Voting for the STEM t-shirt contest is now closed. Thank you to everyone who voted. Now we wait to see. The contest rules basically don't address how the prizes will be awarded, and it's only hinted that the voting will help determine the choices. Since this contest is sponsored by Intel, I'm assuming they'll want a voice in the choice. There is no indication if just votes will be counted, or the "score" of how people voted (1-5) will be used (also very little info on if 1 or 5 was the top choice, so there's that as well). The prize money for this contest is substantial ($10,000 to first place) whereas most of their other contests give out store credit and bragging rights. So sorry for being so spammy lately.
"When 'wokeness' comes to Middle-earth: Why some say diverse casting ruins the new 'Lord of the Rings' series." And those who think it does are ignorant, racist, or simply didn't read the source material deeply enough. First, it's fucking fiction. Second, Tolkien did describe hobbits as having darker skin (as well as other descriptors of characters). And thirdly, you can accept Valinor, the wizards being godlings, dragons, balrogs, an evil that lives forever, vikings as a horse culture, and elves that are immortal, but having any of them being non-white is too far? Let me laugh in your face.
"Flood watches were in effect in the U.S. southeast early Monday as forecasters warn of the possibility of torrential downpours on Labor Day across already saturated ground."
"For months, the 2022 Atlantic hurricane season was notable for one reason: a complete lack of hurricanes. That finally changed on Friday, when Danielle strengthened into the Atlantic's first hurricane since last October."
"America's space agency on Saturday sought to launch a rocket largely cobbled together from the space shuttle, which itself was designed and built more than four decades ago… As the space shuttle often was delayed due to technical problems, it therefore comes as scant surprise that the debut launch of NASA's Space Launch System rocket scrubbed a few hours before its launch window opened. The showstopper was an 8-inch diameter line carrying liquid hydrogen into the rocket. It sprang a persistent leak at the inlet, known as a quick-disconnect, leading on board the vehicle."
"Actor Brendan Fraser received a six-minute standing ovation Sunday night at the Venice Film Festival, after making a comeback to the profession following personal struggles."
"What if there was a way to stop chronic pain in your body before it strikes?… That's the concept behind Vinh Pham's new book, Sit Up Straight: Futureproof Your Body Against Chronic Pain with 12 Simple Movements. Pham, a physical therapist with over a decade of experience, shares a set of exercises aimed at helping to prevent bodily pain that lasts for over three months due to injury, exercise, bad posture or other factors — and relieve it, too. Practicing these movements consistently, he says, can extend your range of motion and increase your flexibility."
"Nurses in North Carolina can now be sued for following doctors’ orders when they cause harm to the patient." Whelp, that's one way to kill a profession.
"An E. coli outbreak that was first detected largely in the Midwest is growing, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says… There are now reported illnesses in New York and Kentucky in addition to those previously recorded in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania."
"The pandemic left workplaces reimagined and workers changed. The number of job openings right now outnumbers people looking for work by almost two-to-one… Last year saw a record exodus of workers, and companies say they are still struggling to hire. Millions have re-evaluated what type of work they were willing to do for what type of pay or benefits and in what type of environment." The economy maybe crazy unstable at the moment, but I am loving that I got to see a moment where the employee has some power while I was alive. And this "quiet quitting" bullshit. No, it's "I'm doing the job you hired me for and pay me for, you don't own me." Given the long time pressures to go "above and beyond" (which is another way of saying, "unpaid labor") it's about time to set boundaries. You want me to give more, than you're going to have to prove we are "family" and not just expect it to happen.
"California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Monday signed a nation-leading measure giving more than a half-million fast food workers more power and protections, despite the objections of restaurant owners who warned it would drive up consumers’ costs."
"The real estate market just can’t catch a break, with inventory of resale homes remaining low and rising interest rates making it harder for buyers to justify making the leap… And now we can add mortgage lender bankruptcies — and the rise (and fall) of 'non-qualified mortgages' — to the factors aggravating an already uncertain market." Here we go again.
"Rather than shell out that kind of money only to depend on the whims of an internet service provider, the 46-year-old decided to create his own fiber ISP."
"Delta Air Lines told an unaccompanied child's father that his daughter had not been picked up from the airport a week after the flight because the airline's system failed to record that she had been collected… Richard Fritz, from Detroit, Michigan, was told that his 13-year-old daughter was 'never released' from the gate when he went to check her in for a flight back home to Burlington, Vermont in the spring."
"Managing your money is obviously an important part of being a responsible adult. But how should you do that? It turns out that there's a large gulf between the advice given by the authors of popular finance books and academic economists."
"Iraq’s caretaker prime minister convened a second round of talks Monday with Iraqi leaders aimed at resolving the ongoing political crisis between rival Shiite blocs, but the representatives of an influential cleric failed once again to attend the gathering."
"The Israeli army said Monday there was a “high possibility” that a soldier killed a well-known Al Jazeera journalist in the occupied West Bank last May, as it announced the results of its investigation into the killing." Gee, ya think?
"Liz Truss will become Britain's next prime minister after winning a leadership race for the governing Conservative Party on Monday, vowing to press ahead with promised tax cuts and action to tackle a deepening energy and cost of living crisis." The conservative playbook is like that old joke about the vet book of horse medicine, except exchange "shoot the horse" for "tax cuts." Oddly, it has the same effect.
"The United Nations' human rights chief has released a long-delayed report on abuses in China's Xinjiang region, despite substantial pressure from Beijing to block the report for the better part of a year… The 48-page document concludes that 'serious' human rights violations have been committed against Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim minorities in the region in the name of counter-terrorism."
"Canadian police searched on Monday for two men suspected of stabbing 10 people to death in an Indigenous community and a nearby town, as the massive manhunt following one of the nation’s deadliest mass killings entered its second day."
"Chile spent the past two years writing a progressive new constitution, but the document was so soundly spurned by voters on Sunday that the result was clear less than two hours after the polls closed."
"In Pakistan, deadly flooding from an unprecedented monsoon season has destroyed lives, livelihoods and infrastructure, in what its climate minister has called 'a serious climate catastrophe.'… Some 33 million Pakistanis have been affected by the flooding since it began in June. It has killed more than 1,100 people — including hundreds of children — and the death toll is expected to rise."
"Russia imposed personal sanctions Monday on 25 Americans, including actors Sean Penn and Ben Stiller, in response to U.S. sanctions against Russians stemming from the conflict in Ukraine." Sean Penn, really?
"Mansur was 13 when Russian soldiers destroyed his village of Samashki during Chechnya's first war for independence against Russia… Wielding flamethrowers, the Russians burned Mansur's neighbors alive in their homes, threw grenades into basements and executed men. Four years later, a truce disintegrated, and Mansur was back at war. He says he was never the same after."
"The U.S. ambassador to Russia, John Sullivan, ended his tenure as America’s top diplomat in Moscow on Sunday after nearly three years, spanning the Trump and Biden administrations, and will retire from a lengthy career in government service."
"Emily Daniels, who was leading a two-day workshop on burnout, encouraged the group including teachers, school counselors, occupational therapists and social workers to stand up inside a hotel conference room. Before long, the group was banging on walls and whatever else they could find. Laughter filled the air. A few started dancing."
"The subject wasn’t voter registration drives or poll worker volunteer training. Instead, they paid $25 each to listen to panelists lay out conspiracy theories about voting machines and rigged election results. In language that sometimes leaned into violent imagery, some panelists called on those attending to join what they framed as a battle between good and evil." It's a business plan now (actually it's the same old grift).
"The producer warned: Fox cannot let host Jeanine Pirro back on the air. She is pulling conspiracy theories from dark corners of the Web to justify then-President Donald Trump's lies that the election had been stolen from him. The existence of the email, confirmed by two people with direct knowledge of it, is first publicly disclosed by NPR in this story. Fox News declined comment."
"Her long record of supporting conservative causes, however, wasn’t enough to save her job after she wound up as a target of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis. Perez lost her school board seat in Miami-Dade last week to a former teacher who was among a slate of candidates endorsed by DeSantis." The lesson is, it doesn't matter how conservative you are, if you're not kissing the leader's ass, you aren't good enough for an endorsement.
"The Republican candidate for governor in Wisconsin endorsed by Donald Trump is calling for people to take up “pitchforks and torches” in reaction to a story that detailed his giving to anti-abortion groups, churches and others — rhetoric that Democrats say amounts to threatening violence." What was the terrible tragedy he suffered? A newspaper published his charitable giving.
"The political landscape, while still in flux, follows a string of President Joe Biden’s legislative victories on climate, health care and gun violence, just as Donald Trump’s hand-picked candidates in electoral battlegrounds like Arizona, Georgia, Ohio and Pennsylvania struggle to broaden their appeal. But nothing has undermined the GOP’s momentum more than the Supreme Court’s stunning decision in June to end abortion protections, which triggered a swift backlash even in the reddest of red states."
"U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon has granted former President Donald Trump's request for a special master to review documents seized by the FBI from Mar-a-Lago last month, temporarily stopping federal prosecutors from using those documents in their investigation into obstruction and mishandling of government secrets." It's bullshit.
"At first, Republicans were highly critical of the FBI search of Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort, but as new details emerge about the more than 100 classified documents the former president haphazardly stashed at his private club Republicans have grown notably silent." Funny how that happened.
"A May 25 letter from one of his lawyers, attached as an exhibit to the search affidavit, advances a broad view of presidential power, asserting that the commander-in-chief has absolute authority to declassify whatever he wants — and also that the “primary” law governing the handling of U.S. classified information simply doesn’t apply to the president himself." Just because a lawyer says so doesn't mean it's true. That is literally one of the reasons we have courts.
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