Mother Nature Versus The West

Between COVID and wildfires, if this was a fight the ref would stop it. I'm puzzling over the residential real estate model for San Francisco: a bunch of people earning lots of money from companies that are urging them to work remotely are paying outlandish rent to live in a city that has gruesome air quality each summer and a year-round homeless challenge. Sustainable?

Comments

[henry]

Got ya Stephanie. Cottonmouths are an unknown. Too aggressive to mess with, i always ran away from them.

[Another Bob]

If it’s not fiction, by all means keep writing Matt.

[lyle]

Apropos of nothing, I think Jen Rubin resembles a rattlesnake and would still do the jaw-snapping thang if...well, you know.

[Strawman Cometh]

This was put up earlier. And rightfully dismissed. Turd blossom. Now prodigal son? I won't send him any money but this works for me.
https://twitter.com/TeamTrump/status/1303871615667777538

[lyle]

I stumbled across that last night, SC. Rove needs to exit stage left. Pathetically past his sell-by date.

[Captain Hate]

Rove can't even read his stupid white board.

[MissMarple2]

Comfortably Smug
@ComfortablySmug
·
3h
INBOX:
"More breaking news in FL and Kamala’s visit to miami. NBC broke the story. She went to a restaurant called Amaize which is Venezuelan and today owner came out and said it was unplanned and If he knew she wouldn’t have been welcome. Latinos do not like Biden/Harris here"

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

"I've been toying with idea of spray painting 'is senile!' on an old bed sheet"

Bub, you old pirate you!

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

I bet Pelosi would even throw Madge under the bus;

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

boris, thanks for the tech pointer for Clickable New Thread!

I think I'd try this on a back thread before doing it live :) :)

[henry]

I think I'd try this on a back thread before doing it live :) :)

Gates never delayed, nor does the rest of Silicon Valley. :)

[henry]

Vid of Nunes blowing smoke up our skirts re Durham. “More indictments “... they catch the janitor smoking in the bathroom? How about substance?

https://twitter.com/nhmommy1/status/1304585655264083975?s=21

[Catsmeat]

My 9/11 was like that of so many Americans--just horror and disbelief. The only comic relief was finally getting through in the late afternoon to my elder daughter at Rhodes College in Memphis (the phone lines, as you remember, were impossible all day) and learning she and her two other first-year roommates had been cowering in a closet all day because they were sure the terrorists were going to attack Graceland, you know, because it's the center of American patriotism or some such. I got her to come out of the closet.

The next day our chair in the spirit of something like "we can't stop ordinary life or the terrorists win" had a department meeting. Got there about ten minutes early and heard nothing but colleagues ragging on Bush's cowardice for going to Offitt Air Base instead of back to Washington. That was the whole point, as far as they could see, of 9/11. Spit.

[CCGirl]

Well, no pizza on the grill. I am seriously thinking God is telling me something. Monday I almost blew up the house - completely my fault. Tonight, hubs has the grill going. He cleans it all the time, and changes out the grease/drip pans below. And it’s a nice, Weber, not very old.
Two oldest are with us. One pizza on grill closed, sounds angry, open it up, and it’s fiery. Then the whole grill erupts, and hubs closes off the propane tank. I run inside for a tiny box of baking soda and a fire extinguisher-not to be used for grease - but whatever. It was an inferno. We all backed away for a bit. All happened in less than a minute. It calmed down, but it was nuts. I joked that the riots were hitting home. I thought the garage might catch on fire for a bit. It was that crazy.

We were able so save the first pizza, and cooked the rest in the oven. Jeepers!

[MissMarple2]

Catturd ™
@catturd2
·
3m
Fox News analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano accused of sexually abusing man in 1980s who faced arson charge in his court.

[CCGirl]

Yeah, Catsmeat, they wasted no time complaining about Bush being a weenie. As if the POTUS should stay to finish reading a book during an act of war. Jerks.

[CCGirl]

Funny how 9/11 has us defending Bush. In the words of she who must not be named, “What the hell happened?”

[MissMarple2]

WOW! Do you believe this!? pic.twitter.com/EZBm1z0fkI

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 12, 2020

Video at link.

[MissMarple2]

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
·
1h
THANK YOU to the 28,000+ Firefighters and other First Responders who are battling wildfires across California, Oregon, and Washington. I have approved 37 Stafford Act Declarations, including Fire Management Grants to support their brave work. We are with them all the way!

[Narciso]

Thats surprising i guess, kilmeade had some w staffer that pointed out that offut afb was the only site that had a secure teleconference. Even airforce one wasnt as fully compliant to coordinate communications

[matt - deplore me if you must]

Sometimes you don't know which one is the rattlesnake, Clarice.

[Narciso]

W did not show enough ganas guts over the long term

[Narciso]

Yikes ccgirl.

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

Air Quality Index has ranged from 60 to 150 lately.
Currently 210.
Yike.

[Narciso]

Missing the point

https://mobile.twitter.com/Havoc16492/status/1304550045644185600

[MissMarple2]

"What are the odds of 31 phones accidentally wiped clean?" @LizMacDonaldFOX @realKTMcFarland pic.twitter.com/mEzwHTmAKI

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 12, 2020

Go to link.

[Narciso]

Hmm, that might explain some things

https://mobile.twitter.com/tracybeanz/status/1304522105296498690

[MissMarple2]

Tracy Beanz
@tracybeanz
Level 1:
Well, this is interesting. From the documents in the Floyd case- the defense is asking for any and all files pertaining to Floyd's cooperation as an informant for the Minneapolis police or FBI... https://mncourts.gov/mncourtsgov/media/High-Profile-Cases/27-CR-20-12953-JAK/NoticeofMotion08272020.pdf
===========================================
Above is stuff on what Narciso linked above.

[CCGirl]

Thanks, Narc. But also I feel like an idiot complaining about our minor grill fire when an unknown percentage of CA is an inferno. It was a big deal here, but nothing to compare. Mr. Knightley would be scolding me, “ Badly done!”

[Neo]

The Atlantic calls to 'end the Nobel Peace Prize' following Trump nominations
'Peace had its chance, and blew it,' reads the tagline of the article

[CCGirl]

Screw The Atlantic, Neo!

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

Read this on another blog.

"Minnesota Viqueens to honor George Floyd’s family in opening day ceremonies:
https://dailycaller.com/2020/09/11/minnesota-vikings-george-floyd-family-season-opener-black-national-anthem/

I don’t remember them doing that for the woman the Minneapolis Somali cop killed a few years back."

[Narciso]

Trump is mote in the vein of teddy roosevelt

https://mobile.twitter.com/omriceren/status/1304529627881316352

[Narciso]

I told you he was trouble

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2020/09/11/exclusivemichael-gove-persuaded-boris-johnson-bring-rule-six/

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

--an unknown percentage of CA is an inferno--

Approximately 3%.

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

So far.

[MissMarple2]

Heading to bed.

Nytol!

[Narciso]

Shirley

https://mobile.twitter.com/redsteeze/status/1304600844415926273

[Narciso]

Shes soaked

https://mobile.twitter.com/BretBaier/status/1304560512169119753

[CCGirl]

In all fairness, I am reading that these fires are the worst in years here, and other web sites. Again, I did type “an unknown percentage.”

[Narciso]

Yes they dont provide any serious context ccgirl

[Neo]

"If Trump wins the prize, it will be the fourth Nobel awarded for peace between Israel and its neighbors," wrote Atlantic staff writer Graeme Wood. "That will make Arab-Israeli peace mediators more successful at charming the Nobel Committee than the International Committee of the Red Cross, which has won three times in the prize’s 120-year history, but still less successful than my favorite, which is no one at all.

"Giving the peace prize to no one at all is a tradition the Nobel Committee should revive, perhaps on a permanent basis," Wood added. "The record of achievement of the peace laureates is so spotty, and the rationales for their awards so eclectic, that the committee should take a long break to consider whether peace is a category coherent enough to be worth recognizing. Peace had its chance, and blew it. The Trump nomination ... helps show why."

https://www.foxnews.com/media/the-atlantic-end-nobel-peace-prize-trump

[Narciso]

In retrospect sen graham was following important leads

https://abc11.com/dozens-of-saudi-officials-may-be-witnesses-in-9-11-lawsuit/6419143/

[CCGirl]

Watching an ad for a show where kids are on see saws. Remember laughing so hard while thinking you were slamming your friend into the ground? Harmless fun. That was taken away years ago. I never have heard that anyone was ever hurt on a see saw. Maybe that was the beginning of the end?

[mockmook]

San Francisco doesn't have bad air quality (generally), even in the summer.

And, even the greater Bay Area isn't really bad.

You must be thinking of LA

[Neo]

THE HILL: Democrat in House race against Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene drops out, says he is leaving Georgia

Georgia state law only allows a party to replace a candidate 60 or more days from the election.
53 days to Election Day.

[Neo]

VMware Cuts Pay for Remote Workers Fleeing Silicon Valley
Twitter among the tech companies localizing wages after moves
Facebook, ServiceNow may alter pay if workers leave Bay Area

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-09-11/vmware-twitter-cut-pay-for-remote-workers-fleeing-bay-area

[Strawman Cometh]

See ya and raise. Youngest and her hubs bought a nice brick house in a very nice Roanoke VA neighborhood (fifties). They've been in it maybe two weeks. We spent the weekend. We were all out and about then came back to her place with the bathtubs and toilets backing up with raw sewage. After some panic (I hat to see my little girl cry) and investigation, I unplugged the electric connection of the septic pump that moves the lower, add-on toilet outflow up to the main sewer pipe and out to the city septic. Turns out they have a busted pipe under their front porch which will have to be rerouted. Many $s, but they are fat from the sale of their house which was sold the 1st day.

[henry]

Libya Peace Deal pending?

Osweda thinks so

https://twitter.com/cosweda/status/1304575725157007361?s=21

[Melinda]

Libya? Hmmmm. Who’s Erdogan playing with?

[henry]

Strawman, it is amazing. My friend just bought a house. The inspector caught a bunch of stuff, but missed as much. What was that movie, the money pit? Seems like that on any house these days. But by a couple months things are dialed in. Hope further surprises aren’t as smelly or expensive!

[Narciso]

Qatar is not supporting the non islamist neither is turkey the gnas authority doesnt extend much beyond tripoli.

[Melinda]

Very precise insight::

@shipwreckedcrew
Re the Dannehy resignation.
So far as I can tell, there is no "validated" explanation. She sent a short email to colleagues in Conn with the announcement and no reason. Speculation is she's not happy with what might be about to happen.

https://twitter.com/shipwreckedcrew/status/1304536697061994496?s=21

Thread of import.

[Melinda]

And I now have to reburn 8 tracks of Bix. Crud.

[Narciso]

But of course

https://mobile.twitter.com/MZHemingway/status/1304601361124859904

[Stephanie Nene Not Your Normal Granma]

ASOFB:

Karma:
When all the forest fires the commie arsonists set end up burning up all the fake mail-in ballots they printed for Biden, causing Trump to win California...

[Melinda]

I’m not sure who’s playing in there anymore, narc.

I’ll sit back and wait for the smoke to clear.

(Saved from reburning, a rare 4+ minute 78RPM.)

[Melinda]

Paul Whiteman Orchestra, for the curious.

[Narciso]

I think we have the main cards the uae and egypt were originally backing haftar, the russians pdobBly have contacts going back to the 70s

[Another Bob]

Any doubts that if Biden wins, and dems flip the Senate, well. Be living in a very different country very quickly?

https://twitter.com/sahilkapur/status/1304548797645811715

[Another Bob]

we’ll be. 🙄

[Narciso]

One like this:

https://youtu.be/X5hdbbGfDGg

[Narciso]

Different one:

https://youtu.be/lruOcMDz-rU

[henry]

Thread

@mikescarcella

The FOIA suit for Durham-related staffing and expenditure records, filed by @CREWcrew, is pending before US District Judge Emmet Sullivan, who is weighing Barr's move to walk away from the Michael Flynn prosecution

https://twitter.com/mikescarcella/status/1304601424718966785?s=21

[John S]

ccgirl
the fires in Cal are bad this year--2 to 3 million acres burned. But before fire suppression started in the mid 20th century, the annual acres burned was 4 to 12 million per year. Also, the native Americans used to use controlled burns to manage the land as well. This is settled science from many many academic studies. When you hear "biggest in history" that means since 1950, when modern records started. The increase in recent years is due to the build up of fuel due to fire suppression. the fuel is not big trees but brush.

[Strawman Cometh]

Narc, Quin is a Coach K protege. K needs to come out from under his TDS blankie now and smell the coffee.

[Captain Hate]

Paul Whiteman Orchestra, for the curious.

As part of keeping me occupied throughout all the music clubs being locked out I've been going through this Brit book from the early 70s of 200 essential jazz recordings between 1945 and 1970. They try to hit all bases and there are some curious choices (Ellington and Basie were considered too dominant to be included although they still have a gazillion Charlie Parker records plus there's an odd Sonny Criss included; it's not bad but just not what I consider his best plus it's oddly inserted between two much earlier recordings and he's doing Fifth Dimension covers) but finding some on Spotify can be difficult (a Lee Konitz earlier release of Konitz Collates was reissued as Subconscious-Lee) although discogs is a great help in that regard. Finding the Charles Whiteman collection might be impossible.

[Captain Hate]

Not to be confused with Paul Whiteman...

[Narciso]

Stipulated

https://youtu.be/lruOcMDz-rU

[Pinandpuller]

This goes a long way towards debunking the narrative that White people weren’t slaves, they were indentured servants. The term kidnapping derived from the term kid nabbing which sprung from stealing White children from Ireland and Scotland and bringing them to the Americas:

White Slavery in America Michael Hoffman
https://youtu.be/Aq3gH_IqOrA

[Manuel Transmission]

Catching up.

JiB, funny you mention Alstom. Amtrak is apparently buying new Alstom train sets and that has caused two different groups to track me down to help better monitor performance so the FRA will sign off on their performance on the NEC. That’s pushing out past 45 years that I’ve been scrutinizing new Amtrak rolling stock.

Air quality: we’ve been bumping up against 200 on and off all week without any fires within a hunnert miles. Today I’ve had to suck on lozenges to offset the raw throat.

Rattlesnakes. Growing up in MT it was a pretty regular event to deal with them. My worst case was crawling under a big ol’ Army 4x4 stacker I’d been working on to grab a wrench that I’d left laying in the weeds. Just as I’m reaching for it, I realized a rattler is stretched under me below my chest. Yike! I scrambled back out without it getting pissed, but I was so rattled (heh) that when I grabbed my pistol, it took several rounds to dispatch it at almost point blank range.

[Captain Hate]

I ran across this last night when Spotify started free associating after a Marilyn Crispell recording

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HxMIiTW59Co

[Narciso]

Theit instinxts are always terrible

https://mobile.twitter.com/MaggieJordanACN/status/1304593028871589888 (ht rg who is on twitter yet is locked out.

[Narciso]

Interesting contrast same song

https://youtu.be/a3kCAPkO7bE

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

I have so many rattlesnake stories I can't pick which one to tell.

[Narciso]

A little red pill across the pond.

https://youtu.be/Lh6VnB7JvW0

[CCGirl]

John S, thanks. I am always skeptical of any studies. Something my parents gave to me. I appreciate the post. Glad you are posting.

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

JiB: "I think we are entering a new beginning or an old end.
Someone or something needs to provide the catalyst. No more of this caterwauling. I am tired of it but if #2weeks wants to dominate our discussion., so be it. I am on the sidelines laughing.
September 11, 2020 at 06:18 PM"

This hit me. I feel the same, I think.
To expand, if you think of the time of, say, the Russian Revolution, there was intense ferment. Most people (Deplorable serfs) were drying hay out in the fields though, so they didn't participate or at most participated piecemeal in limited groups. Therefore events rolled out quickly yet at the same time gradually.
I realize that's a contradiction.

But if this were the old days, the roaring sweep of revolutionary elan would succeed.
Holy cow, they have the Swamp, the athletes, the media, the celebs, the professors ... all the elites.
Yet in our world we have a real chance to drag them to a halt and reverse the tide. We have blogs and cell phones, unlike serfs we can read-and-write (indeed, many of us are more intellectually honest and well-read than lots of them). Common people are talking to each other and quietly choosing "I like the old way better".
No guarantee of victory, but I like our chances.

[Captain Hate]

I had no idea Frisell ever played with Chet Baker. Here's another version

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=98yrbU18d-M

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

JohnS hits the nail on the head at 11:38.
It is not lack of logging nearly so much as a surfeit of fire suppression. and the solution is not predominately logging [the market for logs is finite after all] but burning.
As I relayed previously, prior to human intervention roughly half of the California forest was recovering from a fire at any given point.
And they were catastrophic fires because nature often does mild fires but when conditions are right even an old growth forest will get nicely cooked.
It was only with the Indians yearly fires that the forest was able to avoid so many catastrophic ones. My own family used to imitate the Indian's policy and every fall when they moved the cattle down from the mountains would set the ground litter on fire and let it go where it might.

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

Here's a graph that covers what JohnS mentioned;

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

mockmook: "San Francisco doesn't have bad air quality (generally), even in the summer.
And, even the greater Bay Area isn't really bad."

Normally that's true, of course.

Maybe only 3% of California is an inferno but LOTS more has really terrible air right now. AQI is air quality index.
https://www3.epa.gov/airnow/aqi_brochure_02_14.pdf
Here in San Jose: AQI is 180
In San Francisco: AQI is 194
In Oakland: AQI is 201

The first day was relatively OK but most people stayed inside. The air was not awful but the weird orange sky creeped people out. Yesterday was worse. It was dark all day long. Ash fell from the sky. Cars are filthy. Even squirrels and birds are not moving around much.
Today was bad. Unhealthy air for the entire day, and predicted to continue that way through Monday at least.

[Melinda]

CH-

Paul Whiteman was one of the final pro gigs of Bix's short career. He died "of everything" at the age of 28, per his LFA roommate.

[Melinda]

Oh,

And I started collecting 78s by the box in the 70's for $0.25 a box. Caruso (silly me) went to skeet while everyone else went to album.

[Melinda]

OK, I know this is going to blow up in someone's face, and the name won't start with "D"::

Hamza Shaban
@hshaban
Politically appointed aides have demanded the right to review and edit the CDC’s weekly scientific reports on the coronavirus, in attempts to intimidate the reports’ authors and water down their communications to health professionals, Politico reports politico.com/news/2020/09/1…

https://twitter.com/hshaban/status/1304636478199390208

[If it's this late, It's totally made up. ]

[Another Bob]

“Common people are talking to each other and quietly choosing "I like the old way better".

May be true Jim, but what comes after that choice. The OPFOR shock troops are already in the field with surprising amounts of political support. Their political wing seems prepared to steal elections, and is laying the groundwork to quickly impose their will. I’m just not seeing an equivalent response from “our side”.

[Melinda]

Hi, Karen!

[Melinda]

G'night.

Playing with you can wait.

[Narciso]

Thats the opposite of what really happened, its chock full of 'racisn isthe real virus' participants.

[Ralph L]

When we lived near Long Beach in '69, some days were so smoggy they put flares at each intersection so drivers would know when they'd reached one.

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

"When we lived near Long Beach ..."
Yeah, despite my complaint about air qual, it was worse 2 or 3 winters ago when we traveled to China.
And we had some bad pollution growing up in the Detroit area, come to think of it.

[President-Elect Jim,SunnyvaleCA]

Me: “Common people are talking to each other and quietly choosing "I like the old way better".

ABob: May be true Jim, but what comes after that choice. The OPFOR shock troops are already in the field with surprising amounts of political support.

Granted but "Aslan is on the move." Don't wait for orders, start coming up to speed.

[Ralph L]

In '79, my parents bought a brand new $200k house. My mom told the builder there was a narrow, deep hole in the back yard. He said to fill it up with gravel and dirt, which she did.

Saturday night we come home, someone flushes, and the pump for the basement bathroom outflow is ejecting water out of the ground floor toilet, headed for the new carpet. Turns out the hole was the sewer access pipe which had been cut off below ground level. The builder had a backhoe there on Sunday.

We also found out the hard way that they hadn't sealed around the sewer pipe at the foundation or caulked the base of one tub. We heard the cat screaming--water was dripping from the foyer light fixture, and he'd gotten his butt stuck between the stair banisters trying to escape it.

[mike in houston]

Ran across this recently

Policeman - By. Paul Harvey

Paul Harvey (1918-2009) was a radio broadcaster for the ABC Radio Networks. He gave the "Policeman" speech on talk radio nearly 40 years ago and it is known as one of his best speeches....Mr. Harvey's father inspired this speech....He was a police officer who was shot and killed while doing what police officers do every day.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQ1YsyZMaaU

[anonamom]

Here in CA we have a recent state Senate bill that child molesters can avoid the Sex Offender database if the age difference is 10 years or less and the sex is "voluntary".

Am I doing the math correctly here--a 19 year old can sodomize a nine year old, and that won't get you on the list in CA, as long as the nine year old claims "consent"?

Whoever sponsored that bill still walks the halls in Sacramento?
Submitting that bill should be a felony.

[Pinandpuller]

If you stay past the credits of Cuties Liam Neeson comes out and kills everyone over the age of 12.

[anonamom]

mike--just yesterday I was thinking "we need Paul Harvey."
Thank you.

[hoyden]

THE WEEK IN PICTURES: FAR TURN EDITION

[Marlene]

Good morning! Last night the Maine Senate candidates held a debate. Two minor candidates, Gideon and Collins fielded questions from members of the Maine media. I didn't watch, but this morning's headline isn't a surprise. "Collins once again declines to say whether she will vote for President Trump."

[Pinandpuller]

Senator Scott Wiener, anonamom.

A 🏳️‍🌈✡️

Criticizing him is anti-Semitic though, so watch out.