(12. 254)

synchronoptica

one year ago: 1984’s inaugural TED (with synchronoptica), Chinese name connotations on US ballots, best acting over a landline and other Oscar categories that should exist plus assorted links to revisit

seven years ago: a seventeenth century treatise on sign language plus a German language version of America’s national anthem

eight years ago: the Washington Post adopts a new motto, Colin’s barn plus more links to enjoy

nine years ago: a strange sound during Apollo X, a fifth suite for playing cards plus a 3D printer for the International Space Station

ten years ago: more on Pope Urban II’s crusade plus the origins of hold muzak

star turn (12. 253)

Via the always engrossing Things Magazine, we are directed towards the vexing but useful author and astrologer of German extraction employed by MI5’s Special Operations Executive—an agency established by Churchill best known for sabotage and helping the resistance in occupied territories—Louis De Wohl (having changed it from Ludwig von Wohl when he fled Berlin) for psyops purposes during the darkest days of World War II. Despite his reputation as a vain and flamboyant “bumptious seeker after notoriety,” as one of his handlers described him and a real risk to compromising the security service’s mission through his indiscretion and high opinion of himself, officials were persuaded that his horoscopes might be an effective way to influence Hitler and his advisors. Dispatching De Wohl on a US lecture tour in 1941—already a figure of certain renown as a dozen of his early books were adapted as films from the late 1920s to the mid 1930s (mostly crime and romance novels, after his spy career, De Wohl continued writing but mostly hagiographies of the saints, following his conversion to Catholicism), Britain wagered that American audiences might be more receptive to and sympathetic for these fringe believes and might bolster public endorsement for joining the war effort. While there was certainly occult elements of the Nazi regime, Hitler’s confidence in and reliance for signs in the stars and cadre of astrologers was an elaborate fabrication, supported by the press to make De Wohl’s predictions seem accurate with supernatural corroboration on the part of the media, even reviving a German defunct horoscope newsletter (edited by De Wohl) and surreptitiously distributed in the country. Not foreseen though the propaganda campaign seemed to be paying off with American attitudes more accepting of such beliefs (see also here and here), the attack on Pearl Harbor rendered the efforts redundant, and recognising the potency of his charisma and power to influence the superstitious, De Wohl was quietly retired, the extent of the operation not revealed until 2008 in a document release from the National Archives.

bullet points (12. 252)

As an encore to the stochastic terrorism being unleashed on the US federal workforce following thousands of probationary period employees being illegally fired and a milquetoast reception to the original threat of deferred resignation, DOGE (at the urging of Trump to ramp things up) has issued another mass-email on Saturday to some two million civil service employees requesting a list of five things that they accomplished this past week. Responses are due Monday at midnight with one’s supervisor courtesy-copied. Aside being unlawful, desperate and a sign of overplaying one’s hand, it’s agonising in regards of crafting an acceptable list and I am sure that far more time will be spend in commiseration and consultation on how to justify one’s work as an organisation, further taking away from productivity in the name of greater efficiency after a week of increased workload due to chronic understaffing, bidding a tearful farewell to those being purged, the chaos of the hiring freeze, manoeuvring the return-to-office mandate with inadequate desk space and general doom-scrolling about what comes next. If we are made to submit the bullet points, I am sure the follow-up abusive email will be a loyalty test, if the termination notices don’t come first. Not sure if mass non-compliance or malicious compliance is best but I can think of some recommended answers: “Supported and defended the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic,” or in the vein of wrong answers only “Did a DEI,” “spent forty-hours correcting maps and globes with a sharpie to read ‘Gulf of America,’” “Did a tonne of ketamine,” “Played golf and danced on stage with a chainsaw.”

performance review (12. 251)

The Pentagon relieved of duty several top officers including Admiral Lisa Franchetti as Chief of Naval Operations, General James Slife of the Air Force and chair of joint chiefs of staff General CQ Brown, Jr, whom Trump himself appointed for leadership role within that branch of the armed services back in August of 2020, making him the second Black individual to rise to such a position after Colin Powell, as “DEI-hires.” The removal of respected and experienced military officers fulfils a campaign pledge to purge the ranks of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and the then nominee for Secretary of Defence’s promise to oust any one involved in “in any of that DEI work shit.” While praised for his leadership and role in deterring China in the Indo-Pacific, Brown—who was visiting troops stationed at the US southern border at the time of his firing, became in the eyes of the incoming administration ideologically suspect in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, releasing a video addressing the impact of racism in the military and his own lived experience within the elite cadre of jet fighters and was involved in a nationwide reckoning of racial relations and reconciliation—see previously. Within moments, the administration announced the appointment of Lieutenant General Dan “Razin” Caine, a retired F16 pilot, whom Trump had previously praised without context or evidence for playing an instrumental role in the destruction of the ISIS Caliphate and was unfairly passed over for promotion due to affirmative action. At the same time, a budgetary realignment was announced, redirecting eight percent of funding per year from non-mission-essential programmes to invest in Trump’s posture and defence priorities—not a cut in funding of fifty billion dollars—but rather creating “the biggest, most badass militiary on the planet—on God’s green Earth.”

synchronoptica

one year ago: drunkonyms (with synchronoptica) 

seven years ago: GLOMAR response, assorted links worth revisiting, a universal bestiary, missing pet posters as art, nineteenth century board games plus a Nazi resistance group

eight years ago: a memorial to heroic self-sacrifice, more extremophiles, a delightful Japanese tourism campaign, demoting Pluto plus technology and populism

nine years ago: the animations of Guillaume Kurkdjian 

ten years ago: the superpower of barnacles plus more links to enjoy

piscina mirabilis (12. 250)

Via Messy Nessy Chic (not attributing the source as it’s Faebook—sorry, no thanks) we are turned toward the “wonderous pool,” an ancient cistern in the Gulf of Naples, given its epithet by the poet Petrarch (previously) during a visit in the fourteenth century. Built under the order of Octavian to provide water to the naval fleet of the port of Misenum (Miseno in Bacoli). Engineered as a cathedral and hewn out of tufa, the monumental reservoir held some twelve million litres of potable water, five Olympic sized swimming pools. Exploration of the underground chambers reveals Tyndall scattering due to the incoming light interacting with the fine suspension of moisture or other filters to propagate blue hues further, ultimately illuminating how the chemical elements express themselves chromatically. Private property but accessible to the public, restoration of the cistern has been carried out from 1926 to the present day.

sink full of insects (12. 249)

Via Web Curios, we introduced to another vintage digital demesne (previously) called NobodyHere, an enigmatic online diary began in 1998 that has grown into web of interactive stories that are still maintained and with irregular new entries. There were—and are still a few—forever-places out there on the internet and not curated just as a succession of platforms, geocities, mySpace, but imagine how many might have not been forsaken, abandoned for the ease and instant dopamine hit of engagement of social media, so many house-proud and vibrant, independent domains with caretakers literate in their architecture and up-keep. There’s no site-map for this labyrinth but a bit of an explainer in the form of a video disclosure from the author.

a moderately successful comedian (12. 248)

After launching a litany of lies about his Ukrainian counterpart, including calling Zelenskyy a dictator and blaming him for starting the war (this reframing of reality echoes the mass amnesia of the first term, the insistence that the 2020 election was stolen, repackaging the January Sixth insurrection as a peaceful protest, etc, etc, and many believe or have moved on) and his bilateral talks with Putin to the exclusion of Ukraine and Europe and already conceding to Russia its objective—slights and insults bolstered by apologist that urge Zelenskyy to tone down his bad-mouthing and accept the altered deal for five-hundred billion dollars in mineral wealth not as protection money (much of the deposits that the US is eying are located in Russian-occupied territory) but rather as repayment for support already rendered—Trump has now issued an ultimatum to European leaders reportedly that unless they sign off to the terms of Ukraine’s “surrender” (not status quo ante bellum but rather to freeze fighting and ceded captured territory and abandon aspirations to join NATO and possibly the EU), the US will withdraw from the continent—see previously here and here. As insidious as the above capitulation is, Russia’s ultimate objective is to have the United States turn its back on Europe and render NATO meaningless or at least narrowed, which Trump also seems ready and willing to add to the bargain.

synchronoptica

one year ago: more on constrained writing (with synchronoptica), a banger from Phil Collins and Philip Baley, geometry teaching aids plus a banger from the Four Seasons

seven years ago: the Louvre apartments plus more Lunar New Year traditions

eight years ago: the subtextual meaning of fascinating plus a mall solicits for a writer-in-residence

nine years ago: remembrance and semiotics, laser-pointers a risk to aircraft plus fractals and Hilbert Curves

ten years ago: a new look for the blog, a vintage Greek map of North America plus sending forces vehicle tags

verkehrshaus der schweiz (12. 247)

Delightfully, we discover courtesy of Present /&/ Correct that the Swiss Museum of Transport in Luzern has a wing (Halle Strassen-verkehr) clad in street signs. One of the most popular exhibitions in the country (see also), the museum campus features displays of historic railroad engines, automotive exhibits (with tunnels and mountain passes), cable cars, maritime navigation and aerospace, including the European Retrievable Carrier (EURECA) an uncrewed science laboratory, one of the few satellites successfully deorbited and returned to the Earth undamaged.