“Armageddon”

Atomic scientists on Tuesday kept their “Doomsday Clock” set as close to midnight as ever before, citing Russia’s actions on nuclear weapons amid its invasion of Ukraine, nuclear-armed Israel’s Gaza war and worsening climate change as factors driving the risk of global catastrophe.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, as they did last year, set the clock at 90 seconds to midnight – the theoretical point of annihilation. Scientists set the clock based on “existential” risks to Earth and its people: nuclear threat, climate change, and disruptive technologies such as artificial intelligence and new biotechnology.

In an era of economic uncertainty and rising populism, it could be considered prudent for the super-rich to hide, or at the very least downplay, their wealth.

Lording it over the masses at a time of political volatility has backfired on elites in the past so some restraint might be advised.

Mark Zuckerberg, however, has a $100 million apocalypse-proof bunker in Hawaii, perhaps explaining why he has no hesitation in flaunting his latest business venture.

Beauty isn’t always diverse

It seems that things are going to the dogs across the Channel. It’s not just that the French birth rate, educational standards, and the homegrown car industry are all in decline; nor even that the homicide rate, Americanisms, and fast-food outlets are surging. It’s even worse than that: a short-haired, flat-chested woman was just crowned Miss France. Though the public vote in Saturday’s televised final went to two more generously appointed and traditionally becoiffed contestants, in a shock move, the all-female judging panel ranked a pixie-cutted maths graduate called Eve Gillès — otherwise known as Miss Nord-Pas-de-Calais — above both of them.

I think she is just fine.

Neil Postman foresaw our trivial dystopia

Of the very few activities in my life that I count as being unambiguously improving, reading books and visiting authoritarian states probably score highest. Both are generally engaging, educational in some form or other, and force me to confront alternative visions of life. I feel much the same way, whenever I dip into Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death (1985), which explores how and why populations might realistically become oppressed or compliant.

This week, the U.S. Navy’s Carrier Strike Group 5, centered around the USS Ronald Reagan, has been steaming off the east coast of Taiwan.

Be glad it is there. China has been throwing a diplomatic tantrum — fiercer than usual — because the Biden administration allowed William Lai Ching-te, Taiwan’s vice president, to make “transit” stops in New York and San Francisco on his way to and from Paraguay.

It’s taken the Liberal government two tries and more than two years to get Bill C-11 through the legislative process. If the Senate doesn’t fight the government on removing a number of amendments senators previously added to the bill, Bill C-11 could receive royal assent shortly after Parliament comes back from break next week.

There is an old saying that revolutionaries never really succeed because they never stop being revolutionary. When power changes hands to new tyrants, the revolutionaries are eliminated, and the process starts all over again. That cycle changes with the elimination of tyranny, but like Tolkien’s missing ring, it never seems to really go away even when dormant.

An Angus Reid poll that canvassed the voting intentions of 5,000 Canadians from March 6-13 uncovered a wide gender gap between Conservative and Liberal supporters. Overall, the Liberals trail (29 per cent to 35 per cent). But while a plurality of men say they would vote Conservative if an election were held tomorrow, 44 per cent of women under 35 say they would vote for the NDP and 42 per cent of women over 55 intend to vote Liberal.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has his work cut out for him on that front. But he should understand that it’s got nothing to do with him personally. Numerous studies have concluded that educated women trend ideologically leftward at greater rates than men.

Green campaigners are not ‘following the science’ – they are promoting a Biblical fantasy.

The End Times are back once more. The latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, published this week, prompted a typically apocalyptic response in the media and beyond. ‘It’s our last chance to limit global warming before climate-change damage becomes irreversible’, ran one headline. ‘Act now or it’s too late’, was the Guardian’s measured assessment. It might as well have said, ‘Repent sinners, the end is nigh’.

This once reliably vocal faction has gone quiet

As Labour prepares for government, Keir Starmer has cracked down on dissidents and fringe groups within the party. More insidious, perhaps, is the decline of what was once a reliable and vocal faction: the anti-war Left. At the weekend Clive Lewis, MP for Norwich South and stalwart of the Labour Left, questioned the Ministry of Defence over its failure to provide Ukraine with used Apache helicopters in the country’s “hour of need”. This came days after John McDonnell, shadow chancellor under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, argued in a piece for Labour Hub that “a refusal to provide the weapons the Ukrainians need” would mean that “the chances of the Russian invasion succeeding are significantly increased”.

A basic question.

The Biden administration has been stonewalling its East Palestine chemical disaster from the beginning. Transportation Secretary Buttigieg took ten days to even comment on it in the most cursory fashion. East Palestine’s mayor stated that no one had reached out to him from the Biden White House until a day before a public event. And residents are still not being told the truth or given basic factual information.

Hmmmm…

🚨OHIO UPDATE 🚨

If it doesn’t get WEIRDER than this! 3 months ago East Palestine, OH was at the center of pilot program to respond to EMERGENCY situations

They gave digital ID’s FOR FREE to residents to track long term health problems like “difficulty breathing” pic.twitter.com/2ImWzMPvFc

— E (@ElijahSchaffer) February 17, 2023

UPDATE: Nothing to see here folks.

Moments ago, airspace over Montana was shut down over what is likely another aircraft that is going to be shot down. This comes just hours after Canadian PM Justin Trudeau ordered another craft to be shot down over Canada.

Many are asking if something bigger is about to happen.

h/t XC