Year: 2021
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Fairness
NBC Nightly News anchor Lester Holt gave a talk upon accepting the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication. In his televised speech, he spoke not only of his career in broadcast journalism but also gave his perspective on recent events and the importance of distinguishing between balanced and truthful coverage.…
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Manhattan Life
We are loving our city life. Izumi went off to meet with some friends at a beer garden (it’s nice out today, not too hot, not too cold) so Julia and I popped into the Guggenheim where a young man played cello in the enormous belly of the building. The lonely cello We wanted to…
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The week that was
The FBI is still hauling in those that were part of the January 6th invasion of the capitol. Suspects identified from social media posts are brought in for questioning to dispel any doubt. That was not necessary for the guy who answered the door wearing his, “I Was There, Washington D.C., January 6, 2021” t-shirt.…
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Listen
A friend of mine (hi Gregg) shared with me this remarkable interview with someone who can hear music through his finger tips. The Oscar-nominated film The Sound of Metal (the best of the year frankly) has several scenes in which the director really tried to convey what it is like to be going deaf. Both…
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The week that was
Lots of shipping stories this week including stories about the ever stuck Ever Given. The World Shipping Council reports that at least 2,980 containers fell off cargo ships in the Pacific since November including one hapless crew that lost 1,800 in one storm. In Toronto, one wandering beaver brought the rush hour subways to a…
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The week that was
After reviewing whaling logs from the 19th century, a study suggests that sperm whales taught each other how to avoid sail-powered whaling ships by swimming upwind To celebrate the arrival of a Van Gogh at their museum, the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art shared the story of how a grasshopper carcass came to be embedded in…
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The week that was
In yet another sign that we’re in a crypto-currency bubble, a jpg file (also known as a non-fungible token) by the artist Beeple was sold to a crypto-investor for $69 million in a crypto-currency called Ether. Susan Rice, the incoming director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, moved into her office in the West…
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The week that was
TEPCO, operators of the flawed Fukushima nuclear power plant, announced that they finished removing all fuel rods from a second reactor. They hope to clean up the remaining two by 20231. Sakae Kato stayed behind in the Fukushima contaminated quarantine zone and spends $7,000 a month feeding the abandoned cats and wild boar. The publisher…
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The week that was
Scientists cloned a black-footed ferret from the frozen cells of another black-footed ferret that died 30 years ago when the species was declared extinct. The NYPD deployed a Boston Robotics “dog” into a tense hostage situation. “We can send it into complete darkness and get an idea of what’s going on inside” said a member…