- The bill is popular.
- 76% of voters
- 60% of Republicans
- The $15/hour minimum wage item will be removed.
- It's possible that the cut-off household income level will be lowered.
- Perhaps the final sum will not quite be up to $1.9 trillion.
- Democrats control both houses of Congress and the White House. The legislation will become law by March 14.
From the New York Times this morning:
 Here are the best and worst moments from the Golden Globes remote awards ceremony, and all the winners. “Drivers License” by 18-year-old Olivia Rodrigo has been the top Billboard song for six weeks. Here’s how she made it. Kate McKinnon played Dr. Anthony Fauci on this week’s “Saturday Night Live.”  |
- AP Fact Check
- FactCheck.org
- SciCheck
- NPR Politics Fact Check
- The Washington Post's Fact Checker
- Fighting Fake News with Search Engine Optimization
- Snopes.com
- Once known as Urban Legends Reference Pages.
- Began in 1994 by David and Barbara Mikkelson. David Mikkelson still runs the site out of Tacoma, Washington, but Vinny Green serves as Chief Operating Officer.
- It has had internal relationship problems (bitter divorce, for one), but has continued this service reasonably effectively.
- Various organizations have reviewed Snopes and found it to be free from bias.
- While in 2016 Snopes said that the entirety of its revenue was derived from advertising, other sources have since been added, and it now has a working relationship with Facebook. Well, then again, not anymore.
- Submit a topic for investigation. However, they have more than they can handle.
- You can buy a t-shirt. Most of them cost $25.
- They have a Top 50 list of newsworthy checks.
- The last time I looked, #1 was : Did Biden Cancel Operating Talon (a Trump-era program aimed at deporting sexual offenders)? The answer was mixed, meaning the claim has significant elements of both truth and falsity to it such that it could not be fairly described by any other rating.
- #50 was: Did Biden Sign an Executive Order Allowing the U.S. to Fund Abortions Abroad? The conclusion was False.
Let me close with some humor, I think. Two years ago a friend visited me and had Aibo, Sony's robot dog. Cute fellah if you have $2899 to spare. Well, the question that followed was:
DID PANASONIC CREATE A FARTING CAT ROBOT?
- Mixture:
Panasonic is producing a limited number of companion robots called Nicobo. Among its attributes is that it does fart.- However, although it has a tail, it's a bit of a stretch to refer to it as a cat. See photo.
- Nicobo (if you clicked, you can view how she interacts with you) is purposefully designed for owners who don't have the time to take care of her.
It is not known if she will be sold, but Panasonic, of all the entities, went to crowdfunding and earned $95,000 to develop Nicobo for delivery by March of 2022 for $360. Extras include $10/month for smartphone pairing.
Elephant Robotics (from China), using Kickstarter, has MarsCat, a fully autonomous bionic cat that purrs, meows and strolls about the house. It interacts with you. Supposedly you can purchase one next month for a special price of $649, and comes in four colors. You can also purchase toys for her/he. The cat can actually charge its own batteries when running low.
I'll end with more animals, starting with what a baby dinosaur might have looked like, and another fake news item we regularly get in our e-mail.
Why is change needed? Many times, in order to survive we have to start a change process. We sometimes need to get rid of old memories, habits and other past traditions. Only freed from past burdens, can we take advantage of the present.
While it's a shame people make things up, that final bit of wisdom actually does make a lot of sense.
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