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Apparently, the National Guard shooter in DC was an Afghan refugee. Now the Trump Administration has got its panties in a twist, calling it an act of “terrorism” and blaming all Afghan refugees. “ Afghan refugees in Massachusetts who fled the Taliban in recent years fear they won’t be able to stay in the country after the Trump administration announced   sweeping changes to Afghan immigration policy   in response to the shooting this week   of two National Guard troops   near the White House.   “Soon after officials identified the suspect as an Afghan national who had worked with the CIA in his native country, the federal government announced it was halting immigration from Afghanistan and would conduct a review of green cards.” The Nazis used collective guilt. The Bolsheviks used collective guilt. Now the Trump Administration is following those examples.  Shame. https://www.bostonglobe.com/2025/11/28/metro/afghan-refugees-trump-crackdown-dc-shooting/

I was a Boy Scout for about three years as a teenager. The troop I was in was sponsored by the Knights of Columbus. Every evening on camping trips we said the rosary around the campfire. I progressed to Star Scout rank before dropping out. One of my younger brothers was in a different troop and made it to Eagle Scout, the highest rank. I can’t say that scouting made a big difference in my life. I recall a few hikes and campouts in the Smokies. The other boys were certainly not the kind of role models my parents would have wanted for me, and I didn’t look up to the older boys as any sort of example. But if Pete Hegseth is unhappy with scouting, they must be doing something right. “According to a leaked proposal obtained by NPR,   Hegseth is unhappy  with the organization and wants his Department of War to end a 100-year relationship, which would leave officials running the annual National Jamboree scrambling to fill the void.   “NPR reported that Hegseth believes the organ...

I don’t know if my IQ   was tested.  Needless to say, I  don’t know what my IQ is. I do know that I was awarded a BA in microbiology with honors at the age of 22, a PhD in genetics at the age of 27, a tenure  track  assistant professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the age of 32 and served as a medical school professor for 37 years . IQ? I don’t know. “ As so often happens, a short cut evolved into the standard of practice. Moderate correlations have been found between IQ scores and school grades and occupational success. But correlations are not proof of causation and even those findings may have been skewed by publication bias and poor research design. In other words, the validity of IQ tests as a predictor of performance is questionable. This is not to say that IQ scores are therefore inherently invalid. Only that their meaning and usefulness are not unambiguously clear. ” I’m not in MENSA, so I can’t be bothered with IQ. https://angrybearblog.com/...

I lived in Tennessee from 1958, when my parents moved to Oak Ridge, until 1977 when I moved to Chapel Hill NC to start grad school. While these might be considered my “formative years,” I don’t consider myself a Tennessean. Judged by number of years spent in a state, I’m Missourian, since I lived in St. Louis for 40 years. I don’t think any native St. Louisans would consider me one of them, though. It’s ok. I eschew tribalism in all its manifestations. With that disclaimer, I disown Tennessee on this one: “ One hundred and eighty-one public libraries in Tennessee are reviewing their children’s collections after Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett (R) ordered them to remove books with LGBTQ themes or characters. Hargett suggested that libraries that made such books available to children were violating federal and state law. Some libraries have closed for days so staff could focus on weeding out prohibited volumes.” *snip* “In Tennessee, Hargett is attempting to censor the idea that...

My wife and I did our PhDs at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It took us five years after we finished undergrad. “ Typically, the philosophy department at Boston University funds PhD candidates for up to seven years. Grippo, who uses they/them pronouns, started PhD coursework in 2019, and as of September, still had a dissertation to finish and undergraduate writing classes to teach before graduating, likely in spring 2027.   “That was until a few weeks ago, when Grippo was told they   were expected to graduate this coming May — a consequence of BU’s decision to tighten funding for PhDs beyond their fifth year.     “There was suddenly a hard line that no post-fifth-year PhDs should be eligible” for university funding or teaching opportunities on campus, Grippo said. “If I knew that I was meaningfully going to have five years to finish my PhD earlier on, I would’ve done a lot of things differently.”   Time from BA/BS to PhD in the life sciences wa...

Artificial fluoridation of public water supplies, which reduces dental caries, tooth decay, and dental health disparities, is one of the 20th century’s great public health achievements. The idea began with the observation that communities where the natural levels of fluoride in the water is high had unusually low levels of dental decay.   When I was growing up in East Tennessee, the John Birch Society and other right-wingers considered water fluoridation to be a communist plot. If so, the commies not only plotted to put dentists out of business, but it appears that it made me and my high school classmates smarter. No wonder we won the Cold War. From a recent Science Advances paper: “We use data from the nationally representative (United States) High School and Beyond cohort, characterize fluoride exposure from drinking water across adolescence, adjust for confounders, and observe cognitive test performance in both secondary school and at age ~60. We find that children exposed to re...

There are plenty of good reasons to maintain high levels of physical activity throughout your life. In addition to reducing risk of heart disease, diabetes and clinical depression, we can add reduced risk of dementia:   “Physical activity in both midlife and late-life was linked to substantially less dementia risk, a long-term analysis of a large cohort showed.   “Compared with the lowest quintile of midlife physical activity, the top two quintiles were associated with 40% lower all-cause dementia risk over 26 years (HR 0.60 for quintile 4, 95% CI 0.41-0.89; HR 0.59 for quintile 5, 95% CI 0.40-0.88), reported Phillip Hwang, PhD, MPH, of Boston University, and colleagues.”   *snip* “The early adult group had 1,526 participants who were 26-44 years old. The midlife group had 1,943 people ages 45-64, and the late-life group had 885 participants ages 65-88. Overall, about 53% of participants were women. Participants in each ascending age group were followed for an average of ...

“President  Donald Trump  stepped into a growing internal battle in the  Republican Party  on Monday,  defending right-wing media figure Tucker Carlson  from fellow conservatives angry that he had hosted Nick Fuentes, the openly fascist podcaster known for his racist, misogynist, pro-Hitler and antisemitic rants, for a softball interview.   “If he wants to [interview Fuentes], get the word out,” Trump said, while asserting he didn’t know who Fuentes is. “People have to decide.”   “The president actively entered the fray of an unfolding battle within the Republican Party, as the right wing struggles to deal with the rising influence of antisemitism and unvarnished bigotry against racial minorities and women in the conservative movement. On Oct. 27, Fuentes’ appearance on Carlson’s online show launched the ongoing row into high gear: Fuentes was given a platform on one of the most important online shows in the conservative ecosystem where he could d...

Trump announced he’ll sign the bill demanding the release of the Epstein file, something the While House has resisted for months. But if that’s the case, why doesn’t he just release them and dispense with legislation? BWAHAHAHAhahahaha!!! Did you fall for that one? “In his social media post suddenly declaring he didn’t care if the House Oversight Committee got the Epstein files, Trump caveated it by saying they “can have whatever they are legally entitled to.”     “Legally entitled to” is doing a lot of work there. The Trump White House and his DOJ will make that determination and can use it to throw a broad protective blanket over any evidence damaging to Trump.   “That language was   echoed   to Politico by an unnamed White House official: “This idea that the federal government is in possession of documents that they can legally hand over with respect to Jeffrey Epstein, and we’re keeping them from the public is a fallacy, like, it’s not true.”   ...

As we say in the south, I was born at night, but I wasn’t born *last* night. In my dictionary, if you look up   the word “whackjob,” you’ll see a picture of Marjorie Taylor Greene. So what to make of MTG’s apostacy over the Epstein files and Trump’s attacks on her? So far, I’ve seen this as classic Trump kayfabe. But I have great respect for Josh Marshall, and here’s his take: “ If Greene was really a true believer in the whole Q-Anon world, which transmigrated pretty seamlessly into the Epstein story, maybe seeing Trump turn on his heels and insist that the world move on and never talk about it again simply shook her at a basic level that most of us can’t quite imagine. If you recall, when we first heard of Greene as a candidate, she was as the first actual Q-Anon supporter running for Congress.   “Here’s where I want to remind you, that this all seems a bit too novelistic, a bit too just right. But why exactly? For most of us, Trump is a serial liar and abuser of women. He h...

Trump screwed his farm belt voters with his China tariffs. While China had been a reliable buyer of American soybeans, it retaliated by buying Brazilian soybeans instead. Brazil is expected to have a record soybean harvest next year. Recently, Trump announced a “deal” in which China would resume American soybean purchases. “A U.S. Department of Agriculture report released last Friday showed only two Chinese purchases of American soybeans since the summit between Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in South Korea, totaling 332,000 metric tons from Oct. 2 through Nov. 12 — well short of the 12 million metric tons that the White House said China agreed to purchase by year-end.” Americans are the losers when Trump negotiates a “deal.” Based on his history, why would anyone expect otherwise? https://www.cnbc.com/2025/11/17/china-soybean-mountain-exports-trump-xi-us-farmers-trade-deal-brazil-crop-legumes.html

Looks like Trump is finally seeking tariff reductions to lower the price of groceries. “ The White House on Thursday during a background call with reporters announced   framework deals   with Argentina, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Ecuador that it hopes will bring down the costs of certain groceries.   “These deals come after President Donald Trump and some of his top allies promised an announcement on a deal to help alleviate the price increases of bananas, coffee and other agricultural goods, but a senior administration official on the call could not provide any specifics about how much relief this would bring to Americans' wallets.    “According to data from the September 2025 Consumer Price Index, coffee prices have spiked 18.9%, bananas are up 6.9% and beef prices are up 14.7% in the past year.” Of course, these are tariffs that Trump put in place and has boasted that they have brought in trillions of dollars. He has also insisted that the price of...

Remember all the GOP outrage over Bill Clinton getting a blowjob from a consenting adult in the White House? Seems quaint now. Convicted felon-in-chief Trump bragged about assaulting women in the Access Hollywood tapes, so the only real eyebrow-raiser is that his taste ran to minors. So far, the Epstein emails point that way. Any wonder the Administration is stonewalling on the Epstein files and Bannon is silent on his many hours of Epstein interviews? Now it’s not so surprising that Trump nominated a guy who paid a minor for sex to be Attorney General.* “ The man President Trump wanted to be attorney general was allegedly paying for sex with a 17-year old girl who was working at a McDonald’s, saving up for braces, and partly living at a homeless shelter.   “Last year, a   House Ethics Committee report   found “substantial evidence” that former representative and former attorney general nominee Matt Gaetz “regularly paid women for engaging in sexual activity with him,” an...

I understand why this gets ignored by the MSM. Republican racism isn’t news. “The president of Boston University College Republicans wrote   on X   he called the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement requesting it detain employees at Allston Car Wash, the site of a Nov. 4 raid where nine employees were   arrested. ” *snip* “The nine detained employees all had work permits, Allston Car Wash Manager Jose Barrera   told   Boston.com. “ https://dailyfreepress.com/11/13/10/216199/bu-college-republicans-president-says-he-called-ice-to-detain-these-criminals-at-allston-car-wash/?utm_campaign=linkinbio&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=later-linkinbio

I see where the Philadelphia mint recently pressed the last penny. This holds a little nostalgic interest for me in that I collected pennies when I was a kid. Back then, there were three mints—Philadelphia, San Francisco and Denver—so a complete set for any given year meant getting pennies from each mint. The coins minted in Denver had a little D under the date, and those minted in San Francisco had an S. If there was no mint mark, the coin was minted in Philadelphia. The S pennies were the hardest to find, at least in Tennessee. Pennies were made of pure copper until 1962, except in 1943, when they were made of steel to conserve copper for munitions. Eventually, the melt value of the copper penny exceeded its face value, and today a copper penny is worth two to three cents as copper regardless of year or condition. Since 1982, pennies have been 97.5% zinc with copper plating. It currently costs about four cents to make a penny, so other than sentimental value, there’s no reason to mak...

The Republican Party and the American right-wing (but I repeat myself) has been predicting for over 100 years the doom of the US if liberals or moderates are elected. Yes somehow, these absurd prophecies are evergreen. “ Fox News  host  Sean Hannity  on Tuesday ranted about the supposed dangers of New York City Mayor-elect  Zohran Mamdani , warning that “America will be doomed” if his democratic socialism becomes more popular — to the unbridled mockery of critics on social media.   “At some point, simple, basic, fundamental common sense has gotta prevail or America will be doomed if we become New York, and New Jersey and California and Illinois,”  warned the “Hannity” host , with a graphic of the communist hammer and sickle symbol on screen.” Guess nobody told Fox News management. “. . . Fox News  signed a 20-year lease renewal  at its New York City headquarters in 2023, revealing no plans to escape the supposed doom Hannity warned about, and that...

Trump is pushing 50-year mortgages as an answer to home affordability. Given his track record, it’s a safe bet that anything Trump is selling is a bad investment. “ The appeal of a 50-year mortgage is simple: Home prices are near all-time highs, leaving many aspiring buyers priced out of the market. A longer payback period would lower monthly payments and give more people a foothold in the market. “But the extended time horizon also has major downsides. Homeowners will build equity much more slowly and could, ultimately, end up on the hook for almost double the interest they’d pay compared to a standard 30-year mortgage.” So how does the math work out? “ Take a buyer of a $415,000 home, which is around the median price in the US. If they put 20% down and received today’s average 30-year mortgage rate of 6.22% over 30 years, they’d pay $2,038 a month in interest and principal. Over the course of three decades, that works out to about $734,000, with $402,000 of that going toward interest...

Looks like the Democrats traded the shutdown for a vague promise, rather than insisting on reversing the GOP Medicaid subsidy cuts.   “ The bill will keep the government open until Jan. 30 of next year, fund some federal programs like the Agriculture Department for the entire year, and put limits on Trump’s ability to fire federal workers for the next few months, among other provisions, if it is eventually signed into law. “It’s part of a larger agreement that also includes a promise from Thune to Democrats to hold a separate vote on the issue of healthcare before the end of the year. Democratic negotiators say the deal will give their party "control" of what's in the bill.” I don’t know what “other provisions” means, but this looks like mighty thin gruel to me. The Democrats don’t hold many cards, but they aren’t even playing the few cards they have for maximum advantage.    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/live/government-shutdown-latest-senate-advances-a-new-bill-to-end-...

The passing of Jim Watson, co-discoverer of DNA structure, got me thinking about the other great discoveries of the 20 th   century. Without consulting Google AI, I came up with these: General relativity Plate tectonics ABO histocompatibility blood types Penicillin Structure of DNA Here’s what Google AI said: “ . . . the discovery of penicillin and other antibiotics, the unraveling of the structure of DNA, the development of vaccines, and the creation of the airplane, the internet, the computer, and the use of nuclear power. Other significant advancements were the harnessing of electricity, telephones, and the development of modern medicine, including transplants and chemotherapy.” While vaccination has certainly been transformative, inoculation and vaccination for smallpox antedated the 20 th  century.  And successful transplantation depends on histocompatibility matching.  Apart from DNA structure, Google AI’s list is about applications, not fundamental d...

In the annals of Trump administration whining, the outrage over a protester flinging a wrapped sandwich at a border patrol officer must surely rank as among the silliest and most childish. “ Jurors showed no appetite for the Justice Department's case against "sandwich guy," the D.C. resident who chucked a Subway sandwich at the chest of a federal officer, finding him not guilty Thursday after several hours of deliberations.” *snip* “Lairmore had testified that the sandwich “exploded all over” his chest and claimed he could smell mustard and onions. But a photo showed that the sandwich was still in its wrapper on the ground after it hit Lairmore in his bulletproof vest.” I wonder how much taxpayer money was squandered on this phony prosecution. <a href=" https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/dc-sandwich-guy-verdict-rcna242142 " >Sandwich guy exonerated</a>

The US has a long and sordid history of military extortion. The latest example is Trump’s saber-rattling movement of Navy battle groups off the coast of Venezuela and the extrajudicial assassinations the administration has been conducting off the Venezuelan coast in the name of drug interdiction.* Writing for the Boston Globe, Stephen Kinzer, a senior fellow at the Watson School of International and Public Affairs at Brown University offers a cogent analysis of what’s really going on here.  Part of it is the classic right-wing pathology: Venezuela has huge oil reserves and a government unfriendly to the US. If Trump can depose Venezuela’s president and install a US puppet regime, it will flood the world market with cheap oil, lowering gas prices in the US.  The other part, Kinzer asserts, is that Venezuela is the only remaining benefactor of Cuba. Cut off that lifeline and Cuba folds, realizing the life-long dream of Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Casual inspection of th...

I see where Jim Watson, famed for the Watson-Crick double helix structure of DNA, has died.   Watson was certainly very smart by conventional metrics. He entered the University of Chicago on a scholarship at 15, graduated at 19 and earned a PhD in zoology at Indiana University three years later. He and Crick published the Nature paper describing the double helix when he was 25. Watson embodied what I have long observed, that in humans the traits of high intelligence are unlinked. While visionary and discerning about science, he was an unrepentant racist and misogynist.  “He has shown “a regrettable tendency toward inflammatory and offensive remarks, especially late in his career,” Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, said in 2019. “His outbursts, particularly when they reflected on race, were both profoundly misguided and deeply hurtful. I only wish that Jim’s views on society and humanity could have matched his brilliant scientific insights...

In addition to mRNA vaccines and CAR-T cell therapy, semaglutides and tirzepatides offer transformative therapies for obesity and associated type-2 diabetes. But the drugs aren’t cheap, so access is a problem in the US. “ Medicare will cover semaglutide (Wegovy) and tirzepatide (Zepbound) for their weight management indications for people with obesity, President Trump announced on Thursday.   “As part of a new deal with the White House, doses of Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly's blockbuster drugs will be priced at $350 through TrumpRx for a month's supply -- the GLP-1 receptor agonists currently carry list prices of over $1,000 per month. Starting doses of new, pill versions of the treatments also will cost $149 a month if they are approved.” Good to see that our obese president understands the benefits of these transformative therapies, even if he chooses to forgo them for himself. https://www.medpagetoday.com/publichealthpolicy/medicare/118344?xid=NL_breakingnewsalert_2025-11-06...

For those of us who count ourselves as old-school patriots, there was a lot to be happy about in Tuesday’s off-year election. That said, it was mainly a repudiation of Trump himself. I’m not convinced it was a repudiation of right-wing extremism. The naval-gazers continue to harp on the Democratic Party’s embrace of human rights—immigrants and refugees, gay marriage and trans rights, equality for racial minorities—as a political liability rather than the Party’s endorsement of single payer, fair wages and housing accessibility. Those are all American values, not merely liberal values.  I get it. The right long ago seized control of the media and public discourse. Ideas and policies that were solidly conservative—getting the nanny state out of reproductive choice, same sex marriage, personal gender identity—got rebranded by a money-starved media as radical and anti-Christian. The US is not a Christian nation. The words “God,” “Christ,” “Jesus,” and “Christian” don’t appear anywhere ...

Probably the best analogy is duck hunting, where they use decoys to fool the ducks. “ If the past is any indication, sellers working for insurance companies, some with household names, others not, will snare new recruits into Medicare Advantage plans, possibly omitting in their sales pitches that they will be locked into an MA plan and could face great difficulty returning to traditional Medicare and buying a supplement policy if things go wrong – as they often do.  Insurers will once again flood seniors with “free” Medicare Advantage goodies and offers. ” While I have encountered one person who likes his Medicare Advantage plan with Kaiser, that’s an anecdote. The data show that many people experience false or misleading claims. https://www.juancole.com/2025/11/deceptive-marketing-practices.html  

Years ago, I was course director for a first-year medical school course on genetics and molecular biology. I was and am still an enthusiast for problem-based learning (PBL). Together with an MD colleague, I wrote up a case on hereditary deafness. It was through this process that I learned about deaf culture and the conflicts in the deaf community.   There is a deaf community that teaches that deafness isn’t a disability but just a variation on human experience. They embrace sign language and lip reading. Other deaf people embrace cochlear implants for themselves or their kids. There is significant antipathy between these communities. The course was on genetics and molecular biology of heredity deafness, so that was the major theme, but we used this case to teach future physicians about the cultural experiences of their future patients as well. “ Clinicians often assume deaf patients can understand spoken or written language and rely heavily on lip-reading, handwritten notes, or eve...

Ladies and gentlemen, your GOP nanny state: “House Republicans are exploring ways to prevent Zohran Mamdani from ever being sworn in as mayor even if he prevails in Tuesday’s election by using the Constitution’s “insurrection clause,” The Post has learned. “The New York Young Republican Club is pushing to prevent the NYC mayoral frontrunner from taking the oath of office Jan. 1 under an idea floated this summer. “It cites language in the post-Civil War 14th Amendment to the Constitution barring from office anyone who “engaged in insurrection or rebellion” or who has “given aid or comfort to the enemies.” The group argues that Mamdani’s own statements calling to resist ICE could violate the prohibition.” So the January 6 th  riot wasn’t an insurrection, but a free and fair election in New York City is? Stalin would be proud. https://nypost.com/2025/11/01/us-news/house-republicans-latest-push-to-keep-mandani-out-of-office/  

I voted for Obama both times. I don’t regret that at all. I think he was among our better presidents, although that’s a pretty low bar. One of the things I fault him for is that he didn’t do much to build the party he led. Looks like I’m not alone. From a paywalled CNN article:   “People who know Obama say he has been surprised and appalled in how many of the rich people who now form his social circle have made concessions to Trump. He’s reaching out to business and other institutional leaders, urging them not to bend to the current administration even if it helps their bottom lines.”   He's surprised? Seriously? I doubt it. Embarrassed, more like. As well he should be.   From Duncan Black:   “One of Obama's flaws is that he is an elitest. He does believe the rich guys in nice suits should run the world, and that they will do it competently and benevolently.   “Not sure how he came to that conclusion.”   https://www.eschatonblog.com/2025/11/welp.html?fbclid...

I’ve long said that libertarianism is the political philosophy of middle school boys and arrested development, the apotheosis of solipsism. Libertarianism holds that property rights are the only rights that matter, and that in any conflict the marketplace, not the state, must and can resolve conflicts between interests. That, my friends, is feudalism. And feudalism, like the socialism that libertarians so fear, is and has always been coercive. “If you take seriously the premise that property rights are inviolable and that democratic constraint on property is illegitimate, you cannot avoid the concentration of power in private hands. You cannot prevent the emergence of hierarchy. You cannot maintain anything resembling equal liberty for all.   “The libertarian response has always been: “But the market will prevent that! Competition will discipline power!” But this is faith, not argument. History shows us repeatedly that markets, left unconstrained by democratic governance, produce m...

You read that right. Trump told Senate Republicans, who hold a majority, that they should eliminate the filibuster. I agree. My reasons are (1) it’s undemocratic and (2) it has historically benefitted Republicans more than Democrats. But Josh Marshall unpacks the arguments supporting abolishing the filibuster, as well as why the Senate GOP is unlikely to do so. Click the link. https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/trump-wants-to-abolish-the-filibuster-please-proceed-degenerate

The high school my wife and I attended in East Tennessee back in the early 70s offered both home ec and shop. She took home ec, but I didn’t take shop. Shop was power tools and home ec was domestic skills like cooking and sewing. The Boston Globe just published an article that reminded me what real home economics is about: spreadsheets showing inflow and outflow of money. The article highlights several ideas: • lower housing prices by sharing rent with roommates. I had roommates for three years in college, then got married; • selective shopping for groceries. Well duh. Buy in bulk. Buy on sales. Prepare meals at home instead of eating out; • if you buy a house, refinance if interest rates fall. We saved enough living in apartments for a 20% down-payment that avoided mortgage insurance, re-financed three times and paid off our loan in 20 years. Also too, get an energy inventory to insulate against heating and cooling costs; • shop around before buying a car: well, fine, but how about pu...