Afternoon Tea 3.20.24 - Obstetrics Winter
Hospital Plunder, Boiling Stars, and a Greek Pygmy Hippo
The world warms, the people remember their lives 4 years ago, a new star will be visible this month, and the Era of the Short Grift continues. Get to the end for a new baby pygmy hippo, just born in Athens, Greece! Our paid subscribers get complextro that bomps, poetry that Marches, and a quotable quote.
Many hospitals in China stop newborn delivery services as birth rate drops (Reuters) An “Obstetrics Winter” is one of the most depressing phrases I’ve heard in a long time.
The plundering of America's hospitals (Business Insider) America’s hospital system continues to be degraded by profit seeking, private equity, and the other usual suspects that have hollowed out essentially every institution that citizens would care about. I can't wait for fee-for-service fire departments.
Bomb threats in Maine legislature follow bills on transgender care (USA Today) That thing I said would keep happening? It’s still happening. USA Today doing some shockingly comprehensive work on extremism, swatting, and fake bomb threats. They also documented LibsOfTikTok being stochastic terrorists back in November, so I tip my hipster-news hat to that paper they leave outside your Holiday Inn Express.
A Wisconsin ruling on Catholic Charities raises the bar for religious tax exemptions (AP) I could feast on news like this every day for a year and not get tired of it. If you’re lobbying the state, you’re a political organization. If you’re a political organization, you don’t get to claim exemptions that religious organizations get. Expect this to get overturned on appeal to the Supreme Court, but a win is a win, even if it’s temporary.
Musk's SpaceX is building spy satellite network for US intelligence agency (Reuters) Given SpaceX shut down internet access for the Ukrainian military during a major military engagement, I have to wonder if the CCP will be able to ask Musk to turn off spy satellites. Why wouldn’t he, given who he’s trying to impress these days…
There Are Dark Corners of the Internet. Then There's 764 (Wired) A child victimization & exploitation network spanning 50 chat groups on Discord, 3+ million messages on Discord & Telegram, with activity on every social media network you can think of, including SoundCloud and Roblox. Deeply disturbing and anyone involved should be removed from the internet forever.
The Parents in My Classroom (Slate) Parents demanding texts every Period from their kids. Facetiming DURING class, and a handful of other stories that…terrify me.
YouTube Introduces Mandatory Disclosure For AI-Generated Content (Search Engine Journal And Google just announced you can’t use the likeness of a famous person to “entice” someone to spend money in an ad or use the likeness in a slogan, logo, or brand name. Yes, up until…March 2024, this was something you could do in Google Ads.
A new spin on Betelgeuse’s boiling surface (Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics) The star is hard to visualize, because the surface is boiling. To the point where the boiling bubbles are larger than the radius of our planet’s orbit around our sun. Seriously:
And finally, your new baby pygmy hippo!
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Factual Dispatch to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.