Random News Stories

[pietillidie]

I'm not sure where to put this, but I thought it was worth a look if you haven't seen it. Fukushima 10 years on, including some great (haunting) photography:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/10/worl ... rsary.html

[think positive]

I love seeing these articles, saw one the other day about a photographer who travelled through deserted Russian towns, in winter, full of ice, amazing stuff. Also the ones on discarded weird factories and installations. There is one on abandoned shopping malls, some turned into other things, like apartments. Better than wasting them. We went to a town in Death Valley called Darwin, an old mining town, our rental car had a faulty fuel gauge and we ran out of fuel in the middle of Death Valley! Some German tourists took me to the nearest town, there was no servo there but a guy had some big Jerry cans. We filled the car and returned them and had a coffee, (they wanted us to stay the night!) the house was half caravan, and they had built on to the side of it! It had two gold Buddha’s at the gate taller than me! Only 2 of the houses in the town were occupied, I wish we had had more time and fuel to explore, but we wanted to get closer to Yosemite. Funny thing was we both remarked how like a spooky movie the town was, and 6 months after we returned home the gorgeous hotel we stayed at that night on the shores of a lake near Yosemite was on the news, the cleaner was killing visitors!

Still hoping to visit one of the aircraft graveyards one day! Thanks for posting, fascinating stuff.

[stui magpie]

^

Who was the cleaner, Norman Bates?

Thanks for posting Ptiddy, interesting stuff.

I've explored a few abandoned farm houses before, it's like a window back in time. One at a farm 30km west of Toc was where the old farm caretaker had lived after the owners had moved to town. FMD, the only thing holding it up was the thousands of empty beer bottles under it, yet just down the back was like a lean to shed or long carport with around 6 Mercedes in it in various stages of disrepair.

[David]

Great photos, PTID, thanks for posting. One of my dreams is to visit Pripyat (the town near Chernobyl that got evacuated) one day!

[doriswilgus]

Why David?What’s the attraction for you?And wouldn’t you be worried about any lingering radiation in the area?

[think positive]

i am but i have to say, it fascinates me too! no idea why!!

[David]

Why David?What’s the attraction for you?And wouldn’t you be worried about any lingering radiation in the area?

I love abandoned buildings and towns in general, and always have. There’s something beautiful about seeing an urban landscape in the midst of being returned to nature. With regard to Pripyat, there is some lingering radiation in areas, but as long as you stay away from dangerous spots and keep track of your geiger meter, it’s fine.

[Pies4shaw]

^Just wait and go, if you must go at all, late in life. Ideally, don't even go then, unless you've been diagnosed with something terminal. Then, the radiation won't matter so much. In the meantime, anyone who says it's OK as long as you keep an eye on your geiger counter is peddling snake oil.

[5 from the wing on debut]

Wear a Pies jersey with no.5 on the back and nothing can touch you.

[David]

[5 from the wing on debut]

And of course, you can trust them because their name says that they are responsible. Everyone knows that internet businesses have the highest safety standards. Look on the bright side though - if your kids have 14 fingers on one hand they may be great pack marks or really good fielding in slips.

[David]

Lol. They seem a legit group, but happy to hear arguments to the contrary, of course. The advice seems to be pretty much the same everywhere, though:

https://www.worldnomads.com/travel-safe ... -chernobyl
https://www.livescience.com/65673-is-vi ... -safe.html
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-06-07/ ... o/11184962

And here's an interview with a nuclear-waste researcher about the safety of visiting:

https://www.businessinsider.com.au/cher ... ?r=US&IR=T

Corkhill said tourists who stick to major pathways aren’t likely to experience high levels of radiation like she did.

“You will probably get more radiation from the flight that you take,” she said. That’s especially true if you’re coming from the US. At 33,000 feet, she said, “you have less protection from the earth’s atmosphere, the sun’s radiation, and cosmic rays and particles.”

Are they all in the pocket of Big Ukrainian Tourism? Who can say. But in all seriousness, it all seems fairly thoroughly assessed.

[doriswilgus]

Why David?What’s the attraction for you?And wouldn’t you be worried about any lingering radiation in the area?

I love abandoned buildings and towns in general, and always have. There’s something beautiful about seeing an urban landscape in the midst of being returned to nature. With regard to Pripyat, there is some lingering radiation in areas, but as long as you stay away from dangerous spots and keep track of your geiger meter, it’s fine.

Thanks for the explanation,David.You’re obviously a lot more adventurous than I am.That’s something I would never want to do myself,but I can see how it would appeal to other people.Just make sure it is absolutely safe before you do go over there though.You can never be too safe with things like this.

[pietillidie]

NYT editorial on ideas for properly collecting all that avoided billionaire tax society needs.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/20/opin ... n-IRS.html

This is the underlying problem that leaves the rest of us trying to come up with ingenious schemes to divide the loaves and fishes.

This is where the anger and wasted whacko energy needs to be directed. Much of the rest we discuss is a distraction from this single problem.

There are ways to get it done.

[5 from the wing on debut]

I don't know that I agree with you - I believe that you are having the wool pulled over your eyes. That story appears to me to be a plant to draw the attention away from the real culprits - the large corporates and new IT billionaires that are in bed with the Democrats, who have been in bed with the NY Times since the early 1960's. It is Facebook, Twitter and many multi nationals etc who are doing everything they can to not pay their way in tax terms. They helped the Democrats and they didn't do it for nothing. That's where the large tax avoidance is.
As we have moved away from a cash society to a card/EFT payment society the simple old school small business failing to disclose income has become less prevalent. That's one of the reasons that small retail has declined in Australia, as if tax has to be paid on all income then the margin isn't there to keep the doors open. It's much easier now for the ATO to uncover undisclosed income when an audit takes place. The IRS is even more aggressive than our ATO.