Saturday, July 5, 2025

SatStats

On this day:
1687
Isaac Newton publishes Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica.
1830
France invades Algeria.
1934
“Bloody Thursday” – Police open fire on striking longshoremen in San Francisco.
1947
Larry Doby signs a contract with the Cleveland Indians baseball team, becoming the first black player in the American League. (Jackie Robinson had broken the color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers in the National League 11 weeks earlier.)
1962
Algeria becomes independent from France.
1996
Dolly the sheep becomes the first mammal cloned from an adult cell.
1998
Japan launches a probe to Mars, and thus joins the United States and Russia as a space-exploring nation.

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The pause in shipment of some weapons systems to Ukraine— reported first by POLITICO — was driven by Pentagon policy chief Elbridge Colby and a small circle of advisers over concerns that certain weapons stockpiles in the U.S. were running low.
Even allies of President Donald Trump were frustrated by the move, and accused officials such as Colby — who led a review of U.S. munitions stockpiles that preceded the freeze — of pushing the move forward without notifying the rest of the administration or others.

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Sheen, with an awful analogy: "There is no such thing as saving democracy alone. Democracy is a branch, not a root. The root of democracy is the recognition of the value of a person as a creature of God. To save democracy alone is like saving the false teeth of a drowning man. First save the man and you will save his teeth. First preserve belief in God as the source of rights and liberties, and you will save democracy. But not vice versa."

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The UN's IAEA said Iran could start enriching uranium in a few months. But that's okay, right? They are just doing this for peaceful use, right?

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SatStats

Thirty people a day are arrested in the UK for things they say on social media.

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South Korea has banned the dog meat trade:
Traders and butchers before the ban would buy an average of half a dozen dogs per week.
Animal rights activists and authorities fought hard to outlaw the dog meat trade, but have no clear plan for what to do with the leftover animals, of which there are close to 500,000, according to government estimates.

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The median bride price for marriages in the Chinese countryside doubled in real terms between 2005 and 2020, according to a recent paper by Yifeng Wan of Johns Hopkins University. Prices in urban areas are rising, too. A bride price of 380,000 yuan would indeed be steep in Guangdong province, where the median was about 42,000 yuan when last estimated. But it would look a bit less outrageous in neighbouring Fujian, where 115,000 yuan is the norm.

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The Federal government controls more than half of Oregon, Utah, Nevada, Idaho, and Alaska, and nearly half of California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Wyoming. The vast majority of this land is NOT parks.

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Latin America and the Caribbean are much more violent than the rest of the world. Homicide rates are significantly higher in this region, and the top 6 highest homicide rates are in the Caribbean Basin.

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Germany and Italy hold the world’s second- and third-largest national gold reserves after the US, with reserves of 3,352 tonnes and 2,452 tonnes, respectively, according to World Gold Council data.

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Pittsburgh had only made between 4-6 draft picks each year from 2013-24. Taking 13 players this year more than doubles the typical yield. The Pens hadn’t drafted 10+ players since 1994.
The Pens had four picks in the top-40 and seven in the top-100. Pittsburgh made four top-40 picks in 2013-24 - combined.

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The Pens draft was big. After the #11 pick, Zonnon (6’2”, 185 pounds) and Horcoff (6’5”, 203 pounds) are forwards. Peyton Kettles (6’6”, 194 pounds) and Brady Peddle (6’3”, 203) are monstrous defenders. Charlie Trethewey (6’2”, 201) isn’t far behind.

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Repair vs. buying new. The big story isn’t declining durability but declining price:
In 1972, Sears sold a clothes washer for $220 and a dryer for $90, per 2022 research by AARP Magazine. That’s about $2,389 in 2025, adjusted for inflation. Today you can get a washer-and-dryer pair on sale from Sears for around $1,200.

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No work of literary fiction has been on Publisher’s Weekly’s yearly top ten best-selling list since 2001
According to the National Endowment of the Arts, the number of Americans who “read literature” has fallen from 56.9% in 1982 to 46.7% in 2002 to 38% in 2022. 
Literary fiction makes up something like 2% of the market.

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In the early days of FedEx, when the company was struggling financially, Smith took the company’s last $5,000 to Las Vegas and played blackjack. He reportedly won $27,000, which was enough to cover an overdue fuel bill and keep the company afloat for another week.

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According to Israeli estimates, its interceptions of incoming missiles during an intensive bombardment cost as much as $285 million per night. Each Arrow 3 interceptor is priced at $2 million.

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Birth rates are lower, but in several high-income nations, rising female earnings are now associated with higher fertility. Studies in Italy and the Netherlands show that couples where both partners earn well are more likely to have children, while low-income couples are the least likely to do so. Similar findings have emerged from Sweden as well. In Norway, too, higher-earning women now tend to have more babies.

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Earning a doctorate during the first 70 years of the 20th century typically assured the graduate of a position in academe…Humanities Ph.D.s had the highest rate of academic employment—83 percent in 1995–99—but lower than the 94 percent level in 1970–74.

 

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