"Bunnies boiling on the stove" mentioned several times here regarding Katie Britt. What is that?

At least someone finally gave us the creeeeeeepy clip of a traumatized young black man and a therapist(?) clinking her teacup.

Well, that was the opening bell for the Dem's part of the 2024 presidential campaign...

…and Joe Biden came out swinging.

Go, Joe!

What happened to Boebert last night? I've been looking around for her demise & can't find it.

Thanks in advance.

Resources I wish I'd had years ago for debunking vax & other conspiracy theories: downloadable links...

I hope this is okay to cross-post here. I put it in GD first, but things can get lost over there.

Resources I wish I'd had years ago for debunking vax & other conspiracy theories: downloadable links...

This is from a great article today by Michael Hiltzik of the Los Angeles Times. Never mind the link unless you have a subscription, but the meat of it for me is that various organizations have written booklets/manuals on how to rebut, prebut, and educate people who have fallen or may soon fall down the rabbit hole.

Counteracting political lies about science
Johns Hopkins, Yale and others are offering researchers playbooks on how to combat disinformation.
In recent years, disinformation has seemed to be on an inexorable march across the scientific and medical landscape.

Prominent politicians, up to and including the former president, have promoted useless drugs as supposed cures for COVID-19. Partisan attacks on the safety and efficacy of COVID vaccines have expanded into attacks on all vaccines. Established scientific and medical authorities have been vilified on social media and on the airwaves and even been subjected to physical assault.
The sheer volume of lies and misrepresentations injected into the political mainstream has some scientists despairing of ever regaining the public’s attention.
“Scientists really recognize this as a problem, from what they see in the community and read in the news,” says Tara Kirk Sell of Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Health Security. “They see the problems they have from misinformation and disinformation on the public health side and in the medical field and in other areas. They want to figure out how to deal with it. We’re providing…

Sell’s reference is to the “Practical Playbook for Addressing Health Misinformation” just released by her center. The 65-page publication amounts to a road map for identifying misinformation and disinformation and applying the best strategies for counteracting it before it spreads..
https://centerforhealthsecurity.org/sites/default/files/2024-02/24-02-14-cdc-misinfo-playbook_0.pdf

UNICEF, the Yale Institute for Global Health and other organizations published one of the earliest such guides in late 2020, aimed specifically at anti-vaccine misinformation.
https://vaccinemisinformation.guide/

Others have the broader goal of fighting conspiracy theories in general.
https://skepticalscience.com/docs/ConspiracyTheoryHandbook.pdf

One recommendation that most seem to have in common is to take a strategic approach: Disinformation campaigns can’t be defeated by ad hoc measures; they require an organized, proactive and targeted approach mounted by credible defenders of science.

For what it’s worth, link to LATimes, page A2, 2-25-2024

https://enewspaper.latimes.com/infinity/latimes/default.aspx?token=42e23962a5d74614be16bae3d62d13e7&sfmc_id=6532a30f25b3640666bed99d&utm_id=34465635&skey_id=f0185674dd52c0ccd4b79cadf4d6840cd74dca950f70382e51f3c73188047081&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=ENP-email-Subs-eNewspaper-2024225&utm_term=eNewspaper+Daily+Notify&edid=bfe96f70-c429-48c9-87cb-514087918ad7

Resources I wish I'd had years ago for debunking vax & other conspiracy theories: downloadable links...

This is from a great article today by Michael Hiltzik of the Los Angeles Times. Never mind the link unless you have a subscription, but the meat of it for me is that various organizations have written booklets/manuals on how to rebut, prebut, and educate people who have fallen or may soon fall down the rabbit hole.

Counteracting political lies about science
Johns Hopkins, Yale and others are offering researchers playbooks on how to combat disinformation.
In recent years, disinformation has seemed to be on an inexorable march across the scientific and medical landscape.

Prominent politicians, up to and including the former president, have promoted useless drugs as supposed cures for COVID-19. Partisan attacks on the safety and efficacy of COVID vaccines have expanded into attacks on all vaccines. Established scientific and medical authorities have been vilified on social media and on the airwaves and even been subjected to physical assault.
The sheer volume of lies and misrepresentations injected into the political mainstream has some scientists despairing of ever regaining the public’s attention.
“Scientists really recognize this as a problem, from what they see in the community and read in the news,” says Tara Kirk Sell of Johns Hopkins University’s Center for Health Security. “They see the problems they have from misinformation and disinformation on the public health side and in the medical field and in other areas. They want to figure out how to deal with it. We’re providing…

Sell’s reference is to the “Practical Playbook for Addressing Health Misinformation” just released by her center. The 65-page publication amounts to a road map for identifying misinformation and disinformation and applying the best strategies for counteracting it before it spreads..
https://centerforhealthsecurity.org/sites/default/files/2024-02/24-02-14-cdc-misinfo-playbook_0.pdf

UNICEF, the Yale Institute for Global Health and other organizations published one of the earliest such guides in late 2020, aimed specifically at anti-vaccine misinformation.
https://vaccinemisinformation.guide/

Others have the broader goal of fighting conspiracy theories in general.
https://skepticalscience.com/docs/ConspiracyTheoryHandbook.pdf

One recommendation that most seem to have in common is to take a strategic approach: Disinformation campaigns can’t be defeated by ad hoc measures; they require an organized, proactive and targeted approach mounted by credible defenders of science.

For what it’s worth, link to LATimes, page A2, 2-25-2024

I got a shocking email from the Electronic Frontier Foundation the other day about some Calif cops

I’m a Californian — I thought we’d taken care of this, but apparently not.
Since it is a press release, the copyright limitations don't apply afaik.

https://www.eff.org/press/releases/dozens-rogue-california-police-agencies-still-sharing-driver-locations-anti-abortion

Dozens of Rogue California Police Agencies Still Sharing Driver Locations with Anti-Abortion States
Civil Liberties Groups Urge Attorney General Bonta to Enforce California's Automated License Plate Reader Laws
PRESS RELEASEJANUARY 31, 2024

SAN FRANCISCO—California Attorney General Rob Bonta should crack down on police agencies that still violate Californians’ privacy by sharing automated license plate reader information with out-of-state government agencies, putting abortion seekers and providers at particular risk, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and the state’s American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) affiliates urged in a letter to Bonta today.

In October 2023, Bonta issued a legal interpretation and guidance clarifying that a 2016 state law, SB 34, prohibits California’s local and state police from sharing information collected from automated license plate readers (ALPR) with out-of-state or federal agencies. However, despite the Attorney General’s definitive stance, dozens of law enforcement agencies have signaled their intent to continue defying the law.

The EFF and ACLU letter lists 35 specific police agencies which either have informed the civil liberties organizations that they plan to keep sharing ALPR information with out-of-state law enforcement, or have failed to confirm their compliance with the law in response to inquiries by the organizations.

“We urge your office to explore all potential avenues to ensure that state and local law enforcement agencies immediately comply,” the letter said. “We are deeply concerned that the information could be shared with agencies that do not respect California’s commitment to civil rights and liberties and are not covered by California’s privacy protections.”

ALPR systems collect and store location information about drivers, including dates, times, and locations. This sensitive information can reveal where individuals work, live, associate, worship, or seek reproductive health services and other medical care. Sharing any ALPR information with out-of-state or federal law enforcement agencies has been forbidden by the California Civil Code since enactment of SB 34 in 2016.

And sharing this data with law enforcement in states that criminalize abortion also undermines California’s extensive efforts to protect reproductive health privacy, especially a 2022 law (AB 1242) prohibiting state and local agencies from providing abortion-related information to out-of-state agencies. The UCLA Center on Reproductive Health, Law and Policy estimates that between 8,000 and 16,100 people will travel to California each year for reproductive care.

An EFF investigation involving hundreds of public records requests uncovered that many California police departments continued sharing records containing residents’ detailed driving profiles with out-of-state agencies. EFF and the ACLUs of Northern and Southern California in March 2023 wrote to more than 70 such agencies to demand they comply with state law. While many complied, many others have not.

“We appreciate your office’s statement on SB 34 and your efforts to protect the privacy and civil rights of everyone in California,” today’s letter said. “Nevertheless, it is clear that many law enforcement agencies continue to ignore your interpretation of the law by continuing to share ALPR information with out-of-state and federal agencies. This violation of SB 34 will continue to imperil marginalized communities across the country, and abortion seekers, providers, and facilitators will be at greater risk of undue criminalization and prosecution.”

For the letter to Bonta: https://www.eff.org/document/01-31-2024-letter-california-ag-rob-bonta-re-enforcing-sb34-alprs

For the letters sent last year to noncompliant California police agencies: https://www.eff.org/press/releases/civil-liberties-groups-demand-california-police-stop-sharing-drivers-location-data

For information on how ALPRs threaten abortion access: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/09/automated-license-plate-readers-threaten-abortion-access-heres-how-policymakers

For general information about ALPRs: https://sls.eff.org/technologies/automated-license-plate-readers-alprs

I just tuned in this morning. WTF happened with the New York Times that has people in a no-doubt-deserved swivet?

It’s early where I am.

I just tuned in this morning. WTF happened with the New York Times that has people in a no-doubt-deserved swivet? What have they done? Did they give Hur the high-five on the front page?

Who here remembers Bush v. Gore? Who remembers the Brooks Brothers Riot to stop counting the vote?

Who here remembers Bush v. Gore? Who remembers the Brooks Brothers Riot to stop counting the vote?

Well, we’re DUers, so anyone not actually in a coma at the time remembers the events very vividly and personally.

One by one the young lawyers involved with Team Bush and Bush v Gore rose through the ranks of highly respectable and highly right-wing legal careers. Bush v Gore not only gave us the presidency of BushCheney, but ultimately Chief Justice Roberts, Justice Brett Kavanagh, and Justice Amy Coney Barrett. I’m sure when they get together in a private setting they all bask in the warm glow of a job well done — but under actual oath at their confirmation hearings they all had a specialized sort of amnesia about those events.

So, to watch them hem and haw today about the sacredness of votes cast, and how they were horrified at the thought of electoral chaos, much less whether one state could be the deciding factor in a presidential election — my mind inescapably returned to the events of Bush v Gore.

These aren’t your grandpa’s Republicans. They’re not even conservative, whatever that means any more. The rot that has taken over the Supreme Court is unspeakable.

I hope Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson are okay — this has got to be hard for them.

This is glorious -- thank you! Off to the side is the happiest dog I've ever seen ❤️

What's been going on with Trump's Las Vegas rally today? Has he melted down yet?

Inquiring minds want to know, and all that