A blog about societal, cultural, and civilizational collapse, and how to stave it off or survive it. Named after the legendary character "Crazy Eddie" in Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's "The Mote in God's Eye." Expect news and views about culture, politics, economics, technology, and science fiction.
Jon Stewart takes a look at Trump’s first 100 days: from plummeting approval ratings to unfulfilled promises on immigration, health, and the economy, to destroying his reputation as a shrewd negotiator with China and Ukraine[.]
"Suck it, Herbert Hoover!" That's yet another reason for me to call him Hoover Cleveland, although Hoover wasn't unpopular until after the Great Depression hit. That took a year; we're not waiting that long.
Hoover Cleveland claiming things are going great because he's making bank while posting record low poll numbers is enough to repeat what I wrote in George Santos sues Jimmy Kimmel and Trump sells sneakers, "[H]e has long had a very bad case of 'L'État, c'est moi.' As far as he's concerned, he is the country. He's also the worst president..." I may have more opportunities to connect those two thoughts.
I'm letting davidarcherd9868's comment on the video speak for me about what the economy.
Donald Trump promised that if I voted for Kamala Harris, I would experience the worst economy in recent American history. Turns out, he was right. I voted for Kamala Harris and am experiencing the worst economy in recent American History.
I voted for Harris, so I can say it's not my fault. On the other hand, I'm repurposing what I wrote at the end of John Oliver examines RFK Jr. & HHS, "Trump supporters like the Archdruid and his readers actually approve of what he's doing. I have another post planned about them."
John Oliver discusses the budget and staffing cuts being made to public health agencies in the U.S. under RFK Jr.’s new leadership, the many ways those cuts will impact all of us, and how WWII really ended. Trust us, it’s not how you think.
I'm repeating what I wrote earlier this month: "If I have to concentrate on criticizing any of Trump's Cabinet Secretaries, it will be RFK Jr. I'm a scientist and he's the biggest threat to science of anyone actually confirmed by the Senate..." I don't find his statement that "Our purpose is not to reduce any level of scientific research that is important" reassuring. I don't trust his judgment of what's scientifically important, especially in the context of cutting funding to diabetes research at the University of Michigan. That's doublypersonal!
Oliver and his writers also demonstrated how cuts at and by HHS pose short- and long-term threats to health. Bird flu and measles, both of which Oliver addresses later in the video, come to mind on top of the example of lead paint. It's not just in drinking water!
Vox showed its viewers how RFK Jr. could mess things up. Oliver shows how he already is. As Oliver quoted the experts, "This is a disaster. People will die because of the mistakes we're making right now." I'm calling for his impeachment and removal, because I'm sure he won't resign and doubt Donald "Hoover Cleveland" Trump will fire him because of what he's doing to science and public health.* Hoover Cleveland will only do the right thing for the wrong reasons. Even so, that will take until 2027 because the House won't have a Democratic majority until then. Sigh.
Stay tuned for Wayback Wednesday tomorrow.
*Trump supporters like the Archdruid and his readers actually approve of what he's doing. I have another post planned about them.
Purdue All-American Marching Band halftime performance at Ross–Ade Stadium, vs. Wisconsin, 10/23/2021, all about Superheroes!
That's quite the collection of superhero music from the 1960s to the 2010s! The show included both Spider-Man and Underdog, which have lasted far longer than I would have expected as a kid.
Have you ever been rescued from a risky situation or saved from injury or death? Those who come to our aid are called heroes. Some heroes happen to be in the right place at the right time. Others choose to be a hero as a career (though they wouldn't call themselves heroes.) And others still are fictional creations that inspire us with hope. Each year on April 28th, National Superhero Day honors superheroes, both real and fictional.
I've linked to National Day Calendar on this day before, but I've never embedded one of their videos for today until now. It was about time.
Amy Poehler presents Peter Straughan with the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for 'Conclave' at the 97th Academy Awards.
This was no surprise.
Best Adapted Screenplay:Conclave won the Golden Globe as well as the Critics' Choice Awards and WGA Awards, so it's a prohibitive favorite here; again, all eleven editors voted for it to win.
Just the same, congratulations to Peter Straughan on winning Conclave's only Oscar out of eight nominations.
Once the period of mourning for Pope Francis is done, the centuries-old tradition of selecting a new pope, known as the conclave, gets underway. NBC’s Keir Simmons reports for TODAY about the process that’s shrouded in secrecy.
Saturday’s funeral and burial of Pope Francis mark the beginning of nine days of official mourning at the Vatican, with cardinals leading masses each day. The words of their homilies will be closely examined and analyzed for clues about what’s on their minds as they prepare to elect a new pope. John Yang speaks with John Allen, editor of Crux, for more.
LOL, Spaceballs. That's not a flattering comparison, but it gives me the opportunity to mention the movie on this blog for only the second time.
I expect I'll return to the topic once the real conclave elects a new Pope. In the meanwhile, follow over the jump to see how Gold Derby's Oscar predictionsfared.
The controversial restaurant has recently filed for bankruptcy. This video explores the brand's history while highlighting some of the biggest reasons behind its decline.
Here's Company Man Mike's list.
Red Lobster's and TGI Fridays' bankruptcies were and still are such big deals that they made a joint cameo under "External Factors." Company Man Mike also featured his videos about them in the outro. The pandemic also made an appearance. Check out 2020 in this chart.
That's quite the drop! In retrospect, Hooters did well lasting five years; Chuck E. Cheese, Ruby Tuesday, and Sizzler filed for bankruptcy in the middle of 2020.
Company Man Mike added the "Free Toyota/Free Toy Yoda" lawsuit, which was a bad joke, to controversies, so I'm mentioning the one time I patronized a Hooters. It was in Orlando in 2003. I went with a late friend of mine, who suggested the place. I had a good time, but never went back. I just didn't want to be associated with the brand.
Moving on to competition, Company Man Mike posted this chart.
Even at its 2008 height, Hooters with ~400 locations would have been less than a third of Buffalo Wild Wings and less than a fifth of Wingstop. Now I feel like seeing where the nearest Wingstop is to me.
Why am I not surprised that private equity became one of the changing owners?
What happens when a study goes viral? After the “trillion tree” campaign captured the internet's imagination, YouTube sensation, MrBeast, raised 20 million dollars to plant 20 million trees. But did they survive? We went to check in on them… and were shocked.
In this episode of Weathered, we get into the surprising origins of the viral “trillion tree” campaign, why it nearly ended the careers of the scientists behind it, and what actually works when it comes to storing carbon and fighting climate change. Spoiler: it’s not as simple as planting trees.
Planting trees will definitely make the local environment cooler and relatively soon, but it will take decades for the trees to have a positive effect on global carbon dioxide. As May pointed out, we don't have decades. Conserving forests will have more of an effect now.
NBC News National Political Correspondent Steve Kornacki joins Meet the Press NOW to discuss the early state of play in California's gubernatorial race as former Vice President Kamala Harris weighs a run for governor.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris would have a wide lead over the rest of the field if she were to enter the 2026 race for California governor, according to an Inside California Politics/Emerson College poll released Thursday. April 17, 2025.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris is the runaway front-runner in the California governor’s race – but voters are split on whether the failed 2024 Democratic presidential candidate should even enter the fray.
Harris has the support of 31% of Californians who plan to vote in the Golden State’s June 2026 gubernatorial primary election, according to an Emerson College Polling/Inside California Politics/The Hill survey released Thursday,
But half of likely voters, 50%, believe that the former vice president, California senator and state attorney general should not run for the governorship.
Harris’s closest competitors are former Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.), who only mustered 8% support, and Republican Riverside Sheriff Chad Bianco, who garnered a 4% backing.
Former Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra, a recent entrant into the race, received 2% support.
That's a really good preview image, but I'm suspicious of the channel itself. I wonder who's behind it.
Follow over the jump for a retrospective of the relevant top post plus the most commented posts between March 21, 2024 and March 20, 2025 for today.
English has unusual linguistic features most other languages don't! These skills really make English unique compared to other languages around the world.
Other languages have unique features that English just doesn't have access to. So, English, why don't you level up your skills with these linguistic tricks from around the world?
Here's Josh R's partial list.
I expressed my gratitude about something Josh R didn't list.
I'm glad you didn't mention gender for nouns or number for articles and adjectives in addition to nouns and verbs. The former can be arbitrary and not necessarily improving understanding and the latter would be redundant.
On the other hand, I think English could use a standard second person plural. Because I live near Detroit, I use y'all, but there are other ways of saying it. What do you use?
Follow over the jump for a retrospective of the relevant top post for today.
Unlike the Trump administration, The Daily Show acknowledges the existence of climate change. In this collection of segments honoring Earth Day, Ronny Chieng breaks down rising global temperatures, Michael Kosta discovers an environmental safe haven in Duluth, Minnesota, and Troy Iwata investigates solutions to the climate crisis, including a trip to Mars and a woolly mammoth resurrection.
Michael Kosta is complaining about snow? He was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, just like my younger daughter! We know snow! On the other hand, he spent long enough to Los Angeles to know about the people there. He may be telling a joke, but he's not kidding! On a more serious note, Duluth is on CNBC's list of safest places in the U.S. from climate change, but so is Detroit, and we already have better weather than Duluth!
Troy Iwata managed an interesting transition from 2024 being the world's hottest year on record to a space ark to mammothde-extinction. Re-establishing the mammoth steppe would help keep methane from permafrost in the ground, but that's an entire biome; bringing back one species would not be enough, which is part of why Colossal Biosciences also revived dire wolves, although those are Game of Thrones dire wolves, not the real ones. George R.R. Martin is even listed as a co-author on the paper!
That's a wrap for Earth Day. Stay tuned for Wayback Wednesday.
Lore of the ghostly whale skeleton, Bake-kujira, brings an ominous twist to stories of the revered marine giants in Japan. The entity is an omen of misfortune that emerged during the rise of industrial whaling in the 20th century. Is it a simple ghost story, or a warning of ecological collapse? And is Bake-kujira’s legend as relevant now as ever?
One of the projects I'm considering pursuing in my retirement is a horror mystery series set in Oakland County. I thought I would ignore the Nain Rouge because it was concerned with Detroit proper, not the suburbs. Hearing that the Nain Rouge protects the suburbs as well as the city means that I might have to incorporate the imp in my stories. Hmm. Maybe in the sequel. I have another supernatural entity planned to bedevil my protagonists in the first collection of tales.
In 1927 excavations for a new schoolhouse in Oscoda turned up a Late Pleistocene fossil rib that may have belonged to a bowhead whale of the genus Balaena. The specimen is now catalogued as UMMP 11008.[15] 1930 saw Hussey publish the first scientific paper on the Michiganian whale fossils curated by the University of Michigan Museum of Paleontology.
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The 1950s saw paleontological attention return to Michigan's whale fossils. In 1953, Handley tentatively referred the rib discovered in Oscoda during the 1927 schoolhouse excavation to the genus Balaena.[15] He also reported the discovery of an Arkonan-aged[clarification needed (possibly referring to Thedford-Arkona region)] rorqual rib of the genus Balaenoptera. The fossil had been discovered upright in the sand during the excavation of a cellar in Genesee County.[18] Handley also reported the discovery of another walrus fossil, a skull catalogued as UMMP 32453 found in a Mackinac Island gravel deposit.[13] Handley also reported the discovery of sperm whale ribs and a vertebra from Lenawee County.
While I've read at least one author explain these findings as the result of early Native Americans transporting them from the coast, I think it's just as likely, if not more so, that the whales swam up the early Mississippi or St. Laurence into the forerunners of the Great Lakes. Whales swim into rivers from time to time, and it usually ends poorly for them.
Last week the results of study found the township bones were baleen whale vertebrae and radiocarbon dated the age at 220 +/- 30 BP (Before Present), as such, it is similar to a previous date of 190 years old for a sperm whale bone found in Michigan. The baleen whales have baleen instead of teeth which they use to collect shrimp-like krill, plankton and small fish from the sea. The report also included that all the dated whale bones found to date from Michigan are far too young for whales to have entered the Great Lakes. Bones of a sperm whale, finback whale, and a right whale where reported found in Michigan were dated between 190 and 810 years old,
John Zawiskie, the Curator of Earth and Life Sciences at Cranbrook Institute of Science commented on the results of the whale bone discovery.
“Whales could only have entered the Great Lakes when the sea level was higher during glacial and post-glacial times more than 10,000 years ago,” said Zawiskie. “The whales are all too young – the oldest are only 800 years old.”
Why the bones were found in the township is uncertain, however one suggestion is that the bones may have been brought to Michigan by Hopewell culture people from the Atlantic coast, or maybe even a long running elaborate hoax, where someone else placed the whale bones on the landscape.
“The Hopewell people lived on the Atlantic Coast and they may have brought the whale bones to Michigan as they brought many shells and other marine items with them,” added Zawiskie. “It is unlikely that the Hopewell people scattered whale bones across Michigan and of course the recent find is only 220 years old – the other whale ages range from 190 to 800 years old.”
Darn. On the other hand, these findings make it more likely for whale spirits to haunt Michigan, not less, as they've been moved relatively recently. Just the same, I think I might refer to the legend of Bake-kujira, but choose another angry animal apparition for my antagonist, like a mammoth or mastodon. Time to look for African and south Asian stories of ghost elephants as inspiration.
Enough weirdness. I already have more conventional videos for tomorrow's celebration of Earth Day. Stay tuned.
Whoever came up with our Easter traditions must have been really stoned, Italy’s new prime minister paid a visit to the White House, scientists may have discovered living organisms on a distant planet, and idiots online are insisting that Gayle King and Katy Perry didn’t really go to space.
Being stoned has little to do with our Easter traditions conflicting with each other. GaudyMarko explained in a comment.
Fun fact but Easter used to be a pagan holiday that celebrated the spring equinox and fertility before it got rebranded as a christian holiday. The rabbits, eggs, and even the name are all cultural reminants that predate christian influences. Hence the weird mismatch in themes.
Trueflights reinforced the point.
To be fair, most of the traditional Easter symbolism was stolen from the Pagan fertility holiday that happens around the same time. That is why you have bunnies (who reproduce quickly), chocolate (which is an aphrodisiac), and eggs (another fertility symbol).
This sounds familiar, as something similar happened with Christmas trees.
One part of the monologue that the video description missed involved Hoover Cleveland's proposed budget cutting FDA inspectors and NIH and CDC research. Three commenters weighed in on both. First, PC-kd7dj wrote, "No food inspection in U.S.? Now that should get other countries to increase food imports from us :_D" The other two reacted to the clip of RFK Jr. AlliePetty wrote, "That clip of RFK Jr talking about taking LSD just so he can see dinosaurs would be sufficient evidence against him to have kept him from becoming a cabinet member in any normal administration..." Too bad this is not a normal administration. Finally, SuperNov4 spoke for me with "I really need a warning before the rfk slaps on the screen, it's like nails on a chalkboard. What he says and how he speaks it's all garbage." I second that emotion.
Meanwhile… A new machine can tell how much fat is in tuna meat, wild salmon exposed to anxiety drugs took more risks, ancient Romans fed tax evaders to leopards, and scientists grew real “chicken” meat in a lab.
Science, animals, and more drugs! Also, the Webby Awards qualify today's post as the Sunday entertainment feature. I love awards shows!
Jesus Christ (Mikey Day) and his disciples (Kenan Thompson, Andrew Dismukes, Sarah Sherman, Ego Nwodim, Emil Wakim, Devon Walker, Michael Longfellow, Jane Wickline) get interrupted by President Donald Trump (James Austin Johnson) during the cleansing of the Temple.
Phantom Regiment opens their 1980 production with Rimsky-Korsakov's "Russian Easter Overture." The corps finished in 5th place at the DCI World Championship Finals in Birmingham, Alabama.
I was in the audience for this performance, so imagine you can hear me cheer. For all I know, you can.
Tipsy Bartender uploaded a new Easter drink recipe for the first time since 2020, Double Spicy Easter Bunny.
Drink responsibly!
*I might still feature this year's Easter sketch tomorrow along with other comedy appropriate for both Easter and 4/20. Stay tuned.
President Trump distanced himself from Project 2025’s radical conservative vision on the campaign trail. Now, more than half of his executive orders including some on immigration and DEI policies align with recommendations made in the Heritage Foundation’s blueprint. Trump has even hired multiple key architects and contributors of Project 2025 to be in his administration.
WSJ explores some of the notable ways Trump’s first few months are aligning with Project 2025 – and what that can tell us about his second term.
As for Hoover Cleveland (un)truthing "I have no idea who is behind [Project 2025]," check out MSNBC's list of chapter authors.
All of them have worked for him, so of course he's lying. He's not fooling anyone but himself and his most devoted followers.
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I leave my readers with the following list Digby embedded in Incomplete Cheat Sheet.
As I've written before, yikes! No wonder it's unpopular!
On the campaign trail, President Trump distanced himself from the writers and content of Project 2025, but just two months into his presidency, much of what was laid out in the sprawling document has been enacted. Atlantic staff writer David Graham, who has written on Project 2025, joins Katy Tur to discuss how far along the Trump administration is in the conservative playbook.
Project 2025, the conservative policy project, became a flashpoint during the presidential campaign. Angelo Carusone of Media Matters studied the 900-page document and spoke with Geoff Bennett for our series, On Democracy, where we hear a range of perspectives on how government should function, what led to this moment in American history and where the country goes next.
Carusone and PBS News host Geoff Bennett also shared this graphic.
That illustrates the problem for Democrats and other resisters; a lot of people get their news and views from podcasts and videos and the overwhelming majority learn right. The stat that 32% of Americans get their news from YouTube now compared to 23% in 2020 shows the effect of the pandemic on Americans' media diet. I resemble that remark, as I'm using YouTube uploads of mainstream media here on my blog instead of watching the newscasts directly. I hope my curation helps direct my readers to good sources of news!
Thousands of employees at the Internal Revenue Service have lost their jobs in recent months as part of widespread cuts to federal spending by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. The layoffs could impact essential functions at the agency during the height of tax season, from audits and collection enforcement to processing tax returns and refunds.
I'm repeating what I wrote two years ago.
Why am I not surprised that the "Satan Sandwich" budget sequestration deal and 2017 tax bill both played major parts in the shrinking of the IRS, that the InflationReductionAct is restoring that lost funding and staffing, and that the Republicans in Congress are seeking to reverse the IRA's increased funding of the IRS as part of raising thedebtceiling? Because I've been watching Washington long enough to see history rhyme, if not repeat.
So far, as CNBC pointed out, the cuts have not affected service for middle-class Americans. My wife filed our taxes last week and we should get our refund tomorrow, for example. They will reduce enforcement on the weathiest 1%, resulting in non-collection of $1 billion. Way for Hoover Cleveland and Elon Musk to look after themselves and their fellow billionaires. That's not the kind of class solidarity we need.
Enough about taxes. Stay tuned for Wayback Wednesday tomorrow. I have something fun planned.
A new AI tool says it can detect similarities in fingerprints that humans can't.
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Fingerprints have long been known to be completely unique. They also don’t change their pattern over your lifetime, making them an extremely useful biometric for identification. Their uniqueness largely comes from how they form in the womb: as waves of skin cells growing in random patterns of ridges under the top layer of skin in our hands and feet.
Fingerprints are so unique that it is considered impossible to match two different fingerprints from the same person — the only way to know for sure is to match a fingerprint to the exact finger. But a new AI tool developed by students at Columbia University says there are more similarities in intra-person, or same person, fingerprints than we’ve previously known.
Rewatching this video made me realize it has become a missed opportunity, twice. First because it came out too late to show my Human Structure and Function students before I lectured on the integumentary system, which consists of the skin and associated structures, and second because this semester is the last time I plan on teaching the course. I won't have a chance to show it to students next year. Darn.
The features that make your voice unique.
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Most of us use our voices every day to communicate one way or another, but the way we produce sound is so much more than the words we say. Our voices are about as unique as fingerprints — similar instruments, but with endless variations.
As humans, we each essentially produce sound in the same physiological way, but it’s not as simple as plucking a guitar string. And when we talk we’re dropping clues about who we are, what we do, and where we’re from. A dialect can hint where a person is from. An expressive range might suggest a person is a singer or actor. A slow and quiet tone could mean a person is feeling sad or tired. Check out the video above to learn more about the ins and outs of how we produce sounds and why no one else sounds like you.
The students enjoyed this video, which makes me realize how much of a missed opportunity the fingerprints video is. Sigh.
You’ve heard about asteroid 2024 YR4 and we’ve heard your questions — so let’s talk about it. What are the chances it’ll hit Earth? Why do those odds keep changing? And should you be worried? (Spoiler alert: No). Get the facts from a NASA expert and learn how we track asteroids, update predictions, and keep an eye on the skies.
NASA has significantly lowered the risk of near-Earth asteroid 2024 YR4 as an impact threat to Earth for the foreseeable future. When first discovered, asteroid 2024 YR4 had a very small, but notable chance of impacting our planet in 2032. As observations of the asteroid continued to be submitted to the Minor Planet Center, experts at NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s (JPL’s) Center for Near-Earth Object Studies were able to calculate more precise models of the asteroid’s trajectory and now have updated its impact probability on Dec. 22, 2032 to only 0.004% and found there is no significant potential for this asteroid to impact our planet for the next century. The latest observations have further reduced the uncertainty of its future trajectory, and the range of possible locations the asteroid could be on Dec. 22, 2032, has moved farther away from the Earth.
Astronomers using the Gemini South Telescope and W. M. Keck Observatory have determined the shape and origin of asteroid 2024 YR4. It now has a 'few percent' chance of impacting the moon after it was determined that it will most likely not hit Earth, according to NOIR Lab.
As my regular readers might note, no Sunday entertainment feature or highlights of last night's Saturday Night Live today. The blog passed its page view goals for April on Sunday night, so I'll be posting evergreen and holiday content through the end of the month. Stay tuned.
The Artemis II mission, slated to launch early 2026, will fly four astronauts around the Moon. This mission will last for about 10 days and will be the first crewed test flight of the Space Launch System rocket, the Orion spacecraft, and the Exploration Ground Systems at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center Florida needed to support them.
Not only will this mission be the first time in over 50 years that human beings have seen the Moon close-up, Artemis II will also prepare us for future human landings on the Moon starting with the Artemis III mission and help prepare for future missions to Mars.
“We know how to live and work in low Earth orbit. Now, it’s time to go further.” Gateway, humanity’s first lunar space station, will advance science and exploration on and around the Moon as part of NASA’s Artemis campaign. Gateway will also help NASA and its partners test the technologies and operations essential for a sustained presence in deep space, laying the groundwork for the first human mission to Mars. This video brings together insights from the “Houston We Have a Podcast” miniseries on Gateway, “Lunar Space Station 101,” where NASA leaders and astronauts discuss how Gateway will shape the future of space exploration.
Voices featured: NASA astronaut Randy Bresnik, deputy director for NASA's Exploration Operations Office Stephanie Dudley, ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano, and NASA’s Lunar Architecture Lead Shatel Bhakta.
I'm looking forward to Gateway as well. Two space stations, at least as long as the ISS remains in orbit!
From the volcanic fields of Arizona to the lunar-like landscape of Iceland, NASA scientists are actively preparing astronauts and mission support teams for conducting science on the Moon.
Learn about NASA’s rich history of geology training and hear how scientists and engineers are getting ready to bring back samples that will help us learn about the origins of our solar system.
I'm a geologist as well as a paleontologist, so I find this video not just professionally interesting, but thrilling. May it come to pass!
It is WILD how often cities used to burn down. So when fires ripped through LA at the beginning of 2025, we wondered: are urban firestorms BACK?
In 1871, nearly a third of Chicago burned down. In 1889, 25 blocks of Seattle went up in flames. Modern buildings and firefighting solved the problem. So, how is this happening again? And why is it getting worse? To find out, we went to LA while the fires were still burning. Our crew was on the ground from day one. We interviewed top fire officials and leading scientists. And, we learned exactly what went wrong in LA - and the ONE THING that could stop these UNSTOPPABLE fires.
Wow! That's the most in-depth I've seen Maiya May and Weathered get on a topic! Of course, it's also the longest. Here's to hoping my readers watch the whole thing.
I found out last week that the home where I grew up was in a mandatory evacuation zone. In the 25 years I lived there, that never happened. In addition, I don't recall my family ever telling me that had happened during the three decades I've lived in Michigan until this past week.*
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*I[n] case anyone is wondering, the house is O.K. It was more than a mile from the edge of the fire at its greatest extent.
My old house was under mandatory evacuation orders during these fires as well, but survived again. Whew!
PBS Terra retitled the video in the second post "The Insurance Industry Can't Weather Another Wildfire Season Like This UNLESS..." which I think is more accurate. As the second video points out, the fires have caused between $135 billion and $150 billion in damages so far. Yikes!
Those are just the monetary losses. May and the Weathered crew also showed the human costs. Those can be seen and felt, but are harder to measure.
Follow over the jump for the top posts featuring videos from Weathered, whether on PBS Terra or the main PBS channel, between March 21, 2024 and March 20, 2025. The most read of them was PBS examines 'THE RISKIEST Places to Live in the US as Our Climate Changes', which listed Los Angeles County, California, among the riskiest places in the U.S. because of climate change. That turned out to be true sooner than I expected!
We often hear industry and political leaders talk about how we need to balance the economy with the environment. The thinking goes something like this: environmental destruction is necessary to earn a living and make the things we need. But is this really true? Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant explores how we can approach the economy and the environment differently.
This video reinforces a point I've been making since the first year of the blog and even before that in my environmental science classes: "economy is dependent on society, which is in turn dependent on the environment. Without an environment, there is no society. Without a society, there is no economy."
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I think the system needs to be reformed; the status quo is unsustainable, while scrapping our food, energy, and economic systems and starting over would be too disruptive.
This video provides an idea of how those reforms could work. It's also one I could show my students. Welcome to blogging as professional development.
Dr. Rae Wynn-Grant also pointed out the inequitable distribution of both harms and benefits from economic activity using the example of the port district of Wilmington in Los Angeles, which I can add as an example of environmentalracism. What struck me as hard as the life expectancy of residents of the port neighborhoods of San Pedro, Wilmington, and West Long Beach being eight years lower than Los Angeles County as a whole is that more people died from air pollution in L.A. County than from traffic accidents and crime combined. Yikes! Am I glad I moved out of there!
Follow over the jump for how today's top post earned its page views.
A couple of the videos mentioned the bankruptcies of Red Lobster and TGI Fridays. Those were the subjects of two of the most read entries of last year. Expect me to cover them on Wayback Wednesday. Stay tuned.
Between 2014 and 2024, private equity firms invested more than $90 billion into U.S. restaurants and bars. Red Lobster and TGI Fridays were two of the most notable. The two casual dining giants were acquired through a transaction type called a leveraged buyout that ultimately contributed to their bankruptcies in 2024. Watch the video above to learn more about the most commonly used strategies by private equity firms, including sale-leasebacks and roll-ups, to try to turn a company around.
Speaking of lists, one of the biggest surprises was the roster of restaurant chains Roark Capital owns.
I've eaten at a majority of them and I had no idea they were under the same ownership! I know I write that it's a good day when I learn something new, but I wonder if I learned something good from this. I will say I learned something useful, that Roark Capital helped defeat raising the federal minimum wage to $15/hour. That makes me like them even less than their name.
It is named for Howard Roark, the protagonist in Ayn Rand's novel The Fountainhead. The firm claims that its name is not meant to connote any particular political philosophy but instead signify the firm's admiration for the iconoclastic qualities of independence and self-assurance embodied by the central figure in The Fountainhead.
Based on the continued interest private equity has in restaurant chains, I expect to see more bankruptcies and write more Retail Apocalypse entries about them. Now follow over the jump for the most popular entries about the Retail Apocalypse posted between March 21, 2024 and March 20, 2025.
Colossal Biosciences' project to revive the once-extinct dire wolf could also prevent existing but endangered animals from slipping into extinction themselves.
On the one hand, this is a great technological and scientific advancement. On the other, these aren't really dire wolves. They're genetically modified gray wolves with about a dozen dire wolf genes, which is still quite an accomplishment. If nothing else, they're proof of concept and cool animals in their own right.
Extinction is typically for good. Once a species winks out, it survives only in memory and the fossil record. When it comes to the woolly mammoth, however, that rule has now been bent. It’s been 4,000 years since the eight-ton, 12-foot, elephant-like beast walked the Earth, but part of its DNA now operates inside several litters of four-inch, half-ounce mice created by scientists at the Dallas-based Colossal Laboratories and Biosciences.
Hello and welcome! My name is Anton and in this video, we will talk about the woolly mice (please note a small correction in the video comments about the base pair/gene differences between mammoths and elephants)[.]
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Small correction (thanks Jake): It's not 1.5 million gene differences, but 1.5 million base pairs (building blocks of DNA)[.]
Mouse genome is believed to contain around 80,000 genes (but only 22000 create proteins) and here 8 were affected[.]
A more realistic comparison would be to use total number of base pairs and for Asian elephants there are 3.38 billion base pairs and it looks like 1.5 million are different between elephants and mammoths[.]
Still a lot[.]
Petrov's objection I most agree with is the ethical and legal one — obtaining an elephant to experiment on. Just the same, I'm more optimistic than he is, even if these are stunts.
That's a wrap for today. Stay tuned for a retrospective on Wayback Wednesday tomorrow.
