Attack of the bots
That problem with the bot attacks got significantly worse today, and I’ve been working on trying to protect against it. I already had a plug-in that’s supposed to protect against them, but it’s obviously no longer very effective. So I did a bunch of research, decided on a different plugin, managed to get into the files of the blog – not an easy task when under attack – and installed the new one.
It’s improved the situation for now, so I’m hopeful. We’ll see if the improvement continues.
Apologies for any delays you may have experienced. Bots get smarter and smarter as time goes on, but perhaps plugin developers can stay ahead of them.
Titanic artifacts exhibit: from the bottom of the ocean
Last weekend I went to this exhibit in Boston that featured many items taken from the wreck of the Titanic. Most were very ordinary: some green cufflinks, a bow tie, paper money, a toilet, men’s wool slacks and a vest. But they were so strange to see, knowing their history. And many were in surprisingly good shape, having been somewhat protected in suitcases and then restored.
There were also life-size replicas of a first-class stateroom and a third-class stateroom, as well as of the famous grand staircase – again, the same size as the original. It all had a strange, disturbing, poignant, and fascinating quality.
I took quite a few photos, and here are two that I think capture something of the essence of the experience. First we have a set of au gratin dishes as they were displayed in an exhibit case. They seem perfectly preserved and unbroken, and there were so many of them:
I wondered how there came to be so many, and in such good condition, and when I read the explanation and then looked up, I saw this photo. It’s what they looked like when they were found at the ocean’s bottom. Apparently there were hundreds of them, originally in a large wooden cabinet which fell undisturbed and settled on the bottom. Over the approximately seventy years they lay there, the wooden cabinet disintegrated and left the dishes in these neat rows:
Roundup
There is SO much news that a roundup is in order, and even then it’s very incomplete.
(1) About the DC crash – here’s a heartbreaking list of some of the victims. RIP.
The control tower was understaffed that night. Plus:
“DC airspace is very unique,” Henry Harteveldt, President and travel industry analyst with Atmosphere Research Group, told The Post, citing the proximity of the military operations and the outdated design of the airport.
Reagan National was built in the 1930s as the original airport in DC … commercial and military aircraft share the airspace … We’ve been lucky to have never before had an incident like this happen,” he added.
In May 2024 there was nearly a collision between an American Airlines jet and a small airplane at DCA and there was another almost bang-up in April 2024 between Southwest and JetBlue airplanes.
Harteveldt attributes that partly to the fact Reagan “has runway configurations that are no longer used at contemporary airports. We’ve got runways that intersect with one another.”
The precarious situation is exacerbated due to the fact that the airport’s main runway is half the length of the standard — 7,000 feet instead of 13,000 — resulting in the compact scheduling for takeoffs and landings.
Despite this, in 2024 Congress allowed the airport to increase its number of daily flights from DCA.
Unbelievable – yet all too believable.
Also, the helicopter was significantly higher than it should have been, and we don’t know why. In addition, although the Army has said that the pilot of the helicopter was a woman, here name is not being released yet, at the request of the family.
(2) The FAA has restricted helicopter flights from the airspace around Reagan Airport. Why didn’t that happen a long time ago? It’s not as though there wasn’t a lot of warning.
(3) A small medevac jet with six Mexican nationals onboard crashed in Philadelphia last night. It was returning a pediatric patient to Mexico after treatment in the US. RIP. Six people on the ground were injured as well.
(4) At the DOJ, some of the J6 prosecutors have been let go.
(5) Guess what? The administration has halted federal aid to NGOs that assist illegal aliens in coming here:
“Today we are announcing that we have stopped all grant funding that’s being abused by NGOs to facilitate illegal immigration into this country,” she told host Will Cain. “So it’s amazing to me the hundreds of millions of dollars that have been spent by the federal government that has been sent to NGOs to facilitate this invasion of our country.”
Yarden Bibas is back in Israel, but where are his wife and children?
By now I assume just about everyone reading this knows who Yarden Bibas is: his wife and two very young children were kidnapped on October 7, 2023 by Hamas, and he was kidnapped as well. We don’t know the exact history of whether they were ever kept together, but quite early on it became clear that Yarden was held in a different location than his family. He also was videoed being told his family had been killed in an Israeli strike. Other than that, Hamas has been silent on whether they’re dead or alive, and Israel says it cannot confirm their condition but is deeply concerned.
In these current exchanges, woman and children were supposed to be released first – plus, the living were supposed to be released first. Since the children and their mother have not been released, it is logical to conclude that they are in fact deceased. Not only logical, but almost certainly true. But still, there is that doubt, revolving around the fact that Hamas has not told Israeli authorities the family’s status yet, despite demands by Israel:
“Yarden is a father who left his safe room to protect his family, bravely survived captivity and returned to an unbearable reality,” [a family statement] says.
“At this time, we ask: Protect Yarden, Protect his soul. Please respect his privacy and give him the space he needs so that his body and soul can begin to recover,” the statement says.
Hamas has claimed that Shiri and the boys were killed in Gaza, but Israel has had no definite proof and has demanded information from Hamas through the mediators.
My question is: why isn’t Hamas telling? Possible answers:
(1) The better to torture the family and all who have been following the story.
(2) The better to get additional huge concessions from Israel later, either for the information, for the living family, or for their bodies. The Bibas family are their prize captives.
(3) The circumstances of their deaths implicate Hamas in some extra way – in addition, of course, to the outrage of the kidnapping in the first place. And so they’re stalling.
(4) They cannot find them.
(5) They are planning some elaborate and ghoulish “reveal.”
Did you know there were six Americans held in Venezuela? Well, they’re freed
I don’t know about you, but I had missed the news entirely until yesterday, when I saw a story about them. Trump sent Richard Grennell down to Venezuela, and guess what he returned with? Six Americans:
“Just been informed that we are bringing six hostages home from Venezuela. Thank you to Ric Grenell and my entire staff. Great job!” Trump posted on Truth Social Friday night.
Grenell met with Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro to send a warning about the consequences that would come from the continued detainment of the Americans.
Who are the six? Their names have not been released, but:
Among those detained are as many as 10 Americans who the government has linked to alleged plots to destabilize the country. Neither the White House nor Maduro’s government immediately released the names of the six who were freed Friday.
Trump has been criticized for sending Grennell to meet with Maduro; they say it lends Maduro legitimacy. Trump has said that he has no intention of changing his attitude towards Maduro, which is still hardline. He also claims the administration got this concession:
And very important to note, that Venezuela has agreed to receive, back into their Country, all Venezuela illegal aliens who were encamped in the U.S., including gang members of Tren de Aragua. Venezuela has further agreed to supply the transportation back. We are in the process of removing record numbers of illegal aliens from all Countries, and all Countries have agreed to accept these illegal aliens back.
I don’t know what was threatened or what was promised. But I very much doubt that it was to become buddy-buddy with Venezuela.
By the way, the Biden administration had also gotten American detainees returned from Venezuela, but the deal was quite different. Here’s what happened in December of 2023:
The United States freed a close ally of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in exchange for the release of 10 Americans imprisoned in the South American country and the return of a fugitive defense contractor known as “Fat Leonard” who is at the center of a massive Pentagon bribery scandal, the Biden administration announced Wednesday. …
The deal represents the Biden administration’s boldest move yet to improve relations with the major oil-producing nation and extract concessions from the self-proclaimed socialist leader. The largest release of American prisoners in Venezuela’s history comes weeks after the White House agreed to suspend some sanctions, following a commitment by Maduro to work toward free and fair conditions for the 2024 presidential election.
The Biden administration suspended sanctions, got some prisoners back but gave up Alex Saab:
Saab, 51, was pulled from a private jet in the summer of 2020 during a stop in Cape Verde en route to Iran, where he was heading to negotiate oil deals on behalf of Maduro’s government.
He is charged with conspiracy to commit money laundering tied to a bribery scheme that allegedly siphoned off $350 million through state contracts to build affordable housing for Venezuela’s government.
In addition, of course, that “commitment by Maduro to work toward free and fair conditions for the 2024 presidential election” in Venezuela was a joke.
Open thread 2/1/2025
Here are the hostages due to be released tomorrow
Three men have been announced as tomorrow’s hostage releases.
One is dual American/Israeli citizen Keith Seigel, 65 years old. His wife had also been taken hostage but was released in the first round of exchanges in the fall of 2023.
Another is Ofer Calderon, age 54. Two of his children had originally been kidnapped but were released in the fall 2023 exchange.
There is also Yarden Bibas, who is 35 years old. It is wonderful that he is coming back, but also very ominous that his wife and two small children, also kidnapped, have not yet been returned. In fact, it was already ominous that they had not been returned long ago with the other children in the fall of 2023. At that time, Hamas announced that they are dead – and of course blamed it on Israel – but Israel has not confirmed the deaths. I would be very surprised if they are alive. Yarden, the father, was already told of their deaths in a harrowing and sadistic video Hamas released back in November of 2023:
The footage, which the group released as a sick propaganda video, shows Yarden Bibas, 34, sobbing and visibly shaken as his captors inform him that his children, 10-month-old Kfir Bibas and 4-year-old Ariel, have been killed along with his wife and wife, Shiri Silverman-Bibas, 32.
A distressed Babis then begs to have their bodies returned to Israel and blames Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for their deaths — repeating similar condemnation of Israel’s government in previous hostage videos ripped as propaganda.
Hamas had claimed that the Bibas family had been killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip but did not offer proof and the fate of the family has not been verified.
I actually don’t think there’s much question that they are dead. But Hamas is tricky and you can’t be 100% sure. They are reportedly on the list of 33 to be returned in this phase, but Hamas has not yet said whether they are dead or alive. But bodies can contain evidence of who actually killed them, and it could have been Hamas or some of their confederates.
Yarden Bibas has a long long road ahead of him, and I wish him help and healing. There are other relatives of his who say that they “are facing very complex days” ahead. Indeed.
Hakeem Jeffries, street fighter
The Minority Leader Hakeen Jeffires has issued a call:
Keep focused on the need to look out for everyday New Yorkers and everyday Americans who are under assault by an extreme MAGA Republican agenda that is trying to cut taxes for billionaire donors and wealthy corporations and then stick New Yorkers and working class Americans across the country with the bill.
That’s not acceptable. We are going to fight it legislatively. We are going to fight it in the courts. And we’re going to fight it in the streets. Thank you, everyone.
Insurrection, anyone?
The Democrats have been doing this sort of thing for quite a while, and especially in the summer of 2020.
When I read the Jeffries quote, it conjured this up in my Boomer memory:
Diversity hiring in the FAA
Diversity hiring is indeed a thing in the FAA. What it had to do with the collision over the Potomac – if anything – is unknown at present. But the following may have been factors:
The FAA has already stated that there weren’t the usual number of controllers on duty that night. In fact:
That left one air traffic controller (ATC) to handle both helicopters and planes, a job that two controllers typically handled.
Not only is the workload doubled for the controller, but the ATC would also use different radio frequencies to talk to the helicopter and the plane. “While the controller is communicating with pilots of the helicopter and the jet, the two sets of pilots may not be able to hear each other,” reports the New York Times.
The staffing shortages are nothing new at Reagan or any other air traffic control tower in the U.S. The job is brutal, with a workload of up to ten hours a day, six days a week. Turnover is high.
The tower at Reagan National is roughly 30% understaffed. The National Air Traffic Controllers Association union said airports lost air traffic control staffing nationwide by 9% from 2011 to 2023, while flights increased during that same time period.
Meanwhile, the number of flights has increased, in part because Congress members wanted more convenient flights for themselves, although they were aware that it’s a crowded air corridor. In fact, the commercial flight involved in the crash – although almost certainly not responsible for it – was lobbied for by Kansas Senator Moran, and instituted one year ago:
“I know that flight, I’ve flown it many times myself,” Moran said in a press conference on Wednesday night. “I lobbied American Airlines to begin having a direct nonstop flight service to DCA. That flight has been in existence for about a year… this is a very personal circumstance as well as an official response.”
And of course the area has a great many helicopters as well.
Plus this, which is where DEI might come in [emphasis mine]:
Years before Wednesday’s fatal collision between a military helicopter and a passenger jet approaching Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, critics warned that the Obama and Biden administrations had jeopardized safety by prioritizing diversity, equity and inclusion at the Federal Aviation Administration. …
Critics warned that the FAA’s focus on DEI diverted time and resources from air travel safety. It hobbled the agency as it grappled with air traffic controller shortages, antiquated monitoring equipment and an increase in near misses on crowded airport runways, they said. …
Air safety concerns prompted 11 Republican attorneys general to write to FAA Administrator Michael Whitaker last year to question the administration’s hiring practices and priorities. …
Diversity goals at the FAA ramped up during the Obama administration, were largely dropped under Mr. Trump’s first term and resumed under President Biden.
During the Obama and Biden administrations, the FAA prioritized hiring more minorities and those with disabilities for key positions, including those in air traffic control. …
In 2013, the FAA started using a “biographical assessment” to increase the hiring of preferred minority racial groups at air traffic control centers. The assessment asked applicants about their participation in school sports and the age at which they started earning money.
The assessment disqualified more experienced, qualified applicants, many of whom were Air Traffic Collegiate Training graduates or had other critical experience, such as a pilot’s license.
More than 3,000 rejected applicants filed a lawsuit claiming discrimination. The FAA dropped the biographical assessment in 2018 after Congress enacted a law banning its use. …
As late as last year, the FAA was recruiting those with targeted disabilities, including “hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability and dwarfism.”
The Democrats and the press are focusing – of course – on Trump’s remarks about diversity hiring. As I said yesterday, I think he should have kept his mouth shut on that until strong evidence exists that it’s a factor. Or, if he had to mention it, explain in a logical manner how DEI hiring has helped create a shortage of air controllers.
Why should anyone care about the race of an air controller? Doesn’t everyone simple want the best people, whether white or black or Hispanic or whatever? Apparently not.
Should a traffic controller have a hearing or vision disability? Or an intellectual disability, severe or not? Sorry, but I don’t think so. And what is this bit about “psychiatric disability”? The only “psychiatric disability” I can think of offhand that might be okay in an air traffic controller would be Asperger’s – and even then, if the person has been labeled “disabled” because of it, that does’t sound like the intensely stressful job of an air traffic controller would be a good fit.
ADDENDUM:
Meanwhile, J. D. Vance does a better job of explaining:
ADDENDUM II:
More here on possible causes of the crash.
Open thread 1/31/2025
Remember when 2025 was brand new?
Does Hamas think this is a good look for them?
I suppose to their followers it looks like a show of strength. But to anyone the least bit objective, it looks like a pack of larping bullies lording it over a slight young woman:
Welcome home, Agam Berger – the woman in the video – as well as Arbel Yahoud, similar but slightly different optics:
Also 80-year-old Gadi Mozes comes home: