Get Ready for Saturday’s Eclipse; Why Did Hamas Attack?

Indy Digest: Oct. 12, 2023

I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone as passionate about anything as Robert Victor is about astronomy.

I first met Bob more than a decade ago. He picked up the first Independent print edition, our April 2013 quarterly, liked it, reached out and offered to write a monthly astronomy column, specific to the Coachella Valley.

When I started the Independent, I didn’t plan on having an astronomy column. In fact, the thought never crossed my mind. But the first pieces Bob sent were good, so I said sure, why not—and his monthly astronomy column has been a part of the Independent since June 2013.

If you’ve ever been at an event in the western portion of the valley, and you’ve seen an older gentleman with a telescope offering anyone and everyone a look at the heavens … that’s Bob. Be sure to say hi the next time you see him.

Occasionally, Bob will text or email me an astronomical tidbit. Here’s one he texted me on Tuesday: “Folks can still catch a very thin crescent moon on Friday morning, some 26 hours before the start of Saturday’s solar eclipse. About 40 minutes before sunrise on Friday, the old Moon will be very low in the east, about 34 degrees to the lower left of Venus. Earlier that morning, before twilight gets too bright, Regulus can be spotted 4 degrees upper left of Venus.” So, if you’ll be up early tomorrow morning, take a look!

Anyway, I am talking about Bob because this weekend is a really big freaking deal for astronomers: There’s a solar eclipse happening on Saturday morning. You can read more about the eclipse—including start, peak and end times—in his October astronomy column.

Earlier today, Bob emailed me a reminder that the Rancho Mirage Library and Observatory is having a special gathering on Saturday during the eclipse. The details:

We are taking a journey down the road to gather at the Rancho Mirage Community Park (71560 San Jacinto Drive) to view a partial solar eclipse as the moon passes between Earth and the sun. Join us at the park to safely view this wonderful event through our telescopes equipped with special solar filters, learn more about eclipses, and create your own pinhole projection viewer!

8:08 am Partial Eclipse begins

9:26 am Maximum Eclipse: 73% of the Sun’s disk will be blocked by the Moon!

10:53 am Partial Eclipse ends

I know Bob would want me to remind you to NEVER look directly at the sun, even during an eclipse. So, please don’t do that.

Everyone, (safely) enjoy the eclipse this weekend—and Bob, thank you for keeping me and our amazing readers in the astronomical know!

—Jimmy Boegle

From the Independent

More News

• Why in the world did Hamas attack Israel, setting off an awful war? NPR offers up a helpful explainer. A couple of paragraphs: “The strike by Hamas could also serve as a touchstone for others who want to fight against Israel, says C. Ross Anthony, a senior economist at Rand Corp. and co-author of Alternatives in the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. ‘They were able to capture people and kill Israelis in a way they never had before,’ he says. ‘So that will inspire people in the Middle East, unfortunately, and probably some of the people on the West Bank.’ Bilal Saab, a former Pentagon official who is now a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, says he doesn’t think Hamas expected the attack to lead to an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank or other territorial concessions. Instead, the hostages Hamas seized during the operation are a means to an end, he says, giving the extremist group ‘bargaining space with the Israelis’ for the release of some or all of the thousands of Palestinians in Israeli jails.”

• The latest newspaper to announce a big staff reduction is The Washington Post. NPR reports: “The Washington Post plans to cut 240 jobs, or almost 10% of its workforce, through voluntary buyouts. The Post had been ‘overly optimistic’ about its growth in readership, subscriptions and ads for the past two years, interim CEO Patty Stonesifer wrote in an email to staff on Tuesday. ‘We are working to find ways to return our business to a healthier place in the coming year.’ Stonesifer said voluntary buyouts would be offered to employees in specific roles. … ‘To be clear, we designed this program to reduce our workforce by approximately 240 employees in the hopes of averting more difficult actions such as layoffs—a situation we are united in trying to avoid.’ she said. At a staff meeting on Wednesday, she said half of the job cuts would come from the newsroom, with the rest from the Post’s business operations, an attendee said.”

• Our partners at Calmatters break down some of the more controversial vetoes coming from Gov. Gavin Newsom. One involved a bill to lower insulin co-pays: “Gov. Gavin Newsom has made lowering the cost of prescription drugs a signature health care issue, but over the weekend, he rejected a bill that would have provided some relief for diabetics by capping what they pay for insulin. His reasoning: California is already working on a separate effort to manufacture and distribute insulin at a cheaper price. The trouble is, that program has not yet begun producing the medication. Senate Bill 90 by Sen. Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat, would have prohibited state-regulated health insurance plans from imposing a deductible on insulin prescriptions and would have capped copays at $35 for a 30-day supply. California’s current copay limit for most prescription drugs is $250.”

• Another involved mandatory severance pay for grocery-store workers: “Gov. Gavin Newsom vetoed a bill that would have given grocery store workers who are laid off as a result of a merger or acquisition a week of severance pay for every year of their service. The veto, announced Sunday night, comes after the governor signed two other grocery worker protection bills. Advocates have been pushing for the measures since last fall, when Kroger and Albertsons announced plans for a massive merger. The $24.6 billion deal involving two of the largest grocery chains in the United States faces antitrust scrutiny but, if approved, it could happen in early 2024. Newsom said he vetoed the bill—Senate Bill 725—because other laws already protect these workers. He cited the state’s Grocery Worker Retention law, which since 2016 has required companies that merge or buy another grocer to retain existing workers at least 90 days, and the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act, which requires companies with 100 or more workers to give them 60 days notice before mass layoffs. He also noted that affected workers could tap unemployment insurance.”

• Sort-of related: A public policy expert, writing for The Conversation, explains the impacts two new laws Newsom did sign could have globally: “Many of the world’s largest public and private companies will soon be required to track and report almost all of their greenhouse gas emissions if they do business in California—including emissions from their supply chains, business travel, employees’ commutes and the way customers use their products. That means oil and gas companies like Chevron will likely have to account for emissions from vehicles that use their gasoline, and Apple will have to account for materials that go into iPhones. … And it will have global ramifications. California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed two new rules into law on Oct. 7, 2023. Under the new Climate Corporate Data Accountability Act, U.S. companies with annual revenues of $1 billion or more will have to report both their direct and indirect greenhouse gas emissions starting in 2026 and 2027. The California Chamber of Commerce opposed the regulation, arguing it would increase companies’ costs. But more than a dozen major corporations endorsed the rule, including Microsoft, Apple, Salesforce and Patagonia. The second law, the Climate-Related Financial Risk Act, requires companies generating $500 million or more to report their financial risks related to climate change and their plans for risk mitigation.”

• If you felt like crud after getting your recent COVID booster—and I did (for the first time after a COVID shot)—that may actually be a good thing? The New York Times says: “A new study has an encouraging message for Americans who shy away from COVID shots because of worries about side effects: The chills, fatigue, headache and malaise that can follow vaccination may be signs of a vigorous immune response. People who had those side effects after the second dose of a COVID vaccine had more antibodies against the coronavirus at one month and six months after the shot, compared with those who did not have symptoms, according to the new study. Increases in skin temperature and heart rate also signaled higher antibody levels. … The relative increase in antibody levels among those who experienced side effects was small and doesn’t mean that people without symptoms don’t muster a strong immune response, experts said.”

• And finally … bed bugs are gross. And they’re a big problem in Paris—and not just Paris. Time magazine says: “Paris, the city known for its style, cuisine, and amour, has a bed bug problem. Video of the insects crawling over Metro seats, in hotels, and swarming buses and movie theaters swept the internet, and bed bug anxiety reached a new high. But what’s behind the Parisian invasion? How did bed bugs launch such a widespread infestation of the city? With Paris hosting the first Olympics in the post-COVID-19 era next summer, those questions aren’t just matters for idle conversation. The reality is that the infestation didn’t happen overnight. It’s likely that Paris, as well as other cities and even less-densely populated areas around the world, harbor a consistent, and persistent bed bug problem. … Unlike mosquitos and ticks, which government groups address with wide-scale, community-wide spraying and eradication efforts, bed bugs are seen more as an individual, rather than a societal, problem. And not everyone has the time or money to take the proper steps to get rid of them, so the insects continue feeding, breeding, and spreading to find new hosts. Contrary to anecdotal reports, bed bugs aren’t the result of poor hygiene and aren’t limited to lower income communities. It’s just that less advantaged people don’t have the resources to eradicate them.”

Support the Independent!

Thanks, as always, for reading! Please click the button below if you like what we do, and you have the means to help us out!

Read this Indy Digest at CVIndependent.com!