Author: philg

Kwanzaa versus Hanukkah, a first grade perspective

by philg

The Federal Aviation Administration likes to remind flight instructors that it is possible to control what one says, but not what the recipient of a communication hears.

The Palm Beach Public Schools prepared a helpful two-page document comparing the multi-day candle-oriented holidays of Hanukkah and Kwanzaa. The local first graders were sentenced to read this document and answer questions about it. Our own first grader was asked by the teacher what the difference was between Kwanzaa and Hanukkah. His answer: “Kwanzaa is for Black people and Hanukkah is for white people.” (When he was at dinner recounting the interaction, I corrected this misinformation faster than a Hunter Biden fan working at Twitter. I cued up a Sammy Davis Jr. song and explained that people of any race could convert to Judaism.)

Shutterfly doesn’t seem to offer a tri-fold holiday card with Merry Christmas, Happy Kwanzaa, and Happy New Year. So I’ve been adding a Kwanzaa stamp to the holiday cards that I mail to friends in Maskachusetts and California:

Happy Last Day of Kwanzaa to all of my readers who celebrate. And, for readers who aren’t following the Lunar New Year, Happy New Year!… please share your resolutions.

My own resolution? Threatened by SARS-CoV-2, a virus that attacks the obese, I’m going to try to eat more healthful and nutritious meals, as promoted by official scientists at the USDA. For example, pizza topped with extra cheese and supported by a cheese-stuffed crust:

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A Bidenflation New Year’s Eve party

by philg

Some photos from a recent trip to Costco where we stocked up for holiday entertaining. A roast feeds a lot of (masked-for-safety) people inexpensively:

Wash it down with some red wine, reduced in price thanks to a glut in Australia:

Costco in Florida offers fun family fireworks for after dinner:

And the local Publix agrees that explosives and incendiaries are safe for the whole family:

Happy New Year to everyone!

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Toaster for Kwanzaa

by philg

Happy 5th day of Kwanzaa everyone. Here’s a kinara that a friend designed and 3D-printed:

I can probably get the 3D model from him if you need it for next year.

Inspired by the life of Professor Dr. Dr. Maulana Karenga, Ph.D., Ph.D., the creator of Kwanzaa, I ordered a new Breville toaster oven (“They also were hit on the heads with toasters” — Wikipedia) this week. It would have been nicer to get a Karenga- or Kwanzaa-branded toaster, but the Australians behind Breville apparently aren’t experts on Kujichagulia, Ujima, and Kuumba. I’m pretty sure that they have studied Professor Karenga’s work on Ujamaa (“cooperative economics”) because I have had to cooperate with them on about 6 toasters in 12 years (the function knobs fail, making it tough to switch modes; I paid Amazon for 3 extra years of warranty on this latest one). Our old huge-for-a-countertop Breville air fryer oven still works, though the function knob is touchy, but we’re using it outside to cook fish, etc. The Smart Oven Pro takes up less counter space and is plenty big for most projects. It is not quite as heavy as the air fryer version, but still suitable for traditional Kwanzaa observance (hitting kidnapped women on the head). Due to the small size and low thermal mass, it heats up much faster than your regular kitchen oven(s). I love this toaster oven for everything except… making toast. The bread is much farther from the heating elements so you don’t get the fast perfect browning of a conventional pop-up toaster. Who else bought a toaster this year for Kwanzaa?

Let’s check out the Ministry of Truth at ChatGPT:

ChatGPT:

The founder of Kwanzaa is Maulana Karenga, who is not a convicted criminal.

Wikipedia:

In 1971, he was convicted of felony assault, torture, and false imprisonment of women.

(Unclear if there was a specific toaster-related conviction.)

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How are the Europeans doing with their Cheat Our Way to Economic Prosperity plan?

by philg

Back in September, the Europeans decided to deal with energy price inflation by cheating. They’d hide the market prices from consumers by borrowing (printing?) money. “Germany will borrow nearly $200 billion to cap consumers’ energy bills” (CNN, 9/29/2022):

The German government announced plans to borrow €200 billion ($195 billion) to cap natural gas prices for households and businesses. That’s a bigger price tag than the £150 billion ($165 billion) the UK government is expected to borrow to finance its own price cap.

Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, is trying to cope with surging gas and electricity costs caused largely by a collapse in Russian gas supplies to Europe. Moscow has blamed these supply issues on the Western sanctions that followed its invasion of Ukraine in February.

“Prices have to come down, so the government will do everything it can. To this end, we are setting up a large defensive shield,” said German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Thursday.

The package will be financed with new borrowing this year, as Berlin makes use of the suspension of a constitutionally enshrined limit on new debt of 0.35% of gross domestic product.

Lindner also said the steps would act as a brake on inflation, which has hit its highest level in more than a quarter century.

Consumer prices rose 10.9% in the year through September, provisional data from the country’s statistics office showed on Thursday.

As in the U.S., when the government spends more, inflation is guaranteed to come down (our “Inflation Reduction Act”). It’s been a few months How has the decision to pretend that gas prices didn’t go up gone? This December 14, 2022 report says that inflation across Europe is typically in the double digits. How about in Switzerland, where they deny the Science of printing money? From December 1: “Swiss inflation steady at 3.0% in November as expected”. The U.S. Congress and Federal Reserve have proven that there is no need to work harder in order to become richer and yet the Swiss reject this proven scientific result.

At least back in October, inflation wasn’t keeping folks in Paris from partying:

What about our own stagflation? “Home Depot co-founder says ‘socialism’ killed motivation to work: ‘Nobody gives a damn’” (New York Post, 12/29/2022):

The 93-year-old billionaire co-founder of Home Depot blamed “socialism” for Americans lacking the motivation to work and warned that the future of capitalism is in danger.

Bernie Marcus — who along with Arthur Blank built Home Depot into a nationwide empire from just two stores founded in Atlanta in the late 1970s — told Financial Times on Thursday, “Nobody works.”

“Just give it to me. Send me money. I don’t want to work — I’m too lazy, I’m too fat, I’m too stupid,” Marcus said about what he perceived as the attitude permeating the country.

“Nobody gives a damn.”

The longtime Republican backer ticked down a list of people he blamed for standing in the way of private enterprise, including President Biden, “the woke people,” the news media, Harvard graduates, MBAs, lawyers and accountants.

“I’m worried about capitalism,” said Marcus, whose net worth is estimated by Bloomberg at $5.25 billion. “Capitalism is the basis of Home Depot [and] millions of people have earned this success and had success.”

Billionaires can’t buy this Bernie because he already is one!

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Want to come to MIT for Private Pilot ground school January 11-13?

by philg

After nearly three years of complete coronapanic, the MIT campus reopened to the public on December 1, 2022. Consequently, if Maskachusetts officials don’t impose a Science-based lockdown in the next two weeks we’re doing our three-day FAA ground school in person on campus, January 11-13 from 9-5 in Room 1-390. Full details and a registration link on the class home page. For non-MIT students the course is available at a significant discount to the $500,000 list price of an MIT degree…. $free.

If anyone is concerned about contracting a SARS-CoV-2 infection in a 70-person lecture hall, I will be happy to purchase a P100 respirator for you so long as you promise to wear it for the full 7-8 hours of daily class. See below for Mx. Cherry and Mx. Nerode modeling this type of mask in a recent NYT article.

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Why can’t we get Art Nouveau furniture made by CNC?

by philg

What I wanted for Christmas and did not get is an entire house full of Art Nouveau furniture as seen in the Musée d’Orsay or the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Here are a few images of the collection at the d’Orsay, from our October 2022 trip there:

With modern 3D printing (e.g., for the lamp) and computer numerical control (CNC) routers, what stops the mostly-automated production at near-IKEA prices of replicas of the above works of genius and craftsmanship? An IKEA-crafted bed for comparison:

Maybe the problem is that putting an Art Nouveau piece into a standard American developer-built house or 2BR apartment would make the walls look sadly lacking in ornamentation.

Related:

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Government cannot agree on whether coronapanic is over

by philg

“Migrant Expulsion Policy Must Stay in Place for Now, Supreme Court Says” (NYT, yesterday):

The Supreme Court said on Tuesday that a pandemic-era health measure that restricted migration at the southern border would remain in place for the time being, delaying the potential for a huge increase in unlawful crossings.

Unlawful? If they’re coming over to claim asylum, isn’t that a lawful crossing of an open border?

“The administration asked to end Title 42, but there was no clear plan for how they would have managed the inevitable influx,” said Justin Gest, a professor at George Mason University who studies the politics of immigration.

The expulsion policy, first introduced by the Trump administration in March 2020, has been used to expel migrants — including many asylum seekers — about 2.5 million times.

“We are deeply disappointed for the desperate asylum seekers who will continue to be denied even the chance to show they are in danger,” said Lee Gelernt, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union, which represents migrants challenging the expulsion policy. “But this ruling is only temporary, and we will continue this court battle.”

Justice Gorsuch, joined by Justice Jackson, said the legal question that the court agreed to address, about the states’ intervention, “is not of special importance in its own right and would not normally warrant expedited review.”

By issuing a stay while it addressed that question, he added, the court effectively took an incorrect position, at least temporarily, on the larger issue in the case: whether the coronavirus pandemic justifies the immigration policy. The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had initially adopted the policy to prevent cross-border transmission of the disease, a policy that the agency has since said is no longer medically necessary.

“The current border crisis is not a Covid crisis,” Justice Gorsuch wrote. “And courts should not be in the business of perpetuating administrative edicts designed for one emergency only because elected officials have failed to address a different emergency. We are a court of law, not policymakers of last resort.”

So… the CDC and Justice Gorsuch agree that coronapanic is over. We have nothing to fear from 2.5 million unvaccinated potentially SARS-CoV-2-infected immigrants.

But… at the same time, we are informed by the CDC that Science says coronapanic is not over. “Requirement for Proof of COVID-19 Vaccination for Air Passengers” (cdc.gov) has not been updated since July 14, 2022:

On October 25, 2021, the President issued a Proclamation to suspend and limit entry into the United States for non-U.S. citizens who are nonimmigrants, referred to as “Covered individuals,” seeking to enter the United States by air travel and are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19. On the same day, CDC issued the Order: Implementing Presidential Proclamation on Safe Resumption of Global Travel During the COVID-19 Pandemic to implement the President’s direction.

It might make sense to have two branches of government disagreeing, but in this case it seems that the CDC disagrees with itself. Millions of unvaccinated asylum-seekers crossing via land to settle permanently are not a threat. Even a single unvaccinated air traveler who intends to stay temporarily, e.g., Novak Djokovic, is an existential threat (like climate change). From CNN:

Readers: Is there a way for these two CDC positions to be rendered logically consistent?

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A meek and compliant people celebrate their own boldness

by philg

A couple of photos from a hotel in Houston, which just recently voted for a gubernatorial candidate who promised California- and Maskachusetts-style lockdowns and mask/vaccine orders:

(Most Texans are Republicans and anti-lockdown Governor Abbott won reelection, but Houston is majority Democrat and voted for Beto.)

I’m wondering how it is possible that a group of humans who recently cowered in place for years can celebrate their own boldness even as quite a few of them long to return to cowering in their bunkers, or at least behind the cloth masks that Dr. Fauci said would preserve them from a deadly aerosol virus.

A photo from the NYT article, showing the two Mxes and their P100 masks:

If everyone at the board game group would commit to wearing well-fitting, high-quality masks — they prefer elastomeric p100s — and the group invested in a HEPA filter, Mx. Cherry says the couple could safely attend. Mx. Nerode’s 90-year-old father, for instance, a math professor at Cornell, has taught all semester with the same equipment.

(The group could also sand a fiberglass boat or airplane as long as they all have their P100 masks on!)

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Why hasn’t Maulana Karenga been invited to the White House to light the kinara?

by philg

President Biden has made Kwanzaa an official U.S. government holiday. Examples:

‘

Wikipedia says that the creator of Kwanzaa, Professor Maulana Karenga (formerly “Ron Everett”), is alive and well and working at California State University, Long Beach. Why hasn’t he been invited to the White House to light the kinara? Who knows more about Kwanzaa than the person who invented it, a couple of years after Kamala Harris was born:

Professor Karenga could also address systemic racism in our criminal justice system. From Wikipedia:

In 1971, he was convicted of felony assault, torture, and false imprisonment of women. He denied involvement and claimed the prosecution was political in nature. Karenga was imprisoned in California Men’s Colony until he received parole in 1975.

One of the victims gave testimony of how Karenga and other men tortured her and another woman. The woman described having been stripped naked and beaten with an electrical cord.

Deborah Jones, who once was given the Swahili title of an African queen, said she and Gail Davis were whipped with an electrical cord and beaten with a karate baton after being ordered to remove their clothes. She testified that a hot soldering iron was placed in Miss Davis’ mouth and placed against Miss Davis’ face and that one of her own big toes was tightened in a vise. Karenga, head of US, also put detergent and running hoses in their mouths, she said. They also were hit on the heads with toasters.

Karenga has declined to discuss the convictions with reporters and does not mention them in biographical materials.[24] During a 2007 appearance at Wabash College, he again denied the charges and described himself as a former political prisoner.

And, of course, to readers who are celebrating, let me wish you a joyous and peaceful Kwanzaa. When I was growing up in Bethesda, Maryland, the first day of Kwanzaa (December 26) was a special time. Friends and family members would fill our home. We would listen to the elders tell stories. During dinner, we would discuss why the Hanukkah presents, e.g., socks, that we had received over 8 nights were so much crummier than all of the awesome Christmas presents that the neighbor kids had received in just one morning.

Related:

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Bankman-Fried as a verb

by philg

How is everyone’s favorite Effective Altruist doing? Regardless of how the legal and financial situation gets untangled, I’m wondering about the linguistic aspects. Could “Bankman-Fried” become an English verb?

“I’m going to try to Bankman-Fried the investors” would mean to tell people about one’s charitable and political plans for wealth to be acquired using their money.

“I Bankman-Frieded the local election” would mean “gave money to ensure a Democrat victory.”

“We’re Bankman-Frieding the C suite” would mean “installing a sex partner as the CEO of a related enterprise.”

We can also look at Sam Bankman-Fried’s mom explaining complex ethical issues and how they could be handled (“Frieded”?):

(A 2014 Stanford Center for Ethics in Society presentation. The tax-exempt institution for exchanging ideas seems to have decided that it wouldn’t be Tethical to allow comments from viewers. As a test, I posted the following:

Great to have Sam Bankman-Fried’s mom’s perspective on this complex topic. I am running a bank right now and am trying to figure out whether it is ethical to steal all of the money that customers have deposited with me. I need some help from the big brains of Stanford.

Let me know if you can see it on YouTube!)

Related:

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