Events

I'll have more on this when I digest it further. This week, U.S. Senators John McCain (R-AZ) and Jeff Flake (R-AZ) released a report showing that the Department of Defense has spent $7m sponsoring patriotic displays at sports events. I am horrified. James Fallows is gobsmacked, saying: "I wasn't cynical enough." The title of this post comes from a circa-1900 essay by Mark Twain. And, of course, we should all re-read Sinclair Lewis. And Edward Gibbon. The end is not near. We still have hundreds of years...

Thank you, Dr. L:

TPM's Josh Marshall isn't saying so exactly, but there does seem to be something off about the good doctor's campaign: Hucksters and cheats can be found everywhere. But particularly on the right there is a significant layer of people in the business of fleecing outraged and/or low-information conservatives of their money. Some of it you see with those advertisements for buying gold on Fox News. ... But the big thing on the right are various fundraising groups that exist largely to fundraise. So for...

The Economist reports that gun seizures at TSA checkpoints have risen dramatically: TSA agents discovered 68 firearms in travellers’ carry-on bags. That is the most the agency has ever found in a week. Of them, 61 were loaded, and 25 had a round in the chamber, ready to fire. The record probably won’t stand for long. The prior high-water mark for intercepted guns was  set a month earlier, when TSA agents found 67 firearms. As the Washington Post points out, it’s all part of a steady upward trend that...

First, Pabu Izakaya, early Saturday night (pre-party): The inscription reads, "One Time, One Place." Second, yesterday, on approach to Chicago: That's approximately over Devon Ave., on approach to 27R, as I predicted.

The normal high temperature in Chicago on November 2nd is 12°C, which we aleady hit between 7 and 8 am today. Yesterday Chicago got to 22°C at O'Hare and 23°C at Midway, with similar temperatures expected to continue through Thursday. These temperatures make more sense mid-September than at the beginning of November. But we'll take them anyway. Temperatures will go back to normal Friday and Saturday, with frost expected Saturday night.

A G3-class solar storm (i.e., a big one) is predicted to hit the earth tonight, generating category 7 aurorae, which are rarely seen on earth: Auroral activity will be high(++). Weather permitting, highly active auroral displays will be visible overhead from Inuvik, Yellowknife, Rankin and Igaluit, to Portland OR, Cheyenne, Lincoln, Springfield, and New York City, and visible low on the horizon as far south as Carson City, Oklahoma City, and Raleigh. Here's the prediction map from the University of...

Krugman destroys the myth of Job-Killing Obama: And yes, I'm back in Chicago.

We live in an era of ubiquitous, high-speed connectivity. I'm writing this on a Microsoft Surface Pro 3, with all my current documents synchronized with OneDrive, and six browser tabs open on Chrome...on an airplane over Wyoming. I love in-flight WiFi. Sometimes. But right now, with three of my browser tabs spinning endlessly while I wait for them to download, and a Microsoft Excel document taking a few minutes to close (because it's uploading changes to OneDrive), I'm just trying to keep things in...

Now that O'Hare's runway 10R/28L has opened, travelers on flights unlucky enough to land on the new tarmac have reason to be unhappy: The normal taxi route from new runway 10 Right to the gate follows parts of three taxiways to wind around one runway instead of crossing over it, which would create potential collision risks. But the taxi route then requires a turn to directly cross a different runway — staying behind planes that are taking off on that runway — followed by another turn, and then another...