wj, I think you underestimate the effect on the Russian people of seeing Putin treated like an honoured guest in America. However, neither Ubu nor Witkoff nor any of their stooges have enough knowledge about internal Russian politics to understand that. Not to mention there is symbolic value in keeping tyrants and aggressors as isolated as possible, out of the G7 etc. But of course, with Ubu as POTUS, expecting any such idea to have currency is hopeless. I like TonyP's Make America Decent Again, but can't see it happening anytime soon. I dread the Zelensky meeting on Monday, and I can't imagine how he must feel.
It's pretty bad. Trump has gone from "stop fighting or else" to "carry on, we'll have some peace talks".
Letting Trump conduct international negotiations is like letting a toddler conduct brain surgery. But with many more lives at stake.
I'm actually pleasantly surprised at the outcome. Far less bad than I had expected. Far less.
I read some griping about Putin being "honored" by being welcomed on US soil. Putin may feel honored (fat chance!). But will anyone else be impressed? Will anyone change their opinion of Putin? No and No.
Putin left Trump virtually speechless....given Trump's gonoerrhea mouth, quite a feat if you ask me. I wonder if the KGB hacked the Epstein files.
That Ukrainians will continue to die trying to deal with these monsters is absolutely enraging.
Re TonyP's comment, and a general thought about Alaskan resources... Those would be oil, natural gas, and coal for the most part. Russia already has lots of those.
Spent some time off and on this week adding a first cut illumination correction to the toy software for processing images of documents.
Original snapshot taken with a handheld iPad here.
Result of correcting various geometry impairments -- curled pages, perspective, orientation -- here.
First cut at doing some illumination correction here. The approach I've taken seems to do well at correcting problems caused purely by the light source being off to the side (darker sections where page curl has the surface normal vector pointing away from the light, brighter where the normal vector is pointing towards the light). The shadow in the lower right corner is from the iPad and will require a different approach to identify and correct. Or more likely, when I get closer to production I'll arrange things so the camera doesn't cast shadows.
Yesterday I made this comment on Charlie Pierce's blog at Esquire, and I stand by it:
The MAGAts who run Congress probably think that He, Trump owns Alaska's (and Ukraine's) resources and is therefore entitled to trade them to his KGB handler in exchange for a Noble* Prize. The rest of us need to do something about that, and I propose this: demand a commitment to deMAGAfication from any candidate for office who seeks our support. DeMAGAfication of government agencies, deMAGAfication of the courts, and deMAGAfication of "deals" made by the MAGAt-in-Chief. Of course a decent nation honors its commitments -- even those made under the previous regime -- but we can worry about that AFTER we Make America Decent Again.
--TP
*sic; look it up
Side note on "smart" and "posh": Bryan Ferry is an interesting case. Working class, but attended that crucible of 60s upward (and other directions) mobility, art school. Fine Art degree, then teaching til music career. Clearly an aesthete by temperament (easily seen), he wears Savile Row suits and hunts to hounds (was married for 22 years to an upper class girl who hunted from the time she was 12). Of course this does not make him "posh", but really in today's world it's hard to miss his identification.
All this being said, it is good to be reminded that when I pronounce on "normal usage" in the UK, it is coming from a particular place of (as I said before) age, education and social class. I must remember this when giving such confident declarations in the future!
Or, you could just go: pick the first of the remaining choices the first time, then the second the next, then the third (if there happens to be one). Repeat as you go thru the test.
True randomness, or even pseudo- randomness, isn't required. The folks creating the test will have done all the randomizing necessary
wj: to make your strategy work properly it requires generating an actual random choice.
PRO TIP: #2 pencils used for multiple-choice have 6 sides: using a pen to impress 'dots' in the wood, 1 dot, 2 dots, etc for the sides. Need a random number? Roll the pencil. Fast and easy.
Computer tests mess that up, dammit.
a kid who aces his college boards is probably pretty smart
Or clever enough that you can get a pretty high, at least way above chance, score on a multiple choice test if you eliminate the (2, sometimes 3) obviously wrong choices and then just guess at random. (Versus guessing at random among all 5. Or, worse, just leaving it blank.)
If asked how I know, I'll take the 5th, thank you.
my perception of American English has both "crafty" and "cunning" as something that is intentionally deceptive
When my step-son was born, my wife's Scottish then mother-in-law took a look at him and said "What a cunning child!".
One of the most interesting things to me in language is that way that words in languages that are more or less imposed on people - English on the Scots, in this case - get re-purposed to suit local meanings.
See also "overstand" in Jamaican patois, which re-tools "understand" to have a richer meaning, one that is not completely captured by any standard English word (except perhaps "grok").
In computer programming, it usually means things like really obscure code that exploits some odd aspect of the programming language
I used to refer to that as "stunt programming". And, have been guilty of it, more times than I like to admit.
I blame C++, which offers more opportunities for general pointless wise-guy trickiness than another language I've bumped into. the difference between "smart" and "clever"
I always think of "smart" as being innate intelligence, while "clever" is more about what you do with it. In particular, clever seems more about finding creative solutions to problems.
So, a kid who aces his college boards is probably pretty smart, but might not be able to figure out how to change a tire without a user's manual. Smart, but not clever.
The exemplar of clever is the crow.
Michael - My use of clever doesn't necessitate intentional deception, it just makes room for it in the name of getting the job done - which probably means that it maps well onto your usage of "cunning."
I would add that my perception of American English has both "crafty" and "cunning" as something that is intentionally deceptive, where "clever" is not.
I think both smart and clever are secondary terms, the base meaning of smart was painful or cutting (Ouch, that smarts!), while cleaver was probably to split up or divide (hence meat cleaver), which constrasts with dull, so both point out the ability to break things down into smaller parts. I imagine in a closed village society, being intelligent could be disfavored a bit, because it would be disruptive.
The distinction between "smart" and "clever" noted by US commentators doesn't, so far as I'm aware, exist in British English.
I think "smart" here refers to intelligence, unless the context makes it obvious that it refers to dress.
GftNC's suggestion that "smart" can mean "posh" is not part of my idiolect. Bryan Ferry, for example, has always seemed to me to be smartly dressed, but never posh.
How fascinating, I have just looked up smart in the OED and the main usage for e.g. clothes seems to be "Attractively neat and stylish, relatively formal". It's true, I can imagine if someone asks what you think of an outfit, and you don't know them all that well and want to reassure them you might say "very smart", but generally speaking most people I know would use it in the way following, which is "Fashionable, elegant, sophisticated; belonging to or associated with fashionable or high society." Like so much else in UK English, it looks like it might be more class-coded than I realised.
And just before those two usages, despite what I have said before, the following: "Clever, intelligent, knowledgeable; capable, adept; quick at learning, responding intelligently to a situation, etc.; astute, shrewd; (of an action) characterized by cleverness or astuteness." In my experience this usage is rare here, although possibly more common as a result of American movies, literature etc.
British usages have long interested me. GftNC's observation that "smart" more or less equals "posh", for instance.
I remember reading somewhere that, at one time at least, a "clever" horse did not mean a witty or intelligent one but rather a well-formed or well-outfitted one. I wonder whether that's still true in the UK.
In the US, would "a clever work-around" and "a smart work-around" mean exactly the same thing? Or is there an articulable distinction there?
--TP
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.
On “Giving Away the Store”
OT, so a bit of a pivot back to class, but in this case class in America. David Brooks, on America's New Segregation:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/14/opinion/trump-democrats-resistance-reform.html?unlocked_article_code=1.ek8.T4vb.EoYRJkuNSb_8&smid=url-share
"
TACO - Trump Always Conciliates Oligarchs.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/aug/16/russia-jubilant-putin-alaska-summit-trump-ukraine
'Cos flattery gets you everywhere with Orange Chicken.
"
wj, I think you underestimate the effect on the Russian people of seeing Putin treated like an honoured guest in America. However, neither Ubu nor Witkoff nor any of their stooges have enough knowledge about internal Russian politics to understand that. Not to mention there is symbolic value in keeping tyrants and aggressors as isolated as possible, out of the G7 etc. But of course, with Ubu as POTUS, expecting any such idea to have currency is hopeless. I like TonyP's Make America Decent Again, but can't see it happening anytime soon. I dread the Zelensky meeting on Monday, and I can't imagine how he must feel.
"
Comrade Krasnov met with his handler and got updated instructions.
"
It's pretty bad. Trump has gone from "stop fighting or else" to "carry on, we'll have some peace talks".
Letting Trump conduct international negotiations is like letting a toddler conduct brain surgery. But with many more lives at stake.
"
I'm actually pleasantly surprised at the outcome. Far less bad than I had expected. Far less.
I read some griping about Putin being "honored" by being welcomed on US soil. Putin may feel honored (fat chance!). But will anyone else be impressed? Will anyone change their opinion of Putin? No and No.
"
Utterly enraging, and completely unsurprising.
"
Putin left Trump virtually speechless....given Trump's gonoerrhea mouth, quite a feat if you ask me. I wonder if the KGB hacked the Epstein files.
That Ukrainians will continue to die trying to deal with these monsters is absolutely enraging.
"
Re TonyP's comment, and a general thought about Alaskan resources... Those would be oil, natural gas, and coal for the most part. Russia already has lots of those.
"
Spent some time off and on this week adding a first cut illumination correction to the toy software for processing images of documents.
Original snapshot taken with a handheld iPad here.
Result of correcting various geometry impairments -- curled pages, perspective, orientation -- here.
First cut at doing some illumination correction here. The approach I've taken seems to do well at correcting problems caused purely by the light source being off to the side (darker sections where page curl has the surface normal vector pointing away from the light, brighter where the normal vector is pointing towards the light). The shadow in the lower right corner is from the iPad and will require a different approach to identify and correct. Or more likely, when I get closer to production I'll arrange things so the camera doesn't cast shadows.
"
Yesterday I made this comment on Charlie Pierce's blog at Esquire, and I stand by it:
The MAGAts who run Congress probably think that He, Trump owns Alaska's (and Ukraine's) resources and is therefore entitled to trade them to his KGB handler in exchange for a Noble* Prize. The rest of us need to do something about that, and I propose this: demand a commitment to deMAGAfication from any candidate for office who seeks our support. DeMAGAfication of government agencies, deMAGAfication of the courts, and deMAGAfication of "deals" made by the MAGAt-in-Chief. Of course a decent nation honors its commitments -- even those made under the previous regime -- but we can worry about that AFTER we Make America Decent Again.
--TP
*sic; look it up
On “A New Gilded Age”
Side note on "smart" and "posh": Bryan Ferry is an interesting case. Working class, but attended that crucible of 60s upward (and other directions) mobility, art school. Fine Art degree, then teaching til music career. Clearly an aesthete by temperament (easily seen), he wears Savile Row suits and hunts to hounds (was married for 22 years to an upper class girl who hunted from the time she was 12). Of course this does not make him "posh", but really in today's world it's hard to miss his identification.
All this being said, it is good to be reminded that when I pronounce on "normal usage" in the UK, it is coming from a particular place of (as I said before) age, education and social class. I must remember this when giving such confident declarations in the future!
"
Or, you could just go: pick the first of the remaining choices the first time, then the second the next, then the third (if there happens to be one). Repeat as you go thru the test.
True randomness, or even pseudo- randomness, isn't required. The folks creating the test will have done all the randomizing necessary
"
wj: to make your strategy work properly it requires generating an actual random choice.
PRO TIP: #2 pencils used for multiple-choice have 6 sides: using a pen to impress 'dots' in the wood, 1 dot, 2 dots, etc for the sides. Need a random number? Roll the pencil. Fast and easy.
Computer tests mess that up, dammit.
"
a kid who aces his college boards is probably pretty smart
Or clever enough that you can get a pretty high, at least way above chance, score on a multiple choice test if you eliminate the (2, sometimes 3) obviously wrong choices and then just guess at random. (Versus guessing at random among all 5. Or, worse, just leaving it blank.)
If asked how I know, I'll take the 5th, thank you.
"
my perception of American English has both "crafty" and "cunning" as something that is intentionally deceptive
When my step-son was born, my wife's Scottish then mother-in-law took a look at him and said "What a cunning child!".
One of the most interesting things to me in language is that way that words in languages that are more or less imposed on people - English on the Scots, in this case - get re-purposed to suit local meanings.
See also "overstand" in Jamaican patois, which re-tools "understand" to have a richer meaning, one that is not completely captured by any standard English word (except perhaps "grok").
"
In computer programming, it usually means things like really obscure code that exploits some odd aspect of the programming language
I used to refer to that as "stunt programming". And, have been guilty of it, more times than I like to admit.
I blame C++, which offers more opportunities for general pointless wise-guy trickiness than another language I've bumped into.
the difference between "smart" and "clever"
I always think of "smart" as being innate intelligence, while "clever" is more about what you do with it. In particular, clever seems more about finding creative solutions to problems.
So, a kid who aces his college boards is probably pretty smart, but might not be able to figure out how to change a tire without a user's manual. Smart, but not clever.
The exemplar of clever is the crow.
"
found this
https://blog.oup.com/2023/11/clever-hans-and-beyond/
possibly clever is related to clamber and climb, in the sense of being nimble.
"
Michael - My use of clever doesn't necessitate intentional deception, it just makes room for it in the name of getting the job done - which probably means that it maps well onto your usage of "cunning."
"
I doubt that "clever" has got anything to do with "cleaver". It might be related to "claw".
"
I would add that my perception of American English has both "crafty" and "cunning" as something that is intentionally deceptive, where "clever" is not.
"
I think both smart and clever are secondary terms, the base meaning of smart was painful or cutting (Ouch, that smarts!), while cleaver was probably to split up or divide (hence meat cleaver), which constrasts with dull, so both point out the ability to break things down into smaller parts. I imagine in a closed village society, being intelligent could be disfavored a bit, because it would be disruptive.
"
The distinction between "smart" and "clever" noted by US commentators doesn't, so far as I'm aware, exist in British English.
I think "smart" here refers to intelligence, unless the context makes it obvious that it refers to dress.
GftNC's suggestion that "smart" can mean "posh" is not part of my idiolect. Bryan Ferry, for example, has always seemed to me to be smartly dressed, but never posh.
"
How fascinating, I have just looked up smart in the OED and the main usage for e.g. clothes seems to be "Attractively neat and stylish, relatively formal". It's true, I can imagine if someone asks what you think of an outfit, and you don't know them all that well and want to reassure them you might say "very smart", but generally speaking most people I know would use it in the way following, which is "Fashionable, elegant, sophisticated; belonging to or associated with fashionable or high society." Like so much else in UK English, it looks like it might be more class-coded than I realised.
And just before those two usages, despite what I have said before, the following: "Clever, intelligent, knowledgeable; capable, adept; quick at learning, responding intelligently to a situation, etc.; astute, shrewd; (of an action) characterized by cleverness or astuteness." In my experience this usage is rare here, although possibly more common as a result of American movies, literature etc.
"
British usages have long interested me. GftNC's observation that "smart" more or less equals "posh", for instance.
I remember reading somewhere that, at one time at least, a "clever" horse did not mean a witty or intelligent one but rather a well-formed or well-outfitted one. I wonder whether that's still true in the UK.
In the US, would "a clever work-around" and "a smart work-around" mean exactly the same thing? Or is there an articulable distinction there?
--TP
*Comment archive for non-registered commenters assembled by email address as provided.