"Julius Caesar: The Making of a Dictator" Ignores the Rot in the Roman Republic, and Its Analogy to Contemporary Politics Is Flawed

Andonis Anthony as the Roman emperor Photograph: Laurence Cendrowicz/Laurence Cendrowicz/BBC Studios Julius Caesar: The Making of a Dictator is a the 3-episode series available on United States Public Broadcasting. The docudrama’s contemporary commentators portray Julius Caesar as an ambitious aspiring ruler who masks himself with populism to attract supporters. It portrays Cato as a principled…

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Use Your Email Filter to Make Sure Important Emails Aren't Labeled Spam

I use Google’s email service Gmail on the web. If you can’t figure out how to do a similar procedure with your email service/client combination, contact me. There are many reasons why legitimate email messages are marked as Spam (in some services, “Bulk”). At the same time, you probably don’t want to reduce the senisitivity of your Spam filters because there are many more illegitimate emails you…

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Is Facebook not Showing Political Posts in Your Feed? Try adjusting some settings.

I noticed that my Facebook feed was filled with content from sources I don’t follow, and posts from sources I do follow didn’t show up. So I changed some settings, and now I like my feed better. These screenshots and instructions are based on using Facebook using a PC browser. From Home Screen of Facebook, click on the downward pointing arrow in the lower right hand of the circle with your…

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Neil deGrasse Tyson on Science Literacy

All the adults are saying, ‘We need to improve science in the world. Let’s train the kids.’ I’ve never heard an adult say, ‘We need more science in the world. Train me.’ Neil deGrasse Tyson, on America’s lack of science literacy

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Review: "Kiss the Ground: How the Food You Eat Can Reverse Climate Change, Heal Your Body & Ultimately Save Our World" by Josh Tickell 

Carbon capture is advanced as a technology for humans to avoid the worst impacts of anthropocentric climate change. Author Josh Tickell claims that regenerative agriculture is the best way to capture carbon and methane, and, moreover, it is absolutely necessary to prevent desertification and pollution and maintain the food production necessary to feed all of the humans on the planet. I first…

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Make Sure Your Twitter Searches Include Sensitive Content

Mohammad Fadel, whose Twitter (X) account is @shanfaraa, asked if his account was shadow-banned or restricted. I happened to be at a computer where another person has a Twitter account. Using a Chrome browser on a Windows 10 machine, I used the Twitter search bar to search for “shanfaraa”. I printed out as PDF files the “Top,” “Live” and “People” tabs from the results. The URLs for each of these…

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CIA Torture Jet crashed with 4 Tons of COCAINE

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Be Like Bill Furlong, Not Ivan Ilych

Most of us in life are like Leo Tolstoy’s Ivan Ilych. Even when [Ivan Ilych] was at the School of Law he was just what he remained for the rest of his life: a capable, cheerful, good-natured, and sociable man, though strict in the fulfillment of what he considered to be his duty: and he considered his duty to be what was so considered by those in authority. Neither as a boy nor as a man was he a…

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Coverage of Escaped Prisoner is More Proof that Mainstream "Liberal" Media is All About Entertainment & Propaganda

A family member regularly watches CNN, so I hear snippets. For weeks now, a frequent news item has been Danelo Cavalcante’s escape from a jail in Pennsylvania and the attempts by law enforcement to apprehend him. Screenshot of results from search of CNN.com, 2023-Sep-13 Aside from the danger the prisoner poses to his targets, what is the purpose of a national news outlet covering this story?…

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Could a frog die from heat crossing a driveway?

Warning: this post includes pictures of a dead animal. On July 21, 2023, at 4 pm in Columbia County, Georgia, I noticed a dead frog on a driveway. The frog didn’t have any indicators of trauma (squished by a car, for example.) The weather wasn’t particularly hot. Continue reading Untitled

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If you don't like the film "Cocaine Bear," we probably wouldn't have been friends in the 1980s

I subscribed to Peacock TV so that I could add its French Open 2023 coverage to my Tennis Channel Plus coverage. Fortuitiously, it included Cocaine Bear (2023), and it combined the best elements of 1980s coming-of-age, slasher, stoner and drug crime movies. Continue reading Untitled

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James Loewen's "Lies Across America" Should Inspire Local Public History Projects

I’ve been listening to James Loewen‘s Lies Across America: What Our Historic Sites Get Wrong using my public library’s subscription to Hoopla Digital. Listening to it, I wonder how Professor Loewen, who passed in 2021, ever slept at night knowing the scale of injustice society perpetuated and the mountain of indifference society placed in the path of restoration of rights and acknowledgement of…

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Mr. Friedman, please email Larry Page and ask him to add roughly six and a half decades to this algorithm.

friedmanforher: Mr. Friedman, Google Maps tells me it should only take 21 minutes to get from where I live to where I was born, but it didn’t ask if I was Palestinian before calculating the travel time.  Can you please email Larry Page and ask him to add roughly six and a half decades to this algorithm?  Thanks for everything you’ve done for us. – Dalal, Dheisheh

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Obama has the same function as an agent provocatuer, but he does it by co-opting radical demands. Agent somnatuer?

Charles Ferguson. Barack Obama: The oligarchs’ president. Salon.com, October 27, 2010 There are a lot of shitlib Democratic Party politicians and pundits in the United States. None, however, has the unique talents of #44Regime figurehead Barack Obama. For example, listen to #46Regime 2nd-in-command Kamala Harris and realize the unique oratory skills Obama posesses. We have many examples of…

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The only reason to ban "It Feels Good to Be Yourself" by Theresa Thorn is that Noah Grigni, the illustrator, made the children look too happy

Through a Georgia Open Records Request, I received the minutes from the Greater Clarks Hill Regional Library‘s (GCHRL) and the Columbia County Library‘s Boards of Directors meetings. The Columbia County Library is the largest branch within GCHRL, and it is the closest branch to my home. At the December 13, 2022 meeting, the Board of Directors of the Columbia County Library voted to remove It…

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Kim Stanley Robinson's Vast World of Speculative Fiction Can't Envision a Point in the Next 30 Years When Arabs Deserve Respect

I’m a Kim Stanley Robinson fan. I’ve read the Mars Trilogy, which I believe is one of the best science fiction series ever. I’ve read the Science in the Capitol series, which was good. I LOVED Years of Rice and Salt, although I might have some criticisms of it if I reread it now. Shaman was rollicking good fun! So, The Ministry for the Future was on my to-read list since its publication. When…

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Supplement Marketing Deceptions: Benefiber Health Shape

A gastroenterologist recommended for a family member Benefiber to regulate bowel movements. Benefiber is a product of Haleon. I purchased Benefiber Healthy Shape from my regular Kroger. On one hand, the powdered supplment dissolved without taste in water and grape juice, which was an advntage over the Metamucil supplement we had tried before. In expectation of our relative’s continued use of the…

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