https://www.persuasion.community/p/a-letter-from-an-iranian
Should be required reading for my friends of the left.
Iran is yet another civil war waiting to happen.
Author Archives: jgordon
China’s industrial policy: “vicious price wars and deflation, due to the subsidization of too many competing companies”
https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/chinas-industrial-policy-has-an-unprofitability
But if they can get the US car market that would help a bit.
Onion NYT ad: “… the public often looks to Congress for profiles in meekness. We search for men and women much like yourselves, emotional weaklings who are afraid to meet their own glance in the mirror”
https://www.thehandbasket.co/p/exclusive-the-onion-nyt-ad-congress-cowardice
Maybe the post-Z generation will be into integrity? When do we get them?
Minnesota’s global warming injury: “The fire season is changing in Canada because the climate of Canada is changing. Canada’s north is warming at a rate two to three times the global average.”
https://www.startribune.com/canada-forest-fire-smoke-minnesota-air-quality/601376477
In an anonymous poll Minnesotans would vote for CO2 increases. But even in MN there are consequences …
“On Tuesday, June 3, the air quality index hit … 800 in Grand Portage … worst air quality ever recorded globally occurred in New Delhi, India, on Nov. 11, 2022, when the AQI reached 999.”
How MAGA works: “longstanding Republican policy of seeding the media with a false narrative of bad behavior by their opponents”
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/june-20-2025
MAGA depends on journalists being corrupt and weak.
XKCD’s favorite stats quote.
“FAR BETTER AN APPROXIMATE ANSWER TO THE RIGHT QUESTION, WHICH IS OFTEN VAGUE, THAN AN EXACT ANSWER TO THE WRONG QUESTION, WHICH CAN ALWAYS BE MADE PRECISE.’
JOHN W. TUKEY THE FUTURE OF DATA ANALYSIS (1962)
Passkeys: “either users will lose control of their logins or that passkeys will become mainly a convenience for quickly logging in, with passwords, SMS, and e-mail as a less secure fallback”
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2025/06/20/forcing-passkeys/
I think it will be passkeys and email, no more passwords. Because the web is dying and not worth the money to maintain authentication/password systems.
Unruptured Intracranial Aneurysms: “overall prevalence of UIA was estimated at 3.2% among persons without coexisting medical conditions with an average age of 50 years”
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMcp2409371?query=WB
Thanks to modern imaging we see the time bombs. I would have guessed it was less common than 3%. Operate for “≥7 mm in diameter and located in the anterior circulation”.
DM I cure: “stem cells that scientists prodded to turn into pancreatic islet cells”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/20/health/diabetes-cure-insulin-stem-cell.html
“patients in the trial had to stay on drugs to prevent the immune system from destroying the new cells.”
Lifelong immunosuppression is not ideal.
The farm crisis to come: a historical context.
Great Econ hx – esp mechanism of ag boom/bust cycles. We really are speed running the late 70s.
Exoplanets profiled.
Starting to feel earth is a bit odd.
“all of the increase in firearm deaths among children happened in states that had more permissive gun laws”
https://contrarian.substack.com/p/we-all-need-to-take-a-troubling-new
The SEO title is completely backwards. This is an encouraging study — gun management can work in America.
Bottom Trawling – Attenborough Oceans may end it. 🆓
https://gwynnedyer.com/2025/bottom-trawling/
“Bottom trawlers are responsible for the bulk of the damage that human beings have done to the oceans”
Much new to me here.
Yvette Hoffman threw herself over her daughter to shield her from assassin’s bullets.
“Hope was born with spina bifida, and her father has cited her disability as a reason he went into state politics.”
A deranged man with a gun.
‘No Kings’ gets legacy media attention: “Couples came, families came, individuals who said they’d never before protested came. They carried hand-lettered signs focused on democracy, the rule of law and human rights”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/06/14/no-kings-protests-anti-trump-rallies-us/
We are a broken nation. But not a broken people.
In praise of middle managers.
MidManagers make or break any enterprise, they are mostly invisible, and they are widely disparaged.
Google’s Agent-to-Agent protocol explained.
https://timkellogg.me/blog/2025/06/14/a2a
Does anyone out there remember TeleScript? I wonder how the agent protocols line up.
“MCP is for tools (function-like things with inputs and outputs). A2A is for when you need free-form communication. Hence why tasks look more like actors.”
Tsai: “I just want Apple to make the basic stuff—announced back when Steve Jobs was still alive—fast and reliable…”
https://mjtsai.com/blog/2025/06/12/apples-spin-on-ai-and-ipados-multitasking/
They really are lost.
T: “… Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them”
Trump is testing how dumb the MAGA really are.
Cape Town conference on geoengineering: deployment from China, India, UK and Africa?
https://gwynnedyer.com/2025/geoengineering-or-bust/
America, the fallen giant, is best kept out of the discussion.
From Gaza to Libya or Somaliland – who will take the Palestinian refugees? (free)
https://gwynnedyer.com/2025/where-shall-we-put-the-palestinians/
Falling into the abyss.
Microproteins: when you thought biology could not get messier.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/12/science/genes-dna-microproteins.html
So much complexity. Likely key to some diseases.
A protestor’s guide to risk mitigation on the eve of the National No Kings March.
https://www.bannedinyourstate.com/p/should-you-go-to-a-protest-tomorrow
N-95 mask helps a bit with tear gas. Jedeed doesn’t fuss much about phone beyond removing biometric login.
We will be at the back and will leave if there is violence.
What broke America: Noah Smith’s list
“housing crash and Great Recession, the rise of China, racial diversification, and the rise of smartphone-enabled social media”
My list: IT, globalization, rural collapse, rise of women. (I think we broke in late 90s, well before his 2010 date.)
“…the Pentagon gave the gave the Ukrainians dozens of M1 Abrams tanks … vast majority have been destroyed or captured.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/13/us/politics/army-parade-trump.html
Excellent article on why the US Army is in a slow motion crisis.
Also, the M1 is obsolete now.
“Trump administration is vowing to get rid of the democratically elected government of California by using military force”
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/june-12-2025
According to Noem. No Kings march Sat June 14.
Raskin: “We have no kings here, we have no queens here, we have no emperors, we have no dictators, we have no despots, and we have no serfs and no slaves and no subjects, and none of us is a subject to Donald Trump. None of us is a subject to Mike Johnson.”
TV News is the key to manipulating Trump.
https://contrarian.substack.com/p/a-showdown-made-in-heaven
“Trump watches TV news throughout much of the day and night. It is the way he has lived for most of his life. His sense of reality is formed by what he sees and hears on the TV screen.”
GOP on Gabbard: “Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana … “she obviously needs to change her meds.”
https://danieldrezner.substack.com/p/is-tulsi-gabbard-okay
The GOP Senate is perhaps the worst of the GOP. They are not as stupid as the GOP Reps, that makes them more explicitly evil.
“developers to create, download or run Linux container images directly on Mac, with OCI compliance”
https://thenewstack.io/what-you-need-to-know-about-apples-new-container-framework/
Hypervisor. This sounds not terrible.
“AI to analyze San Francisco’s 16-million-word municipal code and regulations and identify outdated or duplicative reporting requirements—resulting in a legislative proposal to eliminate or consolidate 36% of reports”
AN interesting example; basically enhanced semantic search. Not a big AI tech challenge, but does a useful thing that is not cost-efficient without AI.
MAGA vs America; “America did not exist Trump’s speech, except as a cult to him personally.”
https://snyder.substack.com/p/trumps-civil-war
If we get to rebuild we need to understand why America derailed after 1995.
Mystery Foundation spread voter registration applications with fake IDs across Minnesota
Two have plead guilty but nobody’s talking.
iOS 26 to support federal passport identification?!?!
https://9to5mac.com/2025/06/10/ios-26-apple-wallet-digital-id-passport-support/
“According to Apple’s website, you’ll be able to use it at TSA checkpoints, online, and in person.”
No need to carry your wallet/state ID when you go to a bar. This is a big leap and bypasses the complexity of state ID support. As is typical of Apple the important updates are done quietly, the liquid glass stuff is BS to cover their AI failure.
“Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard today released a video warning that the world is close to a nuclear war caused by a political elite that expects it can survive one in special bunkers.”
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/june-10-2025
Even though it’s no longer news, Putin’s power over the GOP remains astounding. He used his billions to completely corrupt the party.
MAHA paper omitted smoking as a health issue. That’s an RFK thing …
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/10/rfk-smoking-maha-tobacco-cigarettes-00394863
RFK appears to use nicotine replacement products when stressed. Given his psychiatric and substance history it would be extraordinary if he was not a heavy smoker in the past, I suspect he’s a closeted smoker now.
“You’re a fraud. You’re a total fraud,” Bessent supposedly said. At that point Musk body-checked the Treasury secretary, who hit back, and White House staff had to break up the fight.”
https://paulkrugman.substack.com/p/if-you-lie-with-doge-you-get-fleeced
via Bannon. So 50/50 at best unless someone talks.
“America will spend years paying the price for Musk’s fraudulence.” If we are very lucky.
“in 1990, Trump praised the Chinese government for its handling of the protests at Tiananmen Square”
He is who he always was and he was very transparent about his goals. The rot is in us, the American people. And, of course, in the legacy media.
Executive Functioning in ADHD and autism: NYT guide
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/10/well/mind/executive-function-tips.html
Pretty good really.
“subscribers have mostly ignored Discovery’s enormous assortment of lowbrow reality shows and unscripted lifestyle content”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/10/business/media/hbo-max-warner-bros-discovery.html
Why they merged then split. Daytime TV fair doesn’t work for a streaming audience.
Novo Nordisk trillion dollar error: “Novo did file a patent there for semaglutide. . .but the last time they paid the annual maintenance fee on it was 2018”
https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/novo-nordisk-s-canadian-mistake
Semaglutide goes generic in Canada. Maybe invasion delayed while Canada supplies US market?
“Roundabouts in Minnesota have had over an 80% reduction in fatal and serious injury crashes.”
https://www.dot.state.mn.us/roundabouts/safety.html
No wonder they are popular. Crashes tend to be low consequences vs t-bone of running an intersection.
“Trump administration is scrambling to rehire many federal employees dismissed under DOGE’s staff-slashing initiatives”
https://www.startribune.com/trump-races-to-fix-a-big-mistake-doge-fired-too-many-people/601368798
Musk takes the blame. Fed workers needed big raises before DOGE, raises will need to be bigger now.
Apple paper: “LRMs effectively overthink on simple problems, outperform LLMs on mid-complexity puzzles, and fail in the same exact way LLMs do on high-complexity tasks and puzzles”
https://daringfireball.net/linked/2025/06/08/apple-research-lrms
Encouraging sign that we have hit a hard AI limit for at least a few years. The longer the better.
“A Centers for Disease Control and Prevention official said Tuesday she was resigning from her role overseeing updates to the agency’s COVID-19 vaccine recommendations”
https://contrarian.substack.com/p/the-golden-age-of-resignations
People with courage and convictions.
HCR: “Journey to American Democracy: a series of short videos about American history that we will release on my YouTube channel, Facebook, and Instagram”
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/june-7-2025
An antidote to MAGA lies.
HCR has very much seized her moment. Historians arise.
How the market for US bonds works and why MAGA-America will pay more interest on debt or will have inflation or both.
https://www.twincities.com/2025/06/08/real-world-economics-bonds-part-2-how-this-affects-us/
A very clear explanation that includes appropriate caveats. The balance of debt vs inflation seems inherently unpredictable.
COVID update: “asymptomatic throughout infection was 44.1”
https://www.thegauntlet.news/p/common-misconceptions-about-covid
I liked this update.
“many of the guidelines … simply hygiene theater”
Funding journalism- “… government give individual tax credits to people, who could then support the news outlet(s) of their choice. The model for this already exists: the charitable contribution tax deduction”
https://cepr.net/publications/saving-journalism-will-require-some-new-thinking/
Someone agrees with me.
“every adult in the country would have the right to give $100, regardless of whether they owed taxes or not”
Remember tariffs? “deadline come and gone for best trade offers, and the radio silence by the Trump White House about trade since that deadline has passed”
https://danieldrezner.substack.com/p/the-curious-incident-of-the-trade
Trade negotiator comments are enlightening.
Post-shame MAGA loves their corruption.
https://danieldrezner.substack.com/p/corruption-in-plain-sight-is-still
Our culture is broken. It isn’t just legacy media.