#ScienceStudiesSaturday

Henceforth Saturdays will serve as the day we examine stupid studies, generally done at least partially on your dime, conducted by researchers with an agenda that seldom includes simple scientific curiosity in order to publish astounding results that will likely be retracted at a later date.

Saturdays will there fore become a permanent repository for this week’s #TransformationTuesday theme: bad science. Why? Because bad “science” makes bad policy and bad policy makes bad law – that we are all subject to. First and foremost in this genre is “Global Warming/Cooling/Climate Change” studies that are based on lies faked studies and Al Gore’s video tapes. Lies that have been repeated so often that both Goebbels and Lenin would be proud.

Why people continue to believe any of the garbage that is pumped endlessly into the education system and mainstream media echo chamber would be a mystery if you didn’t know how education has transmogrified into a propaganda camp. Two generations, minimally, have been conditioned to believe the Big Lie, as long as it comes from the government.

So, once a week we will discus another crappola study intended to shape public policy. This week’s subject: the study Diane Feinstein cited in the meeting she and other legislators had with President Trump. The one she claims demonstrated that the ban on “assault rifles” reduced mass murders while it was in place.

Not so fast. As I speculated at the time, it was another case of data manipulation.

As Jon Stokes ably explains at the Los Angeles Times, Klarevas and Feinstein are able to insist that the ban produced "a remarkable 37% decline in mass shooting fatalities" only by ignoring the fact that both before or after the ban, such weapons are hardly used to kill anyone. "Klarevas and his allies are taking an apparent drop in fatalities from what are mostly handgun shootings (again, pre-ban as well as post) and attributing this lowered body count to the 1994 legislation," Stokes explains.

Klarevas also cherry-picked to get an apparently impressive result from the assault weapon ban by adopting an unusual definition of "mass shooting." If he had "chosen the most widely accepted threshold for categorizing a shooting as a 'mass shooting'—four fatalities, as opposed to Klarevas' higher threshold of six—the 1994 to 2004 drop in fatalities disappears entirely. Had Klarevas chosen a 'mass shooting' threshold of five fatalities instead of six, then the dramatic pause he notes in mass shootings between 1994 to 1999 would disappear too."

*yawn*

So listen up all you vulnerable students, SJWs, Trump haters and other liberal “resisters:” you are being played. But you just keep doing what you’ve been doing - pushing gun control and trying to undo the Second Amendment - and ignore the mental health crisis in this country at your peril.  I’m sure everything will work out and there will be no more mass murders. Idiots.

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

MOTUS Twilight Nocturne Lounge: Janice the Elder Edition

The lounge is now open!

We’re gathered here this evening  to send Janice the American Elder sailing happily into the sunset with all her tools, professional chemistry kits and computer in order to wreak havoc on the world outside of Los Alamos after spending decades dedicated to re-engineering the landscape and driving bureaucrats crazy. Well done, Janice!

SO LET’S GET THIS PARTY STARTED!!!

Raj (in conjunction with Homer ) created this special tribute video as a rat race sendoff for JtAE

So please leave your food contribution for tonight’s party on the buffet table next to the bar.

Little Mo made some special cupcakes:

You can drop your virtual gift for Janice’s use in retirement on the table at the back of the lounge. 

Here’s what I got her:

Feel free to leave suggestions for JtAE’s post-retirement hobbies in the comment section.

I think her chemistry and engineering proclivities makes her a natural for recreational molecular gastronomy (discussed in this vintage post). As far as I can ascertain MG requires both mechanical engineering and a solid grasp of mysterious chemical reactions that when combined create “food” called “foams, emulsions and Polymer Melts.” The ingredients for such constructs include Sodium Alginate, Calcium Chloride, Sodium Citrate, Isomalt and – I hope you’re sitting down -   Transglutaminase - that’s … Meat Glue!  Not to put too fine a point to it, butt I think this is right up JtAE’s alley. 

The spherification of zygotes

Also, please deposit all of your musical sendoffs in the comments section as well so we may all sing, sway and dance as we are able. I selected about 2 dozen tunes but narrowed it down to just 3. The first was a no-brainer as I just know that someone as unique as Janice did it her way, within the confines and strictures of the Department of Energy of course.

My next selection is because I’ve always thought that Luckenbach Texas would be a swell place to retire if one was inclined to relocate. Also I like the song and think this is a great party version:

And my final selection is from my ever growing vault of “shut up and sing” artists – Art Garfunkel, performing Breakaway, because that’s really what retirement is. Plus it’s a lovely, romantic melody and Art was blessed with the voice of an angel.

I would just like to wrap up this party post with a piece of advice which I now realize should have been passed along before Janice actually left her job at the Lab.

So just sidle up to the bar, give Little Mo (he’s the mole in the MAGA hat) a nod – he knows what you want – and settle in for an evening of fun and reminiscing.

Oh, and please behave. I don’t have any bouncers.

Peacock Ascending

Can you believe it, #FLOTUSFriday already! 

FLOTUS looks magnificent at the WH Opioid Summit

And speaking of magnificent, did you see this photograph that Son of Sobieski posted of a peacock taking flight a couple of days ago?

Lovely as it is I’m afraid my previous WH assignment has ruined me for peacocks. Ever since Lady M’s 2009 impersonation of a peacock with the fennel harvest in the Organic Garden of Good and Evil™

  and again at the 2010 harvest,

every time I see a peacock that’s all I can think about. So it could well be PTSD, but when I laid eyes on that exquisite peacock ascending all I could see was Lady M:

I take comfort in the fact that she finally found a frock that doesn’t make her butt look big.

Now I have to run: I have a few finishing touches to put on the decorations and I still have snacks to make for Janice the American Elder’s retirement party, being held in the Twilight Nocturne Lounge tonight, 7 –9 PM EST. Don’t miss it, there might be virtual prizes!

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

Throwback Thursday

Everybody does Throwback Thursday because it’s fun to remember, for better or worse, the way we were: the fashion, food, politics and  culture of by-gone eras. Until last year I thought of it less as nostalgia and more as a history of a dying culture. Now I can view it as a chronicle of America in the process of making itself great again. See what you think.

H/T EVR

I’m so old that some of these old things are new again, like TV rabbit ears, fallout shelters/drills (thank you Obama - and what happened to that Trump/Putin collusion?), vinyl and turntables. Perhaps they are like sex and leveraged buyouts: every generation thinks they’ve discovered them.

The things I miss most from this compilation are Borders bookstores, especially the one in Ann Arbor which pioneered the bookstore Koffee Klatch Korner Kliché, and Burger Chef – although I hate to think what their delicious burgers and fishwiches would have devolved into by now.

So here’s my first entry from the way, way back machine: remember when (last week I believe) the gals on The View diagnosed Mike Pence with an unspecified mental illness?

"Like I said before, it's one thing to talk to Jesus," Behar said. "It's another thing when Jesus talks to you."

"Exactly. That's different!" Hostin said enthusiastically.

"That's called mental illness if I'm not correct. Hearing voices," Behar continued.

Well my goodness, look who’s exhibiting signs of mental illness now – Oprah!

Amid calls for her to consider a run for the White House — from fans as well as her closest friends — “I went into prayer,” she tells PEOPLE in the magazine’s new cover story. “ ‘God, if you think I’m supposed to run, you gotta tell me, and it has to be so clear that not even I can miss it.’ And I haven’t gotten that.”

Shoot, Oprah would be perfect; she pushes so many of the right buttons  - not white, female (or possibly “other”), #MeToo, and Meryl Streep thinks she’d be great, even though God talks to her.  And God knows Meryl, bless her heart,

knows how to pick winners:

That’s it for for my Throwback Thursday contribution, now let’s see yours.

REMINDER:  Janice the American Elder’s virtual retirement party  will be held in the virtual MOTUS Twilight Nocturne Lounge this Friday from 7:00 – 9:00 PM EST.

Linked By: BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

#OpenWhineWednesday

I find it odd that people call Wednesday hump day.

“When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more or less.”

Oh sure it’s technically in the middle of the work week. But when you wake up on Wednesday morning do you actually say “yippee! I’ve made it half way through the week!” Because you haven’t. And if you can convince yourself on Wednesday morning that you only have 2 more days to work, well, you’re a true optimist.

So my guess is that like many modern conventions Hump Day as a concept was made up by a group with something to gain. In this case I suspect the other NRA – the National Restaurant Association - for the sole purpose of promoting “Wine Wednesdays.” It’s an opportunity to sell slow moving (bad) wine at a discount.

And while I’ve been known to participate in Wine Wednesdays at our local trattoria from time to time I must say I’ve given little thought or notice to Hump Day since I retired. That’s all about to change; I now see how, with a slight twist, the tactical value of promoting #OpenWhineWednesday. Who couldn’t use a little boost between #MondayMoanin’ and #FLOTUS Friday? And sometimes just drinking cheap wine doesn’t cut it.

Sometimes a little whining in the middle of the week is exactly what we need to get by and it’s something that everybody can participate in with gusto whether you choose to imbibe or not. So whine away: whine about your pet peeve,  whine about people who whine about their pet peeve, or just say “screw it” and order a cheap glass of wine and then whine about that.

The point is we all have something to whine about, why should celebrities be the only ones to enjoy that pleasure? Take the lovely Jennifer Lawrence for example, who has been whining about President Trump since the day he won the election and seems determined to continue.

On Thursday, actress Jennifer Lawrence, who has openly expressed her hostility for President Trump, telling Oprah Winfrey that if she met Trump it would end “with a martini to the face,” and implied that Trump’s election was related to devastating hurricanes last fall. – Daily Wire

Donald Trump was probably responsible for this embarrassing Oscar wardrobe malfunction too

Remind me again, we are to listen to an actress who falls down as frequently as Hillary Clinton, can’t keep her designer gown intact and who is taking a year off from acting to “save democracy” because, why?

She recently told Entertainment Tonight that she'd be taking a break from acting to focus on activism…"It doesn't have anything to do with partisan [politics]," Lawrence said of her involvement with the non-profit organization. "It's just anti-corruption and stuff trying to pass state by state laws that can help prevent corruption, fix our democracy."

The stupid burns brighter in the darkness too

Because “anti-corruption and stuff” needs to fixed by a middle school dropout who can’t figure out how to walk sober and keep her clothes together, that’s why.

"I dropped out of middle school. I don’t technically have a GED or a diploma. I am self-educated… I wanted to forge my own path. I found what I wanted to do and I didn’t want anything getting in the way of it. And even friends, for many years, were not as important to me as my career, I mean from the age of 14."

And that makes her smarter than us, the #Deporables, who learned stuff the old fashioned way rather than self-educating by reading all those Hunger Games scripts. And smoking dope.

Because everyone knows dope makes you smarter, right Barry?

I’m done whining now, for the day. I think I’ll make it till the weekend.

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

#TransformationTuesday

If it’s Tuesday we must be transforming. So welcome to #TransformationTuesday - in which we explore all the ways large and small that Obama and his mignons are still trying and/or succeeding in fundamentally transforming America.

Today I bring you a small story (via Instapundit) that highlights, bigly, how science has been transformed from, well, science, to fraud: The Inside Story Of How An Ivy League Food Scientist Turned Shoddy Data Into Viral Studies.

“Brian Wansink won fame, funding, and influence for his science-backed advice on healthy eating. Now, emails show how the Cornell professor and his colleagues have hacked and massaged low-quality data into headline-friendly studies to ‘go virally big time.'”

The transformation here is simple, you start with the basic, long established Scientific Method:

And turn it on its ear. Science Transformers begin by gathering data and then mine the data through a series of contortions and tweaking until such time as the manipulated data suggests a hypothesis to the researcher. At that point you can “identify the problem,” draw conclusions and quickly publish your “study” in the most prestigious journal you can get to buy it as legit research.

To put it mildly, that’s not kosher, even BuzzFeed knows that:

But that’s not how science is supposed to work. Ideally, statisticians say, researchers should set out to prove a specific hypothesis before a study begins. Wansink, in contrast, was retroactively creating hypotheses to fit data patterns that emerged after an experiment was over.

Unfortunately once you’ve transformed something as basic as science, you get a lot of crap: Retracted Scientific Studies: A Growing List. In fact, so much crap there are now entire publications dedicated to documenting all the retractions.

That’s the thing about transformers: they can change back.

So we’ll just be keeping our eyes on them. Every week. #TransformationTuesday

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Good Monday Moanin’

The Detroit Free Press once had a columnist by the name of Bob Talbert. He wasn’t a deep thinker but he was deeply beloved for his down home (he originally hailed from South Carolina) take on things and his humor – back when writers for that rag were still allowed to be apolitical and funny.

Bob Talbert: Detroit Free Press columnist 1968-1999

At one time he wrote 7 days a week, but at the time of his premature death in 1999 his column was a must-read Monday thru Friday and the first column of the workweek was dubbed Monday Moanin’ Out of My Mind and would begin with this salutation “From my Monday Moanin’ mind… .” What followed was a compendium of gripes, random thoughts, incompletely formed ideas and observations that might or might not have been 100% true but were funny nevertheless. You might say that Bob was Twitter before there was a Twitter.

So I’ve decided, since he departed this earth nearly 20 years ago, to steal liberate the Monday Moanin’ schtick and make it my own. I will henceforth use Mondays to posit one or some of my random, not fully formed grievances and musings for your consideration. You are invited to add to the concept or, as has become our habit around here, continue on your way to greener pastures.

You may file today’s moanin’ under “They’re Never Going To Be Happy Anyway.” It is brought to you by way of an ad placed  in Saturday’s Park Record, Park City’s newsprint of record. By way of background, Park City outlawed the use of plastic bags last year – because they’re bad for the environment. So unless you want to pay a dime for a paper bag (which are also frowned upon in these parts) you must bring your own reusable bags to the two grocery stores and one pharmacy in town. Only now, apparently, that’s not good enough either: 

Which leaves me to ask: Are progressives ever happy? The answer of course is no, being happy would just make them sad.

Alternatively, residents can travel 5 miles to the Junction and continue to get their wares placed in the bags of their choice – plastic or paper – for no additional charge and lower prices as well. Guess where most people shop?

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!

Because Good Fences Make Good Neighbors

Hungary built a wall…and the EU is going to pay for it! That is if Victor Orbán has anything to say about it. Orbán is Europe’s Donald Trump, hated by Europe’s borderless Leftists just like Trump is by open border apostles here. Orbán built a wall on Hungary’s border to keep the barbarians at the gate while all around him screamed that illegal migration is a human right. And now he wants the EU – who necessitated the wall with their insane policies - to pay for it, which of course they won’t; but at least Hungry is no longer as vulnerable as the rest of the continent.

So it’s snowing here.

I’m making a cioppino with mussels, shrimp, calamari and cod this afternoon.

And it will be a good day. Praise the Lord.

Good fences make good neighbors

Linked By: Larwyn’s Linx on Doug Ross@Journal, and BlogsLucianneLoves, and Free Republic, Thanks!