Little Boy and Castle Bravo

Here is a sobering thought.  The bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima was code-named "Little Boy."  It destroyed most of the city.   In the 1950's the U.S. tested a "nuclear device" code-named Castle Bravo.  It was approximately 1000 times more powerful than Little Boy.  Imagine a bomb like that dropped on New York City or the Bay Area.  The USSR in the early 60's tested bombs even more powerful.

Compare humans to dinosaurs.  People think dinosaurs were stupid.  They didn't adapt.  Their brains were small compared to their bodies.  Yet they flourished for about 175 million years.  Lucy of Africa, a human ancestor, lived a little over 3 million years ago.  Humans switched from being hunter-gatherers to agricultural producers only about 12,000 years ago.  In just 12,000 years we have managed to screw up the planet.  Do you think we will last as long as the dinosaurs?  Will we last even a thousand years from now?  

Don't take your guns to town

This afternoon I caught some of the old movie “Tombstone” on TV–the one starring Sam Elliot and Val Kilmer.  The town had just put up a poster telling all the cowboys and desperados that they had to turn in their guns while they were in town.  I thought how amazing that was.  Tombstone could do that, but we can’t.

Of course, a long investigative piece in today’s Times helps to explain why.  Members of Congress were serving on the NRA board of directors and raking in thousands in campaign contributions, in the meantime derailing legislation the NRA didn’t want and actually helping to change the whole culture on guns.  

Will people be shocked by that expose?  Will the NRA lose clout?  No, Americans will simply go on killing each other.  It’s what we do.  It’s what Congress does.

Very brief "Barbie" review

If you have not seen “Barbie” yet, please do.  I loved this movie.  The first two minutes and the last 30 seconds are alone worth the ticket price.  “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” are the type of movies that film students will be writing dissertations about.  The fact that they were released at the same time is evidence that streaming shows on Netflix and Hulu have a long way to go before they replace Hollywood.

Counting bats

First, if you read last night's post, here is an update.  I visited my optometrist this morning; I have a scratch on my eyeball, but I am now putting antibiotic drops in my eye four times a day.  Everything should be fine.

Now, bat count.  Every year I count our bats for the Pennsylvania State Game Commission.  At one point at the height of the "white nose syndrome disease," we had fewer than ten.   Since then the population is  slowly increasing.  You're supposed to count three times; so far I've done two counts.  First night, 50, 2nd night 45.  I don't know why the discrepancy.  Most of them live in a bat house we put up for them on the east side of our shed, but at least a few are coming out of the eaves from the shed itself. 

The species is little brown bats, and I am so glad they are making a comeback.

Not seeing too well

We were scheduled to have a program underneath our trees for twenty-five or thirty people tonight.  Some branches from the crab apple tree were rather low, so I went out this afternooon with a lopper to cut some off.  Unfortunately I managed to stick one under my glasses and into my eye.  My eye has been watering ever since, and I can’t see too well, and it’s my “good eye” and I can’t post anything reallyy coherent.  I’m sure after a night’s sleep it will be back to normal tomorrow.  Att least I hope so.

Time for Rep. Heffley to act

In 2014 a group of plaintiffs sued to equalize funding in Pennsylvania schools.  The plaintiffs were six school districts, (including Panther Valley in Carbon County), the NAACP, and the PA Association of Rural and Small Schools).  They said the unequal funding now in place violated the State Constitution.  In February of this year they finally won their case.

The Republicans in the legislature, friends of the wealthier school districts and charter schools, opposed the ruling.  They had until this week to file an appeal.  They didn’t, so the decision stands.  The state legislature is obligated to come up with a funding mechanism to equalize spending.  

So far, nothing.  State Representative Doyle Heffley, who represents Nesquehoning, Lansford, and Summit Hill, all in the Panther Valley School district, has introduced no bills.  He should be a leader on this issue.  And it is time for parents and residents and students of the Panther Valley School district to make some noise.

"Barbie" v. DeSantis

“Barbie” took in $162 million on its opening weekend.  DeSantis, who is laying off campaign staff this week, is having trouble raising funds.  He’s raised no where near that amount.  How humiliating it must be to get your ass kicked by a little doll.  I’ll be adding my contribution to Barbie’s total next weekend.  First a mouse, now a doll.  

Spain's new theme park

Spain’s new theme park, now open in Toledo, omits all the nasty bits of Spanish history.  The historical drama of Spain’s colonization of the New World says nothing about the bloody conquests of the indigenous people.  Queen Isabella is heroic, but her expulsion of the Jews and Muslims is not mentioned.  The Spanish Civil War gets one minute out of the 75-minute historical production.  The 40-year dictatorship of Franco is never mentioned.  

Members of the far right Vox party love the park.  On leaving the park one member proclaimed, “The true history.”

See Constant Méheut, “Theme Park in Spain Runs On Selective History.  It’s All the Rage,” New York Times, (July 21, 2023), p,. A6.

Texas A&M jokes

Students at Texas A&M are called “Aggies,” and pretty much every Texan knows some Aggie jokes.

How many Aggie freshmen does it take to change a light bulb?  They don’t–that’s a sophomore class.

Did you hear about the Aggie Olympian?  He was so proud of his gold medal that he had it bronzed.

1st Aggie:  How do you spell Mississippi?  2nd Aggie:  The river or the state?

And here is another.  Dr. Kathleen McElroy, a former reporter for the New York Times and a woman with an exemplary academic career, was initially offered a five-year contract at Texas A&M.  The offer was rescinded.  She has written opinion pieces on diversity, and Gov. Abbot recently signed a bill that will ban offices and programs at publicly funded colleges whose purpose is to promote “diversity, equity and inclusion.”

The dean of A&M’s College of Arts and Sciences told Dr. McElroy why she wasn’t hired.  He said, “You’re a Black woman who was at the New York Times and, to these folks, that’s like working for Pravda.”

Oppenheimer

The film could have been better edited–I would have been looking at my watch near the end if I wore a watch.  The sex scenes were unnecessary and distracting, especially the one at the hearing.  Perhaps we could have had a bit more background on some of the scientists who worked on the bomb.  Maybe the relationship between the group at Chicago and the group at Los Alamos could have been made more clear.

The film shows the urgency of the effort to build the bomb before the Germans.  (I’ve heard people wonder if we would have used the bomb on the Germans.  You better believe we would have.)

The film makes clear how stupid Hitler was in driving out scientists and theorists who were Jewish.  It helps us understand why a demonstration bomb wasn’t dropped and why the bombing of Japan was felt to be necessary and why Kyoto was spared and why Americans at the time, especially soldiers and their families, were so happy when the bombs were used.  It gets across the paranoia of the Red Scare and the cruelties that resulted.  My quibbles aside, it is an excellent film with an excellent lead actor.

Tomorrow we see “Barbie.”

In Florida "Gone with the Wind" is a documentary

Under the new guidelines for Florida teachers on how to teach about slavery, students are told that slavery taught the slaves many skills that they could use in their own lives.  You know, sort of like a vo-tech school.

The No Labels Party

Wow.  There’s a concept.  Joe Manchin is thinking about running for President in a “No Labels” party.  I have a number of labels for Manchin, none of which are suitable for posting.

The whole idea is stupid.  Labels aren’t the problem with American politics.  People like Trump and Kevin McCarthy and John Roberts and his Supreme Court crew are the problem.  Running for office on a platform of not being a Democrat or a Republican solves nothing.  

Is Israel a racist state?

Representative Pramila Jayapal (D, Washington) said a few days ago that Israel was a “racist state.”  She was speaking in Chicago when pro-Palestinian demonstrators interrupted a panel she was on.  She immediately got a lot of flak from Democrats, and she said that she erred:  that Israel as a state was not racist.

Was she wrong?  

Israel’s Declaration of Independence says that Israel will “uphold the full social and political equality of all its citizens, without distinction of race, creed or sex.”  Does anyone believe that Israel does that?  Does Netanyahu believe that?  In 2019 he wrote, “According to the basic nationality law we passed, Israel is the nation state of the Jewish people-and only it.”  Israel may not be a racist state, but its current government is definitely racist.  And it was elected by the Israeli electorate. 

The Anthropocene Era

It’s official.  The Anthropocene Epoch has replaced the Holocene Era, which began about 11,700 years ago and contained the climate and conditions which allowed complex human civilizations to form.

The Anthropocene Era is one which humans themselves have changed the planet.  Since 2009 an Anthropocene Working Group has been discussing when and how the earth has changed and who or what is responsible for the change.  The group has agreed that the new epoch began in the mid-20th century, when globalization, industrialization, and energy consumption began accelerating.  That is, in other words, my lifetime.  

This summer’s changes in climate seem to show that human effects are accelerating.  This is both amazing and frightening.  

When we have swallow nests on our porch, the parents put their butts over the edge and crap outside the nest.  Evidently swallows are smarter than humans.  

For the full story on the labeling, see Raymond Zhong, “Is This the Epoch of Man?  Evidence Is at the Bottom of a Canadian Lake,” New York Times, (July 12, 2023), p. A9. 

Farmers Insurance in Florida

Farmers Insurance has announced that it will be cutting back on home insurance in Florida.  It can no longer afford the payouts resulting from weather events related to climate change.  

A spokesman for the company said he believed that insurers should be allowed to charge whatever they want for policies in disaster-prone areas.  Eventually people would stop building in those areas.  That, of course, would include almost all of Florida. 

Kutztown, PA

Kutztown may be the perfect small town.  It has two Mexican restaurants, La Concina Mexicana and Cielito Lindo.  I’ve dined a number of times at  La Cocina Mexicana, and it is outstanding.  I’ve yet to try Cielito Lindo.  Kutztown has two book stores, one on campus and Firefly Bookstore on the main street.  Again, I’ve only been to Firefly, and it is a great small bookstore.  Kutztown has a farmers’ market just outside of town that sells Pennsylvania Dutch baked goods and fresh fruits and vegetables.  The town is home to Kutztown State.  The town has nice bars.  Maybe that’s redundant; I already mentioned it has a college.  I really like that town. 

Defend or Defund Ukraine

Remember when Republicans supported a strong defense and stood ready to help countries that opposed Russia.  Those days are long gone.

The Far Right in the House of Representative is proposing to defund aid to Ukraine.  Both DeSantis and Trump say they would limit assistance to Ukraine.  While 70 percent of Republicans want Ukraine to win (and what do the other 30% want?), only half support sending military aid.

Last year 57 House Republicans voted against a measure to provide $40 billion in military and humanitarian assistance for Ukraine.  We call those Republicans “surrender monkeys.”

See Karoun Demirjian, “Far-Right Republicans Seek to Defund Ukraine,” New York Times, (July 13, 2023), p. A1, A15.

Little Dancer Aged Fourteen

Recently two so-called “climate activists” glued the hands of one of them to the protractive glass covering a Monet painting of Giverny and also smeared it with red paint.  They were protesting the lack of action on climate change.  In April at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, two “eco-activists” painted trees and faces onto the plinth of the Degas sculpture “Little Dancer Aged Fourteen.”  They used red and black paint to symbolize blood and oil.

Do you know why these jerks are picking on art?  Because it is a soft target.  If they really wanted to protest, why not blow up an oil refinery or a nuclear power plant?  Oh, wait.  That would land you in jail, or get you shot.        So much easier to go into a museum and pretend you are doing something meaningful. 

Should Ukraine be welcomed into NATO

Short answer–not at this time.  NATO is a “collective security” organization.  If any one member is attacked, all the other members are obligated to come to that member’s aid.  The countries in NATO are reasonably aligned with one another and most would, no doubt, defend a victim of aggression.  (I have my doubts about Turkey and the U.S. if Trump wins a second term.)

The problem is that Ukraine is already at war.  Were Ukraine made a member, NATO members would be called upon to join in a war against Russia.  I don’t think many of them, including the U.S., are prepared to take that step.  

That doesn’t mean that NATO members can’t aid Ukraine, and they have been.  Covert aid, or even overt aid, however, is much different than a declaration of war.

Transgender legislation

I don’t know very much about medical policy toward transgender kids.  I’ve read only one book on the subject.  Before I read that book (“Becoming Nicole”) I thought that any medical treatment should wait until after the kid went through puberty.  According to doctors who were featured in the book, however, it is very important to start hormone treatment before puberty.  

I’ll admit that I really am no expert on this subject.  AND NEITHER ARE THE JERKS IN STATE LEGISLATURES WHO ARE PASSING LAWS MANDATING OR FORBIDDING CERTAIN MEDICAL INTERVENTIONS.  Let’s allow individual families, individual trans kids, and individual medical personnel make these decisions, not some yahoo trying to make political hay out of wrecking someone’s life who is already going through a difficult time.

By the way, the same thing goes for decisions on abortions.

A median age of 38.9

Last year the median age of the U.S. reached a record high of 38.9.  In 2000 the median age was 35, and in 1980 only 30.  This is the result largely of low birthrates.  People are delaying marriage and having fewer children. 

To me this is great news.  Fewer people means less resources being used.  Of course, it also means that people may have to work longer, and it will be more difficult to fund social security and pensions.  Nonetheless, those problems can be overcome.  What can’t be overcome is the destruction of the planet overrun by billions and billions of people.

Stanford and San José State

About 20 miles up the freeway from San José State is Stanford.  Stanford is an elite college teaching children of the elite.  A majority of Black and Hispanic college students attend colleges that accept over 80% of their applicants; San José State is one of those.  Stanford accepts about 1% of its applicants.  

San José State didn’t need an affirmative action program.  The student body is amazing diverse.  The backgrounds of my students included Indians, Filipinos, Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Koreans, and Pacific Islanders.  That was just the Asians, and I may have missed some.  I don’t know who Stanford accepts, but probably not many Mexican farmworkers’ kids.  I had a number of those in my classes, possibly some who were here without papers.  (I never asked.)

If the government is really concerned with diversity and with educating a broad swath of America, pump some funding into the state schools like SJSU.  They are doing their job.  

See Richard Arum and Mitchell L. Stevens, “Affirmative Action Didn’t Go Far Enough,” New York Times, (July 8, 2023), p.A. 15.  If you check the graphic accompanying the article, San José State is at the 80% line, along with such schools as U. of Iowa, Arizona State, Michigan State, and Indiana U.  While Penn State only accepts 50% of its applicants, I don’t think that includes the branch campuses.  

Hottest day

That was yesterday.  It may not have been the hottest day ever, since for most of the earth’s history we didn’t have thermometers available.  What we do know is that it was the hottest day world-wide since we have been measuring temperatures.

It seems to me that the people of the earth should be more concerned about this.  Am I missing something?

Free speech and on-line lies

Personally I am not upset by the recent court ruling that the government isn’t supposed to contact media companies to correct misinformation.  If people read on Facebook that horse worming medicine provides a cure for Covid and they believe it, let them take the horse worming medicine.  

There is just too much misinformation to correct.  The government has more important things to do than try to overcome stupidity.

Incidentally, I recently read on Twitter that if you block the barrel of an assault rifle with thick mud, it will still fire.  Really, it will.  Try it.

Planes flew faster in 1986?

According to a column by Pamela Paul of the New York Times, in 1986 the estimated flying time for an American Airlines flight between Kennedy Airport and the Los Angeles Airport was about five hours and 30 minutes. 

Today the flying time for the same flight is estimated to be six hours and 23 minutes.  

In 1987 the Department of Transportation began to require on-time arrival statistics which are now posted on-line.  By doing what is called “schedule padding,” the airline can appear to be on-time more than its rivals.  The pilot can also announce, “Looks like we’ll be arriving early, folks.”

The Declaration of Independence

On July 4 newspapers often reprint the Declaration of Independence.  I wonder how many people read it.  I wonder if they catch the clause where Jefferson criticizes the British government for not allowing the colonists to take land from the Indians.  

I am pleased that at least he took out the clause he had thought about putting in the document that the British forced slavery on the colonies.  That would have been a bit too much. 

The submarine and the migrant ship

When the sub that descended to examine the Titanic lost contact, I was in California visiting my in-laws.  The cable news channel they were watching (CNN or MSNBC–to me they are interchangeable) broadcast almost non-stop coverage of the rescue attempts and the background of the dive.

Admittedly I might have missed something, but I didn’t learn about the more than 600 migrants who had drowned off the coast of Greece until I returned home.  Perhaps they weren’t important.

Chris Christie

In the slew of candidates running for the Republican nomination for President, only one seems to grasp the fact that you must take down Trump, and that is Chris Christie.  Occasionally Nikki Haley will lightly criticize something Trump did, but she holds back.  DeSantis seems to be afraid of Trump, spending more time attacking Mickey Mouse than Donald.  That won’t work.  A Trump opponent needs to get inside his head, drive him bananas, goad him.

There is no one suited to that task better than a wiseass Jersey guy.  Go Christie.  Stick it to him.