Good morning.

Wednesday in Whitewater will be overcast with a high of thirty.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:37 PM, for 9h 12m 12s of daytime.  The moon is a waning crescent with 48.6% of its visible disk illuminated.

  On this day in 1912, German geophysicist Alfred Wegener first presents his theory of continental drift.

Recommended for reading in full — 

Prosecutors clear white police officer over Jacob Blake shooting in Kenosha:

US prosecutors have cleared white police officer Rusten Sheskey in the shooting of 29-year-old Black man Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. ’It is my decision now … that no Kenosha law enforcement officer in this case will be charged with any criminal offense,’ said Michael Graveley, the Kenosha County district attorney. Sheskey shot Blake seven times in the back, leaving him paralyzed. B’Ivory Lamarr, a lawyer for the Blake family, said the decision shows there are ‘three justice systems’ in America: ‘One for black and brown people, one for police officers and one for the rest of America.’ Lamarr said the fight for justice will continue: ‘We won’t stop until there is actually truly one nation under God with justice and liberty for us all.’

 Luke Winkie writes Trump’s presidency is ending. Is the reign of Newsmax and OAN just beginning?:

Yochai Benkler is a professor at Harvard Law School who has studied the ebbs and flows of right-wing media for decades. According to the research in his book Network Propaganda, the fervor for Fox News deteriorated during the early months of 2016, as the Republican party was engulfed in a contentious primary and the Murdoch Estate hadn’t yet formally backed a candidate. “They got attacked viciously by Breitbart and Trump, and our data showed clearly that, at least online, attention to Fox declined and became less central to the right wing media ecosystem,” says Benkler. “It was only with their adoption of the full-throated Trump support that they really came back.”

….

He believes the rot at the core of the right-wing media sphere has percolated for much longer than the lifespans of this current crop of Twitter malcontents. Specifically, he names Rush Limbaugh and his talk radio generation, who initially pioneered the sneering, fuck-your-feelings demeanor that was quickly normalized into an abating media industry. “The craziness didn’t start on social media and migrate to TV,” says Benkler. “It started on radio and TV and migrated online.”

 Michael Kranish reports Cleta Mitchell, who advised Trump on Saturday phone call, resigns from law firm:

Republican lawyer Cleta Mitchell, who advised President Trump during his Saturday phone call with Georgia’s secretary of state in an effort to overturn the election, resigned on Tuesday as a partner in the Washington office of the law firm Foley & Lardner.

Mitchell’s resignation came after the law firm on Monday issued a statement saying it was “concerned by” her role in the call. The firm noted that as a matter of policy, its attorneys do not represent “any parties seeking to contest the results of the election.”

The Washington Post on Sunday published audio and a transcript of the hour-long call in which Trump pressured Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to overturn the election results. During the call, Mitchell complained that she had not been given access to certain information from Raffensperger’s office, and Trump relied on her to an extraordinary degree during the call.

How ‘Ratatouille’ Became A TikTok Musical:

Good morning.

Tuesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of thirty.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:36 PM, for 9h 11m 02s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 59.9% of its visible disk illuminated.

  On this day in 1855, King Camp Gillette, inventor of the Gillette safety razor, is born in Fond du Lac. 

Recommended for reading in full — 

 Mary Astor reports A Georgia election official debunked Trump’s claims of voter fraud, point by point:

In a searing news conference on Monday, Gabriel Sterling, a top election official in Georgia, systematically debunked President Trump’s false claims of voter fraud. Again.

“The reason I’m having to stand here today is because there are people in positions of authority and respect who have said their votes didn’t count, and it’s not true,” said Mr. Sterling, a Republican who last month condemned the president’s failure to denounce threats against election officials, and who was tasked on Monday with responding to the news of a phone call in which Mr. Trump pressured Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, to “find” enough votes to change the outcome of the presidential race.

….

TRUMP’S CLAIM: That, amid the disruption caused by a broken water main at a vote-counting center in Fulton County, election workers brought in “suitcases or trunks” of ballots.

STERLING’S EXPLANATION: Late in the evening, after the water main break had been fixed, election workers prepared to go home for the night and followed standard procedures to store ballots securely: placing them in containers and affixing numbered seals. But when Mr. Raffensperger found out that they were closing up shop, he ordered them to continue counting through the night — so the workers retrieved the containers and resumed counting ballots.

All of this is on video footage that the secretary of state’s office posted publicly.

“This is what’s really frustrating: The president’s legal team had the entire tape,” Mr. Sterling said. “They watched the entire tape. They intentionally misled the State Senate, the voters and the people of the United States about this.”

(Astor’s reporting lists Sterling’s nine other point-by-point refutations of Trump’s claims.)

Helen Davidson writes Where is Jack Ma? Chinese tycoon not seen since October:

Speculation is mounting over the whereabouts of the Chinese billionaire Jack Ma, who has not been seen or heard in public for more than two months.

Ma, the co-founder and former chairman of the technology firm Alibaba, has fallen out of favour with China’s leadership. In late October, he stood alongside senior officials and delivered a blunt speech criticising national regulators, reportedly infuriating China’s president, Xi Jinping.

In the following months, regulators summoned Ma and other executives in for questioning and halted what would have been the world’s biggest share offering of his company, Ant Group. They later launched anti-monopoly investigations into Alibaba and its key competitor TenCent, and called Ant Group in for questioning. In late December, regulators ordered Ma to pare down his empire.

 This cross-border cycle path links the Atlantic Pyrenees to towns on the Spanish side of the border:

Good morning.

Monday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of thirty-one.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:35 PM, for 9h 09m 56s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 70.6% of its visible disk illuminated.

  On this day in 2004, Spirit, a NASA Mars rover, lands successfully on Mars.

Recommended for reading in full — 

 All 10 living former defense secretaries write Involving the military in election disputes would cross into dangerous territory:

Ashton Carter, Dick Cheney, William Cohen, Mark Esper, Robert Gates, Chuck Hagel, James Mattis, Leon Panetta, William Perry and Donald Rumsfeld are the 10 living former U.S. secretaries of defense.

As former secretaries of defense, we hold a common view of the solemn obligations of the U.S. armed forces and the Defense Department. Each of us swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. We did not swear it to an individual or a party.

American elections and the peaceful transfers of power that result are hallmarks of our democracy. With one singular and tragic exception that cost the lives of more Americans than all of our other wars combined, the United States has had an unbroken record of such transitions since 1789, including in times of partisan strife, war, epidemics and economic depression. This year should be no exception.

Our elections have occurred. Recounts and audits have been conducted. Appropriate challenges have been addressed by the courts. Governors have certified the results. And the electoral college has voted. The time for questioning the results has passed; the time for the formal counting of the electoral college votes, as prescribed in the Constitution and statute, has arrived.

As senior Defense Department leaders have noted, “there’s no role for the U.S. military in determining the outcome of a U.S. election.” Efforts to involve the U.S. armed forces in resolving election disputes would take us into dangerous, unlawful and unconstitutional territory. Civilian and military officials who direct or carry out such measures would be accountable, including potentially facing criminal penalties, for the grave consequences of their actions on our republic.

 Steve Schmidt describes The Seven Aspects of Trumpism [three excerpted below]:

Trumpism is an American autocratic movement with fascistic markers. There are seven specific parts that comprise its core.

1. THE LEADER: Donald Trump is the unquestioned leader of this movement. It is a cult of personality, and there are no serious challengers against his leadership.

2. THUGS: The Proud Boys are but one example in a toxic stew of heavily-armed militias, white nationalists and other right-wing extremists. As is always the case, their ranks are filled with people on the fringes of society; the lonely, dispossessed, aggrieved and resentful. Not so long ago, there would have been a near-societal consensus around describing these people as losers. These people bring the menace of violence to politics and are akin to the same thuggish rabble that were wearing brown and black shirts 100 years ago.

4. PROPAGANDISTS: Autocratic movements are built on and sustained by lies. Political lying and conspiracy theories have become billion-dollar businesses. Fox News, Newsmax, One America News Network, social media, talk-radio dividers, Infowars, and others have poisoned the American polity and created the conditions for Trump to create an alternate reality that is now a lethal threat to American liberty.

  Bali’s famous beaches covered in plastic garbage:

Good morning.

Sunday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of twenty-eight.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:34 PM, for 9h 08m 53s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 80% of its visible disk illuminated.

  On this day in 1777, the Continental Army defeats the British at the Battle of Princeton.

Recommended for reading in full — 

E. Tammy Kim writes This Is Why Nursing Homes Failed So Badly (‘The first coronavirus outbreak in the United States happened in a nursing home in February. Since then, it’s only gotten worse’):

The first coronavirus outbreak in the United States occurred in a nursing home near Seattle, in late February. Since then, the country has endlessly revised its hot spot map. Yet the situation in nursing homes and assisted-living facilities has only gotten worse: More than 120,000 workers and residents have died, and residents are now dying at three times the rate they did in July.

Long-term care continues to be understaffed, poorly regulated and vulnerable to predation by for-profit conglomerates and private-equity firms. The nursing aides who provide the bulk of bedside assistance still earn poverty wages, and lockdown policies have forced patients into dangerous solitude.

A few weeks ago, nursing home workers and residents began to receive vaccinations for the coronavirus, but even full immunization will not allay the tragedy that has unfolded in long-term care — not just the deaths, but also the isolation and neglect.

Lori Smetanka, the executive director of the National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care, an advocacy nonprofit, told me stories of nursing home residents who’ve gone weeks without being showered or having their teeth brushed. Residents with dementia have suffered terribly from a lack of human contact, leading to depression and loss of weight, mobility and speech.

 The Associated Press reports British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s father reportedly seeks French citizenship:

CALAIS, France — France’s government cast a favorable light Friday on a reported bid by the father of Britain’s prime minister to take up French nationality, saying it shows how attached Britons are to the European Union that they’re no longer part of.

Reports that Stanley Johnson, the father of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, is seeking to keep a foot in Europe by taking up French citizenship made headlines just as his son led Britain’s split Thursday from the EU. Britain left the European bloc’s vast single market for people, goods and services at 11 p.m. London time on New Year’s Eve.

Visiting Calais on Friday to inspect how the French port is adjusting post-Brexit, France’s minister for European affairs, Clément Beaune, described the citizenship application as emblematic of enduring British sentiment for Europe.

“If Mr. Johnson’s father has a right to French nationality, wants to remain a European citizen and become a French citizen, then we will examine that,” he said. “To me, this is a wink, or a sign, that lots of British people, in different ways, still love Europe.

….

French nationality would give the elder Johnson the automatic rights that other Britons have lost, including being able to travel and live freely in all of the 27 EU countries.

  Boston Dynamics Robots Dance to Do You Love Me?:

Good morning.

Saturday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of twenty-seven.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:33 PM, for 9h 07m 55s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 87.1% of its visible disk illuminated.

  On this day in 1777, American forces under the command of Gen. Washington repulse a British attack at the Battle of the Assunpink Creek near Trenton, New Jersey.

Recommended for reading in full — 

David E. Sanger, Nicole Perlroth, and Julian E. Barnes report As Understanding of Russian Hacking Grows, So Does Alarm:

On Election Day, General Paul M. Nakasone, the nation’s top cyberwarrior, reported that the battle against Russian interference in the presidential campaign had posted major successes and exposed the other side’s online weapons, tools and tradecraft.

“We’ve broadened our operations and feel very good where we’re at right now,” he told journalists.

Eight weeks later, General Nakasone and other American officials responsible for cybersecurity are now consumed by what they missed for at least nine months: a hacking, now believed to have affected upward of 250 federal agencies and businesses, that Russia aimed not at the election system but at the rest of the United States government and many large American corporations.

Three weeks after the intrusion came to light, American officials are still trying to understand whether what the Russians pulled off was simply an espionage operation inside the systems of the American bureaucracy or something more sinister, inserting “backdoor” access into government agencies, major corporations, the electric grid and laboratories developing and transporting new generations of nuclear weapons.

At a minimum it has set off alarms about the vulnerability of government and private sector networks in the United States to attack and raised questions about how and why the nation’s cyberdefenses failed so spectacularly.

Andrew Fazekas writes of 10 spectacular stargazing events to watch in 2021: 

MARCH 9 AND 10: QUADRUPLE FORMATION

An impressive cosmic huddle will greet sky-watchers around the globe as four worlds cluster in the southeast morning sky. Mercury, Jupiter, and Saturn will all appear in near-perfect alignment, while the nearby crescent moon will frame the trio of planets. Each planet will appear as a brilliant dot, with Mercury being the faintest and Jupiter the brightest—all easily visible to the naked eye.

Through binoculars, stargazers will be able to spot Jupiter’s four largest moons, while a small telescope will reveal Saturn’s rings. Because of Earth’s position relative to Mercury and the sun, only half of the innermost planet’s disk will appear illuminated to us. As a result, Mercury will look like a miniature version of the quarter moon through the telescope.

….

AUGUST 12 AND 13: PERSEID METEOR SHOWER PEAKS

Every mid-August, Earth travels through a cloud of debris shed by the comet Swift–Tuttle, producing a flurry of shooting stars in the skies as small meteors burn up in the upper atmosphere. This is the Perseid meteor shower, and it can produce up to 60 shooting stars an hour in a typical year.

This year promises to be particularly good for the Perseids, since the shower’s peak will coincide with a dark, moonless sky. A thin crescent moon will set during the early evening, ushering in excellent viewing conditions later in the night. The Northern Hemisphere is favored since the meteors always appear to radiate from their namesake constellation Perseus, which lies close to the horizon this time of year for those in far southern latitudes.

To get the best view of this celestial fireworks show, scout out a viewing spot with as little light pollution as possible. Even from a suburban backyard or park, dozens of shooting stars should be visible each hour under clear skies.

  Lawmakers Evacuate as Earthquake Shakes Slovenian National Assembly:

Good morning.

Friday in Whitewater will be cloudy, with some snow this evening, and a high of thirty-two.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:32 PM, for 9h 07m 00s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 93.8% of its visible disk illuminated.

  On this day in 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation takes effect in Confederate territory.

Recommended for reading in full — 

 Simon Tisdall writes Trump fed our worst instincts. His global legacy is toxic and immoral:

How much damage did Donald Trump do around the world, can it be repaired, and did he accomplish anything of lasting significance? Assessing the international legacy of the 45th US president is not so much a conventional survey of achievement and failure. It’s more like tracking the rampages of a cantankerous rogue elephant that leaves a trail of random destruction and shattered shibboleths in its wake. Last week’s wild pardoning spree is a case in point.

First, the big picture. Trump’s confrontational manner, combined with his “America First” agenda, seriously undermined transatlantic relations and US global leadership. Joe Biden promises to set this right, but it will not be easy.

….

Trump encouraged authoritarian “strongman” leaders such as Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Egypt’s dictator Abdel Fatah al-Sisi, and hooligans such as Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro. He coddled autocrats such as Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman and Russia’s Putin. Worse, his lies eroded trust in democracy and the rule of law, at home and abroad. Yet even as, properly and electorally vanquished, he slowly departs, he continues to antagonise and divide – and to be lionised by the right.

Maybe it’s not that hard to see why. Trump’s personal brand of viciousness appealed to every worst human instinct, justified every vile prejudice, excused every mean and unkind thought. His is a blind ignorance that resonates with those who will not or cannot see. Falsehood is always easier than truth. For these reasons, Trump’s global legacy is Trumpism. It will live on – toxic, immoral, ubiquitous and ever-threatening.

Melanie D.G. Kaplan writes John Steinbeck’s classic travelogue showcases man’s best road trip buddy:

Fourteen years ago, I decided to drive across the United States. This came after a childhood of cross-country rides in the back seat of my parents’ car, visiting my grandparents in Southern California. But in 2007, when I was a full-fledged grown-up, my grandmother worried about this trip well before my departure. My mother wanted to know where I would sleep. My sister said she couldn’t imagine driving all those miles by myself.

“Don’t you wish you had someone there to share it with?” she asked.

Reminding them about my four-legged travel buddy did nothing to quell their unease. “I’m not alone,” I said, time and again. “Darwin will be with me.”

Perhaps I carried an extra air of confidence when I reiterated that statement about my co-pilot and explained that this trip was wholly different from a solo adventure. I had just read John Steinbeck’s “Travels With Charley: In Search of America,” and it spoke to me. Loudly.

“I took one companion on my journey — an old French gentleman poodle known as Charley,” Steinbeck wrote. He described Charley as a born diplomat, expert sniffer and poor fighter. He was an early bird, a good watchdog and friend who “would rather travel about than anything he can imagine.” The pair set off on their journey in September 1960.

Darwin was also a good friend — a sassy, independent beagle, occasional growler and regular howler who loved road trips second only to eating. In 2007, we traveled 8,800 miles in 30 days.

 Maniacal Squirrels Declare War Against New York: