Friday, October 18, 2024

Reading archive 2024-10-18 pt 1

Yahya Sinwar, architect of Hamas massacre in Israel, is killed: After years in Israeli prisons, he used his hard-line influence in Gaza to build Hamas into a powerful militia force against Israel.

A novel path to affordable housing in D.C.: Lawsuit, then settlement: The city’s Office of Attorney General announced a settlement that requires the owner of a troubled building in Shaw to keep apartment building affordable — or pay millions more.

Artificial nests can help endangered penguins breed, but design matters: Researchers assessed artificial nests made from four different materials to see which would help boost the population of endangered African penguins the most. - "Natural African penguin nests were historically created using burrows dug into accumulated bird droppings known as guano, Pichegru said. However, the nests were largely removed by humans in the 1800s and 1900s due to the practice of harvesting guano, which was used for fertilizer."

Man arrested for threatening FEMA workers speaks out: William Jacob Parsons, 44, defended his alleged actions at a Federal Emergency Management Agency site in storm-battered Lake Lure, N.C. - "Parsons said he was motivated by social media reports claiming that FEMA was withholding supplies from hurricane victims in western North Carolina. Such false claims are part of a wave of misinformation that has hampered hurricane recovery efforts across the Southeast.

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"On Facebook, Parsons expressed support for Trump and espoused far-right, anti-government and anti-vaccination views and conspiracy theories, according to The Post’s review of dozens of publicly available posts made between 2018 and 2022." [ed. note: there's a fucking shock]

Between the Border and the Wall: Expanding the border wall in South Texas would leave more U.S. land in limbo - "At some locations, the wall has been placed as far as two miles away from the Rio Grande, leaving thousands of acres in the liminal space between the border and the barrier.

"The land is mostly farms and fields, but there are homes, historic churches and entire neighborhoods essentially cut off from the rest of the United States. A Washington Post analysis of U.S. Customs and Border Protection planning documents shows that the completion of the wall in the lower Rio Grande Valley would leave more than 100 square miles of U.S. territory — an area five times the size of Manhattan — on the wrong side of the divide.

...

"The project in Texas was different. The Rio Grande forms roughly two-thirds of the 1,954-mile U.S.-Mexico border. The land along the river has long been valuable — unlike most of the borderland farther west — because it has water access. Many parcels in Texas consist of narrow slivers of land running perpendicular to the river, allowing owners to draw water for cattle or crops."

Opinion Harris ought to send Bret Baier flowers for that Fox News interview: Harris’s combative interview with the Fox News anchor displayed her qualities -- and facts

This American fruit could outcompete apples and peaches on a hotter planet: The resilient, native fruit has a cult following and could be small farms’ hedge against climate change in a fast-warming world

Here’s how the Smithsonian Zoo grows bamboo for its pandas: At a 3,200-acre facility in rural Virginia, the zoo harvests over 13,000 bamboo stalks a year. The process is now ramping up for the new pandas, Bao Li and Qing Bao.

Can Trump and Harris turn out the voters they need? A key county has clues.: Northampton County, Pa., which went for Obama, then Trump, then Biden as part of a 100-year track record of almost always voting for the winner, shows the challenges both candidates are confronting.

Va.’s AG accused an election worker of corruption. She’s suing him back.: The office of Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares did not immediately return a request for comment Thursday.

Plan for more housing exposes a schism in a deep-blue Maryland county: Montgomery County officials want to allow denser housing in single-family zones. Opponents call it a “betrayal.”

Amazon doubles down on nuclear energy with deal for small reactors: The cloud computing and retail giant signed a deal to buy electricity generated by small modular nuclear reactors.

Montana ranger comes forward with account of Sheehy gun incident: Candidate says he was shot in Afghanistan; ranger witness to gun incident questions that account

Obama’s fears about Trump drive his stepped-up campaigning: Associates say the rallies are cathartic for the former president as he joins a Harris-Trump battle that could reflect on his own legacy.

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