From Russia, with love

Getting too much sleep during the Holidays? This should help keep you awake at night.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/01/putins-real-long-game-214589

Pope Francis is waging a war on Christmas. Christians should join him.

The title is from the article by the Washington Post. The notion being that the not-yet-announced program by Trump to make Christmas more explicit is NOT something that JC himself would have participated in. Nor a Christianity that project dominance and strength. Although, it is possible that the answer is in Two Corinthians, eh?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/12/24/pope-francis-is-waging-a-war-on-christmas-christians-should-join-him

So, if you're a USA citizen, could you prove it?

One quadrant of my family was from Mexico, except then it became part of the USA with the signing of the Guadalupe Treaty in 1848. My grandmother was from Santa Fe "New" Mexico and born there in 1896, long before the Territory became a state. The notion that one has to prove who they are without legal aid is flatly wrong. Two of our sons are adopted from Ecuador. As they grew up in the (then) lily white suburbs of N. Dallas, they were harassed by the local cops. That was in the 1980s, early 90s. Read it and weap....

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/12/22/504031635/you-say-you-re-an-american-but-what-if-you-had-to-prove-it-or-be-deported

Am I the first one to see this won't work?

Now, in order to stop 'em in their tracks, we'll have 'em tell us their social media accounts.
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/foreign-travelers-social-media-232930

I sure hope that none of the bad guys/gals have multiple or hidden social media accounts. Or fake accounts..... Why do I think that this is not going to work while at the same time lessen the privacy of just about everyone? If they want to know who is doing what on Facebook, my opinion is to start waterboarding Mark Z. to give up the security codes to the Facebook domain.

Science and Economics, Not Politics, Will Strand Fossil Fuels

My Master's degree thesis, back in the stone age of 1977, was on wind energy measurement at Kansas State Univ. All we were trying to do was just get a handle on "what's out there".  Turns out that if you drive I-70 you'll find out the answer. Or try driving in the Dodge City / SW Kansas quadrant.
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/ugc/articles/2016/12/14/science-and-economics-not-politics-will-strand-fossil-fuels.html

Godspeed, John Glenn

Ever heard a president say that the TV news is nothing but lies?

Bolivian TV is nothing but lies: president (in Spanish)
    I'll bet you never heard a president of a country (or president elect?) say that everything on TV are lies from the opposition? These were not casual comments today, but rather the discourse of the President of Bolivia to an assembly of Bolivian ambassadors to other countries. Bashing the press is pretty typical in Bolivia by the government. We will see how it looks in the USA after January 20.....