Links

https://www.businessinsider.com/paul-manafort-plea-deal-mueller-guilty-2018-9

Paul Manafort pleaded guilty on Friday to one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice and one count of conspiracy against the US.


https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-delivery-drivers-reveal-claims-of-disturbing-work-conditions-2018-8
Sept. 11, 2018
Business Insider spoke with 31 current or recently employed drivers about what it's like to deliver packages for Amazon.
Some drivers described a variety of alleged abuses, including lack of overtime pay, missing wages, intimidation, and favoritism.
Many of these drivers also described a physically demanding work environment in which, under strict time constraints, they felt pressured to drive at dangerously high speeds, blow stop signs, and urinate in bottles on their trucks.


https://www.businessinsider.com/bob-woodward-mueller-something-on-trump-2018-9
Sept. 14, 2018
Veteran reporter Bob Woodward on Friday told conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt he looked "hard" for evidence of collusion between President Donald Trump and Russia but didn't find anything.
But he still thinks the special counsel Robert Mueller has "something" on the president.


https://www.bartleby.com/73/1736.html
H. L. Mencken - There is always an easy solution to every human problem—neat, plausible, and wrong.
often paraphrased as
https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/h_l_mencken_129796
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.


https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/09/12/why-growth-cant-be-green/
Sept. 12, 2018
Warnings about ecological breakdown have become ubiquitous. Over the past few years, major newspapers, including the Guardian and the New York Times, have carried alarming stories on soil depletion, deforestation, and the collapse of fish stocks and insect populations. These crises are being driven by global economic growth, and its accompanying consumption, which is destroying the Earth’s biosphere and blowing past key planetary boundaries that scientists say must be respected to avoid triggering collapse.
Many policymakers have responded by pushing for what has come to be called “green growth.”
For reference, a sustainable level of resource use is about 50 billion metric tons per year—a boundary we breached back in 2000.
The team then reran the model to see what would happen if every nation on Earth immediately adopted best practice in efficient resource use (an extremely optimistic assumption). The results improved; resource consumption would hit only 93 billion metric tons [instead of 180 billion metric tons] by 2050. But that is still a lot more than we’re consuming today. Burning through all those resources could hardly be described as absolute decoupling or green growth.
It sounds like an elegant solution to an otherwise catastrophic problem. There’s just one hitch: New evidence suggests that green growth isn’t the panacea everyone has been hoping for. In fact, it isn’t even possible.
Study after study shows the same thing. Scientists are beginning to realize that there are physical limits to how efficiently we can use resources. Sure, we might be able to produce cars and iPhones and skyscrapers more efficiently, but we can’t produce them out of thin air. We might shift the economy to services such as education and yoga, but even universities and workout studios require material inputs.
We might shift the economy to services such as education and yoga, but even universities and workout studios require material inputs.
Once we reach the limits of efficiency, pursuing any degree of economic growth drives resource use back up.


https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/09/16/647415462/study-a-daily-baby-aspirin-has-no-benefit-for-healthy-older-people
Sept. 16, 2018
Results released Sunday from a major study of low-dose aspirin contain a disappointing answer for older, otherwise healthy people.
"We found there was no discernible benefit of aspirin on prolonging independent, healthy life for the elderly," says Anne Murray, a geriatrician and epidemiologist at Hennepin Healthcare in Minneapolis, who helped lead the study.
There is still strong evidence that a daily baby aspirin can reduce the risk that many people who have already suffered a heart attack or stroke will suffer another attack.
And there is some evidence that daily low-dose aspirin may help people younger than 70 who have at least a 10 percent risk of having a heart attack avoid a heart attack or stroke, according to the latest recommendations from the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force.