Sunday: Hili dialogue

January 19, 2025 • 7:00 am

Welcome to Sunday, January 19, 2025, one day before T-Day.  It’s National Popcorn Day, and the world’s best is the caramel and cheese corn mix at Garrett’s Popcorn Shop in Chicago.  You want the “Chicago Mix”, with cheese corn mixed with caramel corn.  It sounds dire, but it’s fantastic! Look!:

It’s also Tin Can Day, World Quark Day (a German foodstuff), New Friends Day, World Snow Day (we have a tad) and World Religion Day, celebrating the fiction that creates a huge hole in humanity).

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the January 19 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*The cease-fire between Hamas and Israel begins today, and although I’m delighted that the hostages will be released (in tiny dribs and drabs), it’s not clear how many of them will be bodies and not living humans.  They will of course let the living ones go first, but Hamas refuses to provide a list of the dead versus living hostages. On top of that, for every Israeli (and other country’s) hostage released, about thirty Palestinians who were either arrested or convicted terrorists will be released.  Altogether up to 3,000 Palestinian prisoners, many of them terrorists, will be released in exchange for an unknownb but much smaller number of hostages. It’s a terrible deal and I fail to understand it, though surely Trump is behind it and I don’t know what happened. Looking from afar, I have to agree with Alan Dershowitz’s article in the World Israel News, “It wasn’t a deal, it was a crime.”

The decision by the Israeli government to make significant concessions to the Hamas kidnappers should never be called a “deal.” It was an extortion.

Would you call it a deal if somebody kidnapped your child and you “agreed” to pay ransom to get her back? Of course not. The kidnapping was a crime. And the extortionate demand was an additional crime.

So the proper description of what occurred is that Israel, pressured by the United States, capitulated to the unlawful and extortionate demands of Hamas as the only way of saving the lives of kidnapped babies, mothers and other innocent, mostly civilian, hostages.

This was not the result of a negotiation between equals. If an armed robber puts a gun to your head and says, “your money or your life,” your decision to give him your money would not be described as a deal.

Nor should the extorted arrangement agreed to by Israel be considered a deal. So let’s stop using that term.

When a terrorist group “negotiates” with a democracy, it always has the upper hand. The terrorists are not constrained by morality, law or truth. They can murder at will, rape at will, torture at will and threaten to do worse.

The democracy, on the other hand, must comply with the rules of law and must listen to the pleas of the hostage families.

The result of this exertion was bad for Israel’s security, but good for the hostages who remain alive and their families.

The heart rules the brain, as it often does in moral democracies that value the immediate saving of the lives of known people over the future deaths of hypothetical people whose identities we do not know. This tradeoff is understandable as compassionate, even if not compelling as policy.

If every democratic nation adopted a policy of never negotiating with terrorists, it might discourage terrorism. But every nation submits to the demands of kidnappers and extortionists, so terrorism and hostage-taking have become a primary tactic of the worst people in the world. And the rest of us are complicit.

Especially complicit, with blood on their hands, are supporters of Hamas on university campuses who chant for intifada and revolution. Also complicit are international organizations, such as the International Criminal Court, that treat Israel and Hamas as equals.

Dershowitz winds up worrying what bothers me: that this “deal,” in the long run, will lead to a net increase in deaths:

Let us welcome the news that perhaps 33 of the 98 hostages may be released, some of them alive, with the realization that what Hamas extorted from Israel in return for these releases may well endanger Israel’s security in the future and cost still more innocent lives.

*The WaPo claims that it has uncovered a key failure in LA’s firefighting strategy that may explain the devastation happening there. And apparently this failure has been known for years. (Article archived here.) Here’s the accusation, and I have no idea about its veracity:

Two years before wildfires incinerated swaths of Los Angeles, the city’s Fire Chief Kristin M. Crowley identified “one significant area of weakness” in her department’s ability to contain wildfires. L.A. had no specialized wildland unit to respond to daily brush fires and scrape vegetation, dig ditches and do the other labor to ensure blazes did not spread or rekindle, she wrote on Jan. 5, 2023, asking for $7 million to assemble its own squad.

In a memo that has not been previously reported, she told city fire commissioners that L.A. relied almost entirely on overburdened “hand crews” from other jurisdictions to bring such muscle to its brush fire emergencies. Hand crews, the most elite of which are sometimes called “hotshots,” fight wildfires with chain saws, axes and shovels, setting containment lines and then sticking around to meticulously monitor smoldering fires, feeling by hand for heat and digging out live spots to make sure fires don’t relight.

The city staffed its own team — made up of unpaid, mostly teenage volunteers — only on Tuesdays and Thursdays after school. Crowley warned the commission that there would inevitably come a day when L.A. would need the important grunt work of a “hand crew” and one would not be available, which could “mean the difference in containment or out of control spread.”

Yet as fire swept down from the Santa Monica mountains last week, L.A. still had no professional unit ready to aid in the initial attack, according to a Washington Post review of dozens of city and county records, hours of radio transmissions and L.A. fire commission transcripts, as well as interviews with more than a dozen firefighters and city officials. More than three years after the fire department’s first request, the city had only recently advertised openings for at least two dozen openings on a team whose launch was delayed because of bureaucracy and competing budget priorities.

This gap in L.A.’s firefighting arsenal provides a new window into how the metropolis failed to reckon with the threat posed by wildfires intensified by climate change. It is unclear whether those additional units would have altered the course of the conflagrations, or have better put out a small blaze now under investigation for possibly reigniting and sparking the Palisades Fire. But had the proposed plans come to fruition, the city would have had two full-time hand crews with more than 50 additional firefighters trained to battle wildfires by now.

*The Wall Street Journal outlines Trump’s plans, to be implemented by Musk and Ramaswamay, to cut back on government after Monday. Trump now says he’ll get rid of ten existing regulations for every new one (article archived here):

President Biden’s executive orders and most recent policy changes figure as some of its most vulnerable initiatives as Trump assumes power. Republicans have decried Biden’s last-minute push to complete loans to renewable-energy projects.

Trump is expected to use a legislative tool known as the Congressional Review Act that allows the president, with the help of Congress, to undo rules enacted in the final months of the previous administration. He was the first president to use it widely, in his first administration.

“We are scrubbing right now to determine what is eligible,” for reconsideration under the act, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.) said Tuesday at an American Petroleum Institute meeting in Washington.

Republicans are also looking to pass the Reins Act, short for Regulations from the Executive in Need of Scrutiny, which the House approved in 2023, to curb Biden-era rules.

“I’m a huge fan of the Reins Act,” Thune said.

Trump has prepared a series of executive orders aimed at boosting American fossil fuels and undoing policies that favor electric vehicles.

Congress is expected to help Trump target Biden-era waivers for California to enact stricter limits on greenhouse-gas emissions from vehicles than the federal government’s. California aims to ban sales of new gasoline-powered cars by 2035. Rescinding the waiver would curb California’s influence over the car industry and set back efforts to boost EV sales.

Trump’s transition team has considered eliminating bank watchdogs such as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. That would require an act of Congress, including unlikely support from Democrats in the Senate.

There are only 52 Republicans in the Senate, 8 short of being able to stop a filibuster. What does that mean for passing legislation to undo existing legislation. The House but not the Senate has the power to initiate spending bills, but spending bills still have to be approved by the Senate. As for immigration, I think that Trump’s promises will be sunk by the Senate.

*The NYT recommends a book that, at least for reader Stefano Montali, went a long way to quell his anxieties. I was interested, and perhaps you will be, too (article archived here). Montali had a special form of OCD: excessive dwelling on one bad possibility, or perseverating.

My O.C.D. is not like the one you see in movies. I don’t check doors or wash my hands eight times before leaving the house. For many people with O.C.D., including me, it’s more internal: Irrational thoughts enter the mind and remain there, festering.

The circular thought I experienced in front of that mural was absurd: that I would never live the life I wanted because I wouldn’t be able to focus on anything except, well, worrying.

But in that old Victorian house, I met Nate, and we quickly morphed from roommates into friends. We played guitar in the living room, prepared homemade dessert hummus and dissected our ongoing exoduses from the Judeo-Christian faiths in which we’d grown up. Not only that, Nate was a meditation teacher and he gradually became mine.

Early on, he introduced me to “” a book by Thich Nhat Hanh, the late Vietnamese Zen master who popularized Buddhist meditation and mindfulness in the West. The classic, his second of more than 100 titles, celebrates its 50th year in circulation.

In it, Thay (the Vietnamese word for “teacher” and what Thich Nhat Hanh is often called) offers simple steps to internal harmony amid uncertainty and discord. His teachings are rooted in mindful appreciation of the present moment, no matter its circumstances. In “The Miracle of Mindfulness,” he wrote: “Meditation is not evasion; it is a serene encounter with reality.” When I first read that line, every day seemed like one endless attempt at evasion.I was trying to temper my intrusive thoughts — that I’d swerve into oncoming traffic; or that if I didn’t pray before a meal, I was morally at fault — by using logic, facts and statistics. But doing that only perpetuated the worrying.

. . .Eight years have passed since Nate first introduced me to “The Miracle of Mindfulness,” and my practice — combined with a consistent schedule of therapy and medication — has changed how I experience the world each day. My mindfulness meditation never ends and neither, most likely, will O.C.D., but the former has dramatically eased the latter.

This resembles Sam Harris’s meditation course on mindfulness. But this has always seemed to me to be too much like work, and I tried mindfulness and it didn’t work. Perhaps it will for you, but you can’t just read a book: you need to practice incessantly. If you think you can, you can find the book here on Amazon for just $9.36.

*And a soothing video and article from the “Oddities” section of the Associated Press. You can watch the albatross couple now!

It’s a reality show about a loving couple waiting to welcome their new arrival, watched by thousands of ardent fans. But the stars of Royal Cam, now in its 10th season, aren’t socialites or hopefuls in love but northern royal albatrosses — majestic New Zealand seabirds with 10-foot (3-meter) wingspans.

The 24-hour livestream of the birds’ breeding season at Taiaroa Head — a rugged headland on New Zealand’s South Island — was established to raise awareness of the vulnerable species, numbers of which have grown slowly over decades of painstaking conservation measures.

Millions have watched the stream since it began in 2016.

. . . The show’s premise is simple: Each season, conservation rangers select an albatross couple as that year’s stars. A camera on the remote headland follows the chosen birds as they lay and incubate an egg, before their chick hatches around February, grows to adult size, and finally takes flight.

Unlike human reality shows, drama is rare: Royal albatrosses usually mate for life. Rangers selecting the birds to follow each “season” avoid anything controversial: no first-time parents and no aggressive or grumpy personalities.

This year’s stars are RLK, a 12-year-old male, and GLG, a 14-year-old female, who have raised two chicks before. Their names are derived from the colors on bands that rangers attach to their legs.

“They’re a youngish pair, but not so young that they don’t know what they’re doing,” Broni said.

Action unfolds slowly, which for many fans is the joy of it. Clouds drift by, ships pass in the distance and the sun sets in glowing pinks and peaches. During January, incubation season, an albatross sits on an egg.

But regular watchers anticipate certain moments: About once every 10 days, the second bird in the pair returns from feeding at sea to relieve the parent looking after the nest. Other fan highlights include albatross crash landings, mating dances and the appearances of rangers or the feathered stars of previous seasons.

Here’s the video. The birds are endlessly patient, and I wonder if they get bored sitting there for ten days at a time (incubation time is about 80 days).

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili doesn’t have an optimal sleeping spot:

Szaron: It’s hard for you there.
Hili: None of your business.
In Polish:
Szaron: Tam jest ci twardo.
Hili: Nie twój interes.

*******************

From Stacy: Watch out for raisins mimicking chocolate chips!

From Cat Memes:

From Jesus of the Day. Hey, it’s a tough job!

Masih doesn’t mourn two Iranian judges who were murdered. It was, according to CNN, a “planned assassination,” and the killer then took his own life.

From Luana (Dillon owns the Babylon Bee):

From Jez, a wonderful thread of pet stories. Here are just two:

From Simon, a non-embeddable but good post (from Bluesky?):

From Malcolm; a wonderful video of a cat rescued from a fire:

From the Auschwitz Memorial, one that I posted:

Two Jewish children, 4 and 6 years old, were murdered with cyanide gas upon arriving at Auschwitz.

— Jerry Coyne (@evolutionistrue.bsky.social) 2025-01-19T12:36:37.705Z

And a double tweet from Dr. Cobb:

the spread of misinformation on bluesky is really quite harrowing. always feed your cat every time he meows. he has never been fed. he is starving.

— mattachine meowppy machine (@spookybiscuits.com) 2025-01-16T17:31:03.997Z

Harry rn

— (@matthewcobb.bsky.social) 2025-01-16T17:35:57.880Z

30 thoughts on “Sunday: Hili dialogue”

  1. There is a good interview with Einat Wilf, who readers of this website may be familiar with, at the Jerusalem Press Club the other day. She brings an Israeli and historical perspective during the 28 minutes which include her uninterrupted thoughts plus some q&a at url hopefully

  2. What is it with younger folks and raisins? Don’t get me wrong, chocolate chips are rarely bad, but a nice chewy oatmeal raisin cookie is a thing of beauty. My son (26) won’t touch a raisin with a ten foot chopstick. And I have noted that reaction among many others in his age group. Trend or anecdote?

    1. Here is a thought experiment for you:

      Imagine a plate heaped high with delicious, chewy oatmeal raisin cookies. Now, replace 10% of those raisins with houseflies. How could you tell?

      You’re welcome 🙂

      2. Before or after you ate one, you mean?

        What’s worse than finding a raisin in a chocolate-chip cookie?
        Finding half a raisin.

    2. Thank goodness I am not the only person who loves oatmeal raisin cookies. Even better is to make them with cranberries.

    3. I’m the older generation and I agree with your son 100%. In fact, I’d probably go farther than him. For me, raisins are a blight, a plague, a pestilence. Every food is better for NOT having raisins in it.

      I am especially bitter about raisins in rugelach. It is my favorite pastry, by far, but usually rendered inedible by the inclusion of those detestable house flies (see above).

      ETA: On a less hateful note, I would guess that the reason that people our age (save me) tend to like raisins is because raisins were a much more common snack item when we were kids than it is today.

      1. “… raisins were a much more common snack item when we were kids than it is today.”

        Certainly true in our household back in the ’50’s and ’60’s. I used to love them, and would eat them by the handful from a red box in the pantry. Then, I went off them, but to be honest, I am coming back to them.

        We would very often have Sunshine raisin biscuits in the house. They were wonderful, but Sunshine has not made them in decades. Imported Garibaldi biscuits are similar, but prohibitably expensive.

        1. They are indeed awfully expensive, but we are hooked on “squashed-fly biscuits” (a.k.a. Garibaldis), bought in bulk (so slightly less expensive) from Amazon.

          Lost two full 12-packs in the Eaton Fire, further confirmation that there is no benevolent deity.

    4. No, I am in that group. When I find an oatmeal cookie that looks as if it has chocolate chips but really has raisins, I feel deceived. I will still eat it (there are no cookies I refuse), but it’s not as good as one with the chocolate chips.

    5. We always had a variety of cookies at departmental seminars – four kinds IIRC. I always went for the oatmeal raisins. And one of the reasons the cinnamon buns at my elementary school were the GOAT was, among many other reasons, that they had raisins in them.

      That said, those who decided that chicken salad should have raisins should be shot. Trader Joe is on that list.

    6. I used to beg my father to get raisin bread when he did our weekly shopping. (My mother didn’t have the patience to shop for groceries. Shoes were a different matter.) So, I’m OK with raisins. My mother made chocolate chip cookies a great deal. Her breakfast—setting a (not so) good example for her children—was a chocolate chip cookie and a cup of black coffee. I preferred Cheerios. She also made raisin cookies. They were good too!

      1. I love raisins in oatmeal cookies, in cinnamon buns, in raisin bread, raisin pie, porridge…in fact, if offered a cinnamon bun that lacks raisins, I feel ripped off. Like: you call this a cinnamon bun?

    7. I’m in a mixed marriage. When I make butter tarts my wife eats the pastry and the filling then she spits out the raisins. She also messes with the cheese-and-caramel ratio in the Chicago mix: two-to-one caramel to cheese. So we get to the bottom of the bag and it’s all cheese. I should start throwing raisins in there.

      1. Butter tarts without raisins…what’s the point?

        Mixed marriages are hard that way. My son is in one. He grew up with his Mom cooking with raisins a lot. Then he married his sweetheart, who hates raisins. I will bake 2 different batches of stuff: one for her, the other for the rest of us.

    8. I saw a meme cartoon about Raisin Bran cereal, with the statement to the effect: “Imagine a breakfast cereal so bad that you need 2 scoops of raisins to make it better”.

      But honestly I like raisins.

      1. I think it’s “Imagine a cereal so bad that two scoops of raisins make it better.”

        Raisins have their place, but I fell for their mimicry as a child (fool’s chocolate, indeed) and can not tolerate them anywhere near a cookie. My good opinion once lost, is lost forever.

    10. I think the point is you’re expecting (dark) chocolate and find you have been deceived and there is no chocolate. Not even milk chocolate.

    11. I’m the Stacy who shared that meme on Facebook.

      I like raisins, and oatmeal raisin cookies. But hyperbole is funny.

      Also, chocolate chip cookies are BETTER, and if you disagree you’re just wrong. Wrong, I say!

  3. For Religion day, I give three citations/quotes that I tend to post :

    1.

    “… religion can be defined as a comprehensive belief system that addresses the fundamental questions of human existence, such as the meaning of life and death, man’s role in the universe, and the nature of good and evil, and that gives rise to duties of conscience.”

    Cornell Law Review
    Volume 74
    Issue 3 March 1989
    Defining Religion in the First Amendment: A Functional Approach
    Ben Clements

    2.

    Science, Politics, and Gnosticism
    Eric Voegelin
    1968, 1997
    Regenery Press, Chicago;
    Washington D.C.

    And 3.

    Sorry I am lazy on this one and just use the computer’s output :

    The New Science of Politics

    An Introduction

    ERIC VOEGELIN

    1952

    THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS
    CHICAGO • ILLINOIS

    Russell Blackford has given some commentary on Voegelin here that was interesting as well – I’m not saying he agrees necessarily.

  4. So, turns out when PZ Meyers said Israel was “going to kill 2 million Palestinians”, he was lying out of his ass. Again!

  6. I read Alan Dershowitz’s piece and have watched many of his podcasts the past few months—most of which include commentary on the war in Gaza. He is quite correct: it is extortion.

    The three Israeli girls who were released today were handed over to the Red Cross reportedly amidst a crowd of Palestinian protestors. I wonder if the girls thought they were about to be executed, rather than rescued. I hope they are OK and can begin to recover.

  7. “The Miracle of Mindfulness” is one of the first books that I read by Thich Nhat Hanh. After that, I attended several week-long retreats offered by him in Canada and in the U.S. His dharma talks at the retreats were very powerful, although he was a quiet, unassuming person. Practicing mindfulness has become habit for me. Meditation is a bit more work, because you have to set aside the time each day, although as Thay says, it can be just five minutes. Overall, this practice has made me a much more happy and contented person. Most especially, intrusive thoughts don’t bother me nearly as much as they used to.

  8. I recall on a science-humor website — maybe Journal of Irreproducible Results or its similarly-named rival — there was for a time an editorial feature of visits to, and photos of, and maybe reviews of, the staff lunchrooms or canteens or diners at various scientific institutions. The memorable highlight for me was from a physics facility, and the menu board had quark very prominent.

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