by JanieM
Surely it's time for something completely different.
I went to an event tonight featuring the authors of the recently published book Proving Einstein Right: The Daring Expeditions that Changed How We Look at the Universe. The book was written by S. James Gates, professor of physics and math at Brown (among various other simultaneous careers) and Maine novelist Cathie Pelletier. They worked on this book together for IIRC five years, and only met each other in person about a month ago.
It’s a long story, and I didn’t take notes, but the gist is something like this: Cathie Pelletier ran across some old typed interviews of people, or people who were related to people, who were involved in the quest to test Einstein’s theory of gravity by tracking starlight during a total eclipse of the sun. Then she saw this commercial, and emailed Jim Gates out of the blue with her idea for a book about the whole thing. And thus this amazing collaboration was born.
I haven’t read the book yet but will pick it up next time I'm at B&N. I'm looking forward to dipping back into some physics for non-physicists – I haven’t done that for a long time.
Cathie’s novels are great too – sweet and funny and down to earth, a nice (and hopeful) antidote to real life as we're currently experiencing it. Most of them are set in the fictional town of Mattagash, Maine, modeled on the town of Allagash, waaaayyyyy up north, where Cathie grew up and is now living again after many decades and adventures elsewhere.
For the record, the eclipse where Dyson and Eddison finally proved that gravity deflected light was in 1919, 100 years ago this past May.
Open thread.
The likelihood that Trump ran numbers is pretty low, but of course everyone understood that piece description.
I was not aware that anyone had suggested that Trump ran numbers. (I.e. an illegal lottery.) Conned a lot of people, yes. Stiffed a lot of small contractors? That, too. But not running numbers. Where did that come from?
Posted by: wj | November 13, 2019 at 07:38 PM
It came from the paragraph where Marty called Obama a grifter.
Marty is saying that so long as he makes a figurative aside about Trump, his entire case against Obama can be a lie.
Posted by: Pro Bono | November 13, 2019 at 07:59 PM
I have a hard time lately understanding what Marty is saying, at least not more specifically than “Democrats suck, especially Obama.”
Posted by: hairshirthedonist | November 13, 2019 at 08:30 PM
Godspeed to the impeachment inquiry. Let's get this over and done, send it to the Senate so they can do whatever the hell they are going to do with it, and then move on.
Get the freaking vote out in 2020 and crush the (R)'s like bugs. Trump or no Trump. Kick their @sses. They won't understand anything other than utter humiliating defeat.
Persuadable swing voters are, I think, gonna have to figure all of this out for themselves. Anything I do or say is just gonna be Another Liberal Hating On Trump, so other than here and with a very small circle of friends and family, I just don't talk about it.
Slightly more than half of eligible voters voted in 2016. Get the damned vote out and this problem will right itself.
That is all.
Posted by: russell | November 13, 2019 at 09:29 PM
key point: Obama didn't swindle anybody.
other than that: spot on
Posted by: cleek | November 13, 2019 at 09:34 PM
it seems like what we have here is that the GOP has decide its new rhetorical strategy is: anything anyone has accused Trump of must be turned back on the left [do not bother seeing if it makes sense]. Trump's a grifter? no, Obama is a grifter! Trump is pursuing electoral shenanigans in Ukraine? no, Clinton was!
it explains at least 50% of Nunes' rantings.
Posted by: cleek | November 13, 2019 at 09:38 PM
I was not aware that anyone had suggested that Trump ran numbers.
how many casinos did Trump bankrupt?
Posted by: cleek | November 13, 2019 at 09:40 PM
how many casinos did Trump bankrupt?
But that was swindling** the investors. Whereas running numbers would swindle the gamblers.
** Although I suppose you could argue that, rather than being swindled, they were just victims of Trump's massive incompetence.
Posted by: wj | November 13, 2019 at 10:15 PM
the GOP has decide its new rhetorical strategy is: anything anyone has accused Trump of must be turned back on the left
It is a characteristic of Trump that he invariably accuses opponents of his own glaring faults. It’s a reflex.
The party of Trump has slavishly assumed the playground habit.
Posted by: Nigel | November 14, 2019 at 12:30 AM
Imo the degree of that has just increased under Trumpy Gumby but it was already SOP before.
Posted by: Hartmut | November 14, 2019 at 01:35 AM
Swiftboating
Posted by: Pro Bono | November 14, 2019 at 07:06 AM
just increased under Trumpy Gumby but it was already SOP before.
True, but with Trump, it's clearly ingrained from childhood, rather than a strategy.
Posted by: Nigel | November 14, 2019 at 09:03 AM
Swiftboating
A pretty perfect example, given Dubya's absurd military swanking when seen in the context of his actual "military" experience.
Posted by: Girl from the North Country | November 14, 2019 at 09:08 AM
"silly ride y'all are allowing Marty to take you on."
The Adventures of Spin and MARTY:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-aK47tMlGE
He passed the audition.
"Obama was a fancy grifter, a top notch long con guy. He is the kind of crook that Leo plays in a movie."
Leo? In blackface? Figures.
Poitier, Jamie, and Denzel not available?
Fancy, was he? Tan suit got yer conservative hernia belt in a twist you wear for all that pro-Trump conservative heavy-lifting you heft round here?
At least Obama could make dem ponies do dose tricks up the asses of the pollution-loving, racist, payday-lending, corrupt, Armenian-murdering, McConnell obstructionist plantation masters you elect:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O7gaOLwxGY&t=2s
Posted by: John D. Thullen | November 14, 2019 at 10:57 AM