Another week, another round of #Brexit negotiations. Here's a handy guide for EU officials struggling to understand their UK counterparts. 😉 pic.twitter.com/1WVD2Ccxjc— 🇪🇺Martin Mycielski (@mycielski) October 30, 2017
Headline of the day. pic.twitter.com/e41IXo4Tsy— Derf Backderf (@DerfBackderf) October 30, 2017
The Ukraine has upped its slow-walked ethnic cleansing program, the Ukrainian parliament has passed a law banning non-Ukrainian language education after elementary school:
Timeya Leshko doesn’t see much of a future for her four children in Ukraine, where a Moscow-backed conflict still flares up in the east and economic opportunities seem few and far between elsewhere.They want you to leave.
"There’s no way to earn a living here. Everyone knows that. All the young people are leaving," Leshko told RFE/RL’s Ukrainian Service in a recent interview. "And I don’t think it’s going to get better, only worse."
The ethnic Hungarian in the sleepy village of Mali Heivtsi on Ukraine’s western fringes, not far from Slovakia and Hungary, is convinced that learning her native tongue is the ticket out for her kids.
But that may be tougher for Leshko and other ethnic minorities in Ukraine after the country’s parliament passed an educational-reform bill on September 5 that includes a clause making Ukrainian the required language of study in state schools from the fifth grade on.
Leshko is not a fan of the bill, which would roll back the option for lessons to be taught in other languages.
"I don't like it. Why? Because, for example, I am a Hungarian. I was studying in a Hungarian school and I want my children also to speak Hungarian," she explained. "Maybe they will move to Hungary or maybe they will go there to earn money. In that case, the Hungarian language will be more useful than Ukrainian, I think."
Some fans in the Monster Seats hung a banner over the wall that said, “Racism Is As American As Baseball.” Security removed them. pic.twitter.com/tVSai9XocY— Pete Abraham (@PeteAbe) September 14, 2017
Fans draped a sign reading “Racism is as American as baseball” over the Green Monster at Fenway Park during the Red Sox-Athletics game Wednesday night.When I first heard about this, I thought that it was a group of white supremacists endorsing racism.
Red Sox spokeswoman Zineb Curran replied with the following statement via email when asked about the incident:
“During the 4th inning of tonight’s game, four fans unfurled a banner over the left field wall in violation of the club’s policy prohibiting signs of any kind to be hung or affixed to the ballpark. The individuals involved were escorted out of Fenway Park.”
According to The Boston Globe, the sign was visible for about two minutes and no arrests were made in connection to the incident.
………
One member of the group spoke to CSNNE anonymously Wednesday night, telling the network they expected to be kicked out of Fenway but were surprised by some people’s interpretation that their message wasn’t clear.
“I guess we should have seen that coming, but we also didn’t think of it as an ambiguous message,” the group member said. “It’s kind of telling that it is being interpreted as one.”
New favorite German word: Backpfeifengesicht, a face that needs to be slapped.— Sarah Sh. (@psygh) July 11, 2017
Swedish passenger operator MTR Express opened up a new line between Stockholm and Gothenburg, and they held an online contest to name it, the obvious happened, but unlike the killjoys at the Natural Environment Research Council, they decided to name the line Trainy McTrainface:
A Swedish rail operator has vowed to name one of its trains Trainy McTrainface after a public vote, saying it would bring joy to people disappointed when Britain rejected the name Boaty McBoatface for a polar research ship following a similar poll.This is so cool.
Trainy McTrainface won 49% of the votes in the naming competition, conducted online by train operator MTR Express and Swedish newspaper Metro, beating choices such as Hakan, Miriam and Poseidon.
“[This is] news that will be received with joy by many, not just in Sweden,” MTR wrote in a statement.
The train will run between the Swedish capital Stockholm and Gothenburg, the country’s second-biggest city.
………
MTR said another train had been voted to be named “Glenn”, an apparent tribute to an IFK Gothenburg soccer team of the 1980s that featured four players of that name – uncommon in Sweden – including Glenn Hysen, who later captained Liverpool.
I was in kitchen, and the radio show Wait Wait ……… Don't Tell Me was on, and they were talking about the Canadian sex toy manufacturer who has been sued for collecting data from their internet enabled vibrator.
I casually commented to Charlie, who was drinking a Coke at the time, "They caught them coming and going."
Charlie was caught mid drink, started to laugh, and proceeded to spew Coke from his nose, thankfully he made it to the trash can before he started to completely lose it.
This raises the obvious question, what is the term for spewing a drink from your nose caused by laughter?
According to the Urban Dictionary, there are two words, snork, and schnarf.
I should note that it was not my intention to get Charlie to schnarf his drink, but I might have chuckled.
I am a bad, bad man.
on the one hand I love the #oxfordcomma, on the other hand these sentences truly are SO GOOD pic.twitter.com/Gst0OSY0Wo— Jules (@scuttling) March 6, 2017
Never let it be said that punctuation doesn’t matter.The AP REALLY needs to rewrite its style guide on this matter.
In Maine, the much-disputed Oxford comma has helped a group of dairy drivers in a dispute with a company about overtime pay.
The Oxford comma is used before the words “and” or “or” in a list of three or more things. Also known as the serial comma, its aficionados say it clarifies sentences in which things are listed.
………
In a judgment that will delight Oxford comma enthusiasts everywhere, a US court of appeals sided with delivery drivers for Oakhurst Dairy because the lack of a comma made part of Maine’s overtime laws too ambiguous.
The state’s law says the following activities do not count for overtime pay:The canning, processing, preserving, freezing, drying, marketing, storing, packing for shipment or distribution of:The drivers argued, due to a lack of a comma between “packing for shipment” and “or distribution”, the law refers to the single activity of “packing”, not to “packing” and “distribution” as two separate activities. As the drivers distribute – but do not pack – the goods, this would make them eligible for overtime pay.
(1) Agricultural produce;
(2) Meat and fish products; and
(3) Perishable foods.
Previously, a district court had ruled in the dairy company’s favour, who argued that the legislation “unambiguously” identified the two as separate activities exempt from overtime pay. But the appeals judge sided with the drivers.
Circuit judge David J. Barron wrote:We conclude that the exemption’s scope is actually not so clear in this regard. And because, under Maine law, ambiguities in the state’s wage and hour laws must be construed liberally in order to accomplish their remedial purpose, we adopt the drivers’ narrower reading of the exemption.
In late 2003, I observed that the Mirriam Webster Dictionary was dropping the word "Snollygoster" from its dictionary, and that this must not stand: (PDF)
To Revive a WordSo, over the past few years, I have engaged in a lonely effort to revive the word on this blog, and now the Merriam Webster Dictionary has brought the word back:
The word “snollygoster” has been dropped from the 11th edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary.
Harry Truman was among the last public figures to use this word in public, and I mean to use the word, meaning “a shrewd, unprincipled person, especially a politician”, as often as I can.
………
And as recently as Tuesday morning, Merriam-Webster staff noted they had re-added the word “snollygoster” to the dictionary. It means “a shrewd and unprincipled person, especially an unprincipled politician.”
Hot on my slight revision to my profanity policy:
Hey @realDonaldTrump I oppose civil asset forfeiture too! Why don't you try to destroy my career you fascist, loofa-faced, shit-gibbon!— Daylin Leach (@daylinleach) February 7, 2017
As you are no doubt aware, there are certain profanities that I block out when I am posting to my blog, F%$#, Sh%$, C%$#, C%$#, C%$sucker, Motherf%$#er, etc.
I did use f%$# when quoting Joe Biden's famous/infamous comment on the passage of the ACA, but generally, I will obscure obscenities in quotes.
However, I have come across the issue that when embedding tweets, I cannot obscure the profanities when preserving the tweet.
Therefore, I shall be embedding those unexpurgated.
That is all.
But, if the global Left is to have any meaning in the future of the world, and I would argue that the global Right will destroy us all if it doesn’t, then it must get beyond post-structural paralysis and go back to the future of fighting not just for social justice issues but for equity based upon class. Empowerment is not just about language, it’s about capital, who’s got it, who hasn’t and what role government plays between them.(emphasis mine)
All sex is not rape, but most poverty is.—David Llewellyn-Smith
They have just updated their definition of "alt-right" to say that it means racist dirtbags:
Recent developments have put the so-called “alt-right” movement in the news. They highlight the need for clarity around use of the term and around some related terms, such as “white nationalism” and “white supremacism.”While the AP's position on copyright is maximalist and counter-productive, (they act as if fair use excerpting does not exist) this is a very worthwhile update to their standards.
………
“Alt-right” (quotation marks, hyphen and lower case) may be used in quotes or modified as in the “self-described” or “so-called alt-right” in stories discussing what the movement says about itself.
Avoid using the term generically and without definition, however, because it is not well known and the term may exist primarily as a public-relations device to make its supporters’ actual beliefs less clear and more acceptable to a broader audience. In the past we have called such beliefs racist, neo-Nazi or white supremacist.
It appears that people are trying to find a method to the Trump madness, and so theyu\ are throwing around terms like, "Demagogic genius.
I think that the term political idiot savant is more accurate, if somewhat politically incorrect.
Then again, politically incorrect is the new black for the next few years.
(emphasis original, %$ mine)
On March 22, 2016 William “Billy” Rhinehart, a regional field director at the Democratic National Committee, received an email from Google warning him that someone tried to access his account and that he should immediately change his password. He complied.
Unfortunately for Mr. Rhinehart, it wasn’t Google who sent him that email. He, along with many others, were a victim of Threat Group 4127 — the SecureWorks designation for Fancy Bear (CrowdStrike), APT28 (FireEye), and Sofacy (Kaspersky Lab). Secureworks assesses that TG 4127 “is operating from the Russian Federation and is gathering intelligence on behalf of the Russian government.”
Thanks to a bizarre twist involving Guccifer 2.0’s solicitation of a journalist at The Smoking Gun (TSG) to write about the DCLeaks emails in exchange for giving TSG an early look at some of the stolen documents, TSG was able to obtain the original spear phishing email directly from Billy Rhinehart and shared it with ThreatConnect, who posted this screenshot of the email’s headers and identified the actual sender of the email: hi.mymail@yandex.com.
………
How Do I Get A Yandex.com Email Address on RUNET?
Now let’s say that you don’t want a @yandex.ru email. You want a @yandex.com email. So you type https://yandex.com into your browser and …, no joy. It resolves back to https://yandex.ru/
For some reason, RUNET is set up to send you to the .ru domain of whatever website you type into your address bar. Besides Yandex, I tried going to Google.com and was sent to Google.ru. I typed Intel.com and was sent to Intel.ru.
So how does our presumed Russian intelligence operative get his Yandex.com email address? He has to click on the Yandex.com link from the Yandex.ru homepage (highlighted below).
………
The point that I’m trying to make is that if anyone in Russia wanted to spear phish employees of the DNC, then creating a @yandex.com email address instead of a @yandex.ru email address is not only unnecessary extra effort but it makes absolutely no sense. You don’t gain anything operationally. You’ve used Yandex. You might as well paint a big red R on your forehead.
However, you know what does make sense?
That the person who opened the account DOESN’T SPEAK RUSSIAN!
He went with Yandex.com because all analysis stops with merely the name of a Russian company, a Russian IP address, or a Russian-made piece of malware. To even argue that a Russian intelligence officer let alone a paranoid Russian mercenary hacker would prefer a Yandex.com email to a Yandex.ru email is mind-numbingly batsh%$ insane.
The USAF has named its new bomber, the B-21, the "Raider" as an homage to the Jimmy Doolittle raids on Japan:
Almost seven months after designating Northrop Grumman’s next-generation stealth aircraft the B-21, U.S. Air Force Secretary Deborah James announced on Sept. 19 that it will be called the Raider, in honor of the Doolittle Raiders who took on the Japanese during World War II.It should have been "Stealthy McStealthface".
The name came about through a poll of airmen that ran from March to May, with the winnowing down of potential names to a handful of top submissions. From more than 4,600 entries, the winning name "Raider" was revealed by Lt. Col. (ret.) Richard Cole at the opening of the Air Force Association’s Air, Space & Cyber Conference at National Harbor, Maryland. Cole is one of the last surviving Doolittle Raiders; he was co-pilot in aircraft No. 1.
………
There had been speculation that the Air Force’s B-21 name would honor a World War II aerial bombardment type, such as the B-17 Flying Fortress, B-29 Superfortress, Consolidated B-24 Liberator, North American B-25 Mitchell or Martin B-26 Marauder.
In choosing Raider, the air branch has rejected ghoulish suggestions like "Wraith" or "Spectre" as well as tongue-in-cheek nods to the aircraft’s low-observable profile such as "Stealthy McSteathface" and "Dr. Stealthlove."
I worked at GE Transportation System in the early 1990s aas a locomotive systems engineer.
After years of contraction and decay, they were recapitalizing.
Standard line was that they had gotten to the point where they had to recapitalize, but it was something more basic: The Wall Street types who believed that railroads were dying had finally looted all they could, and they had been replaced by management that actually believed in railroads.
Freight rail in the Us has been on a generally upward path since.
Well, we are seeing the same thing in the newspaper business these days, with the jargon of the official launch of Tronc, formerly Tribune Publishing being a particularly egregious example.
As Allison Hantschel observes, "Media Companies Hate News, the Internet, Employees and their Own Customers:
Or, as the Hip Happening Kids Today call it, #Tronc:
I understand that conventional journalism in general, and the newspaper business in particular, faces challenges, but the bigger problem is that upper management does not believe in the product: Journalism. (Of course, there is also the fact that Sam Zell ran the company into the ground).CasSelle: We produce tons of great content every single day. We’re really focused on how we we deliver it to people in a way they want to consume it more and more.These are internal employee videos designed to PUMP YOU UP about your newfound place not at Tribune Publishing, a recognizable name that at least still sounded impressive, but at Tronc, which sounds like you stepped on a duck.
Vasquez: One of the key ways we’re going to harness the power of our journalism is to have an optimization group. This Tronc team, will work with all of the local markets, to harness the power of our local journalism, feed it into a funnel, and then optimize it so we reach the biggest global audience possible.
Yes, Tronc shall take the corn feed of journalism and funnel it into the optimization-group goose, to make delicious foie gras that will be consumed by the digital natives.
It arguably gets worse from there. And what’s genuinely sad is that people who talk like this typically don’t understand how the internet actually works—that’s why they lean on buzzwords—or have any notion of how to communicate with journalists, who tend to bristle at this stuff.
Here’s a serious question for Republican officeholders: WTF?Seriously Dana, go Cheney yourself.
Now that Trump has a lock on the presidential nomination, many top Republicans — too many — are moving to embrace this vulgar man for the sake of party unity. It is a real [expletive] show.
The man who would be the Grand Old Party’s standard-bearer has said the following things (among many others) in front of thousands of men, women and children (and millions more via the media):
On U.S. companies relocating overseas: “You can tell them to go f--- themselves.”
On China’s artificial islands in the South China Sea: “They’re ripping the sh-- out of the sea.”
On the Islamic State? “I would bomb the sh-- out of ISIS.”
Earlier, on dealing with China: “Listen, you motherf---ers, we’re going to tax you 25 percent.”
And on climate change: “This very expensive global warming bullsh-- has got to stop.”
Republicans: This vulgarian speaks for you?
A man has changed his last name to "Null" and as a result, has scored lots of free stuff:
A man who changed his surname to 'Null' claims he's bagged numerous freebies because the word isn't compatible with computer databases.Me, I would change my name to, "Matthew'); DROP TABLE NSA;".
Raven Felix Null, 24, says he changed his name when he became an adult and claims it's resulted in seven free nights at seven different hotels and free-of-charge car rental.
It's all because the word 'Null' doesn't register with the computer's programming, so computer systems assume he's not a person.
The glitch means that when receptionists enter "Null" in the surname box the system automatically recognises the word as "an absence of data".
Which then results in the computer refusing to validate the request and Raven isn't billed for any of the items he's purchased.
The IT manager shared his knowledge on Reddit, where he goes by the username koalahumper, saying: "I have gotten a lot of free stuff because [a] code gives an error to the effect of "last name can't be left blank" and the person helping me will "just put my info in later" but they never do (or can't)."
If someone decides to challenge him about the issue, Raven threatens to sue the company for discrimination and the problem is often left until later in the day.
………
And Raven insists he didn't change his surname to "Null" to try and gain freebies, instead he chose it so he could disassociate himself from everything.
He explained: "it means nothing, meaning I am not connected to my "family" in any way any".
