Death by gun

The 2020 Census is in trouble

The Predeccesor

Looking for action

Zafar, the dolphin pictured above, is the one looking for action. A seaside village in Brittany has banned swimming on its beach because Zafar is in heat and has been scaring tourists and locals by approaching them and trying to rub up against them.

He has even tried to prevent several swimmers from getting back to the beach at Landévennec, using its nose to push one woman out of the water and up into the air. The beast, often clearly in a state of sexual arousal, also often tries to rub up against kayaks and other small boats.

Trusting scientific studies

There are more studies published each day than I can count. But how correct are these studies. One group of scientists tried to find out by attempting to repeat 21 influential studies that had been published in Science and in Nature. They could only reproduce 13 of those papers — or 62%. The eight papers that did not fully replicate have been cited hundreds of times in scientific literature and many were widely covered by the media.

Virtual Scam

Student Loans are in tough shape

Ben Miller, the senior director for postsecondary education at the Center for American Progress, has a depressing article in today's Times. Of borrowers who started repaying in 2012, just over 10 percent had defaulted three years later. However, the feds officially track student loans for three years. At the end of that period the default rate continued climbing to 16 percent over the next two years, after official tracking ended, meaning more than 841,000 borrowers were in default. Nearly as many were severely delinquent or not repaying their loans (for reasons besides going back to school or being in the military). The share of students facing serious struggles rose to 30 percent over all.

Closing the gap

Do as I say, Not as I do

This old adage applies quite well to Wells Fargo, which was fined $185 million because its employees created millions of fake bank accounts for customers. From 2011 to mid-2016 Wells employees created more than 1.5 million unauthorized deposit accounts and issued more than 500,000 unauthorized credit card applications. These accounts racked up $2.6 million in fees for the bank.

This paragon of virtue just closed the campaign account of Nikki Fried, a candidate for agriculture commissioner in Florida who supports expanded access to medical marijuana, after inquiring about her donors.

Coal - fading production?

Is diet soda for you?

Making pollution worse

The EPA has issued new pollution rules governing coal-burning power plants. The details indicate that the new rules would increase carbon emissions and lead to up to 1,400 premature deaths annually.

The new rules make minor on-site efficiency improvements at individual plants and also let states relax pollution rules for power plants that need upgrades, keeping them active longer. Emissions would grow under the plan, as the plan says “implementing the proposed rule is expected to increase emissions of carbon dioxide and the level of emissions of certain pollutants in the atmosphere that adversely affect human health.”

The plan defining the rules predicts between 470 and 1,400 premature deaths annually by 2030 because of increased rates of microscopic airborne particulates known as PM 2.5, which are dangerous because of their link to heart and lung disease as well as their ability to trigger chronic problems like asthma and bronchitis. Plus, at least 21,000 new missed days of school annually by 2030 because those pollutants would increase in the atmosphere rather than decrease.

Want some?

Bees are valuable

Without bees there would be no almonds. And that's a lot of money. Almond growing in California alone is a $7.6 billion industry that wouldn’t be possible without the 30 billion bees (and hundreds of human beekeepers) who keep the trees pollinated.

But bees don't pollinate only almonds. Bees are central to an enormous agricultural industry — about one of every three mouthfuls of food we eat wouldn’t exist without bee pollination. However, bee keepers are worried. Since 2006, annual winter losses in colonies have averaged more than 28 percent, nearly double the historical winter mortality rate of 15 percent. The decline is based on 
parasites, pathogens, pesticides and poor nutrition.

Which one is the world's Flycasting Champion?

It's the 14-year-old girl on the right, Maxine McCormick of San Francisco. She's been doing it for only five years, but has been recognized as the champion for the past couple of years.This year she won again as the world champion. She scored 52 in the women’s division — 21 points clear of the second-place finisher. She also won the salmon distance category.

The cost of medical school

The average doctor comes out of medical school with at least $200,000 of debt. NYU is doing something about this. 

It will provide all new, future, and current students a full-tuition scholarship—financial need and merit aside, meaning wealthy students and low-income students alike will receive it. The scholarship doesn’t cover the rest of the costs associated with college—housing, food, child care—but it takes $55,018 a year out of the picture. This will cost $600,000,000; they already have raised $450,000,000.

There are at least two benefits of the program. It may help put a dent in the dearth of diversity in a field in which a little more than 8 percent of physicians are black and less than 7 percent are Latino.
There is expected to be a shortage of up to 120,000 doctors by 2030. Up to 49,000 of that shortfall will be in the realm of primary-care physicians.

Crows as janitors?

That's what a theme park in France is trying to do, at least with regards to cigarette butts and bits of trash. The park has trained six crows to pick up this type of trash and put it in a box. When the crow does so, he is rewarded with some food.

This is not the first time this has been tried.

It reached the level of a TED Talk in 2008. The gig was a crow vending machine that let birds trade coins for peanuts. The concept, though, did not fly. Then, last year “The Crowbar” was developed; it would teach crows to pick up half-smoked cigarettes. It was greeted with muted interest.

Ornithologists and bird experts are skeptical that wild birds can be trained to pick up after humans. Birds raised in captivity, though, have a better chance.

Calling 911

What's with New Zealand women?

The prime minister gave birth to a girl in June. She took six weeks of parental leave and returned to her leadership role with a baby in tow and nary a fuss.

This week the minister for women and associate minister for health and transport, rode her bicycle to the hospital and delivered her child. She and her partner, Peter Nunns, cycled to the hospital because there was not “enough room in the car for the support crew.”

Taking it easy

Who we deal with

Would Universal Basic Income make a real difference?

Joining Mensa at age 3?

Rowing across the Atlantic

That's what Bryce Carlson, an Ohio teacher, just completed. He set a new record - 38 days, 6 hours and 49 minutes,one-third faster than the previous record of 53 days 8 hours 26 minutes. And he did it even though the main desalinator which supplied drinking water stopped after the first day. The boat also capsized twelve times. Salt water salt slowly began to corrode his electronic connections, leaving his navigation system unreliable about halfway through his journey.

Are you one of those counted?

From Social Media Today

National Relaxation Day

Did you know that? Or, who establishes these days? Some company called Mental Floss has declared it. They have even given us "15 Scientific Ways to Relax for National Relaxation Day".

Here are their "ways"
1. GET A HOUSE OR OFFICE PLANT.
2. AVOID SCREENS BEFORE BEDTIME.
3. LISTEN TO CLASSICAL MUSIC.
4. DRINK GREEN TEA SWEETENED WITH HONEY.
5. GIVE YOURSELF A HAND MASSAGE.
6. LOCK LIPS WITH SOMEONE.
7. CHEW GUM.
8. BLOW UP A BALLOON.
9. MOW THE LAWN.
10. FIND SOMETHING TO MAKE YOU LAUGH.
11. MUNCH ON CHOCOLATE.
12. EAT A BANANA.
13. MAKE ANOTHER TRIP TO THE FRUIT STAND.
14. FOCUS ON RELAXING ALL OF YOUR MUSCLES.
15. TAKE A MINI MENTAL VACATION.

A super athlete at 84

Courtesy of our Florida correspondent

Dogs and wounds

Be a college application consultant

Your background need not be education. You can be a former CIA agent, a Hollywood screenwriter, a radiologist. There are more than 2,000 people doing the job. And making a decent dollar. Ms Bayliss runs the four-day Application Boot Camp at a Boston-area hotel. It's only $16,000.

Or, you can charge $5,000 or more if you are a summer expert who helps a teenager “find his passion” and “architect a plan” that includes brand-building volunteer, educational, or work opportunities. 

In the Boston area, the average consulting package — which includes a college list, essay and interview prep, and organizational tools and general advice — costs about $4,800. But it’s possible to spend $80,000 or more for star consultants.

The Mass. State Police has a few problems

The Boston Globe has been looking at the State Troopers and has found out a few things: 

Forty-six  troopers are involved in a pay scandal.

Two troopers routinely filed for more than 30 hours a week in overtime and paid details, but, according to the investigators, didn’t work the entire shifts, and sometimes no part of them at all. 

Leaders were repeatedly confronted not only with remarkable amounts of overtime hours but also suspicious sick time claims and sloppy record keeping across the agency.

Scores of troopers continued to routinely rake in more than $100,000 a year just in overtime and paid details.

Audits and disciplinary letters reviewed by the Globe show that at least 67 troopers were suspected of abusing sick leave since 2011, though they received little, if any, punishment beyond an infrequent written warning. One trooper regularly worked a paid detail, then clocked in for his regular shift, then filed for a partial sick day.

State Police audits show that payroll records in about 40 percent of the barracks contained inaccurate or unclear entries or were missing key information, such as when and where troopers worked.retired amid a scandal involving troopers who say they were ordered to falsify a police report to protect a judge’s daughter.

A trooper is charged with embezzlement; he altered traffic citations to make it look like he issued tickets during phony overtime shifts.

The pay of two troopers; one earned $187,340 last year, including about $72,000 in overtime and additional pay. The other earned roughly $181,661, including about $82,000 in overtime and other pay.

The agency’s former head of payroll pleaded guilty in June to stealing $23,900 from the department.

Inspectors found that one Troop F member coupled so many sick days with other time off that he worked just four Fridays during 2014.

A separate 2016 inspection of Troop F uncovered 11 senior officers who failed to clearly document what work they did during significant chunks of overtime.

School days 2018

From our Florida correspondent

Taxes, profits, wages

From Don Moynihan

Living in a mining town

Helping him walk

Minimizing risk in the Emergency Room

See a woman doctor.

At times it seems that there are more studies than people. While the authors usually believe strongly that their studies are error-free and reflect the real world, that is not always the case, as we are all human beings. Nonetheless, studies are interesting.

One new study I looked at recently does not have a definitive conclusion. It only suggests that female heart attack patients may be at a higher risk of mortality in the emergency room if they see a male physician rather than a female one. Women are significantly less likely to survive heart attacks. According to 2016 American Heart Association statement, 26 percent of women will die within a year of a heart attack compared with just 19 percent of men. The gap widens with time: By five years after a heart attack almost half of women die, compared with 36 percent of men.

The study I looked at was done in Florida. The researchers  reviewed every heart attack case from every ER in the state. They found that if a heart attack patient was a woman and her emergency physician a man, her risk of death rises by about 12 percent. This means approximately one out of every 66 women with heart attacks dies in the emergency room if she sees a male doctor rather than a female one.

Interestingly, the study found that everyone was more likely to survive if they saw a female physician, and a study published last year in JAMA Internal Medicine indicated all patients of female physicians had lower mortality and hospital readmission rates.

Checking Fingerprints

Get your facts straight

How big is your pi?

Courtesy of a Duncaster resident

She has Developmental Topographical Disorientation (DTD)

It's a rare neurological disorder that renders people unable to form cognitive maps—the brain’s way of orienting a person in the environment.

Something new to me

The military, including General Eisenhower, opposed the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagaski. That's what Joseph Gerson, president of the Campaign for Peace, Disarmament and Common Security, claims to be the consensus among US historians. He also tells us that "in the months prior to the US’s atomic bombings, the Japanese government attempted to surrender on terms the US ultimately accepted after the atomic bombings: unconditional surrender with the exception of the emperor remaining on his throne".

Refugee Road

One component of GDP

A new member of the family

Where would you rather live?

Collecting garbage in NYC

Sanitation Salvage is not the only company with poor performance. Century Waste is another. Century Waste trucks have failed 65 percent of the government inspections performed. Brakes, axles, steering mechanisms — they’ve all been found faulty. In February, yet another truck was ordered off the streets after inspectors found “wheel fasteners loose and/or missing.” Recently a wheel flew off a Century Waste truck and killed a motorist.

Trucks operated by New York City’s 50 biggest garbage companies are pulled off the road and declared unsafe to drive after 53 percent of government inspections, according to an analysis of data from the city and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration. Fourteen of those 50 companies hadn’t been inspected even once in the past two years. Nationally, commercial trucks are pulled off the road after 21 percent of inspections.

Make your own gun

If you have a 3D printer, one of the things you can 'print' is a plastic gun. That is, if the Trump administration is able to get a judge's negative ruling on the matter overturned.

I was surprised to learn that you can buy gun parts and designs for guns without any Federal regulations. No federal license is necessary to sell gun parts. And no background check is needed to purchase them.

She's betting on China

A conservative's view of Russia and the 2016 election

Why does anybody buy Tesla stock?