DL Open Thread: Friday, October 22, 2021
How Do You Replant A Billion Trees? With Drones:
While many think of drones as a toy or, in battle, a lethally precise military tool, Flash Forest has gone a new route: It’s deploying drones to nourish life. The 20-person Toronto company is using a fleet of unmanned vehicles to seed the ground with trees and replenish those majestic carbon guzzlers. The battle against climate change can be waged with sober policymaking, an engaged citizenry and corporate responsibility. It can also be fought, it turns out, by a few hipster millennials with flying machines.
BTW, here’s something I didn’t know:
Still, with new regulations, heightened responsibility and reforestation, the losses have slowed. Last year, the United States was one of a handful of countries to show a net addition of forest cover — about 417 square miles, according to a U.N. report.
Which led me to ask the question: How are drones powered? Here’s how, courtesy of the intertubes.
‘Say Goodbye To Hollywood’. Film Union grip unmasked as Jan. 6 insurrectionist. Undone by his own camera feeds, which he tried to get rid of.
Alec Baldwin Kills Cinematographer With Prop Gun. Perry Mason had an episode with a plot like this. The killer turned out to be (I’m not making this up) Dick Clark. Man, how long before Trump tweets about this? Especially since the cinematographer is from–The Ukraine? Where was Hunter Biden when this all went down?
Schumer Does Something UnSchumerlike. Endorses the progressive who won the D mayoral nomination in Buffalo. Good. Could help.
NYPD Cops Jeopardize Cases Despite Being On Prosecutors’ ‘No-Fly List’. You see, they’ve been caught fixing tickets for relatives, but still remain on the force.
The list was created a decade ago amid a sprawling investigation into the city’s biggest police union and its role in helping officers “fix” tickets issued to family and friends for speeding, illegal parking and other traffic offenses. It grew to 664 names and was intended to help prosecutors vet cases that might rest too heavily on officers whose ties to the scandal could raise questions about their conduct and credibility.
Ten years after it was first created, the No Fly List itself remains secret by judicial seal.
But ProPublica has obtained a version of the list. And a review of court records involving 164 No Fly officers still currently on the force shows how one of the most sweeping efforts by prosecutors to flag cops with credibility concerns hasn’t prevented them from jeopardizing cases.
I could ask the rhetorical question: Why are these officers still on the job? But we know the answer: The police union. Great reporting by Pro Publica. As to the police union…well, read for yourselves:
When the indicted ticket-fixing officers were arraigned at a Bronx courthouse in October 2011, hundreds of off-duty officers summoned by the city’s largest police union showed up, heckling prosecutors and investigators while holding signs that read “It’s A Courtesy, Not A Crime.” (No, it’s selective justice, apparently the only kind of justice meted out by NYC cops.)
Patrick Lynch, the longtime head of the 24,000-member New York City Police Benevolent Association, argued that ticket-fixing wasn’t a criminal act but a “long standing practice at all levels of the department” that was ingrained in NYPD culture. (A spokesperson for the union hasn’t responded to phone and email messages seeking comment for this story.)
When you read a headline like this, you know that the story is a non-story: “Timeline for Delaware auditor case unknown.” One could say the same about Darius Brown’s travails. Seriously, what’s going on there?
What do you want to talk about?
I have crossed the line. Our country isnt dying, its dead. a few of today’s headlines:
– Rightwing pundit Candace Owens suggests US invade Australia to ‘free an oppressed people’
– Drama on the House floor developed when MTG confronted Jamie Raskin & Liz Cheney as the House was voting on the criminal contempt resolution for Bannon.
The convo between MTG & Cheney devolved to Jewish space lasers, while Greene accused Raskin of not investigating BLM protests
– On the House floor, Liz Cheney entered this into the record calling out Jim Banks for sending letters to government agencies claiming he is the ranking member of the 1/6 committee even though he is not on the committee.
we have no real government. we have self-dealing, lying, media hungry, power propelled, charcterless, bigots in charge at every level. And it’s just going to get worse.
Where is Al living in france? we’ve started the process to move to my grandmothers familys farm in marseille when my kids graduate college in 3-4 years. I’ll stop by and say hi to him.
I’m in Paris, until the Jewish Space Lasers get me.
Okay, if no one else is going to do it, here goes…
Cue Joni Mitchell…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQj6h8KpkiQ
David Geffen I’m not.
“One could say the same about Darius Brown’s travails. ”
And Rebecca Walker.
And Bill Freeborn.
Former Democratic candidate for lots of offices announced this morning he changed his registration to Republican. He will run for Register of Wills (an office he was appointed to that post by then-Governor Minner and lost election). Now he can lose as a Republican. Anti-gay Dems belong there.
Who? I don’t see any stories in the DE Media.
Greg Fuller
Something I Learned Today (BTW, a great song from Husker Du, but I digress): I’ve always thought that Death Cab For Cutie was the dumbest name for a band, and it still might be.
HowEVER, I now know that they take their name from this song by the same name:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKXsrWrmbAg
Which was in turn inspired by a pulp magazine story title.
The Bonzos appeared in the Beatles’ made for television movie of “Magical Mystery Tour.” They sang the entire version of “Death Cab for Cutie” while a stripper performed on stage in front of them. Unfortunately, that portion was not shown in the broadcast because of the frontal nudity.
That was in 1967. That scene wouldn’t raise an eyebrow now with all of the full frontal nudity regularly shown on British TV.
Those were supposedly the fab four taking seats in front of the stage at about seven seconds in.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lgmLaQ7vmc
https://friendlyatheist.patheos.com/2021/10/22/gop-activist-who-compared-mask-mandates-to-the-holocaust-says-she-has-covid/
Of course Lauren Witzke got COVID.
Before I left the US, it was impossible to miss the “Help Wanted” signs in virtually every store window. Republicans, ever eager to punch down, reacted to the labor shortage by blaming generous unemployment benefits.
I’ve been walking all over Paris for more than a week now, and I have yet to see a single “Help Wanted” sign anywhere. One possible reason: Instead of letting businesses lay off workers and paying them a fraction of their wages via unemployment, France (and Europe’s other advanced economies) subsidized the jobs themselves.
American exceptionalism exists, all right — the country is exceptionally dull-witted, short-sighted and mean-spirited.
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2021-furlough-jobs-unemployment-europe-united-states/