Chris Brockett

This is interesting, if for no other reason it gets into the origin of the US poverty line.

Part 1: My Life Is a Lie How a Broken Benchmark Quietly Broke America

"The Valley of Death: Why $100,000 Is the New Poor
Once I established that $136,500 is the real break-even point, I ran the numbers on what happens to a family climbing the ladder toward that number"

interesting analysis:
www.yesigiveafig.com/p/part-1-my-...

Judeo-Christian is coded hate-speech for "we're dealing with the Muslims right now, we'll get back to dealing with you Jews shortly."

USS Wateree aground near Arica, Chile, after being hit by an earthquake caused tsunami, August 1868. She was unsalvagable, so the Navy sold her for $2,775 to a local businessman who used her as a warehouse. She was later destroyed by another tsunami in 1877.

The USS Wateree was a sidewheel gunboat built during the Civil War. On August 13, 1868 she was struck by a tsunami created by the Arica Earthquake in Chile and was driven 450 yards inland. She had no casualties apart from a boatswain ashore who was killed by the quake.
#NavalHistory

Excerpt from the linked news story. Text reads: Fernando Vazquez doesn't understand why Border Patrol agents took him into custody Tuesday. Agents from Customs and Border Protection (CBP) pinned him to a gate at his Cary worksite, handcuffed him and pulled his wallet out. They saw his N.C. REAL ID. But Vazquez, 18, said they still kept him in handcuffs and ushered him into the back of a gray Chevy Tahoe. He sat next to another worker in his early 20s who was crying.

Excerpt from the linked news story. Text reads: 'I was in shock' Vazquez was born in Raleigh and lives in Apex. His parents are from Mexico, and he works with his dad as a landscaper. He graduated from Vernon Malone College and Career Academy in Raleigh. He was detained close to his former middle school, Reedy Creek.

Excerpt from the linked news story. Text reads: Vazquez said he saw eight agents — four from the Tahoe, and four from a Ford Explorer or Chevy Suburban. Agents put him in the back of the Tahoe and drove off. "I was in shock, basically," Vazquez said. While in the car, a different Latino agent asked Vazquez where he was from. "Here," Vazquez told him. "NO, where were you born?" the agent asked. Vazquez told him he was born in Raleigh. He said the agent got angry and cussed him out.

Excerpt from the linked news story. Text reads: The agents eventually allowed Vazquez out of their SUV, and he caught a video of them removing his handcuffs and throwing his wallet out of the car, its contents scattering on the ground. The video has over 5 million views on TikTok.

Trump's domestic Gestapo raided a job site, then handcuffed a US citizen born in Raleigh NC -- even after being shown the guy's REAL ID, which is only available to US citizens and LPRs

CBP+ICE will ignore your identifying documents when it suits their racism

www.newsobserver.com/news/local/a...

"Grifts are undertheorized, and too often conflated with long cons, scams, frauds and other more blatant soft crimes. Lemme offer a definition.

A grift is a scheme that profits from the existence of a real problem without actually addressing it."

Lee, Ki-Moon. (2025). 어원 사전 [Etymological dictionary [of Korean]]. Seoul: Kiphun Ppwuli.

Late Prof. Lee, Ki-Moon's Etymological Dictionary [of Korean] has finally left the press. It contains upwards of 3,300 entries, spanning over 1,300 pages.

If a Famous Author Calls, Hang Up: Anatomy of an Impersonation Scam - Writer Beware You open your email program one morning. The usual work stuff. Some spam (annoying that it got past your filters!). A couple of newsletters (maybe later). You sip your coffee, scroll down. Wait. What’...

The wonderful @victoriastrauss.com of Writer Beware reveals all the versions of the Famous Author scam. writerbeware.blog/2025/11/14/i...

Seals singing in a sea cave

#Orkney 🦭🎧

Old Chinese Prêt-à-porter. A double-edged sword. Sometimes I miss watching movies with commercial interruptions, at the theater or on television. Not only were they a great way to refill your pop-corn bowl without missing anything. Advertisements…

#otd 4 yrs ago: Old Chinese Prêt-à-porter. A double-edged sword.

A post by @madpoli.bsky.social about the pros and cons of digitized data. Easy to access, but it can also mean that fewer people understand what's underneath behind it

digitalorientalist.com/2021/11/19/o...

臨川書店の「中世の日記をひらく」シリーズ、まずはこの2冊から。内容はいくつかの年の記録を現代語訳が中心で、コラムや解説も。大学院時代、『看聞日記』を研究会で読んでいたが、やはり面白い。『建内記』は真面目な記事ばかりだな。

That would be a mortally unfortunate transcription.

LETTERS, &c., COMMONLY INTERCHANGEABLE. (Wright, p. viii) a, o, and sometimes e. ar, er, or, ur. be, bi, by, as prefixes. c, s, ch, sh, sch. e, ee, i. ʒ, g, gh, y. ʒ, th. h. often omitted where it ought to be inserted, or used superfluously. i, y. k, c, ch. o, oo, ou, u. qu, wh, w. s, c.

For anyone who's struggled with variable spelling practices before modern printing, there's a summary of what's "interchangeable" in Thomas Wright's Dictionary of Obsolete and Provincial English. 2 vols. London, 1857.
#orthography #English #language #dialect #manuscripts #medieval

Edging Toward Japan: What does being literate in Japanese really mean? - The Mainichi By Damian Flanagan The other day I had the pleasure of attending a very interesting presentation about antique books by an expert in Edo period litera

As one who has spent much time these last few months glaring at texts I can partially decipher but cannot read, I am qualified to recommend this essay.

Edging Toward Japan: What does being literate in Japanese really mean? - The Mainichi share.google/Gw4gLrPrnPyI...

Even in Japan, many do not know that several yokai are original (and copyrighted) Shigeru Mizuki designs.

His yokai have become so accepted that most people just assume they are from ages ago.

NZ is safe. People think it's in Australia.

New favourite example of structural ambiguity

This has gotten surprisingly little attention — it's not even on the front page of @science.org right now — but it's really hard to describe what the SAFE Research Act would do to US science and scientists without sounding insane

www.science.org/content/arti...

The Securing American Funding and Expertise from Adversarial Research Exploitation (SAFE) Act would deny federal funding to any U.S. scientist who collaborates with anyone “affiliated with a hostile foreign entity,” a category that includes four countries: China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea. The prohibited activities would include joint research, co-authorship on papers, and advising a foreign graduate student or postdoctoral fellow. The language is retroactive, meaning any interactions during the previous 5 years could make a scientist ineligible for future federal funding.

I've been on the road so I'm behind the times—but if you wanted to destroy US science, I can think of no more expedient action.

Blatant unconstitutionality aside, fuck this backwards forwards and sideways.

www.science.org/content/article/u-s-congress-considers-sweeping-ban-chinese-collaborations

WE WON. I am *begging* you to take note of who did this. *Not* UCLA admin—they’re still scuttling around behind closed doors, attempting to appease—but FACULTY AND STAFF, led by AAUP.

The intro to Judge Rita Lin's 76-page opinion holding that the Trump admin's pressure campaign against the University of California system is coercive and retaliatory in violation of the First Amendment. storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

A Voice for the Voiceless: English’s Lost Consonants In September this year, Catherine Clarke, professor at the Institute of Historical Research, published A History of England in 25 Poems. This chronological hike through England’s history via verses…

'A History of England in 25 Poems' by @cathamclarke.bsky.social has something for everyone, including nerdy historical linguists. While reading it, I seized upon an archaic H in a Middle English poem about happy animals as my chance to write about lost English sounds.
dannybate.com/2025/11/14/a...

This would be a complete disaster for scientific research in the United States.

I did my PhD at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign, which has more Chinese students than any other US university. I had the privilege of teaching and collaborating with Chinese students there.

This makes me indescribably angry for them and for all of us who benefit from our work together

A cultural revolution? Trump’s America feels oddly familiar to those watching from China Demands of absolute loyalty and attacks on institutions have raised memories of Mao-style chaos from US watchers in China

"A cultural revolution? Trump’s America feels oddly familiar to those watching from China.
Demands of absolute loyalty and attacks on institutions have raised memories of Mao-style chaos from US watchers in China." www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025...

Paramount Has Blacklist for Stars Deemed “Overtly Antisemitic” — World of Reel It sure looks like the likes of Javier Bardem, Joaquin Phoenix, Emma Stone, and Mark Ruffalo won’t be making movies for Paramount in the foreseeable future.

Under new head of Paramount David Ellison, the studio has drawn up a list of actors who opposed the Gaza genocide and will not allow them to appear in its films and TV shows.

Does this sound familiar?

Also, "Ellison is reportedly aiming to take over Warner Bros. next."

Look up! The sky in Redmond, WA

Hasn't this come up before a few years ago? With some caveat that the northern Japan groups and North American groups might be offshoots of much less well documented eastern Siberian group?

'It sounded kind of crazy': How ripples in the high atmosphere warned scientists of a tsunami in real time Tsunamis are notoriously difficult to spot on the open ocean as they race towards shore. But in the summer of 2025, scientists watched one unfold as it happened.

www.bbc.com/future/artic...

A bright red glow reaches up into the darkness, illuminating the silhouettes of tall slightly scraggly, spruce trees

Swirls of green and red light sweep down from the sky, lighting up the forest and contrasting against the Stark silhouettes of trees

Dramatic swirls of green and red light swirl down from the middle of the sky, starkly contrasting against the bear of Poplar, tall Spruce trees.

Still more dramatic curtains of light sweep down from above in sheets of green and red. The tall bear poplars and spruce spires our starkly silhouetted.

I really need to get to bed, but I just poked my head out the back door again. This is the view from my deck. All of this is looking south. When the geomagnetic storms are like this, the oval overshoots me and stretches into the US, which is why so many are seeing it tonight. #aurora