winner, winner chicken dinner (11. 922)

Calling the sweepstakes a means to “maximise awareness of our petition to support the Constitution,” the world’s richest man and ardent Trump supporter, Elon Musk, has founded a political action committee (PAC) that is awarding a prize of one-million dollars to a random signatory, pledging to upload the US founding document’s first two amendments, freedom of speech and the right to bear arms, each night until the election. Awardees must also live in crucial swing-districts, like Pennsylvania, which may decide an election essentially in a dead-heat between the two candidates, and be registered to vote—potentially in violation of federal voting laws as coercion with a financial incentive—but no one at the townhall seemed too concerned about statue or norms. Musk, whom holds several multibillion dollar contracts with US government agencies, has had an overture from the campaign to take a grace-and-favour within the administration as a sort of cost-cutting tsar under the executive branch.

.io (11. 915)

Since 1968, the UK and US have operated a joint military base, Diego Garcia, on the Chagos Islands—with the official demonym of the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT, also previously known as the Oil Islands)—and Mauritius (which gained independence from the UK the same year after being ceded as a French colony to Britain under the terms of the 1814 Treaty of Paris) has claimed the archipelago as its own, supported by a ruling of the International Court of Justice to end decolonisation. After more than half a century, the UK conceded and in exchange for a ninety-nine year lease on the military base has handed over sovereignty to Mauritius earlier this month. And while a significant move for justice and reconciliation, these developments—not tracked by the tech world—have an equally sizeable impact on the internet with repatriation, we learn via Web Curious. The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, which issues top-level country domains will remove the suffix, IO, not allowing any new registration under that code (like with the governing body for emoji no longer accepting submissions for flags) and begin the process of retiring existing ones: github, twitch, et al. At a time when domain names can be a considerable portion of a country’s economy (see also) and how many have hitched their identity to a particular brand and legacy with an expectation of permanence, it’s pretty consequential—and of course not without protocol and precedent, albeit established in times when the online world did not play such an overwhelming part of our lives, geopolitically or otherwise. Granted less than a year earlier, the Soviet Union .su domain was replaced with .ru with understanding it would eventually be shutdown in 1991—but the former’s transformation into an unpoliced space and refuge of the dark web convinced authorities that regulations needed to be in place and enforced regarding transition and closure. The 1992 dissolution of Yugoslavia was arguably a better managed affair, with the ISO and IANA having learned from their previous experience, with .yu splintering into its successors .me and .rs respectively.

konzentrationslager uckermark (11. 894)

H and I took a hike around the forested trail of the Sidowsee out of Himmelpfort and continued along the path back towards Fürstenberg. 

A sub-camp for forced labour of the Ravensbrück Women‘s detention centre, little remains in terms of remembrance for this concentration camp for young girls and women considered difficult or otherwise delinquent for various infractions and were put to work under very harsh conditions (the overseers, Aufseherinnen, were particularly brutal and subject to the Ravensbrücker Prozess by British authorities for war crimes). Girls as young as sixteen produced components for Siemens & Halske for the war effort, including V2 rocket bombs and intercom systems for submarines, and once they aged out at twenty-one, they were transferred to Ravensbrück. 

The juvenile camp was closed at the beginning of 1945 to convert it to an emergency extermination operation with a gas chamber, with some five-thousand female inmates deemed too sick, uncooperative of having outlived their usefulness for slave labour at fifty-two. Of the estimated one hundred thirty thousand women processed through Ravensbrück, the site conserved and memorialised after being liberated by the Soviets in March of 1945 along with the site at Uckermark, some additional fifty thousand perished due to punishingly austere treatment, starvation rations and medical experimentation. Eighty percent were political prisoners (members of the resistance) from all over Nazi occupied territories with a significant population of Jewish, Sini and Roma women imprisoned only for their heritage. Inmates were forced to wear triangles sewn into their uniforms in order to denote their crime and nationality—often in combination—lesbians, prostitutes, Romani (leveled with the accusation of racial pollution) and those who refused to get married were lumped together and wore black triangles.

synchronoptica

one year ago: Operation Nickel Grass (with synchronoptica)

seven years ago: a visit to Büdingen, assorted links to revisit plus Victorian mosseries

eight years ago: computer-generated music from Alan Turing 

nine years ago: the inspiration for the Flying Dutchman plus automating laundry

ten years ago: the reasoning behind making Brussels the capital of the EU plus Wikipedia as a major

big horn (11. 890)

Reminiscent of the bonkers Nazi plan to produce a quarry worthy of Nazis to hunt by bringing back the extinct aurochs, we learn that a gentleman in the US state of Montana has been sentenced and fined for his efforts to create a giant hybrid sheep though cloning and selective husbandry with Asian sheep as big game. Struggling to find a punishment to fit the crime, the judge settled on a suspended term—for lack of a criminal record—and imposed a hefty remittance to the US Fish and Wildlife Service for the upkeep of the Montana Mountain King, confiscated and in care until it can be transferred to a zoo, to discourage others from meddling with ferrel populations for trophy hunting.

starlight suppression (11. 864)

As part of a fascinating series called “Who is Government?” (see also), Washington Post columnist Dave Eggers confidently asserts that with the next quarter of a century, humanity will have conclusive evidence of extra-terrestrial life, thanks to the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope—giving a thoroughgoing profile of the astronomy pioneer who is the soon to be launched observatory’s name sake—which features a system of tiny pistons designed to occult the light of a host star, a coronagraph that can dynamically deform the reflecting mirror, that will enable with this shadow-casting technique far better imaging of any exoplanets orbiting it—an alternate yet untenable proposal (among other competitors) would be to use our Sun as a telescope through gravitational lensing (see also here and here) but the focal point is three times the distance that Voyager I has travelled. Aside from the answer to the existential question of are we alone, the essay goes on the explore the importance of tax-payer funded science (with dedicated government workers generally maligned) and return on investment in knowledge—projects that billionaires would never finance as there’s no money to be made in such endeavours. Much more at the links above.

second congressional district (11. 861)

Though GOP efforts to change balloting procedures in crucial swing states like Georgia and North Carolina are likely to fail and have no impact on the outcome with laws in place preventing last-minute alterations given that early voting has already started, a pressure campaign in Nebraska could prove pivotal, this state and Maine being the only jurisdictions that don’t allocate electoral college votes by the spoils system where the winner takes them all but by congressional districts. Not splitting the ticket between rural and urban areas, could according to some strategists’ calculations of several scenarios, increase the chances of resulting in an electoral college tie, which sends the vote to the House of Representatives, which by some estimates advantages Trump over Harris. Democrats, for their part with the party in power setting the conditions, would also be be emboldened to change the rules in order to prevent such bald gamesmanship, further eroding confidence in the process.

the sammies (11. 853)

Via tmn, we learn of the awards ceremony hosted by the US Partnership for Public Service that acknowledges the seen and unnoticed efforts by contentious bureaucrats of the federal government, who many are presently reviling as the Deep State. Named for the late benefactor Samel J Heyman, businessman and philanthropist who encouraged recent graduates to pursue a career in government, the gala has been hosted annually during the first week in October in Washington, DC and a selection committee of journalists, politicians, educators and corporate executives nominates individuals in the categories of emerging leaders, citizen services, science and the environment and safety, security and international affairs plus employee of the year out of the pool of the two-and-a-half million who work for America’s largest employer. The awards ceremony is surprising moving and deserving of its monicker as the Oscars of government work.

synchronoptica

one year ago: rotating ramen (with synchronoptica)

seven years ago: a sanctuary of internet freedom, navel-gazing, antique Japanese hoardings, bacterial phages fight tumours plus more unbuilt architecture

eight years ago: more on the pioneers of Information Theory

ten years ago: more on Scottish secession 

eleven years ago: the US debt ceiling

7x7 (11. 838)

the hemicycle: an exhibition on the European Union parliament’s plenary sessions from 1952 to the present—see also here and here 

i’m feeling lucky: to google as a verb losing traction, younger users preferring search—I have to watch my stories 

matrix: a split-screen tool that converts video to ASCII characters—via Web Curios  

buzz-bar: a global roller coaster database—via ibīdem  

we have no idea the ripple effects we will have in this world: the revolutionary Waite-Colman Smith tarot deck—see previously  

palimpsest: multispectral imaging the Voynich Manuscript (previously) might reveal clues about its origins

holiday creep: US government facing another shutdown showdown ahead of the coming fiscal year, reporting earlier than usual

synchronoptica

one year ago:  a Russian-North Korean summit (with synchronoptica)

seven years ago: the new town square

eight years ago: microbeads and microplastics, the extinction illusion plus the thematic apperception test

eleven years ago: bees still under threat plus a US imposed clearing house for all international bank transfers

twelve years ago: corporate hegemony, banking secrecy plus a consortium of European museum collections digitised

writ of mandate (11. 822)

Having often wondered ourselves how specialised jargon in general was some sort of professional wizardry (tech, medicine, economics, the clergy) to make their practise impenetrable or inscrutable for non-experts, via Language Hat, we enjoyed this study that postulates that the embedded, dependent clause-rich sentence structure of legalese—forgoing even the spellbinding elements of legal Latin—is like a magical incantation. This obfuscation by design, parsing thousands of court documents, holds despite even lawyers decrying and disavowing this style and repeated calls for “plain language” laws (decisions don’t have a specific requirement for florid and what’s perceived to be “exacting” and only precedent and simpler worded ones are equally enforceable on appeal) and seem to have a performative aspect—a capacity for proscription rather than just description—that lends a sense of a magic formula above the ken of outsiders. More from The Conversation at the link above.

 synchronoptica

one year ago: the debut of Star Trek: The Animated Series (with synchronoptica)

seven years ago: newspapers in movies, Hurricane Irma’s path of destruction, Saturn’s rings, London’s Garden Museum, an illustrated ship’s log plus Ford pardons Nixon

eight years ago: a patriotic art counterfeiter, assorted links worth revisiting, more spirit drawings plus New Amsterdam becomes New York

nine years ago: the curious names of US court justices

ten years ago: Scotland’s independence referendum

petrolgrad (11. 813)

On his first visit to a signatory member of the International Criminal Court since the issuing of a warrant for his arrest in 2022 for war crimes—specifically the forced deportation of Ukrainian children to be raised by Russian families—Vladimir Putin is flagrantly testing the limits of the infra-national judicial body’s jurisdiction by his welcome in Ulaanbaatar. Although there is no framework to enforce compliance, state parties like Mongolia are expected to uphold the court’s pre-trial rulings and detain those summoned. Kyiv is urging compliance as well as several protests organised locally. Putin’s presence is for among other things to promote the building of a new pipeline to China, called the Power of Siberia 2, to make up for lost sales to Europe following the boycott of Russian oil.

happy bell’s riot day—to all who celebrate (11. 805)

Though quickly degenerating into internment camps run by gangs—in their particular argot: gimmies, dims and ghosts—the US government’s attempts to redress endemic problems with homeless and unemployment in major urban areas by creating closed Sanctuary Districts began in the early 2020s and was regarded as a way to shield the general public realising the extent of societal collapse (the re-settlement zones were also cut off from the planetary computer network) and curbing the risk for political upheaval. In accordance with Starfleet’s temporal displacement policy, crew from outpost Deep Space 9 travelled back in time to the end of August 2024 to try to rescue an abducted colleague without impacting the history, however, one of the revolutionary leaders is killed while saving the life of Dr Bashir and Commander Sisko, prompting the latter to take on Gabriel Bell’s identity (clips from the 1995 episode at the link) and repair their timeline. The riot occurring on this day, the inmates took over the district’s processing centre and with the help of Chris Brynner, owner and proprietor of Brynner Information Systems (Channel 90 on the Net), reconnected the Sanctuary with the outside world with many imprisoned inside able give testimony, sparking wider rebellions and eventual justice reform.

 

synchronoptica

 

one year ago: factoids about every number (with synchronoptica), warning signs, a walk along an ancient footpath plus assorted links worth revisiting

seven years ago: resorts in the Catskills then and now, more Trump merchandising, Victorian era cabinet cards plus North Korea challenges US to a dance-off

 

eight years ago: exquisite glass sea creatures plus 7-Up psychedelic advertising 

 

nine years ago: more links to enjoy plus free will and microscopic chaos

 

ten years ago: a visit to a Roman outpost in Germany 

halleluja, hare, hare (11. 804)

As our faithful chronicler reminds, George Harrison was found guilty of unintentional plagiarism on this day in 1976 for his 1970 hit single My Sweet Lord (previously) of The Chiffon’s, Ronnie Mack 1963 song He’s So Fine recorded with an ensemble from Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton and Bad Finger, becoming the top release in the US and UK of any ex-Beatles artist. Produced by Phil Spector, whom had underwritten the hits of many girl groups from the 1950s through the seventies, there was a failure to note this inspiration—which Harrison subsequently attributed to the out-of-copyright gospel hymn “Oh Happy Day” during sessions for the triple album, All Things Must Pass. Despite the judgment in favour of infringement and later cases to define homage and sampling, the tune of universal religiosity and discovery endures.

eingungsvertag (11. 803)

Approved by both the Bundestag and the Volkskammer later in September, the Unification Treaty between East and West was negotiated and signed on this day with the then Federal Minister of the Interior Wolfgang Schäuble for the Federal Republic and Parliamentary State Secretary Günther Krause for the Democratic Republic. The terms of the agreement led to the dissolution of East Germany and its accession into the unitary state (see previously) following a series of gradual steps to reintegrate monetary, economic and social policies, with both parties choosing an interstate ratification and transitional legislation rather than drafting a new all-German constitution as the options available under the Basic Law. The articles divided the DDR into five states and merged East and West Berlin into one polity and national capital under the above Grundgesetz, the right to bi-lateral self determination guaranteed under the Two Plus Four Treaty without prejudice from or to the occupying Allied rights and responsibilities ongoing at the time of signing and the treaty going into effect.

 synchronoptica

one year ago: assorted links worth revisiting (with synchronoptica)

eight years ago: van life plus Icelandic elfin habitats

ten years ago: the sanctity of the Roman senate

thirteen years ago: electronic monitoring plus Wikipedia loves monuments

fourteen years ago: exporting the financial crisis plus self-same Celtic tigers 

18 usc § 953 (11. 785)

Although blunted somewhat by the clarification that the remarks were not based on original reporting but anecdotal information (just as likely to be true) that Trump has been in talks with Israeli leadership to discourage a ceasefire in Gaza prior to the election as he believed a truce—just like the US-Mexico bipartisan border security that was torpedoed in fear a solution would diminish a GOP grievance—once learned that both parties denied such conversations, these comments made amid the backdrop of protests outside of the Democratic National Convention are not only telling of the contender’s mindset but, if substantiated, in violation of federal law, namely the Logan Act, prohibiting correspondence of a private citizen with a foreign government in relation to any international dispute which could undermine the government’s position. Enacted in 1799, the law—and the only eponymous one I can think with its perpetrator  (see previously, see also)—came about in response to a diplomatic fiasco the year prior when John Adams sent a delegation to France during the Quasi-War (over America’s stiffing the French for loans that financed the revolutionary war against England) to negotiate a settled peace. Where these envoys had failed, Dr George Logan, a Quaker and state representative from Pennsylvania and member of the minority Democratic-Republican party (see previously here and here) whose platform and priorities were seen to run counter to the Federalist administration, achieved a settlement that avoided wider conflict. Trump is no George Logan. The Biden administration is working to end the violence and genocide, albeit not applying the right leverage. Subsequently made a senator for the state, Logan himself petitioned to have the act repealed but was unsuccessful and despite the association was appointed as a special emissary to Britain to stop the War of 1812 but that mission proved deficient.

wherever we look upon this earth, the opportunities take shape within the problems (11. 782)

Nominated by Gerald Ford on this day in 1974 for the office of vice president of the United States, the former New York governor and presidential candidate, Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller was the second individual to be installed under provisions of the US constitution’s twenty-fifth amendment in quick succession and was chosen a pool of candidates, beating out then-US ambassador to NATO Donald Rumsfeld and Republican National Committee chairman George H W Bush, who were respectively given the consolation prizes of White House chief of staff and first ambassador to China. Confirmed by congress in December (and the first to reside in the official residence), the long-serving and popular governor from the dynasty of oil tycoons and business magnates was known for his progressive policies in terms of equal rights for housing and employment, environmental conservation efforts, public works, healthcare and education and liberal- to moderate-leaning party members at the time were referred to a “Rockefeller Republicans.” Though promised to be a “full partner” in the administration especially in terms of domestic policy, the vice president’s participation in government was seen as a liability for Ford and thwarted by chief of staff Rumsfeld, who ultimately convinced the president to drop Rockefeller from the ticket for his 1976 re-election campaign and pick Kansas senator Bob Dole as his running-mate to boost his conservative credentials. Later, Ford recanted the decision as “one of the few cowardly things I did in my life.”

absaroka (11. 772)

With the notable exceptions of Alaska and Hawaii and those that successfully petitioned for partition from larger territories like Kentucky and West Virginia and Vermont—Maine was created from the Massachusetts exclave district of the same name that existed until the War of 1812 when pro-British sentiments prompted the separatist movement—every state in the union has had its share of break-away polities, but none as we learn courtesy of Strange Company had consisted of counties of three different states proposing to reincorporate like the above coalition, named after an endonym of the Crow people (“children of the large-beaked bird) though no one consulted the indigenous population despite being formed in large part from reservation land. The movement for Absaroka—whose seriousness is disputed as either an earnest attempt at secession or a publicity stunt that achieved their desired goal—began in the mid 1930s during the Depression and attendant dust-bowls when rural residents far removed from their respective capitals protested that their governments were not doing enough to extend NewDeal federal aid to farmers and ranchers. Distant residents of Montana, Wyoming and South Dakota did not feel that Helena, Cheyenne and Pierre had their best interests in mind. The street commissioner of the city and county of Sheridan Wyoming, halfway between Yellowstone Park and Mount Rushmore (further encompassing the Bighorn and Great Teton ranges and Devil’s Tower and thus the motto the Nation’s Playground) spearheaded the drive for independence and recognition, later proclaiming himself governor of the unrecognised forty-ninth state in 1939, issuing their own license plates, choosing a Miss Absaroka in a beauty pageant and inviting the king of Norway, Haarkon VII, to visit as part of his tour of the region to signal formal and diplomatic recognition and even debate in congress about the order of accession and wanting Hawaii to be admitted first. Though abandoned with the outbreak of World War II, the movement achieved its goal of having state governments responsive to their farthest reaches.

vpotus (11. 753)

Set aside as an occasion in the US to reflect on the line of succession, the executive branch of the federal government and the constitutional role of the office also empowered to preside (president pro tempore of the legislative branch) over the senate and cast a vote in the case of a tie, National Veep Day recognises all vice presidents, but falling on this date, the observance coincides with the elevation of Gerald Ford at noon on this day in 1974 following the resignation of Richard Nixon—an individual who was elected to neither high office. The twenty-fifth amendment to the American constitution enumerates the order of precedence for filling the vacancy through removal by impeachment or disability, the order next going from speaker of the house of congress, president pro tem of the senate (the most senior member of the majority party) and then to the presidential cabinet: secretary of state, treasury, defence, attorney general, secretary of the interior, agriculture, labour, health and human services, housing and urban development, transportation, energy, education, veterans’ affairs and finally Homeland Security.

sesquicentennery (11. 750)

Incredibly, especially considering the bureaucracy and controversy that besets modern questions of statehood, as our faithful chronicler informs, on this day in 1953, US president Eisenhower signed a petition from the Ohio general assembly retroactively making it the seventeenth state of the union, backdated one hundred and fifty years and some months to the date when the legislature first convened in 1803. Although president Jefferson had approved the territory’s boundaries and constitution at the time, congress had not formerly ratified the recognition. This oversight was discovered during preparations for Ohio’s upcoming founding anniversary, and while at that point in history, no formal resolution was required for admission, Ohioans wished to correct the record.  This place earning the moniker “mother of presidents” for being the homeland of seven wants to make sure its contributions were legitimate.

 synchronoptica

one year ago: a geopolitical map of the internet (with synchronoptica)

seven years ago: architect Renzo Picasso plus assorted links to revisit

eight years ago: a puzzle book, ancient air-wells, universal phonetics for numbers plus the art of Clive Barker

nine years ago: psychological terms to be wary of, more links to enjoy, illustrated Moby Dick plus even more links

ten years ago: controversy over a simian selfie

thank you for bringing back the joy (11. 749)

Ninety-one days before the election, Kamala Harris introduced her running mate, Minnesota governor Tim Walz, during an energetic rally in Philadelphia. A progressive, Democratic leader of a more conservative leaning state since 2019, the charismatic figure earlier represented Minnesota in congress (he was moved to run for office when as a social studies teacher a field trip to a local political rally ended in the group of students not being admitted due to one member having a discrete campaign sticker for the opposition and the whole group was deemed a threat), and previously served in the US national guard and had a successful educator, including exchange programmes with students in China, football coach and has a demonstrated platform supporting LQBTQ+, women’s, consummer and labour rights as well as being the architect of the state’s liberalisation of cannabis policy, infrastructure and environmental improvements and advocacy for the right to protest US-support for Israel in its war on Gaza. Walz is further credited with coining the descriptor “weird” for MAGAists, which has quickly gained currency and widespread use among Democrats.

après moi, le déluge (11. 745)

We recall how a few weeks ago how Trump chillingly implored a group of Christian supporters to vote just once more and they’ll never need worry about doing it again, implying that he would bring about a theocracy, not just a breech of democratic norms—and although we should not dismiss this as hyperbole since he’s shown us who he is and what he’s capable of, Trump cannot run for an additional term and might presumably not care about his political heirs and what happens afterwards. On multiple occasions, however, and without the media attention Trump is telling crowds at his rallies not that they won’t need to cast ballots in the future but that they don’t need to bother showing up at the polls because Trump already has enough votes. Whether saying the quiet part out loud is a sign of delusion or misunderstanding (“My instruction: we don’t need votes—we’ve got plenty of votes.”), it suggests that Trump plans to claim victory regardless of the outcome and belies the fact that behind the scenes election officials have been installed strategically in counties in crucial wing states sympathetic to the narrative of the stolen 2020 election and have a demonstrated record of manipulation and could withhold certification, which would have cascading effect for statewide electors and cause chaos, likely sending the outcome to the US supreme court to decide.

 synchronoptica

one year ago: the Anomaly Observatory (with synchronoptica), assorted links worth revisiting plus a very incriminating recording from the Watergate scandal

seven years ago: a musical tailpipe plus the movie role Trump turned down to run for US president

eight years ago: more links to enjoy, a simple political message, an economic nudge plus hybrid airships

nine years ago: even more links, a Norwegian monument plus loosing the plot

ten years ago: yeas and nays plus public health and disease drift