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</center><a href="https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_fe441f44cf9dd601476e0d2845fb4a53&ref=preparedwombat">Dr. Blight kills and kills.</a>
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</center><a href="https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_c2c2380df3c55181f6c537344d603a1b&ref=preparedwombat">Venator Kinjo earns their paycheck.</a>
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</center><a href="https://splinterlands.com?p=battle&id=sl_4d5081c76f751c8eb050058872506ed3&ref=preparedwombat">Waka vs. Yodin.</a>
Ever since the Wild/Modern split, I’ve been struggling in Silver. *Way* more strong summoners and monsters than I’d been used to. I’ve *mostly* played Modern, might have to switch to Wild instead next season *unless it’s equally hard there*. What are those of you playing Wild experiencing?
<h1>Cryptocurrency, Investing, Money, Economy, and Debt:</h1>
<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-07-21/spam-auto-warranty-robocalls-blocked-by-fcc-in-latest-order">FCC Orders End to Auto Warranty Spam Calls</a>
>The Federal Communications Commission has ordered phone companies to stop carrying traffic related to robocalls about scam auto warranties.
<a href="https://cointelegraph.com/news/epic-games-definitely-won-t-follow-minecraft-nft-ban">Epic Games ‘definitely won’t’ follow Minecraft NFT ban</a>
<a href="https://archive.ph/9qbXS">The 53 Fragile Emerging Economies</a>
>Squeezed by the high cost of food and energy, a slowing global economy and a sharp increase in interest rates around the world, emerging economies are entering an era of intense macroeconomic pain. Some countries face years of difficult budget choices and weak growth. Others may sink into economic and political crisis.
>All told, 53 countries look most vulnerable: they either are judged by the IMF to have unsustainable debts (or to be at high risk of having them); have defaulted on some debts already; or have bonds trading at distressed levels.
<h1>Coronavirus News, Analysis, and Opinion:</h1>
<a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2022/07/us-life-span-mortality-rates/670591/">America Was in an Early-Death Crisis Long Before COVID</a>
<a href="https://www.wral.com/coronavirus/covid-has-evolved-now-to-be-so-contagious-omicron-subvariant-causing-cases-to-spike-in-nc/20384709/">’COVID has evolved now to be so contagious’ Omicron subvariant causing cases to spike in NC</a>
<a href="https://healthfeedback.org/claimreview/covid-19-vaccines-reduce-risk-death-covid-19-dont-alter-dna-charlie-kirk-alex-berenson/">COVID-19 vaccines reduce the risk of death from COVID-19; the vaccines don’t alter our DNA</a>
<h1>Politics:</h1>
<a href="https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/3568914-retired-generals-admirals-in-op-ed-trumps-jan-6-actions-were-dereliction-of-duty/">Retired generals, admirals in op-ed: Trump’s Jan. 6 actions were ‘dereliction of duty’</a>
<a href="https://politicalwire.com/2022/07/22/typo-of-the-day/">Typo of the Day</a>
>“This is all heresy.” — The @HouseGOP Twitter account, which presumably meant to tweet “hearsay” during last night’s January 6 Committee hearing.
<a href="https://archive.ph/EFk9j">Russia Planning to Annex Parts of Ukraine</a>
>Russian officials and their proxies in Ukraine are racing to permanently annex occupied regions in the south of the country, probably by engineering referendums, perhaps as early as September.
>Senior officials and Kremlin propagandists on state television have warned that Russia will never leave the occupied areas of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine — home to more than 2.5 million people before the Russian invasion — and that the return of territory will not be up for negotiation should peace talks resume.
Call it a guess, but Ukraine and its western allies might have other ideas. The Kerch bridge and the Sevastopol naval base are within HIMARS range.
FWIW, <a href="https://news.yahoo.com/russia-run-steam-ukraine-british-165928788.html">Russia about to ‘run out of steam’ in Ukraine, British spy chief says</a>
>Richard Moore, chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) known as MI6, also estimated that about 15,000 Russian troops had been killed so far in its war in Ukraine, adding that was “probably a conservative estimate.”
Killed. Not *casualties*, which includes the wounded. That’s more than the 14,453 dead than the Soviets lost in nine years of fighting in Afghanistan.
<a href="https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/they-knew-all-along-gop-elites-stomached-trump-to-the-end">They Knew All Along: GOP Elites Stomached Trump To The End</a>
>Senior Republicans working in the White House, the committee’s hearings have suggested, knew exactly who Trump was and clearly understood the nature of the movement he had created: a reckless, far-right political force hell-bent on power without democratic means.
<a href="https://www.newsweek.com/south-carolina-rep-becomes-target-anti-abortion-group-after-she-advocates-1422917">Nancy Mace Becomes Target of Anti-Abortion Group</a>
<a href="https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/07/burt-jones-fani-willis-investigation-trump-crimes.html">A MAGA Candidate Is Trying to Sabotage the Investigation Into His Alleged Crimes for Trump</a>
“There have to be consequences for Donald Trump. It’s imperative if our democracy is to continue. It’s necessary if we’re to remain a free nation.” — Taegan Goddard
<a href="https://newsletters.theatlantic.com/peacefield/62d74c4e30d04800225b7346/republican-party-trump-conservatism/">What Does It Mean to Be Conservative Now?</a>
>The conservatives, in any case, have become completely un-conservative. The traditional conservative emphasis on law and order and on limited government has not held the GOP’s theocratic-nutball wing in check. The same people who decried the growth of executive power now worship a sociopathic real-estate con man as a demigod. The party that prided itself on its national-security cred is now voting against admitting Sweden and Finland into NATO like some early–20th century isolationist know-nothings.
<a href="https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/it-looks-real-real-bad">It Looks Real, Real Bad</a>
>Is it really possible that the Secret Service would purge its records of Jan. 5th and 6th and somehow not think anyone would notice or care? It seems too over-the-top and brazen even for some of the most cynical of observers. At the same time, the Secret Service’s explanation seems even more absurd.
<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/20/politics/trump-january-7-outtakes-message-supporters-house-hearing/index.html">Jan. 6 committee has outtakes of Trump’s message to supporters day after riot</a>
<a href="https://theintercept.com/2022/07/18/joe-gayle-manchin-condo-climate-canaan-valley/">Environmental Policy Joe Manchin Can Support</a>
>While upending climate legislation, Manchin directed over $15 million in federal funding to protected wetlands where the couple owns property.
<a href="https://politicalwire.com/2022/07/21/ex-prosecutor-says-trump-was-guilty/">Ex-Prosecutor Says Trump Was Guilty</a>
<a href="https://www.cnbc.com/2022/07/21/criminal-probe-opened-into-deletion-of-secret-service-jan-6-text-messages.html">Criminal Probe Opened Into Deleted Secret Service Texts</a>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">If Secret Service agents were ordered to erase texts on January 6, were they also ordered to erase Mike Pence?</p>— Middle Age Riot (@middleageriot) <a href="https://twitter.com/middleageriot/status/1550108601653633025?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 21, 2022</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<a href="https://archive.ph/lybP1">What Computer Models Say About Modern Warfare</a>
>Warfare is complex—and, as those who start wars often discover to their chagrin, unpredictable. Anything which promises to reduce that unpredictability is thus likely to attract both interest and money. Add the ability of modern computers to absorb and crunch unprecedented amounts of data, and throw in a live, data-generating war in the form of the conflict now being slugged out between Ukraine and Russia, not to mention the high level of tension across the Taiwan Strait, and you might assume that the business of trying to forecast the outcomes of conflicts is going into overdrive. Which it is.
>One piece of software dedicated to this end is the Major Combat Operations Statistical Model… based on data about 96 battles and military campaigns fought between the closing year of the first world war and the present day. When fed information about Russia’s initial push to seize Kyiv and subjugate Ukraine, which began on February 24th, the model predicted, on a scale of one to seven, ‘operational success’ scores for the attacker and defender, respectively, of two and five.
>That pretty much nailed it.
<h1>Serendipity:</h1>
<a href="https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/20/world/greenland-heat-wave-ice-melting-climate/index.html">Greenland Is Being Transformed by Climate Change</a>
<a href="https://slate.com/human-interest/2022/07/europe-heat-wave-london-record-advice-madness.html">Meltdown</a>
>London’s hottest day ever brought on madness that far exceeded the temperature.
<a href="https://www.sixthtone.com/news/1010774">When China’s Fix-Everything Hotline Breaks Down</a>
>The 12345 hotline promises a one-stop shop for government services, but its call centers are often staffed by private contractors with little power.
<a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/07/21/1112688105/beloved-monarch-butterflies-are-now-listed-as-endangered">Beloved monarch butterflies are now listed as endangered</a>
https://youtu.be/SzdCwXkyVPA
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