Apparently, generative AI doesn't know that only the front part of the cartridge is the bullet. :o At least god doesn't have six fingers.

Since this is an opportunity to educate people about health, I will not discuss politics here. :)

• If you're a guy, your urinary tract is stupidly complicated from a medical viewpoint and there's a prostate beneath the bladder which hydrogenates testosterone (T is produced by the brain) into dihydrotestosterone, produces fluid to mix the seminal fluid with, and generally supports fertility and gender specific phenotype.

• With progressing age, the prostate enlarges, gets infected with HPV (nearly everyone gets it) and may get bacterial infections (typical ones are E. coli). It may also develop calcinations.

• Risk is reduced if you live in Asia and eat a traditional menu containing much soy bean products which enables guys in those regions to enjoy several times less prostate cancer.

• Risk is increased with nearly every urinary tract infection, especially if not conclusively diagnosed and treated.

• After the age of 40, regularly have PSA (prostate specific antigen) measured from a blood test. It tells how much disintegration and immune reaction is occurring down there.

• Regularly have ultrasound check-ups done. If there are UTI symptoms, treatment must not occur blindly, but must be followed by observation.

• If you are young and your home country has medical insurance that covers HPV vaccination, get it while it's free (because it costs 150 € a dose). If you're rich enough, there may be a point in getting it later too, especially if you've not had unsafe sex (it doesn't protect after infection). The majority of people get HPV during their lives and approximately 9 strains cause cervical cancer in women and raise the risk of prostate cancer in men. By getting vaccinated against HPV, you protect both yourself and your partners from drawing a ticket in a quite nasty lottery.

• As long as prostate cancer is androgen dependent, it can be suppressed with an androgen blockade.

Competent ones, I think they do.

Possible explanations:

• yet another time, someone had set money aside for personal use, consequently the bunkers had doors made of plywood or roofing tin :)

• arrival of drones was timed to match the loading / unloading of an ammunition train (that's when even competent militaries have to bring their stuff out)

I hope her lawyer is skilled and the court responsive to arguments - and she gets her freedom back.

If I was her, one of my first actions would be starting to teach a colleague to replace me, while asking colleagues abroad about open jobs in research (followed by questions about legislation, immigration and civil rights).

Basically, I would not stay in a country whose officials wronged me for no reason, and might do that again.

Listing living people as dead in an official database is 99% likely a crime.

If the US does lift sanctions on select oligarchs from Russia, I think the EU should consider sanctions on select oligarchs from the US.

I can suggest one such oligarch, Elon Musk - he's associated with wielding illegitimate power, manipulating social media and interfering in elections (both national and primary) using wealth.

How about freezing his assets? I don't think he has taken the prudent step of collecting all his money and stowing it under Donald's presidential seat.

For ease of reading, the investigation he refers to:

https://harpers.org/archive/2025/01/the-ghosts-in-the-machine-liz-pelly-spotify-musicians/

In short: fake artists with stock music (changing labels and other camouflage applied). Likely goal: to depreciate streaming counts for actual artists and increase profit margins.

What I uncovered was an elaborate internal program. Spotify, I discovered, not only has partnerships with a web of production companies, which, as one former employee put it, provide Spotify with “music we benefited from financially,” but also a team of employees working to seed these tracks on playlists across the platform. In doing so, they are effectively working to grow the percentage of total streams of music that is cheaper for the platform. The program’s name: Perfect Fit Content (PFC). The PFC program raises troubling prospects for working musicians. Some face the possibility of losing out on crucial income by having their tracks passed over for playlist placement or replaced in favor of PFC; others, who record PFC music themselves, must often give up control of certain royalty rights that, if a track becomes popular, could be highly lucrative. But it also raises worrying questions for all of us who listen to music. It puts forth an image of a future in which—as streaming services push music further into the background, and normalize anonymous, low-cost playlist filler—the relationship between listener and artist might be severed completely.

A full-scale invasion of Syria by Turkey, without any political adjustments to the situation, would mean Turkish troops seizing land currently co-held (together with the AANES / SDF) by American troops. Without coordination, Turkish drone and artillery strikes would land near US troops, which would call in reinforcements to remove the drones and artillery.

Needless to say, one NATO ally going at territory held by another is a pretty bad idea.

So, in some parts of Syria, proceeding with their plan requires a US president - and most likely not Biden - to give them the green light and withdraw US special forces from SDF land. Basically, it requires the US to screw its allies in the fight against the Islamic State. Which would not be out of character for Trump, since Kurds cannot "pay him for protection". The protection was based on principles (the Autonomous Administration of North-Eastern Syria was the only player in the region that tried sticking to democracy and human rights) and a common enemy (ISIS).

I hope all of this doesn't happen, but if I were the Kurds, I'd be keeping drone batteries charged and knocking on every diplomatic door for assistance.

In case of things hitting the fan, it might be useful to remember a link to the Kurdistan Red Crescent - Heyva Sor a Kurdistanê. (They can't supply drone batteries, but deliver medical and humanitarian aid to the region.)

Update via Reuters: the president says he'll abide by the parliament's decision and revoke his declaration. Nobody started obeying it anyway - the military tried to do something because they had orders, but was not enthusiastic enough to achieve anything.

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/south-korea-president-yoon-declares-martial-law-2024-12-03/

Some analysis via the Guardian:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/dec/03/declaration-of-martial-law-awakens-ghosts-south-koreans-thought-were-laid-to-rest

Yoon’s declaration of martial law appears to have been a desperate gamble in the face of rock-bottom public popularity – with positive ratings barely over 10% – in the midst of a doctors’ strike and staunch political opposition, increasingly including his own People Power party, whose leader, Han Dong-hoon, said the declaration of martial law was a “wrong move”.

Yoon may have thought that his nostalgia for authoritarianism would resonate with at least some of the South Korean political spectrum, but the unanimous vote in the national assembly to overturn his declaration, including by his own party, suggests he miscalculated.

Some notes, to help folks stay better informed:

• Ukraine has been firing ATACMS into "Russia" (occupied and annexed Crimea) for a good year already, without World War 3 breaking out

• Ukraine has its own missiles too (mostly cruise, not ballistic, but they had at least a few dozen Soviet-made "Tochka" SRBMs) and they've been firing those at high value targets in Russia from day one of getting invaded, it's simply that their supplies of Tochka have almost entirely run out, and their home-grown missile industry is a big fat target for Russian attacks (despite which Ukraine produces missiles, but currently not ballistic missiles of a practically usable sort)

• ATACMS is effective and practical, with a cluster warhead it has shown ability of taking out Russian air defense batteries (S-400 and such), which are difficult targets to attack

• this time too, air defense failed to stop them and they caused secondary detonations at a large ammunition storage site

• since Russia is still attempting to conquer Ukraine, now with added North Korean soldiers sent by their dictator, there continues to be plentiful ground for other countries to supply Ukraine with more advanced stuff to fire at the invaders, lest they invade more of Ukraine or start invading elsewhere

• foreign ballistic missiles that Russia has fired into Ukraine include North Korean and Iranian missiles, so foreign-made BMs flying about is ordinary stuff in this war

Quick analysis: the US flushed itself down the toilet.

• Likely fact: Republicans now control all 4 towers of the castle (president, senate, house of representatives and surpreme court).

• Conclusion: the situation allows Republicans to steamroll legislation into force.

• Further conclusion: US voters really don't understand what they are doing.

Climate: it's bad, but one president's rule is short. Trump will withdraw from the Paris treaty and sabotage domestic attempts to curb emissions. Europe and China will continue their attempts because they haven't changed, and they want energy independence. Climate is a system with great inertia. We are beaten by the mistakes of previous decades, new generations will be beaten by our mistakes. Increasingly hard.

Ukraine: the situation is very bad. The Biden administration won approval for 60 billion of support in spring, but according to Zelensky, only 10% has been delivered so far. Unless the DoD hurries the hell out of itself, Trump will close the tap on aid that Biden secured. Trump will try diplomacy, but Putin's administration is made of a different sort of people. They are running for life while Trumpists are running for lunch. Putin will politely send him where sun doesn't shine and continue grinding meat, now with an added flavour of North Korean. Ukraine faces a very difficult choice: fight a retreating war in conditions of decreasing aid, hoping that revolutionary conditions arise in Russia... or make peace with the attacker, giving them territory. Ukraine will need all the assistance it can get from anywhere. Knowing this, and knowing the risk of a Trump re-election, I started developing a drone system 6 months ago. It has gone through many iterations and might be capable of combat in the coming month. I didn't sign up to live in a world like this, but hey, you take what you're given. :(

If the war in Ukraine gives Putin territory and peace as a result, Putin and his heirs know that you can get territory and peace with war: any place in Eastern Europe could be next.

In summer, Congress locked away the keys for leaving NATO, but Republicans now control both houses and Trump has cleansed the party of dissenters. Trump can credibly threaten to withdraw from NATO or actually do it.

Taiwan needs to find more alliances, because the US might become unreliable, and China knows this. The rest of the world needs to think if they can do without electronics during a Chinese attempt to conquer Taiwan.

Democracy in the US: will be dismantled in favour of something like Hungary. We will see ministers who are oligarchs like Musk or irresponsible liars like Kennedy. Since the storm is near-perfect, I predict that democracy will give way to oligarchy. Risk of disturbances, repressions and internal conflict will grow.

Until now, only unstable people wanted to assassinate Trump. Given these conditions, I predict that stable but ruthless people who see a danger to their future will join the game. They will reason as follows: "risk has reached certainty and there is still time to prevent outcomes". If I was working in the Secret Service, I would increase protection on Trump 10 times (unless I hated him).

A note about Taiwan. Allegedly, Putin asked Musk for a favour for Xi - to refuse Starlink for Taiwan.

Coincidentally, negotiations between Taiwan and Starlink broke down. The Guardian reported about it on October 15:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/15/taiwan-to-have-satellite-internet-service-as-protection-in-case-of-chinese-attack

"Starlink is not available in Taiwan after negotiations reportedly fell apart over Taiwan’s requirement that a local entity have a majority share of any joint venture established."

A person experienced in investigating such matters would take a look at the ownership structure of other Starlink local representatives, and see if Taiwan had unusually harsh demands or Musk was unusually stiff while negotiating with them. If Taiwan had harsh demands, it is plausible that no favour was done. If Musk was unusually stiff, then it's plausible that the favour was done as requested.