It’s possible that I shall make an ass of myself. But in that case one can always get out of it with a little dialectic. I have, of course, so worded my proposition as to be right either way (K.Marx, Letter to F.Engels on the Indian Mutiny)
Friday, November 27, 2020
In his wake, Trump leaves vulnerabilities of democracy exposed
Peter Grier Wed, November 25, 2020
President Donald Trump’s attempts to subvert an election he falsely claims to have won appear to be falling apart. The United States has likely avoided the sort of post-vote struggle for power that characterizes countries with less stable, shallowly rooted democracies.
But the extraordinary actions of the last three weeks could leave lasting marks on U.S. governance. Mr. Trump has identified many cracks and holes in America’s unwieldy, decentralized electoral system – and tested them to see what, if anything, might give.
The result has laid out a path for how others could push further in the future. The way the nation chooses its leader depends at many points on norms and traditions, as well as the goodwill of election workers and local and state officials. Recent weeks have highlighted how a candidate could conceivably manipulate or improperly influence events and key people – particularly if the candidate begins sowing doubts before the ballot, as Mr. Trump tried to do by attacking mail-in voting.
“Elections are the ways we resolve political differences peacefully, and he tried very hard to set up a false choice: one in which either he won or the system was broken,” says Myrna Pérez, director of the Brennan Center for Justice’s Voting Rights and Elections Program. “That really undermines the American system ... in which people choose their elected leaders – not the other way around.”
Trump’s four-pronged approach
Mr. Trump has refused to concede to President-elect Joe Biden and continues to insist that he has a path to reelection. On Wednesday he tweeted, “2020 is a long way from over!”
Many Republicans back the president’s resistance. A recent Economist/YouGov poll found that 84% of self-identified members of the GOP believe that Mr. Biden did not legitimately win the election.
But this week marked a turning point in the official transition of power, as the General Services Administration announced Monday that it would begin coordinating with the incoming Biden administration team. Mr. Biden is now receiving the classified President’s Daily Brief of sensitive intelligence information.
States with a total of 270 Electoral College votes – the margin needed for victory – have now certified a Biden victory.
Mr. Trump’s post-vote strategy to prevent the nation from reaching this point consisted of four things:
Direct appeals to the nation that he was the 2020 winner, which began with a White House appearance in the wee hours after the polls closed and continued on Twitter.
Court cases meant to stop vote counts or throw out duly cast ballots.
Lobbying state and county officials to delay the certification of vote totals.
Lobbying state legislators to ignore vote totals and seat pro-Trump electors.
Of these, the court cases have been the weakest link by far. While Trump lawyers and surrogates and right-leaning media have publicized what they claim to be evidence of voter fraud, those cases have largely dissolved upon close attention or constitute too few votes to make any difference. Judges have tossed virtually all the cases filed by the Trump legal team.
“Republican-appointed judges, Democratic-appointed judges, state and federal judges – they’ve all done their job and they’re acting as guardrails,” says Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Law School and host of the “Passing Judgment” podcast.
Yet the court cases have still had an effect. They have meshed with the president’s communications strategy to portray the 2020 election as “stolen.”
“The lawsuits themselves aren’t posing a legal obstacle. The dangerous thing is that there’s probably at least 40 to 50 million Americans who are buying falsehoods, lies, discredited conspiracy theories,” says Professor Levinson.
The president also broke norms by trying to interfere with the election process in some key states. He brought Michigan state Republican leaders to the White House while some of his surrogates on television were suggesting that those Republicans seat pro-Trump electors in the state, overruling Mr. Biden’s Michigan win. Mr. Trump and his allies also attacked Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger prior to the state’s vote certification – despite the fact that Mr. Raffensperger voted for him.
These precedents might encourage future losers, particularly in close elections, to decline to concede, file multiple lawsuits, push to overturn state results, and delegitimize the seating of their opponent, all in a hardball attempt to gain power.
“The goal was to undermine not only the election outcome, but our democratic processes,” says Ms. Pérez. Strengthening trust in elections
One way to counter this might be more nationwide voting standards and procedures. That could reassure voters that their election systems reflect broad best practices.
Easier registration, with standardized voter databases, would keep voters from being purged from rolls and help allay notional worries about fraud, writes Zeynep Tufekci, a University of North Carolina social scientist, in The New York Times.
Standardized and more common sharing of voter information between states could have the same effect. Required audits after elections – such as Georgia now has – could check for irregularities without the drama involved in asking for recounts or suing states to act.
Voting officials – the unsung heroes of this election cycle – need more resources to do their jobs, adds Ms. Pérez of the Brennan Center. Improved civics education could fill in the gaps in voters’ knowledge, so they have a better idea of when fraud claims are implausible.
Finally, citizens themselves need to stand for democracy.
“Voters need to tell our politicians in one very clear voice that we want free, fair, and accessible elections,” says Ms. Pérez. “We even want people who may not agree with us to have a free, fair, and accessible vote.”
Dominion Voting Systems tore into Sidney Powell's lawsuit accusing it of a vast conspiracy, calling it 'baseless, senseless, physically impossible'
Mia Jankowicz Fri, November 27, 2020
Sidney Powell. Drew Angerer/Getty Images Dominion Voting Systems, a provider of election infrastructure, responded on Thursday to the pro-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell's accusations that it took part in vote rigging.
Powell released two lawsuits on Wednesday alleging "massive election fraud" in Georgia and Michigan.
The company is not a defendant in either lawsuit, but its products are mentioned. It responded to dozens of claims made about it in the Georgia suit.
In a point-by-point rejoinder, Dominion said Powell was "alleging a bizarre election fraud conspiracy" that would be impossible to carry out.
Powell was until recently part of President Donald Trump's legal team. She was unceremoniously dropped after criticism of her outlandish claims.
Dominion Voting Systems, the company that President Donald Trump's supporters have accused of enabling vast voter fraud in the US, on Thursday released a blistering point-by-point rebuttal to allegations from the attorney Sidney Powell.
The company is not a defendant in the lawsuits; governors and local election officials are listed. But allegations about it were scattered throughout, with mentions on 30 pages of the 104-page Georgia lawsuit.
The Michigan case has been filed. But as of Friday, Business Insider had not been able to verify the status of the Georgia complaint in federal court.
Dominion Voting Systems described the allegations in the Georgia suit as "baseless, senseless, physically impossible" and said the events that Powell claimed happened "simply did not occur."
It said Powell's document "appears to be a very rough draft" of a lawsuit "alleging a bizarre election fraud conspiracy that — were it possible — would necessarily require the collaboration of thousands of participants."
The company said that the allegations against it led to harassment and death threats to its staff.
Powell's lawsuit — which was peppered with typos — claimed that President-elect Joe Biden's victory in Georgia is fraudulent and should be overturned because of physical and digital vote tampering.
She accused Dominion Voting Systems of being one of two companies "founded by foreign oligarchs and dictators to ensure computerized ballot-stuffing and vote manipulation to whatever level was needed to make certain Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chávez never lost another election."
She claimed that in Georgia, votes for Trump were "switched" to votes for Biden in such a way as to be undetectable.
She also claimed the voting software "was accessed by agents acting on behalf of China and Iran in order to monitor and manipulate elections."
Many of her claims have been independently debunked, according to CNN. None of the allegations has been given credence by a judge.
Dominion Voting Systems said the fact that it was founded in Canada is a matter of public record, and it denied any connection to Venezuela or Chávez.
It also said the manipulation Powell described was not possible — "not on a machine-by-machine basis, not by alleged hacking, not by manipulating software, and not by imagined ways of 'sending' votes to overseas locations."
"But even if it were possible, it would have been discovered in the statewide handcount of votes," it said.
The company's statement addressed many other points.
Biden was certified as the winner in Georgia after an audit that included a hand recount of more than 5 million paper votes. The Trump campaign has nonetheless requested another recount.
Dominion Voting Systems had already issued a lengthy rebuttal to a wide range of theories floated by Powell and others about its role in numerous states' elections.
The company did not immediately respond to Business Insider's questions about whether it planned to write a rebuttal to charges in the Michigan case, which are similar.
Powell was a prominent part of the Trump campaign's legal team, but it disowned her after she made claims similar to those in her lawsuits at a press conference with Rudy Giuliani last week.
Indiana asks US Supreme Court to deny parental rights to same-sex couples
Stephanie Guerilus Wed, November 25, 2020
Indiana is appealing a decision to the US Supreme Court that recognized lesbian mothers as parents to their children
The state of Indiana is asking the newly conservative Supreme Court to strip same-sex couples of their parental rights.
Indiana Attorney General Curtis Hill asked the High Court to rule that states have the authority to deny married same-sex couples the right to be legally recognized as parents to their own children.
The case is centered on eight married lesbian couples who used artificial insemination to start families. They want Indiana to recognize both mothers on the birth certificate but the state has refused to do so.
A view of the Supreme Court in Washington, Monday, Nov. 11, 2019. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)
Ashlee and Ruby Henderson, who filed suit in 2015, were one of the couples denied their request by the Tippecanoe County Health Department. When their son was born the couple was not allowed to put both their names on his birth certificate. The health department, which issues them, cited Indiana state guidelines. A federal court ruled in the Henderson’s favor a year later, determining that same-sex married couples should have the same rights as heterosexual parents.
However, Indiana insists that biology is the determinative factor in paternity, arguing that two women cannot conceive a child and has taken the matter to the US Supreme Court. In the state’s laws, according to the Journal & Courier, it’s presumed that a child’s biological parents are a man and a woman. If that is not the case, as with same-sex parents, one parent would have to formally adopt the child to be considered the child’s legal parent.
“Doing so, however, is in tension with the traditional, constitutionally protected understanding that, at birth, only a baby’s biological parents have legal rights and obligations toward the child,” Tom Fisher, Indiana’s solicitor-general said about issuing the birth certificates to a same-sex couple. “To protect these rights, Indiana lists a child’s biological parents, and no one else, on the child’s birth certificate unless the child is legally adopted.”
A request was filed by Indiana on June 15 for the case to be reviewed after a U.S. Appeals Court ruled that same-sex couples were entitled to the same parental rights that heterosexual couples have.
“We are disappointed the state of Indiana continues to fight against families headed by same-sex spouses,” Karen Celestino-Horseman, the Hendersons’ Indianapolis-based attorney, said in June. “The Supreme Court has already spoken on this issue, and yet Indiana continues to expend resources fighting against same-sex marriage.”
In September, the Supreme Court rescheduled a private conference on the case and asked for a response from the plaintiffs. The mothers asked the Court to reject the appeal by Indiana.
The justices will now hear the case in a private conference on Dec. 11, in a court now shaped by a 6-3 conservative majority who have openly criticized the landmark Obergefell v. Hodges decision that made gay marriage legal. Last month, Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito suggested the law needed to be overturned to maintain religious liberty.
“[Kim] Davis may have been one of the first victims of this Court’s cavalier treatment of religion in its Obergefell decision,” Thomas said, “but she will not be the last.”
Davis is the Kentucky clerk who in 2015 refused to issue marriage licenses to gay couples citing her religious beliefs.
As theGrio reported, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died on Sept. 18. The liberal jurist was replaced by Justice Amy Coney Barrett who ie expected to rule with the Court’s conservative majority.
An orphan manatee calf named Squirrel forms 'an instant bond' with Stubby, the Columbus Zoo's 'queen'
Alissa Widman Neese, The Columbus Dispatch Wed, November 25, 2020
Orphan manatees, Squirrel and Scampi eat lunch alongside longtime manatee resident Stubby, Thursday, November 19, 2020, at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium. Squirrel, the smallest, has bonded with Stubby faster than any previous calves, and mostly doesn't leave her side. Florida manatees that are federally regulated and the two calves are destined to be returned to the wild.
Alone, the calf hovered around a large boulder — an object rescuers say she probably became attached to in her mother's absence. She had been alone for more than a day, much longer than a mother would typically leave a calf on its own. When the rescue crew arrived, a man scooped up the 65-pound sea cow in his arms to get her to safety.
"She was not budging from that rock. But thank God she didn't, because it made it really easy to get to her," recalled Mary Stella, spokeswoman for the Dolphin Research Center, based in the Florida Keys, which operates one of several manatee rescue teams in the state. She had a bacterial infection, no food and was getting weaker, with no mom to guide her. She probably would have died."
These days, the calf, named Squirrel, has established a new bond miles away from home — with a manatee admired by many visitors of the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium.
In early November, Stubby, a permanent resident of the zoo's Manatee Coast, became Squirrel's surrogate mom. And keepers say they've never seen her connect with a calf so quickly and closely.
"It was an instant bond," said Becky Ellsworth, curator of the zoo's Shores region, which includes Manatee Coast. "Squirrel's only happy if she's touching Stubby at all times."
Stubby, a fan favorite, has lived at the Columbus Zoo since 2005 — a 15-year reign that, along with her laissez-faire attitude, has earned her the nickname "queen of the zoo." Though she hasn't birthed a calf of her own, she has been a welcoming pool mate for more than 20 rescued orphan manatees that have been rehabilitated at the zoo since her arrival.
Squirrel is among the littlest manatees for which the zoo has tended, Ellsworth said. She has bulked up to more than 130 pounds, though, since her rescue on May 2.
On a recent afternoon, Ellsworth watched as she rested on Stubby's back, and then tagged along for a cruise around the 300,000-gallon Manatee Coast pool.
Squirrel occasionally drifted away, distracted by some scrumptious, floating pieces of romaine lettuce, the main meal of a manatee in human care. But just a few feet of exploring was just a little too much adventure for her. She quickly darted through the water, back to Stubby's side.
Watching is a critical part of caring for manatees. Unlike other zoo animals, the calves are preparing to eventually be released back into the Florida waters from which they were rescued. Too much human interaction could keep them from learning survival skills, so keepers must use a hands-off approach.
Orphan manatees, Squirrel and Scampi eat lunch alongside longtime manatee resident Stubby, Thursday, November 19, 2020, at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium. Squirrel, the smallest, has bonded with Stubby faster than any previous calves, and mostly doesn't leave her side. Florida manatees that are federally regulated and the two calves are destined to be returned to the wild.
So instead of hand-feeding, for example, keepers will attach lettuce to a weighted pipe that sinks and toss it in the water from a distance, to re-create the behavior of grazing for natural sea grasses on the ocean floor.
Stubby and Squirrel, along with Scampi, an older, more independent calf who also arrived in Columbus this month, are currently eating 300 heads of lettuce every day.
"We don't want them to associate people with food, or anything," Ellsworth said. "The best thing we can do as their caretakers is let them be manatees."
Stubby is an exception, though. After a boat struck her in the mid 1990s, part of her tail had to be amputated. That means it isn't flat and paddle-shaped like typical manatees'. She also has an undiagnosed skin condition, which causes her to lose weight when it flares up and has left white scars across her body. Recently, it has been under control, and she's bulked up to a healthy 2,000 pounds.
Stubby hasn't been released into the wild because her ongoing health problems would make it very difficult for her to survive, Ellsworth said.
But that means she can be trained to participate in health-care procedures, such as rolling onto her back at the water's surface. While she nibbles on treats, her caretakers can draw blood or collect urine samples.
That training has been put on hold for a while, though, Ellsworth said.
"We would need to separate her from Squirrel, and that's not happening," she joked.
Manatees are federally protected, so only members of an authorized group, the Manatee Rescue and Rehabilitation Partnership, can rescue and care for them. The Columbus Zoo and the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden are the only program partners located outside Florida.
Over 20 years, the partnership has rescued, rehabilitated and released 618 manatees, according to Andy Garrett, who coordinates rescues for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission. An additional 616 received on-site treatment and were released, for a total of 1,234 manatees assisted.
The Ohio facilities are a crucial part of the partnership, freeing space in the Florida facilities for the sick and injured manatees that need critical care, said Julie Heyde, animal care supervisor at the Miami Seaquarium. The manatees that come to Columbus just need time to grow large enough to survive on their own.
Squirrel and Scampi are the 32nd and 33rd manatee calves to rehab in Columbus.
Andy Clarkson, exhibit artist at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium, adds two more manatees to the list of those rehabilitated and returned to the wild Thursday, November 19, 2020.
Before she came to Columbus, Stubby resided at SeaWorld Orlando for 10 years. She's currently the only permanent manatee resident in the Midwest. The calves first received care at the Miami Seaquarium.
Scampi was rescued in November 2019 after a boat hit her mother, Jumbo. She became an orphan a few weeks later, when Jumbo died because of her severe lung injuries.
The Seaquarium currently has nine manatees, including three permanent residents, but that number ballooned to as many as 24 a few years ago, Heyde said.
"We don't get much of a break," she said. "Any day, at any time, we may get a call of a manatee in need of rescue."
Tom Stalf, president and CEO of the Columbus Zoo, said the Ohio facilities also help people in the Midwest connect with a species they otherwise might never see.
Until a few years ago, the federal government considered manatees endangered. They're now threatened, with more than 6,500 animals living in the southeastern U.S. and Puerto Rico, mostly in Florida. In 1991, there were only 1,300 in Florida.
In addition to boat strikes, manatees are susceptible to harmful algal blooms and cold stress caused by changes to their habitats, as well as entanglement in discarded fishing gear.
"Our Columbus visitors respect manatees and they love them," Stalf said. "This is conservation in action that you can watch right here in the United States."
The Clearwater Marine Aquarium Research Institute spearheads the research that ensures recently released manatees are thriving, despite these threats.
By fastening a satellite tracking belt around their tails with a bobber attached to it, researchers can monitor manatees to ensure they're eating, socializing and finding warm water when the temperatures drop without them even realizing it, said James "Buddy" Powell, the institute's executive director.
With time, the trackers fall off or are removed.
Eventually, Squirrel will become more independent and the time will come for her to return to the ocean. In the wild, calves usually separate from their mothers by age 2.
Until then, Ellsworth will enjoy watching her learn to become a grownup alongside Stubby.
"She has gone through so much, but she's overcome everything. To me, Stubby is a symbol of using what you have to help others, or making the best of a poor situation," she said. "She's happier for it. Our program is better because of it. Without her, I don't know if we'd have this much success."
Follow Columbus reporter Alissa Widman on Twitter: @AlissaWidman.
A discovery inside a California cave suggests people were combining hallucinogenic drugs and art nearly 500 years ago
Susie Neilson Wed, November 25, 2020
An enhanced image of the painting on the ceiling of the Pinwheel Cave in California. Devlin Gandy
On the ceiling of a California cave, a red pinwheel-shaped drawing likely depicts a psychoactive plant called datura.
Researchers recently found chewed-up lumps of datura stuffed in the cave's ceiling.
The finding is the first clear evidence that hallucinogens were used at a rock art site. It suggests that humans may have painted cave art to enhance hallucinations.
For decades, researchers have thought that hallucinogenic substances likely played a role in rock art, inspiring many of the vivid drawings that adorn cliffs and caves across all six habitable continents.
But according to a new study, it could go the other way around: Paintings in caves could have acted as visual aids for drug-induced hallucinations.
The study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences this week, describes a cave in Southern California, between Santa Barbara and Bakersfield. It's within the historic territory of the indigenous Chumash people and is known as the "Pinwheel Cave" because of the pinwheel-shaped painting on its ceiling. The painting resembles the datura plant, which delivers intense psychoactive effects when ingested.
David Robinson, the study's lead researcher, has been investigating the cave since 2007. He and a team of archaeologists have over the years discovered and analyzed chewed wads, or "quids," of datura that were stuffed into cracks in the ceiling of the cave up to 490 years ago. Their analysis also showed that humans occupied the cave from about 1530 to 1890, and "in all probability" chewed the datura during that period.
Combined, this set of discoveries makes the Pinwheel Cave the first known site that links evidence of hallucinogen use to cave paintings. Which came first: the rock art or the hallucinogens?
Indigenous Californians used datura for centuries. People once processed the plant into a drink called toloache for coming-of-age ceremonies, and the Chumash consumed it before "vision quests" in which individuals sought interaction with spirits. In the group's mythology, the plant is personified as a supernatural grandmother named Momoy.
The paintings in the Pinwheel Cave seem to depict datura and its primary pollinator, the hawk moth, in its larval stage. The researchers think the Chumash people painted the images while sober and intended them to serve either as "visual catalysts for communal experiences" or simply as signposts to indicate where to take datura.
The new analysis also contradicts what Robinson calls "the myth of the lone shaman": the idea that a single individual would go into a cave and do hallucinogens on their own. Both the density of the quids, as well as the presence of many tools in the cave, suggest that many Chumash people used the space.
"This is a community site," Robinson, who is a reader in archaeology at the University of Central Lancashire in England, told Live Science.
A datura flower as it begins to open in the early evening.
Melissa Dabumalanz
What's more, the fact that these images evoke the plant and its pollinator, the researchers wrote, contradicts the idea that humans took hallucinogens partly for artistic inspiration. The drawing does not seem to be a reflection of divine or spiritual inspiration from the hallucinogenic effects of the plant.
In that sense, the cave painting "calls into question assumptions that rock art imagery directly reflects private images seen in trance," the researchers wrote. A ritual discouraged as the result of US government policy
Datura's likely role in communal rituals makes sense given its importance to the Chumash people, according to Devlin Gandy, a co-author of the study.
"Datura is far more than a hallucinogen," Gandy told National Geographic. "It is a sacred being which is part of prayers, utilized for cleansing, as well as healing."
A pollinating hawk moth feeds from a dutura flower in Seattle, Washington. Thomson Reuters
The US government suppressed tribal rituals like datura ceremonies in the 20th century via forced cultural assimilation policies and the displacement of native people from traditional lands. President Jimmy Carter finally passed the American Indian Religious Freedom Act in 1978, which protected religious freedom for indigenous tribes. But modern-day Chumash people no longer ingest the plant.
Sandra Hernandez, a spokesperson for the Tejon Tribe, which has Chumash people enrolled, told National Geographic she finds her ancestors' relationship to datura inspiring.
"I find myself at times with a lack of words to define the feeling of how great it is to know how smart our ancestors were," she said. "I can never get around that. We knew things because we communed with creators and we communed with nature."
Utah monolith: Internet sleuths got there, but its origins are still a mystery
Kevin Ponniah and Ashitha Nagesh - BBC News Fri, November 27, 2020, 4
It took just 48 hours for the first person to get there.
When officials in Utah on Monday revealed they had found a shimmering, metal structure deep in the Red Rock desert, they refused to say exactly where.
They hoped that would be enough to deter amateur adventurers from setting off to find it, risking getting dangerously lost in the process.
But there was little chance that people would abide by this advice. By Wednesday, pictures were emerging on Instagram of people triumphantly posing with the monolith, eager to show the world that they had got there first - even if the wider mystery of why it is there remains unsolved.
They were aided by internet sleuths who had quickly geo-located the structure on Google Earth and posted the co-ordinates online.
"I decided to go there first because I was drawn to the fact that this object had been there for five years, hidden in nature," said David Surber, a 33-year-old former US Army infantry officer who drove six hours through the night after finding a Reddit post claiming to have found the exact location.
State wildlife officials originally spotted the object on 18 November while conducting a helicopter flyover of the remote, Mars-like terrain to count big horn sheep. The Reddit user who posted the co-ordinates, Tim Slane, said he had tracked the flight path of the helicopter until it went off-radar - a sign it might have landed.
David Surber saw the apparent co-ordinates online and decided he had to be the first one there
At this point, he scanned the map for the exact features of the terrain seen in official photos and videos, before zeroing in on a canyon that appeared to fit the bill. There, a distinct shadow - long and narrow - could be seen. It's not visible in historic satellite imagery from 2015, but appears in October 2016 when scrubland in the vicinity also appears to have been cleared.
"I knew that once the location became public knowledge that people would visit the area," said Mr Slane. "I have received some angry messages for my revealing of the location. If I had not found it, someone else would likely have found it soon enough."
Satellite images showing the location of the Utah monolith
David, who lives in Utah, swung into action - telling the Reddit community of thousands following the mystery that he was heading there. On the way, he was bombarded with hundreds of messages and requests. They included things like: "Bring a magnet in case there is a secret door!"
He arrived in the early hours when it was still pitch black. At first he was alone, marvelling not just at the monolith but at shooting stars. Then others started to turn up, also having found the coordinates online. He was thrilled to report his find back to Reddit.
"It was a good escape from all the negativity we've experienced in 2020."
David Surber filming himself inside the canyon near the monolith
But two questions remain: who put the structure there, and why?
While many have suggested - some sincerely, most in jest - that the monolith was planted by extra-terrestrial visitors, the prevailing theory is that it is an as-yet-unclaimed conceptual artwork.
Initially experts suggested it may have been an unknown work by the late John McCracken, who is known for his "plank" sculptures. His gallerist David Zwirner initially confirmed this, but the gallery later retracted that statement, saying they believed it was another artist paying homage instead. McCracken died in 2011.
Some online then narrowed in on another artist, Petecia Le Fawnhawk, who installs totemic sculptures in secret desert locations and, crucially, used to live and work in Utah.
But she told the online art magazine Artnet that while she "did have the thought to plant secret monuments in the desert", she "cannot claim this one". So the creator of the totem remains a mystery for now.
John McCracken - the late artist many first pointed to when the news broke
It's not uncommon for artworks to be installed in remote locations - either as sculptures, or as "land art", a form of art that makes use of its natural surroundings. For many of these pieces, the journey to get there is as much a part of the artwork as the actual installation.
One of the most famous examples of this is Walter de Maria's The Lightning Field. Its exact location is a tightly-guarded secret - all that is known is that it's in the high desert of western New Mexico, although small groups of visitors can book to be taken there. Another is the temporary land art of Martin Hill and Philippa Jones, such as Synergy - a piece that was installed in Lake Wanaka, New Zealand, in 2009.
David Surber's picture of the monolith
Andy Merritt, a British artist who creates outdoor public sculptures as part of the duo, Something and Son, said that when he saw stories about the Utah monolith, he thought it was "either an artist, or a rich person who's got fantasies around 2001: A Space Odyssey".
"There are so many artists who do stuff in unusual places, especially in America," said Merritt, who plans to "fossilise" a suburban house in Milton Keynes, north of London, next spring by pouring a mixture into the interior and making a cast of its negative space. "Even in my own work, we always want to be doing things in unusual places.
"If you took what they did in the middle of Utah - presuming it is an artist - and put it in another location, like a public square, it would be a lot less interesting. It's the landscape itself that really is the talking point."
Video from the dozens - perhaps even hundreds of people - who have already visited the location suggest a professional job. Three large sheets of what appears to be stainless steel were riveted together, with the inside left hollow. Whoever put it there used heavy-duty tools to cut into the bedrock and embed the structure.
"One person alone could not have done it so there is a group of people who have some knowledge of it somewhere," said Wendy Wischer of the University of Utah's School of Fine Art. "Most artists want some recognition for what they are doing but this seems to include a level of humour and mystery as part of the intention."
David Surber, reflecting on his trip to the monolith, admitted he at first hoped its origins would be "otherworldly".
"Yet deep down inside you know it was most likely just a very patient artist or Space Odyssey 2001 fan."
Like Andy Merritt, he's referring to the imposing black monoliths that play an important, but mysterious, role in the 1968 Stanley Kubrick science fiction film 2001: A Space Odyssey.
In an interview on Thursday, a public information officer at the Utah Department of Public Safety told the BBC that while they don't encourage anyone to travel to the monolith because it could be dangerous, they can't do anything to stop them as the area is public land. No decision has been made to remove it.
"The genie is out of the bottle," said Cpl Andrew Battenfield, when told people had been turning up and posting pictures on social media. "It's a free country."
Utah monolith: First people find mysterious object after frenzy of online sleuthing
Shweta Sharma Fri, November 27, 2020,
Expert claims to have answer to mysterious desert monolith (AP)
It took just 48 hours for the first member of the public to reach the bizarre metal monolith that was discovered by officials in the Utah desert.
Utah Department of Public Safety and Division of Wildlife Resources spotted the mysterious object from a helicopter on 18 November while counting sheep in the remote, Mars-like terrain of southeastern Utah.
In social media posts recounting their discovery, officials at first refused to reveal its precise location for fear of amateur adventurers getting lost in the remote area trying to see it for themselves.
However, this only added to the mystery of a post that sparked comparisons to the iconic sci-fi movie 2001: A Space Odyssey and wild theories of aliens and UFOs.
Guided by co-ordinates posted online by internet sleuths on Reddit, by Wednesday people were flocking to the structure and pictures of hikers posing with the 12ft monolith flooded social media.
David Surber, a 33-year-old former US Army infantry officer in Utah, wasted no time and drove six hours through the night following the co-ordinates posted online.
"I decided to go there first because I was drawn to the fact that this object had been there for five years, hidden in nature," said Mr Surber. "It was a good escape from all the negativity we've experienced in 2020."
Mr Surber, thrilled to see the marvel, was constantly updating his thousands of followers on Reddit - eager to share his other-worldly experience.
Soon, others started to join him at the site of the discovery, and those who could not bombarded him with comments. One asked him to bring a magnet in case “there is a secret door".
Tim Slane, the Reddit user who located the monolith through Google Earth and posted the co-ordinates, reveals he tracked the path of helicopter which first found the monolith and zeroed in where it went off-radar.
"I knew that once the location became public knowledge that people would visit the area," said Mr Slane. "I have received some angry messages for my revealing of the location. If I had not found it, someone else would likely have found it soon enough."
Despite its discovery by officials and now members of the public, the mystery of where it came from remains unsolved.
Keeping aside the wild theories about UFOs, the logical explanation by art experts is that it might be the work of late artist John McCracken.
However, neither the gallerist of the artist or anyone else has come forward to claim knowledge of its origin.
Watch: Utah Highway patrol speaks on the discovery of the monolith
A mysterious monolith found in the wilds of Utah is believed to be an artistic homage paid to a dead minimalist sculptor.
The 12ft high stainless steel structure was spotted in remote backcountry by a state employee counting sheep from a helicopter.
Art experts had speculated that the object resembled the “free-standing plank structures” of the late artist John McCracken.
Mr McCracken lived in New Mexico before his death and his work is represented by the David Zwirner Gallery.
Mr Zwirner said he initially believed it was “definitely” a secret piece by Mr McCracken before ruling it out.
"While this is not a work by the late American artist John McCracken, we suspect it is a work by a fellow artist paying homage to McCracken,” Mr Zwirner told the Art Newspaper.
Lieutenant Nick Street of the state’s Department of Public Safety said that they believed “it’s somebody’s art installation, or an attempt at that.”
He said that the monolith had “human-made rivets” and was buried into the rock to an unknown depth.
“Somebody took the time to use some type of concrete-cutting tool or something to really dig down, almost in the exact shape of the object, and embed it really well,” he said.
“It’s odd. There are roads close by, but to haul the materials to cut into the rock, and haul the metal, which is taller than 12 feet in sections — to do all that in that remote spot is definitely interesting.”
Lieutenant Street admitted that authorities had no idea how long it had been in the location.
“For all we know it’s been installed since the 1940s and 1950s,” he said.
Officials have not given details of the monolith’s exact location amid fears that visitors could become stuck and need rescuing.
“It is illegal to install structures or art without authorisation on federally managed public lands, no matter what planet you’re from,” the department said in a statement.
Mysterious metal monolith found in the wilds of Utah
Mysterious metal monolith found in the wilds of Utah by team of biologists
The structure was planted into the ground and made of a smooth metal Graig Graziosi 3 days ago
A strange monolith has been found in the wilds of Utah after a state employee spotted it from a helicopter.
The employee found the structure while counting sheep from the sky.
The monolith is estimated to stand between 10 and 12 feet high, and appeared to be hidden amongst the rocks and planted into the ground.
It is made of smooth, black-grey metal, unlike anything seen in the nearby red rocks.
KSLTV, a local news station, interviewed Bret Hutchings, the pilot who helped discover the monolith.
“That’s been about the strangest thing that I’ve come across out there in all my years of flying,” he told the broadcaster.
Mr Hutchings said a biologists counting bighorn sheep in the helicopter was the first one to spot the structure.
“He was like, ‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, turn around, turn around!’ And I was like, ‘What?’ And he’s like, ‘There’s this thing back there – we’ve got to go look at it!’” Mr Hutchings said.
He noted the object's similarity to the iconic evolutionary monolith featured in a famous Stanley Kubrick film. Mr Hutchings believes it's likely a work of art.
“I’m assuming it’s some new wave artist or something or, you know, somebody that was a big 2001: A Space Odyssey fan,” he said.
Mr Hutchings and the helicopter crew landed to take a closer look at the monolith, which sits in the center of a small canyon cul-de-sac.
“We were kind of joking around that if one of us suddenly disappears, then the rest of us make a run for it,” he said.
If the monolith is an art installation, it won't be the first time a pop culture reference is built miles away from civilization.
Last year, German-Namibian artist Max Siendentopf constructed an art installation consisting of seven white pillars, an mp3 player, and seven speakers.
The art installation was built in the middle of the Namib Desert in Namibia and plays the Toto song "Africa" on repeat.
The artist refused to give the exact location of the piece, saying it is "like a treasure that only the most loyal of Toto fans can find."
2001: A Space Odyssey fans lose minds over discovery of monolith in Utah desert
‘A barrel of monkeys were just spotted heading south out of Utah,’ one fan quipped
The structure was first spotted by a state employee from a helicopter.
It was later discovered by the Utah Department of Public Safety and the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources.
The monolith, which is made of smooth, black-grey metal, is said to stand between an estimated 10 and 12 feet.
It appears to be planted into the ground and looks unlike anything in the surrounding area
. The monolith was first spotted from a helicopter in Utah (PA)
In Stanley Kubrick's 1968 science-fiction film, an adaptation of Arthur C Clarke’s short story The Sentinel, a similar monolith is discovered by a tribe of appears in a prehistoric African location.
Bret Hutchings, who was flying the helicopter, told KSLTV: “I’m assuming it’s some new wave artist or something or, you know, somebody that was a big 2001: A Space Odyssey fan.”
He called it “the strangest thing that I’ve come across out there in all my years of flying”.
“2020: A Space Odyssey was not on my bingo card for this year,” one person quipped, with another adding: “A barrel of monkeys were just spotted heading south out of Utah.”
A third 2001 fan wrote: “What will happen in December? The monolith. monkeys. It all comes together.”
'It's working!' Deer, bears and other critters like Utah's first wildlife bridge — and the state has video to prove it.
Elinor Aspegren, USA TODAY Wed, November 25, 2020,
The first wildlife bridge in Utah is working as intended. The Utah Division of Wildlife Resources has proof.
A video shared by the department on Nov. 19 shows various animals — including deer, bears and bobcats — using the Parleys Canyon Wildlife Overpass, which spans Interstate 80 southeast of Salt Lake City.
The $5 million project "has been successful at helping wildlife safely migrate over busy Interstate 80 and helping motorists be much safer as well," the DWR wrote.
The nearly 350-foot-long bridge, which opened in December 2018, is the first of its kind in the state, according to the Utah Department of Transportation. The bridge's construction came after 46 deer, 14 moose, and four elk were killed on that stretch of highway in 2016 and 2017 alone.
UDOT spokesman John Gleason told the Salt Lake Tribune in 2019 that although the organization prefers to analyze data over 3-5 years, early results of the wildlife crossing were “encouraging.”
“From what we can tell, the number of accidents there is down dramatically,” he said. “At least initially, it appears the investment in safety is paying off. And we expected it to take several years before the animals got used to using it, so this is great.”
A 2008 federal study “estimated one to two million collisions between cars and large animals every year in the United States.”
Wildlife overpasses and underpasses have had similar success in other states, and thus have been growing in popularity.
Colorado's only wildlife overpass has already proven to be a success. So have several in Montana.
And the world’s largest wildlife overpass is expected to open next year over California’s 101 Freeway, near the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. The 165-foot-wide bridge will “span 210 feet over ten lanes of pavement” that is used by 300,00 vehicles a day, per the National Wildlife Federation.
Editorial: The voters have spoken on legalizing marijuana. Biden and Congress need to listen
The Times Editorial Board Fri, November 27, 2020
Marijuana plants for sale at a California dispensary in 2009. (Los Angeles Times)
American voters may be sharply polarized over many political issues of the day, but they are increasingly unified on one policy: legalizing marijuana.
Just look at the results of November's election — every statewide measure to relax marijuana prohibition won. Arizona, Montana and New Jersey voted to legalize marijuana for adults 21 and older. Medical marijuana was approved in Mississippi. South Dakota voters backed both recreational and medicinal use.
Now, 15 states — with one-third of the American population — have chosen to legalize adult use of marijuana. Thirty-six states, with nearly 70% of the population, have legalized medical marijuana. From deep red states to deep blue ones, there’s widespread support for ending cannabis prohibition.
Yet marijuana remains illegal under federal law. Marijuana is classified as a Schedule 1 drug, like heroin, meaning it has no medicinal value and is highly addictive. That classification is a relic of the war on drugs. And it creates a serious and illogical conflict that makes it harder to properly research, regulate and tax marijuana, even as the cannabis industry grows larger with each new legalization initiative. Clearly the incoming Biden administration and Congress need to modernize federal laws and policies to reflect the reality on the ground.
There’s been little progress at the federal level over the last four years. Despite several bipartisan bills to end or ease the conflict between state legalization and federal law, Congress has repeatedly failed to move legislation. President Trump didn’t help matters by picking two prohibition hard-liners — Jeff Sessions and then William Barr — to run the Justice Department.
Sessions rescinded the 2013 Justice Department memo that outlined the Obama administration's hands-off approach to states that had legalized marijuana. There was little practical effect from Sessions' move; the DOJ didn’t suddenly begin targeting state-compliant pot shops. But the lack of clear guidance from the federal government left businesses and states in legal limbo.
The most logical thing the federal government could do is change the law. There are several bills pending in Congress to eliminate the conflict.
One of the most promising, the Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement Act, is expected to pass the House of Representatives with bipartisan support next month. The act would decriminalize marijuana at the federal level, expunge prior federal marijuana convictions and impose a federal tax on sales of cannabis, with the money going to communities most affected by the war on drugs.
The House has repeatedly passed the SAFE Banking Act, which would prevent federal regulators from punishing financial institutions that provide services to marijuana businesses operating in compliance with state laws. Most cannabis businesses can't open bank accounts or accept credit card transactions because financial services companies refuse to serve them for fear of being penalized by federal regulators. As a result, marijuana transactions are typically made in cash, which is dangerous for employees and makes it harder to collect taxes.
If passed again next year, both of these bills would probably be signed into law; after all, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), the vice president-elect, sponsored the decriminalization bill. The real hurdle would be a Republican-controlled Senate. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has been wary of marijuana legislation, and as long as he’s in charge, passing reform bills will be challenging. However, there’s still a lot the Biden administration can do without Congress' help.
To start, Joe Biden can nominate an attorney general who will restore the guidelines from the 2013 memo and prioritize going after drug cartels, interstate trafficking and illegal pot farms on public land — not targeting law-abiding growers and sellers in legalized states. He can also direct U.S. Customs and Border Protection to discontinue its stringent enforcement of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which bars travelers from entering the country if they admit to working or investing in the marijuana industry or to simply having used marijuana. That’s a silly policy considering that Canada has legalized marijuana and Mexico is poised to do the same.
The Biden administration should also end long-standing barriers to cannabis research, which the Drug Enforcement Administration can do through the rule-making process. Because marijuana is listed as a Schedule 1 drug, the government imposes strict limits on access to cannabis. There’s just one facility in the country that has permission to grow cannabis for study. Universities and other research institutions, meanwhile, are wary of approving marijuana research for fear of losing federal funding. Those conditions make it hard to conduct the kind of in-depth research necessary to understand both the benefits and the dangers of marijuana use.
The voters have spoken again and again. They want to end the ruse of prohibition and move marijuana from the black market into a legal, regulated, taxed system. It’s about time federal leaders listen.
Purdue guilty plea 'cuts head off' opioid serpent Wed, November 25, 2020,
A NY attorney says Purdue Pharma's guilty plea "is a very, very important step" in addressing the opioid crisis but will never bring back the people who died. Hunter Shkolnik said the plea has essentially "cut the head off" the opioid serpent. (Nov. 25) Video Transcript
HUNTER SHKOLNIK: This is now the company being charged with the crime and pleading to the crime. And that affects its ability to do business, to get contracts, just to run [INAUDIBLE] as a pharmaceutical company in the future. A company doesn't go into jail, but it's going to cost them money, and it's going to cost them their ability to run their business the way they have over the years.
Purdue is a bad company. The Sacklers ran it in a bad way. They're out of the company, they'll never step foot back in Purdue. Purdue will continue operating, albeit at a smaller size than it was, and it will sell the drug that many people need, paying patients need, in a legal and proper way.
It also provides for the financial compensation, the peace that is needed to get the money back to the cities, the counties, and the states to pay for the cleanup, to clean up the mess that we're seeing in our communities. This is a very, very important step.
I think a lot of folks would like to have seen a Sackler standing up there raising their hands saying, I plead guilty. But that didn't happen. I mean, no one's going to bring back the the family members they lost. No one is going to cure an opioid addict because of a settlement. But what's important here is we really cut the head off of this serpent. It is never going to be able to do this again.
Op-Ed: Why America is still living with the damage done by the 'superpredator' lie
Kim Taylor-Thompson Fri, November 27, 2020
Demonstrators in Cleveland protest the police killing of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy, on Nov. 22, 2014. (Tony Dejak / Associated Press)
Twenty-five years ago, John DiIulio, a political science professor, created and disseminated one of the most dangerous and lethal lies in our history. He coined the term “superpredator,” depicting Black children as remorseless animals who would prey on victims.
Make no mistake, racism propelled the spread of this theory. DiIulio insisted that this younger, more dangerous breed of offender would soon target “upscale central-city districts, inner-ring suburbs, and even the rural heartland.” His warning was clear: White America was in danger. The response was swift and unrelenting. The media immediately exploited and sensationalized his claims.
Politicians from both parties joined to pass draconian crime bills. And the public eagerly consumed the story. The superpredator lie went viral, infecting every single institution that touches children — courts, schools, law enforcement. In the end, it robbed Black children of their youth and the protections of childhood.
But the superpredator prediction was fiction. The crime wave DiIulio predicted never materialized. Juvenile crime rates actually dropped between 1994 and 2000. Of course, that did not slow politicians who nimbly ignored that data and pushed “adult time for adult crime” legislation.
Even when DiIulio admitted being wrong about his predictions, his retraction could not dislodge this country’s already-formed assumptions that young Black males were coldblooded and dangerous. Today, virtually every state still permits middle schoolers to be prosecuted as adults, exposing them to adult punishment. The overwhelming majority of those kids are Black.
What made this superpredator story so easy to swallow — and so stubbornly intractable?
The answer is simple and damning. The superpredator myth glommed onto a deeper lie rooted in American soil and in the American psyche. A lie that insists that Black children do not deserve the care we reflexively offer white children. All that was needed was the barest of information, and our worst beliefs filled out the contours of the story.
Sadly, this lie is an American phenomenon with intergenerational effects. During slavery, white slavers separated children from their mothers because a child could garner a greater profit. This was not just profiteering. This was insisting that Black children were chattel, not human. During the Jim Crow era, white mobs lynched Black children if they dared to cross a racial boundary that white society invented and ruthlessly enforced. Again, the lesson: Black children weren’t like other children. They needed to “know their place” in the racial caste. The nation was primed to expect the disparate treatment of Black children as appropriate or deserved.
By the time the claim that Black children were predators came along, the false stories were so culturally embedded that the public accepted this newest lie without question. Dehumanizing Black children allowed Americans to withstand any tug of moral constraint as children as young as 9 were charged as adults in the criminal justice system.
Linking Black children to animal traits made them seem less human. Nazi Germany had depicted Jews as “vermin” or “rodents” to relieve the public of all feelings of sympathy or empathy. In the same way, dehumanizing language put Black children outside the boundaries of childhood and allowed this country to remain unbothered by the fact that judges were sentencing children to die in prison under sentences of life without parole.
Choosing who counts as a child is steeped in this country’s racism. When Kyle Rittenhouse, a white 17-year-old, opened fire on a street in Kenosha, Wis., killing two protesters this summer, pundits and political operatives were quick to describe him as a “little boy out there trying to protect his community.” Even when he walked past police toting a semiautomatic rifle, police did not stop or question him. A Black 17-year-old armed with a semiautomatic would not have lived to tell the story.
But Rittenhouse was not perceived as dangerous. He was seen as a child. Contrast that with Tamir Rice. Cleveland Police Dfficer Timothy Loehmann sized up Tamir, a 12-year-old boy playing with a toy gun, in a split second. He saw the boy as dangerous and shot and killed him within two seconds of getting out of his patrol car. The inability to see Tamir as a child cost him his life.
It has been a generation since the superpredator myth entered public discourse and we are still living with its pernicious effects. The justice system needs to stop referring children into the adult criminal justice system so that Black children get the benefit of the doubt instinctively given to white children.
More broadly, any racial reckoning needs to confront and check the reflex that leads us to see Black children as expendable. Maybe then we can begin to undo the untold damage of the superpredator lie. Kim Taylor-Thompson is a professor of law at NYU School of Law and chair of the board of the Equal Justice Initiative.
