synchronoptica
one year ago: the era of AI photography (with synchronopticรฆ) plus the death of Charles Lindbergh
twelve years ago: the last of the VW T-2s
thirteen years ago: the singular roundness of the sun plus a trip through the Rheingau
fourteen years ago: assorted links to revisit
fifteen years ago: bailouts and banking secrecy
Though just another feckless executive order and virtue signalling (plus a distraction) to his base—as President Bartlett said there’s no epidemic of flag-burning in protest after entertainer Penn Jillette stirred controversy with sleight of hand trick and asks deputy chief of staff, “What if we burned a flag, not in protest, but in celebration of the very freedoms that allow us to burn a flag—the freedoms that everyone who has ever worked in this magnificent building has pledged to preserve and protect?”
—and against the 1989 landmark supreme court decision that affirmed such actions as protected speech under the first amendment, the Trump administration has directed officials in the justice department to prosecute flag burning in a way that does not violate the constitution, directing the attorney general to prioritise laws against desecration in connection with other crimes to allow for revocation of visas and deportation of foreign nationals, promising jail time for the offence and suggesting loss of citizenship. Describing the act as “uniquely offensive and provocative,” Trump has always had a particular preoccupation with such acts (see above case protecting “fighting words”)—whilst rubbish the principles behind it—and when a regime tells one what flags cannot be burned, it will next tell one which flags cannot be waved. Creeping—nay galloping—despotism aside, those who insist a symbol is sacrosanct and inviolable also keep it off their crappy merchandise. “Did you go to law school?” “No, clown school.”
After exhumation and reinterment with honours befitting, the mortal remains of Richard III, the last English monarch killed in combat—on 22 August 1485 during the Battle of Bosworth Field, the final skirmish of the Wars of the Roses—and the last Yorkish ruler of the Plantagenet dynasty, discovered (see also) on this day in 2012 beneath a parking garage on the site of the former Greyfriars friary in Leicester, were confirmed following an extensive and exhaustive scientific battery of tests that built solid consensus over the identity of the skeleton. 
The original tomb in the care of a Franciscan brotherhood lost with the Dissolution of the Monasteries and subsequent subdivisions of land and modern development, and triangulating historical records, forensic archaeology (the remains showed evidence of severe scoliosis and a deadly blunt wound to the back of the skull as well as other posthumous “humiliation injuries” consistent with the king’s disposition), radio-carbon dating as well as mitochondrial DNA lineages of descendants. Excavation and studies were granted on condition that if Richard was found, his remains were to stay in Leicester, given a place in the cathedral. A legal controversy followed this condition with counter-claimants proposing alternate sites proposed deemed more in keeping with tradition, like Westminster Abbey or York Minster, though the courts eventually, after much consideration, recused themselves—judging they had no say in public matters having had exercised their due diligence, absent a last will and testament. Reburial ceremonies took place during the last week of March 2015 with a requiem mass and a prayer for all souls fallen in battle and distant relative Benedict Cumberbatch read a poem for the service with special Latin missals composed for the occasion.
many happy returns: belated happy blogoversaries to Miss Cellania and Art for Housewives
then they took him and brought him to a meeting of the areopagus: Peter Thiel’s lecture series sponsored by Acts XVII Collective
oh the huge manatee: dugongs are making a return to the South China Sea after being declared functionally extinct
cavlinball court: Justic Kentanji Brown Jackson has a name for her lawless SCOTUS
no brat, no hot girl, no barbenheimer: trudging through the exhausting Summer of Nothing
sadopopulism: Trump and the Marquis
diastros, emergencia, ruin: a weather spot from The Fast Show, a BBC2 sketch comedy airing from 1994 to 1997
synchronoptica
one year ago: assorted links worth the revisit (with synchronopticรฆ) plus a visit to Hermannsfeld
fourteen years ago: junk drawers and stockpiling
fifteen years ago: a medical scare
Via Damn Interesting, we are treated to a slide show of Kodachrome colour plates (see also), likely souvenirs from an unnamed nurse stationed at the 97th US General Army Hospital in Frankfurt circa 1952 
to 1953 just as West Germany was rebuilding from the war—a sprawling medical campus first used during the Berlin Airlift and since become the grounds of the consulate general. Images from this individual’s tours of West Germany feature the most some of the most photogenic shooting locations for postcard snapshots from Frankfurt, Wรผrzburg (including scenes from the Saint Killian parade), Rothenburg ob der Tauber as well as places unknown, just passing through, the obligatory grand tour whilst in Germany whether one’s stay is short or long. Much more at the links above.
de minimis: new US tariff confusion has many European shipping companies suspending deliveries to the United States—see previously
o tu illustrata: the 1988 David Lynch produced album of Jocelyn Montgomery performing Hildegard von Bingen compositions—see previously here and here
thank you for your attention to this matter: Gavin Newson can perhaps ape despots so well because they’re not all that different
optical illusion: if you stare at this circle for long enough, it becomes a red dot
sometimes easy, sometimes hard: reflecting on the legacy of post-punk hit Deluxe by Harmonia half-a-century on—via Feuilleton
labirinti di immagini: fifteenth century Italian architect Francesco Segala pioneered the picture maze
entartete kunst: Trump orders a purge of diversity narratives at the Smithsonian
uptown top ranking: a reggae one-hit wonder from duo Althea and Donna
never let a crisis go unexploited: like the Dole fruit company in Hawaii or the supposed car-jacking in DC that led to its takeover, the US will capitalise on the protest of a newborn being removed from her Greenlandic mother for welfare reasons as the excuse to annex it
synchronoptica
one year ago: a quick weekend get-away (with synchronopticรฆ) plus the Formosa Straits crisis of 1958
thirteen years ago: travel bumper stickers
seventeen years ago: designed obsolescence
Like pictures of the Moon, I usually expect instances of the above phenomenon (coined and introduced by Karl Ludwig Kahlbaum during his directorship of the mental hospital in Gรถrlitz from the Greek ฯฮฑฯฮฌ and ฮตแผดฮดฯฮปฮฟฮฝ, substitute form of pattern or facial detection (previously) never to translate well to the camera from my mind’s eye so was surprised to see again this distinguished moustachioed chappy hanging among the leaves and branches at sundown as I had remembered him—whereas even whilst looking at them, most faces or fossils conjured up in trees, rough surfaces (called mimetoliths) and shadows are fleeting and transitory at best, very like a cloud—forced perspective and state of mind being and focus being likewise escaping. What sorts of creative, imaginative landscapes are your favourites?
With the death of a monster like James Dobson whom advocated for corporal punishment to reenforce an inverted, hollow and self-serving Christian ideology through a lens of pseudo-psychology and encouraging behaviour that left religious-cum-political scars on a generation, Metafilter directs us to relatively recent debate and legislation in Japan that would classify forced indoctrination and participation in sectarian activities as child-abuse. 
The impetus for the change was fomented by the assassination of former Prime Minster Shinzo Abe by an individual with a history of complaints with controversial cult the Unification Church back at the end of 2022 and has since gained momentum with additional sponsors in the Diet. Of course the US is more interested in grooming in general, peddling the cult of MAGA conservatism and preaching the gospel of prosperity theology (at the expense of spiritual poverty or bankruptcy—concept image courtesy of Takashi Mifune) and although with a deficit of hegemonial cachet Russian too, if such a stance were adopted elsewhere, it could end the vicious cycle of hand-me-down prejudice, superstition and revival abuse that upholds not only evangelicalism but capitalism as well in only a few years, although the counter-forces are strong and well funded, rife with distraction and undermining choice in the same breath as they rubbish expertise.
