If you have one of these cheap Chinese E-bikes (says the video below, their unregulated manufacture and lack of quality controls the problem) you might want to take a look at this video, about how their lithium-ion batteries can catch fire and create a massive, ferocious, hard to put out fire.*
(Is there quite a problem with these lithium-ion batteries in general, and their tending to catch fire? Aren’t these the batteries that they use in electric cars?)
The women wearing a tiara must be stressing about the thing falling off their head and shattering.
I have an idea for a trivia gameshow comedy sketch in the vein of SCTV’s Halfwits or SNL’s Celebrity Jeopardy. The contestants would be President Biden and Senators Dianne Feinstein, John Fetterman, and Mitch McConnell. The gameshow would be called something like “Acuity” or “Word Talkers”.
Anybody who has not donated, just do it. Your identity won’t be stolen. Your credit card will not be compromised.
And your conscience will be clear.
“Nonapod on August 31, 2023 at 11:18 am said:
I have an idea for a trivia gameshow comedy sketch in the vein of SCTV’s Halfwits or SNL’s Celebrity Jeopardy. The contestants would be President Biden and Senators Dianne Feinstein, John Fetterman, and Mitch McConnell. The gameshow would be called something like “Acuity” or “Word Talkers”.”
Kamala would have to be included for her sing/songy prose she keeps spewing out that makes no sense.
“Is there quite a problem with these lithium-ion batteries in general, and their tending to catch fire?”
A cargo pallet containing over 81,000 of these batteries ignited spontaneously in a UPS cargo plane in 2010. Both pilots were killed by the ensuing fire– although they managed to steer the crippled plane into an unpopulated area on the ground before it crashed. There are two videos about UPS Flight 6 on YouTube, one about 36 minutes long–
The only good thing to have come out of that accident was that the FAA restricted the number of devices using lithium batteries on passenger flights. Lithium batteries as a general product are considered hazmat– Class 9 dangerous substances (“Miscellaneous Dangerous Substances and Articles, Including Environmentally Hazardous Substances”) and must be clearly marked as such, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA). The bad news is that “out of the over 1.25 million packages of hazmat shipped each year, three types of dangerous goods stand out. These are items that are most commonly shipped, being flammable liquids, dry-ice, and lithium batteries.”
So yes, lithium batteries are nasty little buggers.
So yes, lithium batteries are nasty little buggers.
You forgot to mention the infamous battery fires on the Boeing 787 “Screamliners”.
“Is there quite a problem with these lithium-ion batteries in general, and their tending to catch fire? Aren’t these the batteries that they use in electric cars?”
Yes, and yes. My neighbor has a new Tesla which his wife insists must be parked in the garage. It’s a fire risk. There have been numerous fires in NYC with e-bikes in apartment buildings. And while we’re at it, if you install those solar panels on your house roof to sell power to the electric utility, there will be a big problem if your house is ever on fire.
@Wendy Brown – I picture Kamala as the host, opening the show with something like:
“Welcome to Word Talkers everyone! Word Talkers is a game show. Game shows are games that are also shows that are on TV! I’m your host Kamala Harris. A host is a person who hosts things!”
Franklin Foer’s new book about Biden is attracting attention, most of it surrounding his account of a cranky Biden’s petulant behavior during the Afghanistan withdrawal. I suspect Biden just follows the advice of his advisors and the bureaucracy when it comes to climate change, fossil fuels, inflation, immigration, DEI and other policy areas. But he was head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, so he thinks he understands foreign (and apparently military) affairs and doesn’t like to be contradicted or corrected.
As Foer’s sources relate, Biden thinks of foreign policy in terms of interpersonal relationships and “family dynamics.” Looking at how Biden’s surviving children turned out and at how the Kabul evacuation turned out, one can speculate about the connections. Biden was also head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, so it’s possible that he’s more personally engaged in the prosecutions of Donald Trump than one might assume.
Lithium batteries are great because of their stored energy to weight ratio. Lithium is the lightest element on the periodic table that’s not gaseous. But all lithium batteries will burn spectacularly if overheated enough or shorted out.
One of the big problems is quality control in manufacturing them. I believe that the conductive elements inside need to have great purity and smooth surfaces. A microscopic protrusion or spine on the surface might be OK when the battery is new or young in its life cycle, but as it is charge cycled many times the spine can grow and eventually the battery can short itself out. Spontaneously.
Abraxas:
I have maintained from the start – and wrote a post about it – that Biden was in charge of the Afghan withdrawal. It has his fingerprints all over it.
And yes, I believe that Biden was the major decision-maker in this horrific set of circumstances, although he wasn’t alone. As I said early on, it bears his fingerprints. Incredibly arrogant, stubborn, ignorant, stupid, corrupt, ambitious, mendacious, and short-sighted, he is now also suffering from some degree of dementia which seems to have heightened all of his most terrible characteristics. And although some people apparently did disagree with him and saw disaster coming, no one could or would stop him, and no one resigned.
Another issue with Lion batteries is the fact that, among other things, they require lots of cobalt. The bulk of the words cobalt production currently comes from Democratic Republic of the Congo. And a lot of that is from these (supposedly illegal) hellish open pit mines where it’s mined by hand by dirt poor men, women, and children. Do an image search for “congo cobalt mine” to get a rough idea.
Vivek is a little unstable. One day he says we need paper ballots. The next day he’s touting electronic voting from home. He seems like a person who is in love with solutions, but passes quickly from one to another. He may not be the person to choose the right solution and put it into effect.
i’m guessing robert malley, qatar’s catspaw, was the lead player in the afghan withdrawal, although climate grifters were apparently all over the draw down becaue reasons,
verified paper ballots, is probably the way to go, but remember the dems didn’t want that in 2000, so they forced a switch to digital, with diebold and es&s, of course they didn’t want diebold other because it was too transparent,
From Instapundit:
“This leaves us with a Bloomberg report citing fintech startup Propel, an app aimed at Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients, that reveals an increasing number of Americans are struggling to pay rent and put food on the table.
Among households using the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program’s boosted pandemic benefits, 42% skipped meals in August and 55% ate less because they couldn’t afford food, more than double last year’s share, according to a Wednesday report from Propel Inc., a benefits software developer.
Bloomberg said:
The data also highlight that households were worse off in August from just a month ago. Since July, an increasing share of low-income households had utilities shut off, couldn’t afford the prior month’s utility bill or couldn’t afford rent. More than two-thirds of those surveyed who were receiving boosted SNAP payments said they had some form of debt.
Propel’s alarming report is an eye-opener, considering we’ve pointed out that mid/low tier consumers have depleted savings and racked up insurmountable credit card debt to make ends meet in the era of ‘Bidenomics’ inflation.
It isn’t so easy for the middle class, either.”
It’s still the economy. And becoming more so with every passing day. Inflation increasing along with energy prices. The housing market is unbalanced. The commercial real estate market is in trouble. Credit card debt is at an all-time high. The Ferd threatens more rate hikes.
The Biden government will do nothing to rein in spending or alleviate cost pressures. This is the issue upon which the Republicans can win in 2024.
Lithium batteries…I don’t believe it’s just cheap Chinese ones, there seems to be a problem with the breed in general. (I should disclose that I’m an investor in an early-stage company that is working to address this problem)
There is currently a lot of excitement about electric air taxis, and several companies working in this space. I certainly hope that the FAA isn’t going to issue airworthiness certificates to any of these without credible answers to the fire problem.
JJ…”This is the issue upon which the Republicans can win in 2024″..yes, and there are also several other issues which the Republicans can strongly leverage…BUT there are also some very serious obstacles. One is that the Democrats have managed to create a perception of ‘Republican = Racist” and even “Republican = Anti-Semite” in the minds of a lot of voters. The other is that the Abortion issue is an absolute killer in the minds of a significant % of voters, especially women.
RE: UFOs–Lou Elizondo’s most “sobering” comments about the reality of UFOs
Based on all the people I have seen talking about and offering their takes on the UFO phenomenon over the years, and based, as well, on what I have read on this subject, Lou Elizondo seems to me to be the most informed, sober, and rational of the lot; he has his head screwed on straight.
For several years there Elizondo was seemingly everywhere, talking about UFOs–on the Internet, on innumerable interview shows, and at many events and conferences.
Then, several months ago, he announced that he had given his last interview, made his last appearance, that he was tired, worn out, and was withdrawing from public view, and he hasn’t apparently been seen or heard from since.
Perhaps he felt that he had fulfilled his purpose, that what he wanted to impart had been imparted, and that enough people had now been alerted to the fact that the issue of UFOs was a vitally important issue.
Among his often oracular statements were the statements excerpted in the video linked to below, statements about the reality behind UFOs which I found to be, in his words, very “sobering,” or perhaps a better word might be “chilling.”*
My interpretation of his remarks?
UFOs are very real, and the entities or intelligences directing or piloting them (and perhaps several species of them) are higher on the food chain, are more accomplished apex predators than humans are–they are much more technologically advanced or perhaps even more advanced in terms of evolution than is the human race.
Moreover, that perhaps these entities have, in essence, been here on Earth “forever,” and that around 70,000 years or so ago they may have done a little tinkering with human DNA to catapult the human race to the head of the food chain here on Earth.
Finally, that these entities may have been intimately involved in past human history.
(So, much as I hate to admit the possibility, perhaps those “experts” on those cheesy “Ancient Aliens” shows are actually on to something.)
Franklin Foer’s new book about Biden is attracting attention…
–Abraxas
Franklin Foer. Ptui!
Foer is the so-called journalist and editor for the “New Republic” who during the Iraq War broke a series of diaries by an Iraqi soldier which reflected quite badly on the American military and the Iraq War.
Not that publishing blatant falsehoods against Republican policies is a bar to one’s career in the American press.
David Foster–There used to be an old TV program in the 50s? which tried to answer viewer’s questions, one of which was often “what would the future look like,” and I remember their mock up of the world of the future–probably what they thought the year 2000 would be like–lots and lots of towers, no roads, but instead very busy low level air transportation, including personal helicopters.
Dick Tracy’s watch has come to be in the Apple watch, but I’m really disappointed that those personal helicopters have not shown up.
RE; Elizondo’s take on UFOs
Just for a few minutes suspend your sense of disbelief, and contemplate what it would mean for the human race–and for you personally–if what Lou Elizondo said about the nature of UFOs and the entities directing/piloting them were true.
That is indeed, a “sobering” thought.
We think that–as human beings–we have “agency,” but perhaps that is an illusion–what we tell ourselves–and we really don’t.
Elizondo also mentioned the “zoo hypothesis”–that rather than us humans being the keepers of the zoo–top of the food chain, apex predators, lords of all Creation–in reality we are actually just another exhibit in some other higher entity’s zoo.
Perhaps such a truth, and it’s impact, if it were to be known, is one of the reasons–perhaps the main reason–for such adamant government secrecy about the UFO phenomenon.
We have seen what happens when a technologically and culturally inferior society meets up with one that is superior to it; the natives always lose, and in this case that would be us humans.
Suspend your disbelief and try to imagine when you meet Jesus Christ face to face.
Snow on Pine…oh, the electric helicopters are coming, assuming that battery-safety problem can be solved. Over at least the next 5 years, and I suspect longer, operation is going to require a certified pilot…it appears that these things are easier to fly than a conventional helicopter, so maybe process will be a little shorter.
If there ever start being hundreds of thousands of these Air Mobility Vehicles in operation, the air traffic control problem will become very, very difficult, and this isn’t just a matter of ‘bureaucracy’ or of the FAA being technologically backwards or something like that. It’s an inherently very difficult problem.
“The other is that the Abortion issue is an absolute killer in the minds of a significant % of voters, especially women.” – David Foster
I agree on that. Unless the national GOP platform comes up with wording that refutes the claim that the GOP wants to ban all abortions, the Dems will use it to their advantage.
Something like this:
“Banning abortion does not end the practice. It only makes it illegal and unsafe. The Republican Party believes abortion should be legal, safe, as rare as possible, and restricted to the early months of pregnancy. We are also in favor of the responsible use of birth control, and other family planning strategies. In addition to legal abortion, we encourage Crisis Pregnancy Centers to offer women with unwanted pregnancies a choice of carrying their baby to term. We believe women should be in control of their bodies and have as many choices as possible.”
I believe well over 50% of voters are on board with something like that. It would remove abortion from the Democrats list of strawmen arguments.
Just for a few minutes suspend your sense of disbelief, and contemplate what it would mean for the human race–and for you personally–if what Lou Elizondo said about the nature of UFOs and the entities directing/piloting them were true.
Snow on Pine:
Why? Why should anyone suspend their disbelief?
I saw a UFO when I was 14. It changed my life to see something that wasn’t supposed to be there according to science. I’ve followed the subject with more than casual interest since then.
However, nothing has changed. The subject continues to circle the same ruts. Your riff about space aliens controlling humanity goes back to Charles Fort.
The lid is always about to blow right off the story, but it never does.
Back to the lithium battery problem: Kate said @12:58 p.m., “There have been numerous fires in NYC with e-bikes in apartment buildings.”
Local news: Yale has just banned e-bikes etc. on campus: “Under a new policy, electronic scooters, bikes and skateboards are no longer allowed in residential areas at Yale University. In a message to students, the university wrote that ‘storing or charging them in densely populated residential spaces poses a severe fire and safety hazard.’ . . . A June fire at a New York City e-bike shop killed four people when it spread to apartments. Officials said the fire was sparked by a lithium-ion battery. ‘As we start to see the proliferation of these, we’re starting to see the proliferation of after-market parts,’ New Haven Fire Chief John Alston said. ‘People who bought these bikes a few years ago, the batteries are now depleted. They’re buying after-market batteries, after-market chargers.'”
Other schools have already banned e-bikes: Fordham banned them last December, as did Boston College.
Brando! batteries, They’ve got electrolytes!
Actually, I happen to think that the particular tiara pictured above is overdone and ugly.
I believe well over 50% of voters are on board with something like that. It would remove abortion from the Democrats list of strawmen arguments.
==
It’s an insipid position and deserves to be discarded.
I don’t know anything about the intelligence of supposed higher beings – given the sightings by humans they may need driving lessons.
Or maybe their force-field shields are powered by those pesky lithium batteries and we only see them when *their* batteries go kablooey… So not to worry – we’ll have something to bond over when they land in Washington…
…but there is delectable and all-too-human irony when people who spend their lives sneering at Biblical revelation find an untapped ability to “suspend disbelief” in modern space-opera fairy tales…. Often these same folks have invested much mind-time immersed in (and drawing their morals from) neo-medieval fantasy worlds, from the Tolkien franchise through Harry Potter and Game of Thrones – to say nothing of the gaming world of which I am.blissfully ignorant.
But nothing overtly Judeo-Christian please… We’re too *sophisticated* for that.
“When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything.”
G.K. Chesterton
huxley–I’m just reporting what Lou Elizondo said, not what I know to be true and, In fact, I hope it isn’t true. Unfortunately, I don’t take Elizondo for a fool, or as someone who is easily mislead.
Elizondo’s comment about things being “sobering” was in response to something like the question, “If people knew what you know, and had seen what you have seen, what do you think their response would be?
I just happen to think that, given what Elizondo has apparently seen and knows, the fact that he thinks that people would find this knowledge very “sobering” is very troubling to me.
I would rather think that we are the masters of our own fate, not that we are just puppets, an exhibit in some alien’s zoo, or walled off from the rest of the Galaxy, and in some kind of quarantine as what Elizondo has hinted at seems to imply.
P.S.–I note DOD’s announcement yesterday that the AARO office will no longer be reporting to Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Ronald Moultrie, but, from now on, to Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, a change which I believe that Congress had ordered to be made in recent legislation.
Moultrie, of course, one of the two high level DOD clowns who gave that (deliberate and staged?) clueless and dismissive performance at the first UFO hearing, in which they claimed to have no real knowledge of the history of or major incidents concerning the subject of UFOs, and illustrated their talk by using the two most unimpressive videos of UFOs that they apparently could find.
It has also been pointed out that a year in AARO had yet to create and launch a website where DOD employees could report UFO sightings, and where AARO could share with the public non-classified information and images.
In yesterday’s announcement DOD said that this website would becoming online in the near future.
Snow on Pine says stuff that indicates his faith in his prophet;
I just happen to think that, given what Elizondo has apparently seen and knows, the fact that he thinks that people would find this knowledge very “sobering” is very troubling to me.
What Elizondo has “apparently seen and knows” is good enough for some followers.
Otay. A true believer.
Art D:
“It’s an insipid position and deserves to be discarded.”
Insipid = lacking vigor or interest:
I’d be interested to see the vigorous and interesting abortion platform you would put forward.
Kate on August 31, 2023 at 12:58 pm said:
“… if you install those solar panels on your house roof to sell power to the electric utility, there will be a big problem if your house is ever on fire.”
Can you please clarify the concern you are suggesting here. My neighbor is entertaining just such a roof situation: is there something specific to which he should be alerted? Clearly if your house is on fire you have a major problem, with or without solar panels. Is this about using solar energy to charge Li ion batteries, which introduce greater risk of fire?
Your comments are always clear and thoughtful, but I am confused about this one. 🙂
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Trump being Trump … with a little help
https://genius.com/Hi-rez-donald-trump-first-day-out-lyrics
RE: Chinese E-Bikes and their exploding batteries
If you have one of these cheap Chinese E-bikes (says the video below, their unregulated manufacture and lack of quality controls the problem) you might want to take a look at this video, about how their lithium-ion batteries can catch fire and create a massive, ferocious, hard to put out fire.*
(Is there quite a problem with these lithium-ion batteries in general, and their tending to catch fire? Aren’t these the batteries that they use in electric cars?)
See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZpNCii-OTqw
Re: Exploding Batteries
https://www.wwnytv.com/2023/08/29/lawmaker-wants-state-check-health-first-responders-solar-farm-fire/
The women wearing a tiara must be stressing about the thing falling off their head and shattering.
I have an idea for a trivia gameshow comedy sketch in the vein of SCTV’s Halfwits or SNL’s Celebrity Jeopardy. The contestants would be President Biden and Senators Dianne Feinstein, John Fetterman, and Mitch McConnell. The gameshow would be called something like “Acuity” or “Word Talkers”.
Anybody who has not donated, just do it. Your identity won’t be stolen. Your credit card will not be compromised.
And your conscience will be clear.
Where would the world be without tiara?
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=h_&q=Thai+tiara&iax=images&ia=images
“Nonapod on August 31, 2023 at 11:18 am said:
I have an idea for a trivia gameshow comedy sketch in the vein of SCTV’s Halfwits or SNL’s Celebrity Jeopardy. The contestants would be President Biden and Senators Dianne Feinstein, John Fetterman, and Mitch McConnell. The gameshow would be called something like “Acuity” or “Word Talkers”.”
Kamala would have to be included for her sing/songy prose she keeps spewing out that makes no sense.
“Is there quite a problem with these lithium-ion batteries in general, and their tending to catch fire?”
A cargo pallet containing over 81,000 of these batteries ignited spontaneously in a UPS cargo plane in 2010. Both pilots were killed by the ensuing fire– although they managed to steer the crippled plane into an unpopulated area on the ground before it crashed. There are two videos about UPS Flight 6 on YouTube, one about 36 minutes long–
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y50saxfTqQA&ab_channel=MentourPilot
and the shorter one about 14 minutes–
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfdrhtvzYZU&ab_channel=TheFlightChannel
The only good thing to have come out of that accident was that the FAA restricted the number of devices using lithium batteries on passenger flights. Lithium batteries as a general product are considered hazmat– Class 9 dangerous substances (“Miscellaneous Dangerous Substances and Articles, Including Environmentally Hazardous Substances”) and must be clearly marked as such, according to the International Air Transport Association (IATA). The bad news is that “out of the over 1.25 million packages of hazmat shipped each year, three types of dangerous goods stand out. These are items that are most commonly shipped, being flammable liquids, dry-ice, and lithium batteries.”
https://www.iata.org/en/publications/newsletters/iata-knowledge-hub/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-transport-of-dangerous-goods-by-air/
So yes, lithium batteries are nasty little buggers.
So yes, lithium batteries are nasty little buggers.
You forgot to mention the infamous battery fires on the Boeing 787 “Screamliners”.
“Is there quite a problem with these lithium-ion batteries in general, and their tending to catch fire? Aren’t these the batteries that they use in electric cars?”
Yes, and yes. My neighbor has a new Tesla which his wife insists must be parked in the garage. It’s a fire risk. There have been numerous fires in NYC with e-bikes in apartment buildings. And while we’re at it, if you install those solar panels on your house roof to sell power to the electric utility, there will be a big problem if your house is ever on fire.
@Wendy Brown – I picture Kamala as the host, opening the show with something like:
“Welcome to Word Talkers everyone! Word Talkers is a game show. Game shows are games that are also shows that are on TV! I’m your host Kamala Harris. A host is a person who hosts things!”
Franklin Foer’s new book about Biden is attracting attention, most of it surrounding his account of a cranky Biden’s petulant behavior during the Afghanistan withdrawal. I suspect Biden just follows the advice of his advisors and the bureaucracy when it comes to climate change, fossil fuels, inflation, immigration, DEI and other policy areas. But he was head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, so he thinks he understands foreign (and apparently military) affairs and doesn’t like to be contradicted or corrected.
As Foer’s sources relate, Biden thinks of foreign policy in terms of interpersonal relationships and “family dynamics.” Looking at how Biden’s surviving children turned out and at how the Kabul evacuation turned out, one can speculate about the connections. Biden was also head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, so it’s possible that he’s more personally engaged in the prosecutions of Donald Trump than one might assume.
Lithium batteries are great because of their stored energy to weight ratio. Lithium is the lightest element on the periodic table that’s not gaseous. But all lithium batteries will burn spectacularly if overheated enough or shorted out.
One of the big problems is quality control in manufacturing them. I believe that the conductive elements inside need to have great purity and smooth surfaces. A microscopic protrusion or spine on the surface might be OK when the battery is new or young in its life cycle, but as it is charge cycled many times the spine can grow and eventually the battery can short itself out. Spontaneously.
Abraxas:
I have maintained from the start – and wrote a post about it – that Biden was in charge of the Afghan withdrawal. It has his fingerprints all over it.
Another issue with Lion batteries is the fact that, among other things, they require lots of cobalt. The bulk of the words cobalt production currently comes from Democratic Republic of the Congo. And a lot of that is from these (supposedly illegal) hellish open pit mines where it’s mined by hand by dirt poor men, women, and children. Do an image search for “congo cobalt mine” to get a rough idea.
Smile! Or not : (
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2023/05/neighborhood-watch-out-cops-are-incorporating-private-cameras-their-real-time
Vivek is a little unstable. One day he says we need paper ballots. The next day he’s touting electronic voting from home. He seems like a person who is in love with solutions, but passes quickly from one to another. He may not be the person to choose the right solution and put it into effect.
i’m guessing robert malley, qatar’s catspaw, was the lead player in the afghan withdrawal, although climate grifters were apparently all over the draw down becaue reasons,
verified paper ballots, is probably the way to go, but remember the dems didn’t want that in 2000, so they forced a switch to digital, with diebold and es&s, of course they didn’t want diebold other because it was too transparent,
From Instapundit:
“This leaves us with a Bloomberg report citing fintech startup Propel, an app aimed at Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) recipients, that reveals an increasing number of Americans are struggling to pay rent and put food on the table.
Among households using the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program’s boosted pandemic benefits, 42% skipped meals in August and 55% ate less because they couldn’t afford food, more than double last year’s share, according to a Wednesday report from Propel Inc., a benefits software developer.
Bloomberg said:
The data also highlight that households were worse off in August from just a month ago. Since July, an increasing share of low-income households had utilities shut off, couldn’t afford the prior month’s utility bill or couldn’t afford rent. More than two-thirds of those surveyed who were receiving boosted SNAP payments said they had some form of debt.
Propel’s alarming report is an eye-opener, considering we’ve pointed out that mid/low tier consumers have depleted savings and racked up insurmountable credit card debt to make ends meet in the era of ‘Bidenomics’ inflation.
It isn’t so easy for the middle class, either.”
It’s still the economy. And becoming more so with every passing day. Inflation increasing along with energy prices. The housing market is unbalanced. The commercial real estate market is in trouble. Credit card debt is at an all-time high. The Ferd threatens more rate hikes.
The Biden government will do nothing to rein in spending or alleviate cost pressures. This is the issue upon which the Republicans can win in 2024.
Lithium batteries…I don’t believe it’s just cheap Chinese ones, there seems to be a problem with the breed in general. (I should disclose that I’m an investor in an early-stage company that is working to address this problem)
There is currently a lot of excitement about electric air taxis, and several companies working in this space. I certainly hope that the FAA isn’t going to issue airworthiness certificates to any of these without credible answers to the fire problem.
JJ…”This is the issue upon which the Republicans can win in 2024″..yes, and there are also several other issues which the Republicans can strongly leverage…BUT there are also some very serious obstacles. One is that the Democrats have managed to create a perception of ‘Republican = Racist” and even “Republican = Anti-Semite” in the minds of a lot of voters. The other is that the Abortion issue is an absolute killer in the minds of a significant % of voters, especially women.
RE: UFOs–Lou Elizondo’s most “sobering” comments about the reality of UFOs
Based on all the people I have seen talking about and offering their takes on the UFO phenomenon over the years, and based, as well, on what I have read on this subject, Lou Elizondo seems to me to be the most informed, sober, and rational of the lot; he has his head screwed on straight.
For several years there Elizondo was seemingly everywhere, talking about UFOs–on the Internet, on innumerable interview shows, and at many events and conferences.
Then, several months ago, he announced that he had given his last interview, made his last appearance, that he was tired, worn out, and was withdrawing from public view, and he hasn’t apparently been seen or heard from since.
Perhaps he felt that he had fulfilled his purpose, that what he wanted to impart had been imparted, and that enough people had now been alerted to the fact that the issue of UFOs was a vitally important issue.
Among his often oracular statements were the statements excerpted in the video linked to below, statements about the reality behind UFOs which I found to be, in his words, very “sobering,” or perhaps a better word might be “chilling.”*
My interpretation of his remarks?
UFOs are very real, and the entities or intelligences directing or piloting them (and perhaps several species of them) are higher on the food chain, are more accomplished apex predators than humans are–they are much more technologically advanced or perhaps even more advanced in terms of evolution than is the human race.
Moreover, that perhaps these entities have, in essence, been here on Earth “forever,” and that around 70,000 years or so ago they may have done a little tinkering with human DNA to catapult the human race to the head of the food chain here on Earth.
Finally, that these entities may have been intimately involved in past human history.
(So, much as I hate to admit the possibility, perhaps those “experts” on those cheesy “Ancient Aliens” shows are actually on to something.)
* See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYY1Mw8TVtg
Franklin Foer’s new book about Biden is attracting attention…
–Abraxas
Franklin Foer. Ptui!
Foer is the so-called journalist and editor for the “New Republic” who during the Iraq War broke a series of diaries by an Iraqi soldier which reflected quite badly on the American military and the Iraq War.
Entirely bogus of course.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Thomas_Beauchamp_controversy
Not that publishing blatant falsehoods against Republican policies is a bar to one’s career in the American press.
David Foster–There used to be an old TV program in the 50s? which tried to answer viewer’s questions, one of which was often “what would the future look like,” and I remember their mock up of the world of the future–probably what they thought the year 2000 would be like–lots and lots of towers, no roads, but instead very busy low level air transportation, including personal helicopters.
Dick Tracy’s watch has come to be in the Apple watch, but I’m really disappointed that those personal helicopters have not shown up.
RE; Elizondo’s take on UFOs
Just for a few minutes suspend your sense of disbelief, and contemplate what it would mean for the human race–and for you personally–if what Lou Elizondo said about the nature of UFOs and the entities directing/piloting them were true.
That is indeed, a “sobering” thought.
We think that–as human beings–we have “agency,” but perhaps that is an illusion–what we tell ourselves–and we really don’t.
Elizondo also mentioned the “zoo hypothesis”–that rather than us humans being the keepers of the zoo–top of the food chain, apex predators, lords of all Creation–in reality we are actually just another exhibit in some other higher entity’s zoo.
Perhaps such a truth, and it’s impact, if it were to be known, is one of the reasons–perhaps the main reason–for such adamant government secrecy about the UFO phenomenon.
We have seen what happens when a technologically and culturally inferior society meets up with one that is superior to it; the natives always lose, and in this case that would be us humans.
Suspend your disbelief and try to imagine when you meet Jesus Christ face to face.
One of these things is not like the other.
Re UFOs: For your info
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/pentagon-releases-new-website-on-ufos/ar-AA1g41TJ
Snow on Pine…oh, the electric helicopters are coming, assuming that battery-safety problem can be solved. Over at least the next 5 years, and I suspect longer, operation is going to require a certified pilot…it appears that these things are easier to fly than a conventional helicopter, so maybe process will be a little shorter.
If there ever start being hundreds of thousands of these Air Mobility Vehicles in operation, the air traffic control problem will become very, very difficult, and this isn’t just a matter of ‘bureaucracy’ or of the FAA being technologically backwards or something like that. It’s an inherently very difficult problem.
“The other is that the Abortion issue is an absolute killer in the minds of a significant % of voters, especially women.” – David Foster
I agree on that. Unless the national GOP platform comes up with wording that refutes the claim that the GOP wants to ban all abortions, the Dems will use it to their advantage.
Something like this:
“Banning abortion does not end the practice. It only makes it illegal and unsafe. The Republican Party believes abortion should be legal, safe, as rare as possible, and restricted to the early months of pregnancy. We are also in favor of the responsible use of birth control, and other family planning strategies. In addition to legal abortion, we encourage Crisis Pregnancy Centers to offer women with unwanted pregnancies a choice of carrying their baby to term. We believe women should be in control of their bodies and have as many choices as possible.”
I believe well over 50% of voters are on board with something like that. It would remove abortion from the Democrats list of strawmen arguments.
Just for a few minutes suspend your sense of disbelief, and contemplate what it would mean for the human race–and for you personally–if what Lou Elizondo said about the nature of UFOs and the entities directing/piloting them were true.
Snow on Pine:
Why? Why should anyone suspend their disbelief?
I saw a UFO when I was 14. It changed my life to see something that wasn’t supposed to be there according to science. I’ve followed the subject with more than casual interest since then.
However, nothing has changed. The subject continues to circle the same ruts. Your riff about space aliens controlling humanity goes back to Charles Fort.
The lid is always about to blow right off the story, but it never does.
Back to the lithium battery problem: Kate said @12:58 p.m., “There have been numerous fires in NYC with e-bikes in apartment buildings.”
Local news: Yale has just banned e-bikes etc. on campus: “Under a new policy, electronic scooters, bikes and skateboards are no longer allowed in residential areas at Yale University. In a message to students, the university wrote that ‘storing or charging them in densely populated residential spaces poses a severe fire and safety hazard.’ . . . A June fire at a New York City e-bike shop killed four people when it spread to apartments. Officials said the fire was sparked by a lithium-ion battery. ‘As we start to see the proliferation of these, we’re starting to see the proliferation of after-market parts,’ New Haven Fire Chief John Alston said. ‘People who bought these bikes a few years ago, the batteries are now depleted. They’re buying after-market batteries, after-market chargers.'”
https://www.wtnh.com/news/connecticut/new-haven/yale-bans-e-bikes-from-residential-areas-on-campus/
Other schools have already banned e-bikes: Fordham banned them last December, as did Boston College.
Brando! batteries, They’ve got electrolytes!
Actually, I happen to think that the particular tiara pictured above is overdone and ugly.
I believe well over 50% of voters are on board with something like that. It would remove abortion from the Democrats list of strawmen arguments.
==
It’s an insipid position and deserves to be discarded.
I don’t know anything about the intelligence of supposed higher beings – given the sightings by humans they may need driving lessons.
Or maybe their force-field shields are powered by those pesky lithium batteries and we only see them when *their* batteries go kablooey… So not to worry – we’ll have something to bond over when they land in Washington…
…but there is delectable and all-too-human irony when people who spend their lives sneering at Biblical revelation find an untapped ability to “suspend disbelief” in modern space-opera fairy tales…. Often these same folks have invested much mind-time immersed in (and drawing their morals from) neo-medieval fantasy worlds, from the Tolkien franchise through Harry Potter and Game of Thrones – to say nothing of the gaming world of which I am.blissfully ignorant.
But nothing overtly Judeo-Christian please… We’re too *sophisticated* for that.
“When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything.”
G.K. Chesterton
huxley–I’m just reporting what Lou Elizondo said, not what I know to be true and, In fact, I hope it isn’t true. Unfortunately, I don’t take Elizondo for a fool, or as someone who is easily mislead.
Elizondo’s comment about things being “sobering” was in response to something like the question, “If people knew what you know, and had seen what you have seen, what do you think their response would be?
I just happen to think that, given what Elizondo has apparently seen and knows, the fact that he thinks that people would find this knowledge very “sobering” is very troubling to me.
I would rather think that we are the masters of our own fate, not that we are just puppets, an exhibit in some alien’s zoo, or walled off from the rest of the Galaxy, and in some kind of quarantine as what Elizondo has hinted at seems to imply.
P.S.–I note DOD’s announcement yesterday that the AARO office will no longer be reporting to Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence Ronald Moultrie, but, from now on, to Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, a change which I believe that Congress had ordered to be made in recent legislation.
Moultrie, of course, one of the two high level DOD clowns who gave that (deliberate and staged?) clueless and dismissive performance at the first UFO hearing, in which they claimed to have no real knowledge of the history of or major incidents concerning the subject of UFOs, and illustrated their talk by using the two most unimpressive videos of UFOs that they apparently could find.
It has also been pointed out that a year in AARO had yet to create and launch a website where DOD employees could report UFO sightings, and where AARO could share with the public non-classified information and images.
In yesterday’s announcement DOD said that this website would becoming online in the near future.
Snow on Pine says stuff that indicates his faith in his prophet;
What Elizondo has “apparently seen and knows” is good enough for some followers.
Otay. A true believer.
Art D:
“It’s an insipid position and deserves to be discarded.”
Insipid = lacking vigor or interest:
I’d be interested to see the vigorous and interesting abortion platform you would put forward.
Kate on August 31, 2023 at 12:58 pm said:
“… if you install those solar panels on your house roof to sell power to the electric utility, there will be a big problem if your house is ever on fire.”
Can you please clarify the concern you are suggesting here. My neighbor is entertaining just such a roof situation: is there something specific to which he should be alerted? Clearly if your house is on fire you have a major problem, with or without solar panels. Is this about using solar energy to charge Li ion batteries, which introduce greater risk of fire?
Your comments are always clear and thoughtful, but I am confused about this one. 🙂