THE MORNING RANT: Re-thinking Charitable Giving to Foundations

I’ve been meaning to write about the problems with foundations for some time, but I’ve just never gotten around to it, because there are so many awful stories to tell, so many facets to the problem, and so much research that could be done for a good long-form essay. Since that great essay I’ve intended to write apparently isn’t ever going to get written, I’d just like to highlight a few thoughts I have about my disdain for foundations, and suggest that you make sure any foundation you are donating to is using your money as you prefer. Or, as an alternative, you might consider donating directly to charitable organizations that will spend your donation rather than investing it.

Here are a few of my biggest problems with foundations.

1) Long-established foundations get hijacked by activists, and no matter what the original purpose of the foundation was, in time it will be used for left-wing activism. John Rockefeller and Henry Ford never intended for the foundations they established with their fortunes to eventually become anti-American funding sources that promote global communism and “climate justice,” but that is what their money is being used for now.

2) Local foundations established to support worthwhile charities eventually tend to redirect their focus toward money management and compensation for those managing the investments. The actual money that makes it to the charity tends to be doled out grudgingly, and only after all the administrative expenses of the foundation (including salaries) are subtracted from the minimum required distribution. Let’s say a foundation has a $20,000,000 portfolio and it is required to distribute 5% for its annual distribution, or $1,000,000. After the salaries, travel, and other expenses of those managing the money are paid, just a few hundred thousand dollars may make it to the actual charity in a given year.

3) “Charitable” foundations established by affluent individuals are used as a way to launder their travel and living expenses as tax deductions.

The great Oilfield Rando has a hilarious example of Number 3:

Here is the link where Mr. Rando found that story of nautical philanthropy.

I gave plenty of money to various foundations over the years until I began to understand how little of my money was getting to the intended charity. No more. Rather than give to the (hypothetical) “Widows and Orphans Foundation,” I will now only donate directly to the operations of the Widows and Orphans organization itself. A $1,000 gift to the operating fund of the charity will provide it with $1,000 dollars to use this year, whereas a $1,000 donation to its associated foundation might result in perhaps $20 or $30 making it to the actual charity this year.

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM | Comments (298) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Mid-Morning Art Thread

Merry Company
Judith Leyster

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (388) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Friday Morning Report (4/12/24)

Nothing matters but the weekend from a Friday's point of view.......

What shall we learn this morning?

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 07:12 AM | Comments (407) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Daily Tech News 12 April 2024

Top Story

• The Humane AI Pin is the solution to none of technology's problems. (Engadget)
  
  Ouch. Well, what about The Verge, they love pointless shiny toys...
  
  
  
• Humane AI Pin review: Not even close. (The Verge)
  
  Maybe those idiots at Wired?
  
  
  
• Humane AI Pin: 4 out of 10. Too bare bones and not all that useful. (Wired)
  
  There's just no pleasing some people, particularly when your product is garbage.
  
  
  

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:54 AM | Comments (157) | Trackbacks (Suck)

If The Content's Free, It's An ONT

Hullo Horde! Welcome to Thursday night. We'll start with a quick peek at the headlines.

Posted by: WeirdDave at 10:00 PM | Comments (372) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Jetskiing With Your Cow Cafe

Devil's Bridge, Sedona
by @paulhurd

Cooking with Legos.

Don't ask him about the Snoo Department.

Rabbit mating ritual.

Diving exhibition.

Scroll through the different videos: Compilation of amateur video of big shooting stars, some with mid-air detonations. That's because they're mostly made of gases, you know.

Compilation of video of space jellyfishes. The rockets are mostly made of gases, you know. That's why we can live there.

Dog keeps rubbing up against couch until its hair builds up with static electricity. The couch is mostly made of gases, you know. That's why the dog can live there.

Moody day in Patagonia.

Adopting an injured, orphaned baby fawn.

A cute, chatty pitbull.

Poor daddy-dog has to babysit all the pups. He looks up at his human saying, "Please help me."

A guardian dog had no friends -- the other guardian dogs were all older, and out of their puppy play phase -- until they got him a friend.

Baby hippo.

When your home is infested by lambs. Houses are mostly made of gases, that's why lambs can live there.

Wait -- I meant the Sun. I'm smaaaaart and you owe me respect and deference.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 07:33 PM | Comments (221) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Quick Hits

The Queen of Corruption

Does that look remind you of anything? Via Twitchy, someone figured out Who She's Wearing.

Harvard has reinstated the SATs as required for most admissions. The clownschool again shows itself to be a follower of trends, as other universities have already reversed their own no-SATs policies. Apparently, they did a "study" and learned that the SATs were good predictors of who would do well in university and who wouldn't. Which has been, you know, the entire justification for the SATs throughout their history.

The LA Times (garbage tier media) confused O.J. Simpson with Donald Trump in O.J.'s obituary, describing "Trump" as he left prison. And then died.

Boy sounds like some next-level wishcasting to me. But then, their heads are made mostly of gases.

A new Wall Street Journal poll finds the defection of black men from the Democrat Party is real.

More Black men said they plan to back Donald Trump this fall, according to a recent Wall Street Journal poll of seven swing states.

While most Black men said they intend to support Biden, some 30% of them in the poll said they were either definitely or probably going to vote for the former Republican president. There isn't comparable WSJ swing-state polling from 2020, but Trump received votes from 12% of Black men nationwide that year, as recorded by AP VoteCast, a large poll of the electorate.

In the WSJ poll, 11% of Black women said they were either definitely or probably going to vote for Trump. In 2020, the AP poll found, 6% of Black women nationwide backed Trump.

Ed Morrissey notes that the comparison to 2020 numbers is apples-to-oranges, as the 2024 numbers are from a random survey and the 2020 numbers are from exit polling (which has been very unreliable in the past). But he thinks the numbers are still pretty accurate. Hit the link for that discussion.

The WSJ reports that even black women are open to defecting:

In a sign that Biden hasn't yet won commitments from many of these voters, some 42% of Black women in the survey fell into a group that the Journal pollsters say are up for grabs in the election, or still persuadable in their vote choice. These voters say they have not yet decided on a candidate, might vote for an independent or third-party option or are likely--but not certain--to back one of the major-party candidates.

While Latino women and Black men in the survey also signaled in large numbers that they remain persuadable in their vote choice, the share of Black women is noteworthy, given that they are among the most loyal Democratic groups in the electorate.

Except for fake-pretend "educated" white women, of course.

Memphis city council WOC says that the reason black people are killing each other is because "white legislators" in the capital hate black people.

She notes that the city is run almost entirely by black people, which she claims is, somehow, further evidence that "the white boys on the hill" are responsible for the weekly slaughter in Memphis.

Her head is made mostly of gases.

Woke consultant group McKinsey -- which has produced a ton of incomptent leftwing technocrats like Pete Bootyjuice -- is laying off workers -- well, let's say "employees" -- as the demand for their services falls.

McKinsey & Co. is beginning to eliminate roughly 360 jobs as the consulting giant deals with a slowdown in demand for its services.

The reductions are global and will affect employees across a variety of divisions including design, data engineering, cloud and software, according to people familiar with the matter. The cuts are expected to impact about 3% of the 12,000 staffers who are considered specialists or have technical expertise that work alongside the firm's traditional consultants, one of the people said, asking not to be identified discussing personnel information.

"We invest to grow capabilities that match our clients' priorities, and adjust the size of a small number of others as appropriate," a McKinsey spokesperson said in an emailed statement. "As part of this process, some roles will be eliminated within this small number of capabilities."

Traditional consultants won't be affected by the dismissals, the person familiar with the matter said. McKinsey has more than 45,000 staffers in 130 cities around the world, according to its website.

...

McKinsey generated a record $16 billion in revenue last year. Still, the firm has warned about 3,000 of its consultants that their performance was unsatisfactory and will need to improve.

How about warning your former consultants, like Bootyjuice?

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 06:20 PM | Comments (390) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Media Organizations Are Lying About the Circumstances of a 100% Justified Police Shooting, Attempting to Gin Up Race Riots for the 2024 Election

If the media thinks the public will reward the left for another planned, coordinated "Summer of Love," I think they misread the mood of the public.

But the media has nothing else so they're putting on a show called George Floyd Got Us Votes Last Time.

In March, Reed was pulled over and approached by police. Body cam footage shows one officer asking him to roll the window down and then attempting to open the door after Reed tried to roll the window up. It's at that point that shots ring out and the officers are seen running away to take cover. A gunfight ensues and with Reed stumbling out of the car, the officers discharge their weapons again.

While the press has reported that the officers fired "96 times" as a way to sensationalize the situation, 11 of the shots were actually from Reed, with his initial burst striking an officer in the arm. He can be seen bleeding on the extended body camera footage.

Misinformation about the situation began to be reported immediately, including from Reed's family.

"If he was supposed to get pulled over for a traffic stop, why do they have four guns pointed at him? He was scared. And after he was already on the ground there, they still put him in cuffs instead of checking to see if he's breathing. They shot to him 96 times and reload the clip three times," Reed's sister Porscha Banks said during a Tuesday press conference.

As the footage clearly shows, guns were only pointed at Reed after he refused to comply and started to roll his window up. The officer who was conducting the stop first approached the vehicle in a normal manner. Seeing Reed's gun through the window may have prompted him to draw his weapon. There's also the fact that Reed was out on pre-trial release for a variety of violent felonies related to a shooting he allegedly committed. Did the officers run his tag and know who he was? That could be another reason the officers were overly cautious in drawing their weapons after Reed refused to comply.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 05:25 PM | Comments (301) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Absolute Balls: Disney Claims It Had an Absolutely-Unquestionable First Amendment Right to Fire Gina Carano (for Exercising Her Own First Amendment Rights)

I will mention again that this just isn't true -- in California. To protect filthy communists from being fired, California law prohibits the firing of employees due to politics.

There is an exception: Expressly-political operations -- partisan political pollsters, ideological think tanks, etc. -- have the right to reject applicants or fire employees based on, as a Disney SEC filing might put it, "misalignment" with the company's politics.

Is Disney ready to declare itself an expressly leftwing partisan operation?

We'll see!

Disney argued Tuesday that it had a First Amendment right to fire Gina Carano, the actor who played a bounty hunter on "The Mandalorian," after she allegedly trivialized the Holocaust in an Instagram post.

Carano sued in February, arguing that the company unlawfully retaliated against her for expressing her personal political views, which were at odds with Disney's preferred ideology.

Disney's lawyers filed a motion on Tuesday to throw out the lawsuit, arguing that it has "a constitutional right not to associate its artistic expression with Carano's speech."

...

Carano was fired in February 2021, after she analogized the treatment of modern-day conservatives to the persecution of Jews in Nazi Germany.

This was not the real reason she was fired.

She was fired because Disney's huge number of trans extremist employees demanded it, but Kathleen Kennedy wanted to hide their hand in Carano's firing.

So she did what evil people often do -- she blamed the Jews.

"Because history is edited, most people today don't realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews," she wrote. "How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?"

Carano had faced significant pushback for earlier social media posts, in which she strongly objected to COVID restrictions, questioned the legitimacy of the 2020 election, and refused to show support for trans rights.

There you go. In a rain of disinformation, a single drop of truth hits the ground.

According to her lawsuit, Disney forced her to have a 90-minute Zoom meeting with GLAAD, the LGBTQ rights organization, after she posted that her pronouns are "boop/bop/beep."

But for Disney, the Nazi post was "the final straw," according to the company's motion. The company argued that the post trivialized the Holocaust by referred to "thousands" of Jews, not "millions," and by likening their experience to those of contemporary conservatives who face scorn on social media.

"Disney had enough," the motion states.

The company put out a statement the same day saying it had no plans to hire her in the future, and that her comments were "abhorrent and unacceptable."

They claimed she was disparaging Jews, which is defamatory.

Carano sued under a California law that prohibits employers from retaliating against employees for political activity.

Yup.

Disney doesn't want to declare itself a leftwing propaganda organization -- which would have the right to fire conservative employees -- so it's attempting to claim there's a general right of any company which engages in communications to act as if it were an expressly-political organization:

In its motion to dismiss, Disney argued that there is a broad exception for companies whose business is to engage in speech, such as newspapers and entertainment companies.

All companies engage in speech. This "exception" invented by Disney swallows the rule, as they say.

Relatedly, Film Threat published part 5 of its "D-Files" expose, this time documenting the disastrous path that led to the box-office bomb Wish.

The disaster began by elevating Jennifer Lee, the writer of Frozen but with little management or production experience, to be Pixar legend John Lassiter's replacement, because #MeToo exists to get men fired and replace them with unsuitable women.

It all began with Wish...for the D-Files, that is. After I attended an early press screening of the feature, it was clear to me that Disney's Wish was the worst animated feature in the 100 year history of the Walt Disney Company and, ironically, was the film meant to commemorate this incredible milestone. My early review opened a floodgate for current and former Disney artists and animators reaching out to Film Threat with their stories about what is happening behind the scenes at Disney and has been for the last decade. I was told that not only was Wish bad...but it was intentionally bad...or, more accurately, misguided from the start!

...

Disney’s Animation’s Slow Descent to Obscurity
It all began with Wish…for the D-Files, that is. After I attended an early press screening of the feature, it was clear to me that Disney’s Wish was the worst animated feature in the 100 year history of the Walt Disney Company and, ironically, was the film meant to commemorate this incredible milestone. My early review opened a floodgate for current and former Disney artists and animators reaching out to Film Threat with their stories about what is happening behind the scenes at Disney and has been for the last decade. I was told that not only was Wish bad…but it was intentionally bad…or, more accurately, misguided from the start!

In the D-Files: Part 1, I recounted the events that led to this Wish disaster, beginning with John Lasseter’s firing and humiliation over alleged #MeToo accusations and the outcry to “get a woman to run this place.” That woman would be Jennifer Lee.

Ezoic

In Part 2 and Part 3, I showed that Jennifer Lee slowly and subversively ushered in her new vision for Disney Animation and its staff. In response to the #MeToo Lasseter ousting and with the help of the gender equity advocacy group Woman in Animation, Lee strove for 50/50 equity between male and female Disney artists. But we learned that leveling the playing field was never her intention. She replaced the “Old White Guy” veteran artists with inexperienced women from Tumblr. Sources told us that these new recruits were used to slowly and systematically remove the Old White Guys by fostering a hostile work environment where every move they made and every word they spoke was under constant scrutiny. After a steady flow of unwarranted complaints with HR, humiliating re-education sessions, and living under the constant fear of firing, the Old White Guys, who did not submit to Lee’s new vision, were finally gone.

Notice the lack of depth of field in this image? © 2023 Disney. All Rights Reserved.

“…ultimately, you were either “with Lee” or “against Lee” in her mind.”

Part 4 describes the new storytelling mandates put in place not only at Walt Disney Animation but also at Pixar, Star Wars, and Marvel. Lee’s first feature film with her complete stamp of approval from start to finish was Strange World, which leaned heavily into producing an environmental allegory with a gay teen love story. Audiences stayed home for this one. Tanking at the box office, Lee responded, “This is a bummer, but the ‘message’ is important, and we will press on with it.” And press on they did, which brings us to Wish.

...

The Queen of Passive Aggression

Disney's Animation's Slow Descent to Obscurity
It all began with Wish...for the D-Files, that is. After I attended an early press screening of the feature, it was clear to me that Disney's Wish was the worst animated feature in the 100 year history of the Walt Disney Company and, ironically, was the film meant to commemorate this incredible milestone. My early review opened a floodgate for current and former Disney artists and animators reaching out to Film Threat with their stories about what is happening behind the scenes at Disney and has been for the last decade. I was told that not only was Wish bad...but it was intentionally bad...or, more accurately, misguided from the start!

In the D-Files: Part 1, I recounted the events that led to this Wish disaster, beginning with John Lasseter's firing and humiliation over alleged #MeToo accusations and the outcry to "get a woman to run this place." That woman would be Jennifer Lee.

Ezoic

In Part 2 and Part 3, I showed that Jennifer Lee slowly and subversively ushered in her new vision for Disney Animation and its staff. In response to the #MeToo Lasseter ousting and with the help of the gender equity advocacy group Woman in Animation, Lee strove for 50/50 equity between male and female Disney artists. But we learned that leveling the playing field was never her intention. She replaced the "Old White Guy" veteran artists with inexperienced women from Tumblr. Sources told us that these new recruits were used to slowly and systematically remove the Old White Guys by fostering a hostile work environment where every move they made and every word they spoke was under constant scrutiny. After a steady flow of unwarranted complaints with HR, humiliating re-education sessions, and living under the constant fear of firing, the Old White Guys, who did not submit to Lee's new vision, were finally gone.

Notice the lack of depth of field in this image? © 2023 Disney. All Rights Reserved.

"...ultimately, you were either "with Lee" or "against Lee" in her mind."

Part 4 describes the new storytelling mandates put in place not only at Walt Disney Animation but also at Pixar, Star Wars, and Marvel. Lee's first feature film with her complete stamp of approval from start to finish was Strange World, which leaned heavily into producing an environmental allegory with a gay teen love story. Audiences stayed home for this one. Tanking at the box office, Lee responded, "This is a bummer, but the 'message' is important, and we will press on with it." And press on they did, which brings us to Wish.

Ezoic
The Queen of Passive Aggression
With Wish, Lee's hand-selected animators, artists, writers, and musicians were now in place. No excuses for failure! When asked about Jennifer Lee, many former Disney artists spoke about Lee's management style, especially regarding how she formed her teams. Many felt that when she took over to replace John Lasseter, her goal was to clean house of Lasseter loyalists. They felt that, ultimately, you were either "with Lee" or "against Lee" in her mind.

When interacting with her, you knew right away if she liked you or not. If she liked you, she would listen to you and give you the best scenes to work on. Of course, her favorites mainly consisted of female artists and male Yes-persons. If you got on her bad side (or were male), you were given the crappy assignments, which rarely involved character animation and often consisted of environmental animation or quick scenelets slipped in between significant scenes. It didn't matter how many years you had been with the company or how many features you worked on in the past; it ultimately boiled down to whether Jennifer Lee liked you or not.

Sources describe Lee as very cunning in how she conducted herself with those on her s**t list. If you could get a conversation in with her, she would nod and acknowledge you, and then end the conversation quickly. Then, in a typically passive-aggressive move, she would have you taken off the project for being a "problem." This happened to many veteran talents who dared to express their opinion, particularly in matters of how things used to be.

The animation and especially the backgrounds in Wish look amateurishly "flat" -- no depth to them. The figures in foreground move against a background that is plainly two dimensional, like in old Bugs Bunny cartoons.

And sure, those are great, but this piece of crap is being generated with computers which are a stone's throw from being artificially intelligent.

Allen Ng called this the worst Disney animation in history, citing, among many other problems, the flatness of the thing. He thought that this was the result of a rushed job.

Nope -- Jennifer Lee actually wanted it this way.

It turns out that many insiders within the production said that the amateurish look of Wish came directly from the top...Jennifer Lee, and it was intentional! Facts that would be backed up in the "Making of" documentary coming on the Wish DVDs and Blu-rays. With decrees coming from the top, they told artists and animators that Wish was going to be a 2D animated feature created with 3D technology.

I guess it was her idea of a "tribute" to Disney glories of the past.

But it didn't work. And in the non-woke world, we grade on outcomes, not intentions. Even if you're a Wahmen.

He also reports that the only thing Jennifer Lee cared about was the insider references and Easter eggs to earlier, competent Disney films. When they'd show the film in test screenings, audiences would say they thought the characters and story were weak. But Jennifer Lee's crew running the screenings didn't care -- they just wanted to know how many references viewers had spotted.

Further harping on Easter Eggs, a significant section of the "Making of" documentary was devoted to the subject--again because we all love Easter Eggs. For example, Asha was supposed to be a young Fairy Godmother. Cinderella's Fairy Godmother used her magic to create a carriage from a pumpkin. Thus, pumpkin seeds were sewn into Asha's costume. She also wore a pumpkin seed anklet. How's that for an Easter Egg? Did you notice it? I sure didn't.

What a great bit of trivia to focus all of your efforts on. Story and characters -- that's #OldThinking. The kids just want their art filled with #hyperlinks to other things.

This is the mark of a talentless hack -- focusing on trivial "callbacks" and references to prior good works of art, instead of fighting to make this work a work of art itself.

I think Nietzsche wrote of periods of decadence that they produce no original art -- just infinite regurgitations of what has come before. He called this "epigonism:"

Noun. epigonism (usually uncountable, plural epigonisms) An artistic or literary imitation of an artist by a later generation; stereotyped repetition.

But this is what #MeToo demands. Move the men out, so that the activist, Marxist, talentless leftwing grievance-farmers can move in.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 04:20 PM | Comments (300) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Senate Republicans Will Force a Vote to Strip Terrorist-Funding Qatar of Its Status as a "Non-NATO Ally"

The Democrats will block this. Qatar keeps all of their pockets filled to overflowing.

Whenever a Democrat or NeverTrumper needs an extra $20-50,000, they just hop on a Qatar-paid luxury jet and fly off to "advise" the Qatar government or give a speech no one attends.

Sen. Ted Budd (R., N.C.) will take to the Senate floor on Wednesday to seek unanimous consent on a landmark measure that would begin the process of stripping Qatar's status as a non-NATO ally due to its close relations with the Hamas terror group, the Washington Free Beacon has learned.

The measure, unveiled on Tuesday, signals mounting frustration with Qatar's inability to secure a hostage deal between Hamas and Israel and is an unprecedented effort by lawmakers to downgrade diplomatic relations with a U.S. ally in the Middle East. The decision to invoke unanimous consent forces the Senate to immediately consider the legislation and hold a vote on it.

Budd's legislation, which is backed by Sens. Joni Ernst (R., Iowa) and Rick Scott (R., Fla.), would force the Biden administration to certify that Qatar is exerting "any and all" leverage it has over Hamas to secure the release of Israeli and American hostages. The administration would have to verify to Congress that Qatar "does not directly or indirectly support, financially or otherwise, acts of international terrorism or foreign terrorist organizations, including Hamas."

If the administration cannot make this determination, President Joe Biden would have to immediately terminate Qatar's status as a non-NATO ally, stripping the country of its elevated status with the U.S. armed forces and other members of the international defense pact.

...

Qatar has been in the spotlight since Hamas's terror attack on Israel, with congressional Republicans repeatedly chastising the country for its long-standing relationship with Hamas. The Iran-backed terror group's senior leadership lives in Qatar and the country maintains a financial relationship with the group.

...

Update 12:21 p.m.: When Budd introduced his unanimous consent motion Wednesday afternoon, Sen. Chris Murphy (D, Conn.) quickly objected, putting the measure on temporary ice.

Murphy described Qatar in 2022 as America's "best partner in the region," a designation typically given to Israel.

Murphy also travelled to Qatar when it held the 2022 World Cup, and came under fire for boosting Doha at a time when it was facing intense criticism for mass human rights abuses. The Democratic senator referred to Qatar's foreign minister as "my friend" in a social media post at the time, sparking pushback from supporters and those concerned about the country's lackluster human rights record.

Qatar, not Israel, is our "best ally in the region."

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 03:15 PM | Comments (357) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Fathomless Corruption: The Bureau of Labor Statistics Shared Confidential Information About the Economy with "Superusers" Like Hedge Funds and Blackrock, Before That Data Was Shared With the Public

Several points:

Hedge funds and giant investment groups like Blackrock are infamously leftwing and Democratic. I guess it just worked out that way!

Occasionally people wonder how it is that Nancy Pelosi consistently out-invests the best-run investment portfolios in the world. Well, obviously, she's being tipped insider information. This might be one of the ways insider information is leaked to her -- first to her "superuser" cronies, then to her and her stockbrokers.

This country is just lie upon lie. The Regime are monsters and they need to be in prison.

This data determines inflation statistics, which are obviously very important in finance. In addition, knowing what the inflation stats will be tips off these institutions about whether the Fed will be cutting or raising interest rates. They know in advance of the ordinary investor whether the Fed is putting the economy into growth or contraction mode.

I suspect that this is just the tip of the iceberg, given how closely the minions of the administrative state work with bigwigs in the finance industry, but this is bad enough.

An administrative employee at the Bureau of Labor Statistics corresponded with a secret list of "Superusers"--hedge funds, traders, and the huge financial firms like Blackrock and Vanguard--giving them information about the BLS' data and analyses that are used to establish inflation statistics.

This is extraordinarily valuable information, especially if your business is highly sensitive to financial data. Think of the inflation numbers that came out yesterday and the massive impact they had on market movements. Tens or hundreds of billions of dollars flow based on these government statistics.

Strom quotes the NYT here:

An economist at the agency set off a firestorm in February when he sent an email to a group of data users explaining how a methodological tweak could have contributed to an unexpected jump in housing costs in the Consumer Price Index the previous month. The email, addressed to "Super Users," circulated rapidly around Wall Street, where every detail of inflation data can affect the bond market.

As far as we know the actual numbers weren't leaked, although this is a developing story, and the BLS is being very closed-lip about the extent of the collaboration with the big Wall Street firms. They had successfully downplayed what was happening until a FOIA request was fulfilled, reigniting the outrage.

At the time, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said the email had been an isolated "mistake" and denied that it maintained a list of users who received special access to information.

But emails obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request show that the agency -- or at least the economist who sent the original email, a longtime but relatively low-ranking employee -- was in regular communication with data users in the finance industry, apparently including analysts at major hedge funds. And they suggest that there was a list of super users, contrary to the agency's denials.

Wait, wait, wait -- you're saying the government acted corruptly to pour billions of dollars into the pockets of the Democrat Party's deepest-pocketed allies, and then lied about it?

You're speaking gibberish. None of this makes any sense.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 02:15 PM | Comments (265) | Trackbacks (Suck)

O.J. Simpson, Winner of Heisman Trophy and Also Winner of the Richard Speck Knife-Spree Prize, Dies at Age 76

He is finally going to prison. The eternal kind.

O.J. Simpson, the former football great who was accused of and ultimately acquitted of the brutal 1994 slayings of his ex-wife and her friend, has died, according to his family. He was 76.

"On April 10th, our father, Orenthal James Simpson, succumbed to his battle with cancer. He was surrounded by his children and grandchildren. During this time of transition, his family asks that you please respect their wishes for privacy and grace," a statement from his family said.

In May 2023, Simpson posted a video on X, then known as Twitter, revealing that he had recently "caught cancer" and "had to do the whole chemo thing." He added, "It looks like I beat it."

The family of the man Simpson murdered, Ron Goldman, issued a statement: "he died without penance."

And he died without paying the $33 million he was found liable for in the Ron Goldman wrongful death civil suit. OJ refused to pay that judgement, and attempted to hide income. Over the decades, that judgment has grown to $70 million due to interest.

How much did OJ pay? Around $132,000. Little of it willingly.

4 I found the real killer!
Posted by: Death

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 01:14 PM | Comments (390) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Global Warming Is Causing More Rain;
Indonesian Transgender Prostitutes Hardest Hit

Earlier I wrote about a "global warming" group that writes -- invents -- fake "news" stories about how global warming affects Real People Living Real Lives and plants them in the lazy, leftwing Gaslight Media.

Just the News highlighted one of their Fake Stories, released just in time for Easter -- global warming is making chocolate more expensive! Please like and share!

Ahead of the Easter weekend, multiple media outlets reported that chocolate prices are soaring, and according to the coverage, the main culprit driving the inflating costs is climate change.

Across multiple platforms, the reports followed a similar message, using similar language to describe the problem and its causes -- and the reports all came out the same week.

"Easter egg prices soar as cocoa crops are hit by climate crisis and exploitation," the Guardian reported on Good Friday. The article blames the shortage of cocoa, which is used to make chocolate, on rising prices of fertilizers, deforestation, illegal mining practices and "extreme weather events."

Spoiler: This is all made up. Just the News checked the easily-found data and reports that cocoa yields are up, not down, in the recent past.

[The "journalist" responsible for this propaganda lie] didn't respond to questions if he was aware of this data or if he ever sought it out.

The Guardian, NPR and The Conversation are among the hundreds of media outlets associated with or listed as partners with an organization called Covering Climate Now (CCN), which encourages reporters to insert "climate crisis" narratives into all their stories.

Covering Climate Now boasts partnerships with hundreds of major media outlets across the world. According to CCN, its partners have a combined audience of 2 billion people -- one-fourth of the globe's population -- in 57 countries.

The group provides advice to reporters on all beats to not only insert a "climate crisis" narrative into every beat, but also how to cover the topic. This includes telling journalists not to platform what it calls "denialists," which includes anyone who "ridicules" climate activists or suggests that climate change is not producing a global emergency.

The site is full of tips on what language to use, how to write headlines and suggested stories for journalists to cover, all in line with an anti-fossil [fuel] message....

...

The organization encourages reporters to make statements attributing "extreme weather" to climate change, even in the absence of any data to support the claims.

"Even in the absence of explicit attribution data, it's accurate to say that climate change is making extreme weather more common and more severe," CCN tells its partnered media organizations. It then provides tips for language journalists can use to blame "extreme weather" on climate change for any story.

They're seriously telling "journalists" to just make up climate panic stories, even when they have absolutely no evidence.

I'm sure the "journalists" were already inclined to do so, but now they have "Experts" telling them that it's ethical to just make up political lies.

I mention this because, courtesy of Matt Walsh, I think I've found another fake story suggested by this group.

You're no doubt wondering if this is a prank.

This ain't no prank, Jack!

Published April 3rd. Not April 1st.

Joya Patiha, a 43-year-old Indonesian transgender woman, first started to notice that changing weather patterns in the mountain-ringed city of Bandung were affecting her income as a sex worker a decade ago.

The rainy season was lasting longer across the West Java province, winds were stronger and in some particularly bad years Patiha lost up to 80% of her earnings.

Trans women like Patiha are among the most affected by extreme weather linked to climate change, as well as suffering disproportionately when disasters strike.

"No one is coming out during the longer rainy season," said Patiha. "It is very hard to make money during that unpredictable weather."

Indonesia is particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change, and trans women, who tend to face more stigma and marginalisation than trans men or other LGBTQ+ Indonesians, are also among those hardest hit by extreme weather.

They said the thing! They said the thing!

That's because many trans women, like Patiha, are shut out of the formal economy and survive as buskers and sex workers, occupations that rely on them being able to solicit clients outdoors.

Sherly Wijayanto, a 28-year-old trans woman from the capital Jakarta, worked as a busker for around seven years until the increasingly volatile weather made her seek other options.

"I no longer want to endure the heat and rain on the streets," said Wijayanto, who joined trans-led arts group Sanggar Seroja, where she now sings with the theatre company and runs the social media channel.

According to the The Independent, it's a bad thing that a prostitute has left prostitution for a career in the theater.

What the hell am I saying? It's all made up!

As well as seeking to adapt their precarious livelihoods to the new climate reality, these women and the groups that support them are also seeking to raise awareness of the challenges posed by extreme weather in a nation composed of more than 17,000 islands.

Despite gender-fluid communities being historically accepted in Indonesia, a rising tide of conservative Islam in the world's largest Muslim-majority country has fuelled anti-LGBTQ+ persecution.

"Those outside the binary category are often labelled with the category 'deviant', (and) associated with the causes of environmental problems and disasters," said Darmawan, who has researched how climate change affects trans Indonesians.

None of this is true. None.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 12:14 PM | Comments (371) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Rant: Minimalist Edition

The West has backed itself into a corner. Russia is grinding down eastern Ukraine and making it clear that they are in it for the long haul. It has been an expensive and painful slog for Putin, and has exposed the weakness of the Russian armed forces in delightful ways. But that doesn't mean he can't consolidate and declare victory of a sort. The question is whether the West will double down and inject massive quantities of war materiel into a conflict that is at best a stalemate, with modest gains and losses at huge expense.

NATO Chief Admits Ukraine May Have to 'Compromise' with Russia.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has conceded the possibility that Ukraine may need to compromise with Russia in order to end the war between the two nations.

In an interview with the BBC, Stoltenberg appeared to acknowledge that without a proposed five-year, 100 billion euro fund for Ukraine, the Eastern European nation could find itself facing unconditional surrender to Russia without any bargaining power.

Acknowledging reality...what a concept! Absent Western armies joining the conflict, is it really in the realm of possibilities that Ukraine will prevail, and push Russia out of its claimed territories?

There are no positive outcomes in this border dispute. All that one can hope for is cessation of hostilities and a cold peace. Ukraine must admit that the odds are not in its favor, in spite of the oceans of money and arms flowing into it from a West that is using it as a proxy in its mostly imaginary conflict with the Russian bear. And of course the massive grift that is Ukraine will continue, regardless of the outcome of this war. If Ukraine wins, then the West will funnel cash into it for rebuilding, and that is ripe for theft. And if it loses, the West will funnel cash into it for rebuilding! It's a Win-Win for the kleptocrats in Washington and the capitals of Europe!

Sadly, American stockpiles of many vital weapons have been depleted, and our military-industrial base is incapable of replenishing those stocks in a manner that a sane country would demand. We are years away from fully stocked arsenals, and our real enemy knows that very, very well.

Taiwan, Korea, Iran...just three flashpoints that could require a major military effort that would dwarf Ukraine. And we don't have the materiel to fight those battles!

[Crossposted at CutJibNewsletter]

Posted by: CBD at 11:00 AM | Comments (394) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Mid-Morning Art Thread

Kitchen Scene
Peter Wtewael

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (336) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Report (4/11/24)

Hmmmm. I wonder what is below the fold this morning..................

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 06:20 AM | Comments (463) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Daily Tech News 11 April 2024

Top Story

• The SEC is planning to sue crypto exchange Uniswap because. (CoinDesk)
  
  Because, basically, the SEC can't decide what to do about cryptocurrencies so it is planning to sue every company that doesn't steal all its customers' money and disappear.
  
  The SEC took no action against FTX until after the meltdown, so now they're making up for lost time by taking action against, basically, everyone.
  
  
  

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:40 AM | Comments (82) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Wednesday Overnight Open Thread (4/10/24) Sluggard Edition

*****

The Quotes of The Day

Quote I

Goodness is about character - integrity, honesty, kindness, generosity, moral courage, and the like. More than anything else, it is about how we treat other people. Dennis Prager

Quote II

Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort. President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 09:58 PM | Comments (435) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Hoverbike Cafe

Greece

i halp

"Autism service dog" sooths an autistic owner having a panic attack.

Lizard threat display involves standing up on its hind legs. Gojira!

The Four Yorkshiremen sketch, as interpreted by pandas. Grubs! Oh, how I used to dream about the day I'd break open a rotten bamboo shoot and find some grubs inside!

Everything is a playground for doggos.

Big "baby" wombat.

Dog philosopher.

I love when dogs parade around with sticks and act like you're so jealous of their stick. The other day I walked to the dog park. There was a pit bull there with a stone in his mouth about the size of a grapefruit. He kept pacing back and forth in front of me to show off the stone and taunt me with my non-possession of it.

Spider-sac trigger warning.

I've got to "peel my lizard," if you know what I mean.

Home Makeover: Stork's Nest Edition.

Ice cafe.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 07:30 PM | Comments (249) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Quick Hits

There's been such a shift in minority voting preference (towards Trump) that Democrats are now arguing against "blindly" trying to turn out all voters, warning that Democrats may wind up gifting Trump with more votes than Biden.

Things have changed so dramatically that it's likely to affect how Democrats campaign. We're already seeing it happen. Last week, we learned that an influential data scientist had warned major Democratic donors in a confidential memo not to register young and black voters ahead of the 2024 election because they're likely going to vote for Donald Trump.

"Indeed, if we were to blindly register nonvoters and get them on the rolls, we would be distinctly aiding Trump's quest for a personal dictatorship," Aaron Strauss warned in the memo, citing recent polling showing Trump's strength with unregistered voters.

LOL, it's a "dictatorship" when more people vote for Republicans.

Democracy is always in crisis every single election Democrats lose, or even just might lose.

Sounds like the Democrat Party is the organization interested in dictatorship.

...

"The left's challenge with non-white voters is much deeper than it first appears," Adam Carlson, a data analyst with the Brunswick Group, explained. "A less racially divided America is an America where people vote more based on their beliefs than their identity. This is a big challenge for Dems."

How terrible!

Biden might not only miss the ballot in Ohio, because Ohio's deadline for naming a nominee comes before Biden will actually be named the nominee at the DNC on August 15th, but he may miss the Alabama ballot for the same reason.

First, we learned that President Joe Biden's spot on the Ohio ballot was in danger and analyzed how that might play out. We still don't even have a definitive answer to that question, but an almost identical situation has now cropped up in Alabama. The Alabama Secretary of State, a Republican, has informed the Alabama Democratic Party Chairman, letting him know that the deadline for certification of candidate names on the ballot for November falls four days before the DNC is set to begin in Chicago. The rules in Alabama appear to allow for some provisional options to avoid this issue, but Wes Allen, the Secretary of State, appears to be taking a hard line on the question for now.

As Jazz Shaw says, this is down to the DNC's own incompetence. The laws and deadlines of these states have been a literal open book for years, but the Democrat Party decided to hold a convention later than usual so as to give Biden a boost nearer to the election. No one, and certainly not any Republican, should bend the rules for them.

David Hogg's political career with the Democrat Party is off to a perfect start.

Gun control activist David Hogg has been hit with allegations over the spending practices of his group Leaders We Deserve PAC. Conservative outlets are reporting that the group spent comparably little on actual candidates as opposed to travel and expenses. His prior counsel is a familiar name in such controversies in Washington: former Clinton campaign general counsel Marc Elias.

Hogg created a group in the aftermath of the 2022 midterm elections to elect Generation Z politicians to offices throughout the country. The group was given favorable national coverage in major media outlets. He explained that contributions would be used to elect young Democrat candidates...

Federal filings reportedly show that year-end 2023, Leaders We Deserve raised over $3 million. That is impressive for its first year in operation.

The conservative sites allege that the group spent "only about $263,000 on its stated mission of electing candidates from Generation Z to office combined with donations to other Democrat Party committees and groups--and instead spent more than $1.4 million on disbursements to themselves for payroll and to political consulting firms and legal fees, in addition to travel and entertainment expenses like hotels, flights, and meals."

However, it reportedly spent more than $1,314,000 on travel and related expenses while giving $80,000 to the Elias Law Group.

Previously, when allegations of self-dealing and accounting improprieties were raised with regard to Black Lives Matter, the group's attorney, Elias, immediately stood out for many. Elias resigned from his "key role" with BLM as the scandal exploded.

...

The group is only the latest political or business effort launched by Hogg, who previously tried to start a "progressive pillow company" before stepping away from the enterprise.

Biden's former chief of staff Ron Klain was caught on tape blasting Biden's frequent babbling about bridges.

Wait 'til he hears abojut Biden's obsession with choo-choo trains! And the ever-mutating circumstances of Beau Biden's death!

"I think the president is out there too much talking about bridges," Klain said. "He does two or three events a week where he's cutting a ribbon on a bridge. And here's a bridge. Like I tell you, if you go into the grocery store, you go to the grocery store and, you know, eggs and milk are expensive, the fact that there's a f***ing bridge is not [inaudible]."

"He's not a congressman. He's not running for Congress," Klain said. "I think it's kind of a fool's errand. I think that [it] also doesn't get covered that much because, look, it's a f***ing bridge. Like it's a bridge, and how interesting is the bridge? It's a little interesting, but it's not a lot interesting."

He also says Biden should focus more on his "economic message" and "proposals" instead of his "achievements."

Why?

Well, obviously: Because Biden's economy is a disaster. He has no achievements. Every time he claims that inflation isn't real or has been "tamed," people think he sounds even more senile and out-of-touch with the actual world.

So instead, Klain advises him to say things about the future which haven't been proven to be lies yet.

Good advice, really, if cynical.

Because our country has maleducated three generations of kids in a row,
the makers of Scrabble are changing the rules so that morons can play it and feel "included."

This is a game-changer.

For the first time in 75 years, Mattel is making a major change to the iconic board game Scrabble -- and touting a "No More Scoring" gameplay option.

The new launch is a double-sided version of the famous board game -- one side with the original game for those who want to stick to the long-time traditional version, and one side with a "less competitive" version to appeal to Gen Z gamers.

The flip side of the classic game, called Scrabble Together, will include helper cards, use a simpler scoring system, be quicker to play and allow people to play in teams.

Mattel is to launch a new version of Scrabble which is designed to be more collaborative and accessible for those who find word games intimidating.

"The makers of Scrabble found that younger people, Gen Z people, don't quite like the competitive nature of Scrabble," Gyles Brandreth, who co-hosts the language podcast Something Rhymes With Purple, told BBC Radio 4 Today. "They want a game where you can simply enjoy language, words, being together and having fun creating words."

Creating words?

So idiots are allowed to just make up fake words?

...

Scrabble Together is marketed for those who find the classic game to be intimidating or for people who have ever thought "word games aren't for me."

However, some naysayers objected to the changes, calling it "Scrabble for Snowflakes" and "Woke Scrabble" on X.

...

So what's new exactly? In addition to a dual-sided board, there are helper cards, which provide assistance, prompts and clues and can be selected to match the player's challenge level of their choice.

In the new version, scoring is a thing of the past -- now all one has to do is finish a goal and collect the goal card.

Goal cards include challenges such as: "Play a horizontal word," "play a three-letter word" or "play a word that touches the edge of the board."

...

Scrabble Together is marketed for those who find the classic game to be intimidating or for people who have ever thought "word games aren't for me."

Despite having a strong vocabulary, I'm absolute crap at Scrabble. So I don't play it.

Not all games need to be "inclusive" for everybody.

...

The helper cards -- which provide help, prompts and clues -- can be selected to match the player's challenge level of their choice.

Amazingly, this game isn't being made for America, because Hasbro, not Mattel, owns the Scrabble license in America.

I bet Hasbro will in fact license Mattel's new "Scrabble for Morons" rules.

Via David Strom.

Fact Check: True.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 06:17 PM | Comments (323) | Trackbacks (Suck)