Learned

 

Protect

 

Army

 

Tax Returns

 

In The NEWS

Sports, Entertainment, & Culture
> Los Angeles Galaxy top New York Red Bulls 2-1 to win a record 6th MLS Cup (More) | Inter Miami star Lionel Messi named 2024 MLS MVP (More)

> Taylor Swift ends "Eras" tour with final performance in Vancouver, Canada (More) | The $2.2B tour was the highest-grossing of all time (More) | "Moana 2" tops $600M at global box office, surpassing original film's total haul in 10 days (More) | Steve Mensch, president of Tyler Perry Studios, dies at 62 in plane crash (More)

> The 2024 Kennedy Center Honors recognizes the Grateful Dead, director Francis Ford Coppola, jazz musician Arturo Sandoval, singer-songwriter Bonnie Raitt, and New York City's Apollo Theater with artistic lifetime achievement awards (More)


Science & Technology
> New AI-powered brain scans found to be twice as effective as doctors at pinpointing when strokes occurred in patients, providing assessments on how much damage is reversible (More)

> Scientists reveal chemistry in tick saliva enabling insects to form a cement cone around their bite; the process allows them to bind to hosts for days (More)

> Engineers develop biodegradable alternative to microbeads—tiny plastic pellets that pose significant environmental and health risks—used in consumer health and beauty products (More)


Business & Markets
> US stock markets close mixed Friday (S&P 500 +0.3%, Dow -0.3%, Nasdaq +0.8%) after November jobs report beat expectations, unemployment rate rose slightly (More)

> Google sues to prevent the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau from supervising Google Payment Corp. like a bank; CFPB says Google failed to investigate fraud in its peer-to-peer Google Pay app, meant to rival Venmo (More) | Why did Google discontinue its Google Pay app in the US? (More)

> President-elect Donald Trump names former PayPal Chief Operating Officer David Sacks as artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency advisor (More)


Politics & World Affairs
> South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol survives impeachment vote Saturday amid boycott from members of his conservative party; opposition party can reintroduce motion to impeach Wednesday (More) | See previous write-up on the country's six hours of martial law (More)

> Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris holds its first mass in five years following 2019 fire and subsequent $1B restoration (More) | See before-and-after photos (More)

> Ghana ousts ruling party, reelects former President John Mahama; election comes amid cost-of-living crisis following 2022 default on $30B in sovereign debt (More)

SOURCE:  1440 NEWS

Out of Pocket Medical Expenses

 If President elect Trump reduces Social Security allocations and/or reduces what Medicare pays that will increase out-of-pocket expenses for patients, there will be consequences.

The public may be forced to tolerate that for FOUR YEARS but at the end of those FOUR YEARS, Trump will be gone, and the general public will get its revenge by voting out of office every republican House of Representatives members as well as Senators.

In other words, I doubt very seriously if another Republican ever got elected to another Federal Office.

There are a lot of cancer patients for instance, that will be sick or the rest of their lives and expect Medicare to cover most of their medical bills except for the monthly premiums they pay.  Those people cannot afford to pay increased expenses.

It was the anger of the public that put Trump into office, and it will be the anger of the people that will start removing Republicans.

This is not a THREAT...  this is more like a promise.

Somewhat Political

 

Largest Universe Simulation EVER

The world’s largest simulation of the cosmos lays a new computational foundation for simultaneous extreme-scale dark matter and astrophysical investigations.

Researchers used the Frontier supercomputer to conduct the largest astrophysical simulation to date, simulating both atomic and dark matter across universe-sized scales. This was facilitated by advancements in HACC, a code developed to run on exascale-class supercomputers, now capable of performing quintillion calculations per second. 

This breakthrough in cosmological hydrodynamics simulations will aid in matching observational data with theoretical models.

Universe Simulation Breakthrough

The universe just expanded—at least in the realm of computer simulations.

Earlier this month, researchers at the Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory harnessed the power of the world’s fastest supercomputer to execute the largest astrophysical simulation of the universe ever achieved.   READ MORE...

The Doors - The End (Edit Version From The Film Apocalypse Now)

HATE

 

Sweden

 

Rude

 

EVs

 

Question

 

Chocolate

 

Don't Worry

 

The world is a messed-up place right now with wars in Ukraine, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, and threats in the south China sea between China and Japan and Taiwan.

Analysists and Military Experts are predicting that we are on the verge of getting ourselves into a WWIII.  I don't know if that's true or not but if it is, then I hope it won't be nuclear.

Is this all happening because a new US President is about to take office or because it is just coincidence that all of this is happening at the same time?

From age 19 to my current age of 77, new government or other country's pissing contests never adversely influenced my life except once that that was the Vietnam war when I was 19.

Prices go up, prices go down, but my wife and I have always still done what we wanted to do, regardless of who was President of what was going on in the world.

What has helped me the most is the following:

• My wife and I have been debt free for over 20 years
• My wife and I have a simple lifestyle
• My wife and I buy what we need not want

LIFE IS TOO SHORT TO WORRY...

If you must worry, worry about those things that you can control like:

• buying habits
• vacation habits
• Lifestyle
• Exercise/eating habits
• stress reduction

Somewhat Political

 

Technology Trends for 2025

👋 Hi, I am Mark. I am a strategic futurist and innovation keynote speaker. I advise governments and enterprises on emerging technologies such as AI or the metaverse. My subscribers receive a free weekly newsletter on cutting-edge technology.


Time flies when experiencing exponential change! With 2025 approaching, it's time for my annual technology trend predictions—a tradition I've maintained since 2012 and one I deeply enjoy. Writing these articles allows me to reflect on the past year's predictions and explore the future with renewed curiosity.

In 2024, I named the year “The Year of Science Reality,” as technologies once confined to science fiction became tangible. Looking back, most of my predictions aligned closely with the developments we witnessed, though some advanced faster than anticipated, while others remain on the horizon. 

Here’s a quick recap:

Spot-on Predictions: 

Humanoids integrated with multimodal LLMs, exemplified by Figure 1’s conversational capabilities, and conversational IoT devices, like LG’s empathetic AI home hub, validated my expectations. Similarly, the rise of deepfakes underscored the growing “fake reality,” and Edge AI adoption accelerated, enabling real-time processing on devices.

Emerging Trends: 

AI-quantum computing convergence shows promise but remains in its infancy, and some researchers now question whether we need quantum computing if we have advanced AI. Synthetic biology, though advancing, is yet to enter the mainstream.     READ MORE...

Bob Seger Against the wind

In The NEWS

South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol faces impeachment vote.

The National Assembly is poised to vote Saturday evening local time on whether to impeach Yoon after the conservative president temporarily declared martial law earlier in the week. Yoon's decision was based on the alleged presence of antistate, pro-North Korean influences within the country. Members of Yoon's party and the opposition liberal coalition have pushed for impeachment. See updates here.



Paris’ Notre Dame Cathedral reopens this weekend after 2019 fire.

A reopening service will be held tonight for over 1,500 invite-only guests, followed by an inaugural Mass tomorrow. Over 50 heads of state and government are expected to attend. The reopening comes more than five years after a fire in 2019 caused the now-861-year-old landmark's roof to collapse. Public viewing areas for 40,000 spectators will be set up along the southern bank of the Seine.



Appeals court upholds law requiring sale or ban of TikTok in US.

A federal appeals court upheld a US law requiring TikTok's Chinese parent company, ByteDance, to either sell the app or face a ban in the US by mid-January. The ruling dismissed TikTok's claim that the law infringes on First Amendment rights, emphasizing the US government's actions aim to protect its citizens from potential foreign adversarial threats. TikTok said it will take its case to the Supreme Court.



Manslaughter charge against former marine Daniel Penny dismissed.

The jury in the trial of Penny had reported Friday they were deadlocked and unable to reach a unanimous decision on whether he was guilty of manslaughter in the May 2023 death of Jordan Neely on a New York City subway. The judge dismissed the manslaughter charge after a request from prosecutors and instructed the jury to consider a lesser count of criminally negligent homicide.



US economy adds 227,000 jobs in November, more than expected.

The nonfarm payroll growth is up from a revised growth of 36,000 in October and beats economist estimates of 214,000 jobs. The unemployment rate edged higher to 4.2% from 4.1%, as expected. Average hourly earnings rose 0.4% month-over-month and 4% year-over-year—both 0.1 percentage point higher than expected. See all data here.



Romanian top court annuls presidential election result over interference.

Romania's Constitutional Court annulled the first round of the presidential election after intelligence services warned about a Russian influence campaign supporting conservative populist candidate Calin Georgescu. The decision means the entire first round of voting will be redone, with a new date to be set, following concerns about foreign interference and the integrity of the electoral process.

SOURCE:  1440 NEWS