good morning, it's 26 march 2017

The day after.

I've talked about the six month, the two year, and the four year wars. This may be the beginning of the end of the six-month war. It is, at very least, the end of the beginning: elected Republicans are no longer universally afraid of the Trumpists, and are no longer lining up behind him and his movement. The neofascist movement is still very much alive and very, very dangerous, as a whole, and this is one of the longer wars, but this goal - of capturing the entire government functionally unhindered out of the electoral box - has been smashed.

Not that they won't keep trying, of course. The six-month war is not over. But the skies - for the moment - are clear over London.

So let's look at what happened. "Pence: Trump 'won't rest' until ObamaCare repealed" - as I said, they won't stop trying. But "Inside the Trumpcare meltdown," we learn that "Steve Bannon Thought He Could Bully Republicans On Health Care. He Couldn't." The steamroller has broken down. It's a Democrat saying it, but "Dem rep: 'We must pause the entire Trump agenda' until Russia investigation complete" - that's not going to happen, because there's far too much consolidation of power going on inside the executive branch that he's managing simply by not appointing people. (See: the two year war.) But it can be talked about.

As fallout, "Trump asked his supporters to watch Fox News host. She then called on Paul Ryan to step down." There's barely any attempt to keep up a united facade now. This will further hurt the legislative agenda, but will not hurt the continuing personalisation of rule and the executive branch. If anything, it will help it. But, again - the two year war.

The investigations continue - and perhaps, if the Republican civil war ramps up, they will become useful leverage for the establishment GOP, and something might happen. "AP Exclusive: US probe of ex-Trump aide extends to Cyprus" is following the Russian money. "Boris Epshteyn, Trump TV Surrogate, Is Leaving White House Job" - his style was very much of Putin's Russia, and now he's being levered out. The CBC report that "A former NSA analyst says the Russia investigations could end Donald Trump's presidency," and there are rumours from a "CNN analyst: Sources say Mike Flynn may have turned on Trump and become a witness for the FBI."

What they were building for, of course, is their ult attack - a broad racial-religious war against Arabic Muslims. That's still the biggest card they have in their hand. And they haven't forgot it, not for a minute. "Civilian deaths from US-led airstrikes hit record high under Donald Trump" shouldn't be ignored. "U.S. Investigating Mosul Strikes Said to Have Killed Up to 200 Civilians" - the US is claiming procedures haven't changed, but the rise in civilian death toll is staggering, and other local sources say US procedures have changed. Finally, a US senator says, "Trump Is Dragging Us Into Another War... And No One Is Talking About It."

We most certainly are.

Possibly tangential, possibly related: "Five months, eight prominent Russians dead." Clean-up, consolidation, or coincidence?

Before this administration, this would've been the biggest headline: "Senate to vote on Neil Gorsuch nomination to Supreme Court in first week of April in a political clash with big ramifications." We need to force a loss here, or a rules change, because I'm confident that the Republicans will change the filibuster rules as soon as a judicial filibuster is used against them; they're a paper tiger at best, now, and more likely, an excuse to inaction. Or so it seems to me. Obviously, I'm not on the ground.

Before this administration, this would've been in "news of the weird" territory only, but we are where we are: "Alex Jones Admits He Blew It With Pizzagate Allegations, Sort Of." I don't think that'll bother the conspiracy goons.

Finally, a couple of cultural warfare stories of import: "Transgender passengers uneasy about TSA shift on pat-downs." and "Utah's governor signs abortion-halting legislation." The headline on the latter is misleading; the bill requires doctors to tell women taking RU-486 and similar drugs that if they only take one pill the abortion can still be halted. There is no medical evidence for this of which I'm aware, and I can't see it being a good idea. But, well, those are facts, and considering facts to be the problem...

...well, that is, in and of itself, part of the problem.

Good luck out there.

( It's March 26, 2017; this is the news )

a bit of errata for the rk-47 build report

A bit of errata on the micparts rk-47/990B kit microphone build report yesterday:

First, I didn’t mention that the board kit includes extra capacitors, to be used either for different capsules than I chose, or to tailor the response curve of the microphone. I went for flattest response, but I could’ve had more or less high-end responsiveness by choosing which included tone capacitors to use.

Second, I said that the “omni” switch setting probably wasn’t really going to be actually “omni,” but was more likely to be figure-eight or the like. This was in response to both the capsule design, grille design, and older pictures of the circuit board which appeared to indicate that. In testing, I discovered that I was mistaken – as you can see here, levels as seen in waveforms made by holding a tone generator at the four cardinal directions remain constant. But read on, after the graphs, because there’s a catch:

rk-47 set to omni, against tone generator at 30cm, front, right, rear, left positions

And here’s the same test, with the mic set to cardioid:

rk-47 set to cardioid, against tone generator at 30cm, front, right, rear, left positions

And here’s an M-Audio Nova, same conditions, for comparison:

nova, cardioid, against tone generator at 30cm, front, right, rear, left positions

The total pickup is certainly omnidirectional. But this is not a true basket head on this thing, there are support brackets on the left and right sides, and that does affect tone! High-end harmonics definitely fall off on the left and right sides.

So while it does qualify as an omnidirectional microphone in “omni” mode, I’d have to call it flawed in that mode, and use something else – like an Oktava 012 with the omnidirectional head, which is built for true omnidirectional pickup and does not exhibit this behaviour.

Alternately, I suppose it might be usable in that mode if you’re recording someone who is a tad screechy – aim the wrong side at the performer and presto, fewer high harmonics. EVERYBODY WINS XD

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good morning, it's 27 march 2017

The NYC attack on a randomly-chosen black man by a white supremacist was explicitly intended to achieve a political purpose through fear and intimidation. See "White supremacist who killed black man only regrets his victim wasn’t younger and ‘more successful" and also, "Timothy Caughman’s Murder Was a Lynching and Donald Trump has said nothing," both of which are excessively important. 8pol seems not to be bothering to talk about it, 4pol isn't talking much but what discussion there is blames it on false flag/MK-ULTRA.

Meanwhile in Russia proper, "Protesters Gather in 99 Cities Across Russia; Top Putin Critic Is Arrested." Brave people. Of course, "The Trump Administration Is Silent After Russia Arrests Hundreds Of Protesters." He's too busy making an ass of himself printing fake invoices and handing them to Andrea Merkel expecting payment, I guess? That didn't work with Mexico, why the fuck would it work with Germany? ("Germany slams ‘intimidating’ £300bn White House bill.")

Remember how Trump promised brutality and savagery in the middle east? He may be delivering on that, as "Trump’s War on Terror Has Quickly Become as Barbaric and Savage as He Promised." This is, of course, how to ramp up the war. "The west condemned Russia’s bombs – now coalition attacks are killing civilians in Mosul" is another story on the topic.

"Pussy Riot's advice on how to defy Putin and Trump" is pretty straightforward, but I include it as part of the shared struggle. They have no illusions about what's going on. In related organisational/structural news, "A Harvard study identified the precise reason protests are an effective way to cause political change" - which is to say, people who attend protests are afterwards more likely to do things and get others to do things as well. The multiplier is nontrivial.

Post-healthcare-reform continues: "Blaming conservatives, Trump signals new openness to Dems" (presumably a lie), "Donald Trump is giving a lot of mixed messages about whom to blame on health care" (true), "Trump Becomes Ensnared in Fiery G.O.P. Civil War" (point and laugh, children), and "Reince Priebus lies after GOP debacle: ‘Obamacare is imploding and exploding and every other adjective’," indicating that Priebus doesn't know that "imploding" and "exploding" are verbs.

I suspect "Trump taps Kushner to lead a SWAT team to fix government with business ideas" is going to be a bit of a do-nothing position, not because they might not want to do some of these things, but because they still don't have a staff worth mentioning. Still, be aware. Kushner has no qualifications on this other than being Trump's son-in-law, and is overbooked already, so... yeah.

Only one immigration/expulsion/travel ban story at the moment: "‘Dreamer’ immigrant in Oregon detained by US authorities."

"An Oklahoma School Had a Christian Sex Educator Speak to Kids, and (Surprise!) It Was a Disaster."

And finally, locally, "McCleary roundup: Senate GOP’s budget plan draws swift opposition from Democrats, teachers union" - nothing to do with fascism, really, but a lot of Washington State people are subscribers, so there's your education funding update. It's hard to keep up with 'normal' things right now, but you need to. It's just life.

( It's March 27, 2017; this is the news )