The mighty encyclopedia: doing research in grade school in the 1950s

The New Neo Posted on by

The blue volumes of the World Book Encyclopedia stood tall on the shelves of my brother’s room, the only reference books our house had except for a dictionary and a thesaurus. But the World Book was king, an essential tool for homework when I was in grade school.

Need to do a report on Cyrus McCormick, inventor of the reaper – whatever that was? Turn to the “M” encyclopedia, and copy the text. Or, actually, don’t quite copy it – that’s cheating. How did we get around it? Change the wording a bit and hope for the best.

We didn’t have computers with the world at our fingertips. Going to the library was a long journey, even if moms drove us. And then there was the card catalogue and books that existed on the index cards but weren’t on the shelves. And who knew how to find what you were looking for, even if the books were there?

We also looked things up in the big fat heavy Reader’s Guide to Periodical Literature. That was a bit better, and often led to a magazine article or two. But the library might not even carry those magazines.

And in the winter we walked ten miles in the snow, barefoot.

Speaking of Cyrus McCormick, I went to Wikipedia – today’s World Book to the tenth power – and found this:

McCormick has been simplistically credited as the single inventor of the mechanical reaper.

Oopsies! Yes, the World Book was probably way simplistic. Wikipedia adds:

He was, however, one of several designing engineers who produced successful models in the 1830s. His efforts built on more than two decades of work by his father Robert McCormick Jr., with the aid of Jo Anderson, an enslaved African-American man held by the family. He also successfully developed a modern company, with manufacturing, marketing, and a sales force to market his products.

There’s a ton more at the link. What an interesting life, including this:

McCormick had always been a devout Presbyterian, as well as advocate of Christian unity. He also valued and demonstrated in his life the Calvinist traits of self-denial, sobriety, thriftiness, efficiency, and morality. He believed feeding the world, made easier by the reaper, was part of his religious mission in life.

And using Wikipedia once again, I am surprised – very surprised – to learn that the World Book is still published. Yes, folks:

World Book was first published in 1917. Since 1925, a new edition of the encyclopedia has been published annually. Although published online in digital form for a number of years, World Book is currently the only American encyclopedia which also still provides a print edition. The encyclopedia is designed to cover major areas of knowledge uniformly, but it shows particular strength in scientific, technical, historical and medical subjects.

World Book, Inc. is based in Chicago, Illinois. According to the company, the latest edition, World Book Encyclopedia 2024, contains more than 14,000 pages distributed along 22 volumes and also contains over 25,000 photographs.

And for a mere $839.00, it can be yours from Amazon.

The dynamic duo: Musk and Ramaswamy

The New Neo Posted on by

They explain their plans for government efficiency (sounds like the oxymoron to end all oxymorons, doesn’t it?):

Musk and Ramaswamy are correct: unelected bureaucrats passing “rules and regulations” have detracted America from what the Founders framed in the Constitution.

DOGE is there to stop it.

“The entrenched and ever-growing bureaucracy represents an existential threat to our republic, and politicians have abetted it for too long,” the entrepreneurs wrote. “That’s why we’re doing things differently. We are entrepreneurs, not politicians. We will serve as outside volunteers, not federal officials or employees. Unlike government commissions or advisory committees, we won’t just write reports or cut ribbons. We’ll cut costs.”

And before Trump was a politician, he was a real estate developers and TV personality.

Musk and Ramaswamy say that they want to concentrate on three areas: regulatory rescissions, administrative reduction, and cost savings. They also plan to help transition the workers whose jobs are eliminated into the private sector.

It’s nothing if not ambitious, and also needed. Will they succeed? I haven’t a clue.

In the weeks since the election, it occurs to me that Trump and the people he’s recently surrounded himself with must have thought there was an excellent chance he would win. They seem to be ready with Cabinet appointments and lots of plans.

In the computer age, are objections to a national ID outdated?

The New Neo Posted on by

It’s long been my impression that objection to a national ID stem from World War II, when they were often mechanisms of tyranny. But the world has changed a great deal since then, and even without a national ID the government has taken on the worst aspects of Santa: they see you when you’re sleeping, they know when you’re awake, they know when you’ve been bad or good so be good for goodness sake. “Good” by their definition, that is.

Computers and ubiquitous videos make it all possible. DNA is the icing on the cake.

So, why not have a national ID card?:

… [T]here is a single, simple, technical solution to minimizing illegal immigrant employment and voting in the United States—a solution which would also simplify the number of documents needed to prove your ID and could help with passing new privacy laws governing what for-profit corporations can do with your personal data. There really is such a technical panacea: a national ID for every American citizen.

Thanks to modern technology, the ID can be digital. The EU is creating a new “digital wallet” for every citizen. The digital identity can be used for multiple purposes, including accessing public services, opening a bank account, filing tax returns, proving your age, checking into a hotel, or renting a car. Far from being a threat to privacy, the new digital wallet will limit the information that private companies now routinely demand from users of their services. In Estonia for the past two decades citizens have already been using the digital identity system—the “e-ID”—to vote, pay bills, sign contracts, access health information, and perform other activities.

National ID cards—both physical, and increasingly, digital, are the norm in the 21st-century world, with at least 170 out of almost 200 countries in the world using them.

The author argues that a national ID will simplify and streamline what has already happened in terms of government control, and would facilitate voting security as well as cut down on employment of illegal aliens. I generally tend to balk at the idea of a national ID, but I agree that we probably have already surrendered every single bit of privacy and liberty that a national ID might threaten to take away.

Here’s an interesting tidbit:

In the aftermath of the election, many stunned Democrats may be wondering if they have accidentally imported the next generation of Republican voters. (If I may engage in some Tom Friedmanesque taxi-driver sociology, I would like to point out that two Uber drivers I recently hired, one a recent Nigerian immigrant and the other a Venezuelan, had both entered the country under Biden. Both men said that if they could vote, they would vote for Trump.)

That possible irony has occurred to me, as well.

But back to IDs:

Trump has learned who his friends are – and who they’re not

The New Neo Posted on by

Trump had a bunch of handicaps first time around:

– The Democrats didn’t think he had a mandate, because of his failure to get the popular vote. Or just because.

– He knew very little about Washington and how it worked.

– Even people on the right didn’t know much about him and were hesitant to work for him.

– He had to rely on others to make recommendations for people to appoint, and their suggestions often involved establishment figures who weren’t onboard with Trump’s agenda. Some were even actively – or secretly – against it

– The “resistance” was out to undermine him and was powerful and quite successful at it, and I doubt he expected the strength of their resolve and the lengths to which they would go.

Now a lot has changed, and all to his advantage. He’s been president before and knows the ropes. Most world leaders already have had dealings with him. He won the popular vote. He has slightly more cooperative GOP leaders in Congress. He’s assembled an interesting group of iconoclastic and often-brilliant allies to help him – at least for now. He’s appointing people who support his agenda. He is seen as having more power. He know what the forces arrayed against him have been and what they’ve been willing to do. He’s older, perhaps wiser, and certainly tougher. The left is still be determined to undermine him, but for the moment they are demoralized and divided.

For the moment.

Laken Riley’s killer got a free ride for a while – but now has gotten a sentence of life imprisonment

The New Neo Posted on by

Jose Iberra has been convicted of murdering Laken Riley and sentenced to life imprisonment (which I suppose, in a way, is another sort of free ride, but a less pleasant one):

Athens-Clarke County Superior Court Judge Patrick Haggard found Ibarra guilty of 10 total counts, including one count of malice murder, three counts of felony murder, one count of kidnapping, one count of aggravated assault with intent to rape, one count of aggravated battery, one count of hindering a 911 call, one count of tampering with evidence and one count of being a “peeping Tom.” Ibarra pleaded not guilty to all counts.

Haggard then sentenced Ibarra to life without the possibility of parole after Riley’s family read victim impact statements aloud before the court on Wednesday afternoon. Ibarra showed no emotion as a translator repeated Haggard’s sentencing to him in Spanish.

“Your honor, on February 22nd of 2024, our family and friends were given a life sentence without a chance of parole. Jose Ibarra took no pity on my scared, panicked and struggling child,” Riley’s mom, Allyson Philips said in a victim impact statement on Wednesday. “There is no end to the pain, suffering and loss that we have experienced or will continue to endure on that horrific day. My precious daughter was attacked, beaten and shown no mercy. She fought for her life and dignity and to save herself from being brutally raped. This sick, twisted and evil coward showed no regard for Laken or human life.”

This is what John Hinderaker of Powerline had to say two days ago on the subject of how Ibarra got to be in a position to murder Laken Riley:

Nor is it just prospective jurors: every sane American must be appalled by the Biden Administration policies that welcomed an illegal alien, a Venezuelan gang member, into the U.S.; disabled ICE from kicking him out, after he was apprehended; allowed him to roam freely within our country; and bought him a plane ticket to the destination of his choice, Athens, Georgia. In a sense, it is hard to blame Jose Ibarra for thinking he could get away with anything, and the crazy American authorities would only reward him.

Kamala Harris, Biden’s laughable “border czar,” would have continued these disastrous illegal immigration policies. Many factors contributed to Harris’s decisive defeat, but her identification with Biden’s anti-American immigration policies may have been the most important.

It comes across as madness by the Biden administration. Fools or knaves? I say: both.

There’s never any election fraud – except when there is

The New Neo Posted on by

This:

Hubbard County Auditor Kay Rave filed a complaint after she determined that she could not find completed registration forms among the ballots she received from Scouton’s jurisdiction.

This complaint led to an investigation by the Hubbard County Sheriff’s Office.

Eventually, another judge who worked with Scouton on election night came forward and told police that Scouton explicitly ordered voters to not fill out the Minnesota Voter Registration Application.

A third judge said that Scouton simply told new voters to sign the back of a book rather than fill out any official forms.

At least 11 people voted illegally as a result of Scouton’s actions.

This seems somewhat in line with the recent attempt in Bucks County Pennsylvania to count flawed ballots, against an explicit law:

But that didn’t stop Bucks County Commissioners Chair Diane Ellis-Marseglia. Not only did she and her fellow Democrat Bob Harvie vote to count the flawed ballots, she publicly acknowledged their decision was contrary to the law.

“I think we all know that precedent by a court doesn’t matter anymore in this country,” she said after the fact. “People violate laws any time they want. So for me, if I violate this law, it’s because I want a court to pay attention to it.”

A video of her admission made a hit on social media, garnering millions of views. Republicans claimed it confirmed their belief that Democrats are willing to manipulate the law to win elections. The fact that Ellis-Marseglia donated $600 to Casey’s campaign in September, and Casey had backed two Bucks County Democrats in previous elections, didn’t help.

Bucks County isn’t alone. Philadelphia, Centre, and Montgomery County Democrats are also defying both the state Supreme Court and Pennsylvania law by including mail ballots that have no date, or have the wrong date, in their county’s final count.

In both cases, there was defiance of the law that was relatively easy to see. How much goes on that’s difficult or impossible to see or to prove? That’s the problem; trust was broken when the laws were changed because some of the new laws were too lax. But trust is also broken when there is either the appearance or the fact of open defiance of laws. And after the fact, it’s often difficult or impossible to prove what happened and to know how it may have affected the results.

There was such a brouhaha about the Bucks Count Commisioners Chair’s statement that she’s issued this “apology”:

“The passion in my heart got the best of me and I apologize again for that,” Bucks County Commissioner Diane Ellis-Marseglia said in front of a fiery crowd at a county meeting.

“I made a mistake, and because I am an elected official, I am held to a far higher standard than everybody else. So, to the citizens I serve, I apologize, and I will continue to work hard for you and endeavor to not make such a mistake again.”

“The passion in my heart” – isn’t that great? She’s so passionate, you see. And no, you’re not held to a far higher standard. You’re held to the exact same standard: follow the law.

She should be fired or resign.

Also, here’s an informative video on the subject of voting fraud, then and now:

Hegseth and the cross

The New Neo Posted on by

Ridiculous and yet typical of the left:

In a Thursday appearance on All in With Chris Hayes, the former NAACP lawyer Sherrilyn Ifill fired the first shot, declaring that Hegseth was a “known white supremacist.” While her remark might be dismissed as hysteria, it was followed up by a Friday report in the Associated Press and a Saturday report in The Washington Post confirming that Hegseth, while serving in the D.C. National Guard, had been flagged by his fellow troops and superior officers as an “insider threat” due to a “white supremacist” tattoo. So what was the tattoo—a swastika? A Sonnenrad? Neither: It was the phrase Deus Vult, Latin for “God wills it,” inked on Hegseth’s bicep. According to the Post, a naval intelligence officer discovered social media evidence of the tattoo in January 2021, and then distributed it to a chat of officers with the warning, apparently based on a brief Google search, that the phrase was affiliated with “the Proud Boys, Three Percenters, and other extremist groups that participated in the siege at the Capitol.” Separately, according to the AP, the security manager of Hegseth’s unit flagged the tattoo to his superior officers …

Hegseth is an evangelical, not a Catholic, and the phrase, while it has been adopted by sections of the online far right, is also a generic Christian slogan popular among certain evangelical subcultures as well as among internet shitposters inspired by the Crusader Kings II video game.

Much more at the link.

I guess everyone on the right is a white supremacist. Even Larry Elder, the so-called black face of white supremacy. People making the okay sign. The Tea Party. And now Hegseth.

On the perception of aging in others and self

The New Neo Posted on by

Commenter “Brian E” notes:

I hope our perceptions of age become skewed, otherwise I’m going crazy. I’ve found myself seeing people that look exactly like the ones I knew from 30-40 years ago. Only it’s not them. I’ve had to remind myself it can’t be them, because they would look as old as I do if it was them.

Yes, yes, and yes! I experience this on a regular basis, complete with the awareness that it can’t be them. My hunch is that although we are all unique – yes, even identical twins – there nevertheless is a finite number of general “looks” for faces and that’s what we’re seeing – a variation on one of those themes.

In addition, some people change a great deal over time and become nearly unrecognizable. Sometimes it’s about weight gain and/or illness, but often it’s just sag and wrinkle and droopy eyelids. And yet there are others who defy time and look not just younger than the rest of the people their age, but very much like their younger selves with just a few droops here and there. It’s uncanny. I noticed it at my 50th (yes, 50th) high school reunion in particular – the variance in the rate of aging was phenomenal given that we were all roughly the same age.

And the board with the photos of the deceased was getting uncomfortably full.

Then there’s this observation by commenter “AesopFan”:

All of the pictures on our walls are of our family from at least 20 years ago or more, and sometimes when the boys are here, especially the ones I see infrequently, I have to consciously tell myself that all those pudgy, balding, and sometimes bearded old men were my little boys.

That reminds me of my mother’s reaction when my brother started to lose some hair (he’s not bald yet; just receding at a slow pace) and I went gray; she was somewhat dismayed. “Oh, no!” she said. I was a bit miffed, but I realized she was thinking of her own advancing age more than ours. Our appearance was just a reminder of the passage of time.

And then there was my own experience when I had cataract surgery:

A day or two after my cataract surgery I was looking at a relative and noticed he looked older. There were lines in his face I’d never seen before. It was alarming, because at first I thought there had been a sudden and abrupt aging process. But then I realized that it was just that I was seeing more clearly the details I hadn’t seen before, like when HDTV first came out.

Then the same thing happened with my own face in the mirror.

Initially I had figured it was because the surgery had been stressful. Then I thought it was because I wasn’t wearing eye makeup. Then I decided it was the extra-bright lighting in the bathroom that I was using as a guest.

Then I closed my left eye – the one with the new lens in it – and looked at myself in the mirror with my right eye. The lines disappeared, and I looked the way I had thought I looked all these years. Soft focus, lines blurred or erased.

Oh, well. It’s a small price to pay to be able to see better. But a disconcerting one.

I’m used to the sight of my own face in the mirror now. But if I ever want to go back in time, all I have to do is close my left eye, and the lines soften instantly when looking through the cataract in my right eye. A time machine!

Hush money trial: another pause in the proceedings

The New Neo Posted on by

Judge Merchan has paused the sentencing in the so-called hush money case against Trump, and the pause might be extended:

New York prosecutors told the judge who presided over Donald Trump’s hush money trial on Tuesday that his sentencing should be postponed while the president-elect’s lawyers file further legal arguments asking the case be dismissed.

The proposal from Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s office would need to be signed off on by Judge Juan Merchan to become official. Merchan has agreed to previous requests from prosecutors seeking delays.

Prosecutors said they would challenge Trump’s efforts to dismiss the case, but agreed they’re in uncharted territory when it comes to sentencing a president, and acknowledged that his sentencing might need to take place after his term in office.

Yeah, right. They’ve been in uncharted territory the entire time, trying the leading GOP candidate for the presidency before a biased court shortly before the election, on ridiculous charges that are truly “unprecedented” (an overworked word but correct in this instance). The goal was to influence the electorate against him. Perhaps they should be found guilty of malicious prosecution:

A malicious prosecution occurs when a police officer or other government official causes criminal charges to be filed against a person when the official knows probable cause is lacking and the charges are filed because of personal animosity, bias, or some other reason outside the interests of justice. In such cases, the victim’s Fourteenth Amendment “right to liberty” has been violated.

It’s a very hard charge to prove, and it’s a tort rather than a criminal charge. I have no idea whether it would apply to a case like this – perhaps prosecutors are immune? – but something should apply, the offense is so egregious.

Also – why are the prosecutors not just dropping the case? Are they arguing amongst themselves as to what to do? Trying to figure out how he could have a prison White House? Or just embarrassed at this point? Do they ever feel that emotion? I doubt it.

Also:

“Given the need to balance competing constitutional interests, consideration must be given to various non-dismissal options that may address any concerns raised by the pendency of a post-trial criminal proceeding during the presidency, such as deferral of all remaining criminal proceedings until after the end of Defendant’s upcoming presidential term,” the filing says.

The other thing is – unless I’m mistaken, the case can’t be appealed on the merits until they sentence Trump, although there are some procedural grounds for appeal based on the fact that the case wasn’t held in a federal court. So Merchan and the prosecutors may be leaving it dangling because they know they’d lose an appeal with such a terrible case. I’m not sure whether or not my legal reasoning is correct there, but here’s more on the legal issues.

Also, it seems to me that a pause of this nature would violate aspects of a defendant’s right to a speedy trial. Has sentencing ever been delayed for four years, when the trial is otherwise complete?