2025-03-16

High school runner hit in head with baton during race


This story has gone viral.  There is debate about whether it was intentional or not.  It doesn't affect my life, but it might be a reflection of society.


2025-03-15

Neil deGrasse Tyson & Charles Liu Make Predictions About the Future

Tornado Warning in Columbus Indiana Last Night

I was woken up in the middle of the night by a city-wide tornado siren. I was tired and didn't hear any severe weather other than distant thunder. Thinking it wasn't necessary to get out of bed, I checked my phone for alerts. There was a tornado warning for Columbus, but the tornado didn't seem to be nearby.

The siren stopped after about three minutes but started again. When it stopped for the second time, I was able to go back to sleep.

I can't find much in the news about it, but I'd like to know where the tornado was.  A couple of years ago there was a tornado in the western part of the county that created a severe wind that knocked down trees all over the city.

https://www.localnewsdigital.com/2025/03/15/136944/

Today it is threatening to storm outside.

Michael Mann Lawsuit Against Mark Steyn

Michael Mann is a climate scientist and a prominent figure in climate activism. He created the controversial "Hockey Stick" graph, which has been widely criticized for its methodology and accuracy.

Journalist and public speaker Mark Steyn referred to Mann as "a fraud."  Mann, who has a history of suing critics, filed a lawsuit against Steyn.  After a decade of litigation, Mann won a million-dollar judgment.  However, an appeals court has largely overturned the ruling for misrepresentation by Mann and his lawyer.

https://www.youtube.com/live/2UcBaVeSMz8?t=986s

The next part of the video discusses the alleged fraud in government funding of climate activism.

https://www.youtube.com/live/2UcBaVeSMz8?t=1673s

2025-03-11

The Stupidity Epidemic: Why Critical Thinking is Dying


This is well-stated and completely on point.

It appeals to my biases. 🙂

Stock Market PLUNGES…So What’s Next?!

This echoes my previous post.

Anti-Trump Mems from Facebook

The anti-Trump memes are strong on Facebook.  It would be easy to dismiss this as deluded people but…


There is a real movement here.  Donald Trump has a slim majority that could be chipped away by people screaming loud enough. 


He has to deliver results. If the country goes into a recession, it could tip to the left, repudiating Libertarian ideas. They would claim that it obviously failed. 




















































2025-03-07

Democrats Play the Race Card

This is a critical moment. By singing "We Shall Overcome" in the House of Representatives, the Democrats are attempting to frame Republicans as racists.  They have already claimed that telling Al Green to stop yelling during the State of the Union Address was an act of racism, equating it to telling Black Americans to sit at the back of the bus in Montgomery, Alabama, during the 1960s.  Now, they argue that the censure of Al Green is a form of racial oppression.

This was their plan all along.

Not only is this insulting to Republicans and their supporters, but it also does nothing to foster intelligent discourse.

I don't expect the Democrats to stop. This is their only strategy. They have no hope of winning unless they regain the minority vote. For the next four years, they will continue labeling Republicans as racists until they achieve victory.

Gene Hackman died of heart disease, about one week after wife died of hantavirus: investigators

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/gene-hackman-betsy-arakawa-deaths-investigators-provide-update

2025-03-05

BREAKING: Supreme Court rules Trump must resume foreign aid

Sign My Petition To Pardon Derek Chauvin


The death of George Floyd had many contributing factors, including a possibly fatal level of drugs in his system, a COVID-19 infection, heart disease, and poor health from a life of drug abuse.

A conviction of unintentional manslaughter might make sense. The murder conviction is most definitely unjust.

The trial turned into a media circus along with mass protests threatening and committing violence.

Some would argue that the police should have cared for Goerge Floyd, but they called for an ambulance, which took too long to arrive.

There is no evidence that Derek Chauvin intended to hurt George Floyd. He was just trying to do his job. It is possible that he did his job badly and contributed to the death of George Floyd, but even that is not clear.

Barron "Octavian" Trump

2025-02-25

Evidence That Gut Microbes May Directly Influence Our Aging

This Is NOT An Anti Meat Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sVfTPaxRwk

I don't have a strong opinion on this matter. I believe animals should be treated humanely but without excessive costs. 

We often attribute human characteristics to animals. However, humans have 86 billion neurons in their brains, while a chicken has only 200 million. Their thought processes are not like ours and are largely instinctual. 

I've heard that dogs' brains are designed to remember what is good and bad, but they react primarily based on instinct and learned associations. Dogs have approximately 2.25 billion neurons, while cats have around 750 million. 

Cows have about 3 billion neurons, and pigs have nearly the same as dogs. 

This doesn't mean that animals can't suffer or shouldn't be treated humanely. 

BTW, according to Google, ants have around 250,000 neurons, though I previously read that they have only 7,000. Their brains are so simple that they don't sleep. An ant cannot function outside of its group, as it depends on chemical signals from other ants to guide its behavior. If isolated, an ant will die. This is also true for other hive insects.

--
Best wishes,

John Coffey

http://www.entertainmentjourney.com

Wolves and Ravens

2025-02-24

Are Vacuums the Future of All Fried Chicken?

Germany’s Election Results Explained

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PrMHoku-G0&t=428s

The conservative Christian party came in first, while the socialist party took second place, alongside several other left-wing parties. The video predicts that the two leading parties will form a coalition government with only a slim majority.

The right-wing, anti-immigration party Alternative for Germany (AfD) doubled its results, but the video suggests that no other party wants to form a coalition with them, as they are considered too extreme.

This seems to reflect the global shift toward the right in politics. Given how traditionally left-wing Germany has been, this development is particularly interesting.


The 59th Street Bridge Song

Something cheery for a Monday Morning.

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

Death by Mosquito

2025-02-22

American Inventions That Changed Britain Forever - Part 2

What Killed The Rotary Engine?

I couldn't believe it when I saw this on the road!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iu_gWqbeEm8

@TheologyUnleashed
21 hours ago
The truck in the image is transporting a massive wind turbine nacelle. The nacelle is the housing that contains essential components of a wind turbine, such as the generator, gearbox, and control systems. These nacelles are incredibly large and heavy, requiring specialized trucks for transport. The size of the nacelle in the image suggests it is part of a modern, large-scale wind turbine used in wind farms. The transport is likely part of the logistics involved in moving components to a wind farm installation site.

2025-02-18

The Disease That Made Thousands Sweat To Death - And Then Disappeared

A Sleeping Giant Awakens


China does import commodities and natural resources, such as oil and iron ore, as well as advanced semiconductors that it hasn't figured out how to engineer. But China's dominance in manufacturing and exports cannot be overstated.

Take automobiles, the anchor of so many industrialized countries' manufacturing sectors for the past century. Around 20 years ago, China was a nonfactor in automaking. By 2018, it had the capacity to produce 40 million gasoline-powered cars per year, far more than the 25 million its economy needed. Since then, it has added, thanks in part to substantial government subsidies for the industry, the capacity to make 20 million electric vehicles annually, a number that may soon rise to 30 million. Annual global automotive demand is 90 million cars; China has the capacity to produce around two-thirds of that.


This pattern is replicated in sector after sector. China routinely produces more than half of the global supply of steel, more than half of the world's aluminum and more than half of the world's ships. In clean technology sectors such as solar cells and batteries, China can produce many multiples of current global demand, and there are fears that it could replicate these successes in memory and automotive chips. What's more, China has partly made up for the fall in domestic steel demand (caused by the housing implosion) by subsidizing the building and equipping of new factories that use domestic steel in churning out yet more manufactured exports for overseas markets.

All told, Chinese export volume is growing three times as fast as global trade. This means China's success is directly coming at the expense of manufacturers in other countries, which increasingly cannot compete and face pressure to abandon sectors that China targets. With China's real estate market still in the doldrums, the pattern shows no signs of changing. This points to a world economy in which China has no need for the industrial inputs of other countries while leaving those countries dependent on Chinese-made goods — and vulnerable to Beijing's political and economic pressure.


https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/18/opinion/china-xi-jinping-trade-manufacturing-tariffs.html



2025-02-17

Milton Friedman - The Robber Baron Myth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dmzZ8lCLhlk

I found this text on Facebook that I wrote 9 years ago:

I've been asked to share my opinion on how the government should handle monopolies.

Before addressing the issue of monopolies, I want to discuss core beliefs. But before that, I have a question to ask.

By my calculation, government spending in 2015 was about 37.5% of GDP. In recent years, this figure has been closer to 40%. The real number is worse because all government spending is included in the GDP calculation. So my question is: At what point would government spending have to rise before those on the left would say, "Enough is enough"? Would it be at 50% of GDP? How about 60% or 70%? The same question applies to taxation—would a 90% tax rate be considered fair?

I could make a similar argument about immigration. I genuinely believe that hundreds of millions of people would come here if they could, so we must set some reasonable limit.

I ask these questions because there doesn't seem to be any clear limit on how much some people are willing to expand government spending or increase government control over our lives.

If we look at two extreme forms of government—on one end, countries where the government controls 100% of GDP, such as the former USSR or North Korea, and on the other, places that have temporarily had little to no government, resulting in chaos—we see that neither extreme works well. However, as we move away from these extremes, conditions improve. That improvement happens more quickly at the lower end of government spending than at the higher end. Studies suggest that GDP growth tends to peak when government spending is around 20–25% of GDP, though some argue that because we lack examples of governments spending less than 20%, lower spending might be even better.

For this reason, I believe that minimizing government leads to greater prosperity, less poverty, and even reduced wealth disparity.

The Libertarian principle states that everyone has the right to do as they please, so long as they do not infringe upon the rights of others. This includes the right to own property, engage in business, and make decisions without unnecessary government interference. If Walmart is one of the richest companies in the world, it is because people choose to shop and work there.

The issue of monopolies is so insignificant that I'm surprised it still comes up. I've debated this topic for decades. At one time, people claimed that Netscape had a monopoly on internet browsers, Microsoft had a monopoly on operating systems, and Lotus had a monopoly on spreadsheets. Yet, all of these have changed.

OPEC once appeared to have a monopoly on oil production, but that, too, has shifted.

Historically, monopolies have often been created by governments. Centuries ago, governments granted individuals exclusive rights to specific businesses and markets. More recently, government-created monopolies existed in industries such as telecommunications, and even today, many utility companies still operate as monopolies. Often, government regulations are used to prevent competition, with industries sometimes lobbying for these regulations to maintain their dominance.

In a free market, as a business begins to dominate a sector, it becomes more profitable, which naturally attracts competition. Even the mere threat of competition can keep businesses in check. For example, we've long known that artificial fuels can be produced for about $5.50 per gallon. OPEC has openly stated that they price oil at a level that keeps alternative fuels unprofitable.

There are many myths about monopolies in the late 19th century. In reality, this period saw some of the greatest economic growth in American history.