Michigan vs. Wisconsin Football

On Saturday, September 21, at noon EST, in Madison, Wisconsin, the Michigan Wolverines will play the Wisconsin Badgers in a college football match. At the time of this writing, Michigan, my alma mater, is a 3.5 point underdog. Michigan has lost the last four games it played in Madison. Although the Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh has restored the program to respectability and brought in more money, he hasn't really had many signature wins, especially on the road. Michigan hasn't looked very good this year with some mistakes against Middle Tennessee and an overtime dogfight against Army. 

That's not why Harbaugh was hired. He was hired to smash Michigan State into irrelevance, beat Ohio State, win the Big Ten Championship, and compete for National Championships. Harbaugh hasn't done those things yet, although he's paid as if he has. Harbaugh's teams at Michigan have done well but they have lapses in intensity and concentration at precisely the wrong times. Occasionally they can be left in the dust by speedier teams or punched in the mouth by stronger teams.

Unfortunately, Wisconsin may be one of those stronger teams. No one has scored on Wisconsin yet this year. Of course beating the snot out of South Florida and Central Michigan doesn't exactly make Wisconsin a champion contender but it IS what a strong program is supposed to do to a weaker program, which is more than I can say for Michigan at this point. I hope that Michigan was just playing down to their opponents as they are sometimes prone to do. Because I really don't care to hear from Wisconsin fans for another year or realize that yet again a Big 10 championship is out of Michigan's reach.

Book Reviews: Golden Prey

Golden Prey
by John Sandford

This is an installment in a series. If I had known that before I made the decision to purchase it, I may not have bought the book. I usually like to start at the beginning. However, in this case, having read the book I'm glad I did purchase it. Ironically, after getting a strong sense of deja vu while reading the book, I later discovered that I have a few other books in this series. Go figure.

This book was just under 400 pages in hardcover but these days that's short for a novel. I didn't think the story dragged at any point though there were certainly some characters I enjoyed reading about more than others. This book is not lightweight in any pejorative sense of the word. But it is good reading if you are stuck somewhere without anything intellectually stimulating. So if you must spend a few hours in an airport, an auto dealership, a hospital lounge or somewhere similar you could do worse than to have this book by your side. 

One of my cousins got me started watching some of the true crime shows on the cable network Investigation Discovery. This book was like one of those shows put in print. And I very much mean that as a compliment. Lucas Davenport is a former Minnesota cop who saved the life and political career of some national bigshots, including a former first lady who is running for President. He's also wealthy. Cashing in some chips, and still protected and watched over by aforementioned political big shots, Lucas has transferred from the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Investigation to the US Marshals service. 

Unusually, in deference to his good deeds and his intelligence, Lucas has been granted the authority to choose his own cases. He also doesn't really have to report to the local US Marshal chief.

Woman Bites Other Woman's Face and Ear in Sexual Assault

No means no, right? That is a ubiquitous and correct message that everyone should hear and understand today. You can ask whoever for whatever but if he or she declines your generous offer then that's it. Move on to someone else. Unfortunately one Allison Weaver, a South East Michigan woman, appears not to have taken that common cultural message to heart. It is important to understand that no means no. It is also important to remember that contrary to some other ubiquitous messaging, not all of the violent sex criminals out there are men.

The Oakland County Sheriff was called to the Lake Village Apartments on Norfolk in Rochester Hills around 1:30 Tuesday morning. A neighbor on the first floor reported hearing someone moaning and calling for help. When deputies arrived, they also heard someone calling for help and entered the upstairs apartment. That's where they said they found two partially naked women in a bedroom, covered in blood.

Deputies say one of the woman had numerous bite marks on her face and other facial injuries, and that part of her left ear was bitten off. The other woman, now identified as Weaver, was hovering over the victim and that they were lying on the floor, deputies said. The victim, a 48-year-old woman of Rochester Hills, was taken to the hospital for treatment.

Birds are Disappearing

At first I thought the numbers in the below article were off. But apparently the numbers are accurate.  What if modern life as we experience it in the so-called First World is actually not good for humans and other living beings?

What if that modern life, which is being eagerly sought after by billions of people in China, Africa, India and other so-called Third World regions or countries is incompatible with continued human existence? If one-third of wild birds have vanished then what replaces their previous role in the world's life cycle? And what impact will that replacement have on us all?

Nearly one-third of the wild birds in the United States and Canada have vanished since 1970, a staggering loss that suggests the very fabric of North America’s ecosystem is unraveling.

The disappearance of 2.9 billion birds over the past nearly 50 years was reported today in the journal Science, a result of a comprehensive study by a team of scientists from seven research institutions in the United States and Canada. As ornithologists and the directors of two major research institutes that directed this study, even we were shocked by the results. We knew of well-documented losses among shorebirds and songbirds. 

Antibiotics are losing their effectiveness

The problem with getting better at overcoming a problem is that often times the problem evolves and adapts. This has been the case with antibiotic usage. 

Although antibiotics are literally lifesavers, assisting our immune systems  to defeat some very nasty infections, many infections (fungi and bacteria) have evolved to resist and become immune to the antibiotics and antifungals. They've done this very quickly as humans count time but perhaps not as bacteria and fungi count time. 

One reason for this problem is that people across the world (this problem is evidently most acute in South Asia) have overused antibiotics and antifungals in a wide variety of circumstances. So we're seeing more of these organisms shrug off our best attempts at killing them. It's as if prisoners started developing immunity to small arms fire. Such a thing would be an unwelcome surprise to prison guards tasked to stop breakouts.

Check out the fascinating nine minute video below which explains the dire situation we're in and how worse may be yet to come. As pointed out in the video some other reasons that this situation exists include the requirements of globalized capital and an unnatural food supply chain. There is nothing supernatural here but this is nonetheless a very real horror show.

Michigan Prosecutor Sleeps with Rape Victim

You would imagine that most prosecutors of sex crimes would be focused on making sure that justice was done and that the perpetrator of the crime was justly punished. 

You would imagine that a prosecutor would not have to be told that his or her job is to put away the bad guys (gals) and not, repeat not, to get nookie from the victim of the crime. You would imagine that. But for at least one prosecutor in Michigan you would be wrong. 

LANSING — Michigan State Police have launched a criminal investigation into an assistant attorney general who has been accused of having an inappropriate, intimate relationship with the victim in a rape case he was prosecuting. Brian Kolodziej, who was hired in September 2018 under former Attorney General Bill Schuette, was put on administrative leave and subsequently resigned last week after the relationship came to light, said Attorney General Dana Nessel.

“To say I’m horrified and disgusted is really an understatement,” she said. “In over 25 years of practice, I have never before even heard of a situation like this.” Nessel wouldn’t provide details of the situation because it’s still under investigation, but noted that she learned of it after a complaint was filed with State Police. All of the cases handled by Kolodziej will be reviewed by the Attorney General’s Office to make sure defendants received due process.

Representative Rashida Tlaib, Netanyahu and Trump

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, at the alleged behest of President Donald Trump, recently barred US Representatives Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar from visiting Israel and the Palestinian occupied territories. Tlaib and Omar are decidedly pro-Palestinian and pro-justice. 

The Representatives do not agree that Jewish people in Israel should have more rights than the Palestinians. It is possible that Netanyahu was going to ban them anyway and Trump just gave him political cover to do so. 

After the uproar Israel cynically agreed to allow Rep. Tlaib to visit her grandmother in the West Bank but only if she agreed in writing to not say or do anything critical of Israel during her time there. Desperate to see her grandmother, Tlaib briefly acceded to this humiliating condition, but faced with outrage by some relatives, constituents and supporters on this issue, Tlaib  stood strong and refused to adhere to Israeli speech restrictions.

"In my attempt to visit Palestine, I’ve experienced the same racist treatment that many Palestinian-Americans endure when encountering the Israeli government. In preparation for my visit, my grandmother was deciding which fig tree we would pick from together, while Palestinians and Israelis who are against the illegal military occupation were looking forward to Members of Congress finally listening to and seeing them for the first time.