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Simon Ings, in a book review of How The Zebra Got Its Stripes, notes the following eep-inducing biological adaptation – if you can call it that:

And Grasset has even more fun describing the occasions when, frankly, nature goes nuts. Take the female hyena, for example, which has to give birth through a “pseudo-penis”. As a result, 15 per cent of mothers die after their first labour and 60 per cent of cubs die at birth. If this were a “just so” story, it would be a decidedly off-colour one.

This is part of an aggregate review of four books that covers the slippery topic of scientific laws in biology, a convenience which gives us a better comprehension of the enormous biological world, but at the risk of occasionally getting it wrong. It’s a topic worth considering; the idea that laws apply to the biological world is actually a little slippery when we realize how poorly we understand the fine points of such laws. It’s easy enough when you’re dropping a ball off a cliff to measure gravity; it’s a lot harder when it turns out that an adaptation may have a downside. Consider, for instance, human intelligence. I’ve read, somewhere, that the reason we have such big skulls containing those brains that let us think about these things is because a mutation caused our jaw muscles, which attach around our skulls, to weaken. Without that strong muscle to restrain the skull, it grows bigger.

But now we’re more limited in what we can eat.

That’s an easy example. Creating descriptions of “laws” becomes a lot harder as statistical descriptions build on statistical descriptions. It ain’t turtles all the way down … but can you tell?

Makes you wonder about the basic physical laws…

(From NewScientist, 17 October 2016)

The MPR report on ACA rates raised some hackles amongst readers on Facebook. First up:

If people bail on paying their insurance (required by law, fined if you don’t have it, though the fine is minor at the moment) after expensive treatments, I’d say someone didn’t think through the financial incentives properly. That “someone” would mostly be legislators, but probably corporations involved in health care legislation as well.

People are always going to do what makes the most financial sense for themselves, _especially_ when stressed. Their altruistic, moral choices of following the intent of the law and making sure the system works by full participating (in this example) will be given quick short shrift when they feel like the health care industry and government are both screwing them, and/or they’re in a panic to pay their bills. Economy goes south? To hell with morals, put food on the table by canceling the health care insurance right after that necessary surgery. It’s an obvious choice.

Which tends to speak to single-payer. Next up:

The penalties are not high enough to actually force compliance, but there is no political appetite to raise them. Without full compliance, the pools are too small and full of older, sicker people. So there’s one problem.

Problem 2 was that the insurance industry did not know how to price insurance for sick people, so their initial estimates were way off. They want to recoup that money now. So premiums go up.

Root problem is that we have a for-profit medical services industry and a for-profit insurance industry. So medical services prices go up, with zero oversight or regulation, which raises the cost of medical care. The insurance companies have to pay some portion of that, and their CEOs want $30 million salaries and big stock prices, so the price of insurance goes up.

Which reminds me of the old Mayo Clinic model of rewarding wellness, not procedures. The procedures model works fine when the customer is an expert; a patient is very rarely an expert. Then an answer to my puzzlement:

Oh, Hue, this one: ” people in government health coverage are being steered into the private insurance market because their providers will get paid more that way.” I think that is things like VA services, where there are now some options to use private sector providers. There’s this huge push by the private sector to convince VA users that waiting a couple weeks for an appointment is intolerable so these patients will opt into private providers, who bill the government more than the VA does. I think.

I do know that the GOP has been pushing to privatize the VA. Here’s Steve Benen:

As Rachel notedon the show last night, privatization of veterans’ care is back as a Republican priority, as this Wall Street Journalreport yesterday helped prove.

Donald Trump says the Department of Veterans Affairs’ health-care system is badly broken, and this week his campaign released some guidelines that would steer changes he would implement if he wins the presidency.

While short on details, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee would likely push VA health care toward privatization and might move for it to become more of an insurance provider like Medicare rather than an integrated hospital system, said Sam Clovis, Mr. Trump’s chief policy adviser, in an interview.

Clovis told the newspaper, “We want quality care top to bottom. If that means we have some form of privatization or some form of Medicare, we don’t see anything wrong with that.”

Veterans, however, tend to have a very different opinion on the matter.

An opposing point of view from Accuracy in Media’s Roger Aronoff:

Instead, left-wing pundits such as Steve Benen of MSNBC warn that Republicans are working to privatize the VA. Focusing on a left-wing bogeyman, Benen’s report, although posted and updated on April 19, contains no mention of the GAO report about misleading wait times, the hearing, or the shredding of claims documents. Readers are left to wonder why, exactly, conservatives might wish to privatize the VA. After all, Benen isn’t reporting on any of the department’s problems.

We have reported, time and again that the news media ignore the biggest stories because they prove inconvenient to the left-wing agenda. While Benen writes of a conspiracy to make changes to how the VA offers care, the other half of the story is how the VA is failing veterans right now.

While there may be problems in the VA, the existence of problems does not justify the destruction of an institution with a long and honorable service record, nor the imposition of a solution which comes with its own set of problems. Insofar as Accuracy in Media goes, I’m not sure how far to trust them to be sincere. From their record, according to Wikipedia, they definitely had some troubles with the truth back during the Reagan era – but that was a long time ago. And how much should I trust Wikipedia?

Finally, another reader notes:

Dayton is getting ready to try and step in with a big subsidy.

I also noted in last night’s news broadcast that Minnesota Speaker of the House Daudt has rapidly changed his tune since a few nights ago, when he threw an impressive fit behind the microphone. Now he sounded quite more like … an adult. I wonder if his constituents called with complaints, or if he simply decided there were better ways to accomplish his goals.

Seeker.com reports on a brine lake found in the Gulf of Mexico:

Scientists have found an alien, inhospitable world not in the far reaches of the galaxy, but on the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico — about a day’s boat ride from New Orleans. Dubbed the “Jacuzzi of Despair,” this pool of super-salty brine kills any unfortunate creature that happens to wonder in — mainly benthic crabs, amphipods and an occasional fish.

The circular pool — about 100 feet in circumference and about 12 feet deep — lies nearly 3,300 feet below the surface of the Gulf. It contains water that is four or five times saltier than the surrounding seawater. As a result, the brine is so dense that it sits on the bottom, forming an underwater cauldron of toxic chemicals that include methane gas and hydrogen sulfide that doesn’t mix with surrounding seawater.

This was discovered using a remotely operated robot. I wonder if more could be found using sonar. The density should show up in sonar scans, I should think. Here’s a video introduction to the pool.

Egypt’s population density. Credit: Wikiwand

On this thread talking about countries sliding into authoritarianism we can add Egypt. Since 2011, Egypt has been subjected to various political perturbations, from the liberation from Mubarak’s rule to that of President Morsi, removed by the military after protests erupted when, according to Wikipedia, …

Liberal and secular groups walked out of the constituent assembly because they believed that it would impose strict Islamic practices, while Muslim Brotherhood backers threw their support behind Morsi. On 22 November 2012, President Morsi issued a temporary declaration immunising his decrees from challenge and seeking to protect the work of the constituent assembly.

Mansour was then installed, then replaced by ex-military leader el-Sisi. It now appears President el-Sisi and Parliament has little respect for civil society, as reported by Amira Mikhail on Lawfare:

In February 2012, following military-led raiding of several NGOs, judges convicted 43 nonprofit staff and sentenced them to between one and five years in prison. The crimes? Operating without a license and receiving foreign funds. This was the first phase of the “Foreign Funding” Case. In July 2014, the Ministry of Social Solidarity issued an ultimatum to all Egyptian and international nonprofits, ordering them to comply with the 2002 law within 45 days or face dissolution and possible criminal convictions or penalties. By September 2015, 500 nonprofits were closed down by the Ministry.

Even more concerning for the civil society, the government had been concocting a new NGO law that has been widely criticized for retaining all of the problematic provisions of Law 84 of 2002 and also giving the government veto power over nonprofits. With a court order obtained (under what showing is unclear and probably doesn’t matter anyway since the judiciary is not free to act independent of the state), the government would have the ability to close down organizations that it deems to be harmful to national security. The draft also gives the government the ability to monitor and interfere in a nonprofit’s internal governance and restrict its access to funding.

And it was “rubber stamped” by Parliament. Amira’s conclusion?

The repression of Egypt’s civil society is a big problem. Many of these organizations are the reason there is any reliable information about the real state of affairs in Egypt. A lot of what we know about the prolific use of torture, overcrowded prisons, extrajudicial killings, sectarian violence, police brutality, poverty, and the plight of street children is because of these nonprofits (and of course, what’s left of independent journalism in Egypt). It’s not like Egypt’s official mouthpieces would compensate for their loss; its stance has consistently been that “Egypt’s human rights should not have a western approach” or other vague statements denying widespread and systematic violations.

If Egypt’s version of human rights abided by the country’s own criminal procedure laws, its constitution, and its international legal obligations, many critics would not be quietly shaking their heads in dismay at the unabashed lies of the Egyptian government. But those lies are coming at a cost, which thousands of Egyptians—and even some Americans—are paying in hundreds of days in prison, and worse.

Is the motivation to stop communications that paints Egypt in a bad light? It seems to me that these communications motivate aid, and that helps Egypt. Perhaps they don’t realize that. Or perhaps it has something to do with the apparently murderous Muslim Brotherhood, although I’m not sure I can make a plausible case for it.

Any idea on what these might be? Send your guesses to me in mail, using the link to the right, or huewhite.umb@gmail.com.

Laura Spinney in NewScientist (15 October 2016, paywall) reports on an effort to encode and process history. It’s named Seshat, for the old Egyptian god of wisdom:

Why was the New Kingdom so advanced, and what triggered its downfall? There is no shortage of theories, and each has its champions. This is the way history tends to work: theories are put forward, their strengths and weaknesses are discussed, and then they line up alongside all the alternative ideas. Like old sailors, they never really die. A new project called Seshat, after the ancient Egyptian goddess of knowledge, aims to change that.

Seshat is a vast and growing database of historical and archaeological knowledge that can be explored using scientific techniques. That makes it a powerful tool for testing and ultimately discarding hypotheses. “A cemetery for theories,” is how Seshat co-founder Peter Turchin at the University of Connecticut in Storrs describes it. By making history more evidence-based, he and his colleagues hope it will become more relevant. They believe that understanding the forces that have shaped human societies in the past will give us more power to predict the future – and perhaps even to direct it by advising politicians and lawmakers on how to avoid the pitfalls of the past.

I find that last line particularly interesting, because it’s another step along the way to specialization. They’re trying to remove any requirement that politicians have training in history, and replace it with simple advice. I have mixed feelings on this, since experts are more likely to get it right – while this would seem to be a core competency for a politician.

Which may, in fact, be one of the silliest statements I’ve ever made.

But I can’t help but remark on some of the best politicians, such as Churchill, had an active interest in history; while today, some of the worst seem motivated only by ideology and not by any well-grounded view of history. Oh, they may think their historical knowledge is excellent – but is it? My experience is that it’s often skewed. I particularly beware of auto-didacts, who tend to have strong, wrong opinions.

From the Seshat web site:

We believe that our approach is the best way to provide meaningful answers to some of the most important questions about the human experience – how and under what circumstances does prosocial behavior evolve in large societies? What roles do religion and ritual activities play in group cohesion and cultural development? What is the impact of climatic and the environmental factors in societal advance? What mechanisms translate economic growth into quality of life improvements for the average person?

Of course, “facts” can be open to dispute. Spinney explains:

The unit of information is a “fact”, which can take the form of a binary choice (presence/absence of writing, for example), a numerical value, or a range of values. Each fact is based on the consensus of specialist historians who meet periodically at workshops, first to decide which variables to consider, and then to validate the facts collected. Facts can be accompanied by text that expresses uncertainty or controversy and, critically, provides sources. The data spans 10,000 years from the dawn of agriculture to the eve of the modern era in 1900.

A fascinating foray into an area not easily modeled mathematically.

There’s no shortage of ridiculous claims the world over. Here’s a recent one from Turkey, as reported by Pinar Tremblay inAL Monitor:

Al-Monitor reported in June that Islamist groups in Turkey have intensified their efforts around the Hagia Sophia. Today, the urging to open it as a mosque and for Erdogan to lead Friday prayers there has reached fever pitch. For proponents of the change, the Hagia Sophia as a museum symbolizes Turkey in chains; for independence to be complete, it must become a functioning mosque. A group called “Free Hagia Sophia” tweeted after the July 15 coup attempt, quoting a prominent religious scholar, “If we turn Hagia Sophia back into a mosque, all Turkey’s hard times and troubles will end.”

The Hagia Sophia is a former Greek Orthodox Church and Imperial Mosque, but now a museum. Precisely how returning it to its former status as a imperial mosque will end the hard times of Turkey is not entirely clear; it might be better understood that, rather than Turkey, the hard times for Muslims in Turkey will end. In other words, if Islam is not the pinnacle of political power in Turkey, if Turkey is still perceived as a secular nation, then Islam is suffering.

Thus religion as a vehicle for political ambition. And, by shifting away from the secular ladder of power to the religious ladder of power, the person whose qualifications are in the religious realm gains over those with secular qualifications. Not that I’m deluded to believe the latter is always more appropriate – politics can do strange things – but a religious qualification is, strictly speaking, never useful except for evaluating candidates for loyalty. I do not care if someone worships the Flying Spaghetti Monster when he’s flying a fighter jet – they’d better have the technical qualifications or that jet’s going to end up as a smoking heap of junk.

And the Hagia Sophia was an imperial mosque, denoting not only its official governmental function, but a certain military aggressiveness. So much for Turkey’s NATO ambitions…

MPR reports on the rising insurance rates:

Insurers have seen short-time policy holders drop their coverage and stop paying premiums after completing expensive medical treatments, said Schowalter, a former Minnesota budget commissioner.

Which defeats the purpose of insurance — which is to pool the resources and pay the costs of those who incur them from the group. But I suppose those doing that think they’re being smart; it might not hurt to announce that those folks will be remembered and placed in more expensive plans in the future. Even if they don’t actually follow through.

He also said there is evidence people in government health coverage are being steered into the private insurance market because their providers will get paid more that way. “That’s a serious concern that state regulators have been looking at as well as federal regulators.

This is opaque to me.

Since 2014, two carriers have pulled out of Minnesota’s individual market after suffering heavy losses. Those that remain have average premium hikes ranging from 50 to 67 percent, depending on the carrier. Most have limited the number of people they’ll cover.

Limiting the number of people they’ll cover … given how insurance works, either I don’t understand something or that’s madness.

Minnesota insurers underpriced their products initially to capture a bigger share of the individual market Wagner said. But since the federal Affordable Care Act changes took effect in 2014 they’ve collectively lost hundreds of millions of dollars on individual and family coverage.

So where does this money go? MPR’s expert, health economist Jean Abraham, closes the report with a warning:

The last drabs we found on Iglehart…

A reader comments on the ongoing ACA problems:

While I’m not among those that want to throw the ACA out completely, I still believe the health care _insurance_ system is completely broken.

All these $100/month people?! In what imaginary place is that? The first year (last year) I was on non-employer sponsored coverage, it was about $800/month. This year, it was over $1000/month. Next year, it will be $16000/month. That’s a 25% increase over last year to this year and a 60% increase from this year to next. And this is Minnesota.

And this is for a plan that has not paid any money yet, despite surgery and many thousands of dollars in bills, because the deductible is so high. If next year goes like this year, I will pay $20,000 for the privilege of being insured, and the only “benefit” I will get is “discounted” bills from the doctors but bills I have to pay nonetheless. At this rate, I will go broke before I can qualify for Medicare. Medicare, which if I can make it that long, may be the only chance I have of saving my financial health.

I’ve read that for most people in the America these days that life is a one strike and you’re out game — i.e. one health care disaster and you’re homeless.

So it’s not ACA that’s really broken, but rather a question of why rates continue to rise.

A reader sent this video on how a Diebold voting machine can be manipulated.

Technically, it’s not much – but the reaction of the one lady is quite affecting.

navajo on The Daily Kos continues his (?) her coverage of the pipeline dispute at Standing Rock:

A large grassfire was started last night, October 29-30, around midnight west of the main Oceti Sakowin Camp on a nearby hill. The startled Water Protectors were calmed by forest firefighters in the camp who quickly assessed that the fire would burn itself out. Video shows the fire was deliberately set as a long-range camera shows numerous dollops of new fires being started on the outskirts of the fire.

So warfare against American Indians continues for those who worship at the idol of money.

The Vincent Price vehicle War-Gods of the Deep (1965, aka City Under the Sea) is, at its heart, about a chicken. Not a rooster, but an everyday chicken named Herbert, who is the pet of a mediocre artist. Set in perhaps the late 19th century or early 20th, we see the artist kidnapped while searching for a missing woman, and in its sudden effect on the chicken, we see how impulsive actions most often lead to deleterious effects.

But Herbert keeps her chin up, and in so doing inspires the artist, a naturally retiring, even timid, man into the rescue of the aforementioned missing woman. Despite the great mass of water above the caverns in which the chicken finds herself, and the great volcano that is threatening this underground city and its inhabitants, the occasional appearance of her head poking from her picnic basket permits her to lead the two men, who find themselves in a predicament of an imminent volcano on one side, and the threats of a smoothly mad Captain (Price) on the other, out of danger.

How can we tell the Captain’s mad? Having found his way down to the caverns 100 years ago, the atmosphere has subtly changed him and his men, so that now he’s immune to aging – but can no longer return to the surface, where he left his wife. All that is a subtle hint, but we know madness, smooth and subtle, has descended upon him when he learns there’s a chicken within his reach – one he could eat, after more than a lifetime of fish.

And he makes no move to confiscate and fricassee our heroic chicken.

Desperate to save his city, the Captain has been using another race of beings (oh, it’s logical, really, it’s logical) to steal books on tectonics, hoping to snuff the volcano, and in one book he discovers the artist’s sketch of the woman – she’s a dead ringer for the Captain’s dead wife (it’s all so apropos). Thus, he has kidnapped the woman.

Under the steady encouragement of Herbert the chicken, the artist leads the rescue of the woman, and then, as the volcano hiccups, they make a break for the surface. The path is via the sea, and our human protagonists must wear ornate diving costumes worthy of the Nautilus.  For a moment, my Arts Editor and I wondered: was this when we would see our heroic hen, Herbert, sacrifice herself for the greater good? We saw no dive costume fit for a chicken!

But, no, for it turns out Herbert likes hands-on management, and shares the diving helmet of the artist. And so Herbert helps throughout the confusing battles between the escapees, the other race of men, and the immortals armed with dart guns. The jiggling of the camera and the anonymous costumes left us considerably bewildered as to who might be winning in this epic battle.

Then our protagonists return to the city (ummm?) in time for a showdown with the Captain; however, it is spoilt as the volcano, ever the screen-hog, intervenes with tremors galore, rendering most of the Captain’s men (those he hasn’t executed out of hand) hors de combat. Herbert’s very life is imperiled, but at the last moment all is risked to save her neck, and then we get a bonus: at this juncture we reach the climax of the movie: the Captain is groped in a truly Trumpian manner, as the giant hand of a stone statue falls and imprisons him.

Once again, there’s a lumbering exit from the city via the sea, another encounter with underwater warriors, with more definitive results, and a final pull from the grasping ocean. Meanwhile, the Captain meets his final fate (one would think a Trumpian goose would be enough).  As he sees the sun for the last time, he withers with age and dies.

No doubt, Herbert lobbied to take a victorious peck at the Captain, but the director gave Price the dignity of his character’s death. Meanwhile, the volcano finally achieves climax in a wonderful gasp of fire and clouds; perhaps, we may hope, a new island is to be born, fit to become … a chicken sanctuary.

And if you think this review is a recommendation to see this movie, go back and read it again.

Igor does photography.

Really cool photography.

But I hope it doesn’t end up in my dreams.

More here.

(h/t Treehugger.com)

David Akadjian on The Daily Kos gets into the raising of individual rates under ACA:

1. Experts warned the states that if they didn’t expand Medicaid coverage, customers could see higher premiums. 

Why? Because hospitals tend to shift the costs of emergency room care to private insurers. In Nebraska in 2014, for example, hospitals provided uncompensated care to 54,000 people who would have qualified for coverage under Medicaid expansion.

Adrian Sanchez, a spokeman for the Nebraska Hospital Association, said:

As a result of Nebraska’s failure to expand Medicaid, insured Nebraskans are likely to see an increase in health insurance premiums as they continue to cover the uncompensated healthcare costs of the uninsured.

The Indiana Hospital Association similarly released a report saying individuals would see premiums drop by $241 and families by $691 if Indiana expanded Medicaid and extended coverage to 400,000 residents under the ACA.

States that refused to expand Medicaid are almost all Republican-led states.

And there’s lots more, in typical Daily Kos fashion. However, it’s worth noting that Minnesota has one of the highest rate jumps in the nation, and did already expand Medicaid as recommended; Arizona falls into the same category. The other two states in the category of highest jump in rates are Oklahoma and Tennessee, neither of which have expanded Medicaid.

While the frantic rhetoric of the GOP is unsurprising, given their unswerving antipathy, I have to wonder if there’s a more subtle influence at work as well: the instant gratification generation (a phrase I made up 20+ years ago when the fencing coach suggested it would take time and work to become a good fencer). After several years of rather good progress, the ACA has hit a bump. Perhaps we’ve lost our capacity for following long term plans. Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton (D) voices intemperate thoughts concerning the ACA and turns it into a crisis.

It’s not. As Mr. Akadjian notes,

3. Nearly 8 in 10 people enrolled through the Obamacare marketplace can find a plan for less than $100 a month after tax credits. 

77 percent of people looking for plans in the marketplace can find a plan for less than $100/month with subsidies. More than 7 in 10 (72 percent) can find a plan for $75/month or less.

Atlas V 401 launch of Cygnus OA-4. Photo Credit: ULA

Historic high rates of insured citizens and a bend in the healthcare cost curve. These are achievements that many writers such as Jonathan Chait can document better than I. As an engineer, you don’t throw out the Atlas V rocket just because it’s sprung a leak. You evaluate the problem and fix it.

And ignore the hysterics who want to throw you into the lake for offending the sky gods.

In this long running thread, Kansas is getting ready to vote on retaining its current Supreme Court, and The Topeka Capital-Journal reports on how the polls are setting for them:

With a little more than a week left before the election, campaigns to retain and to oust the justices are in full swing. Advocates of retention point out that no justice has been nonretained in the decades Kansas’ retention system has been in place. Opponents of retention voice anger over rulings in death penalty, education and other cases — while most also say they want to keep Stegall [most recently appointee, appointed by Gov. Brownback].

The court is also considering a case that involves deciding whether the Kansas Constitution provides the right to an abortion.

“Kansas voters have the right to remove elected officials and have even more responsibility to oust judges who legislate from the bench,” the anti-abortion group Kansans for Life says on its anti-retention website.

Meanwhile, supporters of the justices argue voters need to push back against what they view as efforts to politicize the court by Brownback and the Republican-dominated Legislature. Legislation to begin the process of changing the way justices are selected failed earlier this year.

“Gov. Brownback has tried to remake the court by changing the rules about how justices are selected. The Legislature has targeted the court with new laws and budget cuts that threaten Kansans’ access to justice. The politicians in Topeka want to control our Supreme Court,” Ryan Wright, with the group Kansans for Fair Courts, said in an email.

I see the same old slogans are in place – i.e., blame the judges, not the law. I suppose it’s a way to cover up the fact that, even with control of all branches of government, the anti-abortionists still can’t get satisfaction. Now, maybe it’s just a Constitutional problem – but maybe the GOP is just using them to get elected.

Or maybe they’re just too extreme.

A small sampling of only the interesting views, starting with something slightly …. you know ….

On Empirical SCOTUS, Adam Feldman examines the data for SCOTUS performance when a number other than nine has been the counting of the justices. His conclusion?

There is a lot of data to digest from this post.  What are the key takeaways?

• There have been thousands of cases where other than nine justices voted and the Court still was able to come to decisions on the merits.
• These cases were heard during years where the Court’s size was set to nine-members as well as when the Court was structured with other numbers of justices (these Courts have been composed of ten to one justice(s)).
• A relatively small portion of the cases with decisions from other than nine justices ended in equally divided Courts.
• The percentage of cases decided by equally divided Courts increased significantly in the 20^th century although it has diminished in the last several Court eras.

Basically there appears to be nothing inherently wrong with the notion of a Court of a different size than nine.  It should continue to function as Courts with an even number of members have historically come to decisions as well.  Importantly though, when the number of justices on the Court has been set to any number other than nine, this decision was made by Congress through legislation.  The hold out on hearings for the Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland, is unprecedented and there are political processes in place that could achieve the same outcome of an eight-member Court.  Thus there are data to back up the proposition that the Court will not fail with other than nine-members.  There are more politically credible ways to achieve alternative Courts sizes though than merely suppressing the Senate vote.

In his earlier essay, he describes how a polarized court with an odd number of justices can leave decision-making in the hands of one man:

In fact, it is Justice Kennedy’s vote that has often dictated whether the conservative or liberal position wins out in close cases. This places the power to define the direction of Supreme Court precedent in Justice Kennedy’s hands, especially in some of the most significant and contentious cases.

The problem that the Court faces with nine Justices is similar to the problem it faces with eight Justices, although the effects are different. When Justice Scalia was still a member of the Court, four Justices tended to vote in the liberal direction (Justices Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan) and four tended to vote in the conservative direction (Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Thomas, and Alito). This created a vacuum of power for the swing Justice, Justice Kennedy, to usurp, causing his vote to often be decisive.

Justice Kennedy’s ability to shape the Court’s opinions is further accentuated by the number of majority opinions he wrote in 5-4 cases compared to all other Justices during this period. Majority opinion assignment in close cases can be offered in exchange for a vote in a certain direction.

Is that a monster at my breast, or am I just nursing?

Having just finished viewing Voodoo Island (1957) with Boris Karloff and Elisha Cook, Jr., I am forced to the unpalatable position of finding that the theme of the movie is that one should abandon rationality and surrender oneself to the mystical forces behind Voodoo. A man is examined by a noted scientist and doctor, Phillip Knight (Karloff). He betrays no organic disease, but is unresponsive. He and three others had been dispatched to an island to survey it for a tropical island; he is the only one who returned, found on an island 50 miles away from the target.

Knight proposes they visit the island in hopes of discovering the source of the man’s problem. After an obstacle-ridden flight, they finally arrive at the nearest island with a landingstrip, and embark on a boat for the final leg. Despite mechanical problems, the island is attained. Various adventures occur as members of the party are picked off by carnivorous plants, voodoo, and perhaps other things – I sorta lost focus part way through.

Eventually, taken captive, the primacy of the voodoo is demonstrated for Knight, who, faced with his error, immediately acknowledges it and makes full confession to the native chief, upon which the survivors are released.

Good acting and dialog couldn’t cover for a story that never quite finds a focus. While the opening scene had my Arts Editor and I initially fooled (and pleased at being fooled), the carnivorous plants were mostly laughable – it would have been better to just hint at them, make us wonder. I hoped the initial scene would set a theme to follow, but no, the director didn’t go that direction, at least with anything notable. And the characters were never really setup properly, so it was hard to feel sympathy for each one at they met their fates. Perhaps they shook hands with their fates – it seems like the polite thing to do.

Really mediocre, so not recommended (unless you’re an Adam West completist – bonus, he doesn’t get a credit, so you have to guess!).

A moss on a wall consumed my camera’s interest… I’m awaiting identification of it on iNaturalist.

If you’re tired of the usual voices lamenting or championing the Clinton email incident, Jack Goldsmith and Benjamin Wittes of Lawfare offer an extended analysis of FBI Director Comey’s actions from the perspective of professionals working in the national security arena.

5) Why did [Comey publicly announce his recommendation], and was he justified in doing it?

Comey answered this question in part in his press conference. He stated at the outset that Justice Department and the rest of the government “do not know what I am about to say.” And he later explained: “In this case, given the importance of the matter, I think unusual transparency is in order.”

There were surely other reasons for Comey’s “unusual transparency” that he did not mention. Primarily, the public perceptions that the independent judgment of Comey’s superiors, the President and the Attorney General, was tainted on the matter.

In October 2015, President Obama stated that Clinton’s personal email server “is not a situation in which America’s national security was endangered,” and the following April, a few months before Comey’s press conference, Obama said of the Clinton email controversy that Clinton “would never intentionally put America in any kind of jeopardy.” Both of these statements gave the appearance to many observers that the President had prejudged legally relevant aspects of the investigation. And, of course, Clinton is also the nominee of the President’s own party.

To make matters worse, Attorney General Lynch was compromised not just by these statements by the President, but much more so by Bill Clinton’s controversial private visit on her airplane on the Phoenix tarmac; by the Clinton camp floating the possibility, a few weeks before Comey’s press conference, that she would consider keeping Lynch as her Attorney General; and by Lynch’s own unclear statements the weekend before Comey’s press conference about her role in the final decision to prosecute.

In short, Comey’s superiors were compromised in a fashion that threatened to taint the investigative conclusions, including his independent recommendation not to prosecute. This taint around the Clinton investigation was the original set of factors that hemmed Comey in from the beginning.

In this highly unusual circumstance—a circumstance made more unusual by the fact that the central focus of the investigation was the Democratic nominee for the presidency—we believe Comey was justified in announcing his recommendation and reasons for non-prosecution in public. Comey’s unusual action was the least bad option he had for preserving the integrity and independence of his investigation and recommendation.

In other words, if you want a black & white judgment on Comey, Clinton, or for that matter, Trump – you won’t get it in this article. But you will get an up close and personal view of Comey’s actions and why his hand may have been forced. But they do make the following important remark:

… if there is more that Comey can say, he should probably do so—even at the risk of sliding further down the slippery slope he is on. Specifically, assuming the following statements are true, it would be worth Comey’s saying them publicly:

• The FBI has come into possession of a large trove of additional emails that have to be reviewed. To say that something has to be reviewed does not mean it contains anything implicating anyone of anything. It means only that the material has to be reviewed.
• As I stated in my original letter, the reason I sent the letter was to inform Congress of a development that required me to revise my statement to Congress about the investigation’s being complete.
• Nobody should draw any conclusions about anyone’s conduct based on the fact that the FBI is reviewing these emails.
• Nobody should draw the conclusion that anyone sent or received additional classified material or that any material undermines the FBI’s prior investigative conclusions based on the fact that the FBI is reviewing these emails.
• The fact that the FBI is reviewing new emails means only that the FBI is reviewing new emails, nothing more.

Unfortunately, at this point in time it would be well for the FBI to reach a speedy conclusion.

On Lawfare Clint Watts, in arguing for a re-evaluation of our counter-terrorism alliances, gives examples of the occasional contradiction:

Moreover, the cross-cutting, ad hoc development of counterterrorism alliances have put America at odds with other state partners while simultaneously confirming the grievances of terrorists. The current U.S. fight against the Islamic State provides a prime example. The U.S. decision to lead the fight against the Sunni Arab Islamic State has resulted in a) support to an Iraqi Army backed by Iran with whom the U.S. conducts nuclear negotiations that agitate Sunni partners; b) partnering with Kurdish forces while simultaneously allying with their enemy, Turkey, for airbases; c) working with Saudi Arabia while they pursue a sectarian conflict against Yemen’s Iranian-backed Houthis and inflame sectarianism throughout the Middle East; and d) negotiating, partnering and then breaking off cooperation with Russia while they undertake airstrikes on Syrian civilians. Aside from the contradictory implications in fighting the Islamic State, the U.S. counterterrorism approach has established enduring alliances with nations that have also been sources of terrorism – namely Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt. These three so-called essential partners in America’s counterterrorism operations, it could be argued, also represent the three largest fountains of jihadi terrorism over the past thirty years.

What does Clint suggest be done?

In the near term, problematic counterterrorism partners like Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia should be put on notice – assistance is no longer unconditional. Dr. Dafna H. Rand and Dr. Stephen Tankel’s recommendations in their report, “Security Cooperation & Assistance: Rethinking The Return On Investment,” provide essential guidance for U.S. counterterrorism alliances beyond 2016. They note that, “clearly identifying the goals of a particular security assistance and cooperation initiative, the time frame for achieving them, and agreed-upon metrics and methods for evaluating outcomes is essential in support of broader national security policy.” Beyond prioritizing objectives, U.S. counterterrorism efforts should understand the tradeoffs with partnerships, establish leverage in these relationships, and identify and apply foreign aid and military assistance under spelled out conditions. If counterterrorism partners cross-specified thresholds, say by committing human rights violations or oppressing minorities in pursuit of terrorists, then alliances should be ended.

There is a hint of interference in the internal affairs of other countries, but while some think it’s entirely reasonable to promulgate a rule against such activities, in truth I think it’s on a case by case basis. In fact, I think a more experienced commentator might be able to make the argument that the internal actions of some country will eventually reflect in its external actions, so if internally they’re involved in some activity detrimental to our interests, or to people to which we have some sympathy, then we might consider whether, in a few years, that activity might translate into some external activity that directly impacts our interests.

Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight comments on the race as of today – and how the email scandal may be impacting the polls. It all seems to hinge on North Carolina:

Florida is a well-polled state, and Clinton remains slightly ahead in the polling average there, with a lead of about 1 percentage point overall in our forecast. But Florida is now somewhat less likely to jump its position in the queue and save Clinton if she has last-minute problems elsewhere on the map, such as in Pennsylvania or Michigan. By contrast, two new polls of North Carolina showed Clinton with leads of 3 and 6 points, a problem for Trump given that Clinton has a substantial lead based on early voting in the state. …

OK, this is getting far into the weeds. Obviously, Trump doesn’t have an easy path forward if he loses North Carolina. The point is really just this: Despite the recent tightening, Clinton has a fairly significant lead in the polls of about 5 percentage points. So in order to win, Trump needs a further shift because of Comey or some other news — or he needs the polls to have been off the mark to begin with. In the event of a last-minute shift or a significant polling error, the order of the swing states could easily be scrambled, such that Clinton wins North Carolina while losing Pennsylvania or Michigan, for example. With the race in a somewhat dynamic state as we enter the final full week of the campaign, we encourage you to think broadly about how the Electoral College might play out instead of fixating on just a few scenarios.

Obviously, early voting is having an impact on campaign strategies. Early voters can retract their votes, but that requires additional effort, so if you have an ‘October surprise’ up your sleeve – when do you let it loose? To impact the early voters so they don’t have to retract their votes? But if your surprise doesn’t have staying power, then that may be a failed strategy. Two October surprises? That can be hard to find – or fake up.

A reader provides a correction concerning St. Paul and the Broken Bones:

Cool band, but they aren’t local, they’re from Birmingham, Alabama.

Oops. Quite right.