Afternoon Tea 5.4.21 - Behavior Smuggling

Biden does what he’s pressed to do, Yang continues his pantomime, Pandora stops using mined diamonds, Apple & Facebook shenanigans, and MDMA’s Phase III trial went so well it should be the only approved treatment for PTSD It’s Tuesday May 4th 2021, and this is your New Republic Tea.

US: Joe Biden raises refugee cap after backlash (DW) & For Blinken it’s personal (Politico) A combination of Sec. State Blinken’s stepmother being a refugee who fled Hungary in 1950, and the refrain from the election “Yell at old men until they do what we tell them to do” looks to have done the impossible, lifting the annual refugee cap to 62,500 this year. Biden previously claimed there wasn’t the political will to lift the cap above the Trump-set 15,000, but people dug in, and an unqualified good step forward happened.

Yang describes himself as a serial entrepreneur, but he often worked for someone else (Politico) & Andrew Yang Promised to Create 100,000 Jobs. He Ended Up With 150 (NY Times) Can we please not have another meme mayor? Bloomberg was bad enough, but at least he did research into the things he eventually wrong-headedly pushed forward on. I can summarize Yang’s platform best with “Great, as long as there are absolutely no follow up questions.” His asks belie a total lack of familiarity both with NYC and what makes NYC different than other big cities and big corporations.

Jeweler Pandora Takes Ethical Stand Against Mined Diamonds (Bloomberg) Not only are lab-grown diamonds cheaper than mined ones, they have this handy advantage of not being soaked in blood. Tiffany & Co is providing something equivalent to Fair Trade info on their diamonds, but I assume even that has a time limit.

MAPS’ Phase 3 Trial of MDMA-Assisted Therapy for PTSD Achieves Successful Results for Patients with Severe, Chronic PTSD (MAPS) In my opinion, this is the most important news of the year besides the vaccine. The data on this is so spectacular, when it is finally approved, MDMA will be the most effective treatment for PTSD on the market, by head and shoulders. In a 90 person trial, 2 out of 3 saw symptom reductions so significant, they no longer qualified for a PTSD diagnosis. Almost 90% saw real, meaningful reductions in their PTSD symptoms.

Apple runs App Store with 78% profit margin, according to court testimony (9to5Mac) The discovery process in the Apple vs. Epic trial re: App Store monopoly pricing looks to be steaming along. And boy that kind of cut doesn’t look good to judges. But given the tactics Epic is engaging in, looks like bad behavior all around.

Facebook and Instagram threaten to charge for access on iOS 14.5 unless you give them your data (iMore) Remember those lies about Facebook Gold? They’re back, in iPhone form! For anyone who isn’t sure, Facebook & Instagram are now possibly violating Apple App Store rules, which expressly forbid apps from offering incentives for allowing FB or IG to track you on iOS 14.

Tigger costume stolen, birthday party entertainer punched in dispute over face painting (Buffalo News) Buffalo gonna Buffalo. What’s so sad is that they just threw the Tigger costume into a dumpster. The only thing I can think of is the exact inverse of this, from a highway in Russia:

Do You Know Where Your Grilling Charcoal Comes From? (Apocalypse Soon - TNR) If Hank Hill & I knew that Nigeria lost almost 50% of its forests between 2007 and 2017 to charcoal production before today, we’d be a lot louder about propane and propane accessories.

US Air Force flight in Mideast uses call sign ‘Pickle Rick” (Associated Press) “I’m a mid-air refueling plane Morty! I help America rain death across the Middle East ::Burp:: Morty!” (Editor’s Note: We promise the writer will be getting more sunshine soon.)

The Lanham Act and Universal Childcare During World War II (Friends of the National WWII Memorial) I was today years old when I learned that the USA did have universal/national childcare, back during WWII. $20 million in grants for child care services were given, to allow women and mothers to enter the labor force to increase war manufacturing. Equivalent to $1 billion today, at its peak, 130,000 children were enrolled, with over half a million kids getting some care from Lanham Act funded programs by the end of the war.

Song of the Tea: This will be one of the songs that gets repeated on the Tea. At least once a year during May the 4th, Revenge of the 6th, or something like that. Bonobo was given licensed Star Wars SFX, along with a dozen other artists. Instead of some goofy EDM, he made…something hauntingly beautiful.

Through Passion I gain Strength. Through Strength I gain Power. Through Power I gain Victory. Through Victory my chains are Broken.

Yours,