Good morning, everybody!
Confession time: I grew up with more than a slight antipathy towards Campbell’s Chicken Noodle SoupTM. One of my two older sisters would open and heat up a can of the condensed soup, and I’d inevitably wind up with a bowl of broth, some little bits of chicken, and a few noodles. The vast majority of the noodles wound up in someone else’s bowl.
Flash forward a few years. I’ve turned into a reasonably competent cook. Not cordon bleu grade, mind you; more in the line of what I call “diner food.” Simple, substantial, and plenty of leftovers! Among my favorites in the repertoire is soup-making, and when I make soup, I don’t fool around. Soup-making should be a serious business. Soup-making can turn into a major production, and the results are usually worth the effort.
One of my sisters came over for lunch one day a few years back, and there was a stock-pot of homemade chicken noodle soup waiting. After lifting the lid, she only commented “ you use a lot of noodles in your soup,” to which I replied, “In this house, everyone gets noodles.”
I’ll let you decide what the moral of the story is.
Now, some news!
Butt-hurt, part one: poor Doug Collins
From the Washington Post:
“Shortly before the hearing began, the committee’s ranking Republican, Rep. Douglas A. Collins (Ga.), was officially passed over for a Senate appointment by Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp (R), who instead picked business executive Kelly Loeffler. Trump had wanted Collins, a fierce defender of the president, to get the seat.
And shortly thereafter, Collins was upbraided by one of the witnesses.
Stanford law professor Pamela S. Karlan noted she had worked with some of the Republicans on the committee, and then addressed Collins directly. She took exception to Collins suggesting the hearings weren’t about the underlying facts and were instead about a political vendetta.
“And here, Mr. Collins, I would like to say to you, sir, that I read transcripts of every one of the witnesses who appeared in the live hearing, because I would not speak about these things without reviewing the facts,” Karlan said. “So I’m insulted by the suggestion that as a law professor, I don’t care about those facts."
Butt-hurt, part two: our thin-skinned President.
From the Guardian:
“A furious Donald Trump cut short his attendance at the Nato summit in London after a group of leaders, including Boris Johnson, was caught on video ridiculing the US president at Buckingham Palace for staging lengthy press conferences.
The notoriously thin-skinned Trump cancelled a planned press conference and branded the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, “two-faced” after he was revealed on video leading the laughter at Trump’s expense together with other US allies.
Trump said the Canadian leader was probably angry because he called him out over Canada’s failure to meet the Nato target of spending 2% of its GDP on defence, a target that has developed a shibboleth status in the president’s eyes and underlines his transactional approach to the western defence alliance.”
And there’s this:
According to Reuters:
“By the time the summit wound up on Wednesday, Trump had decided not to hold a final press conference, saying he had already said enough, including commenting on Britain’s upcoming election on Tuesday, despite saying he didn’t want to.”
Butt-hurt, part three: my very own loony Congressman
From the Hill:
“Rep. Devin Nunes (Calif.), the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, defended his conversations with President Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani that were revealed in the House Intelligence Committee’s report released Tuesday.
The House Intelligence report included phone records indicating that Nunes and a member of his staff were in contact with Giuliani and his associate Lev Parnas in April and May amid efforts by Trump's personal attorney to get Ukraine to launch politically motivated investigations into former Vice President Joe Biden and Biden's son Hunter, as well as into the 2016 presidential election.
Democratic lawmakers on the committee, including Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), said they found the contacts uncovered in the report Tuesday “deeply concerning” and that the California Republican could have been “complicit” in Giuliani’s attempts to dig up dirt on one of President Trump’s political rivals.”
That do-nothing House of Representatives! They keep doing stuff!
Aside from the impeachment inquiries, the House is busy handling other matters as well:
The House on Tuesday overwhelmingly voted to approve a resolution disapproving of Russia's participation in future G7 summits.
The chamber voted 339-71 to pass the resolution introduced by Rep. Albio Sires, D-N.J., in August. He brought forward the measure after President Donald Trump called for Russia's return to the organization.
and there’s this!
The House approved legislation Tuesday calling on the Trump administration to sanction Chinese officials over human rights violations involving the nation’s predominantly Muslim Uighur ethnic group.
The House version of the bill, which passed in a 407-1 vote on Tuesday evening, amends an earlier Senate bill to place restrictions on the export of devices that could be used for surveillance of the minority group or to restrict their communications.
European Court of Justice upholds semi-auto rifle ban
From Deutsche Welle:
“The European Court of Justice (ECJ) on Tuesday dismissed the Czech Republic's legal challenge against the ban on semi-automatic rifles for private use introduced after terrorist attacks in 2015.
The Court ruled that the measures taken by the European Parliament and the Council "in the contested directive do not entail breaches of the principles of conferral of powers, proportionality, legal certainty, protection of legitimate expectations or non-discrimination as alleged by the Czech Republic in support of its action."
The EU measures against the use of semi-automatic rifles for private use are intended to curb gun violence and prevent terrorists from acquiring weapons on the black market.
Support for the new rules gained traction following several terror atrocities on European soil, including attacks in Paris, Nice and Brussels over the past several years.
White House Christmas Decorations!
Today in History!
1484: Pope Innocent VIII issues the Summis desiderantes affectibus, a papal bull that deputizes Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger as inquisitors to root out alleged witchcraft in Germany.
1492: Christopher Columbus becomes the first European to set foot on the island of Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic).
1766: In London, auctioneer James Christie holds his first sale.
1791: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Austrian composer and musician dies in Vienna (b. 1756).
1831: Former U.S. President John Quincy Adams takes his seat in the House of Representatives. He will continue to serve in the House until his death on February 23, 1848.
1848: California Gold Rush: In a message to the United States Congress, U.S. President James K. Polk confirms that large amounts of gold had been discovered in California. In less than two years, California will be admitted to the Union as the 31st state.
1901: Walt Disney born.
1933: The Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution is ratified, ending Prohibition.
1945: World War II: Flight 19, a group of TBF Avengers, disappears in the Bermuda Triangle, in one of the most famous aviation mysteries in history.
1952: The Great Smog: A cold fog descends upon London, combining with air pollution and killing at least 12,000 in the weeks and months that follow. Leads to reforms, including the Clean Air Act of 1956.
1955: The American Federation of Labor and the Congress of Industrial Organizations merge and form the AFL–CIO.
1955: E. D. Nixon and Rosa Parks lead the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
2013: Nelson Mandela, South African lawyer and politician, 1st President of South Africa, Nobel Prize laureate dies (b. 1918).
2017: The International Olympic Committee bans Russia from competing at the 2018 Winter Olympics for doping at the 2014 Winter Olympics.
Sources: On This Day, Wikipedia, Time and Date
And in honor of Dave Brubeck, who died today in 2012:
Interesting Things!
Tigers find safe haven in Spain
From AFP:
“Five of nine tigers that narrowly survived a gruelling journey across Europe will be moved to a new home at an animal refuge in Spain after spending weeks recovering at zoos in Poland.
The tigers will leave on Sunday for the "Primadomus" Wildlife Refuge in the south-eastern Spanish town of Villena, Malgorzata Chodyla, spokeswoman for the zoo in Poznan, western Poland, said on Thursday.
Polish border authorities found ten emaciated and dehydrated big cats in the back of a truck taking them from Italy to a zoo in Russia's Dagestan Republic.
Polish prosecutors charged two Italian truck drivers and a Russian man believed to have organised the journey with animal abuse after the truck that set off from Italy on October 22 carrying the ten tigers got stuck for days on Poland's border with Belarus.
Electric eel powers Christmas decorations in Tennessee aquarium!
From the Associated Press:
“CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. (AP) — Visitors to the Tennessee Aquarium may be shocked to learn that an electric eel named Miguel Wattson is lighting up a Christmas tree.
A special system connected to Miguel’s tank enables his shocks to power strands of lights on a nearby tree, according to a news release.
Miguel releases low-voltage blips of electricity when he is trying to find food, aquarist Kimberly Hurt said. That translates to a rapid, dim blinking of the Christmas lights. When he is eating or excited he emits higher voltage shocks which cause bigger flashes.
From the Department of Very Large Things!
From UPI:
“Dec. 4 (UPI) -- A British school said it expects to hear soon whether its attempt to break a Guinness World Record for the world's largest marshmallow succeeded.
Berkhamsted School said the marshmallow in the shape of cartoon character Pudsey Bear's head measures more than 3 feet on each side.
The school auctioned the large confection, which was purchased for $720 by MasterChef winner Irini Tzortzoglou. She cut up the Pudsy head and sold the pieces to raise additional money for The Jigsaw Children's Hospice in Carlisle, England.
Viking ship found in Norwegian field!
From Ars Technica:
“Ground-penetrating radar recently revealed a Viking Age ship hidden beneath the topsoil of a farm near the former town of Edøy in western Norway. The ship would have held the body of an ancient Norse leader along with weapons, loot, and other items. Nearby, the remains of postholes mark the ghostly outlines of two longhouses. The find could offer a wealth of information about ancient shipbuilding and Norse burial rites.
Farmers' plows destroyed the burial mound centuries ago, and soil eventually filled in the surrounding ditch. But that looser soil holds more moisture than the adjacent ground and reflects radar differently. In radar images, the result is an accidentally perfect logo for Viking Age archaeology: the hull of a ship in a circle. The largest Norse ship burial ever found—the Gjellestad ship—stood out in a 2018 radar survey with the same distinctive outline.
Both ends of the ship seem to have suffered damage, probably from a thousand years' worth of plowing. But most of the hull seems intact. The radar images are detailed enough for archaeologists to recognize the keel (a long wooden timber that forms the backbone of a ship) and the first two planks on either side. Based on the length of the keel, the ship was probably between 16 and 17 meters (52 to 55 feet) long.
Hot Links!
From El Pais: Spanish police arrest captain of the ‘narco-submarine’
From the Atlantic: Trump’s Biggest Impeachment Mistake
From Lawfare: Imagining a Senate Trial: Reading the Senate Rules of Impeachment Litigation
From the Nation: What if Democrats Have Already Won Back Enough White Working-Class Voters to Win in 2020?
Charles Pierce in Esquire: Trump's High Crime Was to Assault Every American's Right to Free and Fair Elections
From Vanity Fair: TRUMP’S TOADIES SHOULD TAKE NOTE: WATERGATE SAYS EVERYONE GOES DOWN
And a recipe for Chicken Noodle Soup. Just in case.
And your Thursday goat video!
“Well, there it is!”
Here endeth my 12th Good News Roundup: sent out into the wilderness of the Internet and subject to your tender mercies.
Thank you all, Gnusies, for reading this morning!
Please add your very own content, comments, and of course, criticism. Alliteration appreciated!
And a hearty “welcome back!” to our own Oldhippiedude: his next Roundup will appear on the 3rd Thursday of this month (December 19th).
Now I get to go back to resting on my oars for a while, goofing off, and throwing in an extendo or two as time permits!
There will be goats.
Have a great day!