Monthly Archives: October 2016

Columnist Josh Barro changes his party registration from Republican to Democrat, and summarizes in Business Insider the status, and the danger, of the current GOP base from the inside:

The Republican Party had a fundamental vulnerability: Because of the fact-free environment so many of its voters live in, and because of the anti-Democrat hysteria that had been willfully whipped up by so many of its politicians, it was possible for the party to be taken over by a fascist promising revenge.

And because there are only two major parties in the United States, and either of the parties’ nominees can become president, such vulnerability in the Republican Party constitutes vulnerability in our democracy.

So long as GOP politicians such as Senator Inhofe (R – OK) think it’s OK to reject the claims of mainstream science on ideological or religious grounds, the base will not only follow right along, but even get on out ahead. The lesson they learn? If you don’t like it, reject it. Don’t figure out what happened, just pretend it didn’t happen – or someone’s conspiring.

Sound familiar?

In other words, the lack of leadership comes from those who prefer to pander to their base and to their backers, rather than embracing facts & truth – a key theme of this blog. We’re now seeing the backside of that failure as a black wave of denial rises up, of people who loathe current and forecasted realities and are now flocking to someone who might be the Great Denier – Mr. Trump. He who denies the polls, will deny the election results if they go against him – and will rail against shadowy forces moving against him, because personal failure is not an option, not a reality.

In a way, it’s playing out like a great work of fiction – those who’ve engaged in a base, immoral search for power or wealth are finding the monsters they’ve invoked are now threatening to eat them alive – unless they play long. Sure, it’s purple prose, but it’s also what it’s looking like to me.

I suppose if I were feeling particularly liverish I’d be muttering about worshiping the false idol of the free market …

(h/t Keith Pickering at The Daily Kos)

A reader comments on cybermeddling:

I seriously doubt we’ve tried to throw elections in places like Russia, China, etc. via cyberwarfare, or worse, completely break their inter-institutional faiths. For one, how could we? They’re effectively dictatorships, and the people already have little faith. In democracies, however, it’s key that most people have some reasonable faith in their governmental institutions, such as elections, otherwise we are SOL.

Which is why I’m more or less against voting machines, particularly those not using publicly sourced software and, for that matter, hardware.

fulling:

Archaeologists have uncovered a craftsmen’s district that features the significant ruins of a mill for fulling, a cleansing step in textile processing. In Roman times, fulling was conducted by slaves, who worked the cloth while ankle-deep in tubs of human urine—a resource so central to the business that it was taxed. [Archaeology, Off The Grid column (November / December, 2016)]

Makes you wonder about all the bellyaching about taxation today. I’m seeing a little meter next to every toilet…

Which any reasonable person knows – but it’s unsettling when it’s a declared enemy mucking about with missiles. John Schilling on 38 North provides additional context on the recent test failure of North Korea’s new missile, and what it may mean:

North Korea seems to have tested its Musudan missile seven times this year, with only a single clear success to show for it. But the North Koreans aren’t simply repeating old failures.  And they aren’t taking the slow path to developing a reliable system, with a year or so between each test to analyze the data and make improvements. That has been their practice in the past, and it is what we expected this time once they had one successful flight for the cameras. Instead, they are continuing with an aggressive test schedule that involves, at least this time, demonstrating new operational capabilities. That increases the probability of individual tests failing, but it means they will learn more with each test even if it does result in failure. If they continue at this rate, the Musudan intermediate-range ballistic missile could enter operational service sometime next year–much sooner than had previously been expected.

It would be interesting to have this topic brought up at the final Presidential debate.

Placket:

A placket is an opening in the upper part of trousers or skirts, or at the neck or sleeve of a garment. Plackets are almost always used to allow clothing to be put on or removed easily, but are sometimes used purely as a design element. Modern plackets often contain fabric facings or attached bands to surround and reinforce fasteners such as buttons, snaps, or zippers. [Wikipedia]

My wife, a former professional tailor, mentioned it today, and it’s a word I’d never heard.

Yesterday, in North Carolina a GOP office was firebombed and a message was delivered to the GOP, as reported by CNN:

A GOP office in Hillsborough, North Carolina, was firebombed over the weekend, with a swastika and the words “Nazi Republicans get out of town or else” spray painted on an adjacent building, according to local officials.

The Democratic response?

Early Sunday evening the Clinton campaign tweeted a note of sympathy.

“The attack on the Orange County HQ @NCGOP office is horrific and unacceptable. Very grateful that everyone is safe.”

Local Democrats, meanwhile, created an online fundraising campaign to help local Republicans rebuild following Saturdaynight’s attack. Dems hoped to raise $10,000 as part of the drive – a goal they met in only 40 minutes.

“Until an investigation is undertaken, we cannot know who did this or why. No matter the result, this is not how Americans resolve their differences. We talk, we argue, sometimes we march, and most of all we vote. We do not resort to violence by individuals or by mobs,” the Democratic message read. “So, let’s all pitch in, no matter what your party affiliation, and get that office open again quickly.”

On both sides, this is the response of mature adults who understand the importance of a civil election, and that we’re all Americans; our shared values are far more important than our differences, so long as we have a shared understanding of how the political process works.

In Arizona, repulsive threats against The Arizona Republic, a newspaper that always endorses Republicans, began when the paper endorsed Clinton for President. In response, the editor, Mi-Ai Parrish, wrote a beautiful response to those hate-filled unAmericans. Here’s just a small part of this one newspaper’s understanding of their important part in the political process:

To those who said we should be shut down, burned down, who said they hoped we would cease to exist under a new presidential administration, I give you Nicole. She is our editor who directs the news staff, independent of our endorsements. After your threats, Nicole put on her press badge and walked with her reporters and photographers into the latest Donald Trump rally in Prescott Valley, Ariz. She stood as Trump encouraged his followers to heckle and boo and bully journalists. Then she came back to the newsroom to ensure our coverage was fair. Nicole knows free speech requires an open debate.

And the Trump reaction at the rally leads to the final part of this post: the failure of Trump to understand how our political system works. For him, the ways of the private sector are all that’s important – bluster, threaten, take to court. Nevermind what sort of impact that any particular action will have on the overall system, that’s someone else’s problem, but how can I spin this for me?

Except once you’re in the public sphere, it IS your problem. If he calls for violence to rain down on his opponents, he has opened himself up for violence himself. That’s the prophecy of the North Carolina firebombing.

And that HAS TO STOP. Political systems where opponents are assassinated as a matter of course are those symbolizing countries that are failing – economic systems dying, the masses turning to alcohol to forget their problems.

That’s what will happen if we forget our shared faith, implicit as it may be, in our political system. It may be corrupt from time to time, but that can be fixed through legal processes. But once we start shooting each other, then we’re in deep shit.

And Trump doesn’t get this. All he can see is the lollipop – and if he can’t have it, he’ll stamp his feet and declare the other side cheated. From another report by CNN:

Donald Trump and his surrogates amplified their argument over the weekend that the election is “rigged,” leaving the Republican nominee more isolated as top members of the GOP — including his own running mate — declared their faith in the political system.

Trump opened Sunday with a series of tweets sowing doubt about the legitimacy of the election.

“The election is absolutely being rigged by the dishonest and distorted media pushing Crooked Hillary – but also at many polling places – SAD”

To his credit, Trump’s VP candidate Pence differed with Trump:

But Trump’s own vice presidential nominee, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, disagreed during an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” saying he will accept the Election Day results.

“We will absolutely accept the result of the election,” he said. “Look, the American people will speak in an election that will culminate on November the 8…”

Perhaps he understands that Trump goes too far. But he’s already the VP candidate and can’t really resign the position, so he’s caught in a dark place – very bad policy on one side, rabid supporters who find boundaries to be loathesome, rather than a positive.

Trump needs to step back and retract these words. Forcefully.

Conservative media personality Sean Hannity continues to shout “RINO!” in the dark of the GOP theater, as MediaMatters reports:

SEAN HANNITY (HOST): I think it may be time for a new speaker. I’ll deal with this after the election, but I think maybe it’s time for somebody that can lead.

JIM BRIDENSTINE: And I want to be clear on that, my tweet — I sent out a tweet, and it — given the stakes of this election, if Paul Ryan isn’t for Donald Trump, then I’m not for Paul Ryan. I want to be clear, that is an if, then statement.

[…]

HANNITY: I mean, I have so had it with these pompous, self-righteous, sanctimonious — the very people, if you look in the exit polls in the primary, the very people that were responsible for creating an opening for Donald Trump, Republican establishment in DC, because they failed at a spectacular level.

You know, it’s funny how they blame me, “Hannity, you’re responsible.” No, I’m not responsible for 65 percent of Republicans hating all of you. You did that all on your own, you own that, you did it, you built that.

And so Representative Ryan, not so long ago so far right wing that his accession to the post of Speaker seemed a joke, begins the process of being scraped into the dustbin of history as being too liberal for the GOP – and all the while Hannity disclaims any responsibility. I don’t follow Hannity at all, but I think it’s safe to summarize that he’s not a sober thinker on the nature of the American democracy, as he’s a fervent Trump supporter.

Or, more likely, he’s just a supporter of himself, and his employers have told him to increase revenues. Easy enough to do: throw more red meat to the base. Having a sober discussion doesn’t shoot up revenue.

In the meanwhile, what will losing the Speakership to someone even further to the right mean for Ryan’s future? Will he be content to return to the benches, a discard of a self-destructive machine bent on a certitude made of titanium? Or will he retire in order to regain his equilibrium, spinning out more useless proposed Federal budgets that mean nothing and make little sense without assuming the Laffer Curve works?

NewScientist interviews neuroscientist Charles Nelson (1 October 2016, paywall) concerning his work with orphan infants in Romania who were either placed in government institutions, where attention to the babies is low and the stimulation level is also low, or with quality foster families. The results, now years later?

What was the impact of foster care?

Two or so years into the study, the findings were overwhelming. Across the board, the kids in institutions lagged behind. They had much lower IQs and delayed language development. They had smaller brains. They had all kinds of mental health problems. In every domain, they were hurting. The kids in foster care were doing much, much better.

Some of the improvements – such as in language and IQ – were only seen if children were placed in foster care before the age of around 2. The prevalence of mental health problems such as anxiety and depression were reduced no matter how old the kids were when they were placed. But foster care seemed to have no effect on attention deficit disorder.

How are the children doing now?

They’re 16 or so. Those assigned to institutions are not good. They’re starting to experience significant mental health issues, such as psychotic disorder and paranoia. Around 20 showed a precipitous drop in IQ from the age of 12. That’s surprising and really worrying. IQ is generally stable over time. The kids in foster care are doing much better across the board.

Keep in mind that there were a limited number of quality foster families available, and it’s implied that every one was used – so those in the institutions were not unethically treated by the researchers. Nor were the researchers emotionally immune to the problem:

What were the institutions like?

We had a rule: no crying in front of the children. But it was tough. I can’t tell you how emotional this was. Sometimes you’d have to leave the room because you were so overwhelmed by the suffering of the children and the callousness of the staff.

But this does suggest that poverty is not quite so much the problem as the lack of a caring staff family; sadly, all too often poverty will deprive children of stimulation and nutrients required to build strong bodies and minds. And while some may shrug this off as a problem for the family, the mental illness of one person has the potential to affect everyone around them, ranging from negative economic impacts up to and including physical danger.

This is one of the practical reasons why poverty must be dealt with as a priority item on our national, collective agenda. As with most problems, fixing a problem early in its life cycle is much cheaper than fixing it later; we see this with disease, software implementations, building bridges – name your situation. As studies like this, as painful as they are to read about, become available, they should inform our national conversation on how we handle such issues as poverty, domestic violence, and mental health care, because they are potentially related. We need to ask questions such as whether or not UBI would have a positive impact on those in poverty, no matter how that seems to violate the precepts of the free market, or if we should stick with a welfare approach; how to handle those who, despite (or because) being poverty stricken still spend their money on recreational drugs, legal or illegal, despite having children; and several other items.

For those who would turn their backs on these problems, I would say that having members of our society operating at less than their potential simply because of poverty, as one of the wealthiest nations in the world is not a scandal so much as bloody damn foolishness. We’ve done well because we’re smart, not because we’re stupid, and the more smart people we have, the better off we’ll be in the future. Mantling over your wealth and belaboring a tax rate just because you fear falling behind the millionaire down the street is short-term foolishness. We are a society that must take care of its own, and when we fail to do so, we don’t only endanger those who are falling behind – but yourselves as well.

Sometimes the camera can surprise you …

by Kate Sierzputowski

More on endangered Seussian creatures on Colossal.

My Arts Editor recently viewed My Wicked, Wicked Ways: The Legend of Errol Flynn (1985).

She says it had lots of excellent era cars.

That is all.

IMdb says it was nominated for a couple of Emmy Awards.

A reader responds to the analysis of authoritarians:

In addition to making a slight change in how we raise our children, we could also address the things which cause their fears.

I’d argue that it’s likely that children raised with a growth mindset (see Carol Dweck’s research) instead of a fixed mindset would be less authoritarian-responsive, in addition to just being happier, more productive and successful adults. That will take a long time to accomplish, however (change the conventions for parenting and schooling and then pass an entire generation of kids into middle age where they can influence policies — so minimum 30 to 50 years). Our civilization may not last that long if this goes completely unchecked.

We can do things about some of their fears, though, such as economic stability, jobs and terrorism. Fixing things like “corporate personhood” and Citizens United would go a long way to helping citizens feel like government is responsive to them, rather than in the pockets of “elites”.

For another insight into the minds of Trump supporters, check out this blog post from Cracked’s David Wong. It seems fairly logical and has the additional positive of being written from someone who’s been there.

Boris Karloff hosts Black Sabbath (1963), an Italian-made trio of short movies. All three share the same traits: excellent staging in the typical style for the genre, which perhaps some might find trite, but I thought was entirely appropriate for these stories: decaying furniture cluttering rooms housing decaying characters whose endings are mostly foul. The acting is adequate, and in some cases more than adequate. Lighting and makeup are quite good, illuminating faces, bodies, entire rooms in effective ways.

But the stories! Ah! These are less than adequate, for they lack some of the basics of story-telling: logic and empathetic characters. That these are stories of horror means that supernatural monsters, full of lusts rare and improper, may appear, but in order to bring even the beginnings of horror, even terror, to our nerves requires a certain sympathy for those who are about to suffer for their own moral defects; the nearest I could find to a gesture of empathy is that the victims are either female, or young males, and thus perhaps a cultural requirement is that we feel empathy for such; but this does not work for me, and I have to wonder if this is an Italian characteristic, as Italian movies often seem to skip this step.

And logic. There is, of course, the suspended logic of the horror movie, the supernatural ignoring the otherwise ironclad rules of physics in their quest to invert the quivering nerves of their victims; but here I speak of normal, everyday logic: characters that act and react in expected ways, that we understand how at least some do, while others may be ciphers that are eventually revealed. Sadly, these characters appear to be dragged about by their collars, the plots plunging them hither and yon.

So, to the stories.

The first concerns a woman who must prepare a dead woman for burial. As she does so, she filches a large ring, tearing it from the late owner’s finger with a fury. Perhaps she is poor, but we don’t know. But the corpse is monstrous, terrifying. The woman then returns home to her apartment, and is presently terrified by the dripping of water, the creaking of doors. Before much time passes, she, too, dies; the next morning, other apartment dwellers find her and call the police. The caretaker tells the police she shooed everyone away and has touched nothing, knowing how the police work.

But the ring is gone, and madness is entering the eyes of the caretaker…

The second story concerns a classic stalker, first the phone ringing with no one on the other end. The terrified woman answering the phone finally entices the caller into speaking: it’s Frank. As in Frank, who died six months ago. Their connection? She stole him from another woman, whom she now calls, begging for help. Would I call her in the same situation? No, no, no! But she does, and the woman done wrong shows up as if … the plot requires it. Soon, the first woman falls asleep. Will there now be vengeance? Can the second woman speak like Frank?

No.

Frank himself breaks into the apartment silently, and strangles the woman done wrong. But the first woman has a knife and soon buries it in Frank. So now Frank is dead, which seems to distress the woman. Whoever she is. And how did Frank end up alive, before becoming dead again? We don’t know. Frank … ly, we don’t care.

The third story, starring Boris Karloff, involves a special breed of vampire called the Wurdalak, which only feasts on the blood of loved ones. Sounds horrific, doesn’t it? Lots of story potential. Oh, wait. What happens when you run out of loved ones? “I drained my wife last night and now I’m feeling a bit peckish. Oh, that’s right, I have a son for today’s meal. Hmmm, does the cousin count for tomorrow?” OK, let’s turn on the old “suspension of disbelief”… So, see, Boris’ 4th shepherd was murdered by a local bandit, so Boris decided it was time to kill the bandit; why it took 4 is not clear. But he tells his sons that if he’s not back in five days, he should be considered a Wurdalak and not permitted to come into the house; kill him if you can.

How does Boris know this? I dunno. It’s dumb.

So he comes back on the fifth day. Soon enough? Not soon enough? The sons don’t know, the wives or whatever they are, they won’t express much of anything, but that dog howling in the background, eh, he doesn’t get a vote. Then there’s this traveler who is going somewhere and has fallen in love with the, ah, buxom figure of one of the woman. Because, ah, you know, buxom. There ain’t no other reason for his sudden onset of love, I’m tellin’ ya.

Yeah, this isn’t going to end well.

If you adore Boris, sure, see it. It’s got bits of humor. But, really, it’s not worth it.

Postscript: I see in the Wikipedia entry that the Italian version of this is actually regarded rather highly. It may be worth seeking out that version, especially if it’s dubbed. Apparently this American version has been sculpted for the American sensibility of the early 1960s.

We’re not quite sure what these are, but we like ’em.

A reader remembers his visit to Mammoth Site:

If I remember the story properly when [my wife] and I went there, a contractor had bought the land for development and found the big bones. He sold the land to the university of South Dakota for $1.00 to make it legal. One of the provisions was to open the site to teaching young kids and anthropology students, t [sic] how to remove fossils properly. Among the things they found were several Colombian Mammoths, Wolly [sic] Mammoths, American lions, and 2 faced bears, ancient sea shells. Well worth the trip!

Mammoth Site remarks they’ve discovered a number of Columbian mammoths as well as several woolly mammoths, which were an Eastern seaboard denizens – apparently Hot Springs marked a meeting point for the related species.

Play any appropriate music in the back of your mind…

I had the keys to your heart
But I ain’t got them no more
‘cuz I broke them off in your anus
as you slunk away out the door …

Credit to my Arts Editor for her efforts on improving my sordid beginning…

Taphonomy:

By studying the bone bed’s taphonomy [i.e., studying what happened to an organism between the time of its death and the time it was excavated], researchers can determine the environment of deposition and gain a clearer insight into the world of the mammoths.

From ESRI, the makers of ArcGIS, “The most powerful mapping software in the world.” They supply the mapping software used at Mammoth Site.

Mammuthus columbi,  13′ tall, 10′ long, the majority resident of Mammoth Site. Credit: Dinopedia

A friend reminded me of a lovely experience my Arts Editor and I had in 2012 on a road trip to the area of Mount Rushmore – a visit to nearby Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, South Dakota. This is, as I recall from the docent’s presentation, part of a sinkhole into which the mammoths would occasionally fall. The sides were steep, the sinkhole deep, and the mammoths could only swim and scrabble at the edges for so long.

Today, a building has been built over the sinkhole, making the experience of visiting the dig site pleasant all year round, and includes (or at least during our visit) a restaurant next door.

Mammoth Site excavation

The bodies piled up, as one might imagine. Today, the bone bed is 67 feet deep; on our trip the docent gave out the lovely story that their probes had gone down to their limits, which I do not precisely recall, and at the deepest, they were still pulling up evidence of fossilized animals.

In the picture here on the right, we can see a mammoth in the throes of excavation (click on it for a larger version). Even to my untrained eyes, the spine is clearly visible. But gender?

Probably male.

I don’t know this from a visible cue, but, again, from the docent’s presentation: at the time, all mammoths so far identified were male. Elephant society is matriarchal in which females and juveniles roam in herds and the bulls roam freely, so if we assume mammoths used the same structure, then it makes sense that the free-roaming bulls occasionally fell in, while the queens, who in today’s elephant species are repositories of knowledge and become more valuable to the herd as they age, would lead the other females and juveniles away from the known danger.

Mammoth Site excavation

As an adjunct theory, and probably immune to confirmation or falsification, I have to wonder if the mammoths, particularly those found in the sinkhole, had access to fermenting fruit. It is not unknown today to see animals consume fermenting fruit and then act as if they were drunk. There’s a certain tragic eloquence to the idea of a drunken male mammoth stumbling into the sinkhole, thus to perish for the appreciation of paleontologists and their groupies a few thousand years later.

Predator skeleton found at Mammoth Site.

Mammoth Site is easy find, located within the city limits of Hot Springs, and its scope is not limited to mammoths, but rather to whatever is found at the site, which includes many species, from prairie dogs to mid-size predators to this fearsome critter. It makes for a pleasant day-trip for those of us fascinated by the creatures of yesteryear – Go!

CNN is reporting on the latest Trump suggestion concerning the final debate:

NewScientist, One Per Cent (1 October 2016):

We’re putting the smarts into more and more things these days: thermostats, toothbrushes – and sex toys. But not everyone is happy with these gadgets’ data hoovering habits. A US user is suing the maker of We-Vibe, a vibrator that can be controlled by an app, for collecting personal data without her knowledge. This allegedly includes details such as when the We-Vibe was used and the settings selected.

Warfare and sectarian conflicts are not the only source of tensions in Iraq. As Adnan Abu Zeed reports in AL Monitor, a Turkish dam on the Tigris River is causing worry in Iraq:

Severe drought is affecting agricultural lands across Iraq because of the low levels of river water. Iraqi officials have raised the alarm on the negative impact of the Turkish Ilisu Dam on the Tigris River, which is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2016. …

Of note, Turkey has cut off water on more than one occasion in the past, and it caused a major humanitarian crisis every time, prompting dozens of families to flee their residences in the Ramadi area in Anbar province, where the Euphrates River flows.

In further evidence of Ugaili’s statements, Furat al-Tamimi, the head of the parliamentary Water and Agriculture Committee, told Al-Monitor, “Turkey will escalate its systematic water ban into Iraqi territories, which would take a heavy toll on agriculture, following the completion of the dam’s final stages.”

He added, “Iraq has been objecting to the dam project, but to no avail. Upon completion, Iraq will lose about 50% of the Tigris River.”

Tamimi talked about an “anticipated meeting between parliament and the minister of water resources scheduled for October to discuss plans and procedures to address the risks of the dam construction and the negative effects on irrigation and agriculture.” He added, “Parliament will also host officials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to look into diplomatic efforts for international lobbying against the dam project.”

An October 2015 study by the World Resources Institute revealed that Iraq ranks 21th on the list of countries that are threatened by water crisis, despite having two rivers flowing in its territories.

I’d say that not having control of the source of the rivers makes one vulnerable. International Rivers covers the negative aspects from the Turkish side:

The proposed Ilisu Dam on the Tigris River in Southeastern Turkey is one of the world’s most controversial hydropower projects. If built, it will displace up to 70,000 people, drown the 10,000 year-old city of Hasankeyf, and destroy valuable biodiversity. …

National Geographic gives a quick historical overview:

Since it was first proposed by Turkey’s State Water Works in 1954, the Ilısu Dam has had a troubled history.

In 1982, the hydroelectric dam was incorporated into Turkey’s Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP): a regional development plan consisting of 19 hydroelectric plants and 22 dams. It was slated for construction on the Tigris River, in a village of a few hundred people.

But controversy soon erupted around the project. In addition to the village of Ilısu, the 10.4 billion-cubic-meter reservoir created by the dam would flood 400 kilometers of Tigris ecosystem, displace more than 25,000 people, and flood 300 archeological sites, including the 12,000-year-old town of Hasankeyf.

One of the diseases that lands high on my “oh, crap” list is Naegleria fowleri, or the amoeba that enters its human victims by the nose, often while they’re swimming in a lake, and destroy their brain – and is virtually incurable, with only a couple of known survivors. So while reading an article in NewScientist (1 October 2016) on some progress on discovering why it prefers brains (over, say, toe-nail clippings), I was dismayed at the final thoughts on the subject:

This could become a more urgent problem in the coming years – infections are predicted to rise as the climate warms.

And yet another reason to take climate change seriously – I mean, who wants a world where half the epitaphs are “I died because my brain was eaten by amoebas”?

Katherine Martinko on Treehugger.com reports on the travails of the dairy industry:

If you ever felt like crying over spilled milk, now’s the time. Dairy farmers in the United States have dumped more than 43 million gallons of milk between January and August of 2016. This milk has been poured into fields, manure lagoons, and animal feed, or down the drain at processing plants. According to the Wall Street Journal, this amount of milk is enough to fill 66 Olympic-sized swimming pools and is the most wasted in at last 16 years.

The problem is that the United States is in the midst of a massive dairy glut. Farmers responded to a shortage two years ago that is now catching up with a nation unable to absorb the quantity of dairy being produced. Prices are so low – down 36 percent from in 2014 – that “many can’t even afford to transport raw milk to market at current prices.”

Which strikes me as a classical example of a positive feedback loop – a phrase to which most engineers respond with a twitch and a shake of the head: “Can’t live with that.” The problem is that the feedback loop of information is not properly modulated so that farmers know how many can go into dairy farming without flooding the market and forcing many of them out.

Of course, libertarians would just shrug and say this is a good thing, but in reality it’s inefficient and a depressing situation for the farmers involved – and which then leads to a scarcity situation down the road. Just think roller coaster, without the fun.

Not that I have any solutions to offer. The free market has brought many advances to agriculture, as with many other fields, but when it comes to food, rather than, say, computers, I get a little twitchy. I recognize that a mercantile system merely leads to stagnation, politicization, and eventually revolution; but the solution has its own host of fleas.

I only hope the fleas don’t carry the plague.

A report in the NewScientist 60 Second column (28 September 2016)  leaves me wondering:

A synthetic form of alcohol aims to give you all the buzz minus the hangover. The drink, known as “alcosynth”, is designed to mimic the positive effects of alcohol but without the nausea or throbbing head, claims its creator, David Nutt, at Imperial College London. His 90 or so patented alcosynth concoctions must go through clinical trials before being offered to the public.

So, how about the impaired judgment? But apparently the liver’s not a problem, Professor Nutt tells The Independent:

The Imperial College Professor and former government drugs advisor told The Independent he has patented around 90 different alcosynth compounds.

Two of them are now being rigorously tested for widespread use, he said – and by 2050, he hopes alcosynth could completely replace normal alcohol.

“It will be there alongside the scotch and the gin, they’ll dispense the alcosynth into your cocktail and then you’ll have the pleasure without damaging your liver and your heart,” he said.

If it doesn’t impair your judgment and destroy your memory, it may not be the choice of alcoholics. Roger Ebert, the late, famed movie critic, was an alcoholic and wrote about it:

I’ve known two heavy drinkers who claimed they never had hangovers. I didn’t believe them. Without hangovers, it is possible that I would still be drinking. Unemployed, unmarried, but still drinking–or, more likely, dead. Most alcoholics continue to drink as long as they can. For many, that means death. Unlike drugs in most cases, alcohol allows you to continue your addiction for what’s left of your life, barring an accident. The lucky ones find their bottom, and surrender.

So what will alcosynth offer to the alcoholic?