Links 10/16/2022 | naked capitalism

Lambert and I, and many readers, agree that Ukraine has prompted the worst informational environment ever. We hope readers will collaborate in mitigating the fog of war — both real fog and stage fog — in comments. None of us need more cheerleading and link-free repetition of memes; there are platforms for that. Low-value, link-free pom pom-wavers will be summarily whacked.

And for those who are new here, this is not a mere polite request. We have written site Policies and those who comment have accepted those terms. To prevent having to resort to the nuclear option of shutting comments down entirely until more sanity prevails, as we did during the 2015 Greek bailout negotiations and shortly after the 2020 election, we are going to be ruthless about moderating and blacklisting offenders.

–Yves

P.S. Also, before further stressing our already stressed moderators, read our site policies:

Please do not write us to ask why a comment has not appeared. We do not have the bandwidth to investigate and reply. Using the comments section to complain about moderation decisions/tripwires earns that commenter troll points. Please don’t do it. Those comments will also be removed if we encounter them.

Bear 747 Overcomes Scandal to Win Fat Bear Week Smithsonian and How Fat Bear Week Will Recover From Voter Fraud Slate

US imports sink in September, suffer steepest drop since 2020 lockdowns American Shipper

Climate

Proposal to grant the ocean rights calls for a sea change in legal framework Monga Bay

Alaska snow crab season canceled as officials investigate disappearance of an estimated 1 billion crabs CBS

America’s Lost Crops Rewrite The History Of Farming The Atlantic

Study provides evidence of physical change that can be observed in the days before an earthquake The Watchers

#COVID19

Weber Shandwick Provides PR for Moderna and Pfizer, While Staffing the CDC’s Vaccine Office The DisInformation Chronicle. As of September 2020. Given the democidal debacle that CDC’s Covid messaging has been, obviously nobody should ever hire Weber Shandwick for anything, ever. And speaking of lying–

Lying about COVID? Many Americans did so to feel ‘normal’ amid pandemic, study finds Miami Herald.

Many Americans have admitted to lying about COVID-19. The lies include misleading others about whether they were sick and if they were following recommended public health guidance to reduce the spread of the virus, according to the study published Oct. 10 in JAMA Network Open. The most common reasons 42% of Americans reported telling lies included desiring to feel “normal” and wanting to “exercise personal freedom,” the researchers found.

From JAMA’s original:

Anatomy of a scientific communications debacle. Of the highlighted “reasons” (left column), notice both how damaging to public health the ideology of “personal freedom” is, but also the blown opportunity for public figures to provide life-saving quidance. However, I can’t fathom the first highlight: Lying to feel “normal.” Sounds like our foreign policy establishment, i.e. the fish rots from the head?

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BQ.1.1 is among the most immune-evasive COVID variants yet. It’s coming in hot in the U.S. Fortune

COVID waves: Europe and US compared Pandemic

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Tolerability and immunogenicity of an intranasally-administered adenovirus-vectored COVID-19 vaccine: An open-label partially-randomised ascending dose phase I trial eBioMedicine. AZD1222, University of Oxford / AstraZeneca. From the Summary: “We performed a single-centre open-label Phase I clinical trial of intranasal vaccination with ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 in healthy adults, using the existing formulation produced for intramuscular administration…. This formulation of intranasal ChAdOx1 nCoV-19 showed an acceptable tolerability profile but induced neither a consistent mucosal antibody response nor a strong systemic response.” Fine. It’s hardly in AstraZeneca’s interest to nuke their intramuscular market in the rich West. What about Bharat?

First They Got Long Covid. Then, It Made Them Homeless Rolling Stone and Long COVID took their health. Then it took their money. Boston Globe. Both from a thead by Taylor Lorenz, oddly.

New monkeypox cases have declined by 85% since August peak. Here’s why. LGBTQ Nation. The deck: “‘The strategy worked,’ White House MPX coordinator Dr. Demetre Daskalakis told LGBTQ Nation.” Indeed. Monkeypox is now endemic, along with Covid. And with Ebola, CDC has a chance for a hat trick!

Ebola hits Ugandan capital as president blames victim for ‘poisoning’ others Telegraph. Entebbe International Airport. Commentary:

China?

As it happened: China’s 20th Communist Party national congress opens in Beijing South China Morning Post

Xi Jinping heralds ‘critical time’ in history as he prepares for third term in power FT

The End of ASEAN as We Know It Project Syndicate

India

Why India is arming Armenia against Azerbaijan The Cradle

Syraqistan

Iran’s Evin prison set on fire after clashes between inmates and guards FT

LIV Golfers On Saudi Course Forced To Putt Around Woman Being Beheaded The Onion

Dear Old Blighty

UK PM Liz Truss Is in Charge, Says Her New Finance Minister Reuters. Sounds like the dreaded vote of confidence” in baseball. Commentary (CanCyn):

one mp said to me last night pic.twitter.com/e02T1yBuPY

— Michael Spicer (@MrMichaelSpicer) October 14, 2022

That’s quite an act you’ve got there. What do you call it?

Every doctor, every biologist, everyone with any grasp of antibiotic resistance and its development, just clutching their heads and screaming OH MY GOD NO… pic.twitter.com/JAEDXtb5r7

— David Andress (@ProfDaveAndress) October 15, 2022

Mark Carney: ‘Doubling down on inequality was a surprising choice’ FT. It was?

European Disunion

Germany’s Apokalypse Now The Tablet

EU Ambassadors Annual Conference 2022: Opening speech by High Representative Josep Borrell EUEA (The Diplomatic Service of the European Union). Commentary:

9. “You – the United States – take care of our security. You – China and Russia – provided the basis of our prosperity. This is a world that is no longer there. … a competitive world where everything is being weaponised. …We are too much Kantians and not enough Hobbesians “

— Henry Farrell (@henryfarrell) October 12, 2022

Germany’s Scholz calls for bigger European Union Reuters

New Not-So-Cold War

Elon Musk changes tune, says SpaceX will ‘keep funding Ukraine’ after asking for government support FOX. Post hoc?

Musk added to Ukraine’s Myrotvorets kill list (which includes 327 children!)

I’ve been speaking & writing about this list for years, after being placed on it in 2019, but now that Musk is on it, after Roger Waters & others, perhaps the “peacemaker” list might itself be killed… pic.twitter.com/lLUxnReZZp

— Eva Karene Bartlett (@EvaKBartlett) October 14, 2022

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The dangers of letting blustery rhetoric dictate US policy in Ukraine Responsible Statecraft

A Winter War In Ukraine Favors Russia And Will Be Bloody 1945 (MA).

A Blast From The Past Andrei Martyanov, Reminiscence of the Future. Martyanov was a cadet when the Russian Naval Academy was run by Vasily Alexandrovich Arkhipov. More from Martyanov:

Here, Martyanov does a close reading of the dog’s breakfast that is the Biden Administration’s “National Security Strategy” (original at NC here). Well worth a listen. Good clean fun!

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Ukraine War Day #232: Why Russia Needs To Take Odessa Awful Avalanche

Kerch Bridge, Nord Stream the handiwork of top-tier saboteurs Asia Times

#NAFO Ukes, Kooks & Spooks

Local family tired of dad’s daily Ukraine war briefings Duffel Blog

Biden Administration

With New Crackdown, Biden Wages Global Campaign on Chinese Technology NYT. Let me know how that works out.

2022

Here are 10 critical House races to watch in November The Hill. CA-22, MI-7, NE-2, NH-1, NJ-7, OR-6, RI-2, TX-34, WA-8, WI-3.

Capitol Seizure

As FBI probed Jan. 6, many agents sympathized with insurrection, according to newly released email USA Today (Furzy Mouse).

Democrats en Déshabillé

With Tulsi Gabbard Out Of Democratic Party, Title Of Hottest Democrat Goes Back To Nancy Pelosi Babylon Bee

The Bezzle

The Rise and Fall of Bitcoin Culture Coin Desk. Normally I don’t link to CoinDesk because cheerleading The Bezzle is not my thing. But there’s some history here.

Interview: Why Mastering Language Is So Difficult for AI Undark

Tech

The Instagram gods are angry FlakPhoto

Zeitgeist Watch

New York Congressional Candidate Releases Porn Video Featuring Himself Jezebel

Class Warfare

Quality of life concerns weigh heavily on rail contract vote ABC

Shein: Fast-fashion workers paid 3p per garment for 18-hour days, undercover filming in China reveals iNews

Good Servants and Bad Masters Lapham’s Quarterly (AL).

Did Emily Dickinson Have A Boston Accent? An Investigation Defector

What Do Conductors Really Do? (Part 1 of 2) The Honest Broker

Music and the Body: Richard Powers on the Power of Song The Marginalian

What Is It Like to Have a Brain?: On Patrick House’s “Nineteen Ways of Looking at Consciousness” Los Angeles Review of Books. Get back to me when it makes sense.

Antidote du jour (via):

Bonus antidote:

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.