Saturday, October 15
ALL SOLAR for Five Hours
Greece ran entirely on renewable energy for five hours last Friday for the first time ever - using solar, wind and hydroelectric power.
It reached a record high of 3,106MWh (megawatt hours) of electricity at 9am local time (7am UK time), according to IPTO, the country's independent power transmission operator.
IPTO said: "For the first time in the history of the Greek electricity system, the demand was covered 100% from renewable energy sources."
Greece aims to more than double its green energy capacity as it hopes renewables will account for at least 70% of its energy mix by 2030. READ MORE...
AI Changes Art
Art is subjective. It encompasses many points of view and can withstand just as many or more definitions. As a term, it's ever-evolving, and the boundaries for what can be deemed art continue to get pushed.
Artificial intelligence is not generally associated with art, and yet, AI has made its mark on the art industry. The question is, would that endure, or is AI art a fluke? Will AI carve itself a space in art, or will it be quickly forgotten as a failed experiment?
Art is such a broad term that you get stumped trying to define it clearly. What is art? It's visual, performative, and so much more. It can be music and dance, sculptures and literary works. Photography is a form of art, and so is architecture. There's also cinematic art. Art is more than an old painting in a museum.
Modern art is excellent at pushing the boundaries of what is considered art. Anything can be art as long as people perceive it as such. A banana duct-taped to a wall is considered modern art. The performative act of eating that banana, thus destroying the artwork, is also considered modern art. READ MORE...
Causes of Inflation
WASHINGTON (AP) — What keeps driving inflation so high? The answer, it seems, is nearly everything.
Supply chain snarls and parts shortages inflated the cost of factory goods when the economy rocketed out of the pandemic recession two years ago. Then it was a surge in consumer spending fueled by federal stimulus checks. Then Russia’s invasion of Ukraine disrupted gas and food supplies and sent those prices skyward.
Since March, the Federal Reserve has been aggressively raising interest rates to try to cool the price spikes. So far, there’s little sign of progress. Thursday’s report on consumer prices in September came in hotter than expected even as some previously big drivers of inflation — gas prices, used cars — fell for a third straight month.
Consumer prices, excluding volatile food and energy costs, skyrocketed 6.6% from a year ago — the fastest such pace in four decades. Overall inflation did decline a touch, mostly because of cheaper gas. But costlier food, medical care and housing pointed to a widening of price pressures across the economy. READ MORE...
Friday, October 14
The Democratic Party's Privilege Problem
If you ever get the feeling that Democratic campaign staffers are a lot whiter and better-credentialed than the party’s voters, you’re right. And Swarthmore College sociologist Daniel Laurison now has data to back it up.
According to Laurison’s database of more than 4,500 Republican and Democratic staffers who worked on presidential primary and general election campaigns from 2004 to 2020, 68% of Democratic staffers are white, compared to 60% of Democratic voters.
The differences become even more stark when we turn to education. Over 90% of Democratic staffers have college degrees, compared to two-thirds of U.S. adults who have graduated college. And 40% of Democratic staffers went to elite schools, such as those in the Ivy League, compared to just 4% of the overall population. READ MORE...
Space Dust Rings
A new image from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope reveals a remarkable cosmic sight: at least 17 concentric dust rings emanating from a pair of stars. Just 5,300 light-years from Earth, the star duo are collectively known as Wolf-Rayet 140.
Each ring was created when the two stars came close together and their stellar winds (streams of gas they blow into space) collided so forcefully that some of the gas was compressed into dust. The stars' orbits bring them together about once every eight years, and forms a half-shell of dust that looks like a ring from our perspective.
Like a cosmic fingerprint, the 17 rings reveal more than a century of stellar interactions—and the "fingerprint" belonging to Wolf-Rayet 140 may be equally unique. Other Wolf-Rayet stars produce dust, but no other pair are known to produce rings quite like Wolf-Rayet 140. READ MORE...
OPEC+ Turned Down Biden's Request
WASHINGTON – The Biden administration admitted Thursday it had asked Saudi Arabia to delay the OPEC+ vote to cut oil production until the cartel’s next meeting – after the midterm elections.
“We presented Saudi Arabia with analysis to show that there was no market basis to cut production targets, and that they could easily wait for the next OPEC meeting to see how things developed,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said in a statement.
The Riyadh-led group of oil producers’ next meeting is scheduled for Dec. 4, according to the OPEC website.
Kirby also alleged that other OPEC member nations “communicated to us privately that they also disagreed with the Saudi decision, but felt coerced to support Saudi’s direction.”
The White House was responding to a Wednesday night statement from the Saudi foreign ministry hitting back at Washington’s accusation that it had taken sides with Russia in Moscow’s war against Ukraine. READ MORE...
Thursday, October 13
Future Warfighting with 6G Networks
With 5G broadband networks still being rolled out worldwide, the US and China are racing for supremacy in next-generation 6G, with significant implications for future warfighting.
An August report by the International Institute of Strategic Studies (IISS) notes that China is following a centralized command model in applying 6G technology to military purposes. On the other side, the US is relying more on enabling lower levels of command and operators to take the initiative to make critical decisions.
The IISS report says that 6G technology may play a key role in China’s hypersonic weapons program, including in solving the current communication blackout at hypersonic speeds. READ MORE...
Florida's Use of COVID Funds
A watchdog group with the U.S. Treasury Department plans to examine whether Florida government properly used federal pandemic recovery money in connection to last month’s efforts to relocate migrants, a top official with the agency told the Massachusetts congressional delegation last week.
In a letter dated Oct. 7, Richard Delmar, the Treasury Department’s deputy inspector general, wrote that his department plans “to get this work underway as quickly as possible,” as part of its broader oversight of Florida’s use of funds allocated by the American Rescue Plan Act last year.
Delmar was responding to a written request from members of the Massachusetts congressional delegation, who last month called on the department to investigate what the lawmakers deemed a misuse of pandemic relief money. READ MORE...
Ovewewr 50,000 Contaminated Sites in USA
Researchers have determined that the country is dotted with tens of thousands of locations that may be contaminated by PFAS, which are per- and poly-fluoroalkyl substances—aka forever chemicals that do not disintegrate over time in nature or in the human body.
Now, they’re mapping those sites to help regulators better direct resources toward cleanup efforts.
A new study published today in Environmental Science & Technology Letters estimates that there are over 50,000 PFAS-contaminated sites throughout the United States.
A new study published today in Environmental Science & Technology Letters estimates that there are over 50,000 PFAS-contaminated sites throughout the United States.
The researchers argued that in the absence of testing data, they can presume contamination based on three categories of facilities that are very likely to be contaminated with PFAS chemicals. READ MORE...
Wednesday, October 12
NATO Holding Nuclear Exercises
BRUSSELS (AP) — NATO will push ahead with long-planned nuclear exercises next week despite rising tensions over the war in Ukraine and President Vladimir Putin’s insistence that he is not bluffing about using all available means to defend Russian territory, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday.
The exercise, dubbed “Steadfast Noon,” is held annually and usually runs for about one week. It involves fighter jets capable of carrying nuclear warheads but does not involve any live bombs. Conventional jets, and surveillance and refueling aircraft also routinely take part.
Fourteen of the 30 NATO member countries will be involved in the exercise, which was planned before Russia invaded Ukraine in February. The main part of the maneuvers would be held more than 1,000 kilometers (625 miles) from Russia, a NATO official said.
“It would send a very wrong signal if we suddenly now cancelled a routine, long-time planned exercise because of the war in Ukraine. That would be absolutely the wrong signal to send,” Stoltenberg told reporters on the eve of a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels. READ MORE...
Nissan Pulls Out of Russia
The Nissan car manufacturer sold all of its assets in Russia to the Russian government for a single Euro on Tuesday.
Nissan is only the latest major company to flee Russia following Russian President Vladimir Putin's invasion of Ukraine in February. The deal costs Nissan roughly $687 million, but the company believes it will not affect the earnings forecast for the fiscal year, according to Reuters.
Nissan's move comes months after the company cut business ties with Russia in March, suspending production at its plant in St. Petersburg. The company has roughly 2,000 employees in the country.
"On behalf of Nissan, I thank our Russian colleagues for their contribution to the business over many years," Nissan President and CEO Makoto Uchida said in a Tuesday statement. "While we cannot continue operating in the market, we have found the best possible solution to support our people." READ MORE...
Tulsi Gabbard Leaves Democratic Party
Former Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard announced she left the Democratic Party on Tuesday, denouncing the organization as an "elitist cabal."
Gabbard, who retired from the House of Representatives in 2021, attacked the institution in a nearly 30-minute video posted to her YouTube account. She did not announce plans to join the Republican Party or adopt any other political affiliation, however.
"I can no longer remain in today’s Democratic Party that is now under the complete control of an elitist cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly wokeness, who divide us by racializing every issue & stoke anti-white racism..."
Gabbard said in an excerpt posted to Twitter.She went on to call on other moderate Democrats to follow in her footsteps. READ MORE...
Tuesday, October 11
Living With Health Issues
From age 40-60, I walked 5 miles a day 7 days a week, never drank alcohol, never smoked, stopped eating red meat, fried foods, and sugars 95% of the time.
At age 60, I was first diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma, and then during that time suffered a serious heart attack where it was recommended that I have a triple bypass; however, I had 5 stents put in instead over a period of a year and 3 operations.
At 65, and in all probability, the treatment that I was receiving for my Lymphoma caused me to contract Melanoma on the bottom of my left foot, that spread to my groin, and then to my neck.
At age 74, I had L2-L3-L4-L5-S1 fused together that was part of growing old and would have been worse had I not been so damn healthy all my life. It has been over 4 months since the surgery and I am still learning how to walk normal again. I walk 1.5 miles each day in 33 minutes and take 1 day off.
Over the last 14 years, I have had over 150 infusions, 8 surgeries, 6 intensive radiation treatments, been hospitalized for a staph infection where I became septic and almost died, and have had to watch my physical health and strength gradually decline.
I turn 75 this month and figure that at the most, I only have 2 decades left to live. While that bothers me, I don't think about it... what I do think about, it what I am going to do today, maybe tomorrow, and check and see what appts that I might have the following week.
I try to argue with my wife or get too upset with Democratic politics... I am concerned about Russia and China and our Oil concerns, but there is really nothing I can do about them... it is time for a new generation to take over... and hope they will learn before it is too late to change their minds.
My big concern right now is that my Oncologist is just as old as I am, and one day soon he will retire and then what? His risk taking and standing by his experience saved my life as my cancers had gotten to the point where he said it was hard to stop them... but he did going against the wisdom of a younger team of doctors.
I have been blessed with a strong, sturdy body with strong bones, and a mind that is fixed but flexible and relatively intelligence with its awareness, understanding, retention, and knowledge. Good eyes, teeth, and hearing although all three are showing wear and tear.
I was never overweight except when I was 40 and 65 through the present... largely because of the steroids I took for 14 years, but if I can lose 10 more pounds then I am back to the weight for my age.
My diet of fish, chicken, beans, veges, and rice is keeping my heart and heart arteries at the repair age of 61. My cardiologest is impressed with those results and only needs to see me every 12 months instead of every 6 months.
I will continue to walk 1.5 miles a day in the mornings and in a couple of months will walk 1.5 miles in the afternoons for as long as I can... just because I can and because it is healthy to do so.
Discipline & Determination
In 1987, when I was 40 years old and had smoked cigarettes for 25 years, I decided to quit COLD TURKEY... and, this is exactly what I did...
- no mental digressions
- no weaknesses to start again
- no alcohol substitutes
The reason why there were no alcoholic substitutes is because I quit drinking alcohol as well...
Do you know what it is like to drink alcohol without smoking???
I do, because I spent 12 months planning the eventual day that I would quit... so during those 12 months, I did not smoke when one typically smokes like when drinking, after eating, after sex, etc.
So, my mind was right when I finally did it.
I quit on my 40th birthday. That morning I woke up and had 7 cigarettes left in a pack and knew if I threw them away, I would want to start smoking again... so, I smoked those 7 and STOPPED.
The first 6 months I gained 50 pounds because I was eating candy, especially in the car. After 6 months and needing to buy new pants... well that pissed me off... so my research indicated that if one counted one's intake of fat grams, one could lose weight.
More discipline and determination...
- This discipline and determination helped me find new jobs after mine were lost.
- This discipline and determination helped me build a new life in another state after my divorce.
- This discipline and determination helped me earn a BA and an MBA while married with a child and working 50+ hours each week.
- This discipline and determination helped me rebuild my life after a severe heart attack and after having 5 lumbar disks fused.
- This discipline and determination helped me mentally deal with fighting two kinds of cancers simultaneously for over 14 years.
- This discipline and determination has helped me saved (not invest) over a million dollars during my lifetime.
- This discipline and determination helps me write novels in retirement.
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