Good morning to all, except in Canada, Greenland, Panama, and Colombia

 

World Health Organization protects Xi Jinping's feelings, adopts Omicron for new South African variant B.1.1.529 instead of Nu or Xi

alpha beta gamma delta epsilon

zeta eta theta

iota kappa lambda mu nu

xi omicron pi 

rho sigma tau upsilon

phi chi psi omega

 

This is the first thing you learn in Greek 101, the alphabet. You've got it down when you can say it from memory after lighting a match and you don't burn your fingers, which you will need to write all the funny letters.

Looks like WHO needs to retake the course, however.

This new South African variant, B.1.1.529, will be very confusing since almost a year ago there was a South African variant everyone got hysterical about but it didn't take over the world. The India variant did instead.

That South African variant (B.1.351), was beta, retroactively so designated at the end of May 2021 with all the variants, which is probably why no one remembers it.

The UK variant (B.1.1.7), dominant in the US in April, May, and June, is alpha. 

The gamma variant (P.1), from Brazil, never amounted to much in the US, though that was fear-mongered, too.

The India variant (B.1.617.2) is delta, dominant in the US from July 1.

Epsilon covers variants from California, B.1.427/B.1.429.

Zeta is another Brazilian one, P.2.

Eta and iota cover variants from New York, B.1.526/B.1.525.

Theta was first detected in the Philippines, P.3.

Kappa's another one from India, B.1.617.1, as is B.1.617.3, which oddly hasn't its own Greek letter designation even though it's on radars.

Lambda is from Peru, C. 37.

Mu variants come from Colombia, B.1.621/B.1.621.1.

Nu and Xi are being skipped:

The WHO made the announcement about the B.1.1.529 variant out of Johannesburg, South Africa, passing over a letter many observers presumed would be next — “Nu” — as well as the subsequent letter, “Xi,” which composes part of Chinese leader Xi Jinping‘s name.

I'm looking forward to Beijing being called Peking again one day. 

I mean, who orders "Beijing Duck"?

At any rate, the reality, as one wag put it,  is that they are all Xi variants.

 

And as another answered, the final variant will be communism. 

 

MacArthur was right about China:

Here in Asia is where the communist conspirators have elected to make their play for global conquest. 

 

Elites today everywhere are on their side.

 

 

Fox News knucklehead: Colombian government proposals "would likely exasperate inequalities"

The government’s proposal to slash the minimum wage, salaries, and pension funds would likely exasperate these inequalities and was also a driving force behind the uprising.

More here about the recent massive anti-government protests.

Another knucklehead here just very recently had Colombia on the top ten list of best places to retire in the world.

Elizabeth Talking Bull takes private DNA test to prove she's "Native American"

Well, she obviously took the private test and hired Bustamante because the tests you and I take wouldn't show what she needed to show. 

The Boston Globe reports here:

The inherent imprecision of the six-page DNA analysis could provide fodder for Warren’s critics. If her great-great-great-grandmother was Native American, that puts her at 1/32nd American Indian. But the report includes the possibility that she’s just 1/512th Native American if the ancestor is 10 generations back. ...

Detecting DNA for Native Americans is particularly tricky because there is an absence of Native American DNA available for comparison. This is in part because Native American leaders have asked tribal members not to participate in genetic databases. ...

To make up for the dearth of Native American DNA, Bustamante used samples from Mexico, Peru, and Colombia to stand in for Native American. That’s because scientists believe that the groups Americans refer to as Native American came to this land via the Bering Straight about 12,000 years ago and settled in what’s now America but also migrated further south. His report explained that the use of reference populations whose genetic material has been fully sequenced was designed “for maximal accuracy.” ...

Ivy League universities, like the ones where Warren taught, were under great pressure to show they had diverse staffs.

The University of Pennsylvania filled out a document explaining why it hired a white woman over minority candidates — clear evidence it didn’t view her as a Native American addition. And the Globe interviewed 31 Harvard Law School faculty members who voted on her appointment there, and all said her heritage was not a factor. 

Update: The Boston Globe has amended the first paragraph above as follows:

The inherent imprecision of the six-page DNA analysis could provide fodder for Warren’s critics. If O.C. Sarah Smith were fully Native American, that would make Warren up to 1/32nd native. But the generational range based on the ancestor that the report identified suggests she’s between 1/64th and 1/1,024th Native American. The report notes there could be missed ancestors. 

In other words, Elizabeth Talking Bull could have far less "American Indian" blood in her than originally reported.

Ehhhh ... puto! In the race for most fines for anti-gay slurs, Hispanic soccer fans have everyone else beat

Well, Spain was ruled by Muslims from 711 to 1492 AD.

From the story here:

Homophobia and homophobic chants are not exclusive to Mexico fans. Fifa issued 51 disciplinary actions over homophobia during 2018 World Cup qualifiers. Of these, 11 were handed to the Mexican federation, with Argentina, Brazil, Chile, El Salvador, Honduras, Panama and Peru also receiving multiple fines. Fifa additionally cited Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Paraguay, Uruguay, Greece, Hungary and Serbia once each for homophobic chants.

But there is no doubt the chant is most prominent among Mexico fans. “To call your opponent homosexual is definitely along a spectrum of machismo, whereby your opponent is weaker – less masculine,” says Joshua Nadel, author of Fútbol!: Why Soccer Matters in Latin America.

Giant Snake Fossil Proves Temps 10 Degrees Hotter Than Today AFTER Dinosaur Extinction

The snake has been dubbed "Titanoboa" in the story here:

Partial skeletons of a new giant, boa constrictor-like snake named “Titanoboa” found in Colombia by an international team of scientists and now at the University of Florida are estimated to be 42 to 45 feet long, the length of the T-Rex “Sue” displayed at Chicago’s Field Museum, said Jonathan Bloch, a UF vertebrate paleontologist who co-led the expedition with Carlos Jaramillo, a paleobotanist from the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. ...

Based on the snake’s size, the team was able to calculate that the mean annual temperature at equatorial South America 60 million years ago would have been about 91 degrees Fahrenheit, about 10 degrees warmer than today, Bloch said.

No word on what evil fossil fuel was responsible for the global warming.

The Washington Post story here cuts off the story, leaving out the  part about temperature: "It would have to have been so warm . . .."

So warm what?

Gee, I wonder why they cut him off?

Obama the Milker in Chief Mocks Critics in Cartagena, Says Scouting Next Vacation

Just days after a reporter confronted him on the issue.

The story and video are here.