Friday, January 23, 2026
Now the data have changed. Portlandia leads in shots and are hitting 42% from range to our 19%...
They also lead in O-bounds. 45's still in shootin' distance, 110-103, 8:25 left.
Thursday, January 22, 2026
Queens ran Disney out of the castle! 124-97
The "Hornets" have got something. Their 1st round draft pick , Kon Kneuppel, is averaging 19.1 ppg, 5.4 rpg, and 3.5 apg while shooting 48.4%, other-worldly for a rook. But wait...
Their second round pick, Ryan Kalkbrenner, is 7'1" and he's playing 24.3 mins a game (!) and averaging 8.7 ppg, 6.2 rpg, and 1.5 blocks.
Queens are the most powerful pieces on the chessboard, and these Queens are going to get off the bottom and ascend toward the Least throne in the next couple seasons.
HT T-Blazers 64 Miami 45's 63
Erik Spoelstra starters:
Fucking...Okay, first,
Wigs
Bam
Nahmin
Pelle
Fucking Jako. Who only played 7' in the 1H and was -4.
NOT starting, but playing more mins were:
Niko, 14
3J, 13
Dru, 10
All were - . Only Bam, Nahmin, and The Taking of were +, The Taking of a team best +9. Bam has 17 points.
We took more shots and won the t.o. battle but were even with Portlandia on O-bounds. If those stats hold up, we should squeak by.
Simone, 9,
ICE Detains 5-Year Old in Minnesota
Liam Ramos, five, detained by ICE in Columbia Heights, Minnesota, outside his home on Tuesday.Photograph: Courtesy of Columbia Heights Public Schools
CAIRO (AP) — Desperate Palestinians at a garbage dump in a Gaza neighborhood dug with their bare hands for plastic items to burn to keep warm in the cold and damp winter in the enclave, battered by two years of the Israel-Hamas war.
The scene in the Muwasi area of the city of Khan Younis contrasted starkly with the vision of the territory projected by world leaders gathered in Davos, Switzerland, where they inaugurated U.S. President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace that will oversee Gaza.
At the World Economic Forum in Davos, Trump claimed that “record levels” of humanitarian aid had entered Gaza since the October start of a U.S.-brokered ceasefire deal. His son-in law, Jared Kushner, and envoy Steve Witkoff triumphantly touted the devastated territory’s development potential.
In Gaza, months into the truce, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians still languish in displacement camps, sheltering in tents and war-ravaged buildings, unable to protect them from the temperatures dropping below 10 degrees Celsius (50 Fahrenheit) at night.
Despite the ceasefire, there are still recurring deadly strikes in Gaza. Israeli tank shelling on Thursday killed four Palestinians east of Gaza City, according to Mohamed Abu Selmiya, director of the Shifa Hospital, where the bodies were taken. The Israeli military did not immediately comment.
...
While aid flow into Gaza has significantly increased since the ceasefire, residents say fuel and firewood are in short supply. Prices are exorbitant and searching for firewood is dangerous. Two 13-year-old boys were shot and killed by Israeli forces on Wednesday as they tried to collect firewood, hospital officials said.
...
At the Nasser hospital in southern Gaza, dozens of Palestinians gathered Thursday to mourn three Palestinian journalists — including a frequent contributor to Agence France-Presse — killed the day before when an Israeli strike hit their vehicle, according to Gaza health officials.
The Israeli military said the strike came after it spotted suspects who were operating a drone that posed a threat to its troops.
...
Israel has barred international journalists from entering to cover the war, aside from rare guided tours. News organizations rely largely on Palestinian journalists and residents in Gaza to show what is happening on the ground.
...
More than 470 people have been killed by Israeli fire in Gaza since the ceasefire began in October, according to Gaza’s health ministry. At least 77 have been killed by Israeli gunfire near a ceasefire line that splits the territory between Israeli-held areas and most of Gaza’s Palestinian population, the ministry says.
...
...the Rafah border crossing will open in both directions next week on the Gaza-Egypt border. Israel said in early December it would open the Gaza side of the crossing but has yet to do so.
Mark Carney used the Czech shopkeepers as stand-in for middle-sized countries and companies, but the example was precise to the responsibility of individuals living in the oppressive system. I don't know if Krugman was obliquely referencing individual responsibility; James Fallows' reference is clearer.
It is the reason that I attended the No Kings rally. It's important to me, as an "individual shopkeeper" in a democracy under threat, to "take the sign down" and be on record in these defining moments when future generations ask "What did you do during the war, dad?"
Paul Krugman
👍😊
On Wednesday, President Donald Trump gave a speech that unintentionally confirmed Carney’s message and heightened its urgency.
Carney got Trump to confirm Carney's point
Carney: "The strong can do what they can, and the weak must suffer what they must."
Trump: "Canada lives because of the United States...Remember that Mark the next time you make your statements."
lol trumpie
James Fallows on Carney's Speech
James Fallows
Captioned: Mark Carney, prime minister of Canada, acknowledging a rare-for-Davos sustained standing ovation, at the end of his brief (17 minutes) but exquisitely composed address to the 1,800-person crowd of world financial and political leaders yesterday. He explained American values, and lamented the effects of their permanent loss, far more eloquently than the person who ranted, complained, bragged, and lied on that same stage this morning. And who left the stage to sparse applause except from his own staffers. (Photo Harun Ozalp/Anadolu via Getty Images)
...
None of us can know for sure whether yesterday’s brief address at Davos, by Canada’s prime minister Mark Carney, will similarly be remembered as marking a turning point in understanding world power, and of America’s role. But there’s a chance it will be. ...
...the main accomplishments of the speech were these:
- rupture, not a “transition.”
- power of the less powerful. With many adjustments for scale, Carney was paralleling the message that democracy in the United States now depends less on its once-reliable institutions than on the millions of individuals who are standing up, wherever and however they can.
- the world has changed forever
- honesty
- modesty
Carney's Speech: The Most Important of Our Time
Nick Schifrin:
And, yesterday, of all countries, Canada suggested a new world order in which relatively smaller countries resist the superpowers, even neighbors.
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney:
Let me be direct. We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition. The middle powers must act together, because, if we're not at the table, we're on the menu. We shouldn't allow the rise of hard power to blind us to the fact that the power of legitimacy, integrity, and rules will remain strong if we choose to wield them together.
Wednesday, January 21, 2026
Mark Carney's Speech in Davos
Canada's Prime Minister has been the most stalwart leader in opposing Trump. He is a clear-eyed and firm truth-teller. In this speech, which he wrote himself, he lays out "Canada's path", or the Carney Doctrine. It is brilliant. Carefully thought through, it is moving substantively and stylistically. The world has its Churchill. Carney received a standing ovation from the other delegates.
Thank you very much, Larry. I'm going to start in French, and then I'll switch back to English.
[The following is translated from French]
Thank you, Larry. It is both a pleasure, and a duty, to be with you tonight in this pivotal moment that Canada and the world are going through.
Today I will talk about a rupture in the world order, the end of a pleasant fiction and the beginning of a harsh reality, where geopolitics, where the large, main power, geopolitics, is submitted to no limits, no constraints.
On the other hand, I would like to tell you that the other countries, especially intermediate powers like Canada, are not powerless. They have the capacity to build a new order that encompasses our values, such as respect for human rights, sustainable development, solidarity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of the various states.
The power of the less powerful starts with honesty.
[Carney returns to speaking in English]
It seems that every day we're reminded that we live in an era of great power rivalry, that the rules based order is fading, that the strong can do what they can, and the weak must suffer what they must.
And this aphorism of Thucydides is presented as inevitable, as the natural logic of international relations reasserting itself.
And faced with this logic, there is a strong tendency for countries to go along to get along, to accommodate, to avoid trouble, to hope that compliance will buy safety.
Well, it won't.
So, what are our options?
In 1978, the Czech dissident Václav Havel, later president, wrote an essay called The Power of the Powerless, and in it, he asked a simple question: how did the communist system sustain itself?
And his answer began with a greengrocer.
Every morning, this shopkeeper places a sign in his window: ‘Workers of the world unite’. He doesn't believe it, no-one does, but he places a sign anyway to avoid trouble, to signal compliance, to get along. And because every shopkeeper on every street does the same, the system persists – not through violence alone, but through the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false.
Havel called this “living within a lie”.
The system's power comes not from its truth, but from everyone's willingness to perform as if it were true, and its fragility comes from the same source. When even one person stops performing, when the greengrocer removes his sign, the illusion begins to crack. Friends, it is time for companies and countries to take their signs down.
For decades, countries like Canada prospered under what we called the rules-based international order. We joined its institutions, we praised its principles, we benefited from its predictability. And because of that, we could pursue values-based foreign policies under its protection.
We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false, that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, that trade rules were enforced asymmetrically. And we knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.
This fiction was useful, and American hegemony, in particular, helped provide public goods, open sea lanes, a stable financial system, collective security and support for frameworks for resolving disputes.
So, we placed the sign in the window. We participated in the rituals, and we largely avoided calling out the gaps between rhetoric and reality.
This bargain no longer works. Let me be direct. We are in the midst of a rupture, not a transition.
Over the past two decades, a series of crises in finance, health, energy and geopolitics have laid bare the risks of extreme global integration. But more recently, great powers have begun using economic integration as weapons, tariffs as leverage, financial infrastructure as coercion, supply chains as vulnerabilities to be exploited.
You cannot live within the lie of mutual benefit through integration, when integration becomes the source of your subordination.
The multilateral institutions on which the middle powers have relied – the WTO, the UN, the COP – the architecture, the very architecture of collective problem solving are under threat. And as a result, many countries are drawing the same conclusions that they must develop greater strategic autonomy, in energy, food, critical minerals, in finance and supply chains.
And this impulse is understandable. A country that can't feed itself, fuel itself or defend itself, has few options. When the rules no longer protect you, you must protect yourself.
But let's be clear eyed about where this leads.
A world of fortresses will be poorer, more fragile and less sustainable. And there is another truth. If great powers abandon even the pretense of rules and values for the unhindered pursuit of their power and interests, the gains from transactionalism will become harder to replicate.
Hegemons cannot continually monetize their relationships.
Allies will diversify to hedge against uncertainty.
They'll buy insurance, increase options in order to rebuild sovereignty – sovereignty that was once grounded in rules, but will increasingly be anchored in the ability to withstand pressure.
This room knows this is classic risk management. Risk management comes at a price, but that cost of strategic autonomy, of sovereignty can also be shared.
Collective investments in resilience are cheaper than everyone building their own fortresses. Shared standards reduce fragmentations. Complementarities are positive sum. And the question for middle powers like Canada is not whether to adapt to the new reality – we must. The question is whether we adapt by simply building higher walls, or whether we can do something more ambitious.
Now Canada was amongst the first to hear the wake-up call, leading us to fundamentally shift our strategic posture.
Canadians know that our old comfortable assumptions that our geography and alliance memberships automatically conferred prosperity and security – that assumption is no longer valid. And our new approach rests on what Alexander Stubb, the President of Finland, has termed “value-based realism”.
Or, to put another way, we aim to be both principled and pragmatic – principled in our commitment to fundamental values, sovereignty, territorial integrity, the prohibition of the use of force, except when consistent with the UN Charter, and respect for human rights, and pragmatic and recognizing that progress is often incremental, that interests diverge, that not every partner will share all of our values.
So, we're engaging broadly, strategically with open eyes. We actively take on the world as it is, not wait around for a world we wish to be.
We are calibrating our relationships, so their depth reflects our values, and we're prioritizing broad engagement to maximize our influence, given the fluidity of the world at the moment, the risks that this poses and the stakes for what comes next.
And we are no longer just relying on the strength of our values, but also the value of our strength.
We are building that strength at home.
Since my government took office, we have cut taxes on incomes, on capital gains and business investment. We have removed all federal barriers to interprovincial trade. We are fast tracking a trillion dollars of investments in energy, AI, critical minerals, new trade corridors and beyond. We're doubling our defence spending by the end of this decade, and we're doing so in ways that build our domestic industries.
And we are rapidly diversifying abroad. We have agreed a comprehensive strategic partnership with the EU, including joining SAFE, the European defence procurement arrangements. We have signed 12 other trade and security deals on four continents in six months. The past few days, we've concluded new strategic partnerships with China and Qatar. We're negotiating free trade pacts with India, ASEAN, Thailand, Philippines and Mercosur.
We're doing something else. To help solve global problems, we're pursuing variable geometry, in other words, different coalitions for different issues based on common values and interests. So, on Ukraine, we're a core member of the Coalition of the Willing and one of the largest per capita contributors to its defence and security.
On Arctic sovereignty, we stand firmly with Greenland and Denmark, and fully support their unique right to determine Greenland's future.
Our commitment to NATO's Article 5 is unwavering, so we're working with our NATO allies, including the Nordic Baltic Eight, to further secure the alliance's northern and western flanks, including through Canada's unprecedented investments in over-the-horizon radar, in submarines, in aircraft and boots on the ground, boots on the ice.
Canada strongly opposes tariffs over Greenland and calls for focused talks to achieve our shared objectives of security and prosperity in the Arctic.
On plurilateral trade, we're championing efforts to build a bridge between the Trans Pacific Partnership and the European Union, which would create a new trading bloc of 1.5 billion people. On critical minerals, we're forming buyers’ clubs anchored in the G7 so the world can diversify away from concentrated supply. And on AI, we're cooperating with like-minded democracies to ensure that we won't ultimately be forced to choose between hegemons and hyper-scalers.
This is not naive multilateralism, nor is it relying on their institutions. It's building coalitions that work – issues by issue, with partners who share enough common ground to act together.
In some cases, this will be the vast majority of nations.
What it's doing is creating a dense web of connections across trade, investment, culture, on which we can draw for future challenges and opportunities.
Argue, the middle powers must act together, because if we're not at the table, we're on the menu.
But I'd also say that great powers, great powers can afford for now to go it alone. They have the market size, the military capacity and the leverage to dictate terms. Middle powers do not.
But when we only negotiate bilaterally with a hegemon, we negotiate from weakness. We accept what's offered. We compete with each other to be the most accommodating.
This is not sovereignty. It's the performance of sovereignty while accepting subordination. In a world of great power rivalry, the countries in between have a choice – compete with each other for favour, or to combine to create a third path with impact.
We shouldn't allow the rise of hard power to blind us to the fact that the power of legitimacy, integrity and rules will remain strong, if we choose to wield them together – which brings me back to Havel.
What does it mean for middle powers to live the truth?
First, it means naming reality. Stop invoking rules-based international order as though it still functions as advertised. Call it what it is – a system of intensifying great power rivalry, where the most powerful pursue their interests, using economic integration as coercion.
It means acting consistently, applying the same standards to allies and rivals. When middle powers criticize economic intimidation from one direction, but stay silent when it comes from another, we are keeping the sign in the window.
It means building what we claim to believe in, rather than waiting for the old order to be restored. It means creating institutions and agreements that function as described. And it means reducing the leverage that enables coercion – that's building a strong domestic economy. It should be every government's immediate priority.
And diversification internationally is not just economic prudence, it's a material foundation for honest foreign policy, because countries earn the right to principled stands by reducing their vulnerability to retaliation.
So Canada. Canada has what the world wants. We are an energy superpower. We hold vast reserves of critical minerals. We have the most educated population in the world. Our pension funds are amongst the world's largest and most sophisticated investors. In other words, we have capital, talent… we also have a government with immense fiscal capacity to act decisively. And we have the values to which many others aspire.
Canada is a pluralistic society that works. Our public square is loud, diverse and free. Canadians remain committed to sustainability. We are a stable and reliable partner in a world that is anything but.. A partner that builds and values relationships for the long term.
And we have something else. We have a recognition of what's happening and a determination to act accordingly. We understand that this rupture calls for more than adaptation. It calls for honesty about the world as it is.
We are taking the sign out of the window. We know the old order is not coming back. We shouldn't mourn it. Nostalgia is not a strategy, but we believe that from the fracture, we can build something bigger, better, stronger, more just. This is the task of the middle powers, the countries that have the most to lose from a world of fortresses and most to gain from genuine cooperation.
The powerful have their power.
But we have something too – the capacity to stop pretending, to name reality, to build our strength at home and to act together.
That is Canada's path. We choose it openly and confidently, and it is a path wide open to any country willing to take it with us. Thank you very much.
Public Occurrences January 21, 2026
The Stock Market Did it: TACO
TACO
Sac Town 117 Myami 130
Man, we can play so well at times. Davion and The Taking of...combined for 16 assists and only uno turnover. Edrice has got his Bam back. He was team-high with 25 points and added 7 boards and 5 assists. Nahmin had 22, but also nearly half of our turnovers, 4. 3J, third man off the bench, led the team in minutes with 33. He had 13 points and 9 rebounds. Kel'el and Tyler were out with injuries.
As a team, we won the ever-important shots stat 98-87, and as usual the most important components were offensive rebounds, 12-8, and turnovers, 10-16 (points conceded from: 13-19).
We were incandescent shooting the ball, 48% from the field, 50% from deep. Sac was even better from the field, 51%, but lagged badly from three, 37%.
Yes, it was Sacramento (12-32), but this is the same shit team that embarrassed us in the Bus in December 127-111 in the middle of our worst, 5L, stretch. We're 23-21, .523, projecting to 43-39. We have the easiest remaining schedule in the Association. On Thursday, we're in Portlandia.
I dreamt that the 45's lost 119-117...
I dreamt the 117 correctly, but that's what Excremento had. We, the powerful 45's, hit the target 130 times to get the dub. Spo will not let this team fall to .500. We're now 23-21.
Tuesday, January 20, 2026
It was Purple 64 45's 77 at HT. Purple on a 12-10 3rd Q run. It is now 76-87, 7:28 3Q and Kinks have called FTO
And that will do it for me, vetters and vettees. Good night to America 2.0 and to all the ships at sea.
This is the ESPN "NBA Scoreboard"
Now, there were other issues with my vetting...
...I was asked if I had ever been to Cuba. Yes, I had been to Cuba, too. I was asked if I had ever punched a pizza lady in the arm--Yes, a long time ago; Had I ever been a member of Democratic Socialists of America. Yes, I was a member of DSA--briefly. Had any member of my nuclear family ever attended a Ku Klux Klan rally in Mississippi while in the service? Yes, my-brother-the-klansman did while in the Navy, "to check it out." He was curious, confusing the Klan with the Kiwanis, maybe. Do you have contact with the "curious Klansman"? Not for 10 years. Had I ever had an extramarital affair? "Well, the position is VICE president, is it not? Yes, I am personally unexperienced with the conduct under question.
I think I was a DEI candidate. I think they had to comply with the Rooney Rule. I got the impression I was never seriously considered.
Beams 25 45's 32, end 1Q
3J six points and a steal in one minute seven secs of playing time at the end of the quarter.
Excremento Purple Beams 8 Miami 45's 16, 5:33 1Q. Audience for this must be like Publocc's, in the low thousands.
"Heat" are -4.5. Starters:
WigsBam
Nahmin
Davion
The Taking of...
Public Occurrences January 20, 2026
Wall Street posts biggest daily drop in three months, Trump Greenland tariff threat triggers wide selloff
That's some pain for the American people! We need more pain.
EU moves closer to using its trade bazooka against the US
BRUSSELS — EU leaders have toughened their position and want the European Commission to ready its most powerful trade weapon against the U.S. if Donald Trump doesn't walk back his Greenland threats.
Germany has joined France in saying it will ask the Commission to explore unleashing the Anti-Coercion Instrument at the emergency EU leaders' summit in Brussels on Thursday evening, according to five diplomats with knowledge of the situation.
The procedure is activated when the 1) European Commission examines a potential case of coercion, either on its own initiative or following a substantiated request, and 2) then submits a proposal to the Council of the European Union to determine whether economic coercion exists. 3) If the Council, acting by qualified majority, confirms that coercion is taking place, the Commission engages with the third country to seek a resolution, including through negotiations, mediation, or adjudication. 4) If those efforts fail, the EU 5) may adopt "response measures" such as tariffs, restrictions on trade in goods and services, limits on access to public programmes and financial markets, or measures affecting intellectual property rights and foreign direct investment.[4][14] These restrictions can be targeted at states, companies, or individuals, thereby deploying EU legal authority as leverage.
That's one "when", one "then", two "ifs" and one "may". Greenland will become the 51st state in the time all of that takes, and there is no automatic trigger, only the "may."
Just Do It.
"Hoosier" World
The Indiana Hoosiers Are National Champions. College Football Will Never Be the Same.
An underdog turned behemoth edges Miami—in their home stadium—to complete a historic 16-0 campaign
Monday, January 19, 2026
HT Peaceniks 70 45's 66. No D. Good night, folks!
Peaceniks were not peaceful toward Miami in the 2H. In fact they were more Warrior like and took scalpss. 134-112 the final. Miami falls back near .500, 22-21, .512. 82 game projection on more than half the season: 42-40. We have regressed in recent years from 45's to 44's and now a round-up to get to 42 Ws. And don't expect improvement, there willl be no trades that add players who must, and deserve to be, paid. Norman Powell and Andrew Wiggins will leave in free agency and Tyler Herro will not be expended. It's the Miami Tanker, listless and drifting toward 2027/28. It is a cold. cruel, cynical game. And it will come to naught. No whales will drift into Biscayne Bay in two and a half years. The Tanker will remain aground.
IT'S OVER! THE PERFECT SEASON! FT INDIANA WINS NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP 27-21!!!!!!!
"We won the national championship at Indiana University. It can be done."
They were unbeaten. I believe they also were unbeatable.
THERE'S THE TURNOVER! INDIANA INTERCEPTS BECK AT THE 7!
It was a poor ball by Beck. The receiver was bracketed short and long. Beck HAD an opening but threw it short.
INDIANA! FERNANDO MENDOZA! 19-YARD PASS TO MIAMI 33, EXACTLY 2 MINS LEFT. IND. FTO.
Such SUPERB use of timeouts by BOTH coaches.
INDIANA WENT FOR IT ON 4TH AND 4 MIAMI 12 AND GOT IT ALL!!!!!! 24-14, 9:18 4Q
The BALLS OF Curt Cignetti! The man is a coaching SAVANT!
Indiana, CRUCIALLY, matches Miami point-for-point. The "Hurricanes" will score again before this is over, but now they need TWO scores in 9:18 and have to hold Indiana scoreless.
Miami's D stiffens AGAIN! 4th and 4 Ind. at Mia. 12, 9:21, Ind. again (wisely) takes timeout.
Ind. leads 17-14. Three makes it a one TD game for a Miami win. Wait...
BACK COMES IND. (no offensive TD this half). 3rd and 5 MIA. 37, 11:28. IND. FTO
Indiana cannot stop Miami's offense this half. They need to match them point-for-point or they will lose this game. This is a CRITICAL drive for them.
Indiana took over and came out slinging!
They got out to midfield. That's CONFIDENCE. HT Ind.. 10 Mia. 0. IU gets ball to start 2H.
Miami another (wise) FTO
It's a 49-yard FG from their, no gimme. But there's also only :38 left. If you take a shot at TD and miss, IU doesn't have time to go 68 yards.
M defense stuffs Indiana into 3 plays, zero yards. IU to punt from their 27 end 1Q
NBA-leading Thunder crush Cavaliers
IU 3-0, 2:35 1Q
Miami's defense stiffened, as it has done in these playoffs, but it was pretty easy for Indiana to get in easy FG range: 12 plays, 55 yards, 6:06 of clock.
Both teams have had the ball twice now. IU has 5 1st downs to Miami's 1; 83 total yards to 25; 7:48 t.o.p. to 4:33.
Fernando Mendoza 25-yard pass. IU 2nd 7 Miami 42, 6:27 1Q
First time either team has been across midfield.
I don't know what "Indivisible" is, but I am happy to make them visible
|
WE'RE THE 45's! WE'RE THE 45's!
Preseason projection: 38.5 wins
Current projection: 45.4 wins
Evaluating the Heat requires looking past their 22-20 record, which puts them eighth in the East. Miami's plus-1.6 differential, along with the league's easiest remaining schedule [NOT starting tonight: at Peaceniks] according to the BPI, inspires confidence that the Heat have a good shot at avoiding the play-in tournament.
For all the focus on Miami's unorthodox new offense, which eschews pick-and-rolls in favor of driving and dishing, the Heat have stayed afloat primarily because of a top-five defense. If they can pair that with more offensive production and a healthy Tyler Herro Aafter he missed 30 games, Miami will finish the season strong and improve this grade. [No. A strong finish is not contingent on Tyler.]
