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Asparagus
Checked out my garden tonight: my potatoes are ready, will be harvesting on a need to eat basis until they are gone or frost is imminent.
My asparagus is coming nicely: have planted in 3 bunches, one planting per year. My first bunch should be ready next year (it takes at least 3 years for plants to get going enough (seed plantings a year or more longer)).
So in 3 years time I should have asparagus coming out my Ying Yang! Can't wait. Focused on the asparagus and potatoes due to lack of time: no cherry tomatoes this year. :(
Playing Europa universalist 4 as France currently, then watched Rocket Men with my son and wife: my son enjoyed it. Brought back memories of watching moon walks as a kid.
Keeping busy.
Maybe I'll try to submit some stories next week.
Gotta keep busy.
Happy End of the World
I think I may have figured out at last what is making the Human Race so unhappy, and it's not just to do with chasing after little green pieces of paper. It occurred to me recently, but I'm getting rather forgetful these days. Let me see if I can remember.
Prodigal K-pop composer enlists in South Korean Marine Corps
Prodigal K-pop composer enlists in South Korea’s Marine Corps
Move was kept quiet, with only Lee Chan-hyuk’s parents, agency and a few of his close friends in the know
K-pop duo band Akdong Musician’s composer and singer Lee Chan-hyuk, often regarded as a musical prodigy has enlisted in the country’s Marine Corps.
The star, 21, who plays with his younger sister Su-hyun, voluntarily entered a training centre in Pohang, North Gyeongsang Province. He kept his enlistment quiet from the public as his Christian pastor parents, a few close friends and staff from his agency YG Entertainment saw him enter the military world for two years.
Lee enlisted early compared to other K-pop celebrities, who usually postpone mandatory military service until their late 20s or 30s. He said he enlisted to train with others around his age “to build diverse experiences and improve my musical skills,” according to media reports.
CEO's Bonus Cut After Tirade Against Kathy Griffin
KB Home Cuts CEO's Bonus 25% After Rant Against Kathy Griffin
KB Home’s board will cut Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Mezger’s annual bonus by 25 percent as punishment for his profanity-laced tirade against comedian Kathy Griffin and warned he’ll be dismissed if he does anything like that again.
Mezger’s bonus for the fiscal year ending Nov. 30 will be reduced by $375,000, based on performance targets, because of “recent behavior in his personal dealings with a neighbor,” the board said in a regulatory filing Thursday, calling his conduct “unacceptable.”
KB Home cuts CEO’s bonus as punishment for his profanity-laced rant at neighbor Kathy Griffin
In audio released by the Huffington Post, Mezger called comedian Kathy Griffin a "f---ing c---," "a b----," an "a--hole" and a "f---ing bald dyke." Security cameras caught Mezger's tirade, the culmination of a series of disputes between the neighbors in a gated community in Los Angeles' upscale Bel Air neighborhood.
[...] Through a spokesman, Mezger suggested Wednesday that Griffin's history of unjustly nitpicking about noise was partly to blame for his apoplectic rant.
"Though Mr. Mezger does not believe there is any excuse for the language he used, the incident that led to his losing his temper was the result of the culmination of a series of unneighborly actions taken by Ms. Griffin and her boyfriend," said Mezger's spokesman.
Those "actions" consist of up to 10 noise complaints that Griffin and her boyfriend, Randy Bick, have made against Mezger, leading to multiple visits by police, the spokesman said. In one of those cases in which the police showed up, the spokesman said, Mezger's niece, who "has stage 4 cancer" was renewing her marital vows with her husband at the Mezger home.
New Horizons Could Get More Mission Extensions
Wakened from its latest hibernation, New Horizons may visit additional Kuiper Belt Objects
Fuel saved during the MU69 encounter could be used to send New Horizons to a third KBO, a move that would require yet another mission extension. In 2016, NASA approved an extended mission for the MU69 flyby through the year 2021.
On Sept. 6, Stern told members of NASA’s Outer Planets Assessment Group that mission scientists are already searching for an additional KBO target.
“We have a fighting chance of having a second [Kuiper Belt Object] flyby,” Stern said.
Approval of another mission extension will also provide more opportunities for New Horizons to continue its distant observations of KBOs, dwarf planets, and centaurs. Stern said that he intends to request a second extension once the MU69 flyby is completed and the data collected from it returned to Earth.
Even that might not be the mission’s end. Stern foresees additional extensions beyond the one that would take it to a second KBO.
“There’s fuel and power on board the spacecraft to operate it for another 20 years,” Stern said. “That’s not going to be a concern even for a third or fourth extended mission.”
The probe will be put into another hibernation period on Dec. 22, 2017, during which it will remain until June 4, 2018, when it will be woken up in preparation for the MU69 encounter, which will officially begin in August 2018.
Size comparison to Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko (exact size and appearance of 2014 MU69 are still unknown, but it is suspected to be a binary object or contact binary, like Comet 67P)
basic income thinkings
My crude idea here is that basic income should be a reward for participating in a healthy, growing economy, not merely taking from the rich. That is an unhealthy attitude. It should be higher, if everyone is doing better, including the wealthiest.
My thinking is along the lines of the trust that runs the Alaskan Pipeline. Most Alaskans get a share and the better run and more profitable the pipeline is, the better the payout, leading to incentive to run things well rather than run things for the short term.
I'm not yet prepared for well developed ideas about how basic income should operate, but I think it should be highly predictable in how it operates and using metrics that are difficult to game. For example, no sudden and unpredictable changes in the level of payouts from machinations by politicians. No feedback from inflation (say by basic income being merely the printing of money combined with automatic inflation adjustment mechanisms, combining to create runaway inflation of the system).
Almost strictly pay-as-you-go or "revenue neutral" seems a good idea since money sitting around becomes a political target.
So here's a couple of ideas to put into the ring (oriented around the US where I live):
Basic income is all surplus federal tax revenue acquired by the US above its expenditures. Would generate incentives to run a balanced budget one way or another and encourage reduction of other expenditures.
and
Basic income is set in combination with a moderately progressive income tax at a level where a set percentage of the populace gains money. For example, it could be set so that the median income breaks even, thus half the population gains and half loses income. Incentives here would be to increase median income relative to everything else since that would be the basis for the payouts.
Keyesians might want to tool things so that basic income drops in good times and increases in bad times.
Jailed for writing to the BBC
The BBC has a story about a German schoolboy jailed for writing to the BBC.
Karl-Heinz Borchardt was 18 years old when he was arrested by the Stasi in East Germany for writing to the BBC. In communist East Germany, listening to a foreign broadcaster was a crime, and Borchardt had been listening to the BBC's Letters without Signatures on its German service.
Much to the ire of the East German regime, the BBC programme gave an extraordinary insight into the physical and emotional lives of a cross-section of GDR society for more than 25 years.
"It was like coming up for air," says Borchardt - a form of release for a young, curious mind locked in the suffocating atmosphere of the communist state.
The methods employed by the Stasi to track down "criminals" who wrote to the BBC were quite clever.
They took saliva samples from the licked envelopes to identify blood groups which they cross-checked with doctor's records. They traced fingerprints on the paper, sourced the ink and collated an extensive archive of handwriting samples.
They caught Borchardt by cross-referencing the handwriting on one of his letters with that on a piece of school homework that he'd handed in.
He spent eight months in prison before being sentenced to two years for "attempted subversive activities" in conjunction with an enemy broadcaster.
Can't post
Lawrence Lessig is taking on the Electoral College!
In a democracy, all votes should count equally. In our democracy, when voting for the president, they do not.
Because of the winner-take-all allocation of electoral votes, if you don’t vote for the candidate who wins your state, your vote counts for nothing. That violates the Constitution’s “one person, one vote” principle.
We plan to challenge this system in the courts. Join this fight for citizen equality.
Trump supports DREAMers/DACA now!
Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really!.....
4:28 AM - Sep 14, 2017
..They have been in our country for many years through no fault of their own - brought in by parents at young age. Plus BIG border security
4:35 AM - Sep 14, 2017
Gotta say; I agree with Trump, apparently.
