MrG's Blog & Notes

* This is an archive of my own online blog and notes, with weekly entries collected by month.

[MON 07 JUN 21] THE WEEK THAT WAS 22

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: The most amusing news of the last week was that Trump shut down his blog after only a month in operation. Of course, it had been introduced as a big winner, but it never got more than a few hundred thousand readers -- which would be big for most bloggers, but Trump was getting tens of millions of readers on Twitter -- and, to the extent it was cited, it was largely to mock him.

Trump is behind the learning curve these day, in particular insisting that, come August, the recounts of state ballots in progress or being advocated will result in him being reinstated as president. There were suggestions that Trump had a canny agenda in this, but it seems more plausible that he's delusional.

His worries are piling up. After the predictable refusal of the Senate GOP to authorize a joint commission to investigate the 6 January Capitol Riot, I was expecting on Tuesday, when Congress came back from Memorial Day weekend, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would announce the formation of a House committee to do so. I was half right; she said the House needed to choose between a number of options, the most prominent being a select committee. I thought to myself: Oh yeah, they'd have to take a vote to establish the committee. Good enough.

However, there was a lot of anger among the hard Left on Twitter, who were outraged that a vote needed to be taken, that everything should have been nailed down before the Senate vote. I replied to one: "They were going to vote on what to do following the Senate vote, on the assumption the Senate bill would fail? That would be signaling that they didn't take the Senate bill seriously and weren't acting in good faith."

I was reading about George Washington, as commander of the Continental Army, telling his officers to be patient with the Continental Congress: "Legislatures never do anything quickly." They are not executive organizations, they pass laws by obtaining majority consensus, and they are by design not efficient. I am unconcerned; I would expect the select committee to be a going operation in a week or two.

* The Biden Administration did score a coup this week, getting the leadership of the G7 nations to agree to a uniform corporate tax of 15%. This was a just an agreement in principle and will need to be taken up by the G20 forum, but the rest is really just paperwork.

As discussed in an essay from ECONOMIST.com ("Twilight Of The Tax Haven", 3 June 2021), the Biden Administration's proposal focuses not only on a minimum 15% tax rate, but also on pinning taxing rights in countries where economic activity takes place, not in tax havens where firms can book profits. The big winners will be large economies where multinationals do lots of business but don't make much profit on the books, the profit being siphoned off to tax havens. Poorer countries where global companies have factories and other operations stand to benefit as well, if not as generously. The tax havens, of course, are not happy at all.

The tax havens include Bermuda, the British Virgin Islands (BVI) and the Cayman Islands. They don't really make money off of corporate profits obtained elsewhere, but they rake in money from fees, plus networks of accountants, lawyers, and other corporate-service providers. That's not a lot of money on a global scale, but it's a lot for a little country. Corporate and financial services accounted for over 60% of the BVI's government revenue in 2018.

Global corporate tax normalization will torpedo the business models of the tax havens. They are very angry, but they're not getting much sympathy, since other countries are inclined to see them as parasites. A diplomat says the havens are being "neutralized", and are "irrelevant" to the normalization talks: "No one wants to hear from them." Some of the havens do have backups: Cayman is a big home for hedge funds, Bermuda for insurers.

There are also economies that are not truly tax havens, but have created lightly-taxed environments. Ireland and Cyprus, for example, have low corporate income tax rates of 12.5%, while Luxembourg and the Netherlands have set up rules to turn them into conduits that allow companies to avoid taxes for doing business elsewhere. Hong Kong and Singapore have similarly prospered in the tax dodge game.

The Irish are nervous about tax normalization, and have been lobbying the USA -- the source of much of its foreign investment -- to show mercy. Ireland's finance minister, Paschal Donohoe, has argued that smaller countries should be allowed to use tax policy to make up for the advantages of scale, location and resources that big ones enjoy. Ireland does have friends in the EU, including Hungary -- with a rate of 9% -- plus Cyprus and Malta. Outside the EU, Singapore and Switzerland have indicated they consider 15% too high. Singapore would be happier with 10%.

However, Luxembourg and the Netherlands have been converted to the tax normalization religion. Both countries have been plagued by public exposures of their cozy deals with foreign investors, and have since been implementing reforms. The Irish and other EU malcontents could veto the EU's tax decisions, since the vote has to be unanimous, but they would then suffer the wrath of angry partner governments -- as well as from a public fed up with corporate gaming of taxes. The revolution is coming, and it's not going to be stopped; it's either ride the steamroller, or be part of the road.

This reminds me somewhat of how, when the US Constitution was being put together, the little state of Rhode Island persistently refused to play fair with the rest of the states, becoming known as "Rogue Island". Rhode Island was the last state to ratify the Constitution -- and they had to be threatened with blockade to do it.

* I bought a Honda Fit / Jazz at the beginning of 2020, just before the COVID-19 pandemic hit. Not surprisingly, I haven't driven it much since, and it still looks pretty much new. I really like it, but it does have one significant problem: its pretty black matte finish is a dirt magnet, and keeping it clean is troublesome.

I got to the point of regularly waxing it, which does eliminate the magnetism, but it was too much like work. Then I got to thinking I should try spray wax, which is easy to apply, but doesn't last so long. I got into carnauba spray wax, derived from a type of Brazilian palm tree, and found it works very well. It has a strong but not unpleasant odor; it only lasts about a month -- but I need to wax monthly anyway, so no big deal. I wet down the car and then apply the spray with a soft cloth. I have to do it before the Sun comes up, since it seems to evaporate the wax to a degree; once done, I put the car in the garage and let it dry, then buff it later.

This weekend I did my monthly waxing before sunrise, and was very surprised to see a young elk walking along my street. At least, I think it was an elk; the coloration did not look deerlike, and it seemed more robust than a deer. I chased it off, since human habitation and wild animals don't get along. We get elk passing through Loveland, Colorado, twice a year -- going east from the mountains in the fall, back up west in the spring -- but they typically follow the watercourse of the Big Thompson River running through town.

Anyway, come fall I'll likely take the car on its first real road trip, to Seattle and back. It will be effectively a trial run for later, more ambitious trips, part of a readjustment to post-pandemic life. Now that I'm vaccinated, as far as I'm concerned, the pandemic is behind me. There's a lot of vaccination holdouts, but there's nothing I can do about them. I cannot and don't concern myself with them.

The US government, of course, can't be so casual about the matter, and has been taking measures to up vaccination. One aspect of that has been collaborations with businesses to offer "freebies", such as free beer or phone banking accounts. Why not? Businesses are always doing promotions anyway. There's also been outreach, the government joining hands with non-governmental groups to help push vaccination, and administration officials even publicly campaigning for vaccination. Alas, these measures have had limited effect. If we lose some of the holdouts, there's no more to be said.

* As discussed in an article from JANES.com ("Update: Rafael Unveils SPICE 250 ER Development" by Robin Hughes, 03 February 2021), Rafael Advanced Defense Systems of Israel is now working on a new "extended range" member of its SPICE ("Smart / Precise Impact / Cost Effective") guided munition family. The "SPICE 250 ER" features a miniature turbojet engine, to give it a range of at least 150 kilometers (95 miles).

The standard unpowered SPICE 250 is an all-up weapon system, unlike the heavier 1000 and 2000 family variants, which are essentially electro-optical / infrared (EO-IR) guidance and target acquisition add-on kits for 450 and 900-kilogram (1,000 and 2,000-pound) general purpose and penetration bombs. It has a mass of 115 kilograms (250 pounds), a third of that being a blast / fragmentation / penetration warhead, with pop-out wings and cruciform tailfins. Glide range is up to 100 kilometers (60 miles), with 3-meter (10-foot) circular error probability.

SPICE 250 features an electro-optic / infrared terminal attack seeker, package, midcourse INS/GPS navigation, a two-way datalink, and pre-set or cockpit selectable fuze options. All current production SPICE variants, including the SPICE 250, 1000, and 2000, have an "Automatic Target Acquisition (ATA)" capability, allowing them to recognize specific targets for attack.

[MON 14 JUN 21] THE WEEK THAT WAS 23

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: The origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus behind the COVID-19 epidemic is unclear. Early on, the assumption was that it started in a wild meat "wet" market in Wuhan, China -- but there was speculation that it might have been from a containment failure at a bioresearch lab known to be in Wuhan. That was plausible, though further speculation that the virus had been "weaponized" was not. However, the Chinese denied it, and in the absence of supporting evidence, the "lab leak" theory was forgotten by everyone but the trolls.

Some weeks back, stories began circulating of US government intelligence report that indicated three people from the Wuhan lab had been hospitalized just before the outbreak in the city. There were suggestions from prominent health officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci that the "lab leak" theory needed to be re-examined; President Joe Biden requested that his intelligence services investigate, and come up with a report in 90 days.

The trolls got very noisy about the matter, claiming the "lab leak" theory was proven true after all. Well, no, not proven. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, at a Senate committee hearing over State Department funding, said: "I saw the report. I think it's on a number of levels, incorrect."

The report was classified, having been prepared in May 2020 by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), to then be passed on to by State when it conducted an inquiry into the pandemic's origins during the last months of the Trump Administration.

Blinken elaborated that, as far as he knew, the report originated after the Trump administration asked a contractor to look into the origins of SARS-CoV-2, with a particular concern about the "lab leak" theory. He added:

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While it might be assumed that Trump Administration officials would jump at any report that told them what Trump would want to hear, not all of his staff were Trump loyalists, and it seems some of them smelled rats. Blinken said the report was the work of one officer and a few individuals. LLNL has a reputation for going over-the-top, and tilting to the Right; it would not be surprising that some of the staff are Trump loyalists. It is also a science organization, with no particular brief for intelligence analysis.

OK, we're back to square one. The intelligence report now in preparation is almost certain to conclude: "Definitely MAYBE!" Only the Chinese know for a fact if there was a lab leak or not, and they have repeated their denials. Blinken's public statement on the matter was a message to the Chinese: "We have things we will fight you over, but this is not one of them."

The difficulty with all such conspiracy theories is not that they are demonstrably false; the "lab leak" theory is perfectly plausible. The difficulty with it is that it demands shifting the burden of proof, making grand claims on the basis of thin evidence. It's skewed logic to think that, simply because the obvious is not always true, that the obvious is probably false.

Incidentally, this month will also see the release of a Pentagon report on unidentified flying objects (UFO). By all accounts, the report is a collection of interesting but ambiguous information on UFOs that goes nowhere in particular. The Pentagon made it clear there was "no evidence" the UFOs were alien spacecraft. This sensible response got a hail of flak, some being outraged the Pentagon would even acknowledge the possibility, others that they had ruled the possibility out -- which they had not. What to be said? "Can't cure stupid." It seems we get a UFO flap every 20 years or so. People get excited, nothing comes of it, then it goes quiet for another 20 years.

* As discussed in an article from CNN.com ("White House Grapples With Spike In Ransomware Attacks As Cyber Vulnerabilities Are Laid Bare" by Kevin Liptak, 4 June 2021), the USA has been hit with a wave of "ransomware" attacks, in which the Black Hats seize control of computer systems and demand payoffs to release control again.

An attack last month on the Colonial Pipeline company resulted in a run on gasoline, prompting fuel shortages along the East Coast. More recently, a major meat packer was hit by a ransomware attack. They have helped promote a spike in inflation, though the inflation has been primarily driven by the resurgence in economic activity as the COVID-19 pandemic winds down. The pandemic badly disrupted international supply chains, and they are only slowly recovering.

Such attacks have been traced to Russian cybercrime gangs. The Russian government does not appear to have been directly involved, but the government appears tolerant of such gangs, as long as they target Russia's enemies. Options for response are limited; this is a long-range problem, and it's going to take a long time to fix.

Colonial Pipelines had to pay bitcoins worth about $4.3 million USD to get operational again; the FBI has managed to get half of its back. It's encouraging to see the authorities are learning. The FBI also announced a coup under its Operation TROJAN SHIELD effort, which was part of an international collaboration to take down an international cybercrime ring, operating on a secure "dark" smartphone network named ANOM.

The investigation involved 9,000 law enforcement officers from 17 countries saw authorities monitor 27 million messages from 12,000 devices in 100 countries. They tracked the activities of more than 300 organized crime groups; to date, there have been over 800 arrests, seizures of tonnes of drugs, hundreds of guns, and dozens of luxury vehicles, plus over $48 million USD in cash and cryptocurrencies.

The trick was that ANOM had been run by law enforcement all along. For at least a decade, organized crime groups have used dark phone networks like Phantom Secure to set up drug deals, to arrange hits on rivals, and for money-laundering. The FBI had got tired of trying to keep up with the dark networks, and decided to set up their own. The authorities were listening in on everything.

That's the problem with bootleg software: nobody has any real idea of where it comes from. ANOM's cover has been blown, and it has served its purpose -- but it still must haunt gangsters to wonder if the marvelous cryptotech on which they rely might be booby-trapped. There's a certain wonderful irony in seeing scammers get scammed.

* In other news, Joe Biden was at a meeting of G7 leaders in Cornwall this last week, and stood for a group photo:

This got the comment on Twitter:

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For those who don't get it, search on STAR TREK REDSHIRTS.

* I got my municipal fiber-optic link this last week. They ran the cable in a shallow trench through my lawn to the house from the junction box they'd installed last year, and then a guy named Dave came out and ran the fiber to my bedroom-office. Actually, I had to partly run in myself; my crawlspace is more than slightly damp right now, so I had to snake it through there myself.

I didn't mind, I didn't want to send him down in that muck anyway, while it's nothing new to me. I was actually somewhat relieved, since I've had installers throw up their hands when they run into a snag, then tell me to call them when I've fixed it. Dave left me some clips to tie up the cable, which I will do when the crawlspace dries out in a few continued warm weeks.

I'm in a duplex house, and he couldn't run the fiber-optic cable up through the dividing wall, it appears because the foundation gets in the way; instead, he ran it to a side wall near my bed. That left the problem of getting an ethernet hookup from the fiber-optic modem / wireless router to my PC on the other side of the room -- but I recalled I had a long ethernet cable in a box of cables. I found the cable, ran it across the room along the dividing wall, and it worked nicely.

I then called up my existing provider, Centurylink, and canceled my service. It was no bother, I talked with a fellow named Miguel, who was very smooth and professional. That done, I got my devices on wi-fi hooked up to the new router without much problem.

The new service costs the same as the old, $45 USD a month, but it gives me about 30 megabits per second instead of 12 MBPS. That's plenty, an HD movie only needs like 10 MBPS, and I never watch HD -- I watch videos on a large smartphone, don't have viewing gear to make HD worthwhile. I didn't notice much change, except that updating apps on my smartphones is well faster now.

The only problem I had was uploading files to my websites using FTP. I long used the old FTP.EXE utility; with the new hookup I would log in, but the remote service would cut me off every time I tried to do anything. Say what? Poking around online suggested that the old utility did some things that modern FTP servers don't like. I decided to download the free Filezilla FTP app. It had no problems.

I'd used Filezilla before, but had preferred using the old FTP.EXE utility from the command line, it being the solution I was used to. On returning to Filezilla and doping it out properly, I found it an excellent solution. It looks like, in fact is, a file manager, with directory windowpanes for my PC and for the remote server. It had a quick logon feature -- it remembered my password by default, which I didn't like, but it was easy to change it so it asked me for the password each time. It also had bookmarks to allow me to switch to different PC directories and their matching directories on the FTP server. During an FTP session, I didn't have to worry about timeouts; if the server timed out, Filezilla transparently logged back in again.

So I am set. The only problem left is fixing the scar in my lawn where they laid the fiber-optic line. I give it a good watering every day. I have hopes that it will look okay by the fall, but if not, then next year.

* As discussed in an article from NEWATLAS.com ("Study Reveals Potential Of Hydropower Dams Topped With Floating Solar" by Nick Lavars, 01 October 2020), hydropower is a well-established renewable energy source -- so much so that it has not so much room for growth. A study from the US Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) suggests that more power can be usefully extracted from a dam, by floating solar panels on the reservoir behind it.

NREL researchers surveyed the freshwater hydropower reservoirs currently installed across the world and their potential to accommodate floating solar photovoltaic panels on the water's surface. The study estimates that there are almost 380,000 hydropower reservoirs around the world that could be augmented with floating photovoltaic panels. If fully used, the panels could generate up to 7.6 terawatts (TW) peak power, or up to 10,600 terawatt-hours (TWh) in a year. In comparison, global electricity demand in 2018 was about 22,300 TWh.

The virtues of floating the panels near dams is that waters tend to be calm near dams, there's not much boat traffic near them either -- and in particular, there's already a power substation near a hydropower facility. The solar panels could, at least in some installations, pump water up into the reservoir to provide energy storage.

Right now, only one such hybrid solar-hydropower system is in operation, as a pilot project in the dam of Portugal's River Rabagao. The reservoir floats 840 solar panels covering 2,500 square meters (27,000 square feet), and can produce 300 megawatt-hours per year. Energy provider EDP is planning to expand on this pilot project with an 11,000-panel floating photovoltaic system at the Alqueva hydropower plant, also in sunny Portugal.

The NREL researchers caution that not all dams may be well-suited to the scheme, for example if they run dry part of the year, Nathan Lee, who led the study, says: "This is really optimistic. This does not represent what could be economically feasible or what the markets could actually support. Rather, it is an upper-bound estimate of feasible resources that considers waterbody constraints and generation system performance."

[MON 21 JUN 21] THE WEEK THAT WAS 24

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: The only major issue this last week was a summit meeting in Geneva between US President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin. It was a little hard to know what to make of it; Biden laid down a set of red lines to Putin, Putin denied everything and gibed at the USA. The red lines did notably include suggestions that Russia take action against Russian cyber-criminal gangs behind recent "ransomware" attacks, with veiled hints that the USA might retaliate.

In any case, it was on a predictable script, and had little particular consequence. It's clear that one of Biden's objectives was to show Americans that he wasn't Donald Trump -- Trump having had secret meetings with Putin, with Trump even going so far as to badmouth US intelligence services in public alongside Putin. Rumors have it that the Biden Administration knows what was said in the secret meetings, having obtained Russian government memos on them. That leads to the next speculation, that the Russian government leaked them. Who knows?

* In the meantime, back in the USA, Congress has been wrangling over Biden's infrastructure bill, and voter rights legislation. The primary sticking point, or so it might seem, has been West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin, a Democrat, who has raised objections to parts of the legislation, and encouraged attempts to reach out to the Republicans in search of compromises. For that, he has been denounced as a traitor, secretly working for the Republicans.

A closer inspection of Manchin suggests that is grossly overwrought. There is a fundamental reality to consider when it comes to Manchin: he is a Democratic senator from an otherwise overwhelmingly Republican state, and had he not been elected, the Democrats would not have had a Senate majority. In addition, none of the changes to the legislation he has proposed are fatal. The highly regarded Stacey Abrams, who delivered Georgia for the Democrats in 2020, endorsed Manchin's voter rights legislation changes.

The bottom line is that the Democrats will get their legislation, with only modest changes. It is not easy to follow Manchin's game; while he has been mocked for thinking that Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell has any interest in compromise, it is hard to believe that a shrewd and experienced politician like Manchin thought he did. There's much to speculate about there, but it is better to just see how it works out. All will become clear in time.

What is hard to doubt is that Joe Manchin has Joe Biden's ear, and their conversations are not particularly antagonistic. It is flatly impossible to believe that Manchin told Biden that he was going to derail Biden's agenda, and nothing in Manchin's behavior really suggests he is trying to do so. It is also hard to believe that Manchin hasn't been talking to his Senate colleague Bernie Sanders, one of the principal leaders of the Woke Left. If Manchin were honestly up to no good, Sanders would have had something to say about it -- but Sanders has hardly mentioned him. Indeed, there is no evidence of a war between Manchin and any of his Democratic colleagues in the Senate.

Manchin has been particularly criticized for saying he would not, under any circumstances, kill the filibuster. He has made more ambiguous comments about modifying it, clearly carving out wiggle room. Another reality is that the Republicans are very touchy about the filibuster, and so carefully tugging at it gets their attention.

Oh yes, there was another significant development this last week, in which House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that House committees are proceeding on an investigation of the 6 January Capitol riot, and presumably the election irregularities surrounding it. The announcement was understated; hopefully, the Speaker will raise the public visibility of the effort, lest she be accused, however implausibly, of trying to sweep the issue under the rug.

* An article from ECONOMIST.com ("Broadbandits", 19 June 2021), zeroed in on the spate of recent cyber attacks, the article starting with:

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Such cyber attacks are no longer at all unusual, and they are having a growing impact -- the pipeline shutdown led to a jump in fuel prices and shortages at the fuel pumps. More generally, the attacks are disrupting the vital operation of the data networks that increasingly run the world. International tensions have helped promote the attacks, with autocratic states giving sanctuary to cyber-bandits, or directly encouraging them:

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Targets include critical infrastructure such as oil pipelines, power plants, and ports. The financial industry is also a major target, with the healthcare industry being hit as well. The rise of the universal "internet of things" suggests that, ultimately, almost everything can and will be attacked.

One of the big difficulties is that companies often cover up cyber attacks, lest they lose credibility. Their computer security is often dreadful; Colonial was wide-open to attack. The computer-security industry is infested with flim-flam operators, who sell ineffective security tech to gullible customers. What to do to fight back?

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Better disclosure will provide better intelligence for the battle. Losing insurance coverage would force companies to up their game. Governments can help set security standards, and also keep closer track of cryptocurrencies, which are often used to pay ransoms. Finally, governments around the world need to collaborate against the threat:

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* A video from REUTERS.com focused on "Wikihouse", an open-source effort to design low-cost houses, using sustainable practices. The exercise began in 2011 through the work of Alastair Parvin and Nick Ierodiaconou of "00", a London-based strategy and design practice, in collaboration with other designers. It has since grown into a global collaboration.

WikiHouse provides an online library of design files, which can be downloaded and modified by anyone, with a set of jigsaw puzzle-like pieces cut out of plywood with a CNC router. The pieces snap together with wedge and peg connections, inspired by classical Korean construction methods; assembly can be performed quickly by people with no special training. However, the result is only a frame of a house, which then has to be completed with plumbing, wiring, cladding, roofing, flooring, and so on.

The Wikihouse designs emphasize energy efficiency and digital technology. The Wikihouse v4.0 design is a two-storey smart home, featuring smart device-controlled lighting and ventilation, plus a safer and more efficient low-voltage DC electrical system. All systems are integrated together via OpenHAB smart home software, an open source alternative to products like Nest.

At present, Wikihouse remains largely an experimental effort. There have been comparisons with IKEA furniture; it certainly does look like fun the way the houses snap together.

[MON 28 JUN 21] THE WEEK THAT WAS 25

* THE WEEK THAT WAS: I mentioned here last week that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had decided to pursue the investigation of the 6 January Capitol riot with existing committees. I was disappointed, but I misunderstood her somewhat: this last week, she committed to a select committee instead.

The only question is whether the Republicans will be able to place Trump loyalists on the select committee to sabotage it. Not knowing the mechanics of setting up the committee, how much influence House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has over it is not clear. What is clear is that the spineless and dim-witted McCarthy is no match for Pelosi, so that's encouraging.

The dramatics continued for the Democrat efforts to pass President Biden's infrastructure plan, and voter rights legislation. They're not going anywhere in a hurry, but it seems the Democrats are patient, pursuing every option and seeing if they work. In the face of pig-headed GOP obstruction, things aren't working out well. However, there seems no cause for despair. It is likely that the Democrats will finally proceed on shackling -- not killing -- the filibuster, if maybe not right away, and clear the path for getting things done. Legislatures work by discussion and consensus, and so they are inevitably slow; what happens in a day outside of Congress takes a week inside.

* The wheels of justice are turning for the 500+ arrested for the 6 January Capitol riot, with some of them already having their day in court. US District Judge Royce C. Lambeth -- a Reagan appointee -- judged in the case of Anna Morgan-Lloyd, a 49-year-old Indiana woman, that she should be under three years of probation and perform community service. She was not implicated in violence in the Capitol invasion, she was a first offender, and she was cooperative and contrite, telling the court:

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With so many arrested, the courts are likely to be charitable to most of the offenders, preferring to reprimand them and release them to focus on the hard-core troublemakers, who remain behind bars. Judge Lambeth also made clear his contempt for those who have been downplaying the 6 January riot:

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Referring to Members of Congress who described the rioters as merely on a "normal tourist visit", Lambeth said that video introduced in court "will show the attempts of some congressmen to rewrite history ... is utter nonsense."

The judge also to dismissed "conspiracy theories" about FBI informants, and address claims that the Capitol defendants are being treated more harshly than Black Lives Matter protesters. He said he couldn't speak to what happens in state courts, but that Attorney General Merrick Garland has "promised the law will be applied equally ... whatever the complexion of the demonstrator is."

* There were a few surprises in the news this week, the first being news of the death of has-been software magnate John McAffee in a Spanish prison. McAffee was a pioneer of antivirus software, with a package that bore his name becoming an effective standard. He sold out in 1994, to lead a life of dissipation -- sex, drugs, booze, "send lawyers guns & money". He was accused of rape, implicated in a murder of a neighbor in Belize, and generally led a high-profile shiftless life. He decided to become a cryptocurrency guru, engaging in promotional tactics that were questionable even by the low standards of cryptocurrencies, and was indicted for tax evasion in the USA.

He was arrested in Spain in 2020, with a Spanish court judging to allow his extradition; he was dead hours later. McAffee was 75 years old. Twitter wits chimed in, with a notable lack of sympathy:

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Sometimes, if we didn't have grim humor, we wouldn't have any humor. I had to add:

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* A second surprise was unleashed from the ultra-Right One America News Network (OANN), which has heavily promoted Trump's "Big Lie" about "massive election fraud". OANN talking head Pearson Sharp decided this week to dial it up to 11 with:

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It is hard to believe this wasn't a fabrication, but it certainly seems it wasn't. Exactly what the fallout will be is not clear yet, but there will be fallout. The current lunacy is not sustainable, but how long will it take to get it to go away?

* Oh, another thing ... the Pentagon finally released its report on UFOs, with some expressing dismay that it didn't say much very that was specific. Like that's a surprise? If we ever got anything specific about UFOs, it would be around the world immediately. Of course, not everyone buys that idea, one Twitter poster saying:

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I replied:

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That was actually from one of Terry Pratchett's DISKWORLD novels, involving an exchange between Corporal Nobby Nobbs and Sargent Fred Colon. Since not so many would recognize them, I had to generalize the citation.