January, 2024 archive
All That Was Old Is New Again 0
Mary Beth Tinker figured in a case that went to the Supreme Court when, as a 13-year-old student, she was suspended from school for having the unmitigated gall to peacefully express her disagreement with the Vietnamese War.
At the Des Moines Register, she writes that she hears echoes of the past.
Vaccine Nation 0
At Psychology Today Blogs, psychology professor Ronald Riggio looks at the flawed reasoning which can lead persons to spurn vaccination, despite three centuries of history starting with the smallpox vaccine that prove vaccines work.
He offers three bits of advice; follow the link for an exploration of each one.
- When deciding about vaccinations or health interventions, rely on trusted scientific sources.
- Avoid the common psychological biases that lead to poor decisions about your health.
- Our limited experiences are prone to bias and error because we cannot see the bigger picture.
“A Republic, If You Can Keep It” 0
Chris Satullo has some suggestions about how to do just that.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
Yet another oxymoronic “responsible gun owner” plays with his portable phallus,
The Voter Fraud Fraudsters 0
Republican resurrects deceased voters to sign his petition.
Have you noticed it’s almost always Republicans?
What’s in a Word? 0
At the Las Vegas Sun, Ricky Kendall asks (to paraphrase), if January 6 was not an insurrection, what is?
Methinks he is onto something.
Still Rising Again after All These Years, Reprise 0
Thom dissects a racist fund raising email he received from Donald Trump’s campaign and the troubling implications of news media’s failure to call out racism, whether it be subtle or blatant.
Still Rising Again after All These Years 0
Derefe Kimarley Chevannes sees a pattern repeating itself:
Yet, America seems intent on repeating its noxious history of Black oppression.
Follow the link for the evidence.
Artificial? Yes. Intelligent? Not So Much. 0
It turns out, when persons as “AI” questions about case law, “AI” tends to just make stuff up “hallucinate,” to use the term from the article at Above the Law.
The Surveillance State Society
0
The EFF reports on a victory for privacy. A snippet:
So it is welcome news that the Federal Trade Commission has brought a successful enforcement action against X-Mode Social (and its successor Outlogic).
The FTC’s complaint illustrates the dangers created by this industry. The company collects our location data through software development kits (SDKs) incorporated into third-party apps, through the company’s own apps, and through buying data from other brokers. The complaint alleged that the company then sells this raw location data, which can easily be correlated to specific individuals.
More at the link.
Aside:
I find it ironic that persons sweat bullets about limited and regulated “government surveillance” while willingly and heedlessly running nekkid before corporate collectors of confidentia–oh, never mind.
Suffer the Children 0
As Micheal in Norfolk reminds us, that is not scripture. That’s Republican policy.
Fright-Wing Politics 0
Thom discusses Donald Trump’s resort to stochastic terrorism so as to protect his assets.
Extra-Special Bonus QOTD 0
Via Slantblog, where F. T. Rea offers this as evidence that Mark Twain had seen the likes of Donald Trump:
You take the lies out of him, and he’ll shrink to the size of your hat; you take the malice out of him, and he’ll disappear.
