Actual sunrise time: 5:49.
Saturday, May 2, 2020
The pro-Biden talking point was the NYT did an investigation and found the Tara Reade allegations to be false.
So it's especially inconvenient that The Editorial Board of the New York Times is saying "Investigate Tara Reade’s Allegations/Americans deserve to know more about a sexual assault accusation against the likely Democratic Party nominee."
IN THE COMMENTS: The Editorial Board speaks of "an unbiased, apolitical panel, put together by the D.N.C. and chosen to foster as much trust in its findings as possible," which prompted Roger Sweeny to say: "'Unbiased, apolitical panel' and put together by a political party do not go together."
But, you know, it makes sense to me. Who can believe in such a thing as "an unbiased, apolitical panel" in the first place? They don't arrive from Planet Neutralia. Are you going to find a neutral panel to appoint the neutral panel? Where do you start?! The Editorial Board puts the burden to pick the panel on a political entity with a huge political stake, and sets it up for our political judgement by announcing the standard that must be met: It's supposed to be "an unbiased, apolitical panel... chosen to foster as much trust in its findings as possible." Why would the DNC meet that standard? The reason is stated right there, and it's a political reason: the interest in getting us to trust the outcome.
Now, I wonder who could be chosen who could perform the task. We're told that the Biden archive at the University of Delaware arrived in the form of "nearly 2,000 boxes and more than 400 gigabytes of data" and that "most of it has not been cataloged." The Reade incident is alleged to have occurred in 1993: Was that the gigabytes era or the paper-in-boxes era? Who are the hyper-trustworthy, unbiased and apolitical investigators who can and will handle a project like that and do it quickly enough to work on the election time line? That's the problem I see. How is the DNC supposed to find people like that?!
ADDED: To state the problem is to see the real solution. This "unbiased, apolitical panel" — if anything like it could be convened — cannot get a creditable search done within a satisfying time line. Therefore: Biden needs to withdraw.
Last year, this board advocated strongly for a vigorous inquiry into accusations of sexual misconduct raised against Brett Kavanaugh when he was nominated to a seat on the Supreme Court. Mr. Biden’s pursuit of the presidency requires no less. His campaign, and his party, have a duty to assure the public that the accusations are being taken seriously. The Democratic National Committee should move to investigate the matter swiftly and thoroughly, with the full cooperation of the Biden campaign....There's no mention in the editorial of the way the NYT was used by so many Biden supporters, who claimed that the NYT had done an investigation and absolved Biden.
In his statement, Mr. Biden said that if such a document existed, there would be a copy of it in the National Archives, which retains records from what was then the Office of Fair Employment Practices... Later on Friday, after the National Archives said it did not have personnel documents....
Any serious inquiry must include the trove of records from Mr. Biden’s Senate career that he donated to the University of Delaware in 2012..... Any inventory should be strictly limited to information about Ms. Reade and conducted by an unbiased, apolitical panel, put together by the D.N.C. and chosen to foster as much trust in its findings as possible.... No relevant memo should be left unexamined....
IN THE COMMENTS: The Editorial Board speaks of "an unbiased, apolitical panel, put together by the D.N.C. and chosen to foster as much trust in its findings as possible," which prompted Roger Sweeny to say: "'Unbiased, apolitical panel' and put together by a political party do not go together."
But, you know, it makes sense to me. Who can believe in such a thing as "an unbiased, apolitical panel" in the first place? They don't arrive from Planet Neutralia. Are you going to find a neutral panel to appoint the neutral panel? Where do you start?! The Editorial Board puts the burden to pick the panel on a political entity with a huge political stake, and sets it up for our political judgement by announcing the standard that must be met: It's supposed to be "an unbiased, apolitical panel... chosen to foster as much trust in its findings as possible." Why would the DNC meet that standard? The reason is stated right there, and it's a political reason: the interest in getting us to trust the outcome.
Now, I wonder who could be chosen who could perform the task. We're told that the Biden archive at the University of Delaware arrived in the form of "nearly 2,000 boxes and more than 400 gigabytes of data" and that "most of it has not been cataloged." The Reade incident is alleged to have occurred in 1993: Was that the gigabytes era or the paper-in-boxes era? Who are the hyper-trustworthy, unbiased and apolitical investigators who can and will handle a project like that and do it quickly enough to work on the election time line? That's the problem I see. How is the DNC supposed to find people like that?!
ADDED: To state the problem is to see the real solution. This "unbiased, apolitical panel" — if anything like it could be convened — cannot get a creditable search done within a satisfying time line. Therefore: Biden needs to withdraw.
"I've never seen a beautiful lady reading The Guide... so far away from the TV... you must really like television...."
Goodbye to the actor Sam Lloyd, who has died at the age of 56.
Lloyd is best remembered for his portrayal of lawyer Ted Buckland on the comedy-drama series Scrubs and the sitcom Cougar Town. He and his uncle [Christopher Lloyd] both guest starred on Malcolm in the Middle, Lloyd as a housing lawyer and his uncle as Hal's father. The two also guested on The West Wing, Lloyd requesting the White House to release information about UFOs and his uncle as a constitutional law expert... Aside from acting, Lloyd was an accomplished singer with the a cappella group The Blanks, who made many appearances on Scrubs under the name "The Worthless Peons" (also known as "Ted's Band"). He also played the bass guitar in a Beatles tribute group called the Butties; although right-handed, he learned to play bass left-handed like Beatles bassist Paul McCartney to maintain authenticity."This is my band. We're all working from different departments in the hospital":
"I recognize this request is unusual and constitutes a drastic measure, and the emergency powers set out under the Riot Control Act should be invoked sparingly.
"However, the COVID-19 outbreak in the city of Gallup is a crisis of the highest order. Immediate action is necessary," wrote Mayor Louis Bonaguidi, quoted in "Roads closed into New Mexico city to mitigate 'uninhibited spread of Covid-19'" (CNN).
Under the Riot Control Act, anyone who fails to comply with restrictions imposed under the act is guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction of a second or subsequent offense is guilty of a fourth-degree felony....I was only familiar with Gallup, New Mexico from the song "(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66" — "You see Amarillo/Gallup, New Mexico/Flagstaff, Arizona/Don't forget Winona..." — but I'm reading about it now. Wikipedia:
"The spread of this virus in McKinley County is frightful," Lujan Grisham said. "And it shows that physical distancing has not occurred and is not occurring. The virus is running amok there. It must be stopped, and stricter measures are necessary."
Gallup (Navajo: Naʼnízhoozhí /nɑ̀ʔnɪ́ʒòːʒɪ́/; Zuni: Kalabwakin) is a city in McKinley County, New Mexico, United States, with a population of 21,678 as of the 2010 census. A substantial percentage of its population is Native American, with residents from the Navajo, Hopi, and Zuni tribes. Gallup is the county seat of McKinley County and the most populous city between Flagstaff and Albuquerque, along the historic U.S. Route 66.
The city was founded in 1881 as a railhead for the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad, and named after David Gallup, a paymaster for the railroad. It is on the Trails of the Ancients Byway, one of the designated New Mexico Scenic Byways. Because of the nearby rugged terrain, it was a popular location in the 1940s and 1950s for Hollywood Westerns....
Gallup is known as the "Heart of Indian Country" or "The Heart of Indians" because it is on the edge of the Navajo reservation and is home to members of many other tribes as well.
Friday, May 1, 2020
The sunrise brings the glassy calm surface of the lake to life.
At 5:46, the surface of the lake was like a mirror...
At 5:50 — the "actual" sunrise time — the lake began to stir...
One minute later — at 5:51 — there were long swooping waves, criss-crossed with tiny ripples...
In half a minute, as the sun peeked over the line, the effect was distinctly more dramatic...
And at 5:53, it looked like this...
At 5:50 — the "actual" sunrise time — the lake began to stir...
One minute later — at 5:51 — there were long swooping waves, criss-crossed with tiny ripples...
In half a minute, as the sun peeked over the line, the effect was distinctly more dramatic...
And at 5:53, it looked like this...
"Rose Byrne’s Gloria Steinem comes off as a vacillating, shallow, vain egomaniac; Tracey Ullman’s Betty Friedan strongly suggests that her feminist anger..."
"... came out of crushed romantic dreams; Bella Abzug is only slightly more appealing — but largely because her pragmatism seems so sane in comparison with the antics of her fellows.... And what the series gets so right about left-wing identitarianism is how riddled it often is with jealousy, personal rivalry, and internal spats... The intersection, if you’ll forgive my using that word, of glamour and elite left-wing politics is pretty damning of both. The feminists completely underestimated Schlafly, because their vain self-regard could not believe that any serious pushback against the ERA could be rooted in real arguments about the difference between the sexes rather than their interchangeability.... Schlafly’s version of feminism is, in fact, less a reactionary one than a truly prescient one. She was the first feminist (though she would reject that label) to depict traditional home and family life as something not to be despised, as long as women had the choice to abandon it.... This is the first time I’ve seen a conservative woman portrayed as human, complicated, vulnerable, and also extraordinarily courageous."
Andrew Sullivan praises the Hulu movie-biography of Phyllis Schlafly (in NY Magazine).
Here's the trailer (with Cate Blanchett in the starring role):
Andrew Sullivan praises the Hulu movie-biography of Phyllis Schlafly (in NY Magazine).
Here's the trailer (with Cate Blanchett in the starring role):
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