sessio plebis

Significantly, the Friday before the US Presidents’ Day holiday weekend (read more about that contentious and politically-loaded apostrophe here) organisers all across the country and beyond are calling for a general strike, during which no work is accomplished (though judging from the way that Dear Leader regards his bureaucratic workforce, it shouldn’t matter one way or the other) and that economic activity is driven to a stand-still. This is primarily an organic movement and we’ll see how it’s pulled off and how it’s received, but there are five common demands: disclose and divest, women’s reproductive rights and health globally, respect for the environment and accords already party to, the preservation of universal health care, and freedom of movement for all. One has to choose one’s battles carefully and we don’t all have the means to be insufferably galling or petulantly dashing off to the next catastrophe and have the audacity to call that victory, but we can all walk that picket-line in our own ways.

oldthinkers unbellyfeel ingsoc

The latest scuttlebug suggests that as tribute, a belated congratulatory gift—that I’m sure exceeds the threshold for value on what gifts can be accepted from foreign powers according to US ethics code but no one cares about that—the Russian government may turn over Edward Snowden, the fugitive from justice whom they’ve been harbouring since 2013, to American authorities.
I doubt that Snowden will receive the prodigal hero’s parade he deserves, and all of this to me doesn’t make much since first of all the debt of gratitude is owed to Russia for installing the present regime (read more about the Manchurian Candidate theory here) and not the other way around; Snowden, I don’t think, is not some figurative or literal Trojan Horse—and suspect the headlines, probably pulled from the master propaganda playbook, to be a distraction, a-pace with everything that’s come out of the regime so far, to placate the masses and cast aspersions on detractors and prevent news of real consequence from welling to the surface. What do you think? For their parts, Snowden and the Russian government say there’s no truth to this matter.

ivory tower

Via the always engaging Nag on the Lake, we’re given a glimpse into the surprisingly openly acknowledged—no stuff of urban legend that could be easily disavowed, undisclosed locations, hidden and secret lairs—opening up of what was until recently the exclusive domain of the conservative fringe, the preppers, the survivalists to all and sundry with the means to wait out the apocalypse or at least the temporary collapse of society in luxury.
A far cry from the austere fall-out shelters meant to house great swathes of the population, these are subterranean resorts, either purpose-built or in former military bunkers and missile silos—including all amenities and purport to be self-sustaining. Soberly, some also offer a family DNA vault in case the elite need to be resurrected in the future through cloning after the Earth has healed. Let’s hope and pray that it never gets so bad that the occupants have to live in sequestered resplendence by force and end up regretting spending all that money that could have gone to efforts, especially for those more liberal-minded new-comers to survivalism, to clean up the environment, build community cohesion or even to another representative’s campaign. I am sure that those wailing left-behinds stuck on the surface won’t be able to break in easy and they’ll be killer robot sentries to protect the egress to the compounds, but the fact that real estate agents are taking clients, earning commissions and holding open-house suggests to me that it would not remain impenetrable for long.

terra bella or daily planet

One internet giant known for among other things its pioneering map and route-planning services and satellite telemetry will graciously divest itself of that arm of operations later on this spring.
This company is not doing so, however, without an exit strategy that’s going to propel the start-up venture assuming this role towards a surveying milestone that’s also to be realised within the year: a daily refresh of the entire globe, capturing fifty-trillion-pixel resolution composite image of the Earth’s whole surface updated from one day to the next by a constellation of shoebox-sized satellites. What does it mean to take a global snap-shot casually—something that’s not a unique and profound achievement? We’ve hovered close to that goal of scanning every inch for some time but have been within reach until now and I wonder what new insights this comprehensive picture might bring.

beefcake

Finland became the first country to define its unique national character, treasures, quirks and generally untranslatable customs with its own emoji family, which includes, as Dangerous Minds informs, quite proudly fetish and bondage artist Tom of Finland—plus the baby-in-a-box, the Sàmi people, the kicksled, Finnish fashion and many others, with quite a few relating to sauna culture.

never remember or known unknowns

After citing a terror attack that did not occur in Bowling Green in order to justify the travel and immigration ban, the regime has persisted with the argument and narrative that die Lügenpresse is selectively under-reporting major incidents of terrorism.
Bob Canada’s Blogworld gives us some of the gruesome and chilling statistics from insurgencies that were heretofore subject to a self-imposed media blackout, like the siege on Fort Knox by arch-villain Aurus Goldfinger the horrendous attack on Metropolis by Kryptonian terrorists and fugitives from justice Zod, Ursa and Non. What do you think? There’s a lot of trivial matters—like crowd-size and turn-out, but there’s far more at stake with people’s lives and livelihoods. Credibility is important and none of the characterisations that come out of the regime’s spokes-liars ought to be given a pass.