By Lambert Strether of Corrente.
Bird Song of the Day
Northern Mockingbird, Cape Island – Crewe House, Cape May, New Jersey, United States. “Night-singing from a single perch in the neighbor’s hedge at night; I walked right up and recorded it from just a few meters away.” Lots of variety!
“Bird brain from the age of dinosaurs reveals roots of avian intelligence” (press release) [University of Cambridge]. “Researchers have identified a remarkably well-preserved fossil bird, roughly the size of a starling, from the Mesozoic Era. The complete skull has been preserved almost intact: a rarity for any fossil bird, but particularly for one so ancient, making this one of the most significant finds of its kind. The extraordinary three-dimensional preservation of the skull allowed the researchers, led by the University of Cambridge and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, to digitally reconstruct the brain of the bird… Navaornis had a larger cerebrum than Archaeopteryx, suggesting it had more advanced cognitive capabilities than the earliest bird-like dinosaurs. However, most areas of its brain, like the cerebellum, were less developed, suggesting that it hadn’t yet evolved the complex flight control mechanisms of modern birds… ‘Modern birds have some of the most advanced cognitive capabilities in the animal kingdom, comparable only with mammals,’ said Professor Daniel Field from Cambridge’s Department of Earth Sciences, senior author of the research. ‘But scientists have struggled to understand how and when the unique brains and remarkable intelligence of birds evolved—the field has been awaiting the discovery of a fossil exactly like this one.’” • Neat! (The original from Nature, which I cannot translate into English.)
In Case You Might Miss…
- About those camps…
- Blame Cannons: Biden staffers, Fetterman unload.
- Boeing’s management challenges., layoffs.
Politics
“So many of the social reactions that strike us as psychological are in fact a rational management of symbolic capital.” –Pierre Bourdieu, Classification Struggles
Trump Transition
“House Probe Into Matt Gaetz Relies On Witnesses DOJ Found Lacked Credibility” [Mollie Hemingway, The Federalist]. The deck: “A convicted felon said he was paying the legal fees of Matt Gaetz’s accuser and controlling her.” More: “Among the many powerful figures in Washington, D.C. opposed to the Gaetz nomination are some who are attempting to thwart it by releasing a report from the House Ethics Committee that will attempt to tie Gaetz to salacious allegations involving child sex trafficking. The report comes years after DOJ dropped its investigation into the same claims on the grounds that the two central witnesses had serious credibility issues. Yet these are the same two central witnesses the House Ethics Committee has relied on for its critical report of Gaetz—the same report it is leaking to compliant reporters as part of a coordinated effort to thwart his nomination as President-elect Donald Trump’s next attorney general…. The politicized employees at DOJ have shown themselves willing to explore novel legal theories and bend federal rules to the breaking point in pursuit of their most reviled political opponents, most notably former and future President Trump. Gaetz has a reputation as one of the most tenacious cross-examiners of DOJ officials from his perch on the House Judiciary Committee. Yet even the DOJ was unwilling to exploit Greenberg’s unsubstantiated claims — apart from leaking them to the press to hurt Gaetz’s reputation. They announced their closure of the investigation in 2022.” • Worth reading in full for detail on the accuser.
* * * “Here Come Trump’s Concentration Camps” [The Tyee]. From Canada. “[T]he stocks of private prison corporations have risen since the election, signalling that investors anticipate a flood of federal money to pay for building migrant detention centres. Whatever they might be called, concentration camps will be necessary under this new administration. Project 2025, the dossier of policy proposals to substantially overhaul the American federal government authored by Trump’s supporters, has a chapter on homeland security and border control. It calls for a ‘significant increase in detention space,’ noting about 100,000 beds would be needed on a daily basis — up from around 60,000 at present. Even if 100,000 deportees could be arrested every day and flown out the next day, it would take 110 days to ship 11 million people out of the United States. (And with perhaps 200 passengers per flight, that would require 500 passenger jets daily, or their equivalent in trains and buses.) They’d stay in camps until their flight was called.” • Let’s assume, as immigrants do, that only undocumented immigrants who are guilty of having committed crimes (other than being undocumented) are targeted. “In 2018, the illegal immigrant criminal conviction rate was 782 per 100,000 illegal immigrants.” Assuming we have 11,000,000 immigrants, that rate implies 86,020 deportees (430 flights in total, not 500 daily for 110 days). Now, I personally don’t think our government should be creating a three-ring binder for how to round people up and put them in detention facilities, because once we use that binder for one purpose, we’ll pull it out and use it for other purposes; I imagine any small-government conservative would agree (“Of all the works of Sauron, the only fair”). It seems to me that this issue would be better addressed through law enforcement at the firm, not law enforcement on the streets, despite any squawking from the American gentry who tend to do such hiring. Yves takes a look at our operational capacity for this project, and has other suggestions here. The entire issue is a good litmus test not only for Trump, but for his staff. Flaky pie-crust loons or nah? NOTE The “13,099 Illegal Immigrant Murderers” talking point that’s running around is a mess, per Cato.
2024 Post Mortem
“EXCLUSIVE’It’s a blood bath’: Inside the White House blame game as backstabbing staffers and score-settling pundits rock a Democratic Party in crisis” [Daily Mail]. Fun stuff. This caught my eye: “As that same former Biden staffer put it: ‘[Obama’s staffers were] signed up as the saviors of the campaign only to run outdated Obama-era playbooks for a candidate that wasn’t Obama.’” And: “In the end, no matter who ends up with the blame, the Democratic Party will have to move on to [hopefully not] survive. A new generation of ambitious Democrats are already said to be plotting their 2028 campaigns – governors such as California’s Gavin Newsom, Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer and Maryland’s Wes Moore.” • That’s the bench for 2028? Really? “Stature” is not a word that comes to mind.
“John Fetterman says Democrats need to stop ‘freaking out’ over everything Trump does” (interview) [NBC]. “‘I’ve said this before, it’s like, clutch those pearls harder and scold louder — that’s not going to win,’ Fetterman, D-Pa., said. ‘And that’s been demonstrated in this cycle.’” Fascinating to see “clutch those pearls” make it into mainstream, idiomatic English; “clutch your pearls and head for the fainting couch” was a trope I encountered as a blogger c. 2003 (on the Democrat side. I don’t think Republicans clutch their pearls, but what do they do instead? Grab their guns?). Fetterman on the Democrat loss in PA: “[FETTERMAN:] I pointed out there were two very incredibly unique situations, and one of them was the assassination [attempt]. … [T]his never happened when it’s the year of an election and when the individual survived. And he responded in a very distinctive way of ‘fight, fight, fight,’ and it created very powerful kind of imagery. And I felt, ‘Hey, that’s definitely going to make things even more difficult.’ And then [Elon] Musk. Surrogates are common in our business, but someone like that is different, and I’ve maintained that he can move the needle, and I do believe he did … that’s why we’ve lost two of our colleagues in the House, and we’ve lost every row office statewide, as well.” • I don’t like Fetterman much on policy, but he’s worth listening to for the campaign he ran. (Fetterman tactfully doesn’t mention the Shapiro v. Walz controversy, but I think Shapiro would have gone down in the face of ‘fight, fight, fight’ also. There was absolutely no way the Pennsylvania Republicans were going to lose that race.
* * * “From New Jersey to Hawaii, Trump made inroads in surprising places in his path to the White House” [Associated Press]. “Common themes emerged in the AP VoteCast data. Voters were most likely to see the economy and immigration as top issues facing the country. More voters said their family’s financial situation was ‘falling behind,’ compared with 2020. When they voted, Trump supporters were thinking about high prices for gas, groceries and other goods and the situation at the U.S.-Mexico border.”
Campaign Finance
“Political Ads Can’t Buy the Presidency” [Bloomberg]. The deck: “Democrats outspent Republicans by more than $300 million in the run-up to the 2024 presidential election. Yet Harris won none of the swing states where the vast majority of spending went.” More: “Money doesn’t win US elections, but it often helps. In bids for the Senate, the candidate who spends the most is typically the victor. That pattern held this year: In 21 of 33 Senate races, the candidate who spent the most on advertising—generally the major expenditure for a campaign—was the winner…. The link between spending and winning has always been weaker in presidential contests…. Given that turnout had a large impact on election outcomes in 2024, [Adam Bonica, a professor of political science at Stanford University] suggests that, in the future, both parties should consider rethinking their spending. ‘Maybe it’s not advertising they need to do,’ he says. ‘Maybe they should be putting more of the resources into mobilization and registration and party building.’” • Money can’t win an election if you set it on fire and throw it into the air!
Syndemics
“I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.” –William Lloyd Garrison
Covid Resources, United States (National): Transmission (CDC); Wastewater (CDC, Biobot; includes many counties; Wastewater Scan, includes drilldown by zip); Variants (CDC; Walgreens); “Iowa COVID-19 Tracker” (in IA, but national data). “Infection Control, Emergency Management, Safety, and General Thoughts” (especially on hospitalization by city).
Lambert here: Readers, thanks for the collective effort. To update any entry, do feel free to contact me at the address given with the plants. Please put “COVID” in the subject line. Thank you!
Resources, United States (Local): AK (dashboard); AL (dashboard); AR (dashboard); AZ (dashboard); CA (dashboard; Marin, dashboard; Stanford, wastewater; Oakland, wastewater); CO (dashboard; wastewater); CT (dashboard); DE (dashboard); FL (wastewater); GA (wastewater); HI (dashboard); IA (wastewater reports); ID (dashboard, Boise; dashboard, wastewater, Central Idaho; wastewater, Coeur d’Alene; dashboard, Spokane County); IL (wastewater); IN (dashboard); KS (dashboard; wastewater, Lawrence); KY (dashboard, Louisville); LA (dashboard); MA (wastewater); MD (dashboard); ME (dashboard); MI (wastewater; wastewater); MN (dashboard); MO (wastewater); MS (dashboard); MT (dashboard); NC (dashboard); ND (dashboard; wastewater); NE (dashboard); NH (wastewater); NJ (dashboard); NM (dashboard); NV (dashboard; wastewater, Southern NV); NY (dashboard); OH (dashboard); OK (dashboard); OR (dashboard); PA (dashboard); RI (dashboard); SC (dashboard); SD (dashboard); TN (dashboard); TX (dashboard); UT (wastewater); VA (wastewater); VT (dashboard); WA (dashboard; dashboard); WI (wastewater); WV (wastewater); WY (wastewater).
Resources, Canada (National): Wastewater (Government of Canada).
Resources, Canada (Provincial): ON (wastewater); QC (les eaux usées); BC (wastewater); BC, Vancouver (wastewater).
Hat tips to helpful readers: Alexis, anon (2), Art_DogCT, B24S, CanCyn, ChiGal, Chuck L, Festoonic, FM, FreeMarketApologist (4), Gumbo, hop2it, JB, JEHR, JF, JL Joe, John, JM (10), JustAnotherVolunteer, JW, KatieBird, KF, KidDoc, LL, Michael King, KF, LaRuse, mrsyk, MT, MT_Wild, otisyves, Petal (6), RK (2), RL, RM, Rod, square coats (11), tennesseewaltzer, Tom B., Utah, Bob White (3).
Stay safe out there!
| Wastewater | |
| This week[1] CDC November 11 | Last Week[2] CDC (until next week): |
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| Variants [3] CDC November 9 | Emergency Room Visits[4] CDC November 9 |
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| Hospitalization | |
| ★ New York[5] New York State, data November 15: | National [6] CDC November 14: |
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| Positivity | |
| ★ National[7] Walgreens November 11: | ★ Ohio[8] Cleveland Clinic November 16: |
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| Travelers Data | |
| Positivity[9] CDC October 28: | Variants[10] CDC October 28: |
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| Deaths | |
| Weekly Deaths vs. % Positivity [11] CDC November 2: | Weekly Deaths vs. ED Visits [12] CDC November 2: |
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LEGEND
1) ★ for charts new today; all others are not updated.
2) For a full-size/full-resolution image, Command-click (MacOS) or right-click (Windows) on the chart thumbnail and “open image in new tab.”
NOTES
[1] (CDC) Good news!
[2] (CDC) Last week’s wastewater map.
[3] (CDC Variants) KP.* still popular. XEC has entered the chat. That WHO label, “Ommicron,” has done a great job normalizing successive waves of infection.
[4] (ED) Down.
[5] (Hospitalization: NY) Steadily down.
[6] (Hospitalization: CDC). Actually improved; it’s now one of the few charts to show the entire course of the pandemic to the present day.
[7] (Walgreens) Down.
[8] (Cleveland) Down.
[9] (Travelers: Positivity) Down.
[10] (Travelers: Variants). Now XEC.
[11] Deaths low, positivity down.
[12] Deaths low, ED down.
Stats Watch
There are no official statistics of interest today.
Manufacturing: “Boeing’s Recent Quality Issues: 5 Key Developments” [Simple Flying]. (1) “Executive resignation amid production restarts”; (2) “FAA mandates a comprehensive quality improvement plan”; (3) “Quality defects discovered in undelivered 787 Dreamliners”; (4) “Whistleblowers expose systemic safety violations”; (5) “Ongoing quality issues affect the 737 MAX program.” • That’s a lot.
Manufacturing: “Boeing strike post mortem: Ortberg has work to do” (excerpt) [Leeham News and Analysis]. “Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg’s performance during the IAM strike is getting low marks from the men and women who will do the work that turns Boeing around-–the mechanics, techs, and engineers in the factories, according to those LNA has spoken with. Ortberg came in talking about a “reset” in the company’s relationship with its unionized workforce. He took a good symbolic step by announcing he’d relocate to Seattle and work from there. But while Wall Street hailed the move, it didn’t land as well as it could have. Ortberg spent one day in the Renton factory before the strike. ” Ouch! More: “Likewise, it’s unclear how much Ortberg was involved in one of the biggest crises his new company faced when he took over: the Machinists Union negotiations.” • Sadly, the material about Ortberg is mostly behind the paywall; however, it appears that he “went with Calhoun’s plan” (Calhoun being the previous CEO who was forced out).
Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 51 Neutral (previous close: 50 Neutral) [CNN]. One week ago: 68 (Greed). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Nov 18 at 1:23:03 PM ET.
Rapture Index: Closes up one on Drought. “A very large area of the nation is under general drought conditions” [Rapture Ready]. Record High, October 10, 2016: 189. Current: 183. (Remember that bringing on the Rapture is good.) • Hard to believe the Rapture Index is going down. Do these people know something we don’t?
Permaculture
“The Way of Mushrooms: Russula, the Trickster Mushroom” [The Meaning of Water]. “It was early October on a warm gentle day when I chose to walk a different path in the Trent Nature Sanctuary forest. And there, in the cedar-birch-poplar forest, I discovered beautiful fanned-shaped saprotrophic mushrooms arranged like street trees on a boulevard and stitching an enchanting network of crisscrossing lines of creamy ‘flowers’ on the forest floor. I noticed that they were arranged in close to what looked like a fairy circle in the thick duff amid dead logs and branches of several fallen poplar and birch trees; no doubt obtaining their nourishment from the decaying wood.” • But how to identify them?
Gallery
So few lines:
Fishing Boat near an Island #artbots #rembrandt pic.twitter.com/HnL3YxvB4w
— Rembrandt (@artistrembrandt) November 11, 2024
“Comment: Was Boeing contract unions’ last big win for now?” [Everett Herald]. “Yet these contract wins at Boeing, UPS, General Motors and the other two big Detroit automakers, and beyond, expose the limits of organized labor’s power today. These workers belong to unions organized decades ago, and they’ve obtained higher pay and much better benefits through collective bargaining on new contracts. But increasing the number of U.S. workers represented by unions remains difficult. The percentage of U.S. workers belonging to a union continues to shrink, declining to 10 percent of the labor force in 2023. As Joe Biden, arguably the most pro-labor president since Franklin Delano Roosevelt, departs the White House, and Donald Trump’s team gets ready to move back in, I believe that prospects for the growth in union members in the near future appear exceedingly bleak.”
I am not feeling wired today.
Contact information for plants: Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, to (a) find out how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal and (b) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi, lichen, and coral are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. From Wukchumni:
Wukchumni writes: “Dusty the Adventure Dog enjoying fall colors in Mineral King.” Plus the expanse of dry grass.
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