Larry Summers is in the news lately for his association with Emmanuel Goldstein: “Larry Summers steps back from public commitments, ‘deeply ashamed’ by Epstein revelations” (Politico).
Was there anyone ridiculing him 20 years ago? Yes! See “Women in Science” from this very server:
Summers was deservedly castigated [fired from Harvard for musings regarding why there weren’t more mathematicians and physicists identifying as “women”] , but not for the right reasons. He claimed to be giving a comprehensive list of reasons why there weren’t more women reaching the top jobs in the sciences. Yet Summers, an economist, left one out: Adjusted for IQ, quantitative skills, and working hours, jobs in science are the lowest paid in the United States. This article explores this fourth possible explanation for the dearth of women in science: They found better jobs.
Is “early ridiculer” credit a thing?
Separately, remember that Larry Summers and Claudine Gay have nothing left of their careers other than lifetime jobs and monthly paychecks that will keep flowing regardless of how senile and incompetent they become.
Separately, the article says that it will take at least 10 years for these fighters to be produced:
Dassault Aviation, the French aircraft manufacturer of the Rafale, would struggle to produce 100 jet fighters within the next 10 years, said Léo Péria-Peigné, a researcher at the French Institute for International Relations. Manufacturing a Rafale takes around two to three years, and the company said last month it still had 233 jets on order that it aimed to deliver over the next five years.
Does this mean that people expect the Russia-Ukraine war to continue for at least 10 more years?
Some photos from an October 2025 visit to Frederick, Maryland that are relevant to our observance of Transgender Awareness Week…
Formerly Christian churches have been mostly converted over to Rainbow Flagism, e.g., a Lutheran church founded in 1738:
The United Church of Christ, founded in 1745:
Their principal flag:
The chamber of commerce folks have adopted the full trans-enhanced religoin:
The shops around town generally adhere to Rainbow-First Retail in which shoppers must pass by a sacred flag as they enter. Perhaps under the guidance of the above business organization, the rainbow flags at businesses nearly all have a “Protect Trans Kids” inscription within the Biden-style trans triangle:
We hit Frederick on the way back from a history tour of Harper’s Ferry, West Virginia and the Antietam battlefield from the War of Northern Aggression. Because we visited during the shutdown (October 3, 2025), it was a great lesson for the kids on how times changed. In the mid-19th century government workers had to come into work every day and toil in extreme temperatures in order to receive pay. In the 21st century, government workers are guaranteed to get paid while sitting at home and the taxpayers who must fund their paychecks are denied entry to various historical sites and museums.
The “ferry” part of Harper’s Ferry is now bridged for the convenience of trains and hikers. Harper’s Ferry is the HQ for the Appalachian Trail Conservancy and the town is rich in resources regarding the trail. As recently as 1970 only about 10 people per year hiked the entire trail. Today it is more than 1,000 per year.
The ironwork done in 1893 is still keeping the trains from falling into the river, 132 years later:
The machines that were so critical to Union success in the War of Northern Aggression continue to roll through Harper’s Ferry:
The “park store” in town is run by a private group and was therefore open. It was, apparently, women who did most of the fighting in the Civil War (there was no section for “men’s history” or “white history”):
Spotted in a local’s driveway and pointed out by our keen-eyed 10-year-old (don’t miss the “Punch More Nazis”):
Below is the closed visitor center for the Antietam battlefield. Just as education wasn’t “essential” during coronapanic, this educational facility isn’t “essential” during a shutdown (i.e., the workers get paid at 100 percent and the kids who show up and try to learn something get nothing).
Here’s a sobering reminder of our insignificance. Soldiers whose names are long-forgotten fought and died for control of Burnside’s Bridge. The Sycamore tree at the far end was there during the battle and it remains there today, 160 years later.
The battlefield isn’t as dense in sculpture as Vicksburg or Gettysburg, but there are many beautiful pieces nonetheless. Examples:
We eventually made it back to Bethesda where the kids learned about the health benefits of marijuana, the importance of Black lives specifically (Korean restaurant door), and the evils of plastic straws (imagine telling a 1970s high schooler that one day marijuana would be considered “essential” and plastic straws would be considered tremendously harmful!).
I have a business trip to Wilmington, Delaware. I thought I would check to see if there was any reason to tack on a day at the end to do something in “Filthadelphia”. Here’s the official tourism site for “the City of Brotherly Love”, reached after searching (on October 13) for “events in philadelphia november 2025”:
Here’s the first event listed:
The text:
A bold installation honoring transgender, queer, intersex and asexual members of the community, In Plain Sight debuted during Pride Month and continues to serve as a vibrant celebration of the TQ+ community on the Delaware River waterfront.
Created in collaboration with local artists and creatives, the sculpture incorporates colors from the different LGBTQ+ pride flags, each representing a segment of the community. The piece sends a loud, clear (and proud) message that all LGBTQ+ visitors are wanted and welcomed warmly in the birthplace of liberty.
A reminder that exactly five years ago, the police in Pennsylvania were hunting for college kids who committed the crime of assembly (formerly a “right” protected by the First Amendment). From Life on campus during the plague:
Our family room TV is almost impossible to use due to the fact that the hub of the system is a Yamaha RX-6A AV receiver with a complex user interface and many functions that overlap with the TV. What’s worse, the Yamaha has already had one HDMI switch board failure and seems to be on track for another one (the receiver is about 3.5 years old and sells for almost exactly what we paid for the vastly-more-useful and vastly-simpler-to-use 86-inch LG TV, i.e., $800 (we got the TV at Costco 3.5 years ago for $900, but they threw in a five-year warranty that should have been worth about $100).
What functions of the Yamaha do we actually want? We want it to switch among HDMI inputs and amplify sound for five passive speakers. If we had a subwoofer we’d want it to provide a line-level output for a powered subwoofer. A modern television already supports HDMI switching, typically among 4 inputs, which is plenty for 99% of consumers (cable TV box, some sort of dongle, maybe a slide show player). The modern television also puts out multi-channel audio and volume control commands via its eARC HDMI output. From ChatGPT:
Given how cheap Class D amplifiers are and how inventive Asian electronics companies are, I can’t figure out why there isn’t a display-free and remote-free 5- or 7-channel amplifier with a line-level subwoofer output that could take eARC with Consumer Electronics Control (CEC) input and drive one’s legacy passive speakers. This would enable consumers who’ve cut their cable cords to enjoy true surround sound with just one remote control. As a minor enhancement, when the TV is off and eARC has no signal the little amp could offer to play a Bluetooth source, e.g., from a phone app, through the two main speakers.
There must be something wrong with this product idea because nobody makes a “keep the TV at the center of the TV-watching system” amp. But what is the flaw?
Naval Air Station Pensacola canceled this year’s Blue Angels Homecoming Air Show due to uncertainty regarding government funding. Officials said the ongoing government shutdown, limited funding and the time needed to arrange for performers and necessary support contracts are key reasons for canceling the annual two-day event, according to a Facebook post by NAS Pensacola. The show was originally set for Nov. 14- 15 in Pensacola, Fla., and expected to draw hundreds of thousands of visitors.
Access to Naval Air Station Pensacola, home of the museum as well as the Pensacola Lighthouse and Maritime Museum, and Fort Barrancas, had been restricted to Department of Defense cardholders since December 6, 2019, when a terrorist opened fire at the military base, killing three and wounding eight.
On the morning of December 6, 2019, a terrorist attack occurred at Naval Air Station Pensacola in Pensacola, Florida. The assailant killed three men and injured eight others. The shooter was killed by Escambia County sheriff deputies after they arrived at the scene. He was identified as Mohammed Saeed Alshamrani, an Air Force aviation student from Saudi Arabia. … On January 13, 2020, the Department of Justice said they had officially classified the incident as an act of terrorism, motivated by “jihadist ideology.”
On February 2, 2020, al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed responsibility for the shooting. In an audio recording, emir of the Yemen-based group Qasim al-Raymi said they directed Alshamrani to carry out the attack. On May 18, 2020, the FBI corroborated the claims.
In response to the domestic jihad, the government excluded taxpayers from the museum for about 3.5 years and then opened the border for any other jihadi who might want to settle permanently in the U.S., e.g., “Nasir Ahmad Tawhedi, an Afghan national who entered the US on September 9, 2021, via humanitarian parole (later applying for a Special Immigrant Visa). In October 2024, he was arrested in Oklahoma City for plotting an ISIS-inspired Election Day mass shooting attack targeting large gatherings. Tawhedi purchased AK-47 rifles and ammunition from undercover FBI agents, communicated with an ISIS facilitator, and planned to die as a martyr. He pleaded guilty in June 2025 to conspiring to provide material support to ISIS and attempting to acquire firearms for a terrorism offense” (Grok).
A friend in suburban Boston apparently delights in enraging his neighbors and, thus, purchased a Cybertruck. His monstrous machine upgraded itself to FSD v14 last night. Our message exchange:
have you tried it?
Just did. It was needing to make a left turn onto a side street. A car was coming in the other direction making a right turn on the same road. They had their turn signal on. The truck turned in front of them and went first, violating the right of way.
So it had one dangerous failure in its first 15 minutes of use?
5 minutes
A New Jersey-based Tesla Y owner in the same group:
It is much more twitchy than v13. It will hesitate hard at blowing leaves and other situations. But it is much more responsive to legit threats, like when another car starts to enter your lane.
(My friends love paying taxes to progressive Democrats!)
What’s happened since then? Are nearly all of the jihadis and their supporters out of prison by now? “Most of the Paris attackers were French and Belgian born citizens of Moroccan and Algerian backgrounds…” Salah Abdeslam, a Belgian man who chickened out and did not detonate his suicide vest, was sentenced to “life in prison”, but “life” doesn’t necessarily mean “life” in progressive societies.
How’s Europe doing now compared to then? Did a few years of meekly complying with lockdowns and mask orders calm Europeans down, including the jihadis? The Wikipedia page “Islamic terrorism in Europe” doesn’t seem to list attacks after 2021.
Politico says that the attacks substantially boosted government power:
The attacks forever changed the country and its politics, tipping the balance of protecting civil liberties versus ensuring public safety in favor of the latter.
Since 2015, France has passed a slew of laws meant to ensure such an event could never happen again. Members of parliament have expanded the state’s surveillance powers and its ability to impose restrictive measures without prior judicial approval. They’ve also reshaped France’s immigration policy and oversight of religious — particularly Muslim — organizations.
The French loss of liberty seems to be evidence for my theory that immigration from disparate cultures is inconsistent with liberty. If residents of a country don’t share a common language, culture, or religion, the only way for the rulers of that country to ensure safety is by taking away their subjects’ rights, e.g., the right to privacy or the right to own a gun.
Related:
Gonzalez v. Google LLC, a case decided by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2023 regarding the extent to which YouTube could be held responsible for showing jihad-related content to European Muslims who would otherwise have been entirely peaceful or at least mostly peaceful
