Was at a party one time where some skinhead was showing off his new racist head tat. Someone asked why he got it on his head and he said, "When I have kids I can grow my hair and they'll never see it.

Someone nearby started laughing uproariously and said, "You idiot, both your grandfathers and you father were all bald by the time they were 40!"

If I need something a foot tall the wander around the house and trip over, well, I already have a dog.

Not sure what they were thinking, Alpamayo is one of the most dangerous climbs in the Andes. Beautiful mountains, but the death toll of the Cordillera Blanca is appalling. A single 1970 avalanche covered the entire town of Yungay and killed an estimated 20,000 people, while earlier avalanches have wiped out multiple other towns.

I wouldn't fuck them with YOUR dick, much less mine.

Really? Covering up the Gaza genocide is a leftist position now? Supporting the Iraq war was leftist? Burying stories about Dow, ADM and Monsanto was leftist? Pretending that no one could predict the Mortgage Meltdown or the Dot Bomb so no one should be prosecuted was leftist? Etc. etc. etc.

Yeesh, I'd hate to see what it takes to qualify as 'right wing' in your book.

The Reagan Badministration pretty much eliminated any 'leftists', they've only moved further and further to the right, even approving of the Iraq invasion.

Damn, we really liked the Alexa better before they started using their AI in the background. Now voice recognition is nowhere nearly as good, it frequently moves our music when resuming after a pause to some other device, and generally seems dumber overall. Now they're going to make it worse? Drat.

That's my stalker troll, it follows up pretty much every post of mine with pro-US propaganda (frequently talking points which were disproved years ago), generally unrelated to the discussion at all. I think it's a particularly poorly programmed bot of some kind.

Well, in all honesty I think my last statement could apply to pretty much every Administration since the early 80's, when the lawyers and bankers took over the government.

Copper is more expensive, and will reduce profits! Won't someone think of the executives' bonuses? How can you deprive them of their second apartment for their mistress? Have you no heart?

It mentions 'antibiotics' instead of antifungal medications because journalism is dead. Once upon a time a science writer would have some background in science and a business writer would have some background (or at least education) in business. Those days are long gone.

I thought retroactive laws were invalid? Or is that only for criminal court?

Thanks for the summary.

Ever seen a consumer recycling operation? It's a miserable, dangerous, low paying job mostly staffed by illegals because rather than pay worker's comp the company can get them deported (much like the meat industry), the sooner it's automated the better. Plastics are particularly problematic for them, because while almost all of them have the "recyclable" symbol on them it's difficult to tell the various types apart so most of them get incinerated.

Robots and AI can sort and separate different types of materials far faster, more efficiently and more accurately than humans. New spectrographs can analyze a fragment of something almost instantaneously, allowing separation of the various types of plastics. All three innovations are already being used in commercial recycling in Europe (like construction waste and factory scraps). Consumer recycling is a considerably more difficult nut to crack, but China seems poised to make it work. It will be interesting to see.

That's been the secret to China's success, sure they have companies which pursue the high-profit industry segments, but they have a plethora of companies which are content with a much lower return like REE and a government which supports their effort. With their galloping advances in robotics and AI it would be surprising if they don't become the world leader in consumer waste recycling very soon.