Linkee-poo on a Tuesday that feels like Monday

"Hurricane Dorian is about 110 miles east northeast of West Palm Beach, Florida, according to the National Hurricane Center's 8 a.m. ET advisory."

Promoting books, "Word of mouth is the old standby. Media interviews are a big help. Book clubs can go a long way to boosting sales. Put those all together and you get celebrity book clubs, which are increasingly seen as a ticket to success."

"The landing module of India's unmanned moon mission separated successfully from the orbiter on Monday in the run-up to its planned touchdown on the moon's south polar region this weekend, the country's space agency said."

"Franklin isn't imagining that: Her neighborhood, Franklin Square, is hotter than about two thirds of the neighborhoods in Baltimore – about six degrees hotter than the city's coolest neighborhood. It's also in one of the city's poorest communities, with more than one third of residents living in poverty." The poor always suffer the worst.

"Eating a diet of French fries, Pringles and white bread was enough to make one teenage boy lose his sight, according to a case study published in a medical journal." Are you sure it was just the diet? Okay, but seriously, eat a balanced diet.

"Cancer has overtaken heart disease as the leading cause of death in wealthy countries and could become the world’s biggest killer within just a few decades if current trends persist, researchers said on Tuesday." Fuck cancer.

"There's encouraging news for patients who have weight loss surgery: A new study finds the benefits of the procedure include decreased risks of heart attacks and strokes as well as healthier blood sugar levels. More than 200,000 Americans each year undergo bariatric surgery." But what they don't tell you is the success rate for such surgery. It isn't that high. Many patients start losing weight, but then reverse that weight loss.

"Rescue crews located what they believed were the remains of 25 people who died after a diving boat caught fire off the coast of Santa Cruz Island, north of Los Angeles, according to a U.S. Coast Guard official."

"Embattled Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said she has caused 'unforgivable havoc' by igniting the political crisis engulfing the city and would quit if she had a choice, according to an audio recording of remarks she made last week to a group of businesspeople."

"The gunman who killed seven people and wounded 25 more in a shooting rampage along a west Texas highway Saturday had previously failed a gun background check, but authorities have not yet said how he obtained the firearm he used." Uh oh, somebody went off script.

"The United States would withdraw 5,400 troops from Afghanistan within 20 weeks as part of a deal 'in principle' with Taliban militants, Washington's top negotiator has said." I have thinky thoughts which are not fit for publication about this.

"A letter threatening to hunt Koreans and containing what appeared to be a bullet has been sent to the South Korean embassy in Japan amid worsening ties between the Asian neighbors, Japanese media said on Tuesday." Racism knows no national boundary and the animosity between Asian countries can go very deep.

How goes Brexit? "British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is pleading with lawmakers to support him amid a brewing rebellion in Parliament – even from members of his own party — to try to block the U.K. from leaving the bloc without securing a deal." So, basically the UK bargaining position is the same as holding a gun to your own head and yelling "cut a deal with me or I'll shoot."

"GE adopted Six Sigma from Motorola in 1995, and under Welch it became corporate religion. The company invested more than $1 billion in training thousands of employees, and the system was adopted by every GE business unit. Tools designed to streamline the making of widgets were adopted for every company process, from accounting to customer service to hiring." How did that work out? How's "Lean Manufacturing" working out these days?

"Secular stagnation is a situation where the private sector of an economy has a tendency to save a great deal and a limited propensity to invest, so that there's all this cash that needs to be absorbed and trouble in absorbing it. Interest rates fall to low levels. Growth has a tendency to be sluggish and inflation has a tendency to decline. And that's not a temporary cyclical situation. It's a secular, or longer term, situation unless policy intervenes very strongly."

"A comprehensive (healthcare) plan could serve as a lightning rod for opponents. Conversely, not having a plan for replacing some of the most popular parts of Obamacare — such as its coverage protections for people with preexisting medical conditions — could leave the GOP flat-footed if an administration-supported lawsuit now before the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals were to invalidate the sweeping health law." For the umpteenth time, conservatives have no healthcare plan other than what we had before Obamacare (which is why we got Obamacare). That's because Obamacare was the conservative plan (mostly).

"With five months before primary season begins, election officials around the country are busy buying new voting equipment." No way this could go wrong. So let's say your electronic voting machine creates the paper record. If the voter isn't able to view that, there really is no way to see if the machine is registering the vote properly.

"Security experts have warned about the prospect of a new era of high quality faked video or audio, which some commentators worry could have deeply corrosive effects on U.S. democracy… Here's what you need to know." Just so we're all up to speed.