The U.S. Has Forgotten How to Do Infrastructure - Bloomberg

The U.S. Has Forgotten How to Do Infrastructure - Bloomberg: "That suggests that U.S. costs are high due to general inefficiency -- inefficient project management, an inefficient government contracting process, and inefficient regulation. It suggests that construction, like health care or asset management or education, is an area where Americans have simply ponied up more and more cash over the years while ignoring the fact that they were getting less and less for their money. To fix the problems choking U.S. construction, reformers are going to have to go through the system and rip out the inefficiencies root and branch.

"



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Fred Rogers - Wikipedia

Fred Rogers - Wikipedia:

Fred McFeely Rogers (March 20, 1928 – February 27, 2003) was an American television personality, famous for creating, hosting, and composing the theme music for the educational preschool television series Mister Rogers' Neighborhood (1968–2001), which featured his kind-hearted, gentle, soft-spoken personality, and directness to his audiences.^[1]

Initially educated to be a minister, Rogers was displeased with the way television addressed children and made an effort to change this when he began to write for and perform on local Pittsburgh-area shows dedicated to youth. WQED developed his own show in 1968 and it was distributed nationwide by Eastern Educational Television Network. Over the course of three decades on television, Fred Rogers became an icon of American children's entertainment and education.^[2] He was also known for his advocacy of various public causes.

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Is Trump an 'adult'? Ben Sasse won't say - POLITICO

Is Trump an 'adult'? Ben Sasse won't say - POLITICO: "Sasse’s formula for true adulthood consists of five main steps: Overcome “peer culture,” or associating just with people of similar ages; work hard; limit consumption of television or other passive media in favor of producing art or music or anything else; travel widely to understand how various people understand the difference between what they need and what they want; and become literate by reading widely and deeply.

"



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Child Therapist Gives Gorgeous Explanation Of What Good Parenting Looks Like | HuffPost

Child Therapist Gives Gorgeous Explanation Of What Good Parenting Looks Like | HuffPost: "
A house full of screaming kids and fighting teenagers and a parent who’s being thrown every question and request is a healthy one to me. 

It’s the silent children, the scared toddlers, the teenagers that don’t come home and the parents who aren’t in communication with their children that I worry about."



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(Explicit language) Carly Rae Jepsen vs. DMX (Mashup) - YouTube

X Gon Give It To Ya Maybe - Carly Rae Jepsen vs. DMX (Mashup) - YouTube: "Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen vs. X Gon' Give It To Ya by DMX.
"




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Popular Science Monthly/Volume 77/October 1910/The Moral Equivalent of War - Wikisource, the free online library

Popular Science Monthly/Volume 77/October 1910/The Moral Equivalent of War - Wikisource, the free online library: "The war-party is assuredly right in affirming and reaffirming that the martial virtues, although originally gained by the race through war, are absolute and permanent human goods. Patriotic pride and ambition in their military form are, after all, only specifications of a more general competitive passion. They are its first form, but that is no reason for supposing them to be its last form. Men now are proud of belonging to a conquering nation, and without a murmur they lay down their persons and their wealth, if by so doing they may fend off subjection. But who can be sure that other aspects of one's country may not, with time and education and suggestion enough, come to be regarded with similarly effective feelings of pride and shame? Why should men not some day feel that it is worth a blood-tax to belong to a collectivity superior in any ideal respect? Why should they not blush with indignant shame if the community that owns them is vile in any way whatsoever? Individuals, daily more numerous, now feel this civic passion. It is only a question of blowing on the spark till the whole population gets incandescent, and on the ruins of the old morals of military honor, a stable system of morals of civic honor builds itself up. What the whole community comes to believe in grasps the individual as in a vise. The war-function has graspt us so far; but constructive interests may some day seem no less imperative, and impose on the individual a hardly lighter burden.

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Afloat on the Erie Canal: Sonar Gear, Ferris Wheel Parts and Beer Tanks - The New York Times

Afloat on the Erie Canal: Sonar Gear, Ferris Wheel Parts and Beer Tanks - The New York Times:

It has been 200 years since a corps of men and mules started to dig what was known as “Clinton’s ditch” across hundreds of miles of farmland, forests and other decidedly dry terrain in upstate New York, creating the Erie Canal and, with it, a range of prosperous towns from Albany to Buffalo.

The canal’s heyday has long passed, and in recent decades it has been relegated as a recreational byway, drawing pleasure boats, fishing lines and the occasional canal fan.

Lately, however, there has been a curious sight along the Erie Canal and some of its offshoots: commercial shipping — a small rebound pegged to the canal’s use as a niche waterway for cargo whose size or weight make it impossible, impractical or too expensive to haul any other way. All told, the state anticipates more than 200,000 tons of shipping on the canal system in 2017, a milestone not reached since 1993, according to state officials. Still, that is a far cry from the millions of tons of cargo the canal regularly trafficked during the 19th and early 20th centuries.

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Why America can’t make up its mind about housing — Strong Towns

Why America can’t make up its mind about housing — Strong Towns: "We are, in conclusion, profoundly conflicted as a nation when it comes to housing: we want it to be affordable, but we also want its prices to rise fast enough to be valuable as a financial investment. That’s a contradiction we need to acknowledge if our housing policy debate—and, ultimately, our housing policy—is going to be coherent and constructive.

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5DaysSober comments on The S&P 500 has an average annual RoI of 7% - 10%. Other indices return at comparable rates. Why, then, do so many investors end up with significantly lower, or even negative returns?

5DaysSober comments on The S&P 500 has an average annual RoI of 7% - 10%. Other indices return at comparable rates. Why, then, do so many investors end up with significantly lower, or even negative returns?: "The typical investor definitely has a positive ROI, but below that of the market.



It's like grilling a piece of meat, the less you fuck with it, the better it is. Every time an investor makes a move he has the opportunity to f*** it up. The typical investor causes more harm than good for each move he makes. But moving it around is the only way to get above average. So, in an effort to make a perfect steak, 1 steak turns out better than average, and 9 turn out worse. But, everybody is convinced they're the grill master so they keep f***ing up their steaks."



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James Fallows's 2017 UVM Commencement Speech - The Atlantic

James Fallows's 2017 UVM Commencement Speech - The Atlantic:

How many of you think of UVM and Burlington and Vermont as special places? As places that are exceptions to the national trend? That are moving forward?

I bet many of you do. And you have better grounds than most. But having spent several years traveling around parts of the country less obviously special than this, I can tell you that in much of the country people feel just the same way about where they are from. They feel that they are doing better, in the part of the country within their own experience, than what they hear about the country as a whole. They say that in Mississippi, with all its burdens. They say it in South Dakota. They say it in Arizona and Oregon and South Carolina and rustbelt Michigan and Pennsylvania. Everyone in this country is aware of the nation’s problems. But most places, most people feel that the greatest possibilities are through local involvement, and that they are moving ahead rather than falling behind.

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Research: How You Feel About Individualism Is Influenced by Your Social Class

Research: How You Feel About Individualism Is Influenced by Your Social Class:

Our body of ongoing research shows that people from working-class backgrounds tend to understand themselves as interdependent with and highly connected to others. Parents teach their children the importance of following the rules and adjusting to the needs of others, in part because there is no economic safety net to fall back on. Common sayings include “You can’t always get what you want” and “It’s not all about you”; values such as solidarity, humility, and loyalty take precedence.

In contrast, people from middle- and upper-class contexts tend to understand themselves as independent and separate from others. Parents teach kids the importance of cultivating their personal preferences, needs, and interests. Common sayings include “The world is your oyster” and “Your voice matters”; values such as uniqueness, self-expression, and influence take precedence.

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MAX stabbing victim was Portland employee, Army veteran | OregonLive.com

MAX stabbing victim was Portland employee, Army veteran | OregonLive.com:

He was headed to his home in Happy Valley when he and two others intervened as a man began hurling epithets at two teenagers aboard a MAX Green Line train, witnesses said. The man then pulled a knife and stabbed the three men, killing two and injuring one.

Best had three teenage sons and a 12-year-old daughter, Austin said.

Best grew up in Oregon, mostly in Salem, and attended Vocational Village High School in Portland.

He met his wife at Portland Community College, and then joined the Army. He said in a voter pamphlet statement that he served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Best retired from the Army as a platoon sergeant for Corps maintenance in 2012 after 23 years in the military. He joined his family in Happy Valley and quickly became frustrated with the county board, in 2014 launching an unsuccessful campaign in which he said he would not accept donations.

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Feature Film Production in Georgia Outpaced California Last Year, Study Says | Hollywood Reporter

Feature Film Production in Georgia Outpaced California Last Year, Study Says | Hollywood Reporter: "Seventeen features filmed in Georgia in 2016, meaning the state has outpaced the previous frontrunner, California, as the top location for feature film production.

"



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When Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg sound the same dire warning about jobs, it’s time to listen - MarketWatch

When Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg sound the same dire warning about jobs, it’s time to listen - MarketWatch: "And Zuckerberg also had some words of wisdom for tomorrow’s entrepreneurs. “Let me tell you a secret: no one does when they begin. Ideas don’t come out fully formed. They only become clear as you work on them. You just have to get started,” he said. “If I had to understand everything about connecting people before I began, I never would have started Facebook. Movies and pop culture get this all wrong. The idea of a single eureka moment is a dangerous lie. It makes us feel inadequate since we haven’t had ours. It prevents people with seeds of good ideas from getting started.”"



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How Bad Are K-Cups for the Environment? - The Atlantic

How Bad Are K-Cups for the Environment? - The Atlantic: "Though the predicted consumer backlash has arrived, especially in recent months, the company continues to grow. Others have entered the market very successfully. While drip coffee-maker sales are stagnant, pod-machine sales have increased six-fold since 2008. Looking back on his invention, amid increasing public condemnation of K-Cups as a scourge on the planet, Sylvan told me, “I feel bad sometimes that I ever did it.”

"



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There are bots. Look around.

There are bots. Look around.: "One example is quote stuffing, which involves flooding specific instruments (like a particular stock) with thousands and thousands of orders and cancellations at rates that exceed bandwidth capabilities. The goal is to increase latency and cause confusion among other participants in the market. Another example is spoofing, placing bids and offers with the intent to cancel rather than execute, and its advanced form, layering, where this is done at several pricing tiers to create the illusion of a fuller order book (in other words, faking supply and/or demand). The goals of these strategies is to entice other market participants — including other algorithms — to respond in a way that benefits the person running the manipulation strategy. People are creative. And in the early days of HFT, slimy people could do bad things with relative ease.

"



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TIL 10% of those conscripted in the UK in WWII were sent to serve not on the battlefield, but in the coal mines that powered the war machine. Some of these soldiers were not released from service until two years after the war ended. They were not formally recognized for their contribution until 1995 : todayilearned

TIL 10% of those conscripted in the UK in WWII were sent to serve not on the battlefield, but in the coal mines that powered the war machine. Some of these soldiers were not released from service until two years after the war ended. They were not formally recognized for their contribution until 1995 : todayilearned:

The 10 Deadliest Jobs: Deaths per 100,000

1. Logging workers: 128.8
2. Fishers and related fishing workers: 117
3. Aircraft pilot and flight engineers: 53.4
4. Roofers: 40.5
5. Structural iron and steel workers: 37
6. Refuse and recyclable material collectors: 27.1
7. Electrical power-line installers and repairers: 23
8. Drivers/sales workers and truck drivers: 22.1
9. Farmers, ranchers, and other agricultural managers: 21.3
10. Construction laborers: 17.4

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City and United donate to emergency fund

City and United donate to emergency fund:

 The Red and Blue halves of Manchester have combined to support the city they have each called home for more than a 120 years and which has been profoundly affected by the tragic events witnessed on Monday. 

Under the banner of #ACityUnited, the two clubs will continue to explore opportunities to support the city at this testing time.

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We’re Seth Rich’s parents. Stop politicizing our son’s murder. - The Washington Post

We’re Seth Rich’s parents. Stop politicizing our son’s murder. - The Washington Post: "We also know that many people are angry at our government and want to see justice done in some way, somehow. We are asking you to please consider our feelings and words. There are people who are using our beloved Seth’s memory and legacy for their own political goals, and they are using your outrage to perpetuate our nightmare. We ask those purveying falsehoods to give us peace, and to give law enforcement the time and space to do the investigation they need to solve our son’s murder.

"



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Letters of Note: 1984 v. Brave New World

Letters of Note: 1984 v. Brave New World:


In October of 1949, a few months after publication of George Orwell's dystopian masterpiece, Nineteen Eighty-Four, he received a letter from fellow author Aldous Huxley, a man who, 17 years previous, had seen his own nightmarish vision of society published in the form of Brave New World, a book also now considered a classic. Having recently finished reading Orwell’s novel, Huxley had a few words to say. What begins as a letter of praise soon becomes a brief comparison of the two novels, and an explanation as to why Huxley believes his own, earlier work to be a more realistic prediction.

Trivia: In 1917, long before he wrote this letter, Aldous Huxley briefly taught Orwell French at Eton.



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Won't You Be My Neighbor? Reconciliation and Foot-Washing in Mister Rogers' Neighborhood - Christ and Pop Culture

Won't You Be My Neighbor? Reconciliation and Foot-Washing in Mister Rogers' Neighborhood - Christ and Pop Culture: "In one brief scene on a children’s television show, we see this happen. We see two men humbling themselves. We see two men cleansing each other through acts of communion and identification. We see two men showing the world how reconciliation happens. And we hear Mr. Rogers say, in his own quiet voice, “Sometimes just a minute like this will really make a difference.”
"



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Remembering Mr. Rogers, a true-life 'helper' when the world still needs one

Remembering Mr. Rogers, a true-life 'helper' when the world still needs one:

Then he opened the student union door and said goodbye. That’s when I blurted in a kind of rambling gush that I’d stumbled on the show again recently, at a time when I truly needed it. He listened there in the doorway, the bitter Pittsburgh winter wind flowing around him into the warm lobby bustling with students.

When I ran out of words, I just said, “So … thanks for that. Again.”

Mr. Rogers nodded. He looked down, and let the door close again. He undid his scarf and motioned to the window, where he sat down on the ledge.

This is what set Mr. Rogers apart. No one else would’ve done this. No one.

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The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion: Jonathan Haidt: 9780307455772: Amazon.com: Books

The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion: Jonathan Haidt: 9780307455772: Amazon.com: Books:

For some, religions are only sets of memes that have undergone Darwinian selection.



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The Circus Leaves Town - BBC News

The Circus Leaves Town - BBC News:

After 146 years, these are the final performances of Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Circus, an American institution that was slowly brought to its knees by a combination of evolving cultural tastes, bad luck and political enemies that left it no longer financially viable for its parent company, Feld Entertainment.

So, in addition to ignoring the 104-foot expanse of floor between the cannon mouth and the airbag, Sanders has had to force herself to stop thinking about the fact that she’s facing unemployment, the loss of her home, the disbanding of her tight-knit circus family, and the end of her dream job.

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In Appalachia the country is beautiful and the society is broken.

| National Review: "It’s not like he has a lot of appealing options, though. There used to be two movie theaters here — a regular cinema and a drive-in. Both are long gone. The nearest Walmart is nearly an hour away. There’s no bookstore, the nearest Barnes & Noble being 55 miles away and the main source of reading matter being the horrifying/hilarious crime blotter in the local weekly newspaper. Within living memory, this town had three grocery stores, a Western Auto and a Napa Auto Parts, a feed store, a lumber store, a clothing shop, a Chrysler dealership, a used-car dealership, a skating rink — even a discotheque, back in the 1970s. Today there is one grocery store, and the rest is as dead as disco. If you want a newsstand or a dinner at Applebee’s, gas up the car. Amazon may help, but delivery can be tricky — the nearest UPS drop-box is 17 miles away, the nearest FedEx office 34 miles away.

"



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Why the obituary for Eudocia Tomas Pulido didn’t tell the story of her life in slavery | The Seattle Times

Why the obituary for Eudocia Tomas Pulido didn’t tell the story of her life in slavery | The Seattle Times: "Obituaries depend on the fundamental honesty of the people who survive to tell the story. Tizon lied to me, and through me, to our readers, depriving Ms. Pulido of the truth of her life, and the rest of us an important piece of our history. And for that I am truly sorry.

"



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A Story of Slavery in Modern America - The Atlantic

A Story of Slavery in Modern America - The Atlantic:

Lola’s mother, Fermina, died in 1973; her father, Hilario, in 1979. Both times she wanted desperately to go home. Both times my parents said “Sorry.” No money, no time. The kids needed her. My parents also feared for themselves, they admitted to me later. If the authorities had found out about Lola, as they surely would have if she’d tried to leave, my parents could have gotten into trouble, possibly even been deported. They couldn’t risk it. Lola’s legal status became what Filipinos call tago nang tago, or TNT—“on the run.” She stayed TNT for almost 20 years.

After each of her parents died, Lola was sullen and silent for months. She barely responded when my parents badgered her. But the badgering never let up. Lola kept her head down and did her work.

(also read this: https://twitter.com/JShahryar/status/864534668284055553)

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Validation of a Functional Pyelocalyceal Renal Model for the Evaluation of Renal Calculi Passage While Riding a Roller Coaster | The Journal of the American Osteopathic Association

Validation of a Functional Pyelocalyceal Renal Model for the Evaluation of Renal Calculi Passage While Riding a Roller Coaster | The Journal of the American Osteopathic Association:

Over several years, a notable number of our patients reported passing renal calculi spontaneously after riding the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad roller coaster at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom theme park in Orlando, Florida. The number of stone passages was sufficient to raise suspicions of a possible link between riding a roller coaster and passing renal calculi. One patient reported passing renal calculi after each of 3 consecutive rides on the roller coaster. Many patients reported passing renal calculi within hours of leaving the amusement park, and all of them rode the same rollercoaster during their visit. 

The purpose of the current study was to validate this functional pyelocalyceal renal model and to provide clinical recommendations based on data generated. 

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Duck Ramps Appear at U.S. Capitol, but Not Everyone Is Pleased - The New York Times

Duck Ramps Appear at U.S. Capitol, but Not Everyone Is Pleased - The New York Times: "Political turmoil rocked the nation’s capital again on Tuesday evening as politicians from both parties responded to President Trump’s — you know what, never mind. This is a story about ducks.

"



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Media Manipulation and Disinformation Online || Data & Society

Media Manipulation and Disinformation Online || Data & Society: ""the spread of false or misleading information is having real and negative effects on the public consumption of news."
"



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The making of a prison town (Prison Town) — High Country News

The making of a prison town (Prison Town) — High Country News:



With the farms and base gone, Adelanto turned to prisons. During the 1980s, under increasingly stringent drug laws and harsh sentencing policies, demand for new prisons had grown. So had the belief that prisons could nourish economic development in rural communities. In California, the prison boom took off throughout the Central Valley and in the desert regions outside Los Angeles and San Diego, in poor rural towns with high black and Latino populations, too far from major metro areas for suburban growth. As Ruth Gilmore writes in Golden Gulag, the new prisons were sited on previously irrigated and cultivated land, taken out of production by the interrelated forces of “drought, debt, and development.”

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A Whistle-Blower Tells of Health Insurers Bilking Medicare - The New York Times

A Whistle-Blower Tells of Health Insurers Bilking Medicare - The New York Times:

In the first interview since his allegations were made public, the whistle-blower, Benjamin Poehling of Bloomington, Minn., described in detail how his company and others like it — in his view — gamed the system: Finance directors like him monitored projects that UnitedHealth had designed to make patients look sicker than they were, by scouring patients’ health records electronically and finding ways to goose the diagnosis codes.

The sicker the patient, the more UnitedHealth was paid by Medicare Advantage — and the bigger the bonuses people earned, including Mr. Poehling.

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This data set took six years to create. Worth every moment. | Hudson Hollister | Pulse | LinkedIn

This data set took six years to create. Worth every moment. | Hudson Hollister | Pulse | LinkedIn: "And today, we celebrate Darrell Issa, Mark Warner, Christina Ho, Tim Gribben, and all the other leaders who caught Jefferson's dream of a single, unified federal spending data set, and didn't let go.

"



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Trump Revealed Highly Classified Intelligence to Russia, in Break With Ally, Officials Say - The New York Times

Trump Revealed Highly Classified Intelligence to Russia, in Break With Ally, Officials Say - The New York Times: "WASHINGTON — President Trump boasted about highly classified intelligence in a meeting with the Russian foreign minister and ambassador last week, providing details that could expose the source of the information and the manner in which it was collected, a current and a former American government official said Monday.

"



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How the wrong cat litter took down a nuclear waste repository | May 15, 2017 Issue - Vol. 95 Issue 20 | Chemical & Engineering News

How the wrong cat litter took down a nuclear waste repository | May 15, 2017 Issue - Vol. 95 Issue 20 | Chemical & Engineering News: "Hobbs, who doesn’t own a cat, is one of the researchers who studied the nuclear waste mixture that in 2014 led to a drum failure and radiological release at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) near Carlsbad, N.M. The accident shut down the facility for three years. It was ultimately traced to an unorthodox sorbent, an organic cat litter called sWheat Scoop, that was used in error to prepare the nuclear waste for disposal at WIPP.
"



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U.S. Accuses Syria of Mass Executions, Running Crematorium - WSJ

U.S. Accuses Syria of Mass Executions, Running Crematorium - WSJ:

“There were suspicions about it when the regime stopped giving the detainees’ families the bodies, and some news was coming out about it, but no 100% confirmation,” said Qutaiba Idlibi, a Syrian activist who was twice detained and tortured by the Syrian regime.

Muneer Al-Fakeer, a former political prisoner at Saydnaya, remembers it was the summer of 2013 when the prisoners at the notorious prison began to smell burning flesh.

“We used to smell the fire and we would smell strange odors,” he said. “We would smell things like meat and flesh burning for days.”

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There’s So Much to Learn From the Montana Special Election

There’s So Much to Learn From the Montana Special Election:

In trying to nationalize these races — and framing them as macro-commentary on politics in America — we lose sight of the actual lessons they can teach us.

Some of those lessons are simple: to remember, for example, that endorsements are unpredictable variables. But others are more complicated, and frustrate the inclination of both Democrats and Republicans to turn every race into a national statement. The Montana special election won’t be a referendum on Trump. It won’t even necessarily tell us what will happen in the midterms. But it, and Montana politics in general, does offer a master class on something even more important: namely, how to cultivate and actually sway one of the most valuable, and increasingly rare, of political entities — the independent voter.

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Seven Reasons the Left Is Losing - The Atlantic

Seven Reasons the Left Is Losing - The Atlantic:

When Abraham Lincoln was 33 years old, he gave a speech inside a Presbyterian church to a temperance society. His message: The assembled ought to be nicer to drinkers and sellers of alcohol, rather than shunning them, or denouncing them as moral pestilences. Indeed, they ought to use “kindly persuasion,” even if a man’s drunkenness had caused misery to his wife, or left his children hungry and naked with want.

For people are never less likely to change, to convert to new ways of thinking or acting, than when it means joining the ranks of their denouncers.

To expect otherwise, “to have expected them not to meet denunciation with denunciation ... and anathema with anathema, was to expect a reversal of human nature,” Lincoln explained. “If you would win a man to your cause, first convince him that you are his sincere friend. Therein is a drop of honey that catches his heart, which, say what he will, is the great highroad to his reason, and when once gained, you will find but little trouble in convincing his judgment of the justice of your cause.”

However, Lincoln cautioned, dictate to a man’s judgment, command his action, or mark him to be despised, “and he will retreat within himself, close all the avenues to his head and his heart. And even though your cause be naked truth itself, transformed to the heaviest lance, harder than steel, and sharper than steel can be made, and though you throw it with more than Herculean force and precision, you shall be no more be able to pierce him, than to penetrate the hard shell of a tortoise with a rye straw.”

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Girls' football team ridiculed for entering boys' league silence critics by winning it | The Independent

Girls' football team ridiculed for entering boys' league silence critics by winning it | The Independent:

The girls of AEM Lleida, in Spain, so dominated the girls' leagues in their area that team bosses signed them up for competition against boys.

Two seasons later they got their hands on the winners' trophy, with top scorer Andrea Gomez netting 38 times, the New York Times reported. The team lost just once in 22 games, AEM said on a fundraising website, and the girls were declared champions four games before the end of the season.

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How to give away $5,000 on the Internet – Nadia Eghbal – Medium

How to give away $5,000 on the Internet – Nadia Eghbal – Medium:

I was impressed by the multitude of backgrounds among applicants. Gender was evenly balanced. Applicants were as young as 13 and as old as their late 60s. Every continent besides Antartica was well-represented, with countries ranging from Colombia to Nigeria to Mongolia. And a lot of people identified as immigrants or first-generation children.

I did not receive a single scammy, spammy, joke-y, troll-y type email. Instead, my inbox was filled with an incredible level of sincerity and vulnerability from my fellow humans.

The internet, even in its humor, is often masked in sarcasm and stoicism. This felt…real. Super real.

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The Billionaire and the Flood: How a Tragedy Transformed the Greenbrier Resort and the Blue-Collar Town that Depended on It | Washingtonian

The Billionaire and the Flood: How a Tragedy Transformed the Greenbrier Resort and the Blue-Collar Town that Depended on It | Washingtonian: "
Once upon a time, the resort had ensured a stable economy. Older residents remember a pleasant and bustling Main Street. “You could buy a spool of thread, and you could buy a white shirt. You could rent a tuxedo,” says Wooding, the former mayor. “Everything you needed was here.”
That began to change over time. In 1995, Lewisburg, eight miles away, got a Walmart.
New restaurants and stores trickled in behind it, and when the resort dropped its all-inclusive dining plan in 2006, more guests began taking its shuttles to Lewisburg."



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Chris Rock Cover Story: On His New Tour and Starting Over - Rolling Stone

Chris Rock Cover Story: On His New Tour and Starting Over - Rolling Stone:

There are two kinds of talent in the world: the guy who shows up hungover 10 minutes before the game/gig (think Keith Richards or Yankees legend Mickey Mantle) and coasts by on natural charisma; and the grinders (think Seinfeld or Tom Brady), who hijack their talent to another level solely on their obsessive work ethic. Rock is firmly in the second camp, and owns it. Rock and Louis C.K. have been friends for 20 years, and C.K. told Rock a story about his early days in Boston when he would pester older comedians for advice and beg clubs to put him onstage when he wasn't on the schedule.

"All those comedians kind of hated me," remembers C.K. "They would write mean graffiti about me on comedy-club walls. I told Chris about that and how I was ashamed I was such a pain in everybody's asses. Chris just yelled at me, ‘No, you’re wrong. They're wrong. That’s what it takes.'" Rock even threatened to break off their friendship if C.K. didn't stop writing for other people and write for himself. 

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James Comey’s Conspicuous Independence - The New Yorker

James Comey’s Conspicuous Independence - The New Yorker: "At this point, Comey and his deputies were venturing far beyond their typical purview as criminal investigators. Under normal circumstances, department policies discouraged public discussion of developments in ongoing cases of any kind; with the election fast approaching, there was the added sensitivity of avoiding even the perception of interference with the political process. But F.B.I. officials worried that agents in New York who disliked Clinton would leak news of the e-mails’ existence. Like nearly everyone in Washington, senior F.B.I. officials assumed that Clinton would win the election, and were evaluating their options with that in mind. The prospect of oversight hearings, led by restive Republicans investigating an F.B.I. “coverup,” made everyone uneasy.

"



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Meet the Donnellys - the Irish family named the oldest in the world by Guinness World Records - Independent.ie

Meet the Donnellys - the Irish family named the oldest in the world by Guinness World Records - Independent.ie: "A group of Armagh siblings - with a combined age of 1073 years - are celebrating after receiving the Guinness World Record for being the oldest family on earth.
The 13 brothers and sisters, Sean (93), Maureen (92), Eileen (90), Peter (87), Mairead (86), Rose (85), Tony (83), Terry (81), Seamus (80), Brian (76), Kathleen (75), Colm (73) and Leo (72) were awarded the Guinness World Record for the siblings with the highest combined age in March but celebrated the achievement this week."



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Meet the Donnellys - the Irish family named the oldest in the world by Guinness World Records - Independent.ie

Meet the Donnellys - the Irish family named the oldest in the world by Guinness World Records - Independent.ie: "A group of Armagh siblings - with a combined age of 1073 years - are celebrating after receiving the Guinness World Record for being the oldest family on earth.
The 13 brothers and sisters, Sean (93), Maureen (92), Eileen (90), Peter (87), Mairead (86), Rose (85), Tony (83), Terry (81), Seamus (80), Brian (76), Kathleen (75), Colm (73) and Leo (72) were awarded the Guinness World Record for the siblings with the highest combined age in March but celebrated the achievement this week."



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Comey infuriated Trump with refusal to preview Senate testimony: aides | Reuters

Comey infuriated Trump with refusal to preview Senate testimony: aides | Reuters:


The anger behind Donald Trump's firing of FBI Director James Comey on Tuesday had been building for months, but a turning point came when Comey refused to preview for top Trump aides his planned testimony to a Senate panel, White House officials said.

Trump, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein had wanted a heads-up from Comey about what he would say at a May 3 hearing about his handling of an investigation into former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server.

When Comey refused, Trump and his aides considered that an act of insubordination and it was one of the catalysts to Trump’s decision this week to fire the FBI director, the officials said.

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What the last Nuremberg prosecutor alive wants the world to know - CBS News

What the last Nuremberg prosecutor alive wants the world to know - CBS News:

These men would never have been murderers had it not been for the war. These were people who could quote Goethe, who loved Wagner, who were polite--

Lesley Stahl: What turns a man into a savage beast like that?

Benjamin Ferencz: He's not a savage. He's an intelligent, patriotic human being.

Lesley Stahl: He's a savage when he does the murder though.

Benjamin Ferencz: No. He's a patriotic human being acting in the interest of his country, in his mind.

Lesley Stahl: You don't think they turn into savages even for the act?

Benjamin Ferencz: Do you think the man who dropped the nuclear bomb on Hiroshima was a savage? Now I will tell you something very profound, which I have learned after many years. War makes murderers out of otherwise decent people. All wars, and all decent people.

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An eye-opening experience: The lasting impacts of the College on a language TA – The Williams Record

An eye-opening experience: The lasting impacts of the College on a language TA – The Williams Record:

I came to the College not long ago, to teach my native language, with a certain mindset, and I am leaving with a different one. How has it changed? Why has it changed?

The first, and probably most important aspect, is the perception of Russia, my home country. As a language teaching assistant (TA), I have spent an enormous amount of time with my colleagues. We are a temporary family of 13, and our baker’s dozen has spent a lot of time together over the last nine months that we have been here. That implies countless conversations about all sorts of things between people of completely different mindsets and opinions. This may sound like a recipe for many personal discoveries (or fights, but fortunately, not in our case).

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Amazing data entry - YouTube

Amazing data entry - YouTube:





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Radio Station WHMI 93.5 FM -- News, Weather, Traffic, Sports, School Updates, and the Best Classic Hits for Howell, Brighton, Fenton, and the entire Livingston County, Michigan Area

Radio Station WHMI 93.5 FM -- News, Weather, Traffic, Sports, School Updates, and the Best Classic Hits for Howell, Brighton, Fenton, and the entire Livingston County, Michigan Area:

After 33 years of dedicated service, a longtime employee of a local McDonald’s celebrated his retirement Monday surrounded by friends and family.

Daniel Lybrink of Howell began working at McDonald’s in April of 1984 as the “lobby manager”. With over three decades of service under his belt, Daniel, who has Down Syndrome, is known for his work ethic and contagious smile.

A surprise party celebrating Daniel’s retirement was held at the Brighton McDonald’s Monday, filling the lobby with his friends, family, and community members who have all been impacted by Daniel’s lovable personality. The event included cake, gifts, and a memory book for guests to sign. David Glynn, General Manager at the Brighton McDonald’s, has worked with Daniel for 13 years. Above all else, he says Daniel “makes everybody feel special”.



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commiespaceinvader comments on How prevalent is Holocaust denial and how does it vary by nationality?

commiespaceinvader comments on How prevalent is Holocaust denial and how does it vary by nationality?: "Holocaust denialism the way we know it today started in the 1960s/70s with the rise of neo-fascist and neo-extreme rightits political movements and causes. Not directly referencing Nazism and old-school fascism as their sources of inspiration but still viewing themselves in the same historical lineage, a lot of these people saw themselves as the right counter-movement to the New Left of 1968 and so on. From Arthur Butz to David Irving, it was this generation who had not themselves taken part in the war and in the Anglosphere rejected the narratives of their elders as the Second World War being just, which formed the most tropes, arguments and methods used by Holocaust deniers to this day. This ranges from the supposedly "scientific" denialism of Leuchter and Zündel to the more subtle relativism of Irving and Nolte to the outright denial of everything like Faurisson's.
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willlienellson comments on TIL In 1992, a man in Texas was sent to death row for murdering his kids by arson. He was executed by lethal injection in 2004. In 2009, through advances in technology, it was found that the fire was likely accidental. According to an expert, "There was no item of evidence that indicated arson."

willlienellson comments on TIL In 1992, a man in Texas was sent to death row for murdering his kids by arson. He was executed by lethal injection in 2004. In 2009, through advances in technology, it was found that the fire was likely accidental. According to an expert, "There was no item of evidence that indicated arson.":

I eventually convinced them all to reverse their first positions and deliver a not guilty verdict, but I basically had to repeat the entire defense case from scratch over again.

Something about not being scowled at by the prosecutor or sitting in the shadow of the judge or something allowed them to actually think objectively.

FWIW, this wasn't anything like a capital crime. I didn't save someones life. It's just something that was a very telling experience for me personally. Because had I (or someone like me) not been there he would have been found guilty in 5 min instead of not guilty in 1 hr.

Based on that experience I think 90% of the population are so inclined to accept "authority figures" that they are extremely likely to deliver a guilty verdict just based on the enthusiasm of the prosecutor. Scary to think about.

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Anti-Vaccine Groups Fuel Fears In Minnesota's Measles Outbreak : Shots - Health News : NPR

Anti-Vaccine Groups Fuel Fears In Minnesota's Measles Outbreak : Shots - Health News : NPR:


She's quick to name the fear that's working against the measles vaccine among Somali-Americans.

"They believe it causes autism."

A weekend meeting in Minneapolis, organized by anti-vaccine groups (the Vaccine Safety Council of Minnesota, the Minnesota Natural Health Coalition, the National Health Freedom Action and Minnesota Vaccine Freedom Coalition and The Organic Consumers Association) attracted dozens of Somali-Americans. Some members of the audience shouted down physicians — including pediatrician Dr. Stacene Maroushek — who showed up to try to convince them vaccination is crucial.

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A Lot of What Is Known about Pirates Is Not True, and a Lot of What Is True Is Not Known. | Humanities

A Lot of What Is Known about Pirates Is Not True, and a Lot of What Is True Is Not Known. | Humanities: "Piracy has not achieved its rightful place in the narrative of American history precisely because it was so familiar to the people of the English-speaking world of the seventeenth century. In the early days of the colonies, pirate attacks were considered a commonplace, inevitable feature of the maritime world, and noted only as entertaining asides. The prevalence of piracy in children’s stories and blockbuster movies has likely also made it difficult for historians to study the topic without romanticism. This was where my childhood disinterest in piracy paid off. I embarked on my research as a historian rather than as a fan.

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Trial by Fire - The New Yorker

Trial by Fire - The New Yorker: "Just before Willingham received the lethal injection, he was asked if he had any last words. He said, “The only statement I want to make is that I am an innocent man convicted of a crime I did not commit. I have been persecuted for twelve years for something I did not do. From God’s dust I came and to dust I will return, so the Earth shall become my throne.”"



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William Baumol, whose famous economic theory explains the modern world, has died - Vox

William Baumol, whose famous economic theory explains the modern world, has died - Vox: "The consequence is that rising productivity in the manufacturing sector of the economy inevitably pushes up the cost of labor-intensive services like live musical performances. Rising productivity allows factories to cut prices and raise wages at the same time. But when wages rise, music venues have no alternative but to raise ticket prices to cover the higher costs.

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New Model Predicts Which Mentally Ill Patients Are Unlikely to Be Violent | American Council on Science and Health

New Model Predicts Which Mentally Ill Patients Are Unlikely to Be Violent | American Council on Science and Health:

Importantly, the model had a negative predictive value of 99.5%. That means if the model predicts that a particular patient is unlikely to commit a violent crime, there is a 99.5% chance that the prognosis is correct. In other words, as the authors write, "of those identified as low risk, 199 of 200 did not in fact offend violently within 1 year."

Unfortunately, the positive predictive value was only 11%. That means if the model predicts a patient is likely to commit a violent crime, there is only an 11% chance that the patient actually will do so. Further research will be needed to improve this aspect of the model.

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How to Raise an American Adult - WSJ

How to Raise an American Adult - WSJ: "But consumption is no route to long-term happiness, as a raft of studies by psychologists, neuroscientists and sociologists demonstrate. Part of learning to be an adult is figuring out that our real needs can be separated from the insistent call of our wants. Maturity requires imagining life without material wealth, resolving that we could be happy in such a state, and actually experiencing mild deprivation from time to time.

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I feel like female Mercy mains get a lot of hate both in game and on stream. : Overwatch

I feel like female Mercy mains get a lot of hate both in game and on stream. : Overwatch: "This always seemed extremely ironic to me because you always hear guys complaining about how girls make every thing about their gender, or how all girls feel the need to explain that they're a "girl gamer". That mentality is so common it's become a meme (mercy main btw), and sure it's a funny one, but the only times my gender has ever been brought up is when it's done by a guy, not by me. In fact, I play games with girls all the time both online and irl, not a single one has ever called attention to their gender. It's always a guy, specifically a guy who doesn't know me but who immediately feels like judging me because of the character who I'm playing.
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whadupbuttercup comments on NYTimes: Puerto Rico Declares a Form of Bankruptcy

whadupbuttercup comments on NYTimes: Puerto Rico Declares a Form of Bankruptcy:

in 1976, in accordance with the prevailing economic beliefs at the time, Congress passed legislation that added section 936 to the U.S. Code

This section created the incentive for people to invest in Puerto Rico by making the returns to all investments in Puerto Rico tax free. The end goal was to spur Puerto Rican development though the inflow of capital and eventually do away with the section.

This worked rather well. Puerto Rico became a major manufacturer of electronics and pharmaceuticals as well as a number of other things and the island prospered.

The problem was that this basically made Puerto Rico an insane tax haven for the wealthy.

In 1996, Bill Clinton signed into law a provision that put a 10-year sunset period on section 936 so that in 2006 returns on investments in Puerto Rico would no longer be tax free.

as a consequence, after 2006 the capital flow to Puerto Rico started to dry up, a phenomenon exacerbated by the financial crisis which dried up liquidity throughout the system. The loss of that money is tied to a substantial decrease in taxable income and in order to maintain a level of service that over a generation of people had grown accustomed to, Puerto Rico started borrowing money - and was able to do so at favorable rates because of it's unique status and the implication that if it ever got into trouble it might be bailed out by the Federal Government.

The problem is that the initial idea, to develop Puerto Rico to quickly become a modern economy and then remove the "training wheels" of economic development was initially flawed.

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Cheshire day dream" 24x36" acrylic on canvas : Art

Cheshire day dream" 24x36" acrylic on canvas : Art:



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This Is What a Modern-Day Witch Hunt Looks Like

This Is What a Modern-Day Witch Hunt Looks Like: "We should want academics to write about complicated, difficult, hot-button issues, including identity. Online pile-ons cannot, however righteous they feel, dictate journals’ publication policies and how they treat their authors and articles. It’s really disturbing to watch this sort of thing unfold in real time — there’s such a stark disconnect between what Tuvel wrote and what she is purported to have written. This whole episode should worry anybody who cares about academia’s ability to engage in difficult issues at a time when outrage can spread faster than ever before.

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‘Black branding’ — how a D.C. neighborhood was marketed to white millennials - The Washington Post

‘Black branding’ — how a D.C. neighborhood was marketed to white millennials - The Washington Post:

The book raises an ominous warning about a cherished dream of District politicians and activists: that they can build neighborhoods that achieve harmony among diverse races and economic classes.

Instead, Hyra found that when mostly white millennials move into traditional African American communities, the two groups interact little and frequently chafe with each other.

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Aardvark1292 comments on Bodycam shows officer jumping into a pond after he sees a little boy fall in

Aardvark1292 comments on Bodycam shows officer jumping into a pond after he sees a little boy fall in:

As a cop who is very pro body cameras, I can share a few thoughts. My first thing I did as a sergeant was have my entire squad given cameras (400 officer department, only about 100 cameras purchased so far). I wore one for 3 years, but when I was promoted they took it away and gave it to a line level guy. There camera protected me against false accusations, made court way easier, and generally made"my job" much simpler. As much as I loved that, I didn't like wearing it, and here's why:

Police are morbid, dark humored people. The amount of fuckery that goes on behind closed doors is astounding, and the things we say in private about your dead/injured loved ones, or people we've sent to jail for years would probably make you very uncomfortable. That's how we survive. 90% of cops are like this. With the camera, there is no closed door, and there is no "in private." The shift this brings in culture is palpable. We once took a bunch of broken glass from a scene and took a new cops car with the spare key, left the glass on the ground, and convinced him that his police car had been stolen. None of that happens any more.

With cameras, you legitimately see more guys going out drinking after shift, or huddling inside a station taking to each other rather than being on the road. Dark as it may sound, we have to have that out, and the cameras take it from us because nobody wants to get fired for making an insensitive joke.

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Pentagon chief cracks down on service academy athletes going pro without serving full-time - The Washington Post

Pentagon chief cracks down on service academy athletes going pro without serving full-time - The Washington Post: "Defense Secretary Jim Mattis has rescinded a Defense Department policy that allowed some of the best athletes from the military’s service academies to avoid active-duty service after graduating in order to pursue professional sports, the Pentagon said Monday.

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Before Michelle, Barack Obama asked another woman to marry him. Then politics got in the way. - The Washington Post

Before Michelle, Barack Obama asked another woman to marry him. Then politics got in the way. - The Washington Post: "Obama had considered Donald Trump long before either man won the presidency, and brushed off his existence as a misguided national fantasy. Americans have a “continuing normative commitment to the ideals of individual freedom and mobility,” Obama wrote in the old Harvard book manuscript, now more than 25 years old. “The depth of this commitment may be summarily dismissed as the unfounded optimism of the average American — I may not be Donald Trump now, but just you wait; if I don’t make it, my children will.”

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The Future of Football

The Future of Football:

The game needs to change. It has changed once before, when football was a smaller pastime largely limited to colleges and universities. It still took a standing president of the United States’ intervention to temper the violence of the sport — and only then, after actual deaths occurred on the field. The game wasn’t the heavily leveraged, culturally embedded, and highly lucrative billion-dollar industry it is today. The odds of significant change happening now without legal intervention, given what the sport is and who profits most from it, are very, very long.

If — and it is a huge if — football will survive, then its revamp should start simple. Those who want football to continue in one form or another should think of the basic building blocks of football itself as changeable, updatable programming. They should start at the grassroots of the sport to affect the largest number of possible teams and games and leagues playing the sport. They should think about the nature of the game itself, and how to keep as much of it as possible without leaning into the excesses of football as it is currently played.

It should start now. Football 3.0 is coming, and this is what it will look like if it wants to survive.

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Little rules for designing with data · 18F/doi-extractives-data Wiki

Little rules for designing with data · 18F/doi-extractives-data Wiki: "Do not even think about starting work without the actual dataset you're going to be designing for. If you or your client cannot provide that, do not agree to timelines for any sort of finished product. Helpful language: "Every day my team can't access that dataset will result an equal slip on our launch date." It is true, and tends to get attention. Do you know how many times the mock data turns out to look like the delivered data? Zero times. That's how many. And you just wasted valuable time and effort designing for zero kinds of actual data.
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The Collapse of American Identity - The New York Times

The Collapse of American Identity - The New York Times: "Americans of both political parties sense the unraveling of a broadly shared consensus of American identity, although they cite different reasons for feeling that way. About seven in 10 Republicans and Democrats fear that the United States is losing its national identity, the A.P.-NORC survey found. The two political parties may not share much, but each is increasingly aware that the other has embraced a radically different vision of America’s identity and future.

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Naidem comments on Mid-Season Invitational 2017 / Play-In Draw - Round 2 / Post-Draw Discussion

Naidem comments on Mid-Season Invitational 2017 / Play-In Draw - Round 2 / Post-Draw Discussion: "Even after we left, the South Vietnamese were better equipped than the North, they were just not remotely as interested or capable as the Vietcong were, and the South got smoked. Our only options to "win" would have been to just keep slaughtering the North Vietnamese, they weren't going to negotiate and they weren't going to stop fighting. The Vietcong WERE the people of North Vietnam, the more we killed them, the stronger their cause became, it was a zero-sum game. They were fighting for their homeland, we were fighting based on flawed ideology. Not to mention that the war was massively unpopular in the states during the later stages of the conflict.
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Sandy Hook father Lenny Pozner on death threats: ‘I never imagined I’d have to fight for my child’s legacy’ | US news | The Guardian

Sandy Hook father Lenny Pozner on death threats: ‘I never imagined I’d have to fight for my child’s legacy’ | US news | The Guardian: "Even in a country all too used to mass shootings, the merciless killing in Newtown, Connecticut of 20 six- and seven-year-olds, along with six of the school’s employees, retains a terrible hold on the US’s imagination, gripping the memory after too many other shootings have faded away. For most, it is too horrible to mention without a shudder. But for a tenacious few, it is too horrible to believe, and soon after Noah was killed, when Pozner thought he had already seen the worst of humanity, he came into contact with the latter group.

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Right and Left: Partisan Writing You Shouldn’t Miss - The New York Times

Right and Left: Partisan Writing You Shouldn’t Miss - The New York Times: "“The ability to associate disagreeable ideas with the oppressor, and to quash free speech or other political rights in the name of justice for the oppressed, is a power without any clear limiting principle.”

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