Blue Horseshoe

Elon Musk says he bought X to save humanity from ‘zombie apocalypse’ ....Elon Musk has claimed that he bought Twitter in a quest to save civilization from a “zombie apocalypse” in a.... three-hour interview with Joe Rogan.....During the podcast, the duo brought up the subject of cancel culture while Mr Musk claimed that X helps “freedom of speech”....When Mr Rogan asked Mr Musk why he had decided to buy Twitter, the controversial tech billionaire responded with a lofty reason: to ultimately save the world....."This is going to sound somewhat melodramatic, but I was worried that it was having a corrosive effect on civilization.... that it was having a bad impact," he said. Mr Musk said he believes that there is a “mind virus” spreading through an “information technology weapon” that is leading to the “end of civilization”.....Social media has spread this “virus”, he claimed, causing people to act like zombies.....“If you walk around downtown San Francisco, right near the X/Twitter headquarters, it’s a zombie apocalypse. I mean, it’s rough,” he added.....The two lamented that they have both been subjected to “cancel culture”, with Mr Rogan explaining that the “mind virus” does not allow for any opposing views because it “doesn’t stand up to scrutiny”. “It was important to have at least one social media outlet that wasn’t cancelling people,” Mr Musk replied.... https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/elon-musk-joe-rogan-zombie-apocalypse

Instagram Connects Vast Pedophile Network ....Instagram, the popular social-media site owned by Meta Platforms, helps connect and promote a vast network of accounts openly devoted to the commission and purchase of underage-sex content, according to investigations by The Wall Street Journal and researchers at Stanford University and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.... Instagram doesn’t merely host these activities. Its algorithms promote them. Instagram connects pedophiles and guides them to content sellers via recommendation systems that excel at linking those who share niche interests....Though out of sight for most on the platform, the sexualized accounts on Instagram are brazen about their interest. The researchers found that Instagram enabled people to search explicit hashtags such as #pedowhore and #preteensex and connected them to accounts that used the terms to advertise child-sex material for sale. Such accounts often claim to be run by the children themselves and use overtly sexual handles incorporating words such as “little slut for you.” ....Instagram accounts offering to sell illicit sex material generally don’t publish it openly, instead posting “menus” of content. Certain accounts invite buyers to commission specific acts. Some menus include prices for videos of children harming themselves and “imagery of the minor performing sexual acts with animals,”.... At the right price, children are available for in-person “meet ups.” The promotion of underage-sex content violates rules established by Meta as well as federal law.... ....The Journal also approached UMass’s Rescue Lab, which evaluated how pedophiles on Instagram fit into the larger ecosystem of online child exploitation. Using different methods, both entities were able to quickly identify large-scale communities promoting criminal sex abuse. ...Test accounts set up by researchers that viewed a single account in the network were immediately hit with “suggested for you” recommendations of purported child-sex-content sellers and buyers, as well as accounts linking to off-platform content trading sites. Following just a handful of these recommendations was enough to flood a test account with content that sexualizes children....The Stanford Internet Observatory used hashtags associated with underage sex to find 405 sellers of what researchers labeled “self-generated” child-sex material—or accounts purportedly run by children themselves, some saying they were as young as 12. According to data gathered via Maltego, a network mapping software, 112 of those seller accounts collectively had 22,000 unique followers.... ....Current and former Meta employees who have worked on Instagram child-safety initiatives estimate the number of accounts that exist primarily to follow such content is in the high hundreds of thousands, if not millions....Instagram, estimated to have more than 1.3 billion users, is especially popular with teens. The Stanford researchers found some similar sexually exploitative activity on other, smaller social platforms, but said they found that the problem on Instagram is particularly severe. “The most important platform for these networks of buyers and sellers seems to be Instagram,”....Internet company algorithms check the digital fingerprints of images posted on their platforms against that list, and report back to the center when they detect them, as U.S. federal law requires. In 2022, the center received 31.9 million reports of child pornography, mostly from internet companies—up 47% from two years earlier....Meta, with more than 3 billion users across its apps, which include Instagram, Facebook and WhatsApp, is able to detect these types of known images if they aren’t encrypted. Meta accounted for 85% of the child pornography reports filed to the center, including some 5 million from Instagram.... ....Hashtags are a central part of content discovery on Instagram, allowing users to tag and find posts of interest to a particular community—from broad topics such as #fashion or #nba to narrower ones such as #embroidery or #spelunking....Pedophiles have their chosen hashtags, too. Search terms such as #pedobait and variations on #mnsfw (“minor not safe for work”) had been used to tag thousands of posts dedicated to advertising sex content featuring children, rendering them easily findable by buyers, the academic researchers found....In such cases, a pop-up screen for users warned that “These results may contain images of child sexual abuse,” and noted that production and consumption of such material causes “extreme harm” to children. The screen offered two options for users: “Get resources” and “See results anyway.” ....The pedophilic accounts on Instagram mix brazenness with superficial efforts to veil their activity, researchers found. Certain emojis function as a kind of code, such as an image of a map—shorthand for “minor-attracted person”—or one of “cheese pizza,” which shares its initials with “child pornography,” according to Levine of UMass. Many declare themselves “lovers of the little things in life.” ...Accounts identify themselves as “seller” or “s3ller,” and many state their preferred form of payment in their bios. These seller accounts often convey the child’s purported age by saying they are “on chapter 14,” or “age 31” followed by an emoji of a reverse arrow.... ....Sarah Adams, a Canadian mother of two, has built an Instagram audience discussing child exploitation and the dangers of oversharing on social media. Given her focus, Adams’ followers sometimes send her disturbing things they’ve encountered on the platform. In February, she said, one messaged her with an account branded with the term “incest toddlers.” ...Adams said she accessed the account—a collection of pro-incest memes with more than 10,000 followers—for only the few seconds that it took to report to Instagram, then tried to forget about it. But over the course of the next few days, she began hearing from horrified parents. When they looked at Adams’ Instagram profile, she said they were being recommended “incest toddlers” as a result of Adams’ contact with the account....A Meta spokesman said that “incest toddlers” violated its rules and that Instagram had erred on enforcement.... ....Sometimes user reports of nudity involving a child went unanswered for months, according to a review of scores of reports filed over the last year by numerous child-safety advocates. Earlier this year, an anti-pedophile activist discovered an Instagram account claiming to belong to a girl selling underage-sex content, including a post declaring, “This teen is ready for you pervs.” When the activist reported the account, Instagram responded with an automated message saying: “Because of the high volume of reports we receive, our team hasn’t been able to review this post.” After the same activist reported another post, this one of a scantily clad young girl with a graphically sexual caption, Instagram responded, “Our review team has found that [the account’s] post does not go against our Community Guidelines.” The response suggested that the user hide the account to avoid seeing its content. A Meta spokesman acknowledged that Meta had received the reports and failed to act on them.... https://www.wsj.com/articles/instagram-vast-pedophile-network

Putin in crisis: Wagner chief Prigozhin declares war on Russian military leadership .....Russia’s FSB security service opens criminal case against mercenary boss, as he vows to steamroll over anyone who gets in his way....Vladimir Putin is facing a major military crisis after Russian mercenary leader Yevgeny Prigozhin declared war on Moscow’s own defense ministry, claiming Kremlin officials had killed thousands of his soldiers....In a statement issued Friday night, the FSB security agency said it had “legally and reasonably begun criminal proceedings” against the Wagner Group warlord “for the organization of armed insurrection.” Russian media outlet TASS reported Saturday morning that Putin plans to make an address soon....Prigozhin claimed he had pulled his troops back from Ukraine and into the southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don, and vowed: “If anyone gets in our way, we will destroy everything!” The outspoken mercenary commander also threatened to move on Moscow if his demands were not met, and Russian authorities responded by saying the key highway from Moscow to the south was blocked.... ....The governor of Rostov warned residents to stay indoors....Russia’s defense ministry said Ukrainian forces are “taking advantage of Prigozhin’s provocation” on the front lines around Bakhmut....Prigozhin claimed around 100,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in the war on Ukraine....Putin has been briefed on the situation, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said, according to Russian state media....Prigozhin’s move comes after he claimed 2,000 Wagner men were killed as a result of strikes ordered by Russia’s Ministry of Defense....According to Russian state media, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that Putin is aware of the rapidly unfolding situation and “all necessary measures are being taken.” “Prigozhin’s statements and actions are actually the calls for the beginning of an armed civil conflict on the territory of Russia and are a ‘stab in the back’ for Russian servicemen,” the FSB was cited as saying...The move comes after Prigozhin accused Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu of having hidden “colossal” failings on the battlefield from Putin, claiming that 2,000 Wagner men were killed as a result of strikes ordered by the Russian Ministry of Defense... Prigozhin called Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov, chief of the general staff of the Russian Armed Forces and the overall commander of the war on Ukraine, “criminals” who had “destroyed around 100,000 Russian soldiers.”..... “Once again I’m warning everyone: we will … destroy everything around us. You can’t destroy us. We have goals. We are all ready to die. All 25,000 of us.” .... Lieutenant General Vladimir Alekseev, first deputy chief of the general staff of the armed forces, said Prigozhin does not have the authority to give orders. “This is a state coup,” he insisted, “come to your senses!”....Meanwhile, the Deputy Commander of Russian forces in Ukraine Sergei Surovikin — known as “General Armageddon” — urged Wagner to hold its positions and not to turn on its own allies. “Stop the columns, return them to the points of permanent deployment,” he pleaded.....According to Ian Garner, a Russia expert.... the Wagner chief has overplayed his hand. “Prigozhin has rolled the dice, and now the state is going to do away with him for good....I suspect Prigozhin’s chances of launching a successful coup are slim. The state can offer everything he does — money, freedom, prestige — without him. Why would the Wagner fighters side with Prigozhin in a battle to the death?....This is the end of Prigozhin and the end of Wagner. An important moment: many within the elite will hold it against Putin that things have come this far and that the president did not react sooner. That’s why this entire story is also a blow to Putin.” https://www.politico.eu/article/putin-in-crisis-as-wagner-chief-prigozhin-declares-war-on-russian-military-leadership/

Oliver Stone’s new movie makes the case nuclear power is the obvious solution to climate change ....The movie had a special screening at the World Economic Forum in Davos earlier in January, opened in New York and Los Angeles.... Critics say the movie overlooks significant barriers for nuclear energy, particularly high cost and slow construction....Generating electricity with nuclear reactors does not produce any greenhouse gas emissions, and is therefore worth a serious look, Stone’s movie says, because anthropogenic climate change, caused by excessive greenhouse gas emissions largely emitted from the burning of fossil fuels, is getting worse..... He started reading about climate change, including a review of the book “A Bright Future: How Some Countries Have Solved Climate Change and the Rest Can Follow” by Joshua S. Goldstein and Staffan A. Qvist. He was struck by both the review and the book.... ....“I didn’t realize it was going to be so tough to pull something like this off,” Stone said, because there is no single main character for the documentary. “The story is the logic of it. Follow the history into the present: What went wrong? What could go right?”....In the movie, Stone presents a case that the beneficial potential of nuclear energy has not been reached because society conflated its collective fear of nuclear bombs with nuclear energy. In the film, which Stone narrates, he says he was anti-nuclear because he generally absorbed the environmentalist anti-nuclear agenda that has been spread for generations....“State the facts. You have to give the information that you have,” Stone told CNBC. Not everyone is going to believe what you say, “but some people will believe it. You have to trust in the truth ultimately will obliterate the lie. You have to believe that....” Goldstein, who worked with Stone to write the film, says the feeling of being in a movie theater can have a more powerful effect on people’s perceptions than leaving them alone to parse facts that may feel overwhelming or out of context....“A film is more than information. It’s an experience, and it’s a collective experience. That’s why I’m really happy we’re getting some release in theaters, because you sit in the theater with everybody else, you have this collective experience...The majority of people actually support nuclear energy, but the people who don’t support it are very loud and very scared and it draws a lot of attention.....” ....Americans’ perspective of nuclear energy fluctuates and has been generally increasing in the last decade, according to a recent poll from Gallup showing 55% percent of Americans either strongly or somewhat favor using nuclear energy as a way to provide electricity. That’s the highest percentage since 2012, according to Gallup....Jaczko says fear of accidents is not the primary reason nuclear energy is not more widespread today. Instead, nuclear energy is expensive and has been managed poorly.....“As with most nuclear fables these days, the film establishes the strawman argument that nuclear is an underutilized technology because people are afraid of nuclear power and confuse it with nuclear bombs: ‘Once we get over our radiation fear, nuclear will thrive and solve climate change.’ This isn’t the main or even a significant problem with nuclear power....The primary problems are cost competitiveness, operational ineffectiveness, engineering weakness, managerial incompetence, and design mistakes. These are well documented deficiencies....” ....Another problem is the length of time it takes to build nuclear reactors.... ....But Stone also felt compelled to make the documentary because he sees nuclear energy as an underappreciated and misunderstood climate solution....“The film is a warning, a dramatic warning, of a major distortion in history, and a need to return to the using nuclear in any possible way....” https://www.cnbc.com/2023/05/01/oliver-stones-movie-says-nuclear-power-is-a-climate-change-solution.html

TYT’s actual election night coverage got 4.5 million viewers—a record for them—over a nearly 12-hour broadcast. These are the "highlights" What I don’t like about it, however, is that vitriol: the nastiness and the dead certainty that those who voted for Trump were ignorant, racist morons. (I shared the sick feeling of loss, but never the rage.) That misses the underlying dynamic that drove this election: whatever it was, it was more than a bunch of idiots and racists—KKK supporters some said—who simply wanted a President who shared their bigotry.... What bothers me is the kind of smug, dismissive attitude toward our opponents that will hinder us Leftists from regrouping and having substantial political power. For if we get that power, we must appeal to a wider audience and, if we can’t share some of the values of our opponents, at least find some common ground with them and concentrate on the problems of all the dispossessed, disadvantaged, and deprived.... https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2016/11/20/the-young-turks-lose-it-over-the-election/ ********** 2:09 Aida Rodriguez says that people don’t like Hillary Clinton simply “because she has a vagina”. (Repeats this claim at 13:41, saying that Clinton lost “because she was a woman”). 8:59 Cenk Uygur has a tantrum about the Democratic Party: he says he’s at “war” with it for allowing Clinton to be defeated by a bigot. (Wasn’t he in favor of Hillary?) Later he calls them “f------- morons.” 14:53: Ana Kasparian says that women who voted for Trump are “f------ dumb”, and says, “I’m losing my mind tonight because of how stupid the majority of the country is.” 19:20: Aida Rodriguez calls the people criticizing her on Twitter “m------f-----s” and gives the camera two middle fingers 19:33: Ana Kasparian addresses those whom (she thinks) voted for Trump because they don’t like affirmative action. She says, “Affirmative action is not the reason you failed in life. You failed in life because you f------ suck! Because you’re a loser!” 23:08: The team turns on Hillary, starts blaming her for the loss. "Not every Trump supporter is a racist, but every racist is a Trump supporter"

It's been commonly accepted for a long time that Matt LeBlanc was considered the most easy going and professional of the core cast. He was the one seen as the least likely to go on a tirade and treat below the line people on set like crap. LeBlanc really suffered and struggled in his early acting days, so he kind of knew how lucky he was and how utterly replaceable he probably was in the grand scheme of things (Other people could have played "Joey" just fine) Schwimmer was known for hitting on women in real life and getting constantly turned down. To the point where he became very unlikeable in the industry. No one wanted him to audition because they thought he'd drag a production into some kind of major scandal. He was cast in Band Of Brothers almost solely based on his private reputation as an unlikeable person. Craig Bierko turned down the Chandler role. Reese Witherspooon was offered a starring role without having to audition and she turned it down. Janeane Garofalo was effectively turned down from Friends because, again, she was considered not attractive enough. She had, at one point, secured the female lead in Jerry Maguire, which would have made her a legitimate "star" in some ways, if that worked out, but she was pushed out because it was considered too unplausible for Tom Cruise to want to sleep with someone that far down the rungs of attractiveness. It's quite unfortunate as Garofalo was great in The Truth About Cats And Dogs and she probably would have done well in Maguire. Instead the experiences of being told again and again she wasn't good looking enough likely broke her and her bitterness reeked into every role she had in the future.

McDaniels is not a bad O-Coordinator. The problem is Mark Davis gave him the entire franchise, and McDaniels got to handpick his own GM. Which essentially means McDaniels was the one drafting. And in Denver, he's proven he's a horrible drafter/horrible personnel guy. Belichick is not a great drafter. He's one of the few NFL long term types where he's had such a long run, that you can see his drafting history in a much more practical context than just about anyone else. Now Belichick has hit on some picks over the years, but the Patriots problems stem, almost completely, from their consistent poor drafting record. That's what a lot of Belichick "disciples" drag along with them. They embody many of the worst personnel aspects of Belichick, but none of the good ones ( Belichick, to his credit, does do well in UDFA, gaming the "compensation pick system" and he sometimes does well in trades, but not always, but that's far more than McDaniels and O'Brien have done) If your team drafts well and keeps drafting well, it covers up a lot of other flaws. The first time that the Giants beat the Patriots in that Super Bowl, the GMen got a ton of contribution from their picks and personnel moves from that offseason and the offseason prior. Belichick is an outlier in that regard. But you can't really give personnel control to someone who is clearly horrible at it. Mark Davis didn't assess that correctly and now that team is a mess. For example, Scot McCloughan of the 49ers, Seahawks and Redskins, that guy understands personnel. But he's a ticking timebomb otherwise in his personal life and that ends up being too much for people. Get someone who can draft and draft well and that gives your team a real future.

You are splitting hairs and being intentionally obtuse on purpose. Lots of everyday working class people are suffering. There is growing food insecurity in the United States, especially post "lockdowns" Biden is currently "QB1". When you are QB1, everything is your fault. You win and you take all the credit, fair or not. ( Does anyone want to point out how much of a difference that Ty Law, Lawyer Milloy, Richard Seymour and countless others contributed to the Patriots dynasty run? But Brady often gets the lions share of the glory. It's how it works. ) If you lose, you take the majority of the blame, it's how it has always worked. If you are the most powerful person in the entire free world, you DO NOT get to have excuses anymore.

May 31, 2017 - Comedian Kathy Griffin has been fired by CNN and will no longer host its New Year's Eve special following the disturbing photo of her holding up a decapitated bloodied head that looked like the president. The image has elicited a strong reaction from those closest to the president, including First Lady Melania Trump. She is beside herself because her 11-year-old son, Barron, was watching TV when the gruesome photo appeared on the screen, according to reports.