Headline of the Day

Inauguration Day Weather Forecast: 54 Degrees, Cloudy, Light Wind, Chance Of Golden Showers

—Down With Tyranny

They owe me a screen wipe.

This is F%$#ing Inspired

Self-driving cars are all the rage right now, though I really don't see the tech taking off for a very long time.

The problem is how to make an AI play nice with people on the road, who are inattentive, stupid, violent, vindictive, and frequently malicious.

And once you do, how do you test it?

Rolling it out on the road, with an operator in the drivers seat, is expensive.

Just the liability insurance would be insane.

Obviously, one solution, for the software at least, is to test it in a virtual environment, but this raises an important question: Where can one find a virtual reality that even comes close to mimicking the insanity that is humans driving cars?

Three Words: Grand Theft Auto:

Developers building self-driving cars can now take their AI agents for a spin in the simulated open world of Grand Theft Auto V – via OpenAI’s machine-learning playground, Universe.

The open-source MIT-licensed code gluing GTA V to Universe is maintained by Craig Quiter, who works for Otto – the Uber-owned startup that delivered 51,744 cans of Budweiser over 193km (120 miles) using a self-driving truck.

The software comes with a trained driving agent; all developers need is a copy of the game to get cracking. After that, programmers can swap out the demo AI model with their own agents to test their code and neural networks. Universe and Quiter's integration code takes care of the fiddly interfacing with the game.

Video games new and old provide great training grounds for developing reinforcement learning agents, which learn through trial and error – or rather, trial and reward when things go right. OpenAI's Universe was released in December, and is a wedge of open-source middleware that connects game controls and video displays to machine-learning agents so they can be trained in the virtual arenas.

Admittedly, GTA, with its hot rods, weapons, and rampant crime is only a pale shadow of commuting in Boston,^* but putting self driving automobile software through its paces in the fictional burg of San Andreas, is a truly inspired reuse of code.

^*No joke: I knew that it was time for me to leave New England when I screamed at someone for NOT cutting me off in a parking lot.

Tweet of the Day

Now is a good time to read Jack Kirby, who fought Nazis and created Captain America, talking about Joseph McCarthy. pic.twitter.com/taFEPlDNZm

— Saladin Ahmed (@saladinahmed) January 10, 2017

Never underestimate the wisdom of comic book writers.

Facepalm

A few days ago, it was revealed that conservative hack Monica Crowley and Trump's designee for senior director of strategic communications for the National Security Council had extensively plagiarized in some of her books.

I didn't consider it a big deal, because his cabinet is shaping up to be a complete cluster F%$#, and the wingnut welfare system ignores such things.

But today, I read that Crowley heavily plagiarized her Ph.D. dissertation:

Conservative commentator Monica Crowley, who is slated to serve in a top national security communications role in Donald Trump's presidential administration, plagiarized thousands of words of her 2000 dissertation for her Columbia University Ph.D., a CNN KFile review has found.

On Monday, Politico reported that it found more than a dozen examples of plagiarism in Crowley's Ph.D. dissertation. CNN's KFile has found nearly 40 lengthy instances of Crowley lifting paragraphs from numerous sources, including several scholarly texts, the Associated Press, and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger.

The revelation comes on the heels of another CNN KFile investigation, which found more than 50 instances of plagiarism in Crowley's 2012 book, "What The (Bleep) Just Happened." On Tuesday, the book's publisher, HarperCollins, announced that it would stop selling the book until "the author has the opportunity to source and revise the material."

OK, this qualifies as a big deal, particularly since Columbia looks to have cause to rescind her doctorate.

Don't worry though, she'll be fine. She's the Republican equivalent of a "Made Man", so she will be taken care of.

A selected sample of plagiarism with a huge amount of yellow highlighting after the break:

Even the Liberal New Republic………

While I have said on many occasions that the new New Republic is better than when it was owned by virulent bigot Marty Peretz.

I find the articles far more thoughtful, and the self satisfied smugness and arrogant idiocy is in far smaller supply.

Still, sometimes it returns to form, and the stupidity is epic, such as when Senior Editor Jeet Heer suggests that in 2020, the Democratic party should run a celebrity rather than an accomplished politician for President.

Some points:

• That's what we did this year.  Hillary Clinton's viability in politics has always been as a celebrity, wife of the Governor of Arkansas, and then wife of the President of the United States.^*
• Hillary lost.
• Trump did not win through celebrity, but through selling the lie that he cares about the ordinary working folks. He did that by pointing out the truth that the the celebrity-political complex did now.
• It reinforces the idea that the Democratic Party is out of touch with the real world.  It's why the hit musical is called La La Land, and not The Real World.^†
• It serves to deflect from the real failure here, which was that the party establishment, in a stunning exhibition of solipsism, nominated one of the few political figures on the face of the earth^‡ who could lose to Trump, because of this.

I get it: Nominating Meryl Streep is easier than fixing the party, and you support stupid lazy.

Gaaaahhhh!  I hate pseudo-intellectual contrarians.

^*This is not to say that she is not a capable person, it's just that if you look at political leaders, they don't get to be the Senator from the 3^rd largest state in the US, and then Secretary of State, and the nominee of the party without being a governor, or a mayor, or a congressman, or a city councilman.
^†Also, if they called it The Real World, MTV would sue their asses.
^‡Other names that spring to mind as other potential losers, are Clayton Williams, Adlai Stevenson, Kathleen McGinty, Patrick Murphy, Evan Bayh, Ted Strickland , Kathleen Kennedy Townshend, Martha Coakley, Frank Murkowski (lost to Palin, for F%$#'s sake), and George P. Mahoney. (Had to spend some time on the Google machine to get a list even this short.)

This ……… And President Mike Pence

Glenn Greenwald has a very good point here: As loathsome as Donald Trump is, there is no cause to cheer an effort by the US State Security Apparatus to engage what can only be called a soft coup against him:

In January, 1961, Dwight Eisenhower delivered his farewell address after serving two terms as U.S. president; the five-star general chose to warn Americans of this specific threat to democracy: “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” That warning was issued prior to the decade long escalation of the Vietnam War, three more decades of Cold War mania, and the post-9/11 era, all of which radically expanded that unelected faction’s power even further.

This is the faction that is now engaged in open warfare against the duly elected and already widely disliked president-elect, Donald Trump. They are using classic Cold War dirty tactics and the defining ingredients of what has until recently been denounced as “Fake News.”

Their most valuable instrument is the U.S. media, much of which reflexively reveres, serves, believes, and sides with hidden intelligence officials. And Democrats, still reeling from their unexpected and traumatic election loss as well as a systemic collapse of their party, seemingly divorced further and further from reason with each passing day, are willing — eager — to embrace any claim, cheer any tactic, align with any villain, regardless of how unsupported, tawdry and damaging those behaviors might be.

The serious dangers posed by a Trump presidency are numerous and manifest. There are a wide array of legitimate and effective tactics for combatting those threats: from bipartisan congressional coalitions and constitutional legal challenges to citizen uprisings and sustained and aggressive civil disobedience. All of those strategies have periodically proven themselves effective in times of political crisis or authoritarian overreach.

But cheering for the CIA and its shadowy allies to unilaterally subvert the U.S. election and impose its own policy dictates on the elected president is both warped and self-destructive. Empowering the very entities that have produced the most shameful atrocities and systemic deceit over the last six decades is desperation of the worst kind. Demanding that evidence-free, anonymous assertions be instantly venerated as Truth — despite emanating from the very precincts designed to propagandize and lie — is an assault on journalism, democracy, and basic human rationality. And casually branding domestic adversaries who refuse to go along as traitors and disloyal foreign operatives is morally bankrupt and certain to backfire on those doing it.

If the US state security apparatus is behind this, it is indicates a part of our bureaucracy is out of control and a clear and present danger to both our democracy and out civil rights.

There is, however, another possibility, which Greenwald obliquely alludes to:

There is a real danger here that this maneuver can harshly backfire, to the great benefit of Trump and to the great detriment of those who want to oppose him. If any of the significant claims in this “dossier” turn out to be provably false — such as Cohen’s trip to Prague — many people will conclude, with Trump’s encouragement, that large media outlets (CNN and BuzzFeed) and anti-Trump factions inside the government (CIA) are deploying “Fake News” to destroy him. In the eyes of many people, that will forever discredit — render impotent — future journalistic exposés that are based on actual, corroborated wrongdoing.

This is pretty clearly what Karl Rove did to CBS with GW Bush's going AWOL from his responsibilities at the Air National Guard.

He floated out the story, Rather got fired, and Shrub's draft dodging was permanently removed as a viable news story.

You create a story, it blows up, and then you point out a few seemingly-minor-but-obvious-in-retrospect-flaws, and you discredit any reporting in that vein for the next few years. (As an historical aside, Karl Rove once bugged his own campaign offices to get control of the news cycle in a campaign, so this is very much in the bag of tricks of both Republican campaign operatives and the GRU.)

I'm kind of hoping it's the latter, because if it is the former, we are very close to a 7 Days in May scenario.

If RFK Were Alive, He'd Kick His Ass

Robert F. Kennedy, JR is in discussions with Donald Trump in an attempt to promote his anti-Vaxx agendaas chair of a "Vaccine Safety Committee":

Donald Trump reportedly has met with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., and invited him to head up a planned “vaccine safety and scientific integrity commission” with an as-yet-unknown directive, although it looks like a shot across the bow of the nation's ship of public health. It also now looks unclear whether or not Trump and Kennedy are on the same page about the invitation itself.

The idea of Kennedy being a part of any federal initiative related to vaccines is appalling, given his record of ignoring scientific evidence that doesn’t fit in with his ill-advised, fantastical fear-mongering about them. Why Trump would choose a lawyer over, say, someone with expertise in vaccines, toxicology and epidemiology is unclear. Perhaps it was Kennedy's comparison of vaccines to "a holocaust" that drew Trump's attention. What is clear is that these two are leaping at the chance to leverage some brand synergy.

I’ve covered Kennedy’s problematic response (or nonresponse) to scientific evidence as it relates to vaccines before. I’ve also covered Trump’s equally problematic relationship with facts as they relate to vaccines and autism, and the ways in which people who cling to one conspiracy theory are so likely to glom onto others. Paranoia can be a hell of a drug, for sure, something that savvy showmen easily manipulate for attention.

But it should surprise no one that Trump and Kennedy found each other. They’re not just having a meeting of conspiracy-oriented minds over vaccine fear-mongering. Maybe paranoia or an attraction to conspiracy theories led them to their mutually shared beliefs. But they also share another feature that keeps them from admitting when they’re wrong, and that’s their commitment to their respective name brands.

Kennedy’s claims about vaccines are staggeringly, blatantly incorrect. He’s had that pointed out to him, repeatedly. It may be that optimistic people looked at his name and lineage and thought that he might be reasonable and objective in assessing these facts. They mistook this Kennedy, who refuses to acknowledge even the most direct evidence controverting his claims, for someone who would go where data led him. Their mistake.

I don't know if RFK would be more upset at his kid spewing flat-earth anti-vaxx bullsh%$, or his offer to work with Donald Trump, but I'm pretty sure that he would be peeling the bark off of his kid right now if he were still here.

The PBA Can Go Cheney Themselves

The national head of the Policemen Benevolent Association is claiming that all of the stories of forfeiture abuse is fake news.

And then he says that departments need the money.

Yes, police departments acting like crooks with the backing of the courts is such a good thing.

F%$# the PBA:

Chuck Canterbury, the president of the Fraternal Order of Police, has been given an editorial megaphone over at the Daily Caller. Canterbury's using this platform to defend the pretty much indefensible: civil asset forfeiture.
Colloquially known as "cops going shopping for things they want," asset forfeiture supposedly is used to take funds and property away from criminal organizations. In reality, it's become an easy way for law enforcement to take the property of others without having to put much effort into justifying the seizures. In most states, convictions are not required, meaning supposed criminal suspects are free to go… but their property isn't.

Canterbury, who previously aired his grievances nationally over director Quentin Tarantino's participation in an anti-police brutality rally, opens up this piece by trying to equate factual reporting with current hot button topic "fake news."

Amidst the current national furor against “fake news” is another, more pervasive issue of creating “fake issues” like the myth of policing for profit. There’s been widespread discussion about the need to end the Federal equitable sharing program because a journalist or columnist writes a sympathetic piece describing a case in which the system may not have functioned as intended.

Canterbury admits the "system" doesn't always "function as intended" (although many could argue these cases illustrate the system working exactly as intended), but argues that every report about a questionable seizure is the equivalent of fake news. Innocent people being deprived of their property by profit-focused law enforcement agencies is a "fake issue" -- something that apparently wouldn't be covered by a more responsible press. 

………

The biggest lie in Canterbury's editorial is also the most expected: that asset forfeiture is actually having an effect on criminal activity.

For over 30 years, the asset forfeiture program has allowed law enforcement to deprive criminals of both the proceeds and tools of crime. The resources provided by the equitable sharing program have allowed agencies to participate in joint task forces to thwart and deter serious criminal activity and terrorism, purchase equipment, provide training upgrade technology, engage their communities, and better protect their officers. It has been remarkably successful.

See what happened here? He just said, "We're not extorting money from people, but we really need to take their money.

Sure, that was the theory. In actuality, billions of dollars have flowed into law enforcement agencies with barely any diminishment in the amount of drugs flowing into the country. It may seem like the use of forfeited funds to purchase law enforcement equipment lightens the load on taxpayers but that's only if you don't consider any person whose property has been seized without evidence to not be part of the pool of taxpayers.

Normally, I am firmly pro union, but their activities in law enforcement, particulary police and correction guards, seem to be thoroughly pernicious in nature.

Tweet of the Day

On #BBCBizLive: During the London tube strike Uber prices surged by up to 500% - are companies exploiting consumers or right to cash in? pic.twitter.com/ICo824TLUF

— BBC Business (@BBCBusiness) January 10, 2017

Their business model is to become monopoly providers, and then screw us like a drunk Congressional page.

Deep Thought

H/t Kate Thornton.

Spocko Did This a Decade Ago

10 years ago, Spocko, the blogger who runs Spocko's Brain, started to send records to advertisers showing what hate-talk radio jocks were showing immediately before and after these ads.

He asked a simple question: Do you really want your products associated with this?

It now appears that it has dawned on online activists that they can do the same thing with online news.

It's even easier, you just have to email a screen shot with their ad and a headline:

One day in late November, an earth and environmental science professor named Nathan Phillips visited Breitbart News for the first time. Mr. Phillips had heard about the hateful headlines on the site — like “Birth Control Makes Women Unattractive and Crazy” — and wondered what kind of companies would support such messages with their ad dollars. When he clicked on the site, he was shocked to discover ads for universities, including one for the graduate school where he’d received his own degree — Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment. “That was a punch in the stomach,” he said.

Why would an environmental science program want to be promoted on a site that denies the existence of climate change? Mr. Phillips figured — correctly — that Duke officials did not know where their ads were appearing, so he sent a tweet to Duke about its association with the “sexist racist” site. Eventually, after a flurry of communication with the environment department, he received a satisfying resolution — an assurance that its ads would no longer show up on Breitbart.

………

In mid-November, a Twitter group called Sleeping Giants became the hub of the new movement. The Giants and their followers have communicated with more than 1,000 companies and nonprofit groups whose ads appeared on Breitbart, and about 400 of those organizations have promised to remove the site from future ad buys.

“We’re focused on Breitbart News right now because they’re the biggest fish,” a founder of Sleeping Giants told me. (He requested anonymity because some members of the group work in the digital-media industry.) Eventually, Sleeping Giants would like to broaden its campaign to take on a menagerie of bad actors, but that would require a much bigger army of Giants, and “it has only been a month since we started doing this,” he told me when I talked to him in December. Then he added, “This has been the longest month of my life."

Advertisers have been fleeing Rush Limbaugh's show for precisely the same reason ever since he tried to slut shame Sandra Fluke, and it appears from the silence over the numbers, last time around they were trumpeting the numbers, that he took a significant pay cut.

Everyone has a right to free speech, but that doesn't mean that they have a right for you to support their sponsors.

She Would Say That, Wouldn't She?*

Over at the Washington Post, Margaret Sullivan, a media columnist (and former Ombud for the NY Times)  suggests that we should stop using the term "Fake News", particularly when applied to major metropolitan newspapers like the Post.

It appears that she is mightily offended that people are calling out the WaPo for publishing fake news (the non-existent Vermont Power hack) just because they, well, you know, published fake news.

She thinks that the term has, "Had its 15 minutes of fame."

Let's be clear: If you have an anonymous source, and they burn you repeatedly, and you don't burn the source, and you keep going back to the well for more quotes from them, as the Post has done with the US state security apparatus since its founding (with a few notable exceptions), it's fake news.

Use the same standards as libel for public figures: A reckless disregard for the truth, and a quick Google gives us this

Disregard of the truth or falsity of a defamatory statement by a person who is highly aware of its probable falsity or entertains serious doubts about its truth or when there are obvious reasons to doubt the veracity and accuracy of a source [the knowingly false statement and the false statement made with reckless disregard of the truth , do not enjoy constitutional protection "Garrison v. Louisiana , 379 U.S. 64 (1964)"

The Washington Post is not just regularly burnt by its sources in intelligence, it is routinely burnt by these sources.

The reporters know this, the editors know this, and Margaret Sullivan knows this, and they just don't care.

This is the very epitome of fake news.

^*This is a reference to Mandy Rice-Davies and the Profumo Affair, who when told that Lord Astor denied having ever met her, much less f%$#ed her, replied with a rather similar quote.

Linkage

• The .Plan: A Quasi-Blog: Bayes' theorem began as a defense of Christianity (The Plan) Interesting from a historical perspective, meaningless from a theological perspective,
• Guns and Chipotle: Millennials are the most employed generation in two occupational areas: food services and military (My Budget 360) Might explain why millenials (though they were more likely to vote for Hillary than any other group) did not turn out in droves for an avatar of the status quo.
• All signs point to a corporate takeover of the marijuana industry by Bayer, Monsanto (Defend Democracy Press) So the monopolists see money in weed. I guess that this is a form of "arriving".
• Media spokesmillennial actually 55 years old / Boing Boing Ich bin ein millenial? (Boing Boing) I'm younger than him, so I guess that I'm a millenial, QED.
• Hyperface: a fabric that makes computer vision systems see faces everywhere (Boing Boing) and Avoid Facial Detection Algorithms … With a T-Shirt (The Atlantic) Basically dazzle camouflage, like the Zebra, and those striped ships from WW I and II. They are hideous, but privacy is not free.
• TV anchor says live on-air 'Alexa, order me a dollhouse' – guess what happens next (The Register) Ummm....Increased activities on their audience's credit cards?
• The Clinton Foundation Stories – REAL in other words (Medium) Note that the author is a Vince Foster theorist, but the basic point, that the Clinton Foundation was dishonestly and poorly managed stands. I think that the foundation was the equivalent of the right wing welfare that the think tanks provide in DC. The Clintons wanted to keep their posse together. I should note that I founded, incorporated, and successfully prosecuted a 501(C)3 application from start to finish, and so I have some knowledge of the subject.
• Those Times the NSA Hacked America's Allies (Juan Cole) Glass houses………
• The discovery of medieval Trellech and the plucky amateurs of archaeology (The Conversation) Getting my history/archeology geek on. Also an interesting commentary on the powers of dedicated amateurs.
• Kodak says it’s bringing back Ektachrome film, and photographers everywhere are smiling (Washington Post) It's a boutique product, but it's nice to see it back. I want Kodachrome back. (See vid)
• Man jailed for 3 days after Texas cops confuse cat litter for meth (The Register) Live in obedient fear, citizen.

Here is Paul Simon, the lyrics version because I could not find an official version of the video:

Deep Thought

Link

Go. Just Go!

They are now trying to suggest that Hillary Clinton should run for mayor:

From political circles in New York City to cocktail parties on Capitol Hill, on right-of-center Facebook pages and among left-of-center donors, two of the biggest untethered threads in New York politics are being drawn together around a single question.

Would Hillary Clinton run for mayor?

The prospect has an obvious, novelistic allure: A run for mayor of New York this year would pit Mrs. Clinton against Mayor Bill de Blasio, a fellow Democrat who managed her Senate campaign in 2000, and, should she win, would put her in charge of President-elect Donald J. Trump’s hometown, ensuring years of potential clashes between bitter rivals.

Gaaahhh!!!!!!

Hillary R. Clinton, would you please go now?
The time has come.
The time has come.
The time is now.
Just go.
Go.
GO!
I don't care how.

You can go by foot.
You can go by cow.
Hillary R. Clinton,, will you please go now!

Please ……… Make ……… it ……… Stop………

Snark of the Day

The most remarkable thing about the government’s assessment released on Friday is that more than a quarter of the report is merely an annex dedicated to the colossal significance of the RT (Russia Today) television network. These seven pages written by the U.S. intelligence community comprise what is perhaps the greatest and most generous Christmas gift in the history of Russian Orthodoxy, which celebrates the birth of Christ on Saturday, Jan. 7.

—Moscow Times. American Unintelligence on Russia (Op-ed)

Heh.

Barack Obama, Shut the F%$# Up

Barack Obama has a sad, because it's all liberal's fault that Obamacare is unpopular.

Yeah, I guess the fact that he killed the public option and spent the entire process fellating big insurance and big pharma, giving people rate increases, narrow networks, and balance billing had nothing to do with this:

President Barack Obama said on Friday that criticism from the left wing of his own Democratic Party helped feed into the unpopularity of Obamacare, his signature healthcare reform law.

………

But Obama also said Liberals like former Democratic presidential candidate Senator Bernie Sanders had contributed to the program's unpopularity.

During Sanders' campaign for the presidential nomination, he proposed replacing Obamacare with a government-run single-payer health insurance system based on Medicare, the government plan for elderly and disabled Americans.

"In the 'dissatisfied' column are a whole bunch of Bernie Sanders supporters who wanted a single-payer plan," Obama said in the interview.

"The problem is not that they think Obamacare is a failure. The problem is that they don't think it went far enough and that it left too many people still uncovered," Obama said.

"They" are right.

If you had been more interested in a good policy than you had been to check off a box on your Presidential legacy, the program would have been better, less expensive, and more universal, and far less unpopular.

You improved on the status quo, but you did so in a way calculated to make minimum changes and to keep the malefactors of the US health insurance system in the driver's seat, because ……… markets.

What's more, your program was structured in a way to make it as opaque and politically unpopular as possible.

Look in the mirror, dude.

Getting it Wrong

Sir Martin Sorrell suggests that the problem with business today is that companies are too timid about taking the long view, so they spend most of their profits on things like stock buybacks, as opposed to investing in capital improvements or R&D.

While this is a nice theory, and the modern publicly held corporation does have an unrealistically short time horizon, this is not about timidity.

This is about managers looting the companies futures for their own personal benefit.

You see, much of the modern manager's remuneration these days is in stock options, and if the stock price goes up, they make 7, 8, and 9 figure paydays, while if the stock does not appreciate, they get nothing, so they, as basic capitalism predicts, manage the firm for their own private benefit by mortgaging the future.

This is not timidity, this is honest services fraud, or at least it was until the Supreme Court found 18 U.S.C.§1346 to be unconstitutional except in the case of a bribe or a kickback. (I actually agree with the decision, the law was too vague and prone to abuse.)

I'd like to go back to the pre-Reagan regulations, which defined most stock buybacks as illegal stock manipulation.

Headline of the Day

The Enemy Du Jour Is Always Hacking

—Moon of Alabama

Iraq was "hacking" us in 2003, Iranians in 2011, and now the Russians.

Whichever Hitler of the week it is, we always see reports of a sophisticate and terrifying hacking apparatus which threatens our way of life.

How awfully convenient.

Seriously, the Masters of the Universe are Seriously Delicate Snow Flakes

Bond king Bill Gross is so very upset that Donald Trump is jawboning companies about moving the jobs out of the USA:

President-elect Donald Trump’s targeting of corporations, to make them change their practices, is reminiscent of policies in Italy under dictator Benito Mussolini, according to billionaire bond manager Bill Gross.

"Some of these pre-term policies, where he’s cajoling companies to move production back into the United States -- that’s fine -- but it reminds me to some extent of policies in Italy long ago associated with Mussolini and government control of corporate interests," Gross said in an interview Friday on Bloomberg Radio. "I don’t want it to go too far."

Seriously?

Calling companies who f%$# their workers "Worker F%$#ers," is telling the truth, not nascent fascism.

Get over yourself.

Out of the Mouths of Babes and Sucklings and ……… Republicans?

Awkward!

Thom Tillis, the distinguished gentleman from North Carolina, reminds James Clapper that the US has been meddling in foreign elections on a wholesale scale for decades:

Several times in today’s hearing on foreign cyberattacks on the US, James Clapper explained why he never favored big retaliation for China’s hack of OPM: because he considers it the kind of espionage we engage in too. “People who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw rocks.”

When North Carolina Republican Thom Tillis got his turn, he addressed Clapper’s comment, pointing out that on election-tampering, as with espionage, the US lives in a big glass house.

The glass house comment is something that I think is very important. There’s been research done by a professor up at Carnegie Mulligan that um Mellon that estimated that the United States has been involved in one way or another in 81 different elections since World War II. That doesn’t include coups or regime changes. Tangible evidence where we’ve tried to affect an outcome to our purpose. Russia’s done it some 36 times. In fact, when Russia apparently was trying to influence our election, we had the Israelis accusing us of trying to influence their election.

So I’m not here to talk about that. But I am here to say we live in a big glass house and there are a lot of rocks to throw and I think that that’s consistent with what you said on other matters.

With regards to comparative numbers on US and Russian intervention in elections, Tillis is discussing research published by Dov Levin last year (see WaPo version), who found that either the US or Russia intervened in 11.3% of all elections since World War II, with the US — indeed — intervening far more often (and more broadly) than Russia.

The research shows that over 11% of competitive elections between 1946 and 2000 were hacked, and about ⅔ of these interventions were by the US state security apparatus, and wasn't just some obscure banana republic:  It includes things like intervening in the Italian elections of 1948.

Glass houses indeed.

Non-Existent Global Warming Strikes Again

We are completely f%$#ed


Breakup of Larsen B in 2002

An ice shelf ¼ the side of Wales is set to break off from the Larsen C ice shelf in Antarctica:

An iceberg expected to be one of the 10 largest ever recorded is ready to break away from Antarctica, scientists say.

A long-running rift in the Larsen C ice shelf grew suddenly in December and now just 20km of ice is keeping the 5,000 sq km piece from floating away.

Larsen C is the most northern major ice shelf in Antarctica.

Researchers based in Swansea say the loss of a piece a quarter of the size of Wales will leave the whole shelf vulnerable to future break-up.

Larsen C is about 350m thick and floats on the seas at the edge of West Antarctica, holding back the flow of glaciers that feed into it.

Researchers have been tracking the rift in Larsen C for many years, watching it with some trepidation after the collapse of Larsen A ice shelf in 1995 and the sudden break-up of the Larsen B shelf in 2002.

………

But in December the speed of the rift went into overdrive, growing by a further 18km in just a couple of weeks. What will become a massive iceberg now hangs on to the shelf by a thread just 20km long.

"If it doesn't go in the next few months, I'll be amazed," project leader Prof Adrian Luckman, from Swansea University, told BBC News.

………

It is believed that climate warming has brought forward the likely separation of the iceberg but the scientists say they have no direct evidence to support this.

However, they are concerned about how any break-off will impact the rest of the ice shelf, given that its neighbour, Larsen B, disintegrated spectacularly in 2002 following a similar large calving event.

"We are convinced, although others are not, that the remaining ice shelf will be less stable than the present one," said Prof Luckman.

"We would expect in the ensuing months to years further calving events, and maybe an eventual collapse - but it's a very hard thing to predict, and our models say it will be less stable; not that it will immediately collapse or anything like that."

As it floats on the sea, the resulting iceberg from the shelf will not raise sea levels. But if the shelf breaks up even more, it could result in glaciers that flow off the land behind it to speed up their passage towards the ocean. This non-floating ice would have an impact on sea levels.

According to estimates, if all the ice that the Larsen C shelf currently holds back entered the sea, global waters would rise by 10cm.

2½ inches (10 cm) may not sound like a lot, but this is just one incident.

There are dozens, if not hundreds, of similar developments around the world, and indicate that the current rate of sea level rise (1.8 mm/year) could be just a prelude.

Even the Fast Food Industry Benefits from a Higher Minimum Wage

The CEO of Wetzel’s Pretzels was rather surprised when California's minimum wage hike boosted his profits:

When California began raising its minimum wage two years ago, Bill Phelps and his investors were worried. Phelps is CEO of a fast food company called Wetzel’s Pretzels, which has almost 100 outlets in California.

“Like most business people I was concerned about it,” he said.

The state increased the minimum wage in mid-2014 and just raised it again on Jan. 1 to $10.50 per hour for companies that employ more than 25 people. Smaller businesses will have a delay in implementation, but will follow suit as California moves along on its schedule to reach $15 per hour by 2022.

Phelps and a lot of other fast food CEOs have been worried that wage increases will cut into profits, and that if they raise prices to compensate, fewer people will come eat. So two years ago, Phelps prepared to take a hit. But something else happened entirely. Sales at his California stores immediately shot up.

“I was shocked,” Phelps says. “I was stunned by the business.”

The same exact pattern took place again in 2016, when the minimum wage rose again, Phelps said. There was a wage increase, and then boom, a bump in same-store sales across the state that held for most of the year.

………

“My overall sales were something like 15 percent ahead after the first minimum wage bump, and now they’re about 12 percent ahead this year,” Jacobs said. “It isn’t because I’m such a great manager or smart guy, but the buying public has more money in their pocket.”

Jacobs says not only are more people coming to shop, but they’re buying more. Sure enough, as Jacobs and I talk, a mall employee stops in to buy a pretzel. He ends up also paying for a dipping sauce and a drink. Jacobs says sales like this are happening all the time.

(emphasis mine)

It's something that liberal economists have been saying for years.

H/t Crooks and Liars.

Bad Day at the Office

Imagine if you will, you are a pilot of a B-52, it's a lovely day, and you are on a training mission.

Then, ​an engine falls off.

On the bright side, it's better to lose AN engine than it is to lose THE engine, but still it ain't good:

A US Air Force B-52 bomber dropped one of its engines during a training mission over North Dakota this week, according to the service.

During a 4 January training mission from Minot Air Force Base, North Dakota, the pilot declared an in-flight emergency after discovering the engine had dropped from the bomber. The mammoth Boeing aircraft, which is powered by eight Pratt & Whitney TF33 engines, landed safely without injuries to the five personnel on board, the air force says in a statement. No weapons were on board during the mission.

Minot deployed its 54th Helicopter Squadron to search for engine pieces and has located possible debris in an unpopulated area about 25nm (46km) northeast of the base, the air force says.

The B-52’s loss could mark a gain for Pratt & Whitney, which has pushed for an upgrade of the 55-year-old TF33 engines. While the air force had considered four-engine options as part of a potential upgrade programme, the service ditched the effort.

 Not a fun day for the pilot and crew, I imagine.

Shouldn't that Read Mausoleum? (Missed Headline of the Day)

The Washington Post uncovers an article titled, "Hillary Clinton to speak Tuesday at new State Department museum bearing her name.

They observed that they first saw the hed as reading mausoleum.

So did I, and I thought, "Well, now we know where the Clintons' future in politics is going."

H/t Naked apitalism.

Linkage

• This Is the Year Economists Finally Figured Out What Everyone Else Long Understood About 'Free Trade' (Alternet) They always say that a rising tide lifts all boats, but these deals are about empowering monopolistic rent seekers (Pharma, Wall Street, Copyright, etc.), and so there have never been efforts to make the losers of such policies whole. After all, the factory workers who have lost jobs have lost power as well.
• Seattle's landmark Uber union law set to go into effect as city releases final rules (GeekWire) Good
• Election Hack Report FAQ: What You Need to Know basically, this is a big bag of nothing
• Fraud in Silicon Valley: Startups Show Their Unethical Underside (Fortune) With all the "Unicorn" crap out there, it seems that no one remembers the dontbomb crash of the early 2000s.
• U.S. stocks riding a bull market in corruption (Marketwatch) Specifically, the stock market rally is driven by Wall Street, which is expecting a repeal of Obama's tepid regulation, to allow them to f%$# us like a drunk sorority girl.
• Silicon Valley's obscure unicorns could boost 2017 IPO market (Reuters) Hold on to your wallet.
• Company Bricks User's Software After He Posts A Negative Review (Techdirt) These folks make Comcast look like the Salvation Army.
• In 2015, a 30 Year Old French Nuclear Submarine 'Sank' a U.S. Aircraft Carrier (The National Interest) Note that the Saphir, is among the smallest nuclear boats in any submarine fleet in the world, which means, because there is no space for sound insulation, it is relatively noisy.  There are only two classes of warships, submarines, and targets.
• When a state trooper slaps his son, here's how the justice system treats him (The Oregonian) Cops are not held accountable, and this is corrosive to society.
• Can a Satire of ISIS Possibly Be Funny? BBC Viewers Are Split (New York Times) It is funny.  Bunch of thin-skinned, no-humor pansies! You tell them an ice-breaker or two about women's libbers, gays, environmentalists, several minorities, the homeless, couple of religions, anorexics, obese people, the handicapped, old farts, baldness, and people who walk real goofy because they've just had a vasectomy, and suddenly, they get all sensitive, like I offended one of them or something!

2016 after a long coma: (funny and alarming at the same time)

There Is Nothing out There That Wall Street Won't Make Worse

And now, they want to be your landlord.

What could possibly go wrong?

Proving That Ayn Rand Is to Business What Ebola Is to the Exchange of Bodily Fluids

Sears, which used to have a tall building and a catalogue, is now taking a butcher knife to its own flesh, so that it can sell them to to keep the lights on:

Sears Holdings will sell its well-known Craftsman tools brand to Stanley Black & Decker, the latest in a recent flurry of moves the retailer is making to generate cash after at least five money-losing years.

The agreement announced Thursday calls for Stanley to pay $525 million when the deal closes — expected later this year — and another $250 million after three years, the companies said. New Britain, Conn.-based Stanley will pay Sears a percentage of its new sales of Craftsman products for 15 years, and during that time, Sears will be able to continue selling Craftsman products royalty-free.

What happened over the past 5 years?

This guy:

Hoffman Estates-based Sears estimated the deal's value could top $1 billion.
CEO Lampert remains committed to bankrolling Sears

Sears’ stock jumped as much as 8.7% following a recent statement issued Dec. 29. (Dec. 29, 2016)

Separately Thursday, Sears said it's trying to raise another $1 billion by selling off real estate. On Wednesday, affiliates of the hedge fund managed by Sears' chairman, CEO and biggest investor, Edward Lampert, lent Sears up to $500 million to fund operations while it negotiates those sales.

You see, Eddie is a big fan of Ayn Rand and her poorly written philosophy, Objectivism.

He took over Sears, and promptly implemented the prescriptions put forth by Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum, which predictably created a complete disaster: (From that Communist rag Inc. magazine)

For those in business who idealize the philosophy of Ayn Rand, maybe it's time to forget books read during the teen years and start thinking about better ways to run a company. Put me in the same camp with Geoffrey James when it comes to saying that Ayn Rand is bad for business. Too bad for the investors in Sears that its CEO, Eddie Lampert, seems to remain a true believer.

Any person who demands the fealty of acolytes while preaching individualism is already off to a bad start with inherent contradictions. Apply the principles of Business-By-Rand and the start goes south pretty quickly.

It might be one thing to invest ruthlessly, but running a company is an entirely different occupation. That's the possible difference between structuring the takeover of Sears by Kmart when you’re the head of a hedge fund and being the CEO. Looking out for No. 1 is a bankrupt strategy when the basics of great business require you to look out for your customers and employees. 

It’s division-eat-division out there.

Lampert has never hidden his affection for Rand and has taken actions to implement its ideas. For example, as Bloomberg reported back in 2013, he broke the company up into dozens of autonomous groups that have to compete for attention and resources. Only the strong will survive.

The problem that quickly develops in such a structure is suboptimization. It's a term that was once used frequently, particularly during the 1990s when companies were trying to reengineer themselves into more efficient and effective organizations. In any system, there are parts that may have to perform in suboptimum ways to get the entire venture to act optimally. If you were engineering a car, for example, you wouldn't optimize the drive train independently of braking and steering. If the car can run away from the ability to control it, you wind up with dead customers and massive lawsuits and regulatory intervention.

But with multiple executives fighting it out to get what they need, you end up running the company backward. Overall strategy takes a back seat to what individual groups can pull off. That was the problem that handicapped Microsoft in the mobile world. Windows and Office were the cash cows, and a future of the company, mobile, was left to wither. Apple and Google took away the significant market share that Microsoft once had.

This is no surprise. After the Rand is someone who wrote that the philosophy of a serial killer who strangled and dismembered a little girl, was an inspiration to her.

There is a certain symmetry here:  Lampert is doing to Sears what William Edward Hickman did to 12 year old Marion Parker.

An important political aside:  One of Rand's biggest fans in the Congress is House Speaker Paul Ryan.

That sadistic bastard makes his staffers read Atlas Shrugged.<sup>*

*</sup>Full disclosure: I have not read Atlas Shrugged.^† I see no reason to plow through a thousand pages of poorly written allegory to understand her philosophy, when I can (and did) read her actual treatise on her philosophy, The Virtue of Selfishness, which is less than 1/5^th the length.^‡
†Honestly, I tried to read it, but it is horrifically piss poor poor writing.
^‡The Virtue of Selfishness is completely awful as well. I read it for a philosophy of literature class, and Immanuel Kant was more readable, and would probably be more readable in the original German.

Doubling Down on Failure

Speaking of Democratic Party dysfunction, the Democratic Party is building a war room to deal with the realities of a Trump administration.

They are staffing the office with refugees from the Hillary Clinton campaign:

The Democratic National Committee is building a “war room” to battle President-elect Donald Trump, pressure the new Republican administration on a variety of policy matters and train a spotlight on Russia's alleged cyberattacks to influence the 2016 election.

The DNC's new communications and research operation, to be staffed by former aides to Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, will be one of several efforts from across the Democratic firmament to take on Trump, including the office of Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), the Center for American Progress and American Bridge.

The DNC has hired John Neffinger, a longtime operative who runs the Franklin Forum, to serve as interim communications director and oversee the national party's operation. He will be joined by two Clinton veterans who spent the campaign focused on Trump — researching his background, monitoring his statements and trying to drive negative media coverage of his candidacy. Zac Petkanas, the Clinton campaign's rapid-response director, will serve as a senior adviser to the DNC and direct the Trump war room, while Adrienne Watson, a Clinton campaign spokeswoman, will serve as the DNC's national press secretary. Rounding out the team as digital director will be Tessa Simonds, who already had been at the DNC, focusing on digital organizing, state parties and down-ballot campaigns.

These people should be asking, "Do you want fries with that?" for a living.

Just kill me.

Quote of the Day

The core of the disagreement between the two factions isn't that one side cares more about poor people than about minorities and the other side cares more about minorities than about poor people. That whole frame is wrong. Both sides, for the most part, care sufficiently about minorities and about poor people. The core of the disagreement is that one side is doing actual politics and the other side is doing cultural criticism but thinks it's doing politics.

—jamalabd on Reddit

They follow up with:

Here's the key point: bougie wokeness liberals and minority voters share distinct desires when it comes to identity politics. If you want to use identity politics to appeal to black voters in Milwaukee or Arab-American voters in the Detroit suburbs or Hispanic voters in the Phoenix metro you're going to need to speak very differently from how you would if you wanted to use identity politics to appeal to Oberlin students. But wokeness liberals consistently pretend that their identity politics demands are identical to those of minority voters: they speak on behalf of minority voters without really representing them. Sometimes the two forms of identity politics will overlap, but oftentimes they won't.

Apologies to my sister-in-law, who is an Oberlin grad, but this is a must read.

H/t Naked Capitalism

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?

Amid all the claims of who hacked the DNC and why, we now discover that the FBI NEVER requested access to the DNC servers:

The FBI did not examine the servers of the Democratic National Committee before issuing a report attributing the sweeping cyberintrusion to Russia-backed hackers, BuzzFeed News has learned.

Six months after the FBI first said it was investigating the hack of the Democratic National Committee’s computer network, the bureau has still not requested access to the hacked servers, a DNC spokesman said. No US government entity has run an independent forensic analysis on the system, one US intelligence official told BuzzFeed News.

“The DNC had several meetings with representatives of the FBI’s Cyber Division and its Washington (DC) Field Office, the Department of Justice’s National Security Division, and U.S. Attorney’s Offices, and it responded to a variety of requests for cooperation, but the FBI never requested access to the DNC’s computer servers,” Eric Walker, the DNC’s deputy communications director, told BuzzFeed News in an email.

The FBI has instead relied on computer forensics from a third-party tech security company, CrowdStrike, which first determined in March of last year that the DNC’s servers had been infiltrated by Russia-linked hackers, the U.S. intelligence official told BuzzFeed News.

“CrowdStrike is pretty good. There’s no reason to believe that anything that they have concluded is not accurate,” the intelligence official said, adding they were confident Russia was behind the widespread hacks.

(emphasis original)

Crowdstrike was hired by the DNC.

If it was the Rooshans, then it isn't their fault, and CrowdStrike was hired by the Democratic Party Nomenklatura whose heads were on the chopping block in the event of any sort of (very) well deserved house cleaning for the utter incompetence o n display.

You know that the Russian angle was pushed by the DNC in discussions with CrowdStrike, and as the Golden Rule says, at least according to Johnny Hart, is, "Whoever has the gold, makes the rules."

The Glory of the US Medical Industrial Complex

Click for full size
Courtesy of: Visual Capitalist

Our healthcare system under-performs by any sane measure of efficiency or outcomes:

Historically, the United States has spent more money than any other country on healthcare.

In the late 1990s, for example, the U.S. spent roughly 13% of GDP on healthcare, compared to about a 9.5% average for all high income countries.

However, in recent years, the difference has become more stark. Last year, as Obamacare continued to roll out, costs in the U.S. reached an all-time high of 17.5% of GDP. That’s over $3 trillion spent on healthcare annually, and the rate of spending is expected accelerate over the next decade.

………

Today’s chart comes to us from economist Max Roser (h/t @NinjaEconomics) and it shows the extreme divergence of the U.S. healthcare system using two simple stats: life expectancy vs. health expenditures per capita.

………

Not only is U.S. healthcare spending wildly inefficient, but it’s also relatively ineffective. It would be one thing to spend more money and get the same results, but according to the above data that is not true. In fact, Americans on average will have shorter lives people in other high income countries.

Life expectancy in the U.S. has nearly flatlined, and it hasn’t yet crossed the 80 year threshold. Meanwhile, Chileans, Greeks, and Israelis are all outliving their American counterparts for a fraction of the associated costs.

For any improvements that Obamacare has made to the medical situation, we still have narrow networks, balance billing, and a system where it is literally impossible to avoid being charged for out of network services, all the things that prevent people from seeking help except when the situation is dire.

Then again, Obama is getting lots of funding for his presidential library and his foundation from Wall Street and health insurance types, so I guess it all works out for him.

Just imagine what he could have netted if he had gotten the TPP through.  That library would have gold plated bidets in its executive offices.

H/t The Big Picture

Don't Let the Door Hit Your Butt on the Way out, Shyster………

Alan Dershowitz has drawn a red line, and said that, "If Keith Ellison is appointed DNC chair, I will resign my membership."

A couple of things here:

• Keith Ellison can't be appointed DNC chair, he can only be elected DNC chair.
• You cannot resign your membership, you have none.  You can only change your party registration, and I for one would welcome your not voting in the primaries.
• You advocated for judicially authorized torture.  You have forever ceded anything resembling the moral high ground on any matter.

Please, just leave.

(Apologies for the Fox Business News Channel link, but this is where he said it.)

The Internet of Things Will Spy on You

It turns out that cops are subpoenaing data from various devices that listen to you for criminal investigations:

“Doorbells that connect directly to apps on a user’s phone can show who has rung the door and the owner or others may then remotely,m if they choose, to give controlled access to the premises while away from the property.

“All these leave a log and a trace of activity. The crime scene of tomorrow is going to be the internet of things.”

………

Mr Stokes said detectives of the future would carry a ‘digital forensics toolkit’ which would allow them to analyse microchips and download data at the scene, rather than removing devices for testing.

………

In the US, Amazon is currently fighting requests by the US authorities to hand over recordings from one of its Echo home entertainment systems belonging to James Andrew Bates.

Officers in Arkansas are investigating the murder of Victor Collins who was found dead at Mr Bates’ hot tub in 2015. They have already taken evidence from an electric water meter, which appears to show that a huge amount of water was used. Detectives say it could have been to wash blood away from the patio.

First, it will be murder, then it will be tax evasion, then it will be unpatriotic thoughts.

BTW, put tape over your laptop's camera as well when you are not using them.

Tweet of the Day

Remember these words from Tsar Nicholas II's diary: "The year 1916 was cursed; 1917 will surely be better!" 😀 Happy New Year!

— Garry Kasparov (@Kasparov63) January 1, 2017

As the saying goes, out of the mouths of Chess Grandmasters………

The Fake News Problem at 1301 K Street NW

The Original Hed

Friday night, the US State Security Apparatus' favorite outlet for fake news, the Washington Post unleashed a bombshell, that Russia had hacked into Vermont's power grid.

It was a real bombshell.

The only problem was that it was not even remotely true, and within 48 hours, the Post issued a mealy mouthed retraction:

Editor’s Note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly said that Russian hackers had penetrated the U.S. electric grid. Authorities say there is no indication of that so far. The computer at Burlington Electric that was hacked was not attached to the grid.

They also changed the headline to read, "Russian operation hacked a Vermont utility, showing risk to U.S. electrical grid security, officials say."

Malware was found on a single laptop, and the malware is publicly available, and written by Ukrainians.  (It's also an old version of the software.

The Post wrote a followup article, which led with, "As federal officials investigate suspicious Internet activity found last week on a Vermont utility computer, they are finding evidence that the incident is not linked to any Russian government effort to target or hack the utility, according to experts and officials close to the investigation."

Forbes unleashed a can of whup ass on the WaPo as well.

I've not looked at the physical paper, but my guess is that it was not on the front page.

Someone's laptop was surfing with its shields down, and it got hacked.

Some people in Congress and/or the White House then sold it as the end of the world.

As Marcy Wheeler pithily notes, "Some of these security professionals are the same ones who’ve been saying for months that the DNC hack can be reliably attributed to the Russian state.

This sort of hysteria undercuts the credibility of our cyber experts and the narrative that they are pushing.

This is a Direct Consequence of Turkey's Support of Daesh

Over 30 people were killed in a terrorist attack of an Istanbul night club:

The manhunt continues for a gunman who killed 39 people in an Istanbul nightclub as Turkey marked the start of the new year.

The unknown assailant opened fire at Reina nightclub early on Sunday, before managing to flee amid the chaos.

The motive for the attack is not clear, but suspicion has fallen on the Islamic State group, already linked to at least two terror attacks in Turkey last year.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said such groups tried "to create chaos".

I would argue that they are not trying to, "Create chaos," they are exploiting the chaos that Erdogan created in Syria through tacit and explicit support of Salafist fighters in his attempt to depose Assad.

This sort of sh%$ always comes back to bite you in the ass.

In Some Ways, India Is Very Much Like the Us

It appears that in response to advance notice of speeches by Indian PM Narendra Modi bars are scrambling to come up with drinking games:

India’s teetotaler Prime Minister Narendra Modi almost fueled a booze binge on New Year’s eve in the nation’s cities.

As his scheduled speech drew nearer, pubs announced Modi-themed drinking games while Indians sought solace through social media humor. The last time Modi had addressed the nation, on Nov. 8, it had ended with him canceling 86 percent of currency in circulation and unleashing chaos in a country where almost all consumer payments are made in cash.

Modi had likened the move to a bitter medicine to help cure tax evasion and graft. Many saw it differently.

"Come get a drink on us," pub chain Social, which has 15 outlets across the nation, announced on Facebook. "If we’re going down, we’re going down together."

‘Mitron’

Social offered a pint of beer or an alcohol shot for 31 rupees ($0.5) each time Modi uttered “mitron,” which means friends in Hindi. That compares with 85 rupees for a pint of Kingfisher beer it normally charges customers. Mobile wallet company Mobikwik -- backed by Sequoia Capital -- promised lucky users a 100 percent cashback.

I think that Donald Trump, another teetotaler, will be a similar inspiration for bars in the United States.

On the other hand the recent ruling by India's Supreme Court banning overtures to religion and caste by political candidates is something unimaginable in the us.

Hell, such a ruling would effectively outlaw the Republican Party:

The Supreme Court on Monday ruled that politicians cannot seek votes on the grounds of caste, creed or religion.

The landmark judgment came while the court revisited earlier judgments, including one from 1995 that equated Hindutva with Hinduism and called it a “way of life” and said a candidate was not necessarily violating the law if votes were sought on this plank.

Several petitions filed over the years have challenged the consequences of that verdict. “It is a fallacy and an error of law to proceed on the assumption that any reference to Hindutva or Hinduism in a speech makes it automatically a speech based on Hindu religion as opposed to other religions … (Hindutva and Hinduism) are used in a speech to emphasise the way of life of the Indian people and the Indian cultural ethos,” the 1995 judgment authored by Justice J.S. Verma had said.

In its decision on Monday, a seven-judge constitution bench of the court ruled that the relationship between man and God is an ‘individual choice’ and the state cannot interfere in it, Economic Times reported. It added that an election is a secular exercise, and that should be reflected in the process that is followed.

Four judges of the seven-judge bench headed by Chief Justice T.S. Thakur (who retires on Tuesday) ruled that “the constitution forbids state from mixing religion with politics”, Livemint reported. While Thakur and justices Madan B. Lokur, S.A. Bobde, and L. Nageswara Rao formed the majority and hence gave the ruling, the other three judges – Adarsh Kumar Goel, U.U. Lalit and D.Y. Chandrachud – dissented and said that the matter must be left to parliament.

I have mixed emotions on this one, I tend to be absolutist on free speech issues, but the fact that this kneecaps the Indian Fascist party (BJP) is a positive outcome.

Finally, 2017

2016 is finally over.

What a kidney stone of a year.

Bank Failure Summaries for the Year

So, there were 5 commercial bank failures, and 15 credit union failures this year, which I have dutifully documented on the oft late "Bank Failure Friday" posts.

This compares to 2015's 8 bank failures and 12 credit union failures.

I am not clear as to why commercial bank numbers went down, and credit union failures went up, though the fact that credit unions are less amenable to the consolidation that has occurred in the commercial bank industry.

The TBTF banks have swallowed up a lot of the commercial bank industry.