Mail in the Middle East

Mail in the Middle East is routinely not delivered. Is this a cultural issue (mail in Riyadh was once dumped in the town square on the chance the crowd might know the addressee) an institutional issue (declining revenues from decreasing first class mailings) or something else? Discuss. Picture is of the main post office in Ho Chi Minh City, often erroneously attributed to Gustav Eiffel. In fact, the building was designed by French architect Alfred Foulhoux.

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Ten Tips for Going In-House

Identify your Enemy This is probably the most important. Even if you join the large in-house legal department of a mega-corporation like Exxon, there will be an enemy. While the enemy might be individual, it might also be a group. You are in competition with anyone who enters at the same time you do. Contracting departments often are at war with the legal department and if they are successful in getting you fired, it’s one for their team.

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The Dark Forest Hypothesis


So What If He Never Said It?


Manufactured Crime Wastes Law Enforcement Resources

They did it again. In the Liberty City 7 case, an FBI freelance troublemaker tried to convince a group of poor black men in Miami to blow up the Willis Tower in Chicago. The building was never at risk. The FBI and the troublemaker provided money, logistics and fake bombs. In another useless sting, Ikaika Kange, a U.S. Army soldier who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, was charged with assisting Da’esh, the Islamic State.

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A Den of Thieves

Pennsylvania’s senator Fetterman just spent nine days in the hospital. “Sheriff” Herschel Walker is out chasing criminals. Anna Luna (née Meyerhof) is an ethnic impostor. And then there’s George Santos.

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Race/Ethnicity Imposters

Anna Paulina Luna George Santos Rachel Dolezal Sherry Stanley Jimenez William Montgomery McGovern Nelson Scott Simpson Vijay Chokal Ingam Chico Colon Meridan George Herriman Gregory Markopoulos John Roland Redd Archibald Belaney Sacheen Littlefeather Sen. Elizabeth Warren Jessica Krug Jeannine Cummins

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Race/Ethnicity Imposters

Anna Paulina Luna George Santos Rachel Dolezal Sherry Stanley Jimenez William Montgomery McGovern Nelson Scott Simpson Vijay Chokal Ingam Chico Colon Meridan George Herriman Gregory Markopoulos John Roland Redd Archibald Belaney Sacheen Littlefeather Sen. Elizabeth Warren Jessica Krug Jeannine Cummins

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Plastic Money

After four days of using polypropylene currency: I don’t like it. It doesn’t fold. It only bends. It’s slippery like a register receipt. It slides out of your pocket onto the floor. I don’t want to be a Luddite. I thought I would like the new money. It doesn’t tear, and if you forget and leave bills in a pocket while doing the wash, they will be cleaned but not destroyed.

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Horizontal Space in Ulysses

If you need blank horizontal space in Ulysses, try using a UTF-8 space character. Ulysses does not strip blank space where that blank space is a UTF-8 character, like U+2004 (three em space). While this symbol cannot be generated in Ulysses–like s̵t̵r̵i̵k̵e̵t̵h̵r̵o̵u̵g̵h̵ for example–if generated in an external program and copied to Ulysses, it will both be displayed in Ulysses and upon export.

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