"New Zealand authorities were so worried about an Islamic extremist they were following him around-the-clock and were able to shoot and kill him within 60 seconds of him unleashing a frenzied knife attack that wounded six people Friday at an Auckland supermarket… Three of the shoppers were taken to Auckland hospitals in critical condition, police said. Another was in serious condition, while two more were in moderate condition."
"Space company Firefly launched its Alpha rocket for the first time on Thursday evening, but the vehicle had suffered an issue a couple minutes into ascent and exploded in the sky above the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California."
"Data received late Sept. 1 from NASA’s Perseverance rover indicate the team has achieved its goal of successfully coring a Mars rock. The initial images downlinked after the historic event show an intact sample present in the tube after coring. However, additional images taken after the arm completed sample acquisition were inconclusive due to poor sunlight conditions. Another round of images with better lighting will be taken before the sample processing continues."
We did it! "All Ohio counties are now rated in the red with high community transmission of COVID-19… Ashtabula County was the last of 88 counties in the state to reach a high status." Hey, ho, way to go, Ohio.
"'For me, the takeaway of this story really is that even just momentary short, brief lapses in, you know, taking off a mask can open up an opportunity for delta to escape through,' says Tracy Lam-Hine, the Marin County epidemiologist who authored the report on the outbreak." Also, most schools don't have the ventilation required and 6' apart isn't far enough (because SARS-CoV2 is spread by aerosol).
"After 10 days in the hospital with a near-fatal case of a multi-system inflammatory syndrome related to COVID-19, the then-13-year-old softball phenom and beloved, straight-A student from Hinds County, Miss., was lethargic and frail. She braced herself against the car's door frame… But six months later, despite having watched a loved one struggle with the illness, some of Allie's closest friends and family remain unvaccinated."
"Job creation for August was a huge disappointment, with the economy adding just 235,000 positions, the Labor Department reported Friday… Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for 720,000 new hires… The unemployment rate dropped to 5.2% from 5.4%, in line with estimates." Remember when a 235k jobs report would have been met with exuberance? That was what, 2 years ago? Again, the only disappointment here is that the real number didn't mean Wall Street "expectations."
And the NPR story about the jobs report with a little more nuance.
"The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell last week to 340,000, a pandemic low and another sign that the job market is steadily rebounding from the economic collapse caused by the coronavirus pandemic."
"The Postal Service regularly cheats mail carriers out of their pay, according to a Center for Public Integrity investigation. Managers at hundreds of post offices around the country have illegally underpaid hourly workers for years, arbitrators and federal investigators have found." Whispers, it ain't just the post office.
"McDonald's loyal fans are used to the fast-food chain’s ice cream machines being broken… And now the machines are under investigation by the Federal Trade Commission, The Wall Street Journal reports."
An On the Media podcast (I don't think I posted this yet)… "'Shrill' popped back up in the national lexicon in the coverage of Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential bid, and again, in a 2020 race filled with female candidates… But these slurs are not just the product of age-old misogynistic stereotypes. Biases against female voices were perniciously exacerbated by the broadcast technology that powers radio and audio recording technology. They're designed to thin higher frequency voices and enrich lower ones. In this interview from 2019, she and Brooke revisit the proliferation of radio in the 1920's and 1930's, when our ears were trained to prefer listening to men talk, and reflect on how societal gender standards have been shaped since."
"China’s government banned effeminate men on TV and told broadcasters Thursday to promote 'revolutionary culture,' broadening a campaign to tighten control over business and society and enforce official morality." Waits for conservatives to embrace this move, "Hey, these commie guys have something good going on here."
More guns make us all safer… "Three schools in Rutherford County were on a brief lockdown Wednesday afternoon while officers investigated a nearby incident of shots being fired. The cause of the gunfire? According to Rutherford County officials, an expectant father fired a weapon during a gender reveal phone call." He fired his gun, because he was on the phone, telling his relatives that he was having a boy. This person is too dumb to own firearms.
Time for the sad trombones… "One way the National Rifle Association projects its power is through the image of tens of thousands of members in a convention center, in front of the politicians who back the powerful gun rights organization… But this weekend, for the second year in a row, the NRA's chosen convention center will stand empty, after it was forced to cancel its annual meeting due to the COVID pandemic." Not that they're having cash flow problems at all.
Another On the Media episode… "Algorithms are everywhere, making crucial decisions at almost every juncture of our lives. But, while we may believe in the objectivity of these mathematical models, they're made from and produce far more bias than we think. Mathematician and former Wall Street quant, Cathy O'Neil wants us to question our unexamined faith in predictive algorithms. Her book, Weapons of Math Destruction, calls out an urgent need to investigate these black box constructions that govern so much of our lives, from going to college and getting a job, to online advertising and criminal sentencing. She and Brooke discuss the science behind predictive algorithms and how they can go terribly wrong." As the old saying goes, "garbage in, garbage out, but this garbage having been processed by an extremely expensive machine is now sanctified and none dare question it."
"As a novel six-week abortion ban has significantly curtailed abortion care in Texas, another bill, aimed at restricting medication abortion, is set to become law in the state… The Legislature this week advanced the bill, called Senate Bill 4, which would limit access to medication abortions for many. For now, patients can obtain the medication up until 10 weeks of pregnancy in the state. The measure would prevent physicians from administering it to people who are more than seven weeks pregnant and prohibit the pills from being mailed in Texas." The heartbeat bill was just the tip of this iceberg.
"The Supreme Court's conservative majority tossed a legal bomb into the abortion debate late Wednesday night… By a vote of 5-to-4, the court's most conservative members upheld, for now, a Texas law that, in effect, bans abortions after about six weeks. But almost as important as the result was how the court reached its decision — without full briefing and arguments before any court." Who's the activist court?
Concerned Senators are concerned again. "Sen. Joe Manchin just made it clear Democrats have work to do to win his vote for their sprawling economic plan — and prevent President Joe Biden’s agenda from collapsing… The West Virginia Democrat on Thursday urged party leaders to 'pause' their consideration of a massive $3.5 trillion spending bill. Democrats aim to approve the measure, which would invest in climate policy and social programs, in the coming weeks without Republican support." What Schumer needs to do is look at Joe and say, "Do it. Vote no. You will never be able to travel anywhere without people telling you what a little shit you are." Because until he does, Manchin will pull this shit every single time. This is political brinksmanship. Manchin knows he's the "lynchpin" in the passage. You have to knock him out of that position. Tell him this is the albatross you are willing to tie around his neck.
"A SurveyUSA/San Diego Union-Tribune poll found Newsom beating back the recall by eight percentage points, and a Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) poll released Wednesday night shows the governor leading by an even bigger margin." Now it's just a get out the vote operation. Also note, IIRC, next year the California governors race is on the November 2022 ballot.
"It's been nearly a month since sensitive data about voting equipment in Colorado's Mesa County was posted online by conspiracy theorists eager to cast doubt on the outcome of the 2020 election… At the center of the criminal investigation into how that information was released is county clerk Tina Peters, whose whereabouts remain unknown. She hasn't returned to work in Mesa County since the data breach was announced… The FBI is also investigating the case."
"How the US created a world of endless war… In 2008, many of Barack Obama’s supporters hoped he would bring the global war on terror to a close. Instead, he expanded it – and his successors have done nothing to change course."
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