corporatists and cringing capitalists.  Both Hershey and Mars are denying that they are trying to circumvent the ‘virtuous’ price increase, when instead they should counter with the free and open markets’ correct argument.  They should tell the cocoa growers that producers also have an obligation to keep prices low for their customers whose financial welfare is no less important than that of the cocoa workers.  Virtue signaling has become a particularly contagious and corrosive form of cringing for capitalists in the face of socialism’s global advance.  (more here)

A new approach to ‘Why can’t we all just get along?’  In the 8dec20 Union, Mr Rob Cairns attempts to heal our divide by suggesting that, instead of attacking, we sit down with our opposites to have a “real conversation” with “them”.  The conversation would launch with questions like ‘What’s important to you?’, ‘What are your concerns?’, ‘What are your fears?’, ‘What are your hopes?’, ‘What are your priorities?’.  A laudable approach indeed, but one having little chance of success when considered in light of the now drastically different belief systems that today propel our polarization.  RR has spent years revealing and dissecting our contending beliefs, and the record is here for all to see.  When a leftist finally deigns to reveal his belief(s) and/or solutions to social problems, to rightists they range from the odious to patently unworkable.  What such questions serve to divert from is an exploration of the meta-world views (i.e. ontologies) of the two discussants.  Without understanding each other’s basic views of how ‘their world’ functions, the rest of the conversation quickly becomes moot since the participants cannot help but talk past each other.  And the real problem, encountered in the attempt to explore ontologies, is that perhaps only a small share of people are capable of such productive pursuits.  Alas.

Today's joke from Rush Limbaugh illustrates the above ontological differences.  A capitalist sitting at a bar is sandwiched between Bernie Sanders and AOC while watching the news.  They see a tense video of a man ready to jump from a tall building.  The capitalist says, 'I have $10 that says he jumps.'  Begrudgingly Sanders and AOC take him up on the bet.  The man jumps to his death, and the capitalist collects his winnings.  Then a moment later he says, 'I can't take your money, because I saw this report earlier on the news.'  AOC responds with, 'That's OK, so did we, but we didn't think he'd do it again.'

Comments

[D]

"edicts that reopen liquor stores and bike shops but shutter churches, synagogues and mosques" - That would be apples to apples as long as church goers are masked and maintain social distancing. Otherwise, going to a church service is no different than going to an indoor Christmas party or a concert or anything else where people are breathing heavy and singing, chanting, etc.
No surprise which way 'Handmaid' Barrett would vote on a religious issue.

[THOMAS O'TOOLE]

George: I appreciate and thank you for the introduction to Yuja Wang. Simply Brilliant!

[Scott O]

Duh 11:41 - "Otherwise, going to a church service is no different than going to an indoor Christmas party or a concert or anything else where people are breathing heavy and singing, chanting, etc."
Don't worry, Duh - no one's inviting you to anything.
P.S. You forgot to include riots and Biden celebration parties. They seem to be totally acceptable.
How does that science work?
From Duh:
"Duh".

[Bob Hobert]

Yuja Wang has supernatural talent on the piano. Thanks!

[Gregory]

So does her dressmaker...

https://img.washingtonpost.com/rf/image_1024w/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2011/08/10/Style/Images/167108.CA.0802.BRINGUIER.7.LKH.jpg?uuid=nK2yhsOfEeCvVfTr5liYMA

[Bill Tozer]

re: SCOTUS and the unalienable rights of the First Amendment, freedom of association, freedom of association.......

‘Supreme Court Smacks Down California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Tells Him To Stop Targeting Churches’

https://thefederalist.com/2020/12/03/supreme-court-smacks-down-california-gov-gavin-newsom-tells-him-to-stop-targeting-churches/

It looks like CA is finally spitting the baby to adhere to the Constitution of the US. Lock it all down, EXCEPT worship and the right to peacefully protest (demonstrate). These two ‘exceptions’ to the dictates are not exceptions at all, but the rule of the land. The framers wanted our God given rights that preceded our government to work in bad times, not just good times.

Opps. There is now a 3rd exception to the shutdown ordered by our Supreme Leader of CA.. Entertainment industry employees (unionized) are off the hook. They are free to go to work and work as they please.

I cannot imagine a worse place to be under current circumstances than standing for 12-14 hours a day in a enclosed sound proof film production stage (set) with 70-100 people with the doors closed and AC off. But, then again I don’t watch soaps or TV series or many movies anymore, so I might be missing the humongous importance of the carve out. Social distancing was not a consideration back in the day when Christians were fed to the lions for public entertainment. But, what do I know? As they say, “break a leg”. The show must go on.

[The Estonian Fox]

from The Guardian 2 days ago-
"The (U.S.) government has decided that when it comes to air travel, only dogs can be service animals, and non-human companions used for emotional support don’t count.

The transportation department issued a final rule Wednesday that aims to settle years of tension between airlines and passengers who bring their pets on board for free by saying they need them for emotional support.

It also cited the increasing frequency of people “fraudulently representing their pets as service animals”, and a rise in misbehavior by emotional-support animals."

Joe Biden was heard to comment "Hey man, they shouldn't allow dogs on planes either".

[Scott O]

Ivermectin? We've bought and used barrels of that stuff. Heart worm prevention for the numerous canines that graced our Nevada County digs. I thought that drug sounded familiar. I'm afraid the good doc is trying to use !SCIENCE!. He doesn't realize that !SCIENCE! has to be run past the politicians and policy wonks to be approved as such. The results of medical trials are only to be announced at such a time as promotes the 'proper' political line on such matters.
Nothing to see here, move on please!
In other news - 'record deaths' in the cv19 pandemic!
Which isn't difficult, considering any new total of a 'novel' virus would be a record.

[D]

Talk about lying scumbags, Ivanka gets busted,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bHuHjrrdQM&feature=push-fr&attr_tag=eNnyMiKoyS_ooPmZ%3A6

[L]

C'mon, Keach, don't be such a cheap bastard. Dominion cost the Wuflu perps 800 mil in two tranches and you want to vent about a maybe scandal 3000 times smaller?

[Scott O]

D 10:46 - Busted? I haven't seen anything about her being arrested.
Maybe you had better provide some facts.
Some guy doesn't like her. Yada, yada, yada.
If you think she's a liar, perhaps you can link to the facts.
Not some one's opinion.

[Scott O]

re R. Cairns - A "real conversation"...
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ...
Total comedy.
Have you written to him to set up this 'conversation'?
It could be a recorded video chat with him and a person to be named later.
Any volunteers?

[Bill Tozer]

Re: Rob Cairns.
What ever happened to the Breaking Bread show on NCTV? Perhaps Dr.Rebane got some insight to R. Caires column from that experience. Can you say "Kumbala"? Good cause I can't even spell it.

[Don Bessee]

BT @903 - The then nctv committed financial suicide with the move to the big space at the old tech center and all the pricey stuff that was not financially sustainable in any sense. My hottie and me invited to the the grand opening and are in the vip pics of the event.

;-)

[Bill Tozer]

My sympathies Don. :) When I was introdused to it was known as the Bongo station operating out the bunker hidden in the bowels of St Joseph's 'cultural center.' Lots of Irish names in that old cementary across from the first orphanage/nunnery in these parts.

Whatever happened to JJ Johns? Whatever happened to

At keast NCTV had the puupy adoption show and the feathers and fur puppet shows and lots of bongo music. :)

What ever happened to the pickle barrel? They had hair then.

[George Rebane]

BillT re NCTV - The best I recollect about 'Breaking Bread' is that it really ended when the station was forced to move out of its (former) Grass Valley Group digs and into a storefront operation in GV. Part of what happened concurrently was that the station manager and their resident producers were also replaced/resigned. And even before that the program went into a bit of a hiatus because on of our five members, who was supposed to compose and host the next show, kept missing deadlines with excuses that indicated she would never put her show together. The rest of us had already done and aired our productions, and were ready to leap in and start a new round when the station's move became a necessity. After the move, the new management never contacted any of us to continue the program.