Saturday: Hili dialogue

Welcome to CaturSaturday, February 14, 2026: it’s shabbos for Jewish cats and Valentine’s Day for all Americans, but it’s also celebrated in many countries. Here’s a Valentine’s Day card from 1906:

A valentine from your cat (via CinEmma):

There’s a Valentine’s Day Google Doodle. Click to see what you get:

. . . and a quote from Shakespeare, spoken by Ophelia in Hamlet (Act IV, Scene 5):

“To-morrow is Saint Valentine’s day,
All in the morning betime,
And I a maid at your window,
To be your Valentine.
Then up he rose, and donn’d his clothes,
And dupp’d the chamber-door;
Let in the maid, that out a maid
Never departed more.”

It’s also Frederick Douglass Day (he is thought to have been born on this day in 1818), Library Lovers Day, National Cream-Filled Chocolates Day, Race Relations Day, and National Organ Donor Day (have you put that on your driver’s license/).

Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the February 14 Wikipedia page.

Da Nooz:

*Oy! The Environmental Protection Agency has rejected the scientific evidence that gave it the authority to combat climate change.

The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday made a critical announcement. It repealed the scientific determination that gives the government the authority to combat climate change.

That 2009 determination is called the endangerment finding, and most people have never heard of it. But it has played an enormous role in environmental regulations affecting cars, power plants and more.

By scrapping the finding, the Trump administration is essentially disputing the overwhelming scientific consensus on climate change. The vast majority of scientists say the Earth is rapidly and dangerously warming, which is fueling more powerful storms, killing coral reefs, melting glaciers and causing countless other destructive impacts.

What is the endangerment finding?

The finding simply states that carbon dioxide, methane and four other greenhouse gases threaten human health, both now and in the future. These gases are released by the combustion of fossil fuels, such as when a car engine burns gasoline or a power plant burns coal.

The Clean Air Act of 1970 required the E.P.A. to regulate air pollutants that harm human health. For example, it directed the agency to limit smog and soot, which are linked to asthma and other health problems.

But the landmark environmental law didn’t explicitly say whether the agency should regulate greenhouse gases. The endangerment finding said that it should, since these gases trap heat in the Earth’s atmosphere, resulting in a range of risks to people’s health.

Why does the Trump administration want to repeal the findings?

President Trump has repeatedly called climate change a “hoax” and has joked that rising seas would create “a little more beachfront property.”

Since Mr. Trump took office, the administration has maintained that climate change is not a problem that the government should solve. To the contrary, the president and his cabinet have argued that the United States should produce and burn more fossil fuels.

They also have sought to relieve the coal, oil and gas industries of pollution limits that cost them money. Lee Zeldin, the E.P.A. administrator, has claimed that Democratic administrations used the endangerment finding to justify “trillions of dollars” in regulations on polluting industries, and argued reversing those will aid the U.S. economy.

The E.P.A. already is erasing dozens of Biden-era regulations that sought to limit the pollution spewing from automobile tailpipes, power plant smokestacks, oil and gas wells and other sources.

Here we have a case of the administration rejecting pretty established science just so they can be allowed to pollute. Press Secretary Karoline “Mad Dog” Leavitt says we should be happy as it reduces new car prices, but that seems lame compared to overheating the world.

*You may recall that Pete Hegseth, the Secretary of Defense War, had threatened to prosecute Senator Mark Kelly and several other veterans for making a commercial saying that soldiers didn’t have to obey illegal orders (below). Well, a federal judge ruled, properly, that such theats of punishment were violations of free speech.

A federal judge ordered the Defense Department to halt pending disciplinary proceedings against Sen. Mark Kelly, saying in a ruling Thursday that the retired Navy captain’s right to free speech was under attack by the Trump administration.

U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon barred Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth from enforcing a censure against Kelly over comments that the Arizona Democrat made in a social media video reminding service members that they can refuse illegal orders. The judge also ordered a halt to disciplinary proceedings that Hegseth had ordered, which could have reduced Kelly’s rank and cut his military retirement benefits.

“This Court has all it needs to conclude that Defendants have trampled on Senator Kelly’s First Amendment freedoms and threatened the constitutional liberties of millions of military retirees,” Leon wrote in a 29-page opinion.

Hegseth said in a brief post on X that the ruling would be appealed immediately. “Sedition is sedition, ‘Captain,’” Hegseth said in a reference to Kelly, who serves on the Senate Armed Forces and Intelligence committees.

. . .The injunction came two days after a federal grand jury in D.C. declined to indict Kelly and five other Democratic lawmakers over the social media video last year that drew President Donald Trump’s ire.

Members of the military, the lawmakers said in the video, could refuse to follow illegal orders amid the administration’s controversial uses of the armed forces to patrol Democratic-run cities and conduct strikes on alleged drug-trafficking boats in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean.

Although active-duty members of the military can be punished for comments seen as insubordinate, those restrictions on speech have never been applied by the federal courts to retired service members such as Kelly, Leon said.

“Sedition comprises attempts to overthrow the government by inciting people to disobey national laws. This is the exact opposite of that: telling people not to obey unlawful orders. The point, of course, is that the government wants to engage in dubious military activities, like blowing up “drug ships.” If a soldier disobeys on the grounds that an order is unlawful, well, that can be adjudicated by either the federal or military courts. Hegseth’s dumb threats won’t stand.  And besides, a grand jury wouldn’t buttress Pete the Warrior’s attempts to discipline retired military.  It’s just one crazy thing after another, isn’t it?

Here’s the ad in question:

*As expected, NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani has reneged on his campaign promise to provide rental vouchers for the impecunious.

Expanding a New York City program to help struggling tenants pay rent seemed like an obvious campaign promise for Zohran Mamdani, who staked his insurgent candidacy last year on making life more affordable in the five boroughs.

Now, confronting a grim fiscal picture in his second month as mayor, Mr. Mamdani no longer intends to back the growth of the $1 billion-plus initiative known as CityFHEPS, despite a plan passed by the City Council and upheld in court.

The reversal marks the clearest example yet of the clash between the ideology of his democratic socialist campaign and the tough realities of managing a sprawling, costly bureaucracy.

During a recent news conference, as the mayor lamented a looming budget deficit that on Wednesday he pegged at $7 billion over two years, he suggested the program’s full expansion may be too expensive.

Now, his administration is negotiating with housing advocates on how to settle a lawsuit that sought to ensure that growth in the program took place. His lawyers recently requested that the case be adjourned while they worked to find a solution with the City Council and the Legal Aid Society, which brought the suit.

About 65,000 households, representing 140,000 people, use the vouchers, according to city data. If the program were to be fully expanded, some 47,000 households would become newly eligible annually, potentially adding $17 billion in costs to the city over five years, according to a rough estimate from city budget officials in January 2024. (Proponents of the voucher program, though, say that City Hall greatly overstated its potential cost to the city.)

Mamdani knew about the city’s fiscal woes before he took office, but he still made those promises.  And it’s not just that “all candidates make promises they can’t keep,” either. For Mamdani’s promises are what got him elected: free childcare, public transportation, subsidized grocery stores, and so on. Those are the only reasons I thought that New York’s Jews would vote for an antisemite. But it was free stuff that got Mamdani elected. Don’t expect to see these promises actually be met.

*Francesca Albanese, the UN’s Special Rapporteur for the Occupied Palestinian territories, has a long history of antisemitism and Israel hatred that France has demanded her resignation (the U.S. has sanctioned her for a while, barring her from entering the country). She was accused of saying in Qatar that Israel was the common enemy of humanity, but this wasn’t correct: She said that “those who control large amounts of capital, algorithms, and weapons.  . . we as humanity have a common enemy.” She argued later that she was referring to “the system” (what system?), but it’s clear what she meant. Here is what ChatGPT says about her history of antisemitism. Take it with a grain of salt, at least the first accusation, but see below, too.

• “Common Enemy of Humanity” Accusation: In February 2026, Albanese allegedly described Israel as a “common enemy” of humanity during a forum in Doha. She later clarified her remarks on X (formerly Twitter), stating that the “common enemy” refers to the global systems—including financial capital and weapons—that enable genocide, rather than the nation itself.
• Genocide Allegations: In her October 2024 report, “Genocide as Colonial Erasure,” she argued there are “reasonable grounds to believe” Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. She has characterized Israel’s military operations as a systematic effort to erase the Palestinian presence from their land.
• Economy of Genocide: In July 2025, she called for a global boycott and full arms embargo against what she termed Israel’s “economy of genocide,” naming dozens of international companies she claims profit from the occupation.
• October 7 Attack Context: She has faced severe criticism from France and Germany for stating that the victims of the October 7 Hamas attacks were “not killed because of their Judaism” but in response to “Israel’s oppression”.
• Criticism of Israeli Society: She has described Israeli society as “genocidal” for what she perceives as a majority support for the war in Gaza and has stated that Israelis risk “losing their humanity” by participating in the occupation.

UN Watch gives more:

UN Watch, the Geneva-based non-governmental organization that monitors the United Nations, today welcomed France’s announcement that it will call for the immediate resignation of UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, during the high-level opening of the UN Human Rights Council session on February 23.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot, responding to a question from Member of the National Assembly Caroline Yadan during a session in the French parliament, condemned Albanese’s recent remarks made at a conference in Doha on February 7, where she characterized Israel as the “enemy of humanity” in the presence of a Hamas representative and the Iranian Foreign Minister. Barrot described her statements as “outrageous and reprehensible,” adding that they targeted “Israel as a people and as a nation, which is absolutely unacceptable.”

Barrot cited Albanese’s history of inflammatory rhetoric, including her justifying the October 7 Hamas massacre—the worst antisemitic attack since the Holocaust—invoking tropes about “the Jewish lobby,” and comparing Israel to the Third Reich.

“She presents herself as a UN independent expert, yet she is neither an expert nor independent—she is a political activist who stirs up hate,” Barrot stated. He affirmed that France will demand her resignation “with firmness” at the upcoming UNHRC session.

UN Watch commended French MP Caroline Yadan for spearheading a letter signed by 50 lawmakers demanding action against Albanese, who has repeatedly portrayed Israel as the “incarnation of evil” and an “enemy of humanity.” The initiative underscores growing international concern over Albanese’s inflammatory conduct, which undermines the credibility of the United Nations and betrays the principles of impartiality required of UN mandate holders.

Hillel Neuer, Executive Director of UN Watch, praised France’s stance: “France’s bold call for Francesca Albanese’s resignation is a crucial step toward restoring integrity to the UN human rights system. For too long, Albanese has abused her position to spew Goebbels-like demonology against Israel, inciting hatred and legitimizing terrorism under the guise of human rights advocacy. She has disgraced the world body and betrayed the very people she claims to defend.”

Albanese has to go.  Her job is to help the people of Palestine, but that doesn’t mean she should act like a member of Hamas or damn Israel. If she accuses Israel of genocide but doesn’t accuse her own remit—Palestine—of the same thing (and she doesn’t), then she’s not doing her job. Her entire history bespeaks Jew hatred, and one of the handful of good things that the Trump administration has done was to sanction her.  Not only can’t she come to the U.S. (where of course the UN is located), but her assets in the US (and I think she has some) have been frozen, and no American can do business with her.

*I reported yesterday that Harvard took the unprecedented step of suggesting capping the percentage of As in all its undergraduate courses at 20%.  The faculty will vote on this in April.  Of course the students are outraged, but one of them, Isaac Mansell, supports what Harvard did in a Free Press article, “I’m a Harvard Student. It’s too easy to get an A.” You’ll be appalled, as I was, at the extent of grade inflation at Harvard.

I am a senior at Harvard. Last week, a faculty committee released a proposal to combat grade inflation at my school. The proposal would do two things: First, it would cap the number of A grades issued to undergraduates at 20 percent for every class. Second, Harvard would cease using grade point average (GPA) to rank students for academic honors and prizes and instead turn to average percentile rank—a measure of how students perform relative to their classmates. If passed by a full faculty vote later this spring, the proposal would take effect in the 2026–27 academic year.

How do the students feel about this proposal? You will perhaps not be surprised to hear they are up in arms. While faculty, according to the campus paper, lent cautious support to the initiative, an overwhelming 84.9 percent of my peers “definitely” disagree with limiting A grades to 20 percent, according to a Harvard Undergraduate Association survey.

I’m among the minority who support the proposal. Let me explain why.

Grade inflation at Harvard is out of control. In 1964, the Sophia Freund Prize at Harvard was endowed as the highest academic honor the university could bestow, and was “awarded annually to the highest ranking undergraduate.” Note the singular.

For decades, the prize was intended to go to one student each year. That changed in 2011, when it was awarded to three undergraduates. By 2020, an entire 20-strong Cambridge polycule could plausibly have been classified as “the highest ranking undergraduate.” By 2025, 55 seniors, or 2.8 percent of the graduating class, received the award.

Harvard is widely considered one of the best universities in the world. And yet, it is far too easy to get perfect grades. According to a report released last October by Dean of Undergraduate Education Amanda Claybaugh, more than 60 percent of grades awarded to Harvard undergraduates are A’s. Twenty years ago, it was just 25 percent.

. . .And there is a natural consequence of grade compression: It erases distinction.

At Harvard, A’s are supposed to mean something specific. According to the faculty’s rubric, an A- is meant to signal “full mastery,” while an A is meant to denote “extraordinary distinction.” But in practice, since A’s are doled out so freely, that distinction has collapsed. The majority of grades now occupy the same narrow band at the “extraordinary” end of the scale. If two-thirds of students are extraordinarily distinguished, from whom exactly are they distinct?

It is in this blissful environment that Harvard’s grading-reform proposal landed. You don’t have to have a PhD to understand why the vast majority of students oppose it. Simply put, people like free stuff. But I do not believe that this proposal is an attack on students. Rather, it is an acknowledgment of an arithmetic system that has had numerous

Mansell argues that grade inflation will reduce the value of a Harvard degree, but I doubt it. The name itself opens doors; it surely has for me.  I agree with the new faculty proposal, though Luana assures me she thinks it will fail.  If it does, well, you can still put the media grade for each course (which will be A or A-) on a student’s transcript.

*Finally, a horrific statistic sent to me by Anna Krylov.  What is happening to sex these days? From the NY Post:

They’re phoning it in.

More than one-third of American college students say they’ve scrolled on their phone during sex.

The shocking stat was uncovered during a survey of 100,000 US students aged 18 and over conducted through the social media apps YikYak and Sidechat.

As much as 35%, or roughly 35,000 of those surveyed, admit to whipping out their device to send a quick text or watch a TikTok video while doing the deed — proof of just how screen-addicted Gen Z Americans have become.

There’s more, but you can read the salacious and disturbing details. I guess the new rules for sex go beyond asking “can I take off your pants?” or “can I unhook your bra?”; they will include: “Could you please put your phone on the other side of the room?”

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili has a question:

Hili: Who invented the vicious circle?
Andrzej: I suspect the ancestors of the Sumerians or the Etruscans.
Hili: I was expecting a different answer.

Hili: Kto wynalazł błędne koło?
Ja: Podejrzewam przodków Sumerów albo Etrusków.
Hili, Spodziewałam się innej odpowiedzi.

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

From Bad Spelling or Grammar on Signs and Notices. Can you find the two errors on this menu? (Click to enlarge.) No, it’s not “Frenchy toast,”: that is supposed to be funny.

From Cats that Have Had Enough of Your Shit:

From America’s Cultural Decline Into Idiocy:

From Masih: Iranians at a memorial service shout “Death to Khamenei!”

Forty days have passed.
Forty days since the Islamic Republic massacred the people of Iran.

This video was sent to me from the 40th-day memorial for Parisa Lashkari and Mehrzad Nazari.
Watch how brave Iranians, despite the most brutal repression, chant
“Death to Khamenei.”

Do… pic.twitter.com/pbsHU3wo1T

— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) February 13, 2026

More from Iran, reposted by J. K. Rowling (yes, she posts about a lot more than gender issues):

A voice is from inside Iran.

Not from a political analyst. Not from a commentator. From someone who was tear-gassed and shot at.

“The truth is, most people were shouting for the return of Prince Reza Pahlavi. But when you’re being tear-gassed and shot at, you start running. You… pic.twitter.com/MLWdcEIBKu

— Omid Djalili (@omid9) February 9, 2026

From Malcolm, a bobcat catting:

Cats will be cats, no matter the size.. 😅 pic.twitter.com/6sQX9yRpOr

— Buitengebieden (@buitengebieden) November 20, 2025

From Luana, a list of scary AI incidents (expand it):

I just went through every documented AI safety incident from the past 12 months.

I feel physically sick.

Read this slowly.

• Anthropic told Claude it was about to be shut down. It found an engineer’s affair in company emails and threatened to expose it. They ran the test…

— Miles Deutscher (@milesdeutscher) February 12, 2026

One from my feed; cat curling!

Curling doesn’t necessarily have to be just a winter sport. pic.twitter.com/kIr6oTnbZh

— Paul Bronks (@SlenderSherbet) February 12, 2026

One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:

This Dutch girl was gassed as soon as she arrived in Auschwitz. She was six years old and would be 89 today had she lived. https://t.co/3qVlHZtJS4

— Jerry Coyne (@Evolutionistrue) February 14, 2026

And two posts from Dr. Cobb. Listen to these eider ducks!

A comforter in Europe is often called an 'eiderdown', because they were traditionally made with the warm, dense down of an eider duck.The eider is a sea duck that occupies the cold reaches of the near-Arctic, places like Finland & Canada.Their calls sound like Wisconsin moms at a potluck. 😉

— c0nc0rdance (@c0nc0rdance.bsky.social) 2025-06-07T16:46:00.604Z

Beatrix wants Spring to come (as do we all):

#onthisday Beatrix living in a box looking for signs of spring

— Chris and his farmily of forever friends (@caenhillcc.bsky.social) 2026-02-11T20:34:53.500Z