(date: 2023-11-10 09:33:09)
date: 2023-11-15, from: ETH Zurich, recently added
Bekar, Ismail; Pezzatti, G. Boris; Conedera, Marco; Vacik, Harald; Pausas, Juli G.; Dupire, Sylvain; Bugmann, Harald
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/636378
date: 2023-11-15, from: ETH Zurich, recently added
Papanikolaou, Nikos; Lambiotte, Renaud; Vaccario, Giacomo
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/637219
date: 2023-11-15, from: ETH Zurich, recently added
Keller, Franziska; Popa, Răzvan-Gabriel; Julien, Allaz; Bovay, Thomas; Bouvier, Anne-Sophie; Geshi, Nobuo; Miyakawa, Ayumu; Bachmann, Olivier
http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11850/637218
date: 2023-11-10, from: Liliputing
The MINISFORUM EliteMini UM780 XTX is a compact, but versatile desktop computer. Inside the mini PC is an AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS processor that’s been cranked up to 70 watts (normally it’s designed for 35 – 54 watt operation). And if the integrated Radeon 780M graphics aren’t powerful enough for you, this little computer has two USB4 […]
The post MINISFORUM’s mini PC with a 70W Ryzen 7 7840HS chip and 63 Gbps Oculink port now available for $479 and up appeared first on Liliputing.
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
Taylor Swift made history by becoming the first person with seven nominations in the prestigious song of the year category with her hit, “Anti-Hero.”
https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/11/10/grammy-nominations-2024-see-the-full-list-of-nominees/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The Texas native was afraid of heights (no air corps for him) and sharks (no Navy), so he joined the U.S. Army.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281692803.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Older veterans, on the other hand, have a different opinion, the survey found.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281688523.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Tilde.news
https://iffybooks.net/event/permacomputing-nov-12/
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
A man was formally charged Wednesday on allegations that he threatened a San Mateo County judge in May, according to the county’s District Attorney’s Office.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The plant absorbs its nutrients from insects that get stuck to its “sticky glands,” experts say.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281689153.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“If everyone would please take a minute to send up prayers for our St. Bruno Falcon Family,” an Illinois Catholic school said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281688398.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
Roush had 11 catches for 118 yards in his first 19 games with Stanford, but since joining the starting lineup two games ago has caught 10 passes for 104 yards.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Cory Doctorow’s blog
Today’s links Big Telco’s fury over FCC plan to infuse telecoms policy with facts: Dickey Amendments for everything. Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. This day in history: 2003, 2013, 2018, 2022 Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading Big Telco’s fury over FCC plan to infuse telecoms policy with facts (permalink) Reality has a distinct anti-conservative bias, but conservatives have an answer: when the facts don’t support your policies, just get different facts. Who needs evidence-based policy when you can have policy-based evidence? Take gun violence. Conservatives tell us that “an armed society is a polite society,” which means that the more guns you have, the less gun violence you’ll experience. To prevent reality from unfairly staining this pristine ideological mind-palace with facts, conservatives passed the Dickey Amendment, which had the effect of banning the CDC from gathering stats on American gun-violence. No stats, no violence! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dickey_Amendment Policy-based evidence is at the core of so many cherished conservative beliefs, like the idea that queer people (and not youth pastors) are responsible for the sexual abuse of children, or the idea that minimum wages (and not monopolies) decrease jobs, or the idea that socialized medicine (and not private equity) leads to death panels: https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/26/death-panels/#what-the-heck-is-going-on-with-CMS The Biden administration features a sizable cohort of effective regulators, whose job is to gather evidence and then make policy from it: https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/23/getting-stuff-done/#praxis Fortunately for conservatives, no every Biden agency is led by competent, honest brokers – the finance wing of the Dems got to foist some of their most ghoulish members upon the American people, including a no-fooling cheerleader for mass foreclosure: https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/06/personnel-are-policy/#janice-eberly And these same DINOs reached across the aisle to work with Republicans to keep some of the most competent, principled agency leaders from being seated, like the remarkable Gigi Sohn, targeted by a homophobic smear campaign funded by the telco industry, who feared her presence on the FCC: https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/19/culture-war-bullshit-stole-your-broadband/ The telcos are old hands at this stuff. Long before the gun control debates, Ma Bell had figured out that a monopoly over Americans’ telecoms was a license to print money, and they set to corrupting agencies from the FCC to the DoJ: https://pluralistic.net/2021/11/14/jam-to-day/ Reality has a vicious anti-telco bias. Think of Net Neutrality, the idea that if you pay an ISP for internet service, they should make a best effort to deliver the data you request, rather than deliberately slowing down your connection in the hopes that you’ll seek out data from the company’s preferred partners, who’ve paid a bribe for “premium delivery.” This shouldn’t even be up for debate. The idea that your ISP should prioritize its preferred data over your preferred data is as absurd as the idea that a taxi-driver should slow down your rides to any pizzeria except Domino’s, which has paid it for “premium service.” If your cabbie circled the block twice every time you asked for a ride to Massimo’s Pizza, you’d be rightly pissed – and the cab company would be fined. Back when Ajit Pai was Trump’s FCC chairman, he made killing Net Neutrality his top priority. But regulators aren’t allowed to act without evidence, so Pai had to seek out as much policy-based evidence as he could. To that end, Pai allowed millions of obviously fake comments to be entered into the docket (comments from dead people, one million comments from @pornhub.com address, comments from sitting Senators who disavowed them, etc). Then Pai actively – and illegally – obstructed the NY Attorney General’s investigation into the fraud: https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/06/boogeration/#pais-lies The pursuit of policy-based evidence is greatly aided by the absence of real evidence. If you’re gonna fill the docket with made-up nonsense, it helps if there’s no truthful stuff in there to get in the way. To that end, the FCC has systematically avoided collecting data on American broadband delivery, collecting as little objective data as possible: https://pluralistic.net/2020/05/26/pandemic-profiteers/#flying-blind This willful ignorance was a huge boon to the telcos, who demanded billions in fed subsidies for “underserved areas” and then just blew it on anything they felt like – like the $45 billion of public money they wasted on obsolete copper wiring for rural “broadband” expansion under Trump: https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/27/all-broadband-politics-are-local/ Like other cherished conservative delusions, the unsupportable fantasy that private industry is better at rolling out broadband is hugely consequential. Before the pandemic, this meant that America – the birthplace of the internet – had the slowest, most expensive internet service of any G8 country. During the lockdown, broadband deserts meant that millions of poor and rural Americans were cut off from employment, education, health care and family: https://pluralistic.net/2021/02/12/ajit-pai/#pai Pai’s response was to commit another $8 billion in public funds to broadband expansion, but without any idea of where the broadband deserts were – just handing more money over to monopoly telcos to spend as they see fit, with zero accountability: https://pluralistic.net/2020/05/26/pandemic-profiteers/#flying-blind All that changed after the 2020 election. Pai was removed from office (and immediately blocked me on Twitter) (oh, diddums), and his successor, Biden FCC chair Jessic Rosenworcel, started gathering evidence, soliciting your broadband complaints: https://pluralistic.net/2021/03/23/parliament-of-landlords/#fcc And even better, your broadband speed measurements: https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/14/for-sale-green-indulgences/#fly-my-pretties All that evidence spurred Congress to act. In 2021, Congress ordered the FCC to investigate and punish discrimination in internet service provision, “based on income level, race, ethnicity, color, religion, or national origin”: https://www.congress.gov/117/plaws/publ58/PLAW-117publ58.pdf In other words, Congress ordered the FCC to crack down on “digital redlining.” That’s when historic patterns of underinvestment in majority Black neighborhoods and other underserved communities create broadband deserts, where internet service is slower and more expensive than service literally across the street: https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/10/flicc/#digital-divide FCC Chair Rosenworcel has published the agency’s plan for fulfilling this obligation. It’s pretty straightforward: they’re going to collect data on pricing, speed and other key service factors, and punish companies that practice discrimination: https://www.fcc.gov/document/preventing-digital-discrimination-broadband-internet-access This has provoked howls of protests from the ISP cartel, their lobbying org, and their Republican pals on the FCC. Writing for Ars Technica, Jon Brodkin rounds up a selection of these objections: https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2023/11/internet-providers-say-the-fcc-should-not-investigate-broadband-prices/ There’s GOP FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr, with a Steve Bannon-seque condemnation of “the administrative state [taking] effective control of all Internet services and infrastructure in the US. He’s especially pissed that the FCC is going to regulate big landlords who force all their tenants to get slow, expensive from ISPs who offer kickbacks to landlords: https://www.fcc.gov/document/carr-opposes-bidens-internet-plan The response from telco lobbyists NCTA is particularly, nakedly absurd: they demand that the FCC exempt price from consideration of whether an ISP is practicing discrimination, calling prices a”non-technical aspect of broadband service”: https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/document/110897268295/1 I mean, sure – it’s easy to prove that an ISP doesn’t discriminate against customers if you don’t ask how much they charge! “Sure, you live in a historically underserved neighborhood, but technically we’ll give you a 100mb fiber connection, provided you give us $20m to install it.” This is a profoundly stupid demand, but that didn’t stop the wireless lobbying org CTIA from chiming in with the same talking points, demanding that the FCC drop plans to collect data on “pricing, deposits, discounts, and data caps,” evaluation of price is unnecessary in the competitive wireless marketplace”: https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/document/1107735021925/1 Individual cartel members weighed in as well, with AT&T and Verizon threatening to sue over the rules, joined by yet another lobbying group, USTelecom: https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/document/1103655327582/1 The next step in this playbook is whipping up the low-information base by calling this “socialism” and mobilizing some of the worst-served, most-gouged people in America to shoot themselves in the face (again), to own the libs: https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/15/useful-idiotsuseful-idiots/#unrequited-love (Image: Japanexperterna.se, CC BY-SA 2.0; www.ccPixs.com, Mike Mozart 1, 2, 3, CC BY 2.0; modified) Hey look at this (permalink) Having rights still bewilderingly popular https://pluralistic.net/PetriWashpo (h/t Diane Duane) The Agar Plate of Cryptocurrency https://crookedtimber.org/2023/11/10/the-agar-plate-of-cryptocurrency/ This day in history (permalink) #20yrsago We’ve had Napster since 1909, and the sky still hasn’t fallen http://earlyradiohistory.us/1909musi.htm #10yrsago Fruitfly evolved pictures of ants on its wings https://www.thenationalnews.com/uae/science/fruit-fly-with-the-wings-of-beauty-1.364064/#ixzz2jhxlLGaH #10yrsago Rich America versus Poor America: stats about the wealth gap https://web.archive.org/web/20131108055750/https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-11-07/which-america-do-you-live-–-21-hard-believe-facts-about-wealthy-america-and-poor-ame #10yrsago Letter from a Chinese forced-labor camp found in Kmart Hallowe’en decorations https://consumerist.com/2013/11/07/inside-the-chinese-labor-camp-that-made-halloween-decorations-sold-at-kmart/ #10yrsago Employment advice for Millennials https://medium.com/the-nib/six-totally-easy-tips-for-millennials-to-get-ahead-in-todays-economy-5451617c78de #10yrsago Burglar surprised to discover the lady he’s robbing is an armed ax-throwing champ https://www.cbsnews.com/losangeles/news/ax-wielding-woman-chases-thief-away-in-hemet/ #10yrsago Toronto’s crack-smoking mayor, covered in the style of foreign affairs https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2013/11/06/canadian-regime-roiled-by-provincial-scandal-sparking-fears-of-instability/ #5yrsago Talking about the DMCA and 20 years of tech law malpractice on PRI’s Marketplace https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-tech/20-year-old-digital-copyright-law-still-being-fought-about-and-copied-today/ #5yrsago Wells Fargo cuts 26,500 jobs, shutters branches, declares “excess capital” and drops $40.6 billion on stock buybacks https://rooseveltinstitute.org/2018/11/07/what-wells-fargos-40-6-billion-in-stock-buybacks-could-have-meant-for-its-employees-and-customers/ #5yrsago 90% of Canadians want to kill future Saudi arms deals https://angusreid.org/saudi-arabia-canada-khashoggi/ #1yrago Tech a la carte https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/08/divisibility/#technognosticism Colophon (permalink) Today’s top sources: Slashdot (https://slashdot.org). Currently writing: A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS JAN 2025 The Bezzle, a Martin Hench noir thriller novel about the prison-tech industry. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS FEB 2024 Vigilant, Little Brother short story about remote invigilation. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Moral Hazard, a short story for MIT Tech Review’s 12 Tomorrows. FIRST DRAFT COMPLETE, ACCEPTED FOR PUBLICATION Spill, a Little Brother short story about pipeline protests. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Latest podcast: The Canadian Miracle, Part 2 (https://craphound.com/news/2023/11/05/the-canadian-miracle-part-2/ Upcoming appearances: Studio City Branch Library, Nov 13, 1830hPT (LA) https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/author-talk-cory-doctorow CBC IDEAS, Nov 16 (Stratford, ON) https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cbc-ideas-visionaries-in-conversation-tickets-729692809837 Inspiring the Next Generation, Nov 16 (Stratford, ON) https://www.provocation.ca/upcoming-2023-events-stratford Gibson’s Bookstore, Nov 18 (Concord, NH) https://www.gibsonsbookstore.com/event/doctorow-lost-cause Lost Cause at Simsbury Public Library, Nov 20 (Simsbury, CT) https://simsbury.librarycalendar.com/event/author-visit-cory-doctorow-29257 Generation of Lost Causes, Nov 22 (Toronto) https://web.archive.org/web/20230907160105/https://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDMEVT495758&R=EVT495758 Who Is Watching Big Tech? Nov 27 (Toronto)` https://web.archive.org/web/20230907160103/https://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDMEVT496408&R=EVT496408 The Lost Cause at The Strand (NYC), Nov 29 https://www.eventbrite.com/e/cory-doctorow-the-lost-cause-tickets-734958008187 The Lost Cause at Flyleaf Books (Chapel Hill), Dec 7 https://www.flyleafbooks.com/doctorow-2023 Recent appearances: Plutopia https://plutopia.io/cory-doctorow-the-internet-con/ An Audacious Plan to Halt the Internet’s Enshittification and Throw It Into Reverse (Hackaday Supercon) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VT1ud0rAT7w The Material Power That Rules Computation (This Machine Kills) https://soundcloud.com/thismachinekillspod/294-the-material-power-that-rules-computation-ft-cory-doctorow Latest books: “The Internet Con”: A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245). “Red Team Blues”: “A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before.” Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/. “Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin”, on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com “Attack Surface”: The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The Washington Post called it “a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance.” Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html “How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism”: an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html) “Little Brother/Homeland”: A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A__Little_Brother_%26_Homeland.html “Poesy the Monster Slayer” a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/. Upcoming books: The Lost Cause: a post-Green New Deal eco-topian novel about truth and reconciliation with white nationalist militias, Tor Books, November 2023 The Bezzle: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books, February 2024 Picks and Shovels: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books, February 2025 Unauthorized Bread: a graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2025 This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. That means you can use it any way you like, including commercially, provided that you attribute it to me, Cory Doctorow, and include a link to pluralistic.net. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Quotations and images are not included in this license; they are included either under a limitation or exception to copyright, or on the basis of a separate license. Please exercise caution. How to get Pluralistic: Blog (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): Pluralistic.net Newsletter (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://pluralistic.net/plura-list Mastodon (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic Medium (no ads, paywalled): https://doctorow.medium.com/ Twitter (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://twitter.com/doctorow Tumblr (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://mostlysignssomeportents.tumblr.com/tagged/pluralistic “When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla” -Joey “Accordion Guy” DeVilla
https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/10/digital-redlining/
date: 2023-11-10, from: 404 Media Group
The ‘Brand Safety’ and ‘Suitability’ industries have financially crushed the news business by keeping ads away from articles that its ‘sentiment analysis’ algorithms think will make people sad or upset.
https://www.404media.co/advertisers-dont-want-sites-like-jezebel-to-exist/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The healthy young pup is now on display, zoo officials said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281688458.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Updated Moves toward enabling satellite connectivity for smartphones have taken a knock with the cancellation of an agreement between chipmaker Qualcomm and satellite operator Iridium.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/qualcomm_cancels_iridium_partnership/
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
The stores will turn off music, make lights dimmer and set TV walls to a still image.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Liliputing
The AYA Neo Pocket DMG is an upcoming handheld gaming device that will be AYA’s first model with a Game Boy-inspired design featuring a display on the top and game controllers on the bottom portion. While the company hasn’t revealed specs, pricing, or availability details yet, AYA is giving a preview of some design elements […]
The post AYA Neo Pocket DMG is a Game Boy-inspired retro handheld appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/aya-neo-pocket-dmg-is-a-game-boy-inspired-retro-handheld/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Marketplace Morning Report
A new report from the Urban Institute finds that hundreds of thousands of younger veterans are uninsured. One of the solutions it outlines is expanded Medicaid, which all but 10 states have already done. Plus, the story of terror portrayed in “Killers of the Flower Moon” takes place in the 1920s and ’30s. But what happened after? We hear about the Osage Nation’s developments in government, language preservation and land acquisition.
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
Prosecutors say the rapper used his music and social media posts to promote the gang Young Slime Life, or YSL, which they say was behind a variety of violent crimes, including killings, shootings and carjackings.
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
U.S. climate envoy John Kerry said talks this week with his Chinese counterpart resulted in “some agreement” on climate issues that leave him optimistic about the U.N. climate summit scheduled for later this month in Dubai.
Speaking at the Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Singapore, Kerry said Friday that he met for four days this week with Chinese climate envoy Xie Zhenhua in California. He described their talks as “productive” and, without providing details, said they had reached “some agreement on reducing emissions and the direction we have to go.”
Kerry said, “I am hopeful about that,” adding that details of the agreements would be released soon.
The U.N. Climate Change Conference, known as COP28, is scheduled for the end of this month. The climate conference seeks to meet and expand on climate goals established during the Paris agreement of 2015, in which some 200 nations agreed to limit the rise of global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius, or about pre-industrial age levels.
Kerry said the goal, as in the previous climate conferences, “is to open up the opportunity to keep 1.5 degrees alive.”
Any agreements between the United States and China — the world’s two largest polluters — would be integral to the success of the conference.
The U.S. climate envoy said the use of fossil fuels — coal in particular — is likely to be a central part of the discussion at the conference. China is the world’s largest user of fossil fuels and relies on coal for most of its energy production.
In comments at the Singapore forum Friday, Kerry said, “It is irresponsible to be funding or building a coal-fired power plant anywhere in the world. And who is allowed to get away with doing that, when it is not the only option for what we could be doing.”
Reuters reports Xie told a diplomatic climate forum in September that phasing out fossil fuels is “unrealistic” for China.
Some information for this report was provided by Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
https://www.voanews.com/a/kerry-us-and-china-have-some-agreement-on-climate-issues/7349818.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Smithsonian Magazine
World governments are planning to produce 110 percent more coal, oil and gas in 2030 than is allowed under the Paris Agreement, U.N. says
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The father used a baseball bat to kill his son, police said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281686608.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Liliputing
The AYA Neo Flip is an upcoming handheld gaming PC with a clamshell-style design with a screen that folds closed for safe keeping or flips upward for gaming. On the bottom section, you’ll find gaming buttons. But depending on the model, you’ll also find either a keyboard… or a second screen. AYA has been showing […]
The post AYA Neo Flip DS is a dual-screen handheld gaming PC appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/aya-neo-flip-ds-is-a-dual-screen-handheld-gaming-pc/
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
The plant in Tracy, built by Silicon Valley startup Heirloom Carbon Technologies, puts California at the forefront of the emerging carbon removal industry as a handful of so-called direct air capture (DAC) hubs are also slated to get underway.
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
The Bears and Cougars have both lost at least four in a row, and Cal has allowed 199 points over its quartet of losses.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
From Our Partners
https://www.fresnobee.com/shopping/article281437113.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
Federal regulators said an inquiry that began in 2019 determined that Apple’s hiring practices discriminated against U.S. candidates for jobs that were awarded to some immigrant workers seeking to be granted permanent resident status in the country.
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Short-lived ransomware outfit Ransomed.vc claims to have shut down for good after a number of suspected arrests.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/ransomedvc_shut_down/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Liliputing
The company behind the AYA Neo line of handheld gaming PCs is branching out into compact desktop computers with retro-style designs. The upcoming AYA Neo Retro Mini PC AM01 is a small form-factor desktop that looks like a classic Mac computer, while the Retro Mini PC AM02 draws inspiration from classic game consoles like the […]
The post AYA Neo’s Retro Mini PC series are inspired by classic computers and game consoles appeared first on Liliputing.
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
“It’s not a rivalry if it’s so one-sided. And right now this thing’s one sided. That’s up to us to play better football in these games to give us a chance to win,” SJSU head coach Brent Brennan said.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Tilde.news
https://github.com/blmayer/astro
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-10, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
I asked ChatGPT for a quick and easy chicken noodle soup recipe and it obliged, without any upsell. NYT this is your competition.
http://scripting.com/2023/11/10.html#a145947
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
Warmer ocean temperatures are hurting coral reefs off the U.S. state of Florida. For VOA, Genia Dulot took a look at what’s happening underwater.
https://www.voanews.com/a/warmer-ocean-temperatures-bleach-florida-coral/7349721.html
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-10, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
The
NYT, which I subscribe to, sent me an email today that linked to a
page
of easy soup recipes. I thought this is nice, I thought their cooking
site was extra money, which I refuse to pay because I think I already
give them far to much money for the value I get. But when I clicked on
one of the pictures I was
told
this is a “subscriber-only recipe.” This, like everything the NYT does,
is incredibly disrespectful and probably unethical, because I was being
conned by an ad, thinking it was journalistic content that I actually
paid for. I used to love the NYT. I grew up reading them along with
everyone else in my family. Now they betray that every chance they get.
Whoever is running the NYT now is running it into the ground as far as
I’m concerned.
http://scripting.com/2023/11/10.html#a145228
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The animal is critically endangered because its toothy beak gets caught in fishing nets, the aquarium said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281684628.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
In what would be delicious irony, Microsoft is reported to have temporarily pulled internal access to OpenAI’s ChatGPT over security fears.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/microsoft_blocks_chatgpt/
date: 2023-11-10, from: San Jose Mercury News
From kookaburras to giraffes, glamping tents and safari rides, here’s what to see and do at Safari West.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/11/10/4-amazing-things-to-do-at-safari-west-in-santa-rosa/
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
“Holodomor Then, Genocide Now, Justice When?” — an exhibition devoted to the 90th anniversary of the Ukrainian Holodomor — is now open at the Victims of Communism Museum in Washington, D.C. Ivanna Pidborska visited the exhibition and has this story, narrated by Anna Rice
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“Cinta has been very attentive to her babies.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281683438.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Authorities fear there could be more victims because of the “ very bold and very cavalier” way the 34-year-old man handled the situation.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281683543.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Veterans Day is Saturday, Nov. 11.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281499548.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: 404 Media Group
Video shot from a getaway car shows how SIM swappers have snatched worker tablets to help them take over phone numbers.
https://www.404media.co/how-hackers-straight-up-steal-t-mobile-tablets-to-sim-swap/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
Luminaries of the Korean consulate, the U.S. military and the Guam Legislature gathered Thursday at the Lotte Hotel Guam in Tumon to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the U.S. alliance with the Republic of Korea.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
The Guam Police Department has identified “excessive speed” as the cause of recent traffic-related fatalities.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
It may take three years for Guam’s visitor arrivals to reach the pre-pandemic peak of 1.7 million per year, but the Guam Visitors Bureau is working hard to get there, according to the board’s chair.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
The Guam Visitors Bureau had hoped that a new route from Haneda, Japan, to Guam would help boost visitor arrivals, but the light at the end of the tunnel has been dimmed by the U.S. Department of Transportation.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
The victim of a homicide in Sånta Rita-Sumai last month was identified as Edwin Babauta Pirando, a 54-year-old man from Hågat.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
Statements made by a doctor on a local radio talk show have received a lot of backlash from elected leaders who rose to defend military veterans on island.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
From Our Partners: Choose the right one for your baby. As your child grows, their pacifier needs to change
https://www.fresnobee.com/shopping/article281638678.html
@Tomosino’s Mastodon feed (date: 2023-11-10, from: Tomosino’s Mastodon feed)
Season 2, Episode 2
https://podcast.tomasino.org/@SolarpunkPrompts/episodes/the-moonshot
How can
Solarpunk address the problems of a massive project, like travel to the
moon? Will the genre crumble under the need for macro-level power and
industry? Come explore the latest story prompt and dream of a future
together.
#solarpunk
#writing
#fiction
#space
#climate
#inspiration
https://tilde.zone/@tomasino/111386608206985732
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Dinkinesh, the first asteroid encountered by NASA’s Lucy spacecraft, is being orbited by a smaller binary pair, and is the first object of its kind to be found by astronomers.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/nasas_lucy_probe/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Two other closures are planned in the region, including one on Highway 99.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281647738.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Opinion by Tad Weber: This is one aspect to how conservatives in California are trying to remain relevant in state politics.
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/article281613888.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“I never thought that suffocating from a cat food bag would be the cause of his death,” the owner said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281352328.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Raspberry Pi News (.com)
Andrew Gregory of HackSpace magazine sat down with the one and only Jeff Geerling to chat about the wholesome corner of the internet he created.
The post Meet Jeff Geerling appeared first on Raspberry Pi.
https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/meet-jeff-geerling/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
He strangled his stepfather, Ohio police say.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281682343.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The LAist
Diwali, which starts on Sunday, is a time for spirituality, to reconnect with friends and loved ones — and enjoy the best of India’s regional desserts. Here’s where to find them.
https://laist.com/news/food/for-your-sweet-tooth-diwali-indian-treats-around-socal
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The LAist
The office will act as an “air traffic control center” for all entities addressing food insecurity.
https://laist.com/news/food/la-county-creates-office-of-food-equity-to-coordinate-aid
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“If an eco-friendly governor isn’t going to wean himself off fossil fuels, why should the rest of us?” asks SLO Tribune columnist.
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/article281499063.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Here’s the latest on De’Aaron Fox and what the Kings are up against in their first NBA Cup in-season tournament game against the Thunder.
https://www.fresnobee.com/sports/article281678318.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Clovis High had the lead against Liberty-Bakersfield.
https://www.fresnobee.com/sports/high-school/prep-football/article281657583.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“The northern spotted owl is going extinct and likely will be in my lifetime … if we don’t change course.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281659668.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The agency is pushing ahead while the public is raising concerns about irreversible diseases from outside plantings.
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/article280709210.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The amphibian’s low growl helped lead wildlife staff to a jackpot of egg masses to collect, the aquarium said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281662413.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Marketplace Morning Report
Many in Hollywood breathed a sigh of relief this week when SAG-AFTRA reached a tentative contract agreement with major studios. But though movie theaters are hungry for content, the impact of the actors strike may linger well into next year. Plus, what will the approval of weight loss drugs mean for health care costs? And later, we hear from an entrepreneur who made vintage arcade games his career.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Sen. Jerry Moran: Thank veterans for their military service on Veterans Day, but don’t forget their everyday contributions to our communities. | Opinion
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/article281649988.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
The UK government has promised to “clarify and update” the law to allow the introduction of self-driving vehicles to the country’s roads, but it is set to be a long, technical journey.…
date: 2023-11-10, from: PeerJ blog
We are delighted to welcome Dr. John Measey as our newest Section Editor for PeerJ Life & Environment’s Zoological Science Section. John is a Professor at the based in the Institute for Biodiversity at Yunnan University and at the Centre for Invasion Biology (C·I·B), Department of Botany and Zoology at Stellenbosch University. He is also […]
https://peerj.com/blog/post/115284888565/meet-our-new-peerj-section-editor-john-measey/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, is stopping political campaigns from using its generative AI advertising products. The move aims at tackling misinformation and deepfake videos. Then, Diwali — the Hindu festival of lights — takes place on Sunday. But as people battle higher living costs and air pollution, will the celebrations be a bit dimmer this year? Additionally, JKN Group — the Thai owner of the Miss Universe beauty pageant — has filed for bankruptcy.
https://www.marketplace.org/shows/marketplace-morning-report/meta-clamps-down-on-ai-in-political-ads
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-08, from: Bruce Schneier blog
Article based on a Mozilla report.
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2023/11/the-privacy-disaster-of-modern-smart-cars.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: Deno blog
Deno KV is now even more flexible and powerful with self-hosted options, replicas, and S3 and GCS continuous backup support.
https://deno.com/blog/kv-is-open-source-with-continuous-backup
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
From Our Partners: Older adults can be hard to shop for, but we have some ideas for the right gift for the seniors in your family
https://www.fresnobee.com/shopping/article281651868.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
Gov. Lou Leon has signed into law legislation legalizing consumer-grade fireworks on Guam, as well as a three-month extension to the Prugråman Ayuda Para I Taotao-ta Energy Credit Program.
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Opinion At KubeCon North America, I did a little exercise I’ve done before at major technology shows. I went around the booths in the exhibition hall and asked a very simple question: “Are you hiring?” The answer from two-person startups still building up from their personal credit cards to Fortune 500 companies was always the same: Yes.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/kubecon_opinion/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
What do GOP voters stand for with him? What are they without him? | Opinion
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/article281652198.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Guam Daily Post
A traffic stop Thursday resulted in the arrest of a man and woman, as well as the seizure of a little more than two ounces of methamphetamine and $4,132 cash.
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
A demonstration Thursday raised awareness about thousands killed in Gaza and called for an immediate ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war.
The post USC community walks out, marches for Gaza appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/10/usc-community-walks-out-marches-for-gaza/
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: Charlie’s Diary
(This is the text of a talk I delivered at the Next Frontiers Applied Fiction Day in Stuttgart on Friday November 10th, 2023. Note: early draft, contains some typos, I’ll fix them next week when I get home.) In 2021,…
http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2023/11/dont-create-the-torment-nexus.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, “some progress” has been made toward protecting Palestinian civilians, but that “much more needs to be done” to minimize casualties and deliver humanitarian assistance to war-stricken Gaza.
“We have seen progress, we just need to see more of it,” Blinken told reporters in New Delhi at the end of a nine-day, eight-country tour that focused in large part on the worsening Middle East conflict.
Israel on Thursday agreed to pause its military operation against Hamas militants in certain areas of northern Gaza for four hours each day, according to White House officials.
The pauses are aimed at allowing the flow of more humanitarian aid, as well as Palestinians who want to flee areas where the Israeli ground operation and airstrikes are most intense.
On Thursday, Israel also opened a second corridor along Gaza’s coast, which will allow more Palestinians to flee, White House officials said.
“What Israel announced yesterday will help,” Blinken said, adding that the U.S. is also discussing “concrete steps” that would allow more regular deliveries of humanitarian aid, as well as fuel for vital facilities, such as hospitals and water treatment plants.
More than 10,000 people, about 40% of them children, have been killed during Israel’s heavy bombardment of Gaza over the past month, according to Palestinian officials.
In reality, that figure may be even higher, according to a senior Biden administration official who delivered testimony to Congress on Wednesday.
Barbara Leaf, assistant secretary of state for Near Eastern affairs, told the House Committee on Foreign Relations that it is “very possible” that the casualty rates are higher than what is being reported. “We will only know after the guns fall silent,” she said.
Israel’s military says its ground forces have encircled Gaza City, a Hamas stronghold, as part of an effort to divide the Palestinian enclave.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to eradicate Hamas, the Islamist group that governs Gaza. Hamas militants last month carried out a bloody surprise attack on Israeli soldiers and civilians that left over 1,400 people dead.
Netanyahu has said there will be no cease-fire until Hamas releases the over 200 hostages it is thought to be holding.
Though global calls for a cease-fire have grown louder, U.S. officials oppose such a move, saying it would allow Hamas to regroup and eventually carry out more terrorist attacks.
The Mideast crisis has dominated Blinken’s trip, which included stops in Israel, the West Bank, Jordan, Iraq, Turkey, Japan, and South Korea.
Asia focus
However, especially in the second half of his trip, the top U.S. diplomat has attempted to maintain a focus on Asia, which he said is “the critical region for our future.”
On Friday, Blinken and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin met their Indian counterparts, Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and Defense Minister Rajnath Singh, in New Delhi for talks aimed at boosting defense ties.
“Defense remains one of the most important pillars of our bilateral relationship,” said Singh at the outset of the so-called “2+2 Dialogue.”
“In spite of various emerging geopolitical challenges, we need to keep our focus on the important and long-term issues,” he added.
India and the United States, along with Japan and Australia, are a part of the Quad, a regional security grouping widely seen as a multilateral attempt to counter China’s rising influence.
India has seen tensions with China rise, especially since a deadly clash in 2020 along the two countries’ disputed Himalayan border.
But India has maintained close defense and economic ties with Russia – much to the disappointment of Western countries that have attempted to economically and diplomatically isolate Russia following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.
Tensions also spiked in September after Canada, a close U.S. ally, alleged Indian involvement in the killing of Canadian citizen Hardeep Singh Nijjar, a Sikh separatist.
India has furiously denied the allegations. But U.S. officials want India to cooperate with Canada on an investigation into the killing.
Speaking to reporters after meeting Indian officials Friday, Blinken said India and Canada are “two of our closest friends and partners and of course we want to see them resolving any differences or disputes.”
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Teaching assistants, research assistants and assistant lecturers demonstrated across campuses, signaling their readiness to strike.
The post Graduate student workers hold ‘last chance picket’ appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/10/graduate-student-workers-hold-last-chance-picket/
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Plans to build a datacenter campus on a landfill site overlooking the M25 motorway near London have been rejected on grounds it would significantly alter the character and appearance of the area, despite recognition there is significant demand for datacenter capacity in the area.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/datacenter_plans_blocked/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>AUSTIN, Texas — The white Honda Civic sped down Highway 57, a rural two-lane corridor that reaches the U.S.-Mexico border, after a Texas sheriff’s deputy tried pulling over the car and gave chase when it didn’t stop.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>While under oath this week Donald Trump was instructed to answer questions about his financial documents as part of New York Attorney General Tish James’ civil fraud trial over allegations that he illegally altered the value of his assets.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Fiscal responsibility has never been a hallmark of the current administration — and President Joe Biden isn’t much concerned about changing course. Now the White House stands by as federal bureaucrats let billions in COVID aid go up in flames.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/10/opinion/who-cares-its-only-taxpayer-money/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Automakers are now learning an important lesson: Not all car buyers are wealthy environmentalists.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>WASHINGTON — Israel has agreed to put in place four-hour daily humanitarian pauses in its assault on Hamas in northern Gaza, the White House said Thursday, as President Joe Biden pressed Israelis for a multi-day stoppage in the fighting in a bid to negotiate the release of hostages held by the militant group.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>SAN FRANCISCO — The man accused of bludgeoning former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband with a hammer was caught up in conspiracies when he broke into her San Francisco home last year, his defense attorney said as his trial opened Thursday.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Valerie Kuulei Berdon, 71, of Hawi died Oct. 27 at Kohala Hospital. Born in Honokaa, she was a foreman for West Hawaii Concrete and member of ABWA, GOS and Waimea Outdoor Circle. Visitation 9-10 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 18, at St. James Episcopal Church, 65-1237 Kawaihae Rd. in Waimea. Service at 10 a.m. Survived by daughters, Kehaulani R. Berdon and Rosaline Leolani Rodrigues; brother, Alfred Berdon Jr.; sisters, Leo Akau, Charmaine Phillips and Corinne (Matthew) Weller; six grandsons and four great-grandsons; aunts, uncles and cousins. Arrangements by Ballard Family Mortuary.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/10/obituaries/obituaries-for-november-10-11/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>WASHINGTON — Authorities were hunting Thursday for whoever sent suspicious letters — including some containing fentanyl — to elections offices in at least five states this week, delaying the counting of ballots in some local races in the latest instance of threats faced by election workers around the country.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>BERLIN — Charlotte Knobloch was 6 years old when she saw the synagogues of Munich burning and watched helplessly as two Nazi officers marched away a beloved friend of her father who was beaten up and bleeding on the forehead.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>NEW YORK — Surgeons have performed the world’s first transplant of an entire human eye, an extraordinary addition to a face transplant — although it’s far too soon to know if the man will ever see through his new left eye.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Another segment of the Hilo Bayfront Trails project has been completed, further connecting downtown Hilo with the Bayfront soccer fields.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Three holiday craft fairs are right around the corner.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/10/hawaii-news/holiday-craft-fairs-return/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>JUNEAU, Alaska — A federal judge on Thursday upheld the Biden administration’s approval of the massive Willow oil-drilling project on Alaska’s remote North Slope, a decision that environmental groups swiftly vowed to fight.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>HONOLULU — A pond in Hawaii has turned so bubble-gum pink it could be from the set of “Barbie,” but the bizarre phenomenon is no cause for a dance party. Drought may be to blame for the strange hue, scientists say, and they’re warning against entering the water or drinking it.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>NEW YORK — The proportion of U.S. kindergartners exempted from school vaccination requirements has hit its highest level ever, 3%, U.S. health officials said Thursday.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The state Department of Health is alerting residents to a voluntary recall by Mid America Pet Food for products distributed to retailers in the state, including Sam’s Club, Tractor Supply Co., and Del’s Feed and Farm Supply. The products are being recalled because they may be contaminated with salmonella.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Hawaiian cultural practitioners have nominated Maunakea to be included on the state and federal registers of historic places.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>CHICAGO — D’Onta Foreman ran for a touchdown and the Chicago Bears boosted their shot at the top pick in the draft, beating the Carolina Panthers 16-13 on Thursday night. </p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Here are previews for Sunday’s and Monday’s NFL games.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/10/sports/nfl-week-10-preview-capsules/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Boston Red Sox owner John Henry will soon receive a special “Stay In Oakland” box from Bay Area fans packed with a green Athletics cap, a baseball card featuring his likeness and a note telling him all the reasons he should vote no on the team’s planned relocation to Las Vegas. </p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>UH-Hilo golfer Tia Kuali‘i and soccer player Colby Lee were named KTA Super Stores’ Superstars of October, as announced Thursday.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/10/sports/kualii-lee-named-kta-superstars-of-october/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>It seems like old times for Dalen Morris.</p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Three former New Mexico State basketball players were charged with multiple sex crimes Thursday related to a series of alleged assaults of teammates that led to the disbandment of the team in the middle of last season. </p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Virginia running back Perris Jones was immobilized on a flat board and carted off the field after being injured on a play late in the third quarter against No. 11 Louisville on Thursday night. </p>
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
I just recently discovered that the correct term is “Daylight Saving” (singular) — NOT — “Daylight Savings” (plural). It matters little to me. I no longer wear a watch because my uber-screen smartphone displays moments in 2,100-point type. Bonus? It resets DST automatically. Ditto with my microwave, computer and garage door opener. The clock in my […]
The post John Boston | Tweedie, Lesbie, Lisa & Inducing Night Urination appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/john-boston-tweedie-lesbie-lisa-inducing-night-urination/
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
In response to the article about the William S. Hart Union High School District’s negotiations with teachers, I strongly disagree with the way our school district is being portrayed. It’s really disheartening to see our district being called a “school-shooting district,” a “racist district,” or a “district of bigots.” We should remember that these are […]
The post Glenda Yakel | Set Aside Hurtful Language appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/glenda-yakel-set-aside-hurtful-language/
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
I received an email from Rep. Mike Garcia touting his backing of a bill supporting Israel. In that message he states, “The emergency aid package we passed this week is fully paid for, and it’s designed to win the war — not tie.” On its face, that sentence makes no sense. First, the aid […]
The post Jim de Bree | Message Lacks Factual Support appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/jim-de-bree-message-lacks-factual-support/
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
Earl Meyer remembers in vivid detail when his platoon came under heavy fire during the Korean War – he still has shrapnel embedded in his thigh.
But over 70 years later, the 96-year-old is still waiting for the U.S. Army to recognize his injury and to award him a Purple Heart medal, which honors service members wounded or killed in combat.
Meyer has provided the Army with documents to back up his assertion that he was wounded in combat in June 1951. Doctors at the Department of Veterans Affairs agreed that his account of the shrapnel coming from a mortar attack was probably true. But few men in his unit who would have witnessed the battle have survived, and he thinks the medic who treated him on the battlefield was killed before he could file the paperwork.
An Army review board in April issued what it called a final rejection of Meyer’s request for a Purple Heart, citing insufficient documentation. His case highlights how it can be a struggle for wounded veterans to get medals they’ve earned when the fog of war, the absence of records and the passage of time make it challenging to produce proof.
“At first I didn’t know that I had been wounded,” Meyer wrote in a sworn statement that was part of his rejected appeal. “But as my unit advanced from where the mortar rounds were hitting, I noticed that my pants were sticking to my leg. I reached down to correct this and discovered that my hand was covered in blood.”
Meyer took the rare step of suing the Department of Defense and the Army in September. The Army’s Office of Public Affairs said it doesn’t comment on ongoing litigation. But after The Associated Press made requests for comment on Meyer’s case, the office of the Army’s top noncommissioned officer, Sgt. Maj. of the Army Michael Weimer, said that it’s going to take another look.
“The Sergeant Major of the Army’s Office is engaging with Mr. Meyer’s family and looking into the situation,” spokesperson Master Sgt. Daniel Wallace said. “Either way, we’re proud of Mr. Meyer’s service to our country.”
Meyer said in an interview that he wouldn’t have pursued the Purple Heart because his injuries were relatively minor compared to those of many men he served with, but his three daughters persuaded him. Growing up, they knew that he had been injured in the war, but like many veterans, he never talked much about it. It’s only been in the past decade or so that he’s opened up to them, which led them to urge his pursuit of a Purple Heart.
“I think it will provide closure for him. I really do,” said his daughter, Sandy Baker, of New Buffalo, Michigan.
Tony Cross, a disability claims and appeals specialist with the American Legion, the country’s largest veterans’ service organization, said the Legion doesn’t commonly see cases like Meyer’s of medals denied, though it did see one earlier this year. The process is challenging because each military branch has its own approval process and it gets more challenging after a veteran leaves the military, he said.
Meyer’s main obstacle has been the lack of paperwork. He told the AP the medic who bandaged his leg told him he would file the forms to show he was wounded in combat. But he never did. Meyer thinks the medic may have been killed in action. Only a few members of his platoon made it out unharmed.
At the time, Meyer wasn’t hurt badly enough to leave the battlefield. But Army medical records show he injured his back a few days later when he fell down a hill while carrying a machine gun, and then aggravated it again days later while lifting ammunition. He was evacuated to a MASH unit, then a hospital ship. The records show his treatment included a tetanus shot, apparently for the shrapnel injury.
“I still had the hole in my pants and the blood on it,” he said about the time he was hospitalized for his back. He said he still had the patch on his leg. “I should have told them at that time.”
But he wasn’t thinking then about gathering paperwork for a future medal. His mind was on survival.
“I was just glad to get out of there,” he said.
Accidental back injuries generally don’t qualify a service member for a Purple Heart, but wounds from enemy shrapnel can.
Meyer finished out his tour guarding prisoners of war. He was honorably discharged in 1952. His decorations included the Combat Infantryman Badge, which is reserved for those who actively participate in ground combat under enemy fire. He also received the Congressional Gold Medal for his service in the Merchant Marine in World War II.
He still has coffee with fellow veterans a couple mornings a week at the St. Peter American Legion post. He said his leg isn’t acutely sore, but it still aches. VA doctors told him they didn’t want to risk surgery to remove the shrapnel because it was too close to his sciatic nerve.
In 2005, doctors at the VA Medical Center in Minneapolis agreed that his leg injury probably happened in combat. “The scar in the left thigh is at least as likely as not (50/50 probability) caused by or a result of a combat fragment wound,” they wrote in one report. “Reasonable doubt has been resolved in your favor,” they wrote in another.
Meyer first applied for a Purple Heart in 2020. The Army denied him, saying he needed more documentation.
So U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s staff then helped him get documents from the National Archives and made numerous follow-up inquiries. But even with the additional evidence, the Army Board for Correction of Military Records turned him down. Klobuchar said this week that she’s not giving up.
“Earl Meyer put his life on the line in defense of our freedoms, and we will continue to do all we can to further the work to rightfully honor his service,” the Minnesota Democrat said in a statement.
In its most recent rejection letter, the board said he must have “substantiating evidence to verify that he was injured, the wound was the result of hostile action, the wound must have required treatment by medical personnel and the medical treatment must have been made a matter of official record.”
The board conceded that “some evidence available for review indicates a possible injury,” but that “based on the preponderance of the evidence available for review, the Board determined the evidence presented insufficient to warrant a recommendation for relief.”
Meyer’s attorney, Alan Anderson, wrote in the the lawsuit that review boards have awarded Purple Hearts under similar circumstances — sometimes under court order. He said the board noted the problems of relying solely on medical records when it approved a Purple Heart in a separate 2015 case.
“Under wartime conditions, wounds requiring medical treatment by a medical officer will not always receive such treatment, and, even if a soldier requiring such treatment receives it, there will be cases where the treatment is not made a matter of official record,” the board said in that case. “In such cases, other sources, including credible statements from colleagues, may be useful in establishing the circumstances in which a soldier was wounded.”
date: 2023-11-10, from: Robert Reich on Substack
Be worried. Be really worried.
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/what-is-trump-planning-if-he-gets
date: 2023-11-10, from: Howard Jacobson blog
A lengthy free post today, but that doesn’t mean you must take me literally. Do become a paid subscriber if your heart so moves you. Early in his book The Death Of Tragedy, the literary critic George Steiner throws out a challenge to monotheism which, though seemingly casual, opens doors to dark places. ‘Tragedy,’ he writes, ‘is alien to the Judaic sense of the world.’
https://jacobsonh.substack.com/p/the-death-of-tragedy
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Ubuntu Summit One of the most common bits of FUD about Ubuntu’s Snap packaging format is that it’s proprietary – but exploring the documentation shows that is wrong.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/snap_without_ubuntu_tools/
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
Now that you’ve been properly introduced to Brancaia and its winemaker, Barbara Widmer, let’s talk about their wines. Giuditta, our delightful hostess whom I mentioned in my first column, provided us with a masterful presentation of nine of Brancaia’s offerings. We started with the 2022 rosé (100% merlot); then to 2022 Il Bianco (100% sauvignon […]
The post Carl Kanowsky | Tasting Brancaia’s wines appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/carl-kanowsky-tasting-brancaias-wines/
date: 2023-11-10, from: SCV New (TV Station)
1929 – Tom Vernon pulls off the “Great Saugus Train Robbery.” [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-nov-10/
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
China’s largest bank, ICBC, was hit by ransomware that resulted in disruption of financial services (FS) systems on Thursday Beijing time, according to a notice on its website.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/icbc_ransomware/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The Gauchos will travel to UTEP for their next game on Monday.
The post Shorthanded UCSB Falls to Portland State 82-76 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/09/shorthanded-ucsb-falls-to-portland-state-82-76/
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
On Call Friday is here, and perhaps your temper is a little frayed. Which is why The Register always opens the last day of the working week with a fresh instalment of On Call, our reader-contributed tale of the excitement of incidents on the front lines of tech support.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/on_call/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The incident happened in northwest Fresno.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281679143.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
As a Jewish student, Eden Roth, always has felt safe and welcome at Tulane University, where more than 40% of the students are Jewish. That has been tested by the aftermath of last month’s invasion of Israel by Hamas.
Graffiti appeared on the New Orleans campus with the message “from the river to the sea,” a rallying cry for pro-Palestinian activists. Then came a clash between dueling demonstrations, where a melee led to three arrests and left a Jewish student with a broken nose.
“I think that the shift of experience with Jews on campus was extremely shocking,” said Roth, who was in Israel last summer for a study-abroad program. “A lot of students come to Tulane because of the Jewish population — feeling like they’re supported, like a majority rather than a minority. And I think that’s definitely shifted.”
Tulane isn’t alone. On other campuses, long-simmering tensions are erupting in violence and shattering the sense of safety that makes colleges hubs of free discourse. Students on both sides are witnessing acts of hate, leaving many fearing for their safety even as they walk to classrooms.
Threats and clashes have sometimes come from within, including at Cornell, where a student is accused of posting online threats against Jewish students. A University of Massachusetts student was arrested after allegedly punching a Jewish student and spitting on an Israeli flag at a demonstration. At Stanford, an Arab Muslim student was hit by a car in a case being investigated as a hate crime.
The unease is felt acutely at Tulane, where 43% of students are Jewish, the highest percentage among colleges that are not explicitly Jewish.
“To see it on Tulane’s campus is definitely scary,” said Jacob Starr, a Jewish student from Massachusetts.
Within the student Jewish community, there is a range of perspectives on the conflict. The latest war began with an attack on Oct. 7 by Hamas militants who targeted towns, farming communities and a music festival near the Gaza border, killing more than 1,400 people. Israel has responded with weeks of attacks in Gaza, which have killed more than 10,000 people.
Emma Sackheim, a Jewish student from Los Angeles who attends Tulane’s law school, said she grew up as a supporter of the Jewish state but now considers herself an opponent of Zionism. Sackheim says she knows students who oppose Israel’s policies “but don’t feel comfortable to publicly say anything.”
“I was standing on the Palestinian side,” she said when asked about the Oct. 26 demonstration, which took place along a public New Orleans street that runs through campus.
Still, she said Tulane is where she feels most comfortable as a Jew. “I know that I have so many options of community,” she said.
On campuses around the U.S., students on both sides say they have been subjected to taunts and rhetoric that oppose their very existence since the invasion and the subsequent Israeli assault on Hamas in northern Gaza.
They see it in campus rallies, on anonymous message boards frequented by college students, and on graffiti scrawled on dorms and buildings. In one case under police investigation as a possible hate crime, “Free Palestine” was found written this week on a window of Boston University’s Hillel center.
Colleges have been scrambling to restore a sense of security for Jewish and Arab students — and stressing messages of inclusion for diverse student bodies. But untangling what’s protected as political speech and what crosses into threatening language can be daunting task.
Tulane’s president, Michael Fitts, has described an increased police presence and other security measures on campus. In messages to the campus community, he has lamented the loss of innocent Israeli and Palestinian lives and said the university was reaching out to Jewish and Muslim student groups and religious organizations.
He has faced criticism from people on both sides seeking more forceful statements.
Islam Elrabieey, for example, seeks condemnation of Israel’s actions.
“To condemn Hamas is a good thing,” said Elrabieey, a native of Egypt and a visiting scholar in Tulane’s Middle East and North African Studies program. “But at the same time, if you didn’t condemn Israel for committing war crimes, this is a double standard.”
As places that encourage intellectual debate, it isn’t surprising that colleges have seen heated conflict, said Jonathan Fansmith, a senior vice president for the American Council on Education, an association of university presidents. But when different factions disagree about what crosses the line between free speech and abuse, it puts colleges in a difficult place, he said.
“Everyone should be incredibly sympathetic to Jewish students who feel under threat, and the alarming rise in antisemitic actions is something college universities take very seriously,” Fansmith said. “But they have a requirement, a responsibility under the law as well, to balance the free speech rights of people who may disagree, who may have critiques that they find disagreeable or dislike. And finding that line is very, very difficult.”
After facing criticism for trying to remain too neutral on the war, Harvard University’s president on Thursday condemned the phrase “from the river to the sea,” saying it has historical meanings that imply to many the eradication of Jews from Israel. Pro-Palestinian activists around the world chanted the phrase in the aftermath of the Hamas raid.
Meanwhile, Roth said that some Tulane Jewish students have been rattled enough to make them think twice about visiting the Mintz Center, the headquarters for the Tulane Hillel organization.
“I don’t feel completely safe, but I feel like we have no other choice but to embrace who we are in these times,” Roth said in an interview at the building. “I know a lot of my friends are nervous to wear their Star of David necklaces, to wear a kippah or even come into this building. But I think it’s critical that we do not let fear consume us.”
Lea Jackson, a freshman from New Jersey who describes herself as a modern Orthodox Jew, said she is concerned that supporters of a Palestinian state are nervous expressing their views because of the large numbers of Jewish students on campus.
The Hamas raid may have made some people more reluctant to speak even as others become more outspoken, said Jackson, who said she recently spent a “gap year” in Israel and has friends and family there.
“But it’s a lot harder to have a civil conversation,” Jackson said, “when emotions and tension are so high and so many people are so personally connected to this.”
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
On Oct. 30 Student Outreach and Recruitment worked alongside campus partners and departments to host Open House at CSUN. Previously called “Preview Day,” Open House is an informative event that provides incoming high school and community college students with several activities to learn about CSUN and its application process. Antonette Abejueala, the recruitment and yield…
https://sundial.csun.edu/176879/news/csun-hosts-annual-fall-open-house/
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
Authorities were hunting Thursday for whoever sent suspicious letters — including some containing fentanyl — to elections offices in at least five states this week, delaying the counting of ballots in some local races in the latest instance of threats faced by election workers around the country.
The letters were sent to elections offices in the presidential battlegrounds of Georgia and Nevada, as well as California, Oregon and Washington, with some being intercepted before they arrived. Four of the letters contained fentanyl, the FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service reported in a statement to elections officials Thursday.
“Law enforcement is working diligently to intercept any additional letters before they are delivered,” the statement said.
The Pierce County auditor’s office in Tacoma, Washington, released images of the letter it received, showing it had been postmarked in Portland, Oregon, and read in part, “End elections now.”
In Seattle, King County Elections Director Julie Wise said that letter appeared to be the same one her office got. She said it was very similar to one King County received during the August primary, which also contained fentanyl.
Authorities in Georgia suspect that election offices in Fulton County, which includes Atlanta and is the largest voting jurisdiction in one of the nation’s most important presidential swing states, was a likely target. They were working to intercept any letters. In the meantime, Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said officials were sending the overdose-reversal drug naloxone to the office as a precaution.
“This is domestic terrorism, and it needs to be condemned by anyone that holds elected office and anyone that wants to hold elective office anywhere in America,” said Raffensperger, a Republican.
It was not immediately clear how authorities came to suspect that a letter might have been sent to Georgia’s biggest election office. Raffensperger said the state alerted all 159 of its counties of the possible threat Wednesday but believes only Fulton County is being targeted.
In California, the United States Postal Service intercepted two suspicious envelopes that were headed to election facilities in Los Angeles and Sacramento.
Authorities in Lane County, Oregon, which includes the University of Oregon, were investigating a piece of mail that arrived at the local election office Wednesday. No one who came in contact with it had experienced any negative health effects, said Devon Ashbridge, spokesperson for the Lane County Elections Office in Eugene.
The incident prompted officials to close the office and delayed an afternoon pickup of ballots. Ashbridge declined to provide further details.
“Someone attempted to terrorize our elections staff, and that’s not OK,” Ashbridge said.
On Wednesday, authorities in Washington state said four county election offices had to be evacuated as election workers were processing ballots cast in Tuesday’s election, delaying vote-counting.
Election offices in King, Skagit, Spokane and Pierce counties received envelopes containing powders. Local law enforcement officials said the substances in King and Spokane counties field-tested positive for fentanyl. In at least one other case, the substance was baking soda.
Pierce County Auditor Linda Farmer released images of the envelope and letter her office received. The letter contained a warning about the vulnerability of “ballot drops” and read: “End elections now. Stop giving power to the right that they don’t have. We are in charge now and there is no more need for them.”
The letter featured an antifascist symbol, a progress pride flag and a pentagram. While the symbols have sometimes been associated with leftist politics, they also have been used by conservative figures to label and stereotype the left, and the sender’s political leanings were unclear.
Elections offices in two Washington counties — King and Okanogan — also received suspicious envelopes while processing ballots during the August primary, and the letter sent to King County tested positive for traces of fentanyl. Those letters remain under investigation by the U.S. Postal Inspection Service and FBI.
Washington Secretary of State Steve Hobbs called the incidents in his state “acts of terrorism to threaten our elections.”
White House spokesperson Olivia Dalton said the Biden administration was aware of the investigation: “We are grateful for the election and poll workers who served this week to ensure the security of our democratic processes.”
Fentanyl, an opioid that can be 50 times as powerful as the same amount of heroin, is driving an overdose crisis deadlier than any the U.S. has ever seen as it is pressed into pills or mixed into other drugs. Briefly touching fentanyl cannot cause an overdose, and researchers have found that the risk of fatal overdose from accidental exposure is low.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Buchanan No. 1 runner was out will an illness, but the girls team rolled to its 24th consecutive TRAC title.
https://www.fresnobee.com/sports/high-school/article281678898.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
Depending on what you are paying attention to, emerging AI tech will either lead to a post-scarcity utopia à la “WALL-E” or to a dystopian nightmare in which rogue sentient robots have crushed humanity and achieved dominance over the planet. Some would have us believe that such science fiction may become fact. Either way, the…
https://sundial.csun.edu/176875/opinions/ok-doomer-the-current-and-future-dangers-of-ai/
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
What had been expected to be a workmanlike meeting Monday between U.S. President Joe Biden and his Indonesian counterpart, Joko Widodo, has become more sensitive in light of widespread Muslim anger over Israel’s devastating anti-terror campaign in Gaza.
During Widodo’s official visit, the U.S. is expected to upgrade diplomatic ties with a key Indo-Pacific partner that has been advancing toward China’s sphere of influence. The two leaders are expected to elevate bilateral ties to a “Comprehensive Strategic Partnership,” putting Washington on par with Beijing.
However, the presidents are far apart in their responses to the Israel-Hamas war, with Biden offering staunch support to Israel in its response to Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack into Israel, while Widodo has called the humanitarian situation in Gaza “unacceptable.”
Biden understands “there are strong feelings” but “will continue to make it clear the U.S. stands with Israel,” National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications John Kirby told VOA during a briefing Thursday.
Biden will also make it clear that the United States will do everything it can to provide humanitarian aid and safe passage for the Palestinian people and will not back down from “the real promise of a two-state solution.”
Gregory Poling, director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said he expects the two presidents to tread carefully on the emotion-laden issue, particularly on calls for an indefinite cease-fire.
“Anything Jokowi [Joko Widodo] says that’s too critical of Israel or too supportive of Hamas will damage relations with the U.S and the West. And anything he says that is not sufficiently critical of Israel will damage him at home,” Poling said.
Indonesian support for Palestinian cause
The Palestinian cause heavily influences political views in Indonesia based on its anti-colonial tradition and demographics. About 229 million Muslims — 13% of the world’s total — live here, where they constitute 87% of the population.
Just as no presidential candidate can win in the U.S. without pledging support for Israel, the opposite is the case in Indonesia.
“Not a single Indonesian president has dared not to defend Palestine,” said Siti Mutiah Setiawati, a lecturer of Middle East studies at Indonesia’s Gadjah Mada University. “Our founding fathers have laid the foundation of our foreign policy — nonaligned, free and active. Defend the oppressed,” she said.
As civilian casualties mount in Gaza, several Indonesian cities have erupted in protest over U.S. support of Israel. Prominent Islamic parties have often sought to capitalize on the Palestinian issue, and with a presidential election next year, the ruling Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle is wary of Widodo appearing too soft on the war in Gaza.
Just a day before his White House visit, Widodo is scheduled to attend a summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, hosted by Saudi Arabia in Riyadh, where the agenda calls for a discussion of “the brutal Israeli aggression against the Palestinian people.”
But policy experts warn that any friction over the Israel-Hamas war could jeopardize progress on a long list of common interests, including a deal on nickel and China’s rising ambitions in the Indo-Pacific.
“The incentive here is to avoid any sort of public airing of differences over the Israel-Gaza conflict,” said Lucas Myers, senior associate for Southeast Asia at the Wilson Center’s Asia Program.
Critical minerals deal
Jakarta has been pushing for a limited free trade agreement similar to one the U.S. signed with Japan in March that will allow Indonesian nickel exports to be covered by the 2022 U.S. Inflation Reduction Act.
The IRA is Biden’s signature climate change and clean energy legislation that provides tens of billions of dollars in tax credits to spur domestic electric vehicle manufacturing and sales.
American consumers can qualify for a $7,500 tax credit to purchase an EV if 50% of its battery components were produced in North America and if 40% of the critical minerals used for the vehicle was extracted, processed and/or recycled domestically or in a country that has a free trade agreement with Washington.
EV manufacturing requires various critical minerals, including nickel, of which Indonesia has the world’s largest reserves by far. When Widodo met Vice President Kamala Harris in Jakarta in September, he asked the U.S. to begin talks on a limited free trade deal for critical minerals.
Negotiations have not formally begun, but according to the White House, Biden and Widodo will “explore opportunities to enhance cooperation on the clean energy transition.”
Challenges lie ahead since Indonesia’s mining and refining industry is dependent on Chinese investment and besieged by labor and environmental concerns. In October, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators sent a letter to the Biden administration urging it to include these concerns in its consideration of any expanded access for critical minerals.
While Jakarta wants a bilateral deal like the U.S.-Japan Critical Minerals Agreement, Washington is also exploring a critical minerals scheme under its 2022 Indo-Pacific Economic Framework for Prosperity, signed by 13 countries including Indonesia. The IPEF does not grant market access to its signees but offers trade facilitation.
Poling said some sort of critical minerals announcement will likely come out of Monday’s meeting.
“There will also probably be a multilateral critical minerals announcement around APEC, like this will be part of IPEF,” he said.
Polling was referring to the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit that the U.S. will be hosting next week in San Francisco that Widodo will attend. Whether Indonesia gets both – the kickoff of bilateral talks on critical minerals and a multilateral framework – remains to be seen, he added.
China
With its large population, fast-growing trillion-dollar economy and abundant resources, Indonesia plays a key role in the geopolitical battle for influence in Asia between Washington and Beijing.
Under Widodo, who cannot run for a third term but is aiming to cement his legacy as a champion of infrastructure projects, Indonesia came second only to Pakistan in terms of value of Belt and Road Initiative projects — $20.3 billion and 71 operating projects in 2021.
However, like other major Southeast Asian countries, Indonesia is tilting its military relations toward Washington as China increasingly asserts its claim to disputed waters in the South China Sea.
In August, the Indonesian and U.S. militaries conducted the Super Garuda Shield exercises, expanding their annual drills to involve more than 4,000 service members with 19 nations either participating or observing. It was one of the largest multinational exercises in the Indo-Pacific region.
Monday’s visit by Widodo was arranged after Biden sent Harris to the ASEAN summit hosted by Indonesia in September, and he went to Hanoi.
VOA’s Rivan Dwiastono and Virginia Gunawan contributed to this story.
https://www.voanews.com/a/gaza-war-complicates-biden-s-meeting-with-indonesia-s-widodo/7349395.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
President Joe Biden will meet Indonesian President Joko Widodo at the White House Monday in what was supposed to be a straightforward engagement to upgrade U.S. diplomatic ties with a key Indo-Pacific partner. However, the war in Gaza has made the meeting between Israel’s staunchest supporter and the leader of the country with the largest Muslim population more complicated. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara has this report.
https://www.voanews.com/a/gaza-war-complicates-biden-s-meeting-with-indonesia-s-widodo-/7349420.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
Jessper Maquindang always wanted to compete in a marathon. In fact, it was one of the items on his bucket list. The Hart High School alumnus got his chance at the Rock ‘n’ Roll San Diego Marathon in 2014, and after getting through it, he caught a bug and has since completed 11 marathons. “I […]
The post <strong>Hart High alum preparing for 12</strong><strong>th</strong><strong> marathon in 10 years</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/hart-high-alum-preparing-for-12th-marathon-in-10-years/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Digital Rhetoric Collaberative
My name is Saurabh Anand. I was born in 1992. It was one of the initial years when many postcolonial countries wentthrough “Globalization,” “Privatization,” and “Liberalization,” including India. Delhi, my birth city, and other major cities became the hub of technology, software, and hardware exports. It’d be an understatement to say right from the beginning […]
https://www.digitalrhetoriccollaborative.org/2023/11/09/introduction-to-saurabh-anand/
@Mike Hukka’s Mastodon feed (date: 2023-11-10, from: Mike Hukka’s Mastodon feed)
TIL that #GitHub profiles let you specify your pronouns.
https://scholar.social/@mhucka/111384015350811817
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Score updates, video and Thursday/Friday highlights.
https://www.fresnobee.com/sports/high-school/prep-football/article281665323.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The LAist
Some local actors and strike captains share their early thoughts on the deal now that the strike has been lifted.
https://laist.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/la-actors-celebrate-sag-aftras-tentative-agreement
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
At Tuesday’s Santa Clarita City Council meeting, city staff are expected to once again ask for more money to expand the design plans for the city’s roller rink, bringing the total potential design costs to around $1.66 million. This would be the second time the plans being designed by Anil Verma Associates Inc. for The […]
The post City looking to expand roller rink plans again appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/city-looking-to-expand-roller-rink-plans-again/
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in New Delhi on Friday for talks seeking to bolster India as a regional counterweight to China and win backing for the U.S. position on Israel’s war with Hamas.
Blinken and U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin will join Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and Defense Minister Rajnath Singh for annual “two-plus-two” talks that India has said will focus on “defense and security cooperation.”
India is part of the Quad alliance alongside the United States, Australia and Japan, a grouping that positions itself as a bulwark against China’s growing assertiveness in the Asia-Pacific region.
Washington hopes a tighter defense relationship will help wean India off Russia, New Delhi’s primary military supplier.
“Our intention is to encourage more collaboration to produce world-class defense equipment to meet Indian defense needs and contribute to greater global security,” Donald Lu, the top U.S. diplomat for South and Central Asia, said ahead of the trip.
Blinken arrived in New Delhi late Thursday from South Korea, the latest leg of a marathon trip that has included a G7 foreign ministers meeting in Japan, which sought to find common ground on the Gaza conflict, and a whirlwind tour of the Middle East.
India was swift to condemn Hamas and shares with Washington a long-standing call for an independent Palestinian state.
“The Indian government was direct in its condemnation of the Hamas terrorist attack and has also joined a chorus of nations, including the United States, that have called for sustained humanitarian access to Gaza,” Lu said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he stood “in solidarity with Israel,” and last month India airlifted aid to Egypt for Palestinian civilians from the besieged Gaza Strip.
The conflict in Gaza poses a major challenge to hopes of a key trade and transport route linking Europe, the Middle East and India, unveiled during G20 talks in India in September.
India has a long-running border dispute with northern neighbor China, with a deadly Himalayan clash in 2020 sending diplomatic relations into a deep freeze. Their 3,500-kilometer shared frontier remains a long-running source of tension.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will also be on the agenda, Lu said.
New Delhi has had to balance its traditional alliance with Russia, the provider of most of its arms imports and now a source of cut-price oil, with growing ties to Washington.
President Joe Biden’s administration has prioritized relations with New Delhi, seeing a like-minded partner faced with the rise of China, but Blinken’s trip could be made awkward by a bitter feud between India and another close U.S. partner, Canada.
Relations between the two have plunged since Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in September publicly linked Indian intelligence to the killing of a Canadian citizen, Hardeep Singh Nijjar, allegations India has called absurd.
Nijjar, who advocated for a separate Sikh state carved out of India, was wanted by Indian authorities for alleged terrorism and conspiracy to commit murder.
https://www.voanews.com/a/blinken-in-india-for-talks-on-china-israel/7349390.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
The 39th annual Rampage band competition, hosted by Hart High School’s band and color guard program, returned to the College of the Canyons Cougar stadium on Saturday. Four out of six Santa Clarita high schools placed in the top three of their respective divisions. Canyon High School placed second in the 2A (RED) subdivision. Saugus placed third […]
The post SoCal’s longest-running band competition brings dozens of schools to Santa Clarita appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
date: 2023-11-10, from: NASA breaking news
The SpaceX-29 commercial resupply spacecraft will deliver numerous physical sciences and space biology experiments, along with other cargo, to the International Space Station. The research aboard this resupply services mission will help researchers learn how humans, and the plants needed to sustain them, can thrive in deep space. The biological and physical sciences investigations headed […]
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
The co-founders and co-CEOs of failed startup Bitwise appeared in a California court Thursday accused of cheating investors out of $100 million by making up bank statements and revenue figures.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/bitwise_100m_fraud_scheme/
date: 2023-11-10, from: NASA breaking news
Following a successful launch of NASA’s SpaceX 29th commercial resupply mission, scientific experiments and technology demonstrations, including studies of enhanced optical communications and measurement of atmospheric waves, are on their way to the International Space Station. SpaceX’s uncrewed Dragon resupply spacecraft, carrying about 6,500 pounds of cargo to the orbiting laboratory, launched on the company’s […]
https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-spacex-launch-new-science-hardware-to-space-station/
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
A Golden Valley High School student took the stage at the Santa Clarita Valley Senior Center at Bella Vida to sing the national anthem. He admitted to the audience he was nervous to sing. The audience of attendees and veterans joined in with him to sing every word of the national anthem, setting the tone […]
The post <strong>Hometown heroes honored for service</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/hometown-heroes-honored-for-service/
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
As Israel Defense Forces commanders claim that Hamas fighters have lost control of the north of the Gaza strip — and its troops enter the center of Gaza City — a central question remains unanswered: What will happen to the devastated Palestinian territory after the war between Israel and Hamas militants is over?
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told ABC News this week that Israel would maintain “security responsibility” for Gaza for an indefinite period, “because we’ve seen what happens when we don’t have that security responsibility.”
However, questioned on those comments, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that Washington would not support any reoccupation of Gaza, some 18 years after Israel withdrew its forces and settlers from the narrow strip of land in 2005. While the territory is home to 2.3 million Palestinians, Israel controls access by land, sea and air, and the United Nations considers the Gaza strip as occupied territory.
G7 meeting
More than 1,400 Israeli soldiers and civilians were killed in the cross-border attack by Hamas militants on October 7, and more than 200 people were taken hostage.
Israel’s aerial bombing and ground attacks on Hamas targets since then have killed more than 10,000 people in the Gaza strip, including several thousand women and children, according to Hamas-run health authorities.
The apparent lack of any post-conflict plan for Gaza overshadowed a two-day meeting of foreign ministers from the G7 group of wealthy nations in Tokyo, which wrapped up Wednesday.
The group — comprising the United States, Japan, the United Kingdom, Canada, France, Italy and Germany — issued a joint statement following the meeting, only the second such joint communique since the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel.
“G7 members have agreed to unequivocally condemn the terrorist attack by Hamas and others and, secondly, to seek the immediate release of hostages. Thirdly, we have agreed that it’s necessary to take urgent action to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” Japanese Foreign Minister Yoko Kamikawa told reporters following the meeting Wednesday.
She added that G7 foreign ministers had called for “pauses” in the fighting “to allow undisrupted humanitarian assistance including food, water, medical care, fuel, shelter and access for those involved in humanitarian aid access [to Gaza].”
Postwar plan
Israel, its Western backers and other regional powers — including the Palestinians — must formulate a postwar plan for Gaza, said Yossi Mekelberg of Chatham House, a London-based policy institute.
“What happens if Hamas disappears as a political and military power? Who is sucked into this vacuum? It might be even worse than Hamas. I think we move into an interim period. And I think it’s really important, I really think there should be a regional element to this,” he told VOA.
While the U.S.-Israeli alliance remains strong, there are disagreements between Washington and Tel Aviv, Mekelberg said.
“From early on, the United States understood that on the one hand, giving Israel all the support it needs, including allocating more than $14 billion, sending weapons, munitions and its navy to the eastern Mediterranean, is one thing. But they don’t trust Netanyahu. They don’t trust the current government. And they know that giving too much of a blank check can be dangerous,” he said.
Global protests
The G7 did not call for a more permanent cease-fire. Across the world, there have been protests calling for an end to the war. There is a danger that the conflict exacerbates global divisions, according to Mekelberg.
“It’s very tricky. Because the G7 obviously represent the more affluent part of the world — and the one that much of the resentment is directed at — of neglecting and taking an approach which protects their interests but not the rest of the world’s interests. I, for one, find it difficult to feel sorry for their predicament, because the neglect of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was criminal. I’ve no other word. Because for years there were some of us that warned that this was unsustainable, it will implode one way or another. And they did nothing,” Mekelberg said.
Israeli security
Arriving in Saudi Arabia for talks on the conflict Thursday, Britain’s Foreign Secretary James Cleverly said Israel’s military operation to defeat Hamas was a necessary response.
“Calling for a cease-fire is understandable. But what we also recognize is that Israel is taking action to secure its own stability and its own security,” Cleverly told Reuters.
“The Israeli military are currently in Gaza. And we have said that any security responsibility that they take on because of the military operation in Gaza needs to be temporary, and needs to exist only as long as we’re able to move towards a Palestinian leadership — a Palestinian leadership that we want to see committed to peace, committed to the two-state solution,” he added.
Ukraine distraction
Meanwhile, Ukraine has warned that the conflict between Israel and Hamas is distracting Kyiv’s Western allies from its war with invading Russian forces.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy spoke with G7 foreign ministers in Tokyo via video link.
The G7 host, Japan’s Kamikawa, said Ukraine had the group’s full support. “We as the G7 stand with Ukraine even while the international attention tends to be on the Middle East,” Kamikawa said Wednesday.
https://www.voanews.com/a/questions-over-gaza-s-post-war-future-remain-unanswered-/7348358.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Heatmap News
What can you say about Joe Manchin, perhaps the most important — and most complicated — American climate policy maker of the past decade?
Let’s start here: Soon, he won’t be a senator any more. On Thursday, Manchin announced that he will not pursue re-election in West Virginia in 2024.
“I’ve made one of the toughest decisions of my life and decided that I will not be running for re-election to the United States Senate,” he said in a video message. Instead, he said, he will be “traveling the country and speaking out to see if there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle and bring Americans together.”
We don’t have many details about what “mobilizing the middle” might look like; Manchin was recently said to be considering a third-party presidential run. If he did make a go for the White House, that would seemingly have disastrous consequences for Joe Biden’s re-election effort — and, in all likelihood, for climate action generally — because it could probably hand the 2024 race to Donald Trump.
But pending that possibility, Manchin’s decision immediately reframes several aspects of next year’s elections.
It means, first, that West Virginia Governor and serial coal-mine-safety violator Jim Justice will likely win Manchin’s seat, marking the end of a tectonic political realignment that saw the state go from solidly Democratic to solidly Republican.
Without West Virginia, Democrats’ path to a Senate majority now looks more like a tightrope: It requires Democrats to hold difficult seats in Ohio, Montana, Pennsylvania, and Arizona. Then the party needs to win in one additional state. But the pickings are slim. Are Texas or Florida really going to elect a Democrat to the Senate? Is Mississippi, Missouri, or Nebraska?
Manchin’s decision will, in other words, have big implications for what Democrats can and cannot do in government. Without a working Senate majority, Democrats will struggle to pass laws or appoint justices to the Supreme Court even if they control the House of Representatives and the White House.
But, of course, Manchin’s decision is even more profound because who he is — his anxieties, whims, and cognitive biases — has long had an outsized influence on legislation. Setting aside presidents and a few jurists, there may not be a recent Democratic policymaker whose personal views more closely shaped the law.
Manchin wielded power, above all, because he represented West Virginia, the most conservative state to send a Democrat to the Senate. That meant he was his caucus’s obvious marginal member and swing vote.
And you could tell. What other Democrat could get away with owning a coal plant while ostensibly overseeing the coal industry? (Manchin is the chairman of the Senate energy and natural resources committee.) What other Democrat could demand last-minute changes to an economic recovery package?
Manchin’s crowning legacy will be the Inflation Reduction Act, which is often described as “President Biden’s signature climate bill,” but which is smudged with Manchin’s fingerprints, too. As chairman of the Senate energy committee, Manchin had a good deal of de jure authority over the law; as the Senate’s swing vote, he had even more de facto power. The final bill text was hammered out in negotiations between Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s team — who were essentially negotiating on behalf of the rest of the caucus — and Manchin’s team.
You can see it in the law’s final policies.
Some of the Inflation Reduction Act’s most generous subsidies will go to the nascent clean hydrogen industry, which Manchin has long nurtured. If hydrogen becomes an anti-environmental boondoggle on par with ethanol, then Manchin will bear a good deal of the blame; if it decarbonizes the American industrial sector, he should get some credit.
Likewise, Manchin is why the bill’s tax credits for electric vehicles do not incentivize union membership.
He is behind the law’s peculiar rules about exactly which industries and organizations can claim their subsidies as direct cash payments. He also shaped the design of its carbon-capture tax credits.
If there is something distinctive in the IRA, the odds are good that Manchin either insisted on it, approved it, or didn’t notice it.
But Manchin drove other climate and energy policy too. He cowrote the bipartisan Energy Act of 2020 with Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. That law focused the federal government’s industrial policy on carbon management, clean hydrogen, and critical minerals — some of the same topics that would dominate the IRA. It also expanded the powers of the Loan Programs Office, the Department of Energy’s in-house bank.
He criticized the Environmental Protection Agency and sometimes voted to overturn its rules. He consistently opposed carbon taxes or pricing carbon in any way, all but ensuring the idea’s political death in the short-term. Even his Senate career more or less began with him taking aim — literally — at Obama’s climate bill. During his first race for Senate in 2010, Manchin ran a TV ad in which he shot a rifle at a stack of papers labeled “cap and trade bill” and promised to take on then-President Barack Obama’s proposal.
In short, if you thought about climate policy over the past decade, you wound up thinking quite a lot about the likes, dislikes, and peculiarities of Joe Manchin. What he might support or oppose mapped the frontier of political possibility in the United States. He was, in short, potentially the most influential force in shaping American climate policy during the 2010s. (Only Mary Nichols, who has been California’s chief air-pollution regulator since 2007, might match his importance.)
My first thought is that Manchin may soon join that list of capricious ex-senators — Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson come to mind — whose names, once synonymous with power itself, become the answer to bad trivia questions. But I have been thinking about Joe Manchin, 76, for a long time, and I expect to find it a hard habit to break. He is an ambitious, eccentric, and preternaturally lucky man. I suspect his next few decisions will prove even more important than those that have come before.
https://heatmap.news/politics/joe-manchin-retiring-west-virginia-senator-inflation-reduction-act
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The LAist
Air quality officials have found asbestos in ash and debris from the fire and continue to test for other toxins.
https://laist.com/news/tustin-hangar-fire-state-of-emergency-navy
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The judge allowed the defendants to remain out of custody with strict conditions, including that they surrender their passports and they must provide a property bond.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281666838.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Iran’s role in the Israel-Hamas war has been largely “reactive and opportunistic,” says Microsoft, in contrast to reports that Tehran’s spies plotted cyberattacks against Israel to coincide with the October 7 Hamas terrorist atrocity.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/iran_israel_hamas/
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
Not many adults, let alone fourth graders, assemble 3D printers at home, but that’s exactly what Nathan Shyam did — not once, but twice. Shyam, 13, who’s now an eighth grader at La Mesa Junior High School, spent years perfecting the first prototype, along with the assistance of his dad, Shyam Raghavan. “My fourth-grade teacher […]
The post Eighth grader creates second 3D printer appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/eighth-grader-creates-second-3d-printer/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
La victoria se produce menos de seis meses después de que el gobernador Gavin Newsom firmara una nueva ley para ampliar los derechos de sindicalización de los trabajadores agrícolas.
https://www.fresnobee.com/vida-en-el-valle/noticias/article281654628.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: The Signal
Hart High School’s fall signing day on Tuesday featured 10 athletes furthering their athletic and academic careers at the next level. The 10 seniors from multiple sports signed their letters of intent to various schools where they’ll have the chance to create another legacy like the one each left at Hart. The signees included Indians […]
The post Hart hosts stacked signing day appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/hart-hosts-stacked-signing-day/
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The LAist
Reports of antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents are on the rise. Some hateful incidents may not be criminal offenses, but you can still report them.
https://laist.com/news/if-you-witness-or-experience-hate-heres-how-to-report-it
date: 2023-11-10, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Veterans Day is more than just a date on the calendar, it’s a poignant reminder of the sacrifices made by countless brave men and women who donned the uniform, standing in defense of freedom and democracy
https://scvnews.com/bill-miranda-community-invited-to-pay-tribute-to-veterans/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
My father is old, feeble, and frail, but his mind is sharp, his humor witty, and his life experiences and knowledge extraordinary.
The post Wit with Age appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/09/wit-with-age/
date: 2023-11-10, from: OS News
As AMD is now well into their third generation of RDNA architecture GPUs, the sun has been slowly setting on AMD’s remaining Graphics Core Next (GCN) designs, better known by the architecture names of Polaris and Vega. In recent weeks the company dropped support for those GPU architectures in their open source Vulkan Linux driver, AMDVLK, and now we have confirmation that the company is slowly winding down support for these architectures in their Windows drivers as well. Under AMD’s extended driver support schedule for Polaris and Vega, the drivers for these architectures will no longer be kept at feature parity with the RDNA architectures. And while AMD will continue to support Polaris and Vega for some time to come, that support is being reduced to security updates and “functionality updates as available.” What’s odd is that AMD is still selling these as integrated GPUs to this day, and they, too, are getting this treatment. That’s a pretty shitty deal for people buying these products today.
date: 2023-11-10, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Salvation Army Santa Clarita Valley Corps invites the community to attend the annual Red Kettle Campaign ribbon-cutting ceremony at Light Up Main Street on Nov. 18, at 5:15 p.m
https://scvnews.com/nov-18-salvation-armys-annual-red-kettle-campaign-launch/
date: 2023-11-10, from: OS News
Amazon has been working on a new operating system to replace Android on Fire TVs, smart displays and other connected devices, I have learned from talking to multiple sources with knowledge of these plans, as well as job listings and other materials referencing these efforts. Development of the new operating system, which is internally known as Vega, appears fairly advanced . The system has already been tested on Fire TV streaming adapters, and Amazon has told select partners about its plans to transition to a new application framework in the near future. A source with knowledge of the company’s plans suggested that it could start shipping Vega on select Fire TV devices as early as next year. Is it a Linux distribution? Amazon’s new operating system is also based on a flavor of Linux, and is using a more web-forward application model. App developers are being told to use React Native as an application framework, which allows them to build native apps with Javascript-powered interfaces. Of course it’s a Linux distribution.
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
In what may be a preview of the 2024 general election, Democrats on Tuesday surged to surprising victories in a number of states across the United States, in large part by highlighting their resistance to Republican efforts to pass strict abortion bans.
More than a year after the U.S. Supreme Court reversed a constitutional right to receive abortion care, experts say the issue is likely to remain salient with voters into next year. This offers some hope to the many Democrats publicly fretting about their chances in 2024.
The party’s leader, President Joe Biden, is suffering from low approval ratings as well as a widespread perception that his age — he would be 82 at the beginning of a second term — may make him less effective in office.
Republicans are not helped by the fact that they do not speak with one voice on the subject. A presidential primary debate on Wednesday featured one candidate calling for a federal law limiting abortion, while another argued that the party should recognize that passing such a proposal is a practical impossibility.
Changing laws
In June 2022, the Supreme Court ruled that Roe v. Wade, a nearly 50-year-old decision that guaranteed women access to abortion in all 50 states, was wrongly decided, and declared that the legality of abortion should be decided at the state level.
That case, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, set off a flurry of legislative activity across the country, as states began considering new laws on abortion, or reviving old laws that had been rendered moot by the Roe decision in 1973. In many states where Republicans control the legislature, strict abortion bans were quickly put into place.
As a result, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive health research organization, 58% of women in the U.S. between the ages of 13 and 44 now live in states with laws that are “hostile or extremely hostile to abortion rights.”
Backlash
Evidence of a backlash began to appear quickly. Prior to the Dobbs decision, Democrats had been expected to fare poorly in the 2022 congressional elections. However, that November, a wave of anger at the new abortion restrictions helped limit Republican gains.
Hoping they would sweep to a large majority in the House of Representatives, the Republicans instead eked out only a tiny one. In the Senate, Democrats managed to retain control — an outcome that was far from guaranteed just a few months earlier.
In the following months, Democrats scored a series of unexpected victories in special elections and abortion-related ballot referendums across the country, foreshadowing the results of Tuesday’s off-year elections in multiple states.
Tuesday’s results
In Ohio, a Republican-run state legislature had passed a strict ban on abortions after the sixth week of pregnancy — before many women even know they are pregnant. On Tuesday, voters overwhelmingly approved adding the right to an abortion to the state’s constitution.
In Virginia, popular Republican Governor Glenn Youngkin campaigned hard for his party’s candidates for the state’s General Assembly, promising that if voters gave the Republicans full control of the state government, he would institute a 15-week limit on the right to an abortion.
Going into the election, Democrats had a majority in the state Senate, while Republicans held a majority in the House of Delegates. In an apparent rebuke to Youngkin, voters gave Democrats control of both houses of the legislature.
In Kentucky, typically a Republican stronghold, Democratic Governor Andy Beshear won reelection handily, despite a concerted effort by Republican political action groups to unseat him. His campaign credited the victory, in part, to the distinction he drew between himself and his opponent, who favors strict curbs on abortion.
New challenge for Republicans
Tuesday’s election results highlight a core challenge facing Republican candidates in a post-Dobbs world, said Jeremy Mayer, an associate professor at the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University in Virginia.
“The Republican base, the people that vote and choose candidates, is very pro-life,” Mayer told VOA. “So, in order to win the nomination for governor or for state legislature or for national Senate, often Republicans have to be incredibly pro-life.”
Supporters and opponents of abortion rights have long used the terms “pro-choice” and “pro-life” to describe their competing positions.
In the past, with Roe v. Wade guaranteeing the right to an abortion, a Republican candidates could be as vocally anti-abortion as they liked. They did not risk losing the votes of Republicans who support abortion access, because the procedure was understood to be protected. Now, however, voters have to take candidates’ anti-abortion-rights stances more seriously.
“Once the Supreme Court opened up the gates to banning abortion, Republicans needed to come up with smart messaging, and they haven’t figured it out yet,” Mayer said.
Sarah Parshall Perry, a senior legal fellow in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, agreed.
“I’m hoping this will be a wake-up call,” Perry told VOA. “The GOP and pro-lifers have got to get their messaging in order.”
She said the Republicans need to do a better job dissecting the language in ballot measures, such as the one that recently passed in Ohio, and pointing out their implications. For instance, she said, the Ohio referendum results could eliminate requirements that a minor’s parents receive notification if their child seeks an abortion.
“There needs to be a little bit of cohesion going forward, because we know we’re going to see this in other states,” Perry said. “In fact, Arizona is getting ready to put a ballot initiative on their election forms for next year. They’re now having discussions in Florida and in Missouri — deep-red states — because the Democratic abortion lobby is energized after some of its recent wins.”
Democrats confident
Democratic activists, for their part, seem confident that Republicans will continue to struggle to reframe the abortion issue ahead of the 2024 election.
“The reason why we can take this into the national 2024 election is because the everyday American has been so impacted by the Dobbs decision,” said Sabrina Talukder, director of the Women’s Initiative at the Center for American Progress.
“Particularly in the maternal mortality crisis that we’re facing in the country, it’s not a hard point to drive home,” Talukder told VOA. “Abortion wins. The American people want access to abortion. They want to codify it in their state statutes, and they want elected officials who believe in abortion access, who believe in abortion care as health care.”
Republican contenders
In a debate Wednesday among five of the Republicans vying for the party’s presidential nomination next year, the challenge in coming to a shared Republican position on abortion was on full display.
“I’m 100% pro-life,” said Senator Tim Scott. “I would certainly, as president of the United States, have a 15-week national limit.”
“I think you have to be honest with the American people,” said former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley. “When it comes to the federal law, which is what is being debated here, be honest. It’s going to take 60 Senate votes, a majority of the House and a president to sign it.
“We haven’t had 60 Senate votes in over a hundred years. … So, no Republican president can ban abortions any more than a Democrat president can ban these state laws.”
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis conceded that the GOP is losing its own voters on issues like the ballot measure passed in Ohio on Tuesday, saying, “A lot of the people who are voting for the referenda are Republicans who would vote for a Republican candidate.”
In his own state, DeSantis signed a strict abortion law banning most instances of the procedure after six weeks.
Former President Donald Trump, the front-runner for the Republican nomination, was not present at the debate. His policy on abortion has shifted over the years, but it was his nomination, during his first term, of three Supreme Court justices known to favor overturning Roe that led to the Dobbs decision.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Tilde.news
https://github.com/hanshuebner/maciifxsimm
@Mike Hukka’s Mastodon feed (date: 2023-11-10, from: Mike Hukka’s Mastodon feed)
I think this mind-blowing practice deserves more attention.
Some cars apparently have software that automatically downloads text messages and call logs from your phone if you connect to the infotainment system. You can't stop the systems from doing it, and you can't access the data yourself.
https://therecord.media/class-action-lawsuit-cars-text-messages-privacy
https://scholar.social/@mhucka/111383500818185082
date: 2023-11-10, from: John Naughton’s online diary
Still life with sunbeams Spotted yesterday. Two rays of sunshine alighting on the scene — one burning out the detail on the bananas, the other highlighting edge petals in the rose. The problems of High Dynamic Range. Sigh. Quote of … Continue reading
https://memex.naughtons.org/friday-10-november-2023/38800/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Opinion by Marek Warszawski: “It will be interesting to see whether the Bitwise founders actually serve time in federal prison.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/marek-warszawski/article281667298.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Altered bank records and financial audit reports are part of the federal case. See them below.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281666028.html
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
A child psychiatrist was jailed Wednesday for the production, possession, and transportation of child sexual abuse material (CSAM), including the use of web-based artificial intelligence software to create pornographic images of minors.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/10/child_psychiatrist_sentenced_ai/
date: 2023-11-10, from: Tilde.news
https://github.com/haileys/doslinux
date: 2023-11-10, from: VOA News USA
The five Republicans vying to snatch their party’s presidential nomination from former President Donald Trump sparred Wednesday night during a foreign policy-heavy debate in which they echoed some of President Joe Biden’s support for Israel while debating how to counter China and manage the relationship with Iran.
They also took a significantly harder line than the Biden administration on how to handle the flow of migrants seeking to enter the U.S. through the border with Mexico.
But on Ukraine, the candidates differed with one another and with the White House, with biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy saying he was “absolutely unpersuaded” by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s appeals for support — going so far as to appear to call the Jewish head of state a Nazi, and a “comedian in cargo pants.”
Here’s a look at how the group — which also included Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, South Carolina Senator Tim Scott and former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie — differs from the Biden administration, from independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and from Trump.
Calls for Israel to ‘finish the job’ with Hamas
The candidates largely echoed one another with tough talk about Hamas, with DeSantis saying he would urge Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to “finish the job” in his quest to eradicate the U.S.-designated terrorist group after its October 7 attack killed more than 1,400 people.
Haley, Ramaswamy and Scott used similarly strong language in supporting Israel’s offensive, as did Christie, who said Netanyahu “must go in and make sure that Hamas can never do this again.”
This support for Israel aligns with that of the White House, though Biden has been careful to moderate his language on the actions of the Israel Defense Forces, with administration officials repeatedly stressing that Israel, as a democracy, is beholden to laws governing warfare.
On Thursday, Biden reiterated his support for Israel, telling reporters that there was “no possibility” of an indefinite cease-fire, although his administration welcomed Israel’s announcement that there will be daily four-hour humanitarian pauses.
In an interview with VOA, spokesperson Nathan Tek explained the U.S. position: “What a cease-fire means, in effect, is that Israel would cease firing, but that Hamas, of course, would be allowed to regroup, reattack and freeze the battle as it is.”
Kennedy, so far, appears to support the White House, saying in early October, “I applaud the strong statements of support from the Biden White House for Israel in her hour of need.”
On Israel, Trump has given mixed and sometimes contradictory messages. Shortly after the Hamas attack, Trump said he would “fully support” Israel over Hamas, but he also drew criticism for criticizing Netanyahu.
‘Absolutely unpersuaded’ on Ukraine
Ramaswamy stood alone in his strong, unsubstantiated criticism of Ukraine, its leader and its democratic bona fides. That prompted Haley to reply that the presidents of Russia and China “are salivating at the thought that someone like that could become president.”
The others took a cautiously supportive line on Ukraine — with Haley calling Putin a “thug” and saying, “I don’t think we should give them cash; I think we should give them equipment to win,” reflecting the Republican Party’s concerns about accountability over the billions of dollars’ worth of aid and military supplies Biden has sent to help the nation stave off Russia’s invasion.
“The last time that we turned our back on a shooting war in Europe,” Christie said, “it bought us just a couple of years. And then 500,000 Americans were killed in Europe to defeat Hitler. This is not a choice. This is the price we pay for being leaders of the free world.”
DeSantis and Scott were more ambiguous, both pivoting to talk of threats from waves of irregular migration at the U.S.-Mexico border. In line with the mainstream Republican platform, all candidates on stage Wednesday advocated stronger controls to stop migration along that border.
“We are not going to send your sons and daughters to Ukraine,” DeSantis said. “I am going to send troops to our southern border.”
Kennedy, for his part, says he “will find a diplomatic solution that brings peace to Ukraine and brings our resources back where they belong. We will offer to withdraw our troops and nuclear-capable missiles from Russia’s borders.”
Trump’s position on Ukraine is complicated. Zelenskyy recently said the former president turned down his invitation to visit Ukraine, citing an unspecified “conflict of interest” with the Biden administration.
Biden has repeatedly said he will support Ukraine “as long as it takes” and is asking Congress to push through $61 billion in supplemental funding for Ukraine.
Tek told VOA that support for Ukraine is “something that we’ve made a commitment to, and that we will continue to fulfill that commitment.”
Iran: ‘You cannot negotiate with evil’
Both Scott and Haley swung hard at Tehran, accusing it of supporting malign groups — something the Biden administration also often says, though administration officials have been careful to say they have yet to find evidence that Tehran directly supported Hamas’ October 7 attack.
“There would be no Hamas without Iran,” Haley said.
“My foreign policy is simple,” Scott said. “You cannot negotiate with evil, you have to destroy it.”
Haley, who had sparred with Scott over other issues in this debate and the two previous ones, most closely aligned with that view, saying: “You punch them once and you punch them hard, and they will back off.”
DeSantis’ language was more vague, but he criticized Biden’s decision to pursue the now-moribund deal aimed at preventing Iran from having nuclear weapons — a deal that would have seen Washington strike compromises with Tehran.
Responding to the Republican debate, Kennedy said on the X platform Wednesday night: “These guys seem to be in full agreement that we should escalate this war and bomb Iran. Seriously? Is that what we want? Am I missing something? Enough of these warmongers. Let’s bring that money back home.”
In an editorial he wrote earlier this month, Trump accused Biden of being too soft on Iran.
New ‘Axis of Evil’?
So is China in the Axis of Evil now? Haley and Christie appeared to think so, echoing a pronouncement earlier this month from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell that lumped it in the infamous grouping that includes Iran and Russia.
Haley said her administration would “end all formal trade relations with China until they stop murdering Americans from fentanyl.” She also endorsed unambiguous support for arming and training Taiwan’s forces against a Chinese invasion.
Ramaswamy described China as “our top enemy” — but noted an inconvenient fact.
“Here’s why we can’t get tough with China,” he said. “It’s because we depend on them for our modern way of life. And we have to declare economic independence from our enemy.”
Trump holds more than 100 trademarks in China, according to ethics paperwork he recently filed, though while president he imposed tariffs on China that the Biden administration has yet to change.
Talk of, of all things, Tik Tok led to perhaps the weirdest, least diplomatic moment of the night. Christie and DeSantis slammed the platform and called for it to be banned or sold.
Haley agreed, which provoked a broadside from Ramaswamy, who uses the platform to campaign.
He pointed out that Haley’s 25-year-old daughter uses the popular platform, prompting her to reply, “You’re just scum.”
Biden’s position on China is neatly described by his famous phrase “competition, not conflict” and circumscribed by careful, measured language. But the relationship has grown frosty this year, with a number of crucial issues at stake, including semiconductor production, military-to-military communication, the status of Taiwan, China’s increased military and economic ambitions, and more.
Biden and President Xi Jinping are both expected in San Francisco next week for a summit of Asian economies. VOA asked the White House this week if it could confirm that Biden has firmed up his heavily hinted-at plans to meet with Xi — and if so, what the two leaders plan to discuss.
“No,” said John Kirby, director of strategic communications for the National Security Council. “And no.”
date: 2023-11-10, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“This wasn’t one simple lie. This was a series of lies backed up with false documentation in order to get all this money.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281653978.html
date: 2023-11-10, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Rosa Sanchez, 58, and Jose Velásquez, 22, were both killed while working on North County farms in September.
The post Central Coast Organizations Speak Out on Two Farmworker Deaths in Santa Barbara County appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-10, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Munger Hall’s public arc of outrage took almost exactly two years, from the McFadden letter to the administration’s announcement of new architects.
The post Goodbye Dormzilla, Hello Student Housing appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/09/goodbye-dormzilla-hello-student-housing/
date: 2023-11-10, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The Santa Clarita Valley Water Agency’s Public Outreach and Legislation Committee Meeting is holding an in-person meeting Thursday, Nov. 16, at 5:30 p.m
https://scvnews.com/nov-16-scv-water-public-outreach-legislation-committee-meeting/
date: 2023-11-10, updated: 2023-11-10, from: Go language blog
Happy Birthday, Go!
date: 2023-11-10, from: Glasgow Haskell Compiler
The GHC developers are happy to announce the availability of GHC 9.4.8. Binary distributions, source distributions, and documentation are available on the release page.
This release is primarily a bugfix release addressing a few issues found in the 9.4 series. These include:
-split-sections on Windows.
-split-sections for various Linux and Windows
binary distributions, enabling GHC to produce smaller binaries on these
platforms.
A full accounting of changes can be found in the release notes. As some of the fixed issues do affect correctness users are encouraged to upgrade promptly.
We would like to thank Microsoft Azure, GitHub, IOG, the Zw3rk stake pool, Well-Typed, Tweag I/O, Serokell, Equinix, SimSpace, Haskell Foundation, and other anonymous contributors whose on-going financial and in-kind support has facilitated GHC maintenance and release management over the years. Finally, this release would not have been possible without the hundreds of open-source contributors whose work comprise this release.
As always, do give this release a try and open a ticket if you see anything amiss.
Enjoy!
-Bryan
http://haskell.org/ghc/blog/20231110-ghc-9.4.8-released.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Doc Searls (at Harvard), New Old Blog
The Big Calendar here in Bloomington is one fed by other calendars kind enough to syndicate themselves through publishing feeds. It is put together by my friend Dave Askins, who writes and publishes the B Square Bulletin. Technically speaking, it … Continue reading
https://doc.searls.com/2023/11/09/datepress/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
OpenAI’s ChatGPT assistant and APIs weathered a distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack this week, according to the super-lab.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/chatgpt_ddos_openai/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The 52-year-old roommate died after lifesaving measures were unsuccessful, Missouri officials said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281663513.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
A series of free events on Friday and Saturday will honor the professor and congressmember’s lasting impact on the community and veterans’ issues.
The post Walter Capps’s Legacy to Be Celebrated at Two-Day Conference at UC Santa Barbara appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“We are heartbroken for every one of these animals and (for) every individual who shares our concern.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281661918.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
State employee unions have threatened to strike in the past, but none have ever walked off the job.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281664388.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
College of the Canyons student-athletes Kyla Dothard (women’s volleyball) and Mason Savery (men’s basketball) have been named the COC Athletic Department’s Women’s & Men’s Student-Athletes of the Week for the period running Oct. 30 to Nov.
https://scvnews.com/kyla-dothard-mason-savery-named-coc-athletes-of-the-week/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
For the first time since the 2016-17 season, the CSUN women’s basketball team has opened their season with a victory. The Matadors (1-0) started their season with a bang at the Premier Union Credit Arena Monday evening, winning impressively against the Utah State Aggies (0-1) 79-64. The bench came alive for CSUN as two Matadors…
date: 2023-11-09, from: Manu - I write blog
This is the 11th edition of People and Blogs, the series where I ask interesting people to talk about themselves and their blogs. Today we have Piper Haywood and her blog, piperhaywood.com.
Piper is a software engineer, previously at SuperHi and currently looking for her next professional adventure.
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Let's start from the basics: can you introduce yourself?
I’m Piper Haywood, and I’m a design-adjacent software engineer based in Brooklyn. I came to my profession in a roundabout way, studied fine art at a liberal arts school in central Maine and took one CS course that I really liked. I had to make my own portfolio site in order to apply for a postgrad in fine art at Central Saint Martins, which led to building other people’s sites, and it sort of snowballed from there.
I met my husband Sam Baldwin when I was studying briefly at Glasgow School of Art, and then we re-met when I was in London for CSM. We ended up running a studio together for six years which was such a fundamental part of my growth as an engineer and professional. But it eventually came time to either really push it, to consider hiring people and that sort of thing, or to fold it and go our separate ways professionally. We decided on the latter, and though we’re still working on some fun stuff together, we’re enjoying working on larger, separate teams at the moment.
I just finished up a stint at SuperHi where I managed the engineers and worked on the next iteration of the platform, and am now looking for new contracting or FTE opportunities. In the meantime, I’m really enjoying poking around with a few side projects including a really exciting one I’m working on with Sam (!), and a whole ton of blog maintenance I’ve been itching to complete. In my free time, I’m usually chasing my toddler around all of the playgrounds in a three mile radius, cooking, recording memories on my blog, or singing in groups (previously with Musarc in London, now with the Brooklyn Conservatory Chorale).
What's the story behind your blog?
My blog started in 2014 when Sam and I decided to make a Tumblr theme that we felt should exist. We needed some test content to work with, so I started keeping track of thoughts and things. That theme project took a back seat, but I found I enjoyed recording things so I just kept going.
I eventually felt a bit penned-in by Tumblr and migrated it over to WordPress. I’ve been tempted to move it off WordPress here and there, I particularly love the ergonomics of a lightweight Eleventy setup. But as a writer, I rely on so many WordPress features that it would be silly to move, really. Also, I know of enough people that use my theme for their own sites that I’d like to keep supporting it by dogfooding it, if I can.
When I first started my blog, I kept it on a subdomain and didn’t really share it much. It helped keeping it less visible, it’s less pressure. I did eventually move it on to my main domain. Looking back through the Wayback Machine, it’s interesting looking at the old versions of my homepage. It doesn’t really feel like “me” until it’s a blog.
My first priority when I started messing around with the design of my blog, and something that remains a priority for me, is deemphasizing the title when appropriate. I think this might be something that I loved from Tumblr, though I didn’t love everything about how they implemented it. The thing is, a lot of stuff that I want to note or record just doesn’t need an obvious title. In fact, an obvious title would make it something other than what it is, something more official or something. If every short little thing I wanted to note required a super visible title, I don’t think I’d ever publish much of anything.
Besides that, I guess you might say that I have a bit of a propensity for white space. Some people might call it “minimal”, though I didn’t really purposefully seek out that vibe. Initially, I experimented with varying opacities for the tags. See an example in the Wayback Machine. So the darker the tag background, the more content associated with it. I liked the effect, but it was almost impossible to do it and keep it appropriately accessible. I fell out of love with writing on my blog for a bit around late 2017, but got back in to the swing of things by revisiting the design and making the blog my entire site in early 2018.
For the new design, I moved towards something more colorful. I was interested in having the color reflect the time of year, so I added a bar down the left-hand side that changed hue depending upon how far through the year the post was added. See this example in the Wayback Machine. It’s sort of hard to get a feel for the color change in that bar since those posts are relatively close together, but you can get a better picture of it if you look at the Browse page. I liked that it made the passage of time, the distance between posts, more obvious. Like that lull in 2017 becomes marked. As well as introducing the color, I started using monospace for all of the text. I wanted to move away from the prior typeface since, though lovely, it just felt a little precious to me. And I used it the same everywhere, always the same weight and size. IIRC it was somewhat inspired by this fantastic community cookbook that my grandma had, where it had clearly been typeset on a typewriter. But it was also a result of myself being extremely unfamiliar with good typography, so it just felt easier to use spacing to differentiate things. I did get frequent reminders that the hierarchy wasn’t great though, lol. In early 2019, I dropped the left color bar and instead gave the dates a color background so that you could differentiate the posts more easily when scrolling (see example). That was a useful suggestion from Sam.
Around the start of the pandemic, my friend Bec Worth and I got talking about my blog and how she found it similar to a commonplace book. I hadn’t encountered that idea before, but it immediately struck me as appropriate once I started reading up about it. She was interested in using my WordPress theme to keep track of her own thoughts, so we collaborated on a new theme that would be more appropriate for both of us and hopefully for others and inspired by the concept of a commonplace book for the web. (By the way, I would share her blog but I don’t really know if she wants it to be public TBH!) We ended up using a serif for the main body copy partly because we just like reading serif text. Also IIRC, it’s sort of a “screw you” to an old boss of Bec’s who said that using a serif, any serif, for some project she was working on would be too “girly”. The idea that an entire typeface category would be gendered, I mean come on! So the serif stuck.
We have further ideas for the theme. Like introducing other views (thumbnails, list, etc.) that you can set as default on a tag-by-tag basis. But life has gotten in the way for both of us, we both have had babies since we started looking at the theme together. I’m hoping to finally introduce some of the new features soon though. On a technical level, I’d like to make much wider use of CSS variables so that the theme is much more easily child-theme-able, for those that want to use it but would want to set up their own typographic system.
Oh and one other thing: analytics. I had Google Analytics on my site for a while, mostly because I found it interesting which posts people identified most with. I then moved to Matomo because I wanted to avoid sharing data unnecessarily. But when numbers started to climb up, I started to get more self-conscious about posting anything. And that’s the opposite of the point for me, it’s nice if I can pretend that no one reads it. So I got rid of analytics entirely in September 2020 and haven’t looked back.
I’m coming up on the 10th anniversary of my blog next year and have been tempted to do some sort of print-on-demand thing to get a hard-copy version of the entire thing, including all of the private posts that I keep for myself. But the index is such an important part of my blog, to me. And I’d want to get that right in a printed version, which would be tricky. I’m thinking of commissioning another engineer for it actually, if anyone knows of someone that would be interested and/or a good fit, let me know!
What does your creative process look like when it comes to blogging?
Oh gosh… it’s not a very formal process! I do have a folder in Apple Notes of things I think are interesting or want to remember, those are usually dashed off in a spare minute for revisiting later. Then when I have a second (which feels rare at the moment!), I’ll draft something up in WordPress. Some things languish in drafts forever. Other things get published privately (especially a lot of stuff relating to my son). And other things get a proper public post. I don’t spend a lot of time re-writing or editing things. That’s partly because most of my posts are fairly short, they don’t really warrant that sort of time.
Longer things like this post about making a Rietveld-esque crate stool or table take days and days. Sometimes I’ll publish it as a password-protected page first so that I can run it past other people for their opinion before making it live. But super long-format stuff is really the exception, not the norm.
I don’t have any objections to editing after the fact, though if it’s a major edit, I do try to note it somewhere on the post. And I don’t have any objections to back-dating content. Sometimes I don’t get round to writing about something until a little while after it happens, but the chronology is important to me.
Do you have an ideal creative environment? Also do you believe the physical space influences your creativity?
I’m not sure… I do believe that physical space influences creativity, quite a bit in many cases. And I don’t really listen to music or anything when I’m writing, I get too distracted by the music. The only exceptions to this are wordless albums that I know inside and out, like Vivaldi’s Four Seasons recomposed by Max Richter.
My biggest hurdle right now is time, and giving my blog the priority that it probably deserves. I went from working independently to working in house for the first time back in early 2022 and my publishing took a bit of a hit at that point. It’s interesting, what is the balance? Writing on my site is really part of my practice both as an engineer and as a human being, since it is so essential to my learning and memory. But if I were to publish something “on the clock”, I felt like it could be perceived as me not doing my job properly. Which honestly, would probably never have been a problem at the company I was at. But I imagine some other managers might look at it that way! It’s tricky. At the moment I theoretically have all the time in the world to write, but I struggle to prioritize it since I feel like I should be doing other things, like reaching out to hiring managers, or finishing the side project that Sam and I are working on. I don’t know, it’s just a tricky line to toe when you have a dependent and simply have less time to play with.
So because of that time crunch, I honestly end up writing and publishing from all over the place and on all sorts of devices.
A question for the techie readers: can you run us through your tech stack?
I’ve covered a bit about the CMS above (started on Tumblr, moved to WordPress, am curious about other options but WordPress is just too good a fit for me).
In terms of the hosting, I was with NearlyFreeSpeech for years and years until just a few weeks ago. I was doing a lot less with my site because I was behind on some server admin I needed to do on NFSN, and that made me realize that I just don’t have time for the server admin anymore. It’s something I used to enjoy, but it’s not the reason I have my blog. So I moved to Flywheel on the suggestion of a lovely internet acquaintance and have been extremely impressed with them so far, especially with their support as I’ve tried to get my site set up on Mastodon.
The domain registration is actually owned by Sam! LOL, I need to get that moved to my own account.
Given your experience, if you were to start a blog today, would you do anything differently?
I don’t think so? Honestly I think I lucked out in a lot of ways. I lucked out with the whole “keep it private for a while” thing, it wasn’t deliberate but allowed me a lot of flexibility in reflection. And starting with Tumblr allowed me to start small, while WordPress has allowed me to make use of a heck of a lot of great blog-specific functionality.
I think I would have moved to managed WordPress hosting sooner, it has just reduced a lot of stress.
I would have kept child theming in mind from the get go when creating my current theme, since the idea of revising it for better child theming is a little daunting.
And I would never have bothered with analytics. I can see how it’s useful for some people who have a different purpose for their blog maybe, but it usually just introduced stress for me.
And I think I would have started my blog earlier. I didn’t realize just how useful it would be until a little while down the road, but my goodness, it is so great having a little slice of the web to yourself.
Financial question since the web is obsessed with money: how much does it cost to run your blog? Is it just a cost or does it generate some revenue? And what's your position on people monetising personal blogs?
I have zero problem with people monetizing their personal blogs, go wild! Whatever you’ve got to do.
For myself, I haven’t been tempted because it hasn’t cost me very much historically. I think it was less than $1.50 per month at NearlyFreeSpeech, and the domain registration was around $13 yearly.
It definitely costs me more now with managed hosting, but I don’t have to spend as much time maintaining it so it seems worth it. I’m on the Starter plan with Flywheel which is around $30/ mo. If I have to bump up a level… I might consider monetizing in some way. But I don’t know, it just changes the priorities a bit. I’ll have to weight it up if/when the time comes.
I do financially support a few other bloggers, but only via Substack at the moment. I would LOVE to both learn more about the web monetization API and support people through it though. If anyone wants to talk about this, please hit me up!
Time for some recommendations: any blog you think is worth checking out? And also, who do you think I should be interviewing next?
For sure!
Any of those people would be great interviewees, would love to know more about their relationships to their blogs.
And honestly I’m sure there are others… But my RSS reader is such a mess at the moment, it’s hard for me to find the ppl I most enjoy following. Yet another thing I need to tidy up!
Final question: is there anything you want to share with us?
I guess maybe just watch this space? I’m really excited about the project Sam and I are working on but am wary of sharing more just yet since it’s still in its infancy. But I’ll share on my site as soon as we can.
And since I’m no longer at SuperHi, I’m looking for opportunities to contribute to a like-minded team either as a contractor or in FTE. If you know of anything that might be a good fit, give me a buzz. There’s more about me and what I’m looking for on my site of course, but feel free to reach out to chat if you’d like to hear it from the horse’s mouth. I love talking to people.
Oh and maybe one final thing. My good friend Gemma Copeland introduced me to Ursula K. Le Guin’s essay “The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction” ages ago, and hardly a week goes by that I don’t refer to or mention it. It feels like an antidote, a salve, for some of the crappiest mindsets that consistently underpin the less savory things happening in the world. I’m so thankful that Gem introduced me to it, and though I feel like some sort of Evangelist with how often I mention it, I do feel like it’s essential reading for anyone living through the past two decades. You can read it in her excellent collection Dancing at the Edge of the World, or get it from Ignota Books in a lovely, slim, pocket-sized edition of just that essay.
Thanks for the opportunity to answer your questions (and for persevering with my extremely tardy reply!). It was fun reflecting. ♥️
This was the 11th edition of People and Blogs. Hope you enjoyed this interview with Piper. Make sure to follow her blog (RSS) and get in touch with her if you have any questions.
You can support this series on Ko-Fi and top supporters will be listed here as well as on the official site of the newsletter.
If you like this series and want to help it grow, you can:
https://manuelmoreale.com/@/page/fXsUljIS5jjialUW
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
On Sunday, Nov. 5, two remarkable LEGO Robotics teams from the Castaic Union School District, the Live Oak Spot Bots and Live Oak Leopard Bots, showcased their ingenuity and skills at the Valencia Qualifying competition
https://scvnews.com/castaic-union-students-showcase-lego-robotics-skills/
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
Astronaut Candidates Visit Ames and Learn about Heat Shields and More On Nov. 8, NASA’s current class of astronaut candidates toured Ames Research Center which included a stop at the Arc Jet Complex. In the arc jet facilities, Ames researchers test advanced materials that protect spacecraft from the extremely high temperatures of entering an atmosphere – whether […]
https://www.nasa.gov/centers-and-facilities/ames/nasa-ames-astrogram-november-december-2023/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Tilde.news
https://monaspace.githubnext.com
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“This prize couldn’t have come at a better time,” the Michigan man said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281661758.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
A 34-year-old Missouri man had breast implants for 48 hours as he waited for lungs, doctors said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281661753.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“I showed the ticket to the store manager, and he told me to sign the ticket.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281661038.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Intel has been sued by a handful of PC buyers who claim the x86 goliath failed to act when informed five years ago about faulty chip instructions that allowed the recent Downfall vulnerability, and during that period sold billions of insecure chips.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/intel_downfall_lawsuit/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“I would absolutely cry with that encounter.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281659263.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
The contiguous United States will see only one total solar eclipse between now and the year 2044, and the citizens of Russellville, Arkansas, are ready. On Monday, April 8, 2024, the Moon will pass between the Sun and Earth, providing a rare opportunity for those in the path of the Moon’s shadow to see a […]
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) in semiconductor and in-space manufacturing collaborated on a white paper that outlines how microgravity benefits the production of semiconductors and related materials. Earth’s gravitational forces pose substantial barriers to quick, high-yield semiconductor production. Microgravity offers a path to overcome these barriers. There are also substantial practical benefits to incorporating LEO-based manufacturing […]
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Researchers also found evidence of hidden chambers within the pyramid.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/world/article281556838.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Forensic genetic genealogy was used to identify the man, deputies said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281654003.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The Afrofuturist production examines the civil rights leader’s legacy and lasting influence
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/malcolm-x-opera-makes-its-met-debut-180983228/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Santa Barbara County Fire is responding to the Sun Fire Incident near Sunburst Farm & Sanctuary.
The post Vegetation Fire Breaks Out Thursday off Highway 1 in Lompoc Area appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
When you think of the holiday season, do you imagine yourself in a Winter Wonderland? A pile of snow? Taking pictures with Santa
https://scvnews.com/kick-off-holiday-season-at-light-up-main-street/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Port Hueneme
For 13th Consecutive Year the Port is Recognized for Excellence in Financial Reporting Download Press Release [PORT HUENEME, CA – November 9, 2023] – The recognition streak continues for the 13th consecutive year! The Oxnard Harbor District was awarded a Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting from the Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) Read More
https://www.portofhueneme.org/acfr-11-09-2023/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
No deaths have been reported.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281659708.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The North Carolina man was planning to take his mother on a cruise, but the large prize will help her “have even more fun,” he said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281659783.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Dating to just 470 million years after the Big Bang, the ancient cosmic structure could help researchers understand how the first black holes formed
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Here’s what to know.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281649993.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Heatmap News
When Manjula Martin was growing up in Northern California in the 1980s, wildfires weren’t something she thought about much. She knew about disaster — the magnitude 6.9 Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989, which killed 63 people and injured thousands, hit when she was a teenager — but fire, she thought, was just something that happened up in the mountains in the summer.
Things are different now. In 2017, Martin left the high prices of San Francisco for the redwoods of Sonoma County. The night of their housewarming party, a firestorm swept through Santa Rosa and Sonoma and Napa counties. The next year — 5 years ago this week — the Camp Fire, the deadliest and most destructive fire in the state’s history, destroyed the town of Paradise and killed 85 people.
In her new book, The Last Fire Season (out on January 16 next year), Martin writes about the fires that swept through California in 2020, weaving her personal story with that of fire in California writ large. It’s a beautiful book, and I called her up to talk about her relationship with fire and how we can learn to live with the changing world. Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
The book opens in 2020, which was a year of multiple fire complexes. Was that the first time fire made itself known in the immediate vicinity of your home?
No, it wasn’t. But it was the first time that I realized that it wasn’t an anomaly.
We had horrible fires near my area in 2017. In 2018, the Camp Fire happened in Northern California, which was like a four-hour drive away, but the smoke from that fire lingered in the Bay Area for weeks. And then in 2019, the Kincade fire was a huge fire up here in Sonoma, and the entire west of the county was evacuated in basically the course of a night, including ourselves.
Then in 2020, the Lightning Complex fires happened in late August, which is what the book starts with. And that was the moment where I personally was like, “oh, this is going to keep happening.”
Before that a natural disaster to me felt like a thing that happened once and then that’s it, right? It wasn’t connected to larger things for me. But the fact is that the new wildfires that we’re having are bigger and hotter and far more destructive than the previous wildfires we’ve had, and 2020, which is probably far too late, was the year that I personally put that all together under the name of climate change. It wasn’t the first year I knew about fire, but it was the moment I realized that I was going to be living with fire for the rest of my life.
I was struck by your description of the 2020 fires and the ways that COVID complicated your experience of them. It reminded me of the concept of cascading events; it was striking to read about how your go bag was filled with these N95 masks that were there for the sake of the fires, but also, of course, turned out to have utility for this other thing that you’re dealing with at the same time.
That was one of the reasons why I chose to center the book around 2020. I think that was a moment where it became clear for a lot of people that disasters don’t take their turn. When it was happening, I felt it was a historic moment.
You named your book The Last Fire Season. But, of course, it wasn’t the last.
Unfortunately not. The book began as an essay, and since I was writing it in 2021 I thought I was writing about the last fire season I had experienced. But then I realized that it was actually a really great title for a book. It’s pretty commonly acknowledged now that in the North American West, fire season isn’t really a thing anymore. Now fire authorities talk about having a fire year.
That is directly linked to the changing of the weather and the climate. But for me, the deeper meaning of it is this idea that fire being seasonal also sort of implies that it’s temporary, and that it’s going to go away. But really it’s not seasonal, it’s part of this land. And we’re going to be living with it forever.
There’s a point in your book where you write that the California ecosystem was fire-adapted, but also that fire is changing. What do you mean by that?
Since time immemorial, California’s ecosystems — from oak woodlands to redwood forests to grasslands and chaparral — evolved with fire as part of their natural cycle. Fire is actually something that helps the cycle of the landscape reset and continue.
And this was something that Indigenous people knew and really sort of harnessed and used in the way that they tended the lands. But the genocide of Indigenous people in California really sort of stopped that cycle, as is the case with colonialism in most places.
Right, you have a chapter about the Indigenous history of fire in California and the suppression of fire both through violence against Indigenous communities and also a long history of policies against fire.
Yeah, the colonial policies of managing the land in California had been what they call ”total fire exclusion,” which is basically the idea that all fire is bad and we need to extinguish fires right away. There was a policy in place called the 10 AM policy that actually said every new forest fire needs to be extinguished by 10 AM the next morning. And, you know, there are a lot of reasons why that happened, including profits and fear and prioritizing human habitat and recreation over the landscape. But the result is that the landscapes here are actually neglected at this point, 150 years after colonization.
You wrote at one point about going to prescribed burns and there was a section that really stood out to me:
Fire is exuberant. It’s joyous. It dances. I can see why people joke that all firefighters are secret pyros. It’s so much fun.
I fully relate to this feeling. Has going to prescribed burns changed your own relationship with fire?
Good fire and cultural fire, which is generally the term we use when we’re talking about Indigenous use of fire, have radically changed my feelings about fire. Humans have evolved with fire, and the more I engage with fire, the more I learn about it, the more I understand its role in both the land and the history of this place, the less afraid I feel.
You write about your own experience with getting a hysterectomy and how that affected your life afterwards, and I thought that was an interesting choice. You could have written a book that was just about fire, and we could have never learned about your hysterectomy. But you chose to include it. Can you tell me a little bit about how that came to happen?
I could have written a straight journalistic look at wildfire right now or at the 2020 fire season specifically. And that was something I toyed with. But I ultimately realized, in thinking about this idea of cascading disasters, that they’re all happening while people are living their lives. Climate change, wars, economic ruin are all happening on top of whatever else is going on in your life. So I thought this part of my life was worth including.
The hysterectomy, and many associated health crises, led me to having chronic pain. And one of the only things that helped me with that was gardening. For me, the physical act of literally touching the land, being in this dialogue with the environment and the ecosystem around me, was the thing that helped me recover from this health crisis. I wasn’t quite well. And more importantly, nature wasn’t quite well. And gardening in this environment is what really made it click for me that this environment is going through a crisis as well.
That garden was partly how you knew about the oncoming fires in 2020, right?
Yeah, when the Lightning Complex fires started, I was out in my garden watering the roses. I saw this little black object on the ground, and when I leaned down and picked it up I saw it was a leaf of a California bay laurel tree. And it was burned black, but it was still whole. It had been blown on the wind and landed in my garden. It was sort of like a messenger, telling me that a few miles away these trees were burning.
Bay trees are a natural part of the forest understory here, but they are highly flammable. They’re basically made of oil, and they serve as what’s called a ladder fuel; if fire gets in that tree, it will shoot up it and then can get into the crowns of taller trees like redwoods or oaks that would normally be more fire resistant. It’s literally a fire spreader. Anyone who lives in the area will tell you that when there’s a fire nearby it rains burnt leaves.
Parts of the book are unexpectedly written in the past tense. You write, for example, that “Northern California was a very large place,” but the depictions of events in the past or future are written in the present tense. Was that intentional? Did you mean to contract the idea of Northern California?
I absolutely did. The convention in nonfiction is to write events in the past tense, but to phrase facts, or things that are still true, in the present tense. I felt like it was important to acknowledge that the things we take as granted, these truths about the way the environment works, might not always remain that way. It was also partly a pragmatic decision, because I didn’t know what would happen before the book came out. What if my house burned down before that, or if I have to move? Things are just so chaotic right now.
The other time I break with convention is when I write about Indigenous nations and Indigenous management practices. I intentionally used the present tense there as a way to push back against the trope of a lot of non-Indigenous writers portraying Indigenous people and worldviews as extinct when in fact they’re very, very alive.
Throughout the book you’re constantly talking to your partner about whether to stay in your home or move away to a “safer” area. I think it can be really hard for people who don’t live in areas under threat to grasp just how hard the concept of migrating really is.
Right, that’s such a common binary: to stay or go. And the reality is actually a lot messier. I’m fortunate to even have the choice of whether to stay or go; I am a person who has a lot of different privileges. I have resources, I have friends, I’m educated, I’m white.
Most people don’t willingly leave their homes unless things are really bad. But it’s never really all bad: Sometimes there’s extreme weather and disasters, and then there isn’t. It’s up and down. There’s a lot of talk around what the perfect solution is, where the safe places are. And the truth is that nowhere is safe because of climate change.
For me, the point of living at this moment on this planet is that it’s messy. It’s full of grief, it’s full of joy and beauty, and it’s also dangerous. There may be a time when I leave this place, for a variety of reasons. But I think the idea that you can run away from climate change is false.
Something I’ve learned a lot from talking with people who are deeply connected to the land here and who work with fire is that you have a responsibility to the place where you live. If I love this place so much, what do I owe it? The idea of tending a place for its overall health, not just for my personal survival, is very powerful.
Right, at one point you write about you and your partner thinking about doing prescribed burns in the woods near you to help reduce the risk of more fires.
We have thought a lot about the idea of reintroducing good fire where we live. Our neighborhood has been getting together and doing work days where we clear fuels from the forest floor together. And it’s really proof of how much work is needed, because you can clear brush and cut dead limbs off trees for a day with a group of 15 people, and then you look at this tiny quarter acre that you’ve worked on, and it still needs so much more work.
Stewardship is a constant act.
Absolutely. And it might not be perfect, and honestly it might not make a difference. These woods might still burn. But if and when they do burn, they are going to be healthier afterwards because the fire is going to be healthier.
https://heatmap.news/culture/the-last-fire-season-manjula-martin
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
It’s been less than a month since the Biden administration effectively barred the export of most American-designed AI accelerators to China, yet Nvidia has already found a way to weave around those rules and get high-ish-end silicon out to the Middle Kingdom.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/nvidia_china_gpu/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“(Bird flu) has been here for a while, we know it’s here, hasn’t gone away,” the California Department of Fish and Wildlife said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281660588.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital will be hosting a Donate-A-Bear Drive Wednesday, Nov. 15, from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. This event is aimed to provide comforting stuffed animals to pediatric patients in the Emergency Department
https://scvnews.com/nov-15-henry-mayo-hosting-teddy-bear-drive/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Doc Searls (at Harvard), New Old Blog
Just sharing some stuff I said on social media recently.: It’s easy to make an ad hominem argument against anything humans do. If we had to avoid every enterprise with owners we don’t like, we might as well graze on … Continue reading
https://doc.searls.com/2023/11/09/some-possible-verities/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“My world will never be the same again,” her husband wrote.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281657218.html
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2023-11-09, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Google is nuking Fitbit from 29 markets.
Like my friend Koush says:
https://www.thurrott.com/wearables/292549/google-stops-selling-fitbit-devices-in-29-markets
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111382609916168428
date: 2023-11-09, from: Liliputing
The Epic Games Store and Amazon Gaming are both giving away more free PC games this week. Walmart has kicked off its Black Friday sale a few weeks early. And there are some great deals on decent laptops and mini PCs today. Also? You can pick up a pair of Bose QuietComfort 45 earbuds for […]
The post Daily Deals (11-09-2023) appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/daily-deals-11-09-2023/
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
The U.S. says it has an obligation to “stand with our friends” and support Israel as it continues its operation against militant group Hamas in the wake of the stunning October 7 attack that left more than 1,400 Israelis dead.
Israel’s offensive has since killed “many, many thousands of Palestinians,” the White House says – President Joe Biden has openly questioned figures from the Gaza Ministry of Health, which is run by Hamas, which the U.S. classifies as a terrorist group. This week, assistant secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Barbara Leaf told a House panel that the ministry’s reported death toll – 10,000 people – may be “higher than is being cited.”
State Department Deputy Spokesperson Nathan Tek spoke late Wednesday to VOA’s Anita Powell about the conflict, why the U.S. supports “humanitarian pauses” but not a ceasefire, and why the U.S.’ lead foreign policy organ believes there is “no equivalency between Israel and Hamas.”
The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
VOA: Let’s start with the conflict between Israel and Hamas. A senior Biden administration official told us that U.S. support for a cease-fire depends on the Israelis feeling secure that something like the Hamas attack will never happen again. Can you elaborate on what that means? How can we ascertain Israel’s confidence in its security?
Tek: Well, if you take into account what happened on October 7, we saw the greatest loss of Jewish life since World War II. It was a profoundly devastating, despicable, abominable attack on Israeli civilians that day. And of course, Israel has the right and, indeed, the obligation to defend itself and that is exactly what Israel is doing. And that is exactly what the United States is helping Israel to do: to ensure that it has what it needs to do what it takes to defeat Hamas. We have been quite clear that we support humanitarian pauses so that civilians can get to safety, so that aid can get to those who need it. It is not the policy of the United States to support a cease-fire, because what a cease-fire means, in effect, is that Israel would cease firing, but that Hamas, of course, would be allowed to regroup, re-attack and freeze the battle as it is.
VOA: Next week, President Biden meets with President Joko Widodo of Indonesia, who leads the largest Muslim country in the world. What’s the message to the leader and the people of this large Muslim country that aligns itself with the Palestinian cause?
TEK: I’m sure that the conflict between Israel and Hamas will come up in those meetings. I think our message to any Muslim country – any Muslim community around the world – is that this is not a religious conflict. This is not about Israel versus Muslims. This is about Israel against a terrorist organization, Hamas, that has a radical extremist interpretation of Islam, that is engaged in a war of choice against Israel. Hamas has dragged 2 million civilians in Gaza into this conflict and into the crossfire. So, this is not a religious conflict. This is a conflict about politics. It’s a conflict about defeating terrorism.
VOA: Let’s talk about something that has been coming up in the White House briefing room, which is: can you explain why the U.S. doesn’t believe that what Israel is doing in Gaza amounts to collective punishment – war crimes – which is something that the United Nations’ refugee agency believes?
TEK: I want to be clear here: The United States, of course, supports Israel’s right to defend itself. Israel is a democracy just like the United States and democracies, of course, have a special obligation to protect civilians and to respect international humanitarian law. I think it is important to draw a distinction – which many unfortunately do not do – between Hamas and Israel. Hamas has deliberately targeted civilians and they have continued to do so with rocket attacks on Israeli civilian infrastructure. Hamas has in fact, without a doubt, violated international humanitarian law. Hamas has also placed an added burden on Israel because Hamas uses civilians as human shields. A clear message that we’ve conveyed to Israel that we’re discussing with Israel as friends and allies do is that Israel has the obligation to take every measure possible to minimize civilian casualties. We will continue to have those conversations with our friend Israel and we will continue to do what we can to ensure that Israel can defeat a terrorist organization.
VOA: But to be clear, does the U.S. believe that Israel has crossed any lines here like Hamas has?
TEK: No, there is no equivalency between Israel and Hamas.
VOA: A senior Hamas official told Lebanese media that Hamas has intensified its contacts with Beijing and Moscow. Is this a concern for the U.S., and what are you doing to address this, if anything?
TEK: It is our view that all outside actors and members of the international community should be playing a positive role here in seeking to ensure that terrorism does not go unpunished. And we believe that it is incumbent upon the international community to reject terrorism, to reject terrorist organizations, and to condemn what Hamas did on October 7.
VOA: Why is unity among the Group of 7 wealthy liberal democracies on Israel important, and how is this bloc moving things forward? And what tools does this bloc have?
TEK: We saw, I think, a very strong statement come out of the G7 meetings in Tokyo, calling for humanitarian pauses, condemning Hamas’ attacks. And I think that really does reflect a sense among the United States and its closest, most like-minded partners and allies, that what Hamas did is unacceptable, Hamas should never again be able to use Gaza as a platform to launch strikes against Israeli civilians, and drag Palestinian civilians into a conflict that they did not ask for. So, we will continue to work with our G7 allies and partners – and countries from around the world, frankly – in order to ensure that terrorism is defeated, because this is really a multilateral challenge that requires, in some cases, multilateral solutions.
VOA: My final question is about Ukraine, and something that President Volodymyr Zelenskyy recently said: he basically said that he needs one more year of U.S. support. I’d like you to just elaborate on what that could mean, if you think that that’s realistic, and if he’s going to get it.
TEK: We have been clear from the start of this conflict that we will support Ukraine as long as it takes to ensure that Ukraine can defend the democratic, independent, sovereign and prosperous nature of its country. And that is something that we’ve made a commitment to, and that we will continue to fulfill that commitment.
VOA: Is there anything else you’d like to tell our global audience?
TEK: I just want to thank you for having me. And I want to be clear that it’s important, in times like these, for the United States to demonstrate that it stands with its friends and allies around the world. Israel is engaged in a very serious fight for its future, for its existence. And we have to stand with our friends.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Here’s how that crime can affect you (assuming you’re not the one stealing).
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281619043.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
An estimated 1,500 customers lost power in the bombings, authorities say.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281655378.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
Climate change is having a big impact on the Arctic permafrost — the subsurface soil that usually remains frozen throughout the year. VOA’s Natasha Mozgovaya reports from Alaska on how warming permafrost is changing infrastructure planning and the local landscape.
https://www.voanews.com/a/alaska-scientists-warn-of-thawing-permafrost/7348810.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: James Fallows, Substack
Everyone was ‘surprised’ by Donald Trump coming out ahead in 2016. In elections since then, including this week’s, the ‘surprise’ has consistently run the other way. Hey, fellow reporters: Listen up!
https://fallows.substack.com/p/covering-the-election-the-one-year
date: 2023-11-09, from: City of Santa Clarita
THERE’S SNOW PLACE LIKE OLD TOWN NEWHALL DURING “LIGHT UP MAIN STREET”Annual Kick-Off to the Holiday Season to Take Place November 18 When you think of the holiday season, do you imagine yourself in a Winter Wonderland? A pile of snow? Taking pictures with Santa? If so, then you’re in luck! The City of Santa […]
The post There’s Snow Place Like Old Town Newhall During “Light Up Main Street” appeared first on City of Santa Clarita.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The West Virginia Democrat has been in the U.S. Senate since 2010.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281656658.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
The following is a statement from NASA Administrator Bill Nelson on the passing of former NASA astronaut Col. (ret.) Frank Borman, who passed away Nov. 7, in Billings, Montana, at the age of 95. “Today we remember one of NASA’s best. Astronaut Frank Borman was a true American hero. Among his many accomplishments, he served […]
https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-administrator-honors-life-of-apollo-astronaut-frank-borman/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“In some sense, she came the farthest of all the wolves in the pack (both physically and psychologically).”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281649093.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The LAist
City attorney says it is the first of its kind in California.
https://laist.com/news/politics/noncitizen-voting-will-be-on-santa-anas-2024-ballot
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The victim is in critical condition, police say.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281651228.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The teacher and assistant principal were both indicted.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281647258.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Titled “America,” the infamous 18-karat loo was created by Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Alien seekers at the SETI Institute have received an organizationally life-altering $200 million (£164 million) bequest from late Qualcomm cofounder Franklin Antonio, the institute confirmed Wednesday.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/qualcomm_cofounder_seti/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Liliputing
Amazon Fire TV and Fire tablet devices ship with an operating system called Fire OS. And for more than a decade, that operating system has been a fork of Android. But according to a report from Janko Roettgers, Amazon is looking to change that by developing its own operating system in-house. The new operating system […]
The post Amazon’s Fire OS for Smart TVs and tablets may drop Android for a new Linux-based OS appeared first on Liliputing.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Both will supply local restaurants with ingredients.
https://www.fresnobee.com/living/food-drink/bethany-clough/article281643478.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Here’s what fans can expect to see when the Sacramento Kings play the Oklahoma City Thunder in their first NBA in-season tournament game.
https://www.fresnobee.com/sports/article281655438.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“I pretended that nothing was going on.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281649388.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
From Our Partners: Get great sound from one of our highly-rated portable Bluetooth speakers
https://www.fresnobee.com/shopping/article281648193.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
A Croatia-Wisconsin partnership brings sea-soaked wines to California; plus, seats left for Pisoni Vineyard dinner and stories you may have missed.
The post Tasting (Legal) Underwater Wines appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/09/full-belly-files-tasting-legal-underwater-wines/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Witnesses described a confrontation, police said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/crime/article281654573.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“The infants seem healthy, actively nursing, and starting to take notice of their surroundings.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281651428.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: City of Santa Clarita
Paying Tribute to Our Valiant Veterans By Councilmember Bill Miranda Veterans Day is more than just a date on the calendar, it’s a poignant reminder of the sacrifices made by countless brave men and women who donned the uniform, standing in defense of freedom and democracy. It’s a day to reflect, honor and appreciate the […]
The post Paying Tribute to Our Valiant Veterans appeared first on City of Santa Clarita.
https://santaclarita.gov/blog/2023/11/09/paying-tribute-to-our-valiant-veterans/
date: 2023-11-09, from: RiscOS Story
The Midlands User Group (MUG) will be holding their next meeting at 2:00pm on Saturday, 11th November, and with their Xmas Market event barely a month away, the time will be given over to discussing the mini show, and finalising plans for it. As such, the meeting may prove a useful one not only for MUG regulars to attend, but also those who are planning to exhibit at the event, and perhaps even people just aiming to visit and see where things are at in the world of RISC OS…
https://www.riscository.com/2023/mug-meeting-11th-november/
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Dr. Stevan Pekovich’s doctrinal convictions and academic credentials made him a natural fit for the science faculty at The Master’s University, which he joined this fall.
https://scvnews.com/tmu-welcomes-dr-stevan-pekovich-to-science-faculty/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
72% of respondents said tipping has become more prevalent in the last five years, according to the poll.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281652823.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
Surgeons have performed the world’s first transplant of an entire human eye, an extraordinary addition to a face transplant — although it’s far too soon to know if the man will ever see through his new left eye.
An accident with high-voltage power lines destroyed most of Aaron James’ face and one eye. His right eye still works. But surgeons at NYU Langone Health hoped replacing the missing one would yield better cosmetic results for his new face, because it would support the transplanted eye socket and lid.
The NYU team announced Thursday that so far, it’s doing just that. James is recovering well from the dual transplant last May, and the donated eye looks remarkably healthy.
“It feels good. I still don’t have any movement in it yet. My eyelid, I can’t blink yet. But I’m getting sensation now,” James told The Associated Press as doctors examined his progress recently.
“You got to start somewhere, there’s got to be a first person somewhere,” said James, 46, of Hot Springs, Arkansas. “Maybe you’ll learn something from it that will help the next person.”
Today, transplants of the cornea — the clear tissue in front of the eye — are common to treat certain types of vision loss. But transplanting the whole eye — the eyeball, its blood supply and the critical optic nerve that must connect it to the brain — is considered a moonshot in the quest to cure blindness.
Whatever happens next, James’ surgery offers scientists an unprecedented window into how the human eye tries to heal.
“We’re not claiming that we are going to restore sight,” said Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez, NYU’s plastic surgery chief, who led the transplant. “But there’s no doubt in my mind we are one step closer.”
Some specialists had feared the eye would quickly shrivel like a raisin. Instead, when Rodriguez propped open James’ left eyelid last month, the donated hazel-colored eye was as plump and full of fluid as his own blue eye. Doctors see good blood flow and no sign of rejection.
Now researchers have begun analyzing scans of James’ brain that detected some puzzling signals from that all-important but injured optic nerve.
One scientist who has long studied how to make eye transplants a reality called the surgery exciting.
“It’s an amazing validation” of animal experiments that have kept transplanted eyes alive, said Dr. Jeffrey Goldberg, chair of ophthalmology at Stanford University.
The hurdle is how to regrow the optic nerve, although animal studies are making strides, Goldberg said. He praised the NYU team’s “audacity” in even aiming for optic nerve repair and said he hopes the transplant will spur more research.
“We’re really on the precipice of being able to do this,” Goldberg said.
James was working for a power line company in June 2021 when he was shocked by a live wire. He nearly died. Ultimately, he lost his left arm, requiring a prosthetic. His damaged left eye was so painful it had to be removed. Multiple reconstructive surgeries couldn’t repair extensive facial injuries including his missing nose and lips.
James pushed through physical therapy until he was strong enough to escort his daughter Allie to a high school homecoming ceremony, wearing a face mask and eye patch. Still, he required breathing and feeding tubes, and he longed to smell, taste and eat solid food again.
“In his mind and his heart, it’s him — so I didn’t care that, you know, he didn’t have a nose. But I did care that it bothered him,” said his wife, Meagan James.
Face transplants remain rare and risky. James’ is only the 19th in the United States, the fifth Rodriguez has performed. The eye experiment added even more complexity. But James figured he’d be no worse off if the donated eye failed.
Three months after James was placed on the national transplant waiting list, a matching donor was found. Kidneys, a liver and pancreas from the donor, a man in his 30s, saved three other people.
During James’ 21-hour operation, surgeons added another experimental twist: When they spliced together the donated optic nerve to what remained of James’ original, they injected special stem cells from the donor in hopes of spurring its repair.
Last month, tingles heralded healing facial nerves. James can’t yet open the eyelid and wears a patch to protect it. But as Rodriguez pushed on the closed eye, James felt a sensation — although on his nose rather than his eyelid, presumably until slow-growing nerves get reoriented. The surgeon also detected subtle movements beginning in muscles around the eye.
Then came a closer look. NYU ophthalmologist Dr. Vaidehi Dedania ran a battery of tests. She found expected damage in the light-sensing retina in the back of the eye. But she said it appears to have enough special cells called photoreceptors to do the job of converting light to electrical signals, one step in creating vision.
Normally, the optic nerve then would send those signals to the brain to be interpreted. James’ optic nerve clearly hasn’t healed. Yet when light was flashed into the donated eye during an MRI, the scan recorded some sort of brain signaling.
That both excited and baffled researchers, although it wasn’t the right type for vision and may simply be a fluke, cautioned Dr. Steven Galetta, NYU’s neurology chair. Only time and more study may tell.
As for James, “we’re just taking it one day at a time,” he said.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
A volunteer made the “rare” discovery, officials said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/world/article281649268.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The victim and the shooter’s family had a confrontation, police said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/crime/article281653038.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Opinion by Marek Warszawski: “This was not at all what I was expecting.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/opn-columns-blogs/marek-warszawski/article281603693.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
Key elements are coming together for NASA’s SPHEREx mission, a space telescope that will create a map of the universe like none before. NASA’s SPHEREx space telescope is beginning to look much like it will when it arrives in Earth orbit and starts mapping the entire sky. Short for Specto-Photometer for the History of the […]
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Looking to try a new stuffing for Thanksgiving? Try Emeril’s take on the Southern classic.
https://www.fresnobee.com/living/food-drink/recipes/article281611453.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Liliputing
Valve is shaking up its Steam Deck line of handheld gaming PCs. Prices still range from $399 to $649, but Valve is doing away with the old entry-level model that had 64GB of eMMC storage, which means that prices now start at $399 for a model with a 256GB SSD. But the bigger change? If […]
The post Steam Deck OLED has a bigger, brighter display, faster WiFi, and longer battery life appeared first on Liliputing.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Cory Doctorow’s blog
Today’s links The enshittification of garage-door openers reveals a vast and deadly rot: Firms undisciplined by competition, regulation, or self-help measures. Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. This day in history: 2003, 2008, 2013, 2018, 2022 Colophon: Recent publications, upcoming/recent appearances, current writing projects, current reading The enshittification of garage-door openers reveals a vast and deadly rot (permalink) How could this happen? Owners of Chamberlain MyQ automatic garage door openers just woke up to discover that the company had confiscated valuable features overnight, and that there was nothing they could do about it. Oh, we know what happened, technically speaking. Chamberlain shut off the API for its garage-door openers, which breaks their integration with home automation systems like Home Assistant. The company even announced that it was doing this, calling the integration an “unauthorized usage” of its products, though the “unauthorized” parties in this case are the people who own Chamberlain products: https://chamberlaingroup.com/press/a-message-about-our-decision-to-prevent-unauthorized-usage-of-myq We even know why Chamberlain did this. As Ars Technica’s Ron Amadeo points out, shutting off the API is a way for Chamberlain to force its customers to use its ad-beshitted, worst-of-breed app, so that it can make a few pennies by nonconsensually monetizing its customers’ eyeballs: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/chamberlain-blocks-smart-garage-door-opener-from-working-with-smart-homes/ But how did this happen? How did a giant company like Chamberlain come to this enshittening juncture, in which it felt empowered to sabotage the products it had already sold to its customers? How can this be legal? How can it be good for business? How can the people who made this decision even look themselves in the mirror? To answer these questions, we must first consider the forces that discipline companies, acting against the impulse to enshittify their products and services. There are four constraints on corporate conduct: I. Competition. The fear of losing your business to a rival can stay even the most sociopathic corporate executive’s hand. II. Regulation. The fear of being fined, criminally sanctioned, or banned from doing business can check the greediest of leaders. III. Capability. Corporate executives can dream up all kinds of awful ways to shift value from your side of the ledger to their own, but they can only do the things that are technically feasible. IV. Self-help. The possibility of customers modifying, reconfiguring or altering their products to restore lost functionality or neutralize antifeatures carries an implied threat to vendors. If a printer company’s anti-generic-ink measures drives a customer to jailbreak their printers, the original manufacturer’s connection to that customer is permanently severed, as the customer creates a durable digital connection to a rival. When companies act in obnoxious, dishonest, shitty ways, they aren’t merely yielding to temptation – they are evading these disciplining forces. Thus, the Great Enshittening we are living through doesn’t reflect an increase in the wickedness of corporate leadership. Rather, it represents a moment in which each of these disciplining factors have been gutted by specific policies. This is good news, actually. We used to put down rat poison and we didn’t have a rat problem. Then we stopped putting down rat poison and rats are eating us alive. That’s not a nice feeling, but at least we know at least one way of addressing it – we can start putting down poison again. That is, we can start enforcing the rules that we stopped enforcing, in living memory. Having a terrible problem is no fun, but the best kind of terrible problem to have is one that you know a solution to. As it happens, Chamberlain is a neat microcosm for all the bad policy choices that created the Era of Enshittification. Let’s go through them: Competition: Chamberlain doesn’t have to worry about competition, because it is owned by a private equity fund that “rolled up” all of Chamberlain’s major competitors into a single, giant firm. Most garage-door opener brands are actually Chamberlain, including “LiftMaster, Chamberlain, Merlin, and Grifco”: https://www.lakewoodgaragedoor.biz/blog/the-history-of-garage-door-openers This is a pretty typical PE rollup, and it exploits a bug in US competition law called “Antitrust’s Twilight Zone”: https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken When companies buy each other, they are subject to “merger scrutiny,” a set of guidelines that the FTC and DoJ Antitrust Division use to determine whether the outcome is likely to be bad for competition. These rules have been pretty lax since the Reagan administration, but they’ve currently being revised to make them substantially more strict: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-and-ftc-seek-comment-draft-merger-guidelines One of the blind spots in these merger guidelines is an exemption for mergers valued at less than $101m. Under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act, these fly under the radar, evading merger scrutiny. That means that canny PE companies can roll up dozens and dozens of standalone businesses, like funeral homes, hospital beds, magic mushrooms, youth addiction treatment centers, mobile home parks, nursing homes, physicians’ practices, local newspapers, or e-commerce sellers: http://www.economicliberties.us/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Serial-Acquisitions-Working-Paper-R4-2.pdf By titrating the purchase prices, PE companies – like Blackstone, owners of Chamberlain and all the other garage-door makers – can acquire a monopoly without ever raising a regulatory red flag. But antitrust enforcers aren’t helpless. Under (the long dormant) Section 7 of the Clayton Act, competition regulators can block mergers that lead to “incipient monopolization.” The incipiency standard prevented monopolies from forming from 1914, when the Clayton Act passed, until the Reagan administration. We used to put down rat poison, and we didn’t have rats. We stopped, and rats are gnawing our faces off. We still know where the rat poison is – maybe we should start putting it down again. On to regulation. How is it possible for Chamberlain to sell you a garage-door opener that has an API and works with your chosen home automation system, and then unilaterally confiscate that valuable feature? Shouldn’t regulation protect you from this kind of ripoff? It should, but it doesn’t. Instead, we have a bunch of regulations that protect Chamberlain from you. Think of binding arbitration, which allows Chamberlain to force you to click through an “agreement” that takes away your right to sue them or join a class-action suit: https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/20/benevolent-dictators/#felony-contempt-of-business-model But regulation could protect you from Chamberlain. Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act allows the FTC to ban any “unfair and deceptive” conduct. This law has been on the books since 1914, but Section 5 has been dormant, forgotten and unused, for decades. The FTC’s new dynamo chair, Lina Khan, has revived it, and is use it like a can-opener to free Americans who’ve been trapped by abusive conduct: https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/10/the-courage-to-govern/#whos-in-charge Khan’s used Section 5 powers to challenge privacy invasions, noncompete clauses, and other corporate abuses – the bait-and-switch tactics of Chamberlain are ripe for a Section 5 case. If you buy a gadget because it has five features and then the vendor takes two of them away, they are clearly engaged in “unfair and deceptive” conduct. On to capability. Since time immemorial, corporate leaders have fetishized “flexibility” in their business arrangements – like the ability to do “dynamic pricing” that changes how much you pay for something based on their guess about how much you are willing to pay. But this impulse to play shell games runs up against the hard limits of physical reality: grocers just can’t send an army of rollerskated teenagers around the store to reprice everything as soon as a wealthy or desperate-looking customer comes through the door. They’re stuck with crude tactics like doubling the price of a flight that doesn’t include a Saturday stay as a way of gouging business travelers on an expense account. With any shell-game, the quickness of the hand deceives the eye. Corporate crooks armed with computers aren’t smarter or more wicked than their analog forebears, but they are faster. Digital tools allow companies to alter the “business logic” of their services from instant to instant, in highly automated ways: https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/ The monopoly coalition has successfully argued that this endless “twiddling” should not be constrained by privacy, labor or consumer protection law. Without these constraints, corporate twiddlers can engage in all kinds of ripoffs, like wage theft and algorithmic wage discrimination: https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men Twiddling is key to the Darth Vader MBA (“I am altering the deal. Pray I don’t alter it further”), in which features are confiscated from moment to moment, without warning or recourse: https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/26/hit-with-a-brick/#graceful-failure There’s no reason to accept the premise that violating your privacy, labor rights or consumer rights with a computer is so different from analog ripoffs that existing laws don’t apply. The unconstrained twiddling of digital ripoff artists is a plague on billions of peoples’ lives, and any enforcer who sticks up for our rights will have an army of supporters behind them. Finally, there’s the fear of self-help measures. All the digital flexibility that tech companies use to take value away can be used to take it back, too. The whole modern history of digital computers is the history of “adversarial interoperability,” in which the sleazy antifeatures of established companies are banished through reverse-engineering, scraping, bots and other forms of technological guerrilla warfare: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability Adversarial interoperability represents a serious threat to established business. If you’re a printer company gouging on toner, your customers might defect to a rival that jailbreaks your security measures. That’s what happened to Lexmark, who lost a case against the toner-refilling company Static Controls, which went on to buy Lexmark: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/felony-contempt-business-model-lexmarks-anti-competitive-legacy Sure, your customers are busy and inattentive and you can degrade the quality of your product a lot before they start looking for ways out. But once they cross that threshold, you can lose them forever. That’s what happened to Microsoft: the company made the tactical decision to produce a substandard version of Office for the Mac in a drive to get Mac users to switch to Windows. Instead, Apple made Iwork (Pages, Numbers and Keynote), which could read and write every Office file, and Mac users threw away Office, the only Microsoft product they owned, permanently severing their relationship to the company: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interoperability-reviving-elegant-weapon-more-civilized-age-slay Today, companies can operate without worrying about this kind of self-help measure. There’ a whole slew of IP rights that Chamberlain can enforce against you if you try to fix your garage-door opener yourself, or look to a competitor to sell you a product that restores the feature they took away: https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/ Jailbreaking your Chamberlain gadget in order to make it answer to a rival’s app involves bypassing a digital lock. Trafficking in a tool to break a digital lock is a felony under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright, carrying a five-year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine. In other words, it’s not just that tech isn’t regulated, allowing for endless twiddling against your privacy, consumer rights and labor rights. It’s that tech is badly regulated, to permit unlimited twiddling by tech companies to take away your rightsand to prohibit any twiddling by you to take them back. The US government thumbs the scales against you, creating a regime that Jay Freeman aptly dubbed “felony contempt of business model”: https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/23/how-to-fix-cars-by-breaking-felony-contempt-of-business-model/ All kinds of companies have availed themselves of this government-backed superpower. There’s DRM – digital locks, covered by DMCA 1201 – in powered wheelchairs: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/when-drm-comes-your-wheelchair In dishwashers: https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/03/cassette-rewinder/#disher-bob In treadmills: https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/22/vapescreen/#jane-get-me-off-this-crazy-thing In tractors: https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/08/about-those-kill-switched-ukrainian-tractors/ It should come as no surprise to learn that Chamberlain has used DMCA 1201 to block interoperable garage door opener components: https://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1233&context=iplr That’s how we arrived at this juncture, where a company like Chamberlain can break functionality its customers value highly, solely to eke out a minuscule new line of revenue by selling ads on their own app. Chamberlain bought all its competitors. Chamberlain operates in a regulatory environment that is extremely tolerant of unfair and deceptive practices. Worse: they can unilaterally take away your right to sue them, which means that if regulators don’t bestir themselves to police Chamberlain, you are shit out of luck. Chamberlain has endless flexibility to unilaterally alter its products’ functionality, in fine-grained ways, even after you’ve purchased them. Chamberlain can sue you if you try to exercise some of that same flexibility to protect yourself from their bad practices. Combine all four of those factors, and of course Chamberlain is going to enshittify its products. Every company has had that one weaselly asshole at the product-planning table who suggests a petty grift like breaking every one of the company’s customers’ property to sell a few ads. But historically, the weasel lost the argument to others, who argued that making every existing customer furious would affect the company’s bottom line, costing it sales and/or fines, and prompting customers to permanently sever their relationship with the company by seeking out and installing alternative software. Take away all the constraints on a corporation’s worst impulses, and this kind of conduct is inevitable: https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/microincentives-and-enshittification/ This isn’t limited to Chamberlain. Without the discipline of competition, regulation, self-help measures or technological limitations, every industry in undergoing wholesale enshittification. It’s not a coincidence that Chamberlain’s grift involves a push to move users into its app. Because apps can’t be reverse-engineered and modified without risking DMCA 1201 prosecution, forcing a user into an app is a tidy and reliable way to take away that user’s rights. Think about ad-blocking. One in four web users has installed an ad-blockers (“the biggest boycott in world history” -Doc Searls). Zero app users have installed app-blockers, because they don’t exist, because making one is a felony. An app is just a web-page wrapped in enough IP to make it a crime to defend yourself against corporate predation: https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/27/an-audacious-plan-to-halt-the-internets-enshittification-and-throw-it-into-reverse/ The temptation to enshitiffy isn’t new, but the ability to do so without consequence is a modern phenomenon, the intersection of weak policy enforcement and powerful technology. Your car is autoenshittified, a rolling rent-seeking platform that spies on you and price-gouges you: https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon Cars are in an uncontrolled skid over Enshittification Cliff. Honda, Toyota, VW and GM all sell cars with infotainment systems that harvest your connected phone’s text-messages and send them to the corporation for data-mining. What’s more, a judge in Washington state just ruled that this is legal: https://therecord.media/class-action-lawsuit-cars-text-messages-privacy While there’s no excuse for this kind of sleazy conduct, we can reasonably anticipate that if our courts would punish companies for engaging in it, they might be able to resist the temptation. No wonder Mozilla’s latest Privacy Not Included research report called cars “the worst product category we have ever reviewed”: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/its-official-cars-are-the-worst-product-category-we-have-ever-reviewed-for-privacy/ I mean, Nissan tries to infer facts about your sex life and sells those inferences to marketing companies: https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/nissan/ But the OG digital companies are the masters of enshittification. Microsoft has been at this game for longer than anyone, and every day brings a fresh way that Microsoft has worsened its products without fear of consequence. The latest? You can’t delete your OneDrive account until you provide an acceptable explanation for your disloyalty: https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/8/23952878/microsoft-onedrive-windows-close-app-notification It’s tempting to think that the cruelty is the point, but it isn’t. It’s almost never the point. The point is power and money. Unscrupulous businesses have found ways to make money by making their products worse since the industrial revolution. Here’s Jules Dupuis, writing about 19th century French railroads: It is not because of the few thousand francs which would have to be spent to put a roof over the third-class carriages or to upholster the third-class seats that some company or other has open carriages with wooden benches. What the company is trying to do is to prevent the passengers who can pay the second class fare from traveling third class; it hits the poor, not because it wants to hurt them, but to frighten the rich. And it is again for the same reason that the companies, having proved almost cruel to the third-class passengers and mean to the second-class ones, become lavish in dealing with first-class passengers. Having refused the poor what is necessary, they give the rich what is superfluous. https://www.tumblr.com/mostlysignssomeportents/731357317521719296/having-refused-the-poor-what-is-necessary-they But as bad as all this is, let me remind you about the good part: we know how to stop companies from enshittifying their products. We know what disciplines their conduct: competition, regulation, capability and self-help measures. Yes, rats are gnawing our eyeballs, but we know which rat-poison to use, and where to put it to control those rats. Competition, regulation, constraint and self-help measures all backstop one another, and while one or a few can make a difference, they are most powerful when they’re all mobilized in concert. Think of the failure of the EU’s landmark privacy law, the GDPR. While the GDPR proved very effective against bottom-feeding smaller ad-tech companies, the worse offenders, Meta and Google, have thumbed their noses at it. This was enabled in part by the companies’ flying an Irish flag of convenience, maintaining the pretense that they have to be regulated in a notorious corporate crime-haven: https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/15/finnegans-snooze/#dirty-old-town That let them get away with all kinds of shenanigans, like ignoring the GDPR’s requirement that you should be able to easily opt out of data-collection without having to go through cumbersome “cookie consent” dialogs or losing access to the service as punishment for declining to be tracked. As the noose has tightened around these surveillance giants, they’re continuing to play games. Meta now says that the only way to opt out of data-collection in the EU is to pay for the service: https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/30/markets-remaining-irrational/#steins-law This is facially illegal under the GDPR. Not only are they prohibited from punishing you for opting out of collection, but the whole scheme ignores the nature of private data collection. If Facebook collects the fact that you and I are friends, but I never opted into data-collection, they have violated the GDPR, even if you were coerced into granting consent: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2023/11/the-pay-or-consent-challenge-for-platform-regulators.html The GDPR has been around since 2016 and Google and Meta are still invading 500 million Europeans’ privacy. This latest delaying tactic could add years to their crime-spree before they are brought to justice. But most of this surveillance is only possible because so much of how you interact with Google and Meta is via an app, and an app is just a web-page that’s a felony to make an ad-blocker for. If the EU were to legalize breaking DRM – repealing Article 6 of the 2001 Copyright Directive – then we wouldn’t have to wait for the European Commission to finally wrestle these two giant companies to the ground. Instead, EU companies could make alternative clients for all of Google and Meta’s services that don’t spy on you, without suffering the fate of OG App, which tried this last winter and was shut down by “felony contempt of business model”: https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/battery-vampire/#drained Enshittification is demoralizing. To quote Wil Wheaton, every update to the services we use inspires “dread of ‘How will this complicate things as I try to maintain privacy and sanity in a world that demands I have this thing to operate?’” https://wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/698603648058556416/cory-doctorow-if-you-see-this-and-have-thoughts But there are huge natural constituencies for the four disciplining forces that keep enshittification at bay. Remember, Antitrust’s Twilight Zone doesn’t just allow rollups of garage-door opener companies – it’s also poison for funeral homes, hospital beds, magic mushrooms, youth addiction treatment centers, mobile home parks, nursing homes, physicians’ practices, local newspapers, or e-commerce sellers. The Binding Arbitration scam that stops Chamberlain customers from suing the company also stops Uber drivers from suing over stolen wages, Turbotax customers from suing over fraud, and many other victims of corporate crime from getting a day in court. The failure to constrain twiddling to protect privacy, labor rights and consumer rights enables a host of abuses, from stalking, doxing and SWATting to wage theft and price gouging: https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/06/attention-rents/#consumer-welfare-queens And Felony Contempt of Business Model is used to screw you over every time you refill your printer, run your dishwasher, or get your Iphone’s screen replaced. The actions needed to halt and reverse this enshittification are well understood, and the partisans for taking those actions are too numerous to count. It’s taken a long time for all those individuals suffering under corporate abuses to crystallize into a movement, but at long last, it’s happening. (Image: Cryteria, CC BY 3.0, modified) Hey look at this (permalink) Welcome to Aftermath https://aftermath.site/ Voters Overwhelmingly Pass Car Right to Repair Law in Maine https://www.404media.co/voters-overwhelmingly-pass-car-right-to-repair-law-in-maine/ You Have a Right to Know Why a Health Insurer Denied Your Claim. Some Insurers Still Won’t Tell You https://www.propublica.org/article/your-right-to-know-why-health-insurer-denied-claim This day in history (permalink) #20yrsago How (not) to negotiate an intellectual property treaty https://web.archive.org/web/20031203202931/https://www.wcl.american.edu/pippi/031119agenda.pdf #15yrsago Saturn’s Children: Charlie Stross’s robopervy tribute to the late late Heinlein https://memex.craphound.com/2008/11/10/saturns-children-strosss-robopervy-tribute-to-the-late-late-heinlein/ #10yrsago All-purpose apology for corrupt, inept, thieving, substance-abusing Canadian politicians https://nationalpost.com/opinion/andrew-coyne-i-am-so-sorry-i-am-sorry-in-a-hundred-inadmissible-ways #10yrsago Muzzling Canadian scientists: Comparing US and Canadian routine scientific secrecy https://www.terry.ubc.ca/2013/11/07/the-terry-project-on-citr-27-silencing-the-scientists/ #5yrsago Winners Take All: Modern philanthropy means that giving some away is more important than how you got it https://memex.craphound.com/2018/11/10/winners-take-all-modern-philanthropy-means-that-giving-some-away-is-more-important-than-how-you-got-it/ #5yrsago Researchers claim to have permanently neutralized ad-blocking’s most promising weapons https://arxiv.org/abs/1811.03194 #5yrsago ICE and the DEA have secretly hidden cameras in some streetlights https://qz.com/1458475/the-dea-and-ice-are-hiding-surveillance-cameras-in-streetlights #5yrsago Apple’s war on repair continues: Amazon now bans refurb Apple products from third parties https://www.vice.com/en/article/bjexb5/amazon-is-kicking-all-unauthorized-apple-refurbishers-off-the-site #5yrsago 7-Eleven accused of weaponizing ICE raids to shed troublesome franchisees https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-11-09/7-eleven-is-at-war-with-its-own-franchisees-over-ice-raids#xj4y7vzkg #1yrago Amazon and Apple have an illegal price-fixing conspiracy https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/10/you-had-one-job/#thats-just-the-as Colophon (permalink) Today’s top sources: Slashdot (https://slashdot.org/), Ian Betteridge (https://mamot.fr/@ianbetteridge@writing.exchange, mrpommer (https://mamot.fr/@mrpommer@mastodon.social). Currently writing: A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS JAN 2025 The Bezzle, a Martin Hench noir thriller novel about the prison-tech industry. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS FEB 2024 Vigilant, Little Brother short story about remote invigilation. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Moral Hazard, a short story for MIT Tech Review’s 12 Tomorrows. FIRST DRAFT COMPLETE, ACCEPTED FOR PUBLICATION Spill, a Little Brother short story about pipeline protests. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM Latest podcast: The Canadian Miracle, Part 2 (https://craphound.com/news/2023/11/05/the-canadian-miracle-part-2/ Upcoming appearances: The New Luddites Seizing the Means of Computation, with Brian Merchant (Hallway Track), Nov 9 https://www.verylittlegravitas.com/hallwaytrack Studio City Branch Library, Nov 13, 1830hPT (LA) https://www.lapl.org/whats-on/events/author-talk-cory-doctorow CBC IDEAS, Nov 16 (Stratford, ON) https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/cbc-ideas-visionaries-in-conversation-tickets-729692809837 Inspiring the Next Generation, Nov 16 (Stratford, ON) https://www.provocation.ca/upcoming-2023-events-stratford Gibson’s Bookstore, Nov 18 (Concord, NH) https://www.gibsonsbookstore.com/event/doctorow-lost-cause Lost Cause at Simsbury Public Library, Nov 20 (Simsbury, CT) https://simsbury.librarycalendar.com/event/author-visit-cory-doctorow-29257 Generation of Lost Causes, Nov 22 (Toronto) https://web.archive.org/web/20230907160105/https://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDMEVT495758&R=EVT495758 Who Is Watching Big Tech? Nov 27 (Toronto)` https://web.archive.org/web/20230907160103/https://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDMEVT496408&R=EVT496408 The Lost Cause at The Strand (NYC), Nov 29 https://www.eventbrite.com/e/cory-doctorow-the-lost-cause-tickets-734958008187 The Lost Cause at Flyleaf Books (Chapel Hill), Dec 7 https://www.flyleafbooks.com/doctorow-2023 Recent appearances: Plutopia https://plutopia.io/cory-doctorow-the-internet-con/ An Audacious Plan to Halt the Internet’s Enshittification and Throw It Into Reverse (Hackaday Supercon) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VT1ud0rAT7w The Material Power That Rules Computation (This Machine Kills) https://soundcloud.com/thismachinekillspod/294-the-material-power-that-rules-computation-ft-cory-doctorow Latest books: “The Internet Con”: A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245). “Red Team Blues”: “A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before.” Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/. “Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin”, on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com “Attack Surface”: The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The Washington Post called it “a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance.” Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html “How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism”: an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html) “Little Brother/Homeland”: A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A__Little_Brother_%26_Homeland.html “Poesy the Monster Slayer” a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/. Upcoming books: The Lost Cause: a post-Green New Deal eco-topian novel about truth and reconciliation with white nationalist militias, Tor Books, November 2023 The Bezzle: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books, February 2024 Picks and Shovels: a sequel to “Red Team Blues,” about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books, February 2025 Unauthorized Bread: a graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2025 This work – excluding any serialized fiction – is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. 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How to get Pluralistic: Blog (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): Pluralistic.net Newsletter (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://pluralistic.net/plura-list Mastodon (no ads, tracking, or data-collection): https://mamot.fr/@pluralistic Medium (no ads, paywalled): https://doctorow.medium.com/ Twitter (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://twitter.com/doctorow Tumblr (mass-scale, unrestricted, third-party surveillance and advertising): https://mostlysignssomeportents.tumblr.com/tagged/pluralistic “When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla” -Joey “Accordion Guy” DeVilla
https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/09/lead-me-not-into-temptation/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Professional polo player Danielle Travis brings a competitive drive to everything she does.
The post Montecito Realtor with a Passion for Polo appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/09/montecito-realtor-with-a-passion-for-polo/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2023-11-09, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
WHOA! Apple thinks of everything!
Seems like you can already do this, I just confirmed up to 11:
https://toot.wales/@stig/111381520443876647
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111382188101034407
date: 2023-11-09, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Hunting later at night may force the big cats to surrender their prey to larger carnivores, such as lions and leopards
date: 2023-11-09, from: TidBITS blog
https://tidbits.com/watchlist/logic-pro-x-10-8/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The Food and Drug Administration announced approval of the Eli Lilly drug for weight loss on Nov. 8.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281646653.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Here’s when you can catch SpaceX’s satellites across the Central Valley.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281645413.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The island bedstraw and Santa Cruz Island dudleya recover from the brink of extinction after 26 years of federal protection.
The post Two Channel Islands Plants Removed from Endangered Species List appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
If convicted, authorities reported that Jake Soberal and Irma Olguin could each face a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, depending on what a judge ultimately determines.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281650548.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
CSUN is home to a diverse student body that comes from a wide range of backgrounds and orientations. The university has made accommodations for these groups; however, providing services, events and resources will have little impact if students are not made aware of their existence. That is why CSUN should advertise the new clothing closet…
https://sundial.csun.edu/176867/opinions/why-a-gender-affirming-clothing-closet-matters/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
He said that Kevin McCarthy should have let the government shutdown at the end of September.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/politics-government/election/article281599348.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Reports indicate that Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has been hospitalized in Mexico City following a speech at the World Business Forum.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/steve_wozniak_hospitalized_mexico/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
A suspect used “his car as a weapon” when he slammed into two deputies, a Florida sheriff said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281646048.html
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2023-11-09, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Every time your corporate boss cancels a meeting, spend the hour fixing bugs for an open source project.
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111382056360614485
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“It could have been much worse,” she said. “I still have a lot to process.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281641738.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“If ever a plant said ‘don’t put me in your mouth’, this is it.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281631923.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“Descendants are now taking matters into their own hands.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281646168.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
More than 8,000 people were recruited into “Blessings in No Time,” authorities said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281642213.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
Astronomy At the Beach NASA’s Glenn Research Center joined more than 3,200 attendees at the 27th annual Astronomy at the Beach event in Brighton, Michigan, to raise awareness of astronomy, NASA, and STEM with the public. The Great Lakes Association of Astronomy Clubs hosted the two-day event at the Island Lake State Recreational Area on […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/glenn-in-the-community/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“We got it wrong on this occasion, and we apologize unreservedly,” the company said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/world/article281643563.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Liliputing
Human beings have developed a love/hate relationship with smartphones over the past two decades. They’re devices many of us can’t imagine living without… but they’re also frustrating gadgets that demand too much of our time and attention. A startup called Humane has been teasing a smartphone alternative for much of the year, and now the […]
The post The Humane Ai Pin is a $699 screen-free wearable designed to replace your smartphone appeared first on Liliputing.
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
Members of NASA’s 2021 astronaut candidate class visited NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland on Oct. 5 and 6 to learn more about the scope of work at the center. NASA Glenn’s world-class facilities and expertise in power, propulsion, and communications are crucial to advancing the agency’s Artemis program. The astronaut candidates, accompanied by Shannon […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/newest-astronaut-candidate-class-visits-nasas-glenn-research-center/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
San Marcos reaches the CIF Finals for the first time since 2003.
The post Boys’ Water Polo Roundup: Dos Pueblos and San Marcos to Meet in CIF Championship Showdown appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Rather than launch from a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V or SpaceX Falcon 9 as it has done in the past, the seventh takeoff of the US Space Force’s reusable X-37B spaceplane will make use of a Falcon Heavy rocket.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/space_force_spaceplane/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
He claimed it was an attempt to catch someone he believed was stealing from him.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281647573.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen kicks off two days of talks with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng Thursday as the U.S. looks to manage tensions with Beijing and keep dialogue open on a range of issues from climate change to trade and defense.
Following Yellen’s meetings on Thursday and Friday, presidents Joe Biden and Xi Jinping are expected to meet next week on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, or APEC, forum in San Francisco.
Analysts say Yellen’s meeting with He is the latest attempt to ensure that China doesn’t back out of the upcoming meeting between the two heads of state. Yellen has previously emphasized a relationship based on “healthy competition” rather than mutual scorn.
In remarks to He ahead of the talks in San Francisco, Yellen said that “the United States has no intention to decouple from China …” but when concerns arise “about specific economic practices, such as those that prevent American firms and workers from competing on a level playing field, we will communicate them directly.”
He told Yellen through an interpreter that his meetings with her have been “constructive.” He also said that U.S.-China relations needed to be restored “back to a healthy and stable development.”
Maintaining lines of communication is how Yellen has so far advanced her diplomacy and prevented misunderstandings about U.S. foreign policy. In July, she visited Beijing to meet with He.
“This week, I will speak to my counterpart about our serious concerns with Beijing’s unfair economic practices, including its large-scale use of non-market tools, its barriers to market access, and its coercive actions against U.S. firms in China,” Yellen wrote in an op-ed for The Washington Post that was published on Monday.
In that op-ed, Yellen also emphasized that global problems, including climate change and debt relief for developing nations, could provide opportunities for bilateral cooperation.
Some information for this report was provided by Reuters.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Computer ads from the Past
Vote while you can
https://computeradsfromthepast.substack.com/p/vote-for-the-november-paid-post
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The victory comes less than six months after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a new law to expand unionization rights of farmworkers.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281551993.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The researcher said he didn’t see the massive creature until he jumped in the ocean.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281639803.html
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-09, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
The thing people don’t like about AI isn’t that the machines are trying to be human, rather it’s that you could be a machine.
http://scripting.com/2023/11/09.html#a172045
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
The finding offers deeper insights into the long-debated internal structure of the gas giant. Gravity data collected by NASA’s Juno mission indicates Jupiter’s atmospheric winds penetrate the planet in a cylindrical manner, parallel to its spin axis. A paper on the findings was recently published in the journal Nature Astronomy. The violent nature of Jupiter’s […]
https://www.nasa.gov/missions/juno/nasas-juno-finds-jupiters-winds-penetrate-in-cylindrical-layers/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The truck landed on a tree in a “very precarious position.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281641828.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction Office will terminate at midnight on Dec. 21 barring reauthorization from Congress.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/politics-government/article281637933.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Cultural competence: “And that word trust in Spanish is very different from that in English. “It’s a special word.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article280356639.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Brianna the pup is “the definition of happy and fun-loving.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281638083.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
SolarWinds has come out guns blazing to defend itself following the US Securities and Exchange Commission’s announcement that it will be suing both the IT software maker and its CISO over the 2020 SUNBURST cyberattack.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/solarwinds_sec_filing/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Om Malik blog
A conversation with Imran Chaudhri, a former Apple designer and co-founder of Humane about the future of personal computing in the age of artificial intelligence.
https://om.co/2023/11/09/imran-chaudhri-humane-interview/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The husband was called a “generous and devoted supporter” of the school’s orchestra program.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281639158.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Om Malik blog
If you think of Humane’s AI Pin as just another device, it is easy to shrug your shoulders. However, when you place it in the context of the development of computing, you can see we are at the start of thinking about computing differently.
https://om.co/2023/11/09/ai-pin-humane/
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Entertainment studios and the Screen Actors Guild, which represents actors who appear in movies and television shows, have a tentative deal for a new contract, ending a 118-day strike, the longest in the union’s history
https://scvnews.com/sag-aftra-studios-reach-tentative-deal/
date: 2023-11-09, from: National Archives, Text Message blog
The 1957 motion picture Paths of Glory, directed by Stanley Kubrick, is one of the more famous anti-war movies of all time. It is set during World War I. A French colonel, played by Kirk Douglas, defends three of his soldiers who have been falsely accused of cowardice to cover up command failures that led … Continue reading International Problems With “Paths of Glory,” 1958
https://text-message.blogs.archives.gov/2023/11/09/international-problems-with-paths-of-glory-1958/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2023-11-09, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
One of my favorite tweets of all time:
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111381649119577273
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
Opening statements are scheduled in the federal trial of David DePape who prosecutors say assaulted then-82-year-old Paul Pelosi, sending shockwaves through the political world just days before last year’s midterm elections.
date: 2023-11-09, from: 404 Media Group
We are hosting our second FOIA Forum at the end of November. Join the livestream, file FOIAs with us, get tips, and more.
https://www.404media.co/our-second-foia-forum-11-30-1pm-est/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
It will be in the Student Union.
https://www.fresnobee.com/living/food-drink/bethany-clough/article281641443.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Liliputing
One of the security updates baked into Android 14 is a feature that blocks you from installing some older apps built for Android 5.1 or earlier… kind of. If you’ve got a shiny new phone or tablet running Android 14, it’s true that you can’t download and install these older apps on your device itself. […]
The post How to install old apps on Android 14 appeared first on Liliputing.
https://liliputing.com/how-to-install-old-apps-on-android-14/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Michael Tsai
Flying Meat: Retrobatch 2.0 includes a new dark UI, a bunch of new nodes, new features, refinements in existing nodes and UI, plus much more.[…]New “Super Resolution” node, which uses machine learning to scale up your image 4x its size.[…]New “Photos Export” node which replaces the “Photos Library” node (which Apple has deprecated libraries it […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2023/11/09/retrobatch-2/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Signal
Capturing a stunning photo is just the beginning. The true essence of photography lies in the post-production process, where raw images are transformed into poignant, captivating masterpieces. Every photographer, amateur or professional, has an essential tool in their arsenal – a reliable photo editing software. In the vast landscape of the digital world, finding the […]
The post The Ultimate Guide to the Best Free Photo Editor for PC: Free Photo Editor Download and Photo Editing Free Downloads appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Signal
Veterans Day is more than just a date on the calendar. It’s a poignant reminder of the sacrifices made by countless brave men and women who donned the uniform, standing in defense of freedom and democracy. It’s a day to reflect, honor and appreciate the immense debt of gratitude we owe to our military veterans […]
The post Bill Miranda | Paying Tribute to Our Valiant Veterans appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/bill-miranda-paying-tribute-to-our-valiant-veterans/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Authorities also found a bag of rare antique coins stolen in a different case at his desk, officials say.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281641243.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The woman and her son were found shot in a driveway.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281636398.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer): The iOS 17.1.1 update addresses a BMW wireless charging problem and a bug with the Weather Lock Screen widget. There have also been issues with Wi-Fi connectivity and device shutdowns, but it’s unclear if anything in iOS 17.1.1 is intended to address those. Previously: iOS 17.1 and iPadOS 17.1
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2023/11/09/ios-17-1-1-and-ipados-17-1-1/
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
NASA Administrator Bill Nelson participated in a signing ceremony Thursday with Bulgaria’s Milena Stoycheva, minister of innovation and growth, as her country became the 32nd nation to sign the Artemis Accords. The Artemis Accords establish a practical set of principles to guide space exploration cooperation among nations, including those participating in NASA’s Artemis program. Also […]
date: 2023-11-09, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer, enterprise, full installer, IPSW, M3): Today’s update includes bug fixes and security updates according to Apple. Joe Rossignol: While the release notes did not specify which bugs were fixed, we have confirmed that the update resolves a software update issue with M3 Macs and an Adobe Photoshop bug. See […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2023/11/09/macos-14-1-1/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Michael Tsai
Apple (release notes, full installer for M1 and M2, M3): This update has no published CVE entries. Available for MacBook Pro (2021 and later) and iMac (2023) Enterprise release notes: MacBook Pro 14-inch and 16-inch computers with Apple silicon no longer start up to a black screen or circled exclamation point after the built-in display’s […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2023/11/09/macos-13-6-2/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Michael Tsai
Juli Clover (release notes, security, developer): Today’s update addresses an issue that is causing some Apple Watch models to drain battery more quickly than expected. Complaints about Apple Watch battery started after the launch of watchOS 10.1, and Apple confirmed in a memo over the weekend that the battery problems would be fixed in a […]
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2023/11/09/watchos-10-1-1/
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2023-11-09, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Petition to change.org to allow Xcode to have 30 items in "open recent"
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111381512391208768
date: 2023-11-09, from: 404 Media Group
Minnesota asked the people to design a new state flag, and the people delivered.
https://www.404media.co/minnesota-flag-design-contest/
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
A 3-year-old girl escaped injury in an Oakland shooting Wednesday night that left her mother with a wound to the arm, authorities said.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/11/09/woman-wounded-child-uninjured-in-oakland-shooting/
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
NASA’s new streaming service is here. More space. More science. More NASA. The new ad-free, no cost, family-friendly streaming service launched Nov. 8. Explore our Emmy-Award-winning live coverage and go behind the scenes with our scientists and engineers through original shows and 65 years of classic NASA footage. NASA has elevated its digital platforms for […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/nasas-new-streaming-service-is-here-more-space-more-science-more-nasa/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Smithsonian Magazine
The upcoming miniseries follows the 100th Bombardment Group, an Air Force unit nicknamed the “Bloody Hundredth”
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-09, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
For FeedLand users and others, how did you feel about the starter feeds you were offered when you first signed on?
http://scripting.com/2023/11/09.html#a161101
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
In response to five class-action lawsuits, a Washington appeals court has decided that Honda and several other automakers did nothing wrong by storing text messages and call records from connected smartphones.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/car_text_harvesting/
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
The aircraft had reached an altitude of at least 14,000 feet by the time it was turned around, reads a special bulletin by the UK’s Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB.) The plane landed back at Stansted Airport safely shortly afterward.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“No minors anywhere were safe from (the Ohio man) so long as (he) had access to the Internet,” authorities said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281636933.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
Purdue University’s School of Mechanical Engineering named Dr. Jimmy Kenyon, director of NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Outstanding Mechanical Engineer during a ceremony on Oct. 13. The award recognizes alumni who have demonstrated excellence in industry, academia, governmental service, or other endeavors related to mechanical engineering. Honorees have shown outstanding character and leadership and have accomplished […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/purdue-university-honors-dr-kenyon/
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
You have to go back to February 2012 to find the last time California buyers were in control by one definition.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/11/09/will-california-ever-have-another-buyers-market-for-homes/
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
This is a thorough and well thought out order, resulting from a great deal of staff time and considerable expertise and technical knowledge by the people who helped draft the order.
https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/11/09/white-house-order-provides-guidance-on-ai-safety/
date: 2023-11-09, from: David Rosenthal’s blog
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The cars are staggeringly expensive, outfitted with high-tech sensors and cameras, and are worth as much as $200,000.And on Cruise:
Each Chevrolet Bolt that Cruise operates costs $150,000 to $200,000, according to a person familiar with its operations.So the upfront investment is around $150K/car. Assuming a 5-year life and 7% interest, the annual cost would be around $32K, or about $90/day. After paying about $12/hr for fuel, insurance, repairs, depreciation and so on an Uber driver makes $18/hr, or assuming an 8hr day, $144/day. The robotaxi looks like it is about $54/day ahead.
Half of Cruise’s 400 cars were in San Francisco when the driverless operations were stopped. Those vehicles were supported by a vast operations staff, with 1.5 workers per vehicle.With 1.5 workers at Uber’s pay rate the robotaxi’s staff and equipment is costing $306/day, so the robotaxi is $162/day behind, and Cruise is unlikely to be able to pay only $18/hr. What were the 1.5 people per car actually doing?
The workers intervened to assist the company’s vehicles every 2.5 to five miles, according to two people familiar with is operations.Lora Kolodny followed up the NYT team’s reporting in Cruise confirms robotaxis rely on human assistance every four to five miles:
Vogt confirmed that the General Motors-owned company does have a remote assistance team, in response to a discussion under the header, “GM’s Cruise alleged to rely on human operators to achieve ‘autonomous’ driving.”Clearly, the robotaxi fleet needs some staff. The cars need refueling, say every 200 miles. They need cleaning. Lets guess the average ride is 5 miles and they need cleaning every 10 rides. That would be staff required every 40 miles. So the vast majority of interventions are because Cruise’s self-driving technology just can’t handle San Francisco traffic. They may be called robotaxis, just pay no attention to the driver behind the curtain. These remote drivers will be more expensive than the in-car drivers they are replacing!
The CEO wrote, “Cruise AVs are being remotely assisted (RA) 2-4% of the time on average, in complex urban environments. This is low enough already that there isn’t a huge cost benefit to optimizing much further, especially given how useful it is to have humans review things in certain situations.”
G.M. has spent an average of $588 million a quarter on Cruise over the past year, a 42 percent increase from a year ago.$2,232B/year for 400 cars is $5.6M per car per year! How could each car earn this much?
The company charged an average of $10.50 per ride in the city.To generate $5.6M each car would have to service 510K rides/year or 1,400 rides/day, or one ride per minute. Cruise’s goal, before they got shut down, was less ambitious:
The shutdown complicates Cruise’s ambition of hitting its goal of $1 billion of revenue in 2025.Covering less than half their costs in 2025 is about 91M rides, or about 250K/day. Lets be generous, and assume 10 rides/day/car. They would need 25K Chevrolet Bolts. Scaling the operation from 400 to 25K in under 2 years would be hard. It would be made harder because Bolt production stops next month. But even if the Bolts were available, this would be an additional investment of between $3.7B and $5B in order to lose only $1.2B/year.
Focusing on the notoriously high margin taxi business has always been odd, in that even if they “work” it’s not entirely clear where the big profit opportunity is! Replacing low wage workers with expensive machines that require a lot of attention from people who have more specialized skills than “driving” doesn’t seem to be such a great plan!Last August, Hubert Horan continued his long-running series with Part Thirty-Three: Uber Isn’t Really Profitable Yet But is Getting Closer; The Antitrust Case Against Uber, which starts:
I get the appeal for the carbrained. What “we” all want is a 24 hour driver at an affordable rate. It’s just not quite clear what the business model is, even if the technology works!
People always point to niche cases in which robot car would be particularly useful. But they’re niche cases and you need scale to make anything in this industry profitable! Scale is necessary for a lot of reasons, but one is maintenance and spare parts production. Your self-driving campus vans won’t last long if there’s only one guy who knows to maintain them and the parts manufacturer just went bankrupt.
After $33 Billion in Losses Over 14 Years, Uber is Finally Approaching GAAP BreakevenUber has always viewed drivers as a temporary necessity to tide them over until robotaxis take over and boost them into actual instead of manipulated profits. Last month they started offering robotaxi service in Phoenix using Waymo’s cars. But unless Waymo is showing them radically different numbers than the NYT team found for Cruise, Horan’s series is going to run and run.
Uber claimed its first ever quarterly GAAP profit when it released its second quarter and first half financial results on August 1. The claim was a bit of stretch as the reported $394 million second quarter profit ($237 million for the first half) was entirely explained by an alleged $386 million second quarter gain ($707 million in the first half) in the value of untradable securities they hold in companies like Didi, Grab, and Aurora that have nothing to do with their ongoing operations. Readers of this series will know that Uber has aggressively used claims like this to justify misleading claims about its corporate financial performance ever since 2018 when it inflated published net income numbers by $5.8 billion just prior to its IPO.
Last week, a Cruise driverless car collided with a fire truck responding to an emergency. Another Cruise vehicle got stuck in wet concrete. The week before, several Cruise cars blocked traffic in the city’s North Beach neighborhood.More recently, Sam Biddle reported that:
previously unreported internal materials such as chat logs show Cruise has known internally about two pressing safety issues: Driverless Cruise cars struggled to detect large holes in the road and have so much trouble recognizing children in certain scenarios that they risked hitting them. Yet, until it came under fire this month, Cruise kept its fleet of driverless taxis active, maintaining its regular reassurances of superhuman safety.In contrast, all the NYT team could find to report about Waymo was:
In May, one of its cars struck and killed a small dog. A few years ago, a driverless Waymo car with a human safety driver operating the wheel hit a pedestrian who needed to be taken to the hospital. The company has been collecting fares in the Phoenix area for several years and now has a fleet navigating some 200 miles across that region, including to and from the airport.Why is Cruise so much less safe? The NYT team write:
Company insiders are putting the blame for what went wrong on a tech industry culture — led by the 38-year-old Mr. Vogt — that put a priority on the speed of the program over safety. In the competition between Cruise and its top driverless car rival, Waymo, Mr. Vogt wanted to dominate in the same way Uber dominated its smaller ride-hailing competitor, Lyft.As someone who has been sharing the roads with Waymo cars for many years, I have always believed that Waymo, unlike Cruise and much worse Tesla, understood that it was necessary to prove that self-driving technology was safe, not just gaslight the public as Mr. Vogt did:
“Kyle is a guy who is willing to take risks, and he is willing to move quickly. He is very Silicon Valley,” said Matthew Wansley, a professor at the Cardozo School of Law in New York who specializes in emerging automotive technologies. “That both explains the success of Cruise and its mistakes.”
To make streets safer, he said in an interview, cities should embrace self-driving cars like those designed by Cruise, a subsidiary of General Motors. They do not get distracted, drowsy or drunk, he said, and being programmed to put safety first meant they could substantially reduce car-related fatalities.Two months later Cruise’s safety record got them shut down. The very same day:
CEO Mary Barra told financial analysts that Cruise “is safer than a human driver and is constantly improving and getting better.”
https://blog.dshr.org/2023/11/robotaxi-economics.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The boundaries of the proposed Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary “could impede development of offshore wind,” the companies wrote in a letter.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281367213.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Marketplace Morning Report
After a nearly four monthlong strike, SAG-AFTRA performers reached a tentative agreement with Hollywood studios last night. While details are still scarce, both sides are celebrating — and there are signs of big gains for actors. What will we be looking for in the contract and what does it mean for our favorite shows? Also, workplace injuries are up and a bakery in Gaza struggles to keep up with demand.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
New data predicts population decline after 2080.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281607593.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
The third Power to Explore Student Challenge from NASA is underway. The writing challenge invites K-12 students in the United States to learn about radioisotope power systems, a type of nuclear battery integral to many of NASA’s far-reaching space missions, and then write an essay about a new powered mission for the agency. For more […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/nasa-seeks-students-to-imagine-nuclear-powered-space-missions/
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
A man died Wednesday after he was engulfed in flames following a collision between the stolen motorcycle he was riding and a vehicle in Oakland.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The 47-year-old man slapped and punched the 16-year-old boy, deputies said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281614293.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
The White House says Israel has agreed to put in place four-hour daily humanitarian pauses in its assault on Hamas in northern Gaza. T
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
A big office complex in Sunnyvale has staggered into a default on its real estate loan.
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-09, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
I wonder if Stack Overflow tried to do a deal with ChatGPT to flow human knowledge through their database. Or were they caught as flat-footed as Encyclopædia Britannica was by Wikipedia, or how digital cameras were obsoleted by smart phones. Was there anything any of them could do, or was there no possible corner-turn? Also newspaper classified ads and Craigslist.
http://scripting.com/2023/11/09.html#a154132
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The buried treasure was found in Poland, officials said.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/world/article281611133.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
There are currently more than 600,000 openings for manufacturing jobs in the United States, according to recent data from the U.S. Department of Labor. That number could rise to about 2.1 million vacancies or open jobs by the year 2030 if more efforts are not made to attract and retain workers with specialized skills. In […]
https://www.nasa.gov/general/nasa-glenn-attracts-students-to-manufacturing-careers/
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
John Glenn. Neil Armstrong. Buzz Aldrin. Jim Lovell. Guion Bluford. These iconic astronauts shared a commonality before they began their careers at NASA: They all served in the United States military. NASA values veterans and their commitment to serving America, and the agency seeks to hire veterans and military spouses, offer career development opportunities, and […]
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-09, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
I bought a new domain for FeedLand today. 😄
http://scripting.com/2023/11/09.html#a151202
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
At the same time, 72% of Californians said they are satisfied with their household’s financial standing and 54% of likely voters said they approved of Governor Gavin Newsom’s handling of jobs and the economy.
date: 2023-11-09, from: NASA breaking news
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and Hubble Space Telescope have united to study an expansive galaxy cluster known as MACS0416. The resulting panchromatic image combines visible and infrared light to assemble one of the most comprehensive views of the universe ever taken. Located about 4.3 billion light-years from Earth, MACS0416 is a pair of colliding […]
date: 2023-11-09, from: San Jose Mercury News
The conference went 11-1 in season openers, with only ASU losing (to Mississippi State).
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
A Rocket Lab update on what caused the failure of its “We Will Never Desert You” mission identifies an electrical arc under Paschen’s Law as the most likely culprit.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/rocket_lab_investigation/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“I still am left with no answer as to why this all took place.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/crime/article281599988.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
These national chains in California have deals for Veterans Day.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281558523.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: OS News
Eight gigabytes has been the standard RAM load out on new MacBook Pros for the better part of a decade, and in 2023, Apple execs still believe it’s enough for customers. With the launch of Apple’s M3 MacBook Pros last month, a base 14-inch $1,599 model with an M3 chip still only gets you 8GB of unified DRAM that’s shared between the CPU, GPU, and neural network accelerator. In a show of Apple’s typical modesty this week, the tech giant’s veep of worldwide product marketing Bob Borchers has argued, in an interview with machine-learning engineer Lin YilYi, that the Arm-compatible, Apple-designed M-series silicon and software stack is so memory efficient that 8GB on a Mac may equal 16GB on a PC – so we therefore ought to be happy with it. Eight gigabyte of RAM in and of itself isn’t an issue, on a budget machine. Apple is selling incredibly expensive machines labelled as “pro” with a mere 8 GB, and charges €200 for another 8, which is highway robbery, plain and simple. I wonder how many people at Apple – at any level – use Macs with 8 GB of RAM. I have a feeling that number is quite low.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
She was one of more than a dozen pets helped during the storm.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281632693.html
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-09, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
I asked DALL-E to help create an icon for Feed Hunter. I can’t imagine an art director at an agency not using AI to play around with ideas for logos, symbols, ads, whatever. What I arrived at was a tennis racket trying to hit a cheeseburger. I didn’t end up using it, but the exploration was useful. I think this process still has quite a ways to go, I find it difficult to control the bot, I give it explicit instructions sometimes that it apparently doesn’t understand. But it’s still a miracle of technology. And a miracle for this human, because I’ve found an artist that is infinitely patient with me, and works for $20 a month.
http://scripting.com/2023/11/09.html#a143752
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The 29-year-old graduate student was a month away from completing his degree.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281633138.html
@Dave Winer’s Scripting News (date: 2023-11-09, from: Dave Winer’s Scripting News)
Feed
Hunter is a new NPM package that looks for a feed, starting with the
address of an HTML file. We first look for feeds that are
linked into the HTML
source code. If we don’t find a working feed there, we
look
in 27 common locations where feeds are often found. And btw, there’s
a new version of FeedLand that uses
this package, so we do better at finding feeds. Thanks to the
Indieblog site which keeps a great
list of blogs with feeds. We
used that info to come up with our list of default locations. We also
used the list of feeds people have subscribed to in FeedLand.
http://scripting.com/2023/11/09.html#a141419
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Sanger High girls roll to fourth consecutive conference title; Sanger High boys pick up fourth league title in five years.
https://www.fresnobee.com/sports/high-school/article281635068.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Arm has shown better than expected revenue in its first earnings report since the company’s public offering, but its shares fell on a weaker outlook for the quarter ahead.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/arm_q2_2024/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The LAist
The Amazon Style store was part of an experiment in brick-and-mortar retail for the online shopping giant. It opened at the Americana last year.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
State funds make up a third of what the radio station will need to upgrade its facility or locate elsewhere.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281628248.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“Newsom’s recent China trip was a a politically brave move and a lifeline of hope for a world on the brink of abandoning climate diplomacy.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/article281500798.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
With the debate on where to build the medical complex as contentious as it was when the governor proposed Eagles Field in Mangilao, the administration continues its effort to lobby support for the Eda Agaga area of Barrigada one talk…
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
Failure to maintain Guam Department of Education Schools already is costing the government of Guam money, as double session at John F. Kennedy High School has increased lease costs.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
Two men were honored for their role in strengthening the friendly relationship between Japan and Guam.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
A judge is considering whether to disqualify the Office of the Attorney General from prosecuting government employees because of a possible conflict of interest.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
District Court of Guam Chief Judge Frances Tydingco-Gatewood toured the former Ordot dump on Thursday to get additional information on the facility’s condition and learn about its operation and maintenance. She visited various areas at the now-capped former dump facility,…
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
A pay increase for the chief financial officer at the Guam Power Authority, one of three pay raises approved Wednesday by the Consolidated Commission on Utilities, drew criticism from Sen. William Parkinson, who said the CCU should reassess its decision…
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
A man on pretrial release in a burglary case from this year was accused of breaking into a home by removing an air conditioning unit.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
A Tumon hotel has welcomed the use of drones to clean and maintain the appearance of the facility.
date: 2023-11-09, from: 404 Media Group
Ten Labcorp workers told 404 Media that Amazon-like productivity goals at the clinical lab giant are squeezing them for profits in a way that could put patients at risk.
https://www.404media.co/labcorp-workers-say-productivity-goals-are-pushing-them-to-the-brink/
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
An exhibition featuring the work of Simone Leigh — one of America’s most influential contemporary female artists — is now on display at the Hirshhorn Museum in Washington. Leigh, known for her focus on feminism, gender equality and racial justice, became the first Black artist in history to represent the U.S. at the Venice Biennale in 2022, where she was awarded the coveted Golden Lion. Maxim Adams has the story. Camera: Sergii Dogotar.
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2023-11-09, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
To celebrate Google’s request at the EU to force Apple to open iMessage, today we celebrate the career promotions for every PM and VP at Google that gave us this bouquet of innovation:
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111380868116458358
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
The 50-year-old victim was a longtime Spanish teacher in Orosi.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/local/article281592333.html
@Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed (date: 2023-11-09, from: Miguel de Icaza Mastondon feed)
Ok I finally got Godot header files incorporated into a Swift project to begin adding Swift to the Godot editor (not via bindings).
The only issue is that it currently contains a lot of unnecessary junk from “thirdpartylibraries” and also requires some manual header file changes, I’ll write a script to automate that.
My work so far is on https://GitHub.com/migueldeicaza/Godot in the swift branch
https://mastodon.social/@Migueldeicaza/111380830179945773
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Now the New York woman owes $578,943.86 in restitution, prosecutors say.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281608338.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
IT spending in Europe is set to hit $1 trillion by the end of 2023, and will see growth of 9.3 percent into next year, well up on this year’s figure of 5.5 percent, according to stats from Gartner.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/enterprise_spending_gartner_europe/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“This is not a place for children,” the woman said of the kids in line with their parents, according to cops.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281632378.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Signal
Along with the rest of the congressional Republicans, Rep. Mike Garcia voted to elect Rep. Mike Johnson speaker of the House. Why is this important? The speaker of the House guides the vision of the Republicans in the House. What he decides is important is what the House Republicans work toward. He also is second […]
The post Karen Fencil | Think About Mike Johnson appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/karen-fencil-think-about-mike-johnson/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The LAist
Norm Day is an annual student count that “strikes fear in the heart of administrators,” in the words of one LAUSD school board member.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“It took me more than a year to find some people who were willing to give it a try.”
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281222828.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Sacramento Rep. Doris Matsui asked for $2 million after CapRadio approached her office for funding.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281592348.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
How long does it take to pay off a solar panel system in California?
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281098418.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Smithsonian Magazine
Written during the Seven Years’ War, the letters offer rare insights into the lives of everyday people during wartime
date: 2023-11-09, from: Marketplace Morning Report
For this month’s “Econ Extra Credit” project, we’re watching Martin Scorsese’s new feature film, “Killers of the Flower Moon.” The film shows how white settlers terrorized members of the Osage Nation, violently attempting to acquire their oil resources. We’re joined by professor and Osage Nation citizen Jean Dennison to define key concepts in the film, including headrights and guardianships. But first: What’s up with Speaker Mike Johnson’s financial disclosure?
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Ocean Exploration Trust visited the site Nov. 3.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/nation-world/national/article281537323.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
The cybercriminals behind the rampant MOVEit exploits from earlier this year are making use a zero-day vulnerability in on-prem instances of IT service and help desk software-slinger SysAid.…
date: 2023-11-09, from: Marketplace Morning Report
From the BBC World Service: A group of young former McDonald’s workers in the United Kingdom is taking the fast food chain to court, accusing it of failing to protect them at work. Earlier this year, a BBC investigation revealed allegations of sexual assault, harassment, racism and bullying. Plus, Bangladesh is the world’s second-largest exporter of clothes, but workers are protesting over better pay and conditions. Then, as the French government hosts a conference in Paris today to discuss ways of getting humanitarian aid to people in Gaza, we hear from a bakery in the territory that is struggling to keep up with the massive demand for crucial supplies of bread.
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-08, from: Bruce Schneier blog
Selling miniature replicas to unsuspecting shoppers:
Online marketplaces sell tiny pink cowboy hats. They also sell miniature pencil sharpeners, palm-size kitchen utensils, scaled-down books and camping chairs so small they evoke the Stonehenge scene in “This Is Spinal Tap.” Many of the minuscule objects aren’t clearly advertised.
[…]
But there is no doubt some online sellers deliberately trick customers into buying smaller and often cheaper-to-produce items, Witcher said. Common tactics include displaying products against a white background rather than in room sets or on models, or photographing items with a perspective that makes them appear bigger than they really are. Dimensions can be hidden deep in the product description, or not included at all…
https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2023/11/online-retail-hack.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
From Our Partners: When a gift card just won’t do, keep the following in mind guide when you want to show your love to a nurse
https://www.fresnobee.com/shopping/article281554083.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: OS News
Xiaomi also has bad news for MIUI users who wish to unlock their smartphones, saying they won’t get updated to HyperOS. “Previous operating systems, such as MIUI 14, still retain the ability to unlock, but users will no longer receive any Xiaomi HyperOS updates if they leave their devices in an unlocked state,” the company told us. The Chinese brand clarified in a follow-up email that HyperOS updates won’t be available if you’ve unlocked your phone’s bootloader, regardless of whether you’re on MIUI 14 or HyperOS. However, the company said you’ll receive HyperOS updates if you choose to lock your device again. This applies to all Xiaomi devices outside of China. I rarely say this, but with this new “HyperOS” skin being the most blatant iOS ripoff I’ve ever seen, just get an iPhone if you want that experience that badly.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Logic Matters blog
The post One in twenty appeared first on Logic Matters.
https://www.logicmatters.net/2023/11/09/one-in-twenty/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Fedora Linux is released when it’s ready, so two decades plus one day after its debut, the latest version is here, with lots of new goodies.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/fedora_39_released/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Raspberry Pi News (.com)
We spotted this excellently simple fractal art display on Reddit. It’s a perfect beginner project for someone looking for a geeky desk trinket.
The post PiArtFrame displays fractal art appeared first on Raspberry Pi.
https://www.raspberrypi.com/news/piartframe-displays-fractal-art/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Nikki Haley and Vivek Ramaswamy again tore into each other. | Opinion
https://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/article281626423.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Alex Schroeder’s Blog
Would you do it? Is “writing your own website” an activity that could be described as “untrusted user generated content”? I get the feeling that perhaps it is not! It is your site, you are writing the thing, so it’s trusted. Your visitors need to trust you, too.
Now, in order for an attacker to hurt your visitors, they would need to get access to the file system via the web server somehow.
Do you feel that the situation changes when there’s a service like Oddmu that generates the HTML based on Markdown?
I guess the source remains the same, you’re writing the Markdown, therefore the HTML, and so on. But now the attack surface is larger: attackers can attack either the web server (the reverse proxy in front) or the service itself (in the backend). I don’t run the service in a “demilitarized zone” (DMZ) – what a word! – so there’s that.
The reason I’m wondering about all that is because I wonder whether I need to sanitize the output of the Markdown to HTML conversion using a library like bluemonday.
bluemonday takes untrusted user generated content as an input, and will return HTML that has been sanitised against an allowlist of approved HTML elements and attributes so that you can safely include the content in your web page.
Hm. Even if Oddmu is used by a group of people, I would still assume that they trust each other. In such a context, there are no “untrusted users”.
So why not take the easy route and just apply sanitization always? The reason is that I sometimes (rarely!) include SVG in my Markdown, like in 2022-06-30 How to communicate dungeon maps to players.
Yesterday evening and this morning I spent a fair amount of time writing code that adds SVG validation to a bluemonday policy. You can take a look in issue #196. It’s awful. And I suspect that the specs will keep changing over time and so I will keep running into issues. It would be much easier to just drop it.
https://alexschroeder.ch/view/2023-11-09-sanitize
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Upcoming versions of Samsung devices will come equipped with Generative AI features starting next year after the chaebol launched its own tool – Gauss – on Wednesday.…
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Interview Intel veep Arun Gupta is taking a pragmatic approach to open source and how contributing companies can keep the lights on.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/intel_arun_gupta_on_open_source/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Cheetahs are usually daytime hunters, but the speedy big cats will shift their activity toward dawn and dusk hours during warmer weather, a new study finds.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>NEW YORK — Ivanka Trump didn’t want to testify. But on the stand Wednesday in her father’s civil fraud trial, she took the opportunity to contend the family business has “overdelivered,” even as she kept her distance from financial documents that New York state says were fraudulent.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>MIAMI — In their first debate since the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war, the Republican presidential candidates all declared hawkish support for Israel but squabbled over China and Ukraine as they faced growing pressure to try to catch Donald Trump — who was again absent.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Flaviana Simpliciano Asencion, 90, of Hilo died Oct. 28 at Hilo Medical Center. Born in Ilocos Norte, Philippines, she was a retired head pantry worker for the Mauna Kea Beach Hotel and member of St. Joseph Catholic Church and Kohala Women’s Club. Visitation 8-9:30 a.m. Wednesday (Nov. 15) at St. Joseph Catholic Church. Mass at 9:30 a.m. Committal service 11:30 a.m. at East Hawaii Veterans Cemetery No. 2 Pavilion. Casual attire. Survived by son, Joseph S. (Elma) Asencion of Hilo; brothers, Narciso (Trinidad) Simpliciano of Kailua-Kona and Santiago (Josie) Simpliciano of Kohala; five grandchildren and a great granddaughter; nieces and nephews. Arrangements by Dodo Mortuary.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/09/obituaries/obituaries-for-november-9-9/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>WASHINGTON — House Republicans issued subpoenas Wednesday to members of President Joe Biden’s family, taking their most aggressive step yet in an impeachment inquiry bitterly opposed by Democrats that is testing the reach of congressional oversight powers.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip — Palestinians living in the heart of Gaza’s largest city said Wednesday they could see and hear Israeli ground forces closing in from multiple directions, accelerating the exodus of thousands of civilians as food and water become scarce and urban fighting between Israel and Hamas heats up.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — The owners of a Colorado funeral home were arrested Wednesday in Oklahoma on charges linked to the discovery of 190 sets of decaying remains at one of their facilities, including some that apparently had been languishing there for four years.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The Downtown Hilo Christmas Lights Parade committee is looking for more parade participants before the annual holiday procession hits the street later this month.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/09/hawaii-news/hilo-christmas-parade-set-for-nov-25/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>WASHINGTON — The U.S. launched an airstrike on a facility in eastern Syria used by Iranian-backed militias, in retaliation for what has been a growing number of attacks on bases housing U.S. troops in the region for the past several weeks, the Pentagon said.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>NEW YORK — A federal jury convicted two longtime U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration supervisors Wednesday of leaking confidential information to defense attorneys as part of a bribery conspiracy that prosecutors say imperiled high-profile cases and the lives of overseas drug informants.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>About 100 people attended the grand opening Wednesday of the Sacred Heart Affordable Housing Project in Pahoa.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>LOS ANGELES — Hollywood’s actors union reached a tentative deal with studios Wednesday to end its strike and months of labor strife that ground the film and television industries to a historic halt.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Members of the state Senate Ways and Means Committee have been holding discussions across Hawaii Island this week to help guide future decisions and budget appropriations during the upcoming legislative session.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — The race to add two-way baseball superstar Shohei Ohtani in a blockbuster free agency deal is off to a clandestine start. </p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The oddsmakers are pretty sure about a happy Veterans Day for the Air Force football team Saturday. The Falcons are favored by between 18 and 19.5 points at Hawaii.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>KEA‘AU — Kamehameha Schools - Hawai‘i senior Liwai Correa announced Wednesday his commitment to play baseball for Utah Valley University.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/09/sports/correa-commits-to-utah-valley/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>NEW YORK — If you think the World Series sped by, it did. </p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — The Philadelphia Phillies have decided two-time Most Valuable Player Bryce Harper is the team’s first baseman of the future, which means the franchise also is moving on from slugger Rhys Hoskins. </p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The University of Michigan warned Big Ten Commissioner Tony Petitti about overstepping his authority and rushing to judgment, insisting Wednesday that he cannot discipline coach Jim Harbaugh under the conference’s sportsmanship policy for an alleged sign-stealing scheme that has rocked college football. </p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Joe Buck and Troy Aikman were nicknamed “The A Team” when they joined Cris Collinsworth to form Fox’s top NFL broadcast crew in 2002. </p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The national championship game in women’s basketball last spring was unforgettable for a lot of good reasons. LSU beating Iowa for its first title. A record television audience of nearly 10 million viewers. The spicy intensity between star players Angel Reese and Caitlin Clark. </p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>There are voices that command you to listen with your heart as well as your ears.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>The Honokaa Business Association presents the 2nd annual Honokaa Renaissance Faire from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Aerial Arts Hawaii will present “Aquatica” at 7 p.m. this Friday at the Palace Theater in downtown Hilo.</p>
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Imagine an environmentally sound planet populated with joyful, healthy animals, humans included. Picture a global society in which everyone is respected and treated as an individual, a world where anger, fear and violence give way to kindness, security and peace.</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/09/opinion/make-world-vegan-month-last-forever/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>‘Chasms between
wealth and poverty’</p>
https://www.hawaiitribune-herald.com/2023/11/09/opinion/your-views-for-november-9-7/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Hawaii Tribune Harold
<p>Usually, when Martin Luther King’s words are misappropriated, the culprits are misinformation mercenaries trying to advance some right-wing idea that is light years away from King’s ideology,</p>
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
A US-based semiconductor biz is to buy the Newport Wafer Fab (NWF) facility in South Wales, following last year’s decision by the UK government that it had to be sold under national security legislation.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/nexperia_sells_newport_wafer_fab/
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
The third Republican presidential debate took place Wednesday in Miami, Florida, featuring fewer candidates than past debates. The candidates tried to set themselves apart from each other and from front-runner Donald Trump with several international issues. VOA’s Senior Washington Correspondent Carolyn Presutti brings us the highlights.
https://www.voanews.com/a/republican-debate-candidates-narrow-to-5/7347955.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Robert Reich on Substack
The Roots of Trumpism (Part 9)
https://robertreich.substack.com/p/why-the-scourge-of-obesity-in-america
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-10, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Europe’s government watchdog has found that the European Commission’s refusal to disclose which experts it consulted on the proposal to scan encrypted communication for child sexual abuse material amounted to maladministration.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/eu_casm_expert_identities/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Daily Trojan features Classified advertising in each day’s edition. Here you can read, search, and even print out each day’s edition of the Classifieds.
The post Classifieds – November 9, 2023 appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/classifieds-november-9-2023/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Nonprofit focuses on eviction and intimate partner violence matters.
The post Chowder Fest Raises Funds for Legal Services in High Demand appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/09/chowder-fest-raises-funds-for-legal-services-in-high-demand/
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
1898 – Actress Winifred Westover born in Oakland; estranged wife of William S. Hart & mother of his son. [story
https://scvnews.com/today-in-scv-history-nov-9/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: Cynthia Kiser’s blog
The key to running so many sites in a single Wagtail installation is they all need to be the same (or nearly the same) except for content. And the best way to make something uniform is to manage it in code. The code that manages our site setup (and tear down) lives in our site creator. This is a Django app that overrides Wagtail’s site management forms to add the logic we use to enforce our ideas about multitenancy.
http://cynthiakiser.com/blog/2023/11/09/site-creator.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Mission Revival architecture was designed to entice tourists to head west.
The post Mission Revival Leaves Its Mark appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/09/mission-revival-leaves-its-mark/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Blackouts in Ukraine last year were not just caused by missile strikes on the nation but also by a seemingly coordinated cyberattack on one of its power plants. That’s according to Mandiant’s threat intel team, which said Russia’s Sandworm crew was behind the two-pronged power-outage and data-wiping attack.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/russias_sandworm_power_plant_attack/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The Trojans are looking to sustain their momentum after No. 7 Ohio State upset.
The post Women’s basketball hosts FGCU in home opener appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/womens-basketball-hosts-fgcu-in-home-opener/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
No. 21 USC will strive to continue its strong start in its home opener Thursday.
The post Men’s basketball returns to South Central appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/mens-basketball-returns-to-south-central/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
USC prepares for Oregon in its first game without coordinator Alex Grinch.
The post Can the Trojan defense be renewed? appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/trojans-hope-for-renewed-defense-under-new-leadership/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Not every person has the immense privilege to follow fads like “bimbo feminism.”
The post ‘Girlsplaining’ is setting back feminism appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/girlsplaining-is-setting-back-feminism/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
What Trojans should know about those pesky underage drinking laws.
The post Faking it: IDs and MIPs appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/faking-it-ids-and-mips/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Campbelle Searcy built an online shop as an outlet for creativity and sustainability.
The post Trojan Threads creates USC apparel appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/trojan-threads-creates-usc-apparel/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Reflecting on who we are in the midst of the Israel-Hamas war through Andrea Rexilius’ poetry.
The post ‘Half Of What They Carried Flew Away’ and some more appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/half-of-what-they-carried-flew-away-and-some-more/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
Participants congregated to debate topics such as abortion and foreign policy.
The post USC Democrats, Republicans clash at Student Debate appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/usc-democrats-republicans-clash-at-student-debate/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
The event included prayers, songs and speakers from Jewish groups on campus.
The post USC Jewish community, allies rally to recognize one month since Oct. 7 Hamas attacks appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/09/jewish-community-recognizes-one-month-since-hamas-attack/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Occidental News (Occidental College Student Newspaper)
Robin Maxile se unió al Centro Comunitario Intercultural (ICC, pos sus siglas en ingles) en el verano del 2021, justo cuando Occidental comenzaba a recuperarse de la pandemia de COVID-19. Desde entonces, Maxile ha desempeñado el cargo de Directora Asociada de Equidad Racial y ha sido directora interina del ICC durante seis meses. Maxile dejará […]
The post La fundación de equidad racial de Robin Maxile ha sido un ‘verdadero regalo para nuestra comunidad’ appeared first on The Occidental.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Kings guard Malik Monk came to the rescue in an overtime win against the Blazers with De’Aaron Fox missing his fourth game due to injury.
https://www.fresnobee.com/sports/article281614028.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
The man accused of breaking into former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco home, bludgeoning her husband with a hammer and seeking to kidnap her goes on trial Thursday.
Opening statements are scheduled in the federal trial of David DePape, who prosecutors say assaulted then-82-year-old Paul Pelosi, sending shockwaves through the political world just days before last year’s midterm elections.
The attack in the early hours of Oct. 28, 2022, also highlighted how conspiracy theories and misinformation that spread online can fuel political violence.
DePape pleaded not guilty to attempted kidnapping of a federal official and assault on the immediate family member of a federal official. Paul Pelosi is expected to testify next week.
DePape posted rants on a blog and an online forum about aliens, communists, religious minorities and global elites. He questioned the results of the 2020 election and echoed the baseless, right-wing QAnon conspiracy theory that claims the U.S. government is run by a cabal of devil-worshipping pedophiles.
The websites were taken down shortly after his arrest.
A Canadian citizen, DePape moved to the United States more than 20 years ago after falling in love with Gypsy Taub, a Berkeley pro-nudity activist well-known in the Bay Area, his stepfather, Gene DePape said. In recent years, David DePape had been homeless and struggling with drug abuse and mental illness, Taub told local media.
Federal prosecutors say DePape smashed his shoulder through a glass panel on a door in the back of the Pelosis’ Pacific Heights mansion and confronted a sleeping Paul Pelosi, who was wearing boxer shorts and a pajama top.
“Where’s Nancy? Where’s Nancy?” DePape asked, standing over Paul Pelosi around 2 a.m. holding a hammer and zip ties, according to court records. Nancy Pelosi was in Washington and under the protection of her security detail, which does not extend to family members.
Paul Pelosi called 911 and two San Francisco Police officers showed up and witnessed DePape strike Paul Pelosi in the head with a hammer, knocking him unconscious, court records showed.
Nancy Pelosi’s husband of 60 years later underwent surgery to repair a skull fracture and injuries to his right arm and hands.
After his arrest, DePape, 43, allegedly told a San Francisco detective that he wanted to hold Nancy Pelosi hostage. He said that if she told him the truth, he would let her go and if she lied, he was going to “break her kneecaps” to show other members of Congress there were “consequences to actions,” according to prosecutors.
A backpack DePape was carrying had tape and a rope, in addition to zip ties, according to police.
The assault was captured on the officers’ body cameras. U.S. District Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley ruled last month that the jury will be allowed to see footage that shows Paul Pelosi in a pool of his own blood struggling to breathe and the police officers trying to stop the bleeding. Angela Chuang, one of DePape’s federal public defenders, had argued that the shocking footage would be prejudicial to her client.
Corley also ruled jurors can listen to portions of a 5-minute call DePape made in January to a television reporter in which he repeated conspiracy theories.
“Freedom and liberty isn’t dying, it’s being killed systematically and deliberately,” he said.
“The tree of liberty needs watering. He needs men of valor, patriots willing to put their own lives on the line to stand in opposition to tyranny,” he added.
Katherine Keneally, a senior researcher at the nonprofit Institute for Strategic Dialogue, said the attack is an example of increasing online hate, conspiracies and false narratives influencing political violence.
“This didn’t occur in a vacuum,” Keneally said.
Keneally said people who commit such conspiracy-fueled acts of violence often are struggling with mental health or other life crises, such as the death of a family member or a divorce.
“I can’t think of a single case where someone engaged in violent behavior where they were solely influenced by the conspiracy theory,” she said.
DePape, who lived in a garage in the Bay Area city of Richmond and had been doing odd carpentry jobs to support himself, allegedly told authorities he had other targets, including a women’s and queer studies professor, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, actor Tom Hanks and President Joe Biden’s son Hunter.
One of those targets is included in the defense’s short witness list, though their name has been redacted. The other possible witnesses are DePape, Nancy Pelosi’s chief of staff Daniel Bernal, extremism and antisemitism researcher Elizabeth Yates, and federal public defender Catherine Goulet.
The prosecution’s list of potential witnesses contains 15 names, including the surgeon who operated on Paul Pelosi, federal agents, San Francisco police officers and several first responders.
If convicted, DePape faces life in prison. He was also charged in state court with attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon, elder abuse, residential burglary and other felonies. He pleaded not guilty to those charges. A state trial has not been scheduled.
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
One of Pablo Picasso’s masterpieces, Woman with a Watch, was sold at auction Wednesday night for $139.3 million by Sotheby’s in New York, the second-highest price ever achieved for the artist.
In a jam-packed room at the venerable auction house, it only took a few minutes of telephone bidding for the 1932 painting depicting one of the Spanish artist’s companions and muses, the French painter Marie-Therese Walter, to be sold.
Femme a la montre had been valued at over $120 million before going on the block, according to Sotheby’s.
It was part of the house’s special sale this week of the collection of New York arts patron Emily Fisher Landau, who died this year at age 102.
Julian Dawes, Sotheby’s head of impressionist and modern art, called the Picasso canvas – which hung in Landau’s living room – “a masterpiece by every measure.”
“Painted in 1932 – Picasso’s ‘annus mirabilis’ – it is full of joyful, passionate abandon yet at the same time it is utterly considered and resolved,” he said.
Walter was regarded as Picasso’s “golden muse,” and features in another of his works going under the hammer on Thursday at Christie’s: Femme endormie, or Sleeping Woman, estimated to sell for $25 million-$35 million.
She also featured in Femme assise pres d’une fenetre (Marie-Therese), or Woman Sitting Near a Window, which was sold in 2021 for $103.4 million.
Walter met Picasso in Paris in 1927, when she was just 17 and the Spanish artist was still married to Russian-Ukrainian ballet dancer Olga Khokhlova. The couple had a daughter, who died last year.
Another Picasso from 1932 was sold for $106 million in 2010.
The record sale for one of his works was of The Women of Algiers (Version O), a 1955 oil painting which sold for $179.4 million.
When it went under the hammer at Christie’s New York in 2015, it was also the record for any work of art sold at auction.
It was dethroned in November 2017 by the sale of Salvator Mundi attributed to Leonardo da Vinci, which went for $450 million and holds the record to this day.
Hot market
Fifty years after his death in 1973 at age 91, Picasso remains one of the most influential artists of the modern world, often hailed as a dynamic and creative genius.
But following the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment and assault, his reputation has been tarnished by accusations he exerted a violent hold over the women who shared his life and inspired his art.
Sotheby’s has already netted $406 million in sales from Landau’s collection, which also includes works by Jasper Johns, Willem de Kooning, Mark Rothko and Andy Warhol.
Flags by the 93-year-old Johns sold for $41 million, while Securing the Last Letter (Boss) by painter and photographer Ed Ruscha sold for $39.4 million.
Auction houses are enjoying a healthy art and luxury goods market, driven by China and showing no signs of a slowdown, said Kelsey Reed Leonard, head of contemporary art sales at Sotheby’s.
Against a backdrop of wars in Ukraine and Gaza, as well as worldwide inflation, the two titans of the sector – Sotheby’s and Christie’s – will be moving a host of big-ticket lots in the autumn sales, though they may still have a hard time topping last year, when total sales hit a record $16 billion.
https://www.voanews.com/a/picasso-s-woman-with-a-watch-fetches-139m-at-auction-/7347910.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
A judge in Michigan is expected to hear arguments Thursday on whether Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson has the authority to keep Donald Trump’s name off state ballots for president.
Activists are suing Benson in the Michigan Court of Claims to force her to keep Trump’s name off ballots and to assess Trump’s constitutional qualifications to serve a second term as president.
Meanwhile, attorneys for the former president are demanding that Trump’s name be allowed on the 2024 Republican presidential primary ballot.
Arguments were scheduled to begin Thursday morning in Grand Rapids before Judge James Robert Redford.
Activists — in two separate suits — point to a section of the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment that prohibits a person from running for federal office if they have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the U.S. or given aid or comfort to those who have.
Liberal groups also have filed lawsuits in Colorado and Minnesota to bar Trump from the ballot, portraying him as the inciter of the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, which was intended to stop Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential election win.
The groups cite a rarely used constitutional prohibition against holding office for those who swore an oath to uphold the Constitution but then “engaged in insurrection” against it. The two-sentence clause in the 14th Amendment has been used only a handful of times since the years after the Civil War.
The Minnesota Supreme Court on Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit citing the provision. The court’s ruling said its decision applied only to the state’s primary.
Free Speech For People, a group representing petitioners before the Minnesota Supreme Court, also represents petitioners in one of the Michigan cases against Benson.
Trump is considered the leading candidate for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.
Benson already has said in a filing that Michigan’s Legislature does not give her the authority to determine whether a candidate for president may be disqualified for the state ballot under the 14th Amendment or to assess a candidate’s constitutional qualifications to serve as president.
It’s a “federal constitutional question of enormous consequence” whether Trump cannot appear as a presidential candidate on state ballots, Benson wrote. “Michigan courts have held that administrative agencies generally do not have the power to determine constitutional questions.”
However, she added that she will follow the direction of the court either way.
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Infosec bods have detailed an underground cybersecurity tool dubbed Predator AI that not only can be used to compromise poorly secured cloud services and web apps, but has an optional chat-bot assistant that only kinda works.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/predatorai_infostealer_chatgpt/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Guam Daily Post
A Port Authority of Guam police officer and three others were taken to the hospital after a three car crash in Piti.
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
Five Republicans hoping to be their party’s candidate in next year’s U.S. presidential election debated Wednesday night, expressing support for Israel in its war against Hamas, while clashing over China and Russia.
Not appearing on the debate stage in Miami was Republican front-runner Donald Trump, who is seeking to return to the White House after losing the 2020 election.
Trump has not appeared at any of the three Republican debates, and while holding his own rally nearby on Wednesday called the event with his competitors “unwatchable.”
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who appears a distant second place in opinion polls, said Trump owes it to those watching the debates to appear and “explain why he should get another chance” to be the party’s nominee.
Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie pointed to Trump’s multiple current and impending legal trials, saying, “Anybody who’s going to be spending the next year and a half of their life focusing on keeping themselves out of jail and courtrooms cannot lead this party.”
With Israel’s military response to an October attack by Hamas militants in its second month, former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley said Israel needs to “eliminate Hamas.”
“We need to be very clear-eyed to know there would be no Hamas without Iran, there would be no Hezbollah without Iran, there would not be the Houthis without Iran, and there wouldn’t be the Iranian militias in Syria and Iraq that are trying to hit our military men and women, if it hadn’t been for Iran,” Haley said.
Senator Tim Scott said he would tell Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, “not only do you have the responsibility and the right to wipe Hamas off the map, we will support you.”
Republican candidates will next debate on Dec. 6.
Voters will begin selecting the party’s presidential nominee Jan. 15 with the Iowa caucuses, and after the state-by-state nominating contests conclude, the Republican nominee will officially be named at the party’s convention in July.
Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Kickoff between Fresno State and San José State is at 7:35 p.m. PST Saturday.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Going into his junior season, lead guard has NBA caliber skills.
The post UC Santa Barbara Basketball Shines with Ajay Mitchell in Leading Role appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Trump still way ahead for president among California Republicans
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/california/article281601243.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
Five candidates seeking to halt Donald Trump’s march toward the 2024 Republican presidential nomination gathered in Miami on Wednesday for the party’s third debate while the former president held a separate campaign rally across town.
Here are some takeaways from the debate:
Laying blame
One night after a stinging series of election losses at the hands of Democrats, the candidates vented their frustrations on the debate stage.
“I’m sick of Republicans losing,” Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said.
DeSantis has long contrasted his successful reelection last year in Florida with Republican setbacks in the last few elections, including Trump’s loss in 2020. Earlier in the day, his campaign argued that backing Trump cost candidates seats in races such as the one for governor of Kentucky, where Republican Daniel Cameron lost to Democrat Andy Beshear.
Republicans on Wednesday were also smarting from the success of a ballot issue in Ohio that enshrined the right to an abortion in the state constitution, as well as the loss of state legislative control in Virginia.
Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy blamed Ronna McDaniel, the chair of the Republican National Committee, instead of Trump, for the party’s recent performance.
“We’ve become a party of losers,” he lamented. “We have to have accountability in our party.”
McDaniel was Trump’s hand-picked choice to lead the RNC in 2017, and the committee was a sponsor of Wednesday’s debate.
Ramaswamy comes out swinging
It was clear from the outset that Ramaswamy, whose candidacy has faded since the first debate, was determined to be a spoiler and throw elbows in every direction.
Ramaswamy, a businessman with no political experience, attacked former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and DeSantis right out of the gate.
In an exchange regarding the conflict in Israel, Ramaswamy warned that the two leading candidates on the stage could drag America into a bloody war in Europe, while also channeling speculation that DeSantis wears lifts inside his boots.
“Do you want Dick Cheney in 3-inch heels? Because you’ve got two of them on stage tonight,” he said in reference to Haley and DeSantis, while invoking the Republican former vice president who was known for his neoconservative views.
“They’re 5-inch heels, and I don’t wear them unless I can run in them,” Haley later shot back. “They are not a fashion statement, they are ammunition.”
Ramaswamy wasn’t finished going after Haley. During a discussion over banning the Chinese short video app TikTok, he mentioned that Haley’s daughter used the platform. “You might want to take care of your family first,” he said.
“Leave my daughter out of your voice,” Haley countered, adding under her breath, “You’re just scum.”
Given his lagging poll numbers, the Miami debate could end up being Ramaswamy’s final one. Haley won’t miss him.
Haley and DeSantis go head-to-head on China
All eyes were on Haley and DeSantis, who were widely expected to go after each other in a bid to establish themselves as the top challenger to Trump in the Republican nominating contest.
After circling each other for half the debate, they finally went on the attack over the other’s dealings with China.
Both said their opponent had cozied up to Chinese industry as governors — Haley in South Carolina and DeSantis in Florida. Both, unsurprisingly, disagreed, leading to a heated exchange.
While all candidates on the stage portray themselves as tough on China, Haley has taken pains for months to establish herself as the top China hawk in the field.
The DeSantis campaign, meanwhile, has tried to attack Haley on that issue, accusing her of welcoming a Chinese company into her state.
https://www.voanews.com/a/takeaways-from-the-third-2024-republican-presidential-debate-/7347878.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
The Biden administration has chosen a Maryland location for a new FBI headquarters, the General Services Administration confirmed Wednesday, as the suburban Washington location was selected over nearby Virginia following a sharp competition between the two states.
The site is planned for Greenbelt, about 20 kilometers northeast of Washington.
“GSA looks forward to building the FBI a state-of-the-art headquarters campus in Greenbelt to advance their critical mission for years to come,” Robin Carnahan, the GSA administrator, said. “Thank you to everyone at GSA, DOJ, FBI, Congress, and others who helped reach this important milestone after a comprehensive, multi-year effort.”
The GSA also noted that Greenbelt was determined to be the best site because it came at the lowest cost to taxpayers, provided the greatest transportation access to FBI employees and visitors, and gave the government the most certainty on a project delivery schedule.
Consideration for a new headquarters has been going on for more than a decade, and in recent months the FBI has expressed concern about the site selection process.
Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin of Maryland said the location in his state was ideal because of access to mass transit and because the cost to taxpayers would be significantly less there.
“We’re very happy about this location. We’ve got a lot more work to do,” Cardin said. The choice was first reported by The Washington Post.
In a joint statement, Maryland’s elected leaders applauded the decision and said their push to bring the FBI headquarters there was “never about politics” and the new facility would meet a “dire, longstanding need for a new consolidated headquarters.”
Democratic Maryland Gov. Wes Moore argued in recent months that building it there would be fast, save taxpayers $1 billion and meet equity goals raised by President Joe Biden, with a location in the majority-Black Prince George’s County.
Most of Maryland’s congressional delegation and the governor personally raised concerns to the GSA in March about the process, including extra weight abruptly given in 2022 to proximity to the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia.
News of the choice brought frustrated criticism from Virginia leaders.
Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia told reporters he had not been officially notified of the selection, but if true, “it would be evidence of gross political interference in an established GSA process that both states went through, and it would be frankly more reminiscent of the tactics from the last administration.”
In a joint statement with Sen. Tim Kaine, he said he was disappointed that the “clear case” for Virginia, home to the FBI Academy, was set aside.
Virginia leaders, including Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin, argued that along with the academy the state has also welcomed Amazon and other big companies in recent years.
In July, the GSA announced changes in criteria for choosing the new location, boosting two potential places in Maryland. The new criteria raised the weight given to cost and social equity concerns to 20% each and reduced proximity to the FBI Academy to 25%, down from 35%.
Plans to replace the FBI’s roughly five-decade-old J. Edgar Hoover Building, where nets surround the facility to protect pedestrians from falling debris, have been under discussion for 15 years. Momentum stalled at one point while Donald Trump was president, with discussion centering on rebuilding on the existing site in Washington.
Two other finalists were Springfield, Virginia, and Landover, Maryland. About 7,500 jobs are connected to the facility
https://www.voanews.com/a/biden-administration-picks-maryland-for-new-fbi-headquarters/7347879.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The LAist
After 118 days on the picket lines, the SAG-AFTRA strike ends at 12:01 a.m. Thursday.
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The LAist
The employees, one of whom was retired, took their own lives.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Heatmap News
Tonight, at approximately seven feet above sea level, the five leading Republican presidential candidates not named Trump assembled in a performing arts center in Miami to once again go through the motions of pretending this is a normal election cycle.
If you happened to be doing something else with your finite mortal hours on Wednesday evening, though, you didn’t miss much. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy made every effort to maintain his status as the group’s enfant terrible with obnoxious barbs that didn’t even spare the moderators; Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina managed to use a Bible verse to talk about the economy; and former Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey reminded the American people that, yes, he is still here.
The debate finally gained a bit of a pulse, however, during a brief rematch between Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley over DeSantis’ fracking record. During the previous debate in September (yes, Wednesday’s was the third Republican debate so far), Haley had blasted DeSantis for being “against fracking” and “against drilling.” DeSantis protested — although a fact check showed Haley kind of had a point, seeing as the governor signed an executive order telling his state officials to “take necessary actions to adamantly oppose” fracking and offshore drilling on his second day in office.
On Wednesday, Haley started in again. “It cracks me up that Ron continues to do this: He has opposed fracking, he’s opposed drilling,” she said. Then she went for the jugular: “He was praised by the Sierra Club,” she slammed. “You’re trying to make up for it and act like you weren’t a liberal when it comes to the environment — but you are, you always have been. Just own it if that’s the case, but don’t keep saying you’re something that you’re not.”
DeSantis protested the use of the E-word (not to mention the L-word) was unfair. “We are absolutely going to frack,” he insisted, though you could see a flicker of his old green moderateness when he added, “I don’t think it’s a good idea to drill in the Florida Everglades and I know most Floridians agree with me.” The end of his sentence was drowned out, however, by Haley saying loudly into her mic, “YOU BANNED FRACKING.”
As was the case the last time around, Haley and DeSantis’ back-and-forth just goes to show “the [Republican] Party’s utter confusion about how to handle environmental issues,” as Heatmap’s Robinson Meyer has written. On the one hand, the conversation around environmental protections and the green transition has advanced to the point that even the GOP debates can’t ignore climate change (or, at least not entirely); Trump himself will allow that hybrid cars are “pretty good” during his rants about electric vehicles. On the other hand, smearing DeSantis as a “liberal environmentalist” who allegedly hates fracking is still perceived to be damaging enough in a Republican primary that Haley used her limited minutes in front of the approximately 17 American viewers who tuned in on Wednesday night to try, once more, to get it to stick.
Only time will tell if such a barb can harm DeSantis (who, for his part, continually insists he welcomes barbs, as well as arrows, hits, and presumably other assorted forms of torment). Then again, the whole thing might be moot. In the next century, the waves of Biscayne Bay could very well be lapping at the stage where, once upon a time, five Republican presidential hopefuls had futilely name-called, hand-wrung, and heel-shamed. Time might tell — but who has time?
.
https://heatmap.news/sparks/nikki-haley-ron-desantis-fracking-environmentalist-gop-debate
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
A Santa Barbara judge finds enough evidence to proceed to trial, alleging that the two teenage victims were killed “for the benefit of a criminal street gang.”
The post Two Men Will Face Trial for January 2021 Double Murder on Santa Barbara’s Eastside appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“Donald Trump as the nominee would be a huge risk,” Florida’s governor said after the debate.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/politics-government/article280588874.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: 404 Media Group
The owner of the site took it offline as of Wednesday, and wrote a long message to users alluding to “attacks” against the site.
https://www.404media.co/omegle-shut-down-offline/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Jirka’s blog
Some time ago I decided to update RAM on my main machine - the Raptor Engineering Blackbird. This OpenPOWER workstation has “just” 4-core CPU (16 threads) which is still OK for most of tasks. But these 32 GB of RAM are not enough for some tasks. I occasionally need to generate some larger data sets and typical size is about 39 GB. This is OK but it means swapping to the disk. Not only swapping is not ideal for a SSD but it also greatly slows things down.
http://jirka.1-2-8.net/20231109-0440_Blackbird_RAM_update
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
Vivek Ramaswamy took a bellicose posture from the outset targeting the moderators and the chairwoman of the RNC at debate in Miami.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/politics-government/article281355703.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: Fresno Bee Stories
“Nobody’s talking about it. Everybody’s watching us,” said former President Donald Trump onstage in Hialeah.
https://www.fresnobee.com/news/politics-government/article280788510.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
Former U.S. President Donald Trump will stay on the Minnesota primary ballot after the state supreme court Wednesday dismissed a lawsuit seeking to end his candidacy under a rarely used constitutional provision that forbids those who “engaged in insurrection” from holding office.
The Minnesota Supreme Court declined to become the first in history to use Section 3 of the 14th Amendment to prevent someone from running for the presidency. The court dodged the central question of the lawsuit — does Trump’s role in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol disqualify him from the presidency — by ruling that state law allows parties to put whomever they want on the primary ballot.
“There is no state statute that prohibits a major political party from placing on the presidential nomination primary ballot, or sending delegates to the national convention supporting, a candidate who is ineligible to hold office,” Chief Justice Natalie Hudson ruled.
The court left open the possibility that plaintiffs could try again to knock Trump off the general election ballot in November. The Minnesota challenge was filed by the liberal group Free Speech For People, which said it will continue its campaign to end Trump’s presidential bid.
“We are disappointed by the court’s decision,” said the group’s legal director Ron Fein, who argued before the court at its Nov. 2 hearing on the case. “However, the Minnesota Supreme Court explicitly recognized that the question of Donald Trump’s disqualification for engaging in insurrection against the U.S. Constitution may be resolved at a later stage. The decision isn’t binding on any court outside Minnesota, and we continue our current and planned legal actions in other states to enforce Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment against Donald Trump.”
The ruling is the first from a series of lawsuits filed by Free Speech For People and a second liberal group that are seeking to use Section 3 to end the candidacy of the front-runner in the Republican presidential primary.
On his social media platform, Truth Social, Trump said: “Ridiculous 14th Amendment lawsuit just thrown out by Minnesota Supreme Court.” He added, “Congratulations to all who fought this HOAX!”
The provision at issue bars from office anyone who swore an oath to the Constitution and then “engaged in insurrection” against it. It was mainly used to prevent former confederates from taking over state and federal government positions after the Civil War.
The plaintiffs in the cases contend that Section 3 is simply another qualification for the presidency, just like the Constitution’s requirement that a president be at least 35 years old. They filed in Minnesota because the state has a quick process to challenge ballot qualifications, with the case heard directly by the state’s highest court.
Trump’s attorneys argued that Section 3 has no power without Congress laying out the criteria and procedures for applying it, that the Jan. 6 attack doesn’t meet the definition of insurrection and that the former president was simply using his free speech rights. They also argued that the clause doesn’t apply to the office of the presidency, which is not mentioned in the text.
Parallel cases are being heard in other states, including Colorado, where a state judge has scheduled closing arguments for next week.
Many legal experts expect the issue to eventually reach the U.S. Supreme Court, which has never ruled on Section 3.
Secretaries of state have generally said they don’t have the power to determine whether Trump should not be on the ballot and have sought guidance from courts.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
CARPINTERIA, CALIFORNIA, NOVEMBER 8, 2022 – Today, community leaders and elected officials celebrated the completion of the Santa Claus Lane
The post Santa Claus Lane Bikeway Complete, Public Celebration November 8 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Daily Trojan (USC Student Paper)
This week on the Soapbox, hosts Britney Zhou and Fabián Gutiérrez discuss the latest installment of Quynh Anh Nguyen’s Opinion column “I Reckon,” on the post-pandemic changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and the implications for card-holding students and citizens in general.
The post Digesting the changes to food stamps with Quynh Anh Nguyen appeared first on Daily Trojan.
https://dailytrojan.com/2023/11/08/digesting-the-changes-to-food-stamps-with-quynh-anh-nguyen/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Sundail (CSUN student paper)
57-year-old Angelita Quezada was killed by a Metrolink train yesterday morning. According to the Los Angeles Fire Department, the accident happened near Napa Street on 8615 Lindley Avenue. The area was experiencing light traffic a few hours after the incident occurred, according to google maps. There is a mix of residential homes and small businesses…
https://sundial.csun.edu/176860/news/brief-woman-struck-by-train-in-northridge/
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
GOLETA, CA, November 8, 2023 – Time is running out to apply to serve on the City of Goleta’s Historic Preservation Commission and the
The post Application Deadline Approaching for Two City Board / Commission Openings appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
Santa Barbara County Chapter – CANP Person of the Year announced Nurse Practitioners (NPs) are advanced practice registered nurses who
The post Celebrating Nurse Practitioner Week Nov 12-18, 2023 appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/08/celebrating-nurse-practitioner-week-nov-12-18-2023/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
India’s Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY) this week issued an advisory saying social media companies need to remove deepfakes from their platforms within 36 hours after they’re reported.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/india_deepfake_takedown/
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
The SAG-AFTRA actors’ union reached a tentative agreement with Hollywood studios to resolve the second of two strikes that rocked the entertainment industry as workers demanded higher pay in the streaming TV era, the union said Wednesday.
The 118-day strike will end officially just after midnight, SAG-AFTRA said in a statement. The group’s national board will consider the deal on Friday, and the union said it would release further details after that meeting.
Members of SAG-AFTRA walked off the job in mid-July asking for an increase in minimum salaries, a share of streaming service revenue and protection from being replaced by “digital replicas” generated by artificial intelligence (AI).
The union said negotiators had reached a preliminary deal on a new contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), which represents Walt Disney DIS.N, Netflix NFLX.O and other media companies.
An AMPTP representative did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The breakthrough means Hollywood can ramp up to full production for the first time since May, once union members vote to ratify the deal in the coming weeks.
“I’m relieved,” actor Fanny Grande said in an interview. “It’s been really difficult for most people in the industry, especially people of color. As it is, we don’t have as many opportunities. We aren’t big celebrities that have money in the bank for months. I just really hope that it’s a fair deal.”
Actors had similar concerns to film and television writers, who argued that compensation for working-class cast members had dwindled as streaming took hold, making it hard to earn a living wage in cities such as Los Angeles and New York. TV series on streaming did not offer the same residual payments that actors enjoyed during the heyday of broadcast TV.
Performers also became alarmed by recent advances in artificial intelligence, which they feared could lead to studios manipulating their likenesses without permission or replacing human actors with digital images.
George Clooney and other A-list stars voiced solidarity with lower-level actors and had urged union leadership, including SAG-AFTRA President and The Nanny actor Fran Drescher, to reach a resolution.
Many film and TV sets shut down when the Writers Guild of America (WGA) called a strike in the spring. While WGA members returned to writing scripts in late September, the ongoing SAG-AFTRA work stoppage left many productions dark.
The disruptions cost California more than $6 billion in lost output, according to a Milken Institute estimate.
With little work available, many prop masters, costume designers and other crew members struggled to make ends meet. FilmLA, the group that approves filming permits, reported scripted production during the week of Oct. 29 had fallen 77% from the same time a year earlier.
The Hollywood strikes came during a year of other high-profile job actions. The United Auto Workers recently ended six weeks of walkouts at Detroit carmakers. Teachers, nurses and healthcare workers also walked off the job.
Hollywood’s work stoppages forced broadcast networks to fill their fall lineups with re-runs, games shows and reality shows. It also led movie studios to delay big releases such as Dune: Part 2 because striking actors could not promote them.
Other major films, including the latest installment of the Mission: Impossible franchise and Disney’s live-action remake of animated classic Snow White, were postponed until 2025.
https://www.voanews.com/a/striking-actors-reach-tentative-deal-with-hollywood-studios-/7347828.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The return of the Santa Clarita International Film Festival’s opening night is right around the corner
https://scvnews.com/dec-7-santa-clarita-international-film-festival-returns/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
AI hypesters may think their training datasets and models’ output are, or ought to be protected, from copyright claims, but their neural networks could still fall foul of consumer protection laws, the FTC has has warned.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/ftc_ai_regulation/
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Finally Family Homes will host an Open House to showcase a tiny house that was built completely by foster youth and community volunteers on Nov. 18th
https://scvnews.com/nov-18-finally-family-homes-hosts-tiny-open-house-fundraiser/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Signal
A GoFundMe has been established for the funeral expenses of the 12-year-old boy who was found dead in Canyon Country on Monday. Medical examiners on Tuesday identified the boy as 12-year-old Willians Lemus Ayala, of Canyon Country. The GoFundMe, at the time of this publication, has a set goal of $25,000. A family member, who […]
The post <strong>GoFundMe started for funeral of slain 12-year-old boy</strong> appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/gofundme-started-for-funeral-of-slain-12-year-old-boy/
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Discover holiday magic at Light Up Main Street on Nov. 18, 2023, from 4 to 8 p.m
https://scvnews.com/nov-18-start-the-holidays-with-light-up-main-street/
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
Biden administration officials warned U.S. lawmakers Wednesday that a failure to pass the White House request for $61.4 billion in aid to Ukraine could result in a victory for Russia within a week. VOA Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more.
https://www.voanews.com/a/looming-shutdown-threatens-us-aid-to-ukraine/7347786.html
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The LAist
With a tentative agreement between SAG and the studios, we look at how four workers’ circumstances changed during the strikes and how they made ends meet
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
The Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit convenes this month against a backdrop of unprecedented global turmoil, observers say. APEC’s discussions during this mid-November event are non-binding but can lay the foundation in other forums for more concrete agreements. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee has more on the agenda and what’s at stake in this year’s APEC Economic Leaders’ Week.
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
ROTM A man in his 40s was crushed to death by a robot at a produce-sorting facility in South Korea Tuesday after the machine apparently mistook him for a box of vegetables.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/robot_kills_employee/
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
The National Weather Service has issued a Red Flag Warning for tomorrow, Thursday, Nov. 9, 2023, from 3 a.m. to 6 p.m
https://scvnews.com/weather-service-issues-red-flag-warning-increasing-wildfire-risk/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The LAist
Now that the actors union has announced a deal, Hollywood could soon be heading back to work as soon as 12:01 a.m. tomorrow.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
I vigorously oppose the ordinance allowing Parklets in the city Right of Way.
The post Open the Street appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/08/open-the-street-2/
date: 2023-11-09, from: OS News
A few weeks ago, we reported an odd discovery in Microsoft Edge: a poll asking users to explain their decision to download Chrome. A similar thing is now haunting OneDrive users on Windows, demanding to answer why they are closing the app. And demanding is a correct word here because Windows will not let you quit OneDrive without answering first. The beatings will continue until morale improves.
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
While I appreciated the thoughts in the Letters section of your November 2-9 edition, a couple of thoughts came to mind after reading “Unhinged Apologists.”
The post Inadvertent Killing? appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/08/inadvertent-killing/
date: 2023-11-09, from: OS News
I cannot pinpoint the source of this misconception, it could have been a vendor, or long-lost blog post, or one of the many webinars I attended in my early days as a program lead. Regardless of the source, I operated under the wild misconception that all I needed to do was train my teams to do accessibility. Developers, QAs, designers, all they needed was training! This model does not work. Especially for an organization with multiple products, multiple platforms, and multiple development teams. Accessibility is so much more complicated than can be summarised in a mere training. It requires experts, capable programmers, users who actually require said accessbility, and so much more. It’s also an ongoing process – it’s not a static “train once, use everywhere” kind of deal.
https://www.osnews.com/story/137779/accessibility-training-will-not-save-you/
date: 2023-11-09, from: OS News
A new update for Ubuntu Touch is here – adding Ubuntu 20.04 LTS support for new devices (the PinePhone, PinePhone Pro, PineTab and PineTab 2), and containing a whole slew of bug fixes and new features. It’s awesome to see the UBPorts team delivering a steady stream of updates, keeping the Ubuntu Touch platform alive and kicking.
https://www.osnews.com/story/137777/ubuntu-touch-ota-3-focal-released/
date: 2023-11-09, from: SCV New (TV Station)
Sen. Scott Wilk (R-Santa Clarita) is pleased to recognize Patsy Ayala for her years of outstanding contributions and service to the people of the Santa Clarita Valley
date: 2023-11-09, from: Santa Barbara Indenpent News
The Energy Innovation Act will spur the transition from fossil fuels to a clean energy future while protecting vulnerable American households, adding thousands of clean energy jobs, and growing the economy.
The post Climate Legislation that Could Save the Planet! appeared first on The Santa Barbara Independent.
https://www.independent.com/2023/11/08/climate-legislation-that-could-save-the-planet/
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
Former President Donald Trump, the front-runner for the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nomination, will be a no-show at the third candidates debate Wednesday night in Florida, opting instead to host an event nearby. But five other conservative presidential hopefuls will be looking for breakthroughs.
Wednesday’s debate will be broadcast live from the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts of Miami-Dade County from 8 to 10 p.m. Eastern time on NBC News and Rumble, a livestreaming platform.
Since the first Republican debate in Milwaukee more than two months ago, former Vice President Mike Pence has left the race and former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson and Governor Doug Burgum of North Dakota have been swept aside, having raised too little money to qualify for Wednesday night’s forum.
Those still in contention — and willing to show up to the debate — are Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, biotech businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and U.S. Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina.
Here’s what to know about the candidates’ positions on key issues that are likely to come up.
Foreign policy
There are two competing approaches to foreign policy to look for tonight: hawkish neoconservativism from Haley and isolationism — Trump’s brand of diplomacy that Ramaswamy and DeSantis seem to be mimicking.
Haley sees military aid to Israel and Ukraine as crucial to preserving Western interests abroad. Scott and Christie agree that helping Israel and Ukraine in their war efforts is crucial.
Ramaswamy, on the other hand, wants out of what he calls “no-win wars” and recently said the U.S.’s job is not “to be the global police.” To Ramaswamy, successful foreign policy means cutting off many U.S. allies from support.
DeSantis has similarly argued that helping Ukraine’s counteroffensive is not a priority, echoing Trump’s controversial “America first” stance.
Super political action committees for Haley and DeSantis have repeatedly aired campaign ads accusing each other of being too easy on China. Those ads leveled claims that fact-checkers have called into doubt, including that Haley allowed a Chinese corporation to “get dangerously close” to a U.S. Army base and another that “DeSantis voted to fast-track” Obama-era trade deals with China.
Expect Haley and DeSantis to defend themselves and spar over their views on China and more.
Abortion
Progressives made inroads in state-level elections Tuesday in winning back abortion rights, which the U.S. Supreme Court returned to the states’ purview when it struck down Roe v. Wade in June 2022. Some states have greatly restricted abortion rights since then.
The Republican candidates differ in their views on abortion.
Haley, DeSantis and Scott would sign a nationwide ban on abortions after 15 weeks. They haven’t said whether they would allow exceptions in instances of rape or incest or when a pregnancy could be fatal.
Ramaswamy and Christie, while both personally against abortions, have said that they would not support a federal ban, citing the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which some legal scholars say gives decision-making authority over abortion bans to the states.
Ramaswamy has advocated for six-week abortion bans at the state level but said he wouldn’t use executive authority to impose them.
Both Ramaswamy and Christie support exceptions in instances of rape or incest or when a pregnancy could be fatal.
As governor of Florida, DeSantis helped outlaw mifepristone, a hormone-blocking drug that is used in medication abortions. Haley has said the legality of mifepristone should be decided by elected officials at the state level.
Ramaswamy, Christie and Scott haven’t elaborated their positions on mifepristone.
Immigration
Ramaswamy, himself the child of immigrants, has perhaps the harshest policies on immigration. He has said that he would deport every undocumented immigrant and deploy the military at the southern U.S. border to halt any more mass crossings.
Haley has said she would make it more difficult for undocumented immigrants to find jobs and that immigration officials should carry out deportations.
DeSantis has said he would deport undocumented immigrants, particularly those who overstay their visas or are found guilty of crimes. In Florida, he clamped down on undocumented immigration.
Scott has supported bringing back Title 42, which forces out migrants without any legal proceedings, but hasn’t said whether he would deport undocumented immigrants.
Christie has supported mass deportations, and as governor of New Jersey he rejected a national program that helped immigrants find new beginnings in his state.
Haley, Scott and Christie are against breaking up families.
Ramaswamy, DeSantis and Haley are against birthright citizenship.
Trump
New polling from The New York Times and Siena College shows that Trump is beating President Joe Biden in five of six battleground states. Analysts say that should worry Trump’s party rivals, who all trail him by some distance.
But not all are so sure of Trump’s campaign.
Christie has made a name for himself among the Republican candidates as Trump’s harshest critic, claiming that Trump’s legal battles will make it harder to beat Biden as the primaries approach.
Haley has likewise called Trump’s trials “a distraction” from the larger goal of getting a Republican in the White House.
Haley blasted Trump for being too cozy with authoritarian leaders, in a recent meeting with the Republican Jewish Coalition, which is a co-sponsor of tonight’s debate. Trump has a record of praising dictators such as North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
DeSantis also has said that Trump “views everything from the lens of him,” referring to how Trump’s legal dramas may have clouded his message.
Scott recently said that Trump isn’t electable in 2024. “I don’t think he can win,” Scott said in late October. “You have to be able to win in Georgia. I don’t think he can win in Georgia.”
Of all the contenders, Ramaswamy has been the least critical of Trump.
As Haley and DeSantis vie for second place, expect them to make their cases for why Republican voters should want them over Trump.
Climate
DeSantis hasn’t said whether he thinks human activity is the main cause of climate change. Haley, Christie and Scott, however, have. Ramaswamy has said that human activity causing climate change is probable but has never expressed certainty.
Ramaswamy and Scott have publicly doubted that climate change is making natural disasters more lethal, with Ramaswamy having said at the first Republican debate that “the climate change agenda is a hoax.”
All the candidates who will take the stage at tonight’s debate have said that the market is better suited than the government to handle climate change.
DeSantis, Haley, Ramaswamy and Scott are opposed to rebate programs for drivers of clean-energy vehicles. Christie hasn’t given his position on tax credits yet.
If the impacts of climate change come up, expect Ramaswamy to be the most vocal denier as in previous debates.
Guns
All the candidates who will appear at tonight’s debate are against restricting access to firearms for those who might pose threats to themselves or others. They also oppose expanding background checks, except for Ramaswamy, who hasn’t yet made his opinions on that known.
Of all the topics that might come up tonight, what to do — or not to do — about gun violence will likely be among the least contentious for the candidates, who broadly see eye to eye on the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.
https://www.voanews.com/a/what-to-know-ahead-of-third-republican-presidential-debate-/7347749.html
date: 2023-11-09, from: VOA News USA
The giant pandas that lived at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo in Washington for 23 years returned to China on Wednesday. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias followed the farewell ceremonies and the politics and conservation strategies that could impact the species’ future. Camera: Elizabeth Lee
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Signal
News release It’s a return to Christmastown with Jack Skellington and Sally as the third annual Holiday Skate Show returns to The Cube on Saturday, Dec. 9. To commemorate the movie’s 30th anniversary, the show will be an adaptation of the Disney classic, “A Nightmare Before Christmas,” with two separate times at noon and […]
The post The Cube to present annual holiday ice show appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/the-cube-to-present-annual-holiday-ice-show/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Signal
The Circus Caballero is back at Westfield Valencia Town Center from Nov. 9 to Nov. 19. and will feature stunts, acrobatics, tightrope walking and more. For more information visit circocaballero.com.
The post Photos: Circus Caballero is back appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/photos-circus-caballero-is-back/
date: 2023-11-09, updated: 2023-11-09, from: The Register (UK I.T. News)
Eight gigabytes has been the standard RAM load out on new MacBook Pros for the better part of a decade, and in 2023, Apple execs still believe it’s enough for customers.…
https://go.theregister.com/feed/www.theregister.com/2023/11/09/apple_exec_defends_8gb/
date: 2023-11-09, from: The Signal
A 35-year-old Canyon Country man is being charged with one count of robbery after being accused of brandishing a black metal “Glock 19” model BB gun at a fast-food restaurant and demanding a free hash brown, according to court records obtained by The Signal. The suspect purchased breakfast at the McDonald’s on the corner of […]
The post DA files charge in hash brown robbery appeared first on Santa Clarita Valley Signal.
https://signalscv.com/2023/11/da-files-charge-in-hash-brown-robbery/