The Frankish Reich

You expect people to read their own links? A totally unfair double standard!

Yep, he never lost the arm. Early returns: his flame out with the Jets last year was more about the Jets than it was about Rodgers.

I'm gonna have to disagree. When you're talking about a head-on collision the force of the impact will be governed by F=ma. Force = mass x acceleration. So all other things being equal, the bigger the player, the greater the force. Of course, that's only a subset of the football collisions. But still, that always struck me as why some of the worst collisions we see are not with smaller players but with big/fast players. The classic old kickoff play with the linebacker/fullback size guys running right at each other at high speed. So ... I'm not sure the little guys have, on average, shorter careers than the bigger guys at the same position. Think of the beating the battering ram type RB takes vs. the small RB.

I'm guessing all of this nonsense started with a valid point, a rather lefty point coming from the granola faction. I learned this a long the same point a long time in an epidemiology class: in modern medicine we focus way too much on infectious disease and not enough on the leading causes of morbidity and mortality in highly developed nations. Things like cancer and heart disease, which are highly correlated with lifestyle factors. Valid point, based in large part on developed nations having largely eradicated deadly infectious diseases. (AIDS emerged in the 1980s to upset the applecart, but still.) And we did this through public health improvements (no more cholera!) and vaccination advancements. So maybe the CDC should spend more time and money on the non-infectious disease causes of morbidity/mortality. So more on diet/nutrition. More on environmental policy (which is RFK Jr.'s entry point into this hole world). More on ever "gun violence" and car crashes. Valid points. So maybe all this lifestyle stuff is really where the action is, and we can all move on from that whole infectious disease/vaccination obsession of public health. Maybe if we just let that ride and get rid of artificial dyes in our foods and eat healthier and ban glyphosate (that one remains strangely off the map thanks to the big ag lobby) and other chemicals in/on/around our foods we'll reach Peak Health and Happiness. Invalid point. It ignores the fact that we are now able to concentrate on non-infectious disease because we've been so good at eradicating a lot of infectious disease! It is the same thing as the famous stupid NYT headline: "Despite lowering crime rates, record numbers remain imprisoned." Only this time it's "Despite infectious disease deaths being way down, we still spend more on preventing infectious disease than ever." Invalid. Stupid. Illogical.

The root of the problem: RFK Jr. is not just skeptical of childhood vaccines. He is skeptical of the entire basis of infectious disease advancements since Pasteur: the germ theory of disease. Incredible that someone this stupid, this ignorant is in this position of power. https://www.wsj.com/health/rfk-jr-what-is-terrain-theory-66b4c660?mod=hp_listc_pos2 Germ theory, Kennedy wrote in his 2021 book “The Real Anthony Fauci: Bill Gates, Big Pharma, and the Global War on Democracy and Public Health,” is at the heart of his critique of American healthcare. “The ubiquity of pasteurization and vaccinations are only two of the many indicators of the domineering ascendancy of germ theory as the cornerstone of contemporary public health policy,” he wrote in the book. “A $1 trillion pharmaceutical industry pushing patented pills, powders, pricks, potions and poisons and the powerful professions of virology and vaccinology … fortifies the century-old predominance of germ theory.” In his book, Kennedy refers to Béchamp approvingly as a “miasmist”—a believer in miasma theory, which predates both germ and terrain theory. It is the belief that disease is caused by bad air, or something poisonous in the environment. There is firm consensus in the public-health community that environmental factors like air quality, as well as good nutrition, are important for good health, but these factors do not reliably protect people from getting infected by viruses.

How many manufacturing jobs have we gained since "Liberation Day?" Last I checked (before the new bad jobs report): -40,000. That's right - negative 40K.

I kept following the NBA, but I never, ever watched the Clippers, which was really easy to do in the 70s/80s/90s. And they screwed over San Diego just like they did Buffalo.

Yeah. And I'm the guy who says Josh Allen is the second coming of half-Filipino Roman Gabriel.

This injury seems to have nothing to do with bullying. But it is sad for the league since watching Caitlin is fun - for me, conjuring my very early sports memories of watching Pete Maravich - and now people like me have even one less reason to occasionally tune in.

I knew you'd enjoy the extended ... umm ... metaphor ...

Treating alien criminals (alleged alien criminals - what happens when there's a US citizen or permanent resident or economic migrant/asylum seeker on board?) like an invading army? We've never done that, and for good reason.

And a muted response from Trump. It's almost as if those BLS numbers are solid! Plus they finally got through his thick head that if he wants the Fed to cut rates, it's useful to show that the economy could use a little kick in the ass.

That emotional scar has never healed for me. McAdoo, Buff State's Randy Smith, Ernie D., John Shumate. Jack Ramsay. Damn. What could've been.

Obviously he's not the guy he was at 29 - 75 for 75 in XP! (Peyton Manning days) AND a 64 yard FG (mile high, but still), but he kicked a bit last year in Arizona and was still pretty reliable - 6 for 6 in FGs, no missed XP, long of 57. I wouldn't be shocked if he becomes our regular PK regardless of Bass's health. You can certainly make a case that even at 41 he's the best kicker we have.

For whatever reason, I love athletes who embarked on an entirely different (not connected to sports) career when their playing days were over. RIP.

And so Corey Lewandowski continues to be invited to come in Kristi's backdoor, even while he ignores the financial disclosure rules. https://www.axios.com/2025/09/05/corey-lewandowksi-trump-aide-probe-expands Here's to hoping that his probe continues to expand.

The Irish presidency is among the weakest in the world. So he may win a meaningless popularity (read: name recognition) contest.

The bogus vaccine-autism link thing just won't go away. There is still no reliable/unretracted study from anywhere that comes close to proving a causal relationship or even a strong correlation. Meanwhile, geneticists are making excellent progress. They are revealing what is no doubt an uncomfortable truth for parents of autistic children. https://medschool.ucla.edu/news-article/is-autism-genetic Autism is hereditary and therefore does run in families. A majority (around 80%) of autism cases can be linked to inherited genetic mutations. The remaining cases likely stem from non-inherited mutations. There’s no evidence that children can develop autism after early fetal development as a result of exposure to vaccines or postnatal toxins. “Everything known to cause autism occurs during early brain development,” says Dr. Geschwind. I understand the discomfort. In a way research is saying that the "fault" is in our own genetic material and not in identifying some kind of environmental (including childhood vaccines) cause. That is a difficult thing to come to terms with. But very often the truth is difficult. We only make things worse when we propose fake "solutions" like repealing school vaccine mandates so that we can have both autism and measles, or pertussis, or whatever. A hard truth is still hard.

At least he wasn't the Percy Harvin of 2024.

This could put a damper on all that Nobel Peace Prize talk.

Acting Deputy Chief of some DOJ division I've never heard of admits that any Epstein file released will redact all Republican names. That's the headline. The real story: another idiot MAGA loser promoted way above his abilities, bragging to a woman he met online. Nicely done. Oh, and this appears to be one of his Facebook pages. Horny bastard who can't keep his mouth shut. https://www.facebook.com/groups/1019468564781551/posts/8835165936545069/ Only the best.

I don't know what to make of headlines because they are not written by the article writers. They sometimes change between print and e versions. I assume they are aimed at getting clicks. Solution? Start thinking beyond the old 140 characters of a tweet or the 10 words of a headline. In other words: read. Don't passively consume.

This Florida thing is insane. How did we go from "the COVID vaccine's cost/benefit ratio swings strongly toward cost with respect to younger people" to "let's let everyone say no to all childhood vaccines for no reason whatsoever." This will not end well, particularly in a state like Florida with, yes, a huge number of recent immigrants who travel frequently to less developed countries.

Yes, because you insist on reading only the free media. You get what you pay for. Again, I would challenge anyone to read the entire NYT article and come away with anything other than "they're covering this like the ridiculous conspiracy theory that it is."