Link round-up for 11 December 2022

Various interesting stuff I ran across on the net over the last week.

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Even in a remote wasteland, the beer must be delivered.

Christmas clashes with cats, and more.

Mama rat wants her babies in the hammock.

It's kitten vs cardboard tube.

Nope, too cold.

She can continue playing softball.

Don't crown the winner too soon.

Downtown Portland decorates for Christmas (this blog is doing an illustrative "advent calendar", so there are new posts every day).

The new masseur got a little out of line.

"Do not save them, do not serve."

Excellent Christmas tree idea.

Appearances can be deceiving.

Only the best hotels provide such amenities.

Lady M shows Christmas spirit.

There should be good ghosts.

Maybe philosophers aren't the best heroes.

Assholes try to disrupt a concert, but get a surprise.

Cats deal with life -- and Christmas.

From dripping, reality emerges.

Nice horsie.

O little star of Bethlehem.....

Build a Tesla.

Yes, there is Creepmas wrapping paper.  And a gingerdead house.

Here's a round-up of Halloween-related posts at Atheist Revolution blog.

That took guts.

These abominations exist.

If one eats, the other will not go hungry.

Musk is to monkeys as Oz is to puppies.

Where would you send the trolley?

Maps help visualize population density.

He likes to make a big splash.

Explore the disturbing world of slaver ants.

If this is for real, it could be a fascinating trip.  Here's what it would look like.

Nanotechnology is now being used to destroy tumors without surgery.

Behold the king.

This is the Danakil Depression in Ethiopia.

Detroit is now hosting a spectacular exhibition of Van Gogh's works.

Help Ukraine, which is feeding the world even as it fights for survival.

Nobody alive today is really following Christianity.

December is ex-Muslim awareness month.

Stephen Fry explains the Puritans.

"When your child tells you who they are, believe them."

Religion is degrading and foolish -- and just plain weird.

Since the Dobbs ruling, vasectomies have become more popular.

There's nothing wrong with atheists celebrating Christmas.

Jesus will judge the self-righteous.

Happiness between Tails remembers a blogger who recently died.

Maybe it's better for kids to be less American.

Some find it difficult to understand suicidal impulses.

Social media are inferior to blogging.

The French could handle Elon Musk.

Blogger John Hill wants to know about your views on the concept of the afterlife.

This is the enduring ugliness of a grossly-unequal society.

Green Eagle manages some sympathy for Herschel Walker.

Bruce Gerencser finds religion to be worse than useless for coping with severe chronic pain.  (Note:  Bruce has asked that commenters not offer medical advice.  Please respect his wishes.)

Oregon and Washington have suffered some attacks on their electrical infrastructure, though with less serious results than the one in North Carolina.

In modern times, Marxism generates an endless gusher of nonsense.

Experts debunk the lies spread by the fake anti-vax "documentary" Died Suddenly (found via Angry Bear).

Credit where due -- Apple offers what looks like a valuable tool for protecting online privacy.

Republicans are increasingly open to Medicaid expansion.

Railway unions respond to the government robbing workers of their right to strike and forcing them to work without paid sick leave.  Biden and Buttigieg have several options for trying to resolve the problem.  More than seventy members of Congress are demanding that Biden use an executive order to grant the paid sick leave.

Robbers used a car to smash through the glass doors of this Portland store.  It was the third robbery of that same store in a week.

Angry Bear makes the case that Trump is still more dangerous than DeSantis.

The Indiana attorney general is clutching at any pretext to punish the doctor who gave a ten-year-old rape victim an abortion.

Here's everything you could ever want to know about QAnon.

As remote workers refuse to return to offices, downtown office-space occupancy is about half what it was pre-pandemic, though cities are slow to adopt the obvious solution -- converting the unwanted office buildings into housing.  The article is from a business viewpoint, so there's plenty of moaning and whining about the "devastating" collapse of the office real-estate market.

Too many young adults, their sexuality twisted by pornography, now believe that choking is a normal part of sex.

Democrats need to quit screwing around and raise the debt ceiling.

This person performs surgery on minors.

Lyft drivers are preaching religion at their passengers -- and the company does nothing to discourage it.

Trumpanzees condemn Murkowski for defending the Constitution.

Authors offer support to striking workers at HarperCollins.

This girl was saved.  Many others are not so lucky.

Since the advent of vaccines, covid has killed more Republicans than Democrats every month -- often far more.  This, and migration caused by the pandemic, have affected the outcome of a few elections, though not many.

Police abuse of rape victims shows why rape exceptions to forced-birth laws don't work.

The New York Times is still garbage.

Sex denialists are the new flat-Earthers.

The trajectory of an earlier Republican president hints at Trump's future.

Darwinfish 2 puts the best possible face on the backstabbing of railway workers over the paid-sick-time dispute.  I have to give him credit for at least addressing the issue -- most of the blogosphere has pretty much ignored it.

Betrayed rail workers warn of possible mass quitting over the next two months.

The conviction of the Trump Organization is a bigger deal than it seems.

The Loudoun county rape cover-up scandal was even worse than was originally reported.  Here's the actual grand jury report -- it's long, but there are summary sections near the beginning.

The American way of work is horror.

Fundamentalism and white nationalism are forms of identity politics.

Americans overwhelmingly support legal marijuana.

Why do people go to church?

In Ontario, gender ideology indoctrination begins in kindergarten.

English people explain why they left Christianity.

There's a problem with the BBC's "top 100 women" list.

Sex workers in Scotland push back against a puritanical government.

"We put Turing on the £50 note as an apology for what we did to him, even as we do the same thing to 18-year-old lads who, just a few years ago, in the pre-trans era, would have grown up to be normal, happy gay men."

Here's how Denmark works to preserve its identity (this article was machine-translated from French, so it's a bit awkward to read).

How does it take three thousand cops and a hundred and fifty raids to arrest twenty-five people?

Italy is nationalizing a Russian-owned oil refinery in Sicily.

Three democracies team up to build a super-advanced fighter plane.

Poland is emerging as a substantial military power, at least where tanks are concerned.

2022 has been a bad year for three of the world's most evil regimes.

Russia's genocidal behavior and track record of breaking agreements rule out any negotiation with it.

This is what life is like in Iran under the theocracy, which imposes totalitarian control over everyday life.  The regime's sexually-twisted fanatics are deliberately shooting women in the genitals, breasts, and faces.

Mohsen Shekari is the first victim of an execution mob hit by Iran's government religious mafia retaliating for the rebellion.  Except for all the people they've shot in the streets or beaten to death in prison, of course.

Time recognizes Iranian women as heroes of the year.

The Taliban are still prohibiting girls' education in Afghanistan.

Farmers in Bangladesh have converted a dry region into a productive cropland.

South Korean truckers ignore a presidential order to end their strike.

The North Korean regime is now forcing its people to adopt shitty, militaristic names.

Besides prohibiting non-marital sex, Indonesia's new legal code also bans criticism of the government and tightens laws against blasphemy.

South Africa is legalizing sex work, hoping to improve safety and limit the spread of disease.

More links at Angry Bear, WAHF, Fair and Unbalanced, and Miss Cellania.

My posts this week:  an image round-up, a call to keep the pressure on Biden over the rail situation, a remembrance of my mother, and a video calling out the Chinese regime's latest lies.

o o o o o

Today marks ten days since railway workers were robbed of their right to strike for paid sick leave.  Issue the executive order, Biden!

[Image at top:  the Iranian rebellion]