If it were redrawn to reflect actual contributions to civilization, their beloved continent would be shrunk to the size of a pea

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African Union Wants End to Mercator Projection Map Use Over “Disinformation”

The officials from the organization want the adoption of a map system that more accurately shows Africa’s actual size. The AU asserts that the Mercator projection distorts global perceptions, “marginalizing” Africans in ways harmful to their “pride”.

“It might seem to be just a map, but in reality, it is not,” AU Commission deputy chairperson Selma Malika Haddadi told Reuters, saying the Mercator fostered a false impression that Africa was “marginal”, despite being the world’s second-largest continent by area, with over a billion people. The AU has 55 member states

The reason? African Union member unhappy with the relative size of the continent presented on those maps, as it makes them feel…marginalized.

It’s not fair! Says Mr. Matt Rosenberg:

The Mercator Map

The Mercator projection was developed in 1569 by Gerardus Mercator as a navigational tool. This map's grid is rectangular and lines of latitude and longitude are parallel throughout. The Mercator map was designed as an aid to navigators with straight lines, loxodromes or rhumb lines—representing lines of constant compass bearing—that are perfect for "true" direction.

If a navigator wishes to sail from Spain to the West Indies using this map, all they have to do is draw a line between the two points. This tells them which compass direction to continually sail in until they reach their destination. But although this angular layout makes navigation easier, accuracy and bias are major disadvantages that can't be ignored.

Namely, the Mercator projection minimizes non-European or American countries and continents while enlarging privileged world powers. Africa, for example, is depicted as smaller than North America when it is, in reality, three times larger. Many feel that these discrepancies reflect racism and prejudice against underprivileged and developing countries. Pro-Peters folks often argue that this projection merely advantages colonial powers while disadvantaging others.

The Mercator map has always been inadequate as a world map due to its rectangular grid and shape, but geographically illiterate publishers once found it useful for designing wall, atlas, and book maps, even maps found in newspapers published by non-geographers. It became the standard map projection for most applications and is still cemented as the mental map of most westerners today.

Mercator Falls From Use

Fortunately, over the past few decades, the Mercator projection has fallen into disuse by most reliable sources. In a 1980s study, two British geographers discovered that the Mercator map did not exist among dozens of atlases examined.

Though some major map companies with less than reputable credentials still produce some maps using the Mercator projection, these are widely dismissed. As Mercator maps were already spiraling into obsoletion, a historian attempted to speed up this process by presenting a new map.

Rosenberg and the Africans are not alone in their outrage: Fortunately, all the best people are aware of this scandalous state of affairs and are determined to do something about it: No, not place three dimensional globes in classrooms; that would be too easy, and not in the spirit of todays’ scientific method: ban the use of any and all maps that offend woke sensibilities:

American Cartographers Resolution:

In 1989, seven North American professional geographic organizations (including the American Cartographic Association, National Council for Geographic Education, Association of American Geographers, and the National Geographic Society) adopted a resolution that called for a ban on all rectangular coordinate maps.

WHEREAS, the earth is round with a coordinate system composed entirely of circles, and

WHEREAS, flat world maps are more useful than globe maps, but flattening the globe surface necessarily greatly changes the appearance of Earth's features and coordinate systems, and 

WHEREAS, world maps have a powerful and lasting effect on peoples' impressions of the shapes and sizes of lands and seas, their arrangement, and the nature of the coordinate system, and 

WHEREAS, frequently seeing a greatly distorted map tends to make it "look right,"

THEREFORE, we strongly urge book and map publishers, the media and government agencies to cease using rectangular world maps for general purposes or artistic displays.

How about this: Too simple?

The Grifter will see you now

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Professional Black Person Dante King makes a fine living from this.

Not surprisingly, the San Francisco Chronicle was appalled when one of King’s employers was embarrassed into cancelling one of his (paid) student indoctrination sessions.

Exclusive: UCSF severs relationship with provocative anti-racism speaker targeted by right-wing groups

By Nanette Asimov, Higher Education ReporterJan 15, 2025

Author and consultant Dante King has taught anti-racism classes at UCSF since 2021, but the university abruptly severed its relationship with him this month amid right-wing complaints and accusations that his content is “blatantly racist.”

UCSF abruptly canceled a two-day anti-racism class for doctors and nurses that was to be taught in February by a consultant who was targeted by right-wing groups that called his provocative content racist, the Chronicle has learned.

The cancellation, confirmed by the San Francisco medical school last week, followed questions from the Chronicle about allegations made against the consultant, Dante King, and his accredited online class, “Understanding the Roots of Racism and Bias: Anti-Blackness and Its Links to Whiteness, White Racism, Privilege, and Power.”

The controversy dates back to a talk King delivered at UCSF during Black History Month last February in which he argued that white treatment of Black people over generations is “psychopathic.” 

In his speech, King said, “In their relationship with the Black race, whites are psychopaths,” attributing the statement to the late psychologist Bobby Wright.

A conservative group, Young America’s Foundation, reduced the nearly 90-minute presentation to a 2.5-minute video that made it sound like King had said only: “Whites are psychopaths,” rather than in the context of how they relate to Black people. [Check King’s website, linked to above, for other, longer videos — in them, he repeats the same inflammatory language at great length. YAF distilled his comments, it didn’t distort or misrepresent them — Ed]. The group posted the video on the social platform X, and it went viral, with hundreds commenting. Many accused King of being racist but also attacked him in racial terms, even praising the KKK. King shared emails he received calling him “n—” and comparing him to animals.

…. UCSF, which has hosted King’s continuing-education class multiple times a year since 2021, gave no explanation for the reversal. Administrators said only that it’s happening by mutual agreement with King.

…. The university’s action comes at a highly politicized time for UCSF. Republicans, who will soon sweep into control of all branches of the federal government, have been scrutinizing UCSF since August.  

That’s when House Republicans sent UCSF a harshly worded letter saying they were opening an investigation into allegations of antisemitism at the medical center and threatening to withdraw its right to participate in Medicare and Medicaid. Since the Israel-Hamas war erupted in October 2023, House Republicans have accused many university leaders of allowing antisemitism to flourish at their campuses.

At the same time, anti-racism efforts — often called “diversity, equity and inclusion,” or DEI — have become a favorite target of conservatives, who have attacked the programs as part of a broad strategy to instill fear in white people that others threaten their safety and financial well-being. In California, some faculty have sued community colleges over DEI requirements, and at least one would-be applicant to the University of California tried to sue, arguing that public schools should not require employees to embrace such efforts. President-elect Donald Trump could halt federal funding to DEI programs, as he did in his first administration. 

UCSF’s action echoes the response last February by the Mayo Clinic, which canceled King’s contract after the clip went viral, King said. He had delivered anti-racism instruction at the Mayo Clinic since 2022. Mayo officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

King, who is not a professor, holds a master’s degree in adult learning and equity. He is the author of “The 400-Year Holocaust: White America’s Legal, Psychopathic, and Sociopathic Black Genocide — and the Revolt Against Critical Race Theory.” (Researchers define psychopathy as a mental disorder marked by a lack of empathy and an increased risk of extreme behavior.)

In the past, King worked on equity programs and initiatives for multiple San Francisco city departments. In 2023, the city paid him $563,000 to settle allegations that he had been discriminated against.

The concepts that have prompted the most recent conservative criticism of King are consistent with his writing, and those of a number of other anti-racism scholars and advocates.

On his website, King criticizes current racial conflicts and their roots in the slavery-era legal system in the strongest terms, often in ways that many people find offensive. Others, including several Black members of the audience at last year’s talk at UCSF, have thanked him for putting their emotions into words. 

“I cannot say this enough,” King wrote. “This country was legally and socially constructed by diabolical, #White, ‘ultra-religious’ maniacs, and psychopathic sociopaths who assumed authority through treacherous acts of violence.” He wrote that “white psychosis” is a “defense mechanism White people employ to (project) their undesirable and otherwise unacceptable thoughts, feelings, and impulses onto others, rather than accepting them.”

The 2.5-minute video that the Young America’s Foundation created from the 90-minute recording of King’s presentation eliminated its context and attributions. [No, it didn’t — Ed]

“Selecting highlights is standard practice in social media exposés,” said Spencer Brown, the group’s spokesperson. 

“Even in the full context of the more than hour-long, university-sponsored tirade,” Brown said, “it’s undeniable that Mr. King’s lessons are blatantly racist.” 

…. The clip also quoted King saying, “Rape culture in America is a legal, economic and moral institution.”

The comment was provocative, and King later told the Chronicle that he meant to use the past tense. [He makes the same “error” in the other videos of his that I’ve viewed — Ed[]. In his presentation, he argued that Black people had suffered ongoing abuses by whites: from the slavery-era death sentence imposed on a Black teenager for killing the white man who raped her for years, to the persistent claims that Black people are genetically inferior to whites, to recent cases of Black children being sent home from school because of their hairstyles.  

In the full video, UCSF’s executive director of diversity and inclusion, Klint Jaramillo, asked King to respond to critics who consider his ideas to be “reverse racism.” 

The short clip included King saying only, “I don’t make room for that.” The full video showed that he responded for nearly four minutes, defending his views. [And repeating his accusations — Ed}

He referenced laws and social expectations that he said have been stacked against Black people for generations, including the present.

“Tell me how that is not psychopathic and sociopathic. That’s what I want someone to explain to me,” King said, before asking the audience how they would feel if they or their ancestors had suffered the abuse he had described. 

Not just "in the locker room", but filming them to record their reaction to her provocation

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School With Pro-Trans Policy Reportedly Suspends Boys Who Wondered Why Girl Was In Their Locker Room

Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS) has reportedly suspended two high school boys after they expressed discomfort with a female student entering the boys’ locker room and recording a video.

LCPS opened an investigation into three male students months prior after they complained about the female student’s presence, and the district has now decided to suspend two of the boys, according to WJLA, an ABC affiliate. The female student, who purportedly claims to be male, allegedly used the boys locker room several times and even filmed inside to catch “the reaction of male students.”

The two boys are reportedly facing discipline for sexual harassment and sex-based discrimination due to their complaints, WJLA reported. They will be forced to meet with school administrators to create a corrective action plan, will be suspended for 10 days and will have a no-contact order with the girl, which will also prevent them from joining the same classes.

One of the boys has reportedly left the state with his family, according to WJLA.

Strikes me that it’s the school board members who should be ridden out of town on a rail, not the boys.

Loudon County schools became infamous in 2021 after the district allegedly attempted to cover up a sexual assault perpetrated by a male student that claimed a transgender identity that occurred in the girls’ bathroom of the same school. The incident sparked protests and student walk-outs.

Taconic sale price reported

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29 Taconic Road, listed at $5.395 million, has sold for $5.7. Built in 1751 (Reader Historically Yours commented when this was first discussed here that it is one of hi family’s original Mead homesteads) 5.4 un-divisable (indivisible?) acres, it’s pretty sweet. Unfortunately, all the original listing photos have been pulled don, and those on the GMLS marked private, so I won’t include them, but … nice place. Buyers came from Marlboro NY (12542 Zip) up in Ulster County.

Fatsos quiver (jiggle?) with rage and indignation

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Fat Grifters Fear The Worst: Americans Will Get Skinny

John Loftus, Daily Caller:

According to the CDC, 40% of American adults between August 2021–August 2023 were clinically obese. For adults ages 40 to 59, the obesity rate was a whopping 46.4%. (Subscribe to MR. RIGHT, a free weekly newsletter about modern masculinity)

Enter weight loss drugs. Though their long-term side effects remain unclear, at least in the short term, GLP-1s are helping obese Americans shed extra baggage. If you don’t have the willpower to eat less and walk more, you still have an option to trim your waistline before your best friend’s wedding.

But for so-called scholars and activists associated with the “Fat Studies” field, the recent surge in popularity of drugs like Ozempic is becoming a cause for concern that is threatening their entire grift, The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported Friday.

Ozempic and other weight-loss drugs may be a promising solution to the growing problem of obesity, but they’ve got a surprising foe: fat activists. https://t.co/iqwe7641Qr

— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) August 17, 2025

“Ozempic is 100% making things worse for us,” Tigress Osborn, executive director of the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance, told WSJ. “It’s created an even louder public narrative that you could just solve all your problems by taking this magical drug, and if you don’t take it, well then, you deserve what you get.”

Marilyn Wann, a Bay Area fat activist suspicious of long-term side effects stemming from weight loss drugs, lamented that they “creat[e] more work for fat activists.”

“People think that if everyone can just take this expensive, dangerous drug, we can get rid of fat people,” she told the WSJ. “These drugs are going through the same excitement-and-disappointment cycle we’ve seen with every method of intentional weight loss. It just creates more work for fat activists.”

Mann has a point. Weight loss drugs are expensive. For people paying out-of-pocket or whose insurance will not cover the drugs, Big Pharma still charges a steep monthly price, even after recent efforts to reduce costs. And they could also be dangerous. Ten years of shooting Wegovy into a thunder thigh may lead to unforeseen consequences that doctors and researchers cannot predict.

But fat activists are equally as shameless as the Big Pharma companies. Instead of peddling drugs, they peddle self-deceptive lies. The more humane message is this: Being obese is bad for your health, and although you should not be treated as less of a human because you weigh 300 pounds, you also should not be enabled.

I wouldn’t go near any drug being peddled at obscene prices — $500-$1,500 per month — by the same companies that assured us that their China Flu vaccines were effective and safe, but neither do I pretend that obesity is healthy or desirable. And there’s an alternative to both: I’m embarrassed to admit it, but, because of severe spinal stenosis preventing me from hiking, bike riding, even walking more than 50 yards for the past five-six years (and my inattention to how much I was eating) my weight ballooned from 180 lbs to 218 lbs as of July of last year.

Purely from vanity, I downloaded a cheap calorie-counting app (Lose It) and began to note and limit how much I was stuffing away every day. Nothing drastic, though I did, almost inadvertently begin eating a much healthier diet by cutting out cookies, ice cream and the like. Result? A year later, I weigh 165 lbs — dropped a pound a week — and as an unintended, but what should have been obvious side benefit, the back pain that two different surgeons a year apart had assured me could only be mitigated by undergoing a double spinal fusion, has gone now that I’m not putting all that weight load on the vertebrae (the legs are still numb, so I still can’t walk very far, but the pain has lifted and that’s enough).

That’s too much information for a public blog, but my point is that the key to losing weight is simply to consume fewer calories than you burn — that’s it. No drugs, no gastric banding (and for you cops out there, no donuts). Eat less, weigh less, all to the distress of Big Pharma and the fat activists alike, and that’s a good thing.

no, no, no!


Funny, ha-ha. I had just finished a post on NBC's truthful but perhaps too revealing name change when I saw that others are thinking along the same lines.

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Crippled by collapsing ratings and obnoxious opinion hosts, NBC rebrands NBCMSN to “MS”. I’m not alone in finding that choice ironic.

How's That Big MSNBC Rebrand Going? Peacock Gone, Multiple Sclerosis Trending

Like the Democrats' "Blueprint for Success" promised as an alternative to Trump four months ago and never delivered, Senator Murphy has a secret plan to end the Ukrainian war, but …

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I won’t tell you what it is until I’m elected president!

Trump blasts 'lightweight' Dem senator who criticized Putin summit in Alaska: 'Stupid'

Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., claimed 'Putin got everything he wanted' when criticizing Trump's meeting in Alaska

Murphy shared a clip of his appearance [on Meet the Press] on his X account, captioning the video with more criticism of Trump's meeting with Putin.

"The Putin-Trump meeting was a disaster, as predicted. Putin got everything he wanted: a photo op legitimizing his war crimes, no ceasefire, and no sanctions or new weapons for Ukraine. Trump's goal was to keep Putin happy. He succeeded," Murphy wrote.

Trump pushed back, asserting in his Truth Social post, "The very unattractive (both inside and out!) Senator from Connecticut, Chris Murphy, said ‘Putin got everything that he wanted.’ Actually, ‘nobody got anything,’ too soon, but getting close. Murphy is a lightweight who thinks it made the Russian President look good in coming to America.

"Actually, it was very hard for President Putin to do so. This war can be ended, NOW, but stupid people like Chris Murphy, John Bolton, and others, make it much harder to do so," he added.

To the extent that our Nutmeg Lightweight has any idle thoughts, beyond opposition to anything and everything Trump, it’s to impose a temporary ceasefire like the ones that have worked so well in Israel, and demand that Russia permanently withdraw behind its original, pre-invasion borders, which is not going to happen. “War! War to the death! (of others)” In other words, the same approach that has failed for the past three years and resulted in hundreds of thousands of civilian deaths and the displacement on millions.

If he actually believed this, I’d call Murphy a moron, but he doesn’t, he’s just another conniving politician with delusionry ambitions.

I don't play the sport or watch it, but this chip shot from the rough: the ball stops, takes a 90-degree turn, then weaves its way to the hole and drops, is ... fun.

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“Okay, Twain didn’t actually say this, but he might have, had he thought of it)

And now … the rest of the story

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mr. harvey dines alone

Oh, the horror of it all!

Miss Tara Suter, The Hill: Restaurant attendance takes a dive in DC after Trump’s police actions

Restaurant attendance in the nation’s capital has taken a dive in the wake of President Trump’s Washington, D.C., crackdown on crime, according to data from OpenTable.

Last Monday, Trump announced he was taking federal control of D.C.’s police department and deploying the National Guard in the city in an effort to fight crime. 

Beginning that Monday, seated diners at Washington restaurants, according to online reservation numbers, started to drop dramatically in comparison to the prior year, dipping 16 percent. On Wednesday, the amount of seated diners at restaurants with reservations fell 31 percent, slightly recovering to down by 20 percent on Saturday.

PowerLine’s Bill Glahn adds context:

I lived for many years back in the 1990’s in the DC Metro area. August was glorious if you could stand the heat and humidity (which was brutal), there was no traffic, no people, when Congress left town and took everyone with it.

Back in the day, I would postpone my summer vacation to September to enjoy the people-free capital.

Restaurants were always empty, no reservations needed, just walk right in. From The Hill,

“On Wednesday, the amount of seated diners at restaurants with reservations fell 31 percent, slightly recovering to down by 20 percent on Saturday.”

80 percent of zero is still zero. Check back in September when the politicians and bureaucrats have returned from the beach and can enjoy crime-free streets. The restaurants will again be packed.

There’s nothing wrong with assigning juveniles to cover non-stories, but they do lack the knowledge to place events in their historical context, having no memory of or interest in anything that happened before, say, 2021.* I’d suggest that this young woman could use the helping hand of a senior editor, but the upper-level staff have probably all left town for the month in the company of their Congressional and lobbyist paymasters.

I’m a breaking news reporter for The Hill, covering a range of topics from U.S. politics to LGBTQ policy issues. I graduated from The George Washington University with a degree in journalism and mass communications. While at GW, I worked in various roles of increasing importance on the student newspaper, The GW Hatchet, including events editor and research assistant. I have previously worked as an editorial intern on WGBH’s FRONTLINE program and a journalism intern at OpenSecrets. I’m originally from Washington state, and love a good cup of (iced) coffee and a good photo of a Corgi.

*August 20, 2015, Washington City Paper: