It’s time once again for news and views that you can peruse. It’s time once again for your Weekly Reader! Got some hot links, blog posts, or articles from a local paper you’d like to share? Head over to the comments and let us know. We love to share here!
Electric or Not, Big SUVs Are Inherently Selfish (from Vice): “The sidelining of the environmental benefits of EVs aligns with the role Hummer and other gigantic SUVs have played in our environmental challenges. The Hummer, in all its militaristic aggressiveness, is the very embodiment of the wasteful excess that contributed to the climate crisis in the first place. Cars are inherently about projecting a self-image, and hundreds of thousands of Americans chose to project one of profound, pathological selfishness. The electrification of the Hummer is not a signal of climate progress. It is a declaration that it’s still OK to be an asshole.”
Disgruntled Civil War reenactor allegedly framed Antifa by fabricating threats against his unit (from Quartz): “As the FBI investigated the threats, certain details raised red flags. According to an FBI affidavit attached to the search warrant application, the Cedar Creek Battlefield Foundation is a small organization with just one full-time employee, 12 board members, and a “small number” of volunteers. The person sending the threats somehow knew a lot about the inner workings of the group, including specific operating procedures, plans, and names only an insider would know. The sender was also strangely fixated with a former Cedar Creek volunteer named Shawn Mowbray, who hadn’t worked there since 2014.”
Powerful Radio Signal From Deep Space Appears to Be Repeating in a 16-Day Cycle (from Science Alert): “Most of them spark once, and we have never detected them again. This makes it rather difficult to track these bursts down to a source galaxy. Some FRBs spit out repeating radio flares, but wildly unpredictably. These are easier to track to a galaxy, but so far, that hasn’t brought us a great deal closer to an explanation.”
Fox News Internal Document Bashes Pro-Trump Fox Regulars for Spreading ‘Disinformation’ (from The Daily Beast): “The 162-page document, entitled “Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration,” was created by Fox News senior political affairs specialist Bryan S. Murphy, who produces research from what is known as the network’s Brain Room—a newsroom division of researchers who provide information, data, and topic guides for the network’s programming.”
I’m Pro-Abortion And I’m Not Ashamed (from Patreon): “People say “No one is pro-abortion.” I am. I’m pro-abortion.
I don’t celebrate it like I would a birthday or a job promotion, but I do celebrate the right to choose. I celebrate the right to bodily autonomy. I celebrate personal liberty and personal freedom.”
Humans are hardwired to dismiss facts that don’t fit their worldview (from The Conversation): “But things don’t work that way when the scientific consensus presents a picture that threatens someone’s ideological worldview. In practice, it turns out that one’s political, religious or ethnic identity quite effectively predicts one’s willingness to accept expertise on any given politicized issue.”
WHEN I WAS A PRO-LIFE HYPOCRITE (from Samantha Field): “Even after all that, I was proudly and solidly pro-life for another three years.
How was that possible? How could I have decided to have an abortion for myself, and still be pro-life? How could I stomach the brazen hypocrisy? How did my brain not explode from cognitive dissonance?”
ASIMOV’S EMPIRE, ASIMOV’S WALL (from Public Books): “It was all framed as nothing but good fun, as were his interactions with women once his success as an author allowed him to proceed with greater impunity. He writes in his memoirs of his custom of “hugging all the young ladies” at his publisher’s office, which was viewed indulgently by such editors as Timothy Seldes of Doubleday, who said, “All you want to do is kiss the girls and make collect calls. You’re welcome to that, Asimov.” In reality, his attentions were often unwanted, and women found excuses to be away from the building whenever he was scheduled to appear.”
Report: Astros front office laid groundwork for ‘Codebreaker’ sign-stealing program (from ESPN): “According to the WSJ, the Excel-based application designed to decode opposing catchers’ signs was used throughout the 2017 season and for part of 2018 by Astros baseball operations employees and video room staffers both at home and on the road.
Staffers would log the catcher’s signs and subsequent pitches into a spreadsheet and “Codebreaker” would determine how the signs related to different pitches. The information would then be communicated to the hitter by a baserunner via an intermediary.”
“I have seen bodies”: A Chinese citizen journalist reports on the coronavirus from Wuhan (from Quartz): “The police security bureau in my hometown also visited my parents’ house because they could not find me. They didn’t dare to come to Wuhan. They ‘educated’ my parents to tell me not to spread negative comments about the government… If I reveal my real location, there could be a risk of me getting arrested. I cannot think about it too much, or I will be afraid of doing anything. As one of the remaining reporters on the front line, I could help spread some information. For the political risks of doing so, I have no time to worry about that for now.”
That’s all for now. Stop by again–same bot time, same bot channel–for more information and articles you might just find fascinating. So until then, happy reading!
Iacon East 