MicroB

Don't think Fox has that much choice of the official portait. Police Mugshot is now framed in the Whitehouse

Same as over use of the terms "Leftist", "Socialist", "Communist", "Far Right" "Hard Right", "Marxist". "Liberal". Too many isms lose impact. Its possible that the US President does not possess any sort of political ideology; he flip flops continuously. He might fit various definitions of being a fascist, but might not actually subscribe to the ideology. At least John Kelly attempted to define the term when ascribing it to the man. Kelly described a fascist as: That's a man who paid attention when attending the National War College. An expert of the ideology agreed that the President is unlikely to be sophisticated enough to be a fascist: https://www.vice.com/en/article/we-asked-a-fascism-expert-if-donald-trump-is-a-fascist-124/ Some argue that while fascism and popuism do share many features, fascism is a form of dictatorship while populism functions within the boundaries of democracy. But populism can turn into something that more definitively fascism. Some observers believe he moved closer to fascism after January 2020, showing increasing distaste for the levers of democracy. Others are less convinced. seeing how he equally praises communist and fascist dictators. inviting the suggestion that whatever 'ism he holds, it might be new and unique. First time around, he was enjoined in cabinet by individuals generally holding high reputation; they likely agreed with his objectives but disagreed with the method, and hence were dubbed the "Adults in the Room". That all fell apart when he pushed back against people who didn't share his methodologies. Second time around, the people he has surrounded himself with like his methodologies, but not his objectives, because ultimately, besides the banal MAGA slogan, which is amibguous and really doesn't mean anything, he doesn't really have any objectives. So they are taking advantage of his methodologies to further their objectives (the heritage 2025 mob). These objectives are not conservative in nature. They are revolutionary. This whole nonsense about a "reset" is quite close to Pol Pot's Year Zero in some ways (arguably, Pol Pot was never a Maoist; his methods genuinely horrified the Chinese). They seem content to destroy parts of American society in order to further their oobjectivs of a reset. I'm not sure the 47th President is wholly convinced, hence his recent turn arounds. Who does he identify with in American society? he doesn't identify with the farmer; he has zero experience of farming culture. He was brought up entirely in a city, and like most city dwellers, scarcely thinks about where his food comes from. He doesn't identify with the working class man, because he's never been there, being born with a silver spoon. Sure, he knows what to say, because that's acting, and it helps the ratings to create a persona. And you know, given all the cameos, from those early appearances on The Jeffersons and The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, he's received acting coaching. What you see is not the real man, but a pastiche perfected on The Apprentice. He might admire, from a distance, the Tech Bros, but probably doesn't understand a thing they say but wishes he could. He identifies with business. He is probably wuite well acquainted with the realities of a supply chain, understanding why his MAGA hats, ties, and sneakers came from China. He knows full well the watches weren't American made, but were Chinese. When a business person goes on TV and explains reshoring is all very well, but he doesn't have the $400k for tooling for the CMO that might or might not exist, and the tooling has to come from overseas anyhow, and even if he had all that, its takes 3-6 months to set up, and by then, the business has gone; the American leader likely understands that, and may even identify with it (or comes close to identifying with it) He doesn't believe in the rule of law, because from his perspective, the law have been an embuggerance in business. Its not a disagreement born of revolutionary zeal, but basically ignorance. Those controlling him do understand it, which is evidenced by the numerous, on the fsce of it, small things happening. Where it all falls apart for them is Him; hs love of Ratings, or being liked. Plus he can fire them. And he will, like last time, ultimately doing a half arsed job.

Big discount I expect. These planes were fitted out to have a business class cabin. There are still a lot of reworks required to configure it for the next customer. These aircraft were finished in the Chinese Completion Center so now Boeing needs to find a slot in their completion center to fit it in for the rework. It means its still a delay delivery and an impact to their check book. $7bn worth of planes; offer them $3.5bn, no questions asked, see what they say. Probably just as well.

The scowl is not a good look.

Yum Yum https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/ecoli-bacteria-lettuce-outbreak-rcna200236 https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2025/04/usda-pulls-back-from-declaring-it-illegal-to-sell-salmonella-contaminated-poultry/ Still, at least there is no Red Dye 40.

The bomb explosion today isn't though.

Well, Stalin did use body doubles, and there has been some speculation about the changing appearance of Putin around whether he employs doubles. It recalls that scene in the superb and acerbic "The Death of Stalin".

Ah, he's trying to appeal to Mum's Net.

No I don't remember it. But, there are about 40-50 murders a year in that city. But when you mentioned remembering a particular murder, the one that springs to mind is the 2017 sniper massacre. Nearly 8 years on, no one knows why Paddock did what he did.

Interesting move from Beijing; considering suspending tariffs on certain US goods, such as medical devices (WTO for years have been pushing for elimination of tariffs on humanitarian goods). Markets has risen in the mere expectation. China is asking companies to identify which goods woud qualify. China is looking for tariff free trade. That's not what the American leader wants, because he's told everyone tariffs are permanent, tariffs will pay off national debt and tariffs will replace taxation.

Generally the reason why companies "lay people off" is improve EBITDA; shore up share price, and meet earnings projections. People are also laid off following M&A; duplicated roles. Not comparable to undustry. The reasons are different. Britain went through this in 2010, with the Bonfire of the Quangos. It didn't work then. Labour is planning to repeat this. It won't work now (by working, achieving more efficient public services). For nstance, Labour is planning to abolish NHS England. NHS England is a Quango. Someone very good at charts presented a convincing reason why NHS England had to be created to deliver better healthcare. And someone with very good charts will present good reasons why it needs to go. Government efficiency drives usually result in the government having pay hefty upfront costs of consultants to tell you how to achieve efficiencies, then they bugger off. What often happens is that the normal functions of government, performed by salaried civil servants on modest salaries, say £40,000 PA, end up getting outsource fo contractors on £120,000 a year. Seen it happen with the MOD, utter disaster. And whats worse, you end up employing the same people you let go on triple the rate, but now they only bother showing up 2 days a week, the rest of the time, taking lovely holidays, or hobbies. Literally, the daily rate of a MOD contractor is £1000-1500 a day.

Early in my career my PhD concerned James Lovelock's CLAW hypothesis. James Lovelock was possibly the greatest British scientist since Sir Isaac Newton. its an hypothesis that has never entirely gone away, but has been modified. James Lovelock's observation of over 50 years ago that the Earth is a living planet is correct. The conditions we enjoy are down to Life on Earth. Take life away, and the planet changes massively. Where life influences our environment is through the mineral cycles; carbon, sulfur, phosphorous, nitrogen and so forth. Without life, everything oxidizes. Lovelock died a few years ago, aged 101. His final thoughts concerned the coming Novacene. He thought humans, as the dominant life form, have only 20-50 years left. He was quite amused by the prospect, because he knew he wouldn't be around to see it. AI would become the dominat life form, which could be genocidal, human skull crushing Terminators, or more likely, an AI rather keen on maintaining humans, like we maintain flowers in a garden. Because we will serve a purpose, in that our (lfe) contribution is providing a environment that coincidently is also pretty good for electronics. Later, I would come to know James Martin, an American oceanographer, equally brilliant and visionary, but his life was cut short by a heart attack. Its really down to him that we are even considerng climate engineering as something to try. Building on Lovelock's work, he was interested in what was going on in the Antartic Ocean during then summer. For a short period, the Weddell Sea, in terms of fisheries, becomes the most productive sea on Earth, an utter feeding frenzy for the Antartic Cod. Fishermen know this, and make a lot of money. What was causing it was the summer melt of the ice shelf releasing micronutrients which kicked started the algae, then the phytoplankton, all the way up the food chain to fish and us. But the sea is full of nutrients already. What is it short of? its short of Iron. If Iron can be added, algal blooms can be stimulated, leading to uptake of CO2, release of DMS, and following the CAW hypothesis, a sulfulr-mediated cooling effect. He died before they could try some practical oceanographic experiments. During the main bit of my researhc, which was all about bacterial activity as part of this feedback loop, I spent quite a bit of time bobbing around the North Sea in Hurricane strength winds, trying to work out how organic volatiles, like DMS, partition to atmosphere in a hurricane; interesting stuff being in a 50m boat, in a 20-50m swell, and trying to keep to a geostationary position. They managed to demonstrate Martin's Geritol effect in an Anglo-American expedition off the Galapogas; literally dump iron into the ocean, and measure the subsequent impact on atmospheric CO2. its a real effect. Enough to be used to enginer the environment? That's another matter, but a great deal of understanding was developed to understand how life affects the climate. I subsequently left the field to work in bioological threat agent work. Its an area of study I greatly miss.

It shouuld be a similar situation to Northern Cyprus; no one recognises this except for Turkey. Interestingly, Russia refuses to recognise Northern Cyprus as well. In the context of comparing the negotiations to a game of cards, Ukrainian recognition of the status the de facto status of Crimea is a bargaining chip. Without international recognition, businesses in Crimea will find it challenging to secure outside investment. Crimea is considered to have the best beaches in the region, and before the conflict, it was being reinvigorated as a resort. Before he became an exiled Youtuber in Uzbekistan, "Inside Russia" used to post harmless videos about life in Russia, including a familiy vacation in occupied Crimea

I was interested in the seating of the Protestant Royals. With the death of the Pope, until the next Pope is selected, King Charles III occupies a unique position as the only European Head of State who is also head of a church. However, that seems to not matter to those in charge of Vatican protocol. I am sure His Majesty is not put out by that. It is your (false) presumption that anything in this story is "the most important thing" to me. Its News, and this is a News section. The Conservative Party supporting Daily Telegraph goes on to state: And, indeed, it is possible to validate that claim from a report issued by GB News: https://www.gbnews.com/news/donald-trump-mocks-joe-biden-over-queen-elizabeth-iis-funeral-seating-they-wouldnt-have-sat-me-back-there/368999 And multiple other sources, if you doubt the veracity of this reportage. If you remember Beatlemania, I guess you are approaching your 80s, or have surpassed that milestone.

Good analysis of the collapse of VTB.