Murder by Experts. The mutual broadcasting system presents Murder by Experts. With your host and narrator, Mr. John Vickson Carr, world-famous mystery novelist whose books have been translated into 17 languages and have sold over 10 million copies. And author of the recently published detective novel, The Lower Suspicion. Good evening. This is John Vickson Carr. Each week at this time, Murder by Experts brings you a story of crime and mystery which has been chosen for your approval by one of the world's leading detective writers. Tonight, our guest expert is the noted mystery writer, Max Ehrlich. From the thousands of thrillers he has read and enjoyed, Mr. Ehrlich has selected an adventure of that first moving, humanish young detective couple, Susan and Johnny Deuce, written by Andrew Phillips. And now we present Anne Shepard and Larry Haynes in The Unseeing Witness. The name's Deuce. Johnny Deuce.  In the movies and on the radio, private eyes are always big, handsome, two-fisted guys working day and night on confessional cases, collecting heavy seas and beautiful blood. Me? I'm five feet seven. And if I don't land the first part, I usually end up on the floor. The cases I get? Well, they're not sensational and they barely pay a cent. And there's never a beautiful blonde car. Maybe I shouldn't say that. I'll take that morning last week. I was sitting right here in my office when the door was open. And the door was open. It was a blonde alright and beautiful. She stood there for a moment and we just stared at each other. She crossed to my desk and then slowly and deliberately fixed me. Then she got down to business. Johnny, it's a curse to the money. Yeah, I know. We've got $54.23 from the bank. I know that. Johnny, you'll never guess who I bumped into yesterday. The last person in the world I ever- Inspector Ross. Where'd you bump into him, baby, in his office? What is this business knife that you have? Johnny, I'm sure it'll give you back your job on the floor. No, Susan. Can't blame a girl for crying. I know things are tough like this, but I'll- Well, okay, what are you doing here? Oh, come on, Susan. Johnny, you've got to help me. No, what's wrong with you? They've arrested you. Oh. What for? Murder. Oh, Susan, I've been going crazy. So did he come home all night. They called me from the police station a half hour ago, but they wouldn't let me talk to them.  Say, now, one thing at a time. Who's the murderer? DeVal. Crazy DeVal? Uh-huh. Is it DeVal who owns the Pelican Club? It's DeVal. Well, why do they think DeVal did it? I don't know. When he left the house last night, he said he was going to the Pelican Club. Why? Well, DeVal asked DeVal to handle a lawsuit for him last night. Oh. Didn't he know DeVal was a mobster? Yes, and that's why I wanted him to get out of it. Oh, didn't he? That's why he went there last night. All right, all right, now get hold of yourself. It's one thing to bring a murder charge, and a slur, and it's a six.  I want to get to the Pelican Club before the cops and Inspector Ross, in particular, mess up the evidence. No, Johnny, this is one case that's open and shut. Ah, that's what you say about all of them, Inspector. Yeah. Well, this time I can prove it. Well, look, would you mind letting the Duchess and me look over the room where DeVal was killed? Not at all. I threw this doorway. This is Duke's and mine porpoise. Doc didn't do his examination. Oh, no. I'm used to them. That Bill Carson's a friend of mine, Inspector, I can't believe he's a murderer. You don't have to take my word for it, Johnny. Hey, Kelly, bring Benedict in. Benedict was DeVal's manager, he'll tell you. Would you want to see me, Inspector? Yes, Benedict. This is Johnny Duke. Tell him what you told me a little while ago. Well, a fellow Carson came into the club last night a little before midnight. He had an appointment with DeVal. I told him in here, and I left the club. This morning when I knocked on the door, it was unlocked by Carson. DeVal was lying on the floor, dead. That's that, Johnny. Tarleton was here all night. Doc, you finished looking at the body? Yes. Preliminary examination shows that death occurred between 4 and 6 in the morning. He's charged by some case. You mean his house strangled, Doctor? No, there are no bruises on his throat. Apparently, he was smothered. An autopsy will give us his answer. I'll have it for you in 24 hours or so, Inspector. I'm a little busy. That's all right, Doc. No rush. Couldn't someone else have come into the office during the night and smothered the house? No, that's impossible. Johnny, take a look at the lock on this door. It can't be opened from the hall, right? Yes, that's right. Uh, what's in the next room? That was DeVal's bedroom. There's one window in here and one in there. Neither of them's been opened. A dustbin threw that.  Go on, darling. Tell him. Uh, I'm afraid I can't. Of course you can't. May I, uh, go now, Inspector? Uh, just a minute, Senator. He's, uh, empty champagne bottles in the wine bucket from these two glasses. When were they served? Oh, um, yeah, just before I left last night, I had one of our men bring them up. Then you weren't the last man to see DeVal last night? Well, uh, not exactly. Well, you've got to sort them in before I shoot you. You get the man of service. I assure you, he doesn't know anything about it. Go ahead, do as Mr. Doke says. All right. Just a moment. Johnny, don't you ever get tired of asking questions. Of course not. Why, if Johnny hadn't asked me the way to town, I swear, we'd be new over town. We'd never have known. Here's the man who served the champagne last night. Uh-huh. Oh, for hell, if it isn't Melvin. Johnny, do. Johnny! Well, how are you, Melvin? Say, where have you been since I last saw you? Well, I, uh, found myself up against the gun to try to fit the machine through a five-yard to Sleepy Hollow. What would he say to you? Oh, oh, he says he got served five years at the state prison in Clinton. Oh. Oh, Melvin, Melvin, this is my wife, Susie. This is Melvin Maloney. Better known as Melvin's the muscle. Well, he's quite a twist in the twirl. Oh. Oh, Johnny, why don't you ever say things like that to me? Uh, say, Melvin, I, I understand you were the one who served the champagne last night. Yes, that's right. Well, tell me, what happened? Nothing. Mr. Benedict Haynes had told me I'd take some knocks on the door. The bell opens up, grabs the bottle of sparkle, and shuts the door. I hear him rock it. What else do you know? Well, that's good, Johnny, aren't it? I wouldn't hold out on you. Well, Johnny, what do you say now? Well, I'm not going to say anything, Inspector, until I hear coffee stories. Hello, Bill. Johnny. Susan, how did you know? They told us. They worried you. You all right? She was nearly out of her mind when she came to the office this morning. She must have been poor, and they told me to talk to her.   Did you kill him, though? I don't know. I don't know. All right. All right, I'm here to help you if I can. Now, tell me what happened. Well, I was working on a lawsuit for the bell. Yeah, I know about that. What happened when you went to the pelican last night? Hank is always waiting for me in his office. I told him I was going to quit. Handed him the papers I'd been wanting to give him my bill. Then what happened? Well, he tried to talk me into staying on. While we were arguing, someone knocked on the door and brought in a couple of buckets of champagne. We started drinking. The bell got mean. Yeah. Finally, he took a poke at me. He missed. So I kept him on the counter and knocked him out. But what happened next? I don't remember anymore. I must have gone into the next room and passed out. And no one came in during the night? I don't know. I told you I passed out. When did you come through? This morning. Someone knocked on the office door. I got up and... I liked it. The key was on the inside? Yes. And I opened the door. Benedict was standing there. The bell was... called on the floor. Yes. Is that all you can tell me, Bill? That's all I know. How do you think it looks, darling? Well, trouble is you haven't told me anything that breaks down the case against you. Mountain will find a way. So long, Bill. So long, darling. Thanks. Goodbye, Bill. Hello, darling. How are you going to do? Can you help him out on me? I don't know it like this. The best thing to do it is to go home and sleep over it. If Bill didn't do it, then it's the perfect murder. My name? I woke up to find my wife. Tell me. I was working on a theory. Oh, it doesn't work. Well, I'm grateful for that. Now I'll go to sleep. I can't sleep. I keep thinking of Wolf K. and Bill. I'm glad I asked you to sleep with them. Yeah, I guess so. Now that was a test of two. Ha! I can remember when you used to do everything under the moon to keep me out until two o'clock. Engine trouble out of gas. Flat tires. Emotion of the batteries. Darling, you never could have explained to me what emotion of the battery was. Oh, there ain't no such animal, baby. Then you just made it up to keep me out. Did I know what would come of it? Now go to sleep, please. I can't. I... Oh, Chris. We cannot leave this all. All right, all right. Stay where you are. I'll get it. All right, take it easy. Can't you see I'm coming? Darling, let me... Why are you shaking?  Hello, Mr. Sookham. Sorry, Chris. Is that a new dance you're doing, Marvin? No, it's... All right, all right. Now stand still for just a second, Marvin. Who was it again? Oh, King. This is Marvin. This is Chris. I'm happy to meet you. All right. Darling, I'm as good as up to hand. What? Yeah, honey. Three messes ride me out to the meadows, giving me the kill all the way to the cross with Army, and they was doing the song. Johnny, what's he saying? Oh, three men took Marvin for a ride, but he managed to escape. Really? He was a nice man. No, we need the truth. Marvin, uh... Who's putting a finger on you? The big pay or... Oh, now wait a minute. How could DeVal put you on the spot when he escaped? You're guffin' it wrong. DeVal is the dressin' to pay off his Benedict. Benedict? Johnny. Oh, uh, Marvin said DeVal was only the front for the Pelican out, but the real brain is Benedict. Well, maybe Benedict had something to do with DeVal's mood. Yeah, it's an angle. Now, why would Benedict want you out of the way, Marvin? Well, nothing. I'm gettin' the torch around. A short con like me don't cut the score with him. I'm crackin' a straight line to clock around, so one of the pointin', I guess. Darling, translation. Uh, Marvin said he can't understand why Benedict wants him out of the way. He has his torch. Well, even if he did, who could understand him? Uh, Marvin, Marvin, are you sure you've told Papa everything?  Mm-hmm. Marvin, this morning, Benedict forgot all about the campaign in the office. Then he didn't want to tell me who brought it. Now, why? I don't know. You can put me to bed with his shovel if I'm old. Yeah, I know, I know. Maybe you're being taken for a ride has a connection with the murderer. Yes. Maybe Marvin knows something, or he doesn't realize it. Of course. And Benedict is sure that he might wake up to it, so he sends him for a ride. I don't know. This might be it. I tell you what, Marvin, you're staying here until you remember what Benedict doesn't want known. Oh, I already told you everything. I know, aren't I? Marvin, what you need is to be psychoanalyzed. What? And I'm just the one to do it. Let me talk to him, Johnny. Well, nothing else ain't the way. What do you say, Marvin? Anything you say, Johnny. You and the Mrs. is back to back. Strictly seein' I got the smore power. The smore power? Who's even trouble, baby? And it might be Captain. Oh. I hope your insurance policy is here in order, dear. Marvin, think hard. It means so much. I'm practically blowin' a fuse. Well, he says that's red when he thinks, but he doesn't say a sentence of any value. We've been quaking in you for two hours now, Melvin, and all we get is the same stories. I run the bottle of sparkle to the office, knocked on the door, to gallop and grab shots locked- Oh. Yeah, well, that's what I've been telling you. Johnny, can't you make these twists to take that lamp out of my eye? I just blinded me. You think I was down at headquarters? Well, I'm only trying to make you feel at home. Yeah, besides, Melvin, I thought you said you were once under police willing for 36 hours. I was, only it wasn't like these twists. They were nice to me. Well, I didn't do just as nice as the police department. Here, you can have another retail. Well, you say. Johnny, come away from the window and help us. Uh, I've set a very nice view from here of one of Benedict's men watching our fuck. Oh, I knew it. I knew it. I'm bein' miles. Let me see him. Oh. Oh, it's the Ripper. I'm as good as up to hand. I'll have nothing real safe. Johnny, you don't have the count on Benedict. He knows more than old Hepps young. Well, Johnny is pretty bright, too. Well, I want you to get as far as the $4.20. You must be sayin' goes on livin' on time for it. No. Yeah. Well, I want you to make it that time. Here. Here's a change. Oh, thanks. Thank you. Oh, hey, Johnny, she's puttin' the lights in the eyes again. Now, when you start singin' for Kay, I've got to do some shopping for dinner. Well, get to make class, will you? Well, like I was sayin', I run the bottle of sparkle to the office, knocks on the door, the valve grips. Malcolm, are you sure there isn't something you haven't told us? Well, I guess. I've got a girl in Jason City. Johnny, come over to the window. The men watchin' the apartment, they're gone. What do they know about that? You think Benedict is givin' up time to get married? Not Benedict. That bloodhound never gets up. Oh, that must be season. How am I supposed to? I wonder why Benedict called his girl as well. Johnny, it's him. He's come to plant me. Hello, Benedict. Come on in. What do you mean, Mr. How are you, Melvin? Well, I'm all, I'm all, I'm all good. All right. No, no, no. You came up with a little song? I thought you might possibly straighten out the sort of misunderstanding between us. I'm talkin' to my good face. I've withdrawn the men who were watchin' the apartment. Am I supposed to be grateful? Come now, Mr. Duke. Give me attitude to take them. I'm willing to let bygones do bygones. Can't you forget what's happened? You mean that ride you gave, Melvin? I'm sorry about that. And my boy's a little overzealous with performance of their duties.  Just give a week's take to see me sort it out.  I only wanted to make a man. Yeah, would've just... Why did the boys take Melvin on a ride? They caught him taking money if it didn't belong to him. Of course, what they wanted to do was far too bad. I never swirled to tell. Uh, you couldn't want Melvin so badly because he holds the key to Vow's murder. Because you know he can send you to the chair. You're wrong. Why am I on personal reasons for wanting him?  No. Duke, um, some of my boys were anxious to tear this place apart. That's not the way I would. You're going to hand Melvin over to people. You'll have a long way. You'll wait just as long before you see your way. My wife's fast. That's my size when I bump into her this evening. And there's two blocks in here. I've decided to become my house guest for the time being.  He'll lay a hand. Easy, Johnny, speak. If I'm not back at the Pelican Club in half an hour, the boys have been stuck. You can't get away with it, Benedict. I don't scare easy, Duke. Give you 24 hours, think it over. When I get Melvin, you get to wife fast. What are we going to do? Hours have been walking the throne outside the world. Melvin, Melvin, you know Benedict. Where's he likely to hide to? Well, he's got to hide out in Westchester. To where, Johnny, that's it. No, no, no, no. Who are you? Well, but nobody knows about it, Johnny. Ah, he's probably counting on my visiting there. By no Benedict, he's probably trying to outsmart me by keeping a right at the Pelican Club. Yeah, yeah, he is foolish, Rick.  I'm paying a visit to it. Oh, no, Liz, and Johnny, you've got to take me with you. That place is big and full of rippers, and it's got more internet than I could tell you about. All right, you can come with me. But I'm going to. Uh-oh, no, no, okay. There'll probably be trouble in 20 hours. Oh, please, don't make me say this. I've got to go crazy. Please, please. All right, all right, all right. We can keep the motor running for six days. Let's go. That's all right. I do it, Johnny. I suppose Benedict has a place for you. Yeah, you take it. All right, come on. The first take is the silence you learn. You've got to do it, yeah, yeah. You keep it sharp. Look out. Probably got a couple of the boys on their own side. I'm watching. I'm getting it to you. That's one of the boys. Hey, what are you doing? You can powder them, John. Yeah, sure. I went to the special services school. Now, tie them up while I can explain to them how I'll take care of him like he was up till. He's one of the rippers that took me on the business. Yeah. There you are. Okay. Got to get the lock on his door. Yeah. This mess is wrapped up for him. There's a couple of games there.  A bunky that could open any lock there was, except of course, the one on the cell door. I thought I'd got it for that. And that door leads into the hallway, doesn't it? Yeah, it leads through the door. Marvelous. I wish we'd make the tape stop there, eh? I'll put them in the pot. All right. Come on, we're going into the hallway. What was that about? I picked some powder. Let's see. There's a wine bucket here, but I didn't spill nothing. Which empty? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Really? You know, come to think of it, the one's in the Val's office where I see two. I don't follow you girls. Melvin, when you were in the Val's office with the inspector, I remembered the taste of those wine buckets when you drive. So what? Was it the ice in the bucket when you started the campaign? Sure, sure. What happened to the water? What water? Uh, look, look, Melvin, when ice melts, there's always water. Yeah. Yet the morning the murder was discovered, those buckets were dry. Oh, they were dry, Melvin. What was it? It was dry ice. Now, don't be funny. No, no, no. On the level. Dry ice. Why dry ice? Well, when Melvin did give me the bucket with the campaign, he said we ain't got no regular ice. Dry ice would just evaporate, leaving no trace behind it. So that's what accounts for the bucket being sent to the inside. Melvin, I've got the answer. Yes? Well, tell it to me. But come on. Yeah, later. Later, later. First, we've got to find the gut. Come on, Melvin. I need to go in the hallway now. Walk lightly.  Tell it some lights out under that door further down the hall. That's where the mob hangs out. Uh-huh. Have a look. They're in there. Oh, I get it. Do you need some water? That's the toughest whip that you ever like to keep on. Try it from the open. I'll give it a care, Melvin. So I can take a look. Okay. Ah, here we go. We go up to your fence. Okay, I'll see you. And raise the door button. The way you say it, that's it. Oh. Melvin, you can scare me out by then. I'll see you. Ah, full house. Full of cars. Ah. Ah, good girl. Look at them and weep. They flood. And they freeze. How do you like that? They're humanized in you. But they do? They're five dollars' worth. Oh, Dad. I say. And, Mike, you can return that ace you just slipped into your pocket. You're accusing me of taking less than you did, Darilla. If you don't return that card, I'll bust you one right in the ticket. I had to be intimidated. I'm in a country's charge. And if I find only fifty-one, Mike, you'll be die. I'm very, very sorry. Well, what do you know? Here's an ace on the floor. Now, isn't that same? Then right by your chair, too. It's my deal. And I suggest you boys dig up a little more coin at a realm. Oh, and, Mike, you, uh, money. What's good? It sounds from here like a card game, Janice. He's similar, all right? Thank you. And what I say to the rest of you will be promised. Let us play poker. Oh, listen, Janice, it would be them necessary to read you with a leg. How are you going to spring it? Well, I'm going to be off to where they hit the floor. I don't know if we're not the lights. Well, I look real as if throwing it around. I'll fall around. Janice, someone's coming this way, huh? If he lets out a piece, it's up to him. All right, all right, all right. I'm going to meet him. Is that you, Mike? Oh, why aren't there some lights on? Oh, oh, let go, I can't. Oh, oh, oh. He's dead, isn't he, Janice? Yeah. He's out cold. Bring him over to the children room. I'm going to take him out to the car. I'll get back in a second. Janice, too risky, alone. Why not?   Okay. But the guys for them guys will need to turn on the TV. Don't worry, I will. I'll stay with the kids.  At least the boys can show up before she can see you. I'll see you, boys. I know who you are. So, come out the floor. Somebody's out the window. I don't want to see Janice go. I think I got a hold on. I got you, I got you. Come on. I don't want to go. Come on before I ring you. I'm back. Oh, hold on me. I'm back in the door. I got a hold on the door. I got a hold on the door. Oh, you're crazy. I just got a hold on the door. Oh, all right, wait, wait. Put on it. Put on the window. This way to you and out the back. Johnny, I think they're coming after us. Okay, I have the car ready for a first-hand. All right, let's get back to work. This way. Come on, Johnny. Get going, pet. All right. Yeah. And get out of here. Johnny, no one said you solved the murder. Yeah. Look at where you've tried to do it. Oh, all right. All right. You can take us to headquarters. They're going to exchange Benedict for Bill. Johnny, how did Benedict kill Duvall? With dry ice, baby? Dry ice. You see, the champagne buckets Melvin delivered to Duvall were full of it. After Bill knocked Duvall out and went into the bedroom, the dry ice evaporated into carbon dioxide, say. Duvall regained consciousness but fell asleep on the floor next to the champagne bucket where his body was found. Carbon dioxide is heavier than air and it's made a layer on the floor of suffocating gas. Duvall breathed it in and died of suffocating. Well, if Bill hadn't been in the bedroom, you would have... No wonder Melvin was so valuable. He was the only one who knew that Benedict gave him the dry ice. Yeah, that's what I was telling you. I learned the bottle of sparkle for the office, knocked on the door... Oh, no, not again. Uh, Duchess, Duchess, would you mind telling me why you didn't want to leave? Just now I practically had to carry you out of there. You certainly did. Why couldn't you have waited a few more minutes? I was ready to choke you for about a minute when you did. But why? Oh, Johnny, I had four aces in my hand and two in my pocket. Well, we turned Benedict over to Inspector Ross and he very reluctantly released Bill Cross. The inspector's a man who hates to be proven wrong. Can't go back to him, they did it so nicely I didn't have the heart to ask him for a seat. Fortunately, the Duchess still had clutched in her hand $250 of the money she'd won playing poker. Well, after giving her a lecture on the evil for gambling, I took the money and paid up. And that concluded the case for the unseeing witness. The moral? Well, as the Duchess said, two aces never hurt. And so the curtain falls on the Duke and the Duchess and the case of the unseeing witness, which was chosen by guest expert, Matt Eric. Mr. Eric is author of the nearly published novel, The Big Eye. Next week at this time, murdered by experts brings you a story of two men who pitted their wits against each other. One, a professor of psychology. The other, a big-time expert. That's selected for your approval by Brett Halliday. Until then, this is your host, John Vickson Carr, hoping you'll be with us again next week at this time. Unseeing witness was written by Andrew Phillips. In the cast were Larry Haynes and Shepard, Bill Zuckers, Joyce Gordon, Kermit Murdoch, Lawson Cerby, and Roger DeCoven. Music is under the direction of Emerson Buckley and was composed by Richard DuPay. Murdered by experts is produced by Robert A. Arthur and David Koch. Last done by speaking, this is the world's largest network serving more than 500 radio stations, the mutual broadcasting system.


Hello, my name is Christopher Price. I head up Ericsson Software Technology, an initiative by Ericsson to establish a dedicated upstream open source R&D organization that works with open source foundation such as Linux Foundation Networking. I'm personally involved in both standards and open source development and see both the challenges and the opportunities that present themselves when those two domains are both together. I recall a day many years ago in California where a group of telecoms engineers came together and tried to figure out how we're going to collaborate on new digital infrastructure technology in a project called OPNV. Further down the line, I recall another day in Paris where a group of telecoms operators invited a broader ecosystem to participate with them on specifying how that digital infrastructure may emerge and the types of behaviors that we could see from it. And that was CNTT. Now we see those two initiatives coming together and forming a new entity called a NuGet. A really powerful opportunity for both the specification and the software development to come together. Traditionally when specification and software development have been done hand in hand, great technology has emerged. And I'm personally looking forward to seeing what comes out of this new project. Thank you for your time.


Hey everybody, welcome back to Magic Orthodoxy. My name is David and this is a deck review. Hey, today we're going to look at the Sibyl Lovita playing cards from Mana playing cards. All right, so what's the meaning behind Sibyl? Well, Sibyl were known as prophetesses and they were regularly sought out for divine advice. Playing cards also have been used to divine the you know the future and we go to them for prophet telling or for seeking divination and magic. And so this is why the Sibyl deck will always have a special kinship between these two fields in its design. The tuck box is a gorgeous gray blue color which takes on a whole new life in the silver metallic ink that's wrapped around it. The tuck case is also unique in that it is a cigarette style tuck case so it opens from the top right there. The tuck box is printed in a gray blue metallic ink with a semi-gloss finish to bring out the beautiful shine and it's also embossed with a silver foil stamp to add to the premium quality. It says number three right across the top there. This is the third Mana deck and it does say Mana playing cards right there on the front with some Roman numerals. Now this side of the tuck case had the tuck seal. Yeah it was printed and put on the side which I didn't really love because it was you can see how thin it was and it's right there on the edge and I couldn't really find the I couldn't find the edge when I was trying to get into it and actually in trying to break the seal open I ripped my tuck case. It is terrible and waited so long for these cards and then I ripped the tuck case and I had to repair the tuck case with tape so that that really sucks so that I didn't really love the seal or where it was placed so there's that. The other side of the tuck case just simply says 52 and then there's a symbol right there and the bottom has a little bit of ad copy about expert playing cards. The back design of course is the back design of the cards and that is pretty much it for the tuck case. Let's take a look at these cards.  Now a lot of people always ask how these cards feel, how they handle. Best thing I can do is stick them in a caliper for you and measure them and then compare them against other cards that you may have previously held or owned. So 10 of these cards in the caliper comes to 2.80. 2.80 is about on par with the cocktail party deck that Bicycle put out as well as the gold gator backs from David Blaine. The back design is an enhanced floral back design. It does have a frame with very thin borders and it is all done in this turquoise and silver wash. With this deck you're also going to get two original jokers and then within one of the jokers you're going to have a card reveal. Now here's another thing I really didn't love about this deck. These jokers just don't fit with the rest of the cards. They they really stand out. They're done on this kind of like burned out washed out old dry parchment paper that bleeds all the way to the edge and yet the cards you know at the cards the faces are white. So I love the illustration and I had nothing wrong with that. I just wish they hadn't gone with the parchment color in the background. Face of Spades is very big, very beautiful. It does say number three up there at the top. You do have the man assembled there in the middle of a very floral pip spade and this is mana playing cards premium quality since 2011. Your pips and indice cards for the most part are going to be completely standard and instantly recognizable making them perfect for gameplay, magic and flourishing. You will also notice that they do have an original indice in the corner that does have any long gated stylistic banner that goes under each pip. The core cards are also completely original and very stylized to the theme of the deck. They're all done in the same colors. You have those deep burgundies that aqua color and black and then each one kind of mirrors their respective classic counterparts. I will say one more thing about these cards that I didn't really love and that again goes back to the tuck case. The cigarette style tuck box just didn't really work for me especially with trying to get the cards in and pull them out. It doesn't feel like the card box is wide enough and they do feel like you have to jam them in if you don't get them perfect and so I love my cards. I try to keep care of them as much as I possibly can. I thought the cigarette style tuck box was really cool and I wish that it had worked better for me but it just in my personal opinion it just didn't work. All right so that is my review of the Sibyl Lavita playing cards and if you'd like to purchase these cards for yourself you can find them and many others of your very favorites at RarePlayingCards.com. Thanks, bye.


You know, for every Roku, Baba, Spotify, Google, Square, Apple, Beyond Zoom, Shopify, all the stocks are red. You still have a lot of good green, big moves in the semiconductors, in Netflix, in touch. Welcome to Access a Trader, the number one community for those who are committed to taking control of their trading in order to achieve success, profitability, and longevity. Thank you for joining us. Here's Dan Shapiro to help you find your edge, master your process, and own your future. Hey guys, good evening everybody. Welcome to another edition of the Access a Trader dot com night, and wrap up show, hope everybody is doing okay. So, you know, we had not, I really didn't have any expectations going into today's session. We talked about the potential continuation of a distribution cycle that started last Wednesday. You can see here with that big, big reversal here after 10 days in a row of upward bias. So, we really didn't know what to expect. Matter of fact, when I woke up this morning, I saw the futures surging up 200 points.  Because again, when you looked at the news today, futures spiking pre-market because first distribution of the vaccines, obviously, that's a good thing. Hope springs eternal, that it works. Like I said, in the weekend update, there's no, at least no major side effects and we can kind of go on with our lives. So, things are very, very optimistic. The problem is, when you get a distribution cycle and you have some sort of news, it's gonna push a lot of stocks into supply. And the one thing when you're trading in the distribution cycle, right, things are stuck in channels. The upper supply and then there's the lower demand. And if everything gaps up into upper supply, what happens is stocks will get rejected in that area because distribution is getting through and things will get pulled out. So, if you look at a lot of beta names today, that's exactly what happened. You look at square, right?  You had Apple, right? Gapped up, sold off.  Slowly but surely, Google, same thing, right? Gapped up, sold off. So, I really didn't have a lot of, I really didn't have a lot of conviction today based on what I knew potentially what could have happened and what did happen in a lot of names. The greatest thing about the stock market is and trading as a whole, sometimes things happen when you least expect it.   But that's exactly what happened today. And this is why I always say, trading is the greatest reality show that's not on television. You just don't know what to expect. And the most important part is, you have to be ready for anything, especially in 2020, which is again, we're only two weeks away. A lot of people are kind of winding down their year, including myself. And I said this morning, I said, look, I have no expectations today. I don't even see a lot of value today after that gap up into supply. And then little by little, little by little, we started seeing things wake up. Netflix was awesome today. And Tesla is Tesla, we'll get to that in a second. Amazon had a monster, monster move. After the close today, we saw, and again, this is where we talk about people know. People always know, especially in the options market. All day today, we saw the hundreds, 105 call buyers coming in after the close Goldman Sachs upgrades AMD. Ta-da, right? They also upgraded MU, right? MU Surging, and they also upgraded Intel, okay? So again, there was a massive call in the semiconductor space, and obviously they make up predominantly the majority of the NASDAQ 100. So it's gonna be again, curious to see if they could pull up the whole group tomorrow. And the one thing speaking of the NASDAQ 100, we talked about on the weekend video how important that 304 level is. Any close over 304 is bullish, any close under 304 continues to be in a distribution cycle. So what did the market do today? Obviously it closed it right at 304, obviously, just to screw us a little bit more. But the action today was very, very good, right? Very good, aggressive, again, you saw really aggressive call buying in Amazon today. And we saw the 3,300s, the weeklies, the 3,200s, the 3,300s, the 3,400s, we started seeing really aggressive call buyers even for January, and the key for Amazon was, at least initially, that first channel over 3,160, we'll talk about the pivots in a second, and obviously what did Amazon do, just like the Qs did, it closed right at the 50-day moving average, again, not leaving us not here nor there. But Netflix broke out today, really, really big move on Netflix. Like this is my move today, this is my play today, Netflix closed well, took out this whole channel here. Again, we're seeing 530 weeklies coming in, 535s. So Netflix looks really, really good. Tesla, again, we talked about over the weekend, they absorbed that offering within, what, two, three days, took out this whole channel, reclaimed the 5-day moving average. And the only reason why it stopped here was the linear regression line. And Tesla's literally one or two days away from reclaiming this linear regression line, testing those 654 highs. And then again, you see this B-line move, potential all the way to 700. And again, if you look at the pattern of activity, that in the call market, right, and the options mark in the last several weeks, you see millions of dollars being poured in on the 660s, the 700 calls, weekly calls just the same way we saw it today again. So again, Tesla looks higher as well. So I like what the market's doing. I still like what these SPACs are doing, IPOB, had a really, really aggressive move today, had some more juice after hours. So these SPAC names continue to be very, very good as well. So again, I think the key is every single day coming in, just with an open mind. Again, let technicals tell us which way the wind's gonna blow. But again, if you look at the dynamics, it's kind of where we are, which we only, what? 10 days away from Christmas, two weeks away from the end of 2020, it's gonna be very, very tough for the bears to seize control that's so obvious, unless something really comes out. And again, you can make a case that, oh, the Dow's sold off because concerns of more COVID spikes and, but again, at the same time, we get that part. We're all trying to be responsible adults. We're trying to save small business at the same time, but we also have this vaccine now that's finally sort of first distribution. So the headlines kind of don't make sense to kind of where we are. Don't we have to, as just human beings, or even as traders, have to give these, this antivirus vaccine, the kind of the benefit of the Dow. So I think that's what's gonna be the next chapter going into the first quarter of 2021. So we'll see. So every single day, guys, now until the end of the year, again, just have an open mind, bulls continue to be in control. There obviously is a disconnect between the Dow and the NASDAQ today. There's also a disconnect and a lot of beta names. Again, for every, you know, for every Roku, Baba, Spotify, Google, Square, Apple, Beyond, Zoom, Shopify, all the stocks are red. You still have a lot of good green big moves in the semiconductors, in Netflix, in Tesla. So again, trade individual names very, very specifically. And again, let technical analysis be your guide instead of what you think is gonna happen. So again, if you look at the scoreboard today, cues, again, even though they gave us an inverted hammer, which is a bearer sign. Okay, don't think for a second, inverted hammer. If you see an inverted hammer here, that's a sell sign. But I don't know, right? I don't know. Semiconductors got upgraded after the close.  We'll see. Again, I think it's predicated on how strong the semi-names can be and can they continue to drag everything up after the Goldman Sachs upgrade on the semi-names after the close. We'll see, you know, we'll see there. If you look at IWM, again, same thing. You have this inverted hammer, but at the same time, you have three days in a row of higher lows, right? So again, the market is kind of wishy-washy. It's not really giving us a lot of conviction. The Dow, again, got rejected. Again, folks, when we talk about stocks going from supply to supply and demand to demand, again, here's a perfect example that emotional buyers met technical sellers right at the Bollinger Band, guess who won? So the technical analysis works.  Again, Netflix looks really, really good. Tesla, again, maybe, you know, Tesla has one more day of sideways action. But again, you can see the top of this range that should get tested.  The video has to be, and it had a phenomenal run this year. And I, you know, we've done incredibly well with the name, but boy, oh boy, over the last month or so, this by far has to be the most disappointing name along with Amazon as well. But again, I'm watching it tomorrow. I figure to reclaim the 50-day moving average, right? Can it possibly wake up then? Right, we'll see. So that's that. So, you know, I'm kind of dealt a new show going into tomorrow. You know, the fact that a lot of the index is put in either inverted hammers or got rejected of supplies. Is that really what I want to see on the bullish case of tomorrow? No, but at the same time, again, we have no fear. There is no materialistic reason to turn around tomorrow and say, sell everything. But again, will it shock me if they rub-pull the same way they did on Wednesday? No, no, nothing. Nothing is shocking. As long as you are prepared for it and you're not naive to think nothing can go wrong, I think you'll be fine. So trade everything trade by trade, one day at a time, going to the New Year, start off 2021 with a fresh head with no buys and we'll see what happens for this year. Other than that, again, you didn't need a lot today. And that was the most important part. You really did not need to be in 500 stocks. The stocks that woke up today were the stocks that we traded. These were beta names. These were names that we covered throughout the years. And I tell you one thing, I think this year got really, really lost as much as like Amazon put on some really big moves this year, Amazon also had like five or six months that it didn't do anything. And the same thing with Netflix and the same thing with a lot of these beta names. If I had to say, you know, if I had to have a bold prediction, kind of going into 2021, if there is going to be any type of strength, I have to assume these stocks are gonna wake up at some point and really start going on a majestic run. And as great as these SPACs have been and these EVA names, there's no greater feeling. And for all you guys who trade technology and beta names, there's no greater feeling being on board of a runaway train on Netflix, on Amazon, on Facebook, on Apple, so fingers crossed, hopefully money will rotate into these names. So let's talk about today. Again, not a lot of things confirmed, but the ones that did did incredibly well. Apple didn't confirm, Boeing didn't confirm. I was watching this SPAC name. This didn't confirm. I was watching this SLDB name. This didn't confirm. ZS, not a big move. I still like it. Have to watch it this week. We talked about this 185 level, traded up to 87 and a half, but again, little disappointing that it didn't make that push, but I still wanna watch the top of the range here for the rest of the week. And here is, again, here is Tesla, just an absolute monster. People were asking me over the weekend, what did I think Tesla on this offering? And once Tesla absorbed this offering a couple of days ago, the price action spoke louder than words. And today, all it needed to do was confirm Friday's high, which was 6.24, that's why I put 6.25 sneaky, and the macro range from last week, 6.2830, and Tesla exploded. I mean, really, Tesla just really went ballistic and stopped right at supply here with a high of 6.43, it's a really good move on Tesla. Amazon, again, Amazon macro play, any close over 31.60 is bullish. And Amazon really exploded off that opening print. And the most, the disappointing part about Amazon, it was building, if you look at the whole day, it was building majority of the day above the 50 day moving average, and the market got pulled and it closed right below it. So here was the 61.60, and it literally put up like a $35, $40 candle. And I really thought this was the day it was gonna start piercing 3,200, especially all the call buying, but ran out of juice towards the end of the day. AMBA, I like this AMBA chart. It's just the problem with this chart is it's thin. But look at the setup, guys, look at the setup on Ambrella. If this was Tesla or Amazon and Netflix, man, I'd be in this thing with two hands, two feet, and every other part of my body. But this thing just trades so thin, 450,000 shares. I'd like to see if you guys are trading smaller shares, you know, keep an eye on it above like today's high. If it starts building, there's a lot of room that it has, just unfortunately it's a little too thin for me. Netflix was really good today. Not only did it confirm the sneaky candle off that 508, it confirmed the recent range highs. I got one in that opening range of 510, really big move on Netflix. I still think it goes higher. So it took out this 508, right? Here's 508 is this whole 508 was the linear regression line. It was right over here. So it took that out. And then it took out that 52150, which was last week's high, and traded all the way up to 524. If this thing starts confirming, look how much room you have for the rest of the week. So definitely keep an eye on Netflix. Great, great mover. Twitter a little disappointing. I caught this for a scalp, but it really didn't do anything. It was really disappointing considering we was sitting there and just watching the 55 calls coming in. So it took out this 53, it ran up, put up like 40, 50 cents, and then just didn't do anything. I'm a little bit disappointing there on Twitter, but I took a little cash flow there. So again, here is the call buying that came in, which is very, very odd that it's sold both towards the end of the day. First move went to 517. Obviously 517 turned into 525. Again, exploding 660, 700 calls came in, and here is kind of the thought process behind all these moves. So we had a lot of really big moves today, but these moves were kind of condensed, right? Really condensed here. The 530 weeklies were coming in as well. So I think going into tomorrow, let's be open-minded. I still wanna give the bulls the benefit of the doubt, but again, folks, always keep in the back of your mind that nothing needs to happen. Always take money along the way, always use break even as your stop. And again, remember, there's no such thing as slam dunks, right? You could look at the data, you could look at the chart, everything looks great. It's going your way, yada, yada, yada. You better take money along the way, because again, if not, they'll take it right back. Guys, have a great night, everybody. God bless, and I'll see you all tomorrow.


Mae'n cael ei gwybod i'r golwg yn sexy. Felly mae'n rhaid i chi'n gweld yn fan, ac mae'n cael ei gwaith i'r hynny'r hybryd. Roeddwn i chi'n maen nhw i'n ddechrau. Ac rwy'n cyflwyno i'r teulu yn Caelawau, sydd yn cael ei gweithio. Mae'r apex pro ac ysyn tw-rescu. Mae'n yn hysylltu i chi'r clasio'r cyflwyno i ni'n bethau hybryd. Mae'n clywed i'r cyflwyno i ni. Mae'n gwaith erioed. I'd probably on a personal level shy away from them normally and go for the sort of bigger overall head shape. But I'm going to see if I can get some numbers out of these things to persuade me to put one of these in the bag because on a looks perspective they go straight in there, either one of them. Now in many of the recent reviews you'll know that when I talk about splitting drivers in terms of performance they're virtually all very much at a level. They all perform very very similar. I do think there's been changes in things like irons in fairways and in clubs like these, into hybrids. I do think that's where we've seen some advances in technology and that's what I'm going to look at today in these two. But they're very much different addresses the key thing to mention here. Really nice in terms of the top line but very very different. I'm really in favour and I always have been if you watch the channel this sort of classic almost tear drop look that has been adopted in the sim too. But the way they've finished it off in terms of that gloss thick top line and fading into that crown I think is really so so nice at address. And I also criticised the bottom end of the sim drivers and that is completely the opposite in terms of the rescues because it looks again superb. It's a real quality finish to it and honestly I just wish they'd have put exactly the same finish on the bottom of the driver as they have into these hybrids. You go into the Callaway and like I said it's an odd shape. I'm not used to them. It's kind of almost a high toe end. You see a lot of the clubfaser address. That's the bit I struggle to get used to. It's that style of and they're very much in the Callaway theme with what they do with hybrids. So that bit's a little bit odd. So from looks at address I would certainly be going for the sim too rescue. But we all know it's about performance so I'll shut up and I'll start hitting some golf balls. It's very neutral at address and again some of that hybrids will be very closed which I don't particularly like. But this offers up quite a bit of loft in terms of the face that you see at address. Dark face. A real great sound out of them. I've got seriously, I always struggle when I've already collected data not to give too many of the secrets away but these two are performing really really well. But where the changes have been made just how good they sort of sound and feel. I'm really taken aback by those differences. I struggle to describe sound and feel. It's so so difficult but they've got that balance right that I've mentioned in a few videos as well. You want to feel like there's a bit of an explosion off the face in terms of it's getting out there. But you want some soft responsiveness into the hands and to be fair that baller just hit was with the sim too but it's exactly the same in the Callaway product as well. They've just done overall a really good job of a very neat profile. Maybe it is going to appeal slightly more to the players market I suppose and I wouldn't put myself in that category necessarily but I've got no problem in thinking I've got the ability to use either of these products either. Slightly louder crisp sound you can hear off of the apex and again probably swaying towards the sim it's a slightly softer feel that resonates back into their ears and into their head and I probably I just prefer that. And again just going back to that difference in address. You see a lot more of the face things that say a dark face on the sim too product.  I just struggle like I said with that more sort of bulbous higher toe end to get this thing squared up at address or feelers are uncomfortable and square at address. That's an issue that I would have. I'm just going to switch back and see what switch back into this sim product again. Really nice bit of balance between this 10 size shaft and feeler. Suddenly feeler head through the swing which I like. It's got a bit of weight in it. I'm really really impressed with this product. Oh God that is so nice as well. Great launching. There's a slight difference I feel in terms of the way each of these products launch but also equally impressed with how they perform overall. It's just a real real interesting line they've introduced here. Overly impressed. We want to know about numbers. I'll carry on it in balls and collecting that and we'll break down the data. But let's have a quick look at what's gone into both of these products in terms of their tech spec. Right in terms of tech spec it's going to be fairly brief. We'll look at both models and I'm going to pretty much read from the tailor made and Callaway website respectively. We've got a new leading edge on the TM product. Different sole geometry. Optimized CG. All the things you'd expect to hear. The v-steel sole which I like visually. I don't know how much it impacted as in terms of on turf interaction but it makes its first appearance in the rescue woods. We've seen it in the fairways come back after years of being away. I like it visually but I don't know what it does in terms of performance wise. It's a forged face and we've also got twist face which we all know about by now. This through slot speed pocket as they call it. It's been designed to maintain higher ball speeds off this bottom of the club face. The bottom grooves and as you understand then Callaway make this point in their sort of appeal is that's a common place for us average golfers is to get it off those bottom grooves. So to see or not see ball speeds drop off then that's very much a positive. Don't forget adjustable sleeve in the TM product. It's available in three different heads a two, a three and a four and that's 17, 19.5 and 22 degrees of loft but then with that adjustability. Into the Callaway head which I've got a sort of a deconstructed Callaway head. What you see inside of there is the jailbreak. It's now called jailbreak velocity blades. We know what they do but what they've done in terms of the hybrid is very much the same as what I said in the TM product is they've made sure that they try and maintain ball speeds on that lower end of the face. So both clubs trying to do the same thing. AI design face again. It's a forged face. Iron like it addresses what they say. I'm struggling on that one to be honest with you. It's available in four different heads a two, three, four and a five and they're 18, 20, 23 and 26 degrees but no adjustability. That's it, tech spec done. I'm going to go straight into numbers in terms of performance and this is what I achieve with these two heads. Right, I'm going to put both of, well I've done a lot of videos of later. I'll put the averages of both so we can go through them now and then I'll put the full data collected at the end and I will also put the dispersion up as well. The third noticeable difference is ball flight and launch angle in particular. It starts with 11 and 11.9 degrees. The TM being the higher launching ball. It was very visible throughout the testing and more so in terms of peak height because it was a huge difference. 81 on average with the TM, 68 with the Callaway. 132 ball speed out of both of them, incredibly similar. And then we've got a spin number of 4, 2 on the TM, 38 on the Callaway and both of them again, unbelievably, 198 carry, 198.8 whatever it was, just a minimal difference splitting them over a fair old sampler shots to be honest with you. What I'm going to say at this point is that they each do what they do very well but get there in a different way and it would be dependent on what you're looking for. I leaned towards the, with a hybrid, what the TM product did, which was a much higher ball flight, it was still a strong ball flight. Although the spin went up to 4, 2, that's really probably a positive to get out at sort of still that 198 carry. 4, 2 spin with a descent angle of 40 degrees and again they're really, really strong numbers to suggest that coming into a green from 200 yards away you're going to get that ball to stop. I preferred that ball flight having said that there's plenty of golfers out there that might prefer to see the more lower penetrating piercing ball flight of the Callaway. Argument for both, but for me like I said and for most average golfers I think you'd be leaning towards the TM product. The other thing to say is I said most average golfers when these products came in I looked at them both and if I'm honest with you I sort of pushed them to the back of the pile in terms of the reviews because they did look like what I would certainly class as the better player hybrid they're really, really small and compact. When the two are together perhaps not picked up on the visuals that I've put in these head to head so far there's quite a big difference as well, the Callaway is really compact and I think would scare so many golfers away and even like I said that TM product is a little bit bigger in profile but most of us would look at them on the shelf and perhaps think they're just a little bit too small and compact and that's the big shock that I had because again if you take everything at face value which I would have done I wouldn't have tried them but we give them a go and I soon learned they were really, really impressive. I was amazed to be honest with you how it performed, how easy it was in terms of that launch and forgiveness and all them things that you perhaps would consider being an issue with them and the size and mass didn't really detract from its performance whatsoever I found it no easier or more difficult to use than any other hybrid I've tested in fact like I said I'd put it on that more impressive spectrum in terms of how easy it was to launch so the lesson learned from my perspective and we always say the same thing is to always try we've got a vibrating camera over to the left is to always try the products for yourself it's that simple and don't be put off by I think manufacturers are guilty of categorising products they put them into a pigeonhole which straight away says well I'm not a better player or I'm not a game improvement type of player I'm not a high handicap or therefore I shy away we shouldn't be doing that a golf club is a golf club you should just pick it up on its own merits and give it a bash, don't dismiss them I've got no more to say really apart from the fact that I think the TEM product would be a clear winner based on the overall package of what it did in terms of performance and in terms of looks it's probably the best looking hybrid I'm trying to think of others as I'm speaking probably the best looking hybrid I've seen on a market today it's absolutely stunning right that is me done a quick shout out again massive thanks for the people who a couple of nights ago we launched our website with merchandise for sale for the first time I know that with some of the products we're getting really low on stock and potentially when this video goes out on Friday night we might be out of stock so I can't thank everybody enough for buying what they did but if you've not been yet then take a look over it's theaveragegolfa.co.uk we'd appreciate any support you can give over on that platform right thanks for watching subscribe if you don't already and I'll see you all soon should be Monday night


The first thing that we want to talk about is vector bundles that many of you will have heard about, but I want to recall some main properties of vector bundles that will be used when considering augmented bundles or decorated bundles, such as Higgs bundles. So how many of you have worked with Higgs bundles before, with vector bundles before? With vector bundles? So you probably know what degree and rank are, and the main thing that we're going to be looking at is stability conditions that we want to use for Higgs bundles. So an introduction to the properties that we want for vector bundles, given a vector bundle, and I should mention where we're going to be working on a Riemann surface. So I'm going to call sigma compact Riemann surface of genus G bigger equal than 2. You can put lower genus and you can put mark points on the Riemann surface, maybe we'll get to that part where we define parabolic structure on those mark points, but for now let's just stick with genus at least 2. So a vector bundle on sigma has slope, and the slope is the following, has slope equal to slope of E. So a vector bundle E here, slope of E is the degree of E over the rank of E. So if you haven't seen degrees and ranks before, what we're going to do in these lectures is something that can be do locally, and locally you can think of the rank as the dimension of your fibers over each point of the Riemann surface, you have a fiber, which is a vector space, it has a dimension, that's the rank, and the degree will be the number of zeros that a holomorphic section of the bundle has. So if I think of E over sigma, the section will be a map from sigma to E that will have zero sometimes, and the number of zeros will be my degree. So this is a slope, and we're going to say that a vector bundle is stable or semi-stable depending on the slope of the sub bundles. So we say, and you should tell me if the handwriting is too small, just shout and I'll make it big. So say we say that is stable or equivalently semi-stable if for every sub bundle that it has, so for every F inside E sub bundle, the slope of F is less than the slope of E. So the mu, I'm going to call this for making it concise, the mu of E, the slope of E. So mu of F is less than mu of E. And for semi-stability, we want less or equal. So this is a stability condition that we need to put in order to construct the modelized space of vector bundles. What we can do once we have this stability or semi-stability condition is we can look at isomorphism classes of vector bundles with fix, rank, and degree. And that's what we usually call N. So N, and we can put here the rank, so say rank R and degree D, the modelized space of rank and degree D vector bundles. So we need a stability condition of isomorphism classes of semi-stable bundles. Yes, yes, I mentioned the sections have to be holomorphic. So let me just put it here, holomorphic. So let's put it here, and I guess I put here the reference of holomorphic. And this is why I was telling you to think about the degree as the number of zeros of holomorphic sections that the bundle has. Thank you. So we can look at this modelized space, and we can ask what are the properties of this modelized space, and we can ask how its tangent space and cotangent space relate to Higgs bundles, and make sure that I have everything I want to say. So one of the things to make sure we remember, because it's going to affect the modelized space of Higgs bundles, is when is it smooth? So remark, when D and R are called prime, so for D, R called prime, then the modelized space is smooth. It's a smooth space, and the dimension so n square g minus one plus one. Look at this modelized space, but not just the modelized space, but its cotangent space. So I want to consider its cotangent space, which Higgs bundles from a different perspective than what those of you at Richard's talk read, which is from the perspective of the self-duality equations, just that you have a new direction to see them, and it's kind of a complementary direction to those appearing in the notes. So just that you don't get bored seeing the notes and seeing these, I want you to see that Higgs bundles can appear from many different ways. What's sorry? Sorry, the rank. No, it's R. Thank you. The rank is going to be R when I remember, and otherwise it's going to be N. Yes, thank you. Let's try to make sure that I, and g is the genus, so that bit is fine. Here I hadn't mentioned the rank. This is what we're going to usually call R, and this is what we usually call D. Okay, so what's the cotangent space? I need to get a representative of a point. So this is isomorphism classes of vector bundles in the modelized space. So we take a representative of an isomorphism class. Take V, a representative of a class, and so I want to look at the cotangent space at the representative of this modelized space. Let me drop the N and D, sorry, the R and D. Let's just call it N for now, since it's clear that we are fixing rank and degree. So what is this space? We can write it down, actually, in terms of endomorphisms of V. So we can write it down as H1 over the Riemann surface of N, traceless endomorphisms of V. This is, you can think of them as the first cosmology, just like you see there, of endomorphisms of V over the Riemann surface. But now we want to use a duality to understand it as terms of sections, so H0. So we can use third duality to make it isomorphic to H0 and using third duality. We put the zero here and we look, what are we looking at? We're adding K, we're adding the cotangent space of the Riemann surface. So cotangent space of the Riemann surface and we're tensoring my end V. And are we remember to put the dual here? And I'm going to give a name to this space because we're going to come back a lot. So I'm going to get K. This is the cotangent space of the Riemann surface. It's also called the canonical bundle of the Riemann surface. The canonical bundle, when we consider off a Riemann surface, is a line bundle. So this is, if you haven't seen this object before, is a line bundle. Sorry, this is probably too small. Line bundle of degree 2g minus 2. So these are the properties we're going to use of the canonical bundle. Okay. Yes, thank you. And so I want to consider what this object is in terms of now sections. So these are sections over the Riemann surface of all of these. So this is a line bundle tensored with dendomorphisms of V dual. How can I think of that? Remembering that dendomorphisms of V can be thought as the product of bundles. This is the same as taking sections that are on sigma, which are traceless and go from V to V tensored with K. So from V to V tensored with K. So here we have K and this is a dendomorphism dual. We're thinking as maps from V to V. So these are maps. We can put them in name. These are holomorphic maps on the Riemann surface. There are sections on the Riemann surface that can be thought as traceless maps between vector bundles. And this takes us to Higgs bundles. So let me now tell you what Higgs bundle is. For those that haven't seen them before, a Higgs bundle, a Higgs bundle E phi on sigma is a pair, is a holomorphic vector bundle, is a holomorphic vector bundle. This is on the Riemann surface and phi is a map just like those that we have here. So it's a map from E to E tensored with K holomorphic. We mentioned that K is a line bundle and has degree 2g minus 2. If you've worked with line bundles before, you know we can take the square root of even degree bundles, line bundles in particular. So let's take the square root of K to construct a classical example of Higgs bundles. So you can see what we're talking about. So what's the example that we want to look at here? We want to consider E the sum of a square root K to the half plus the dual of the square root, the minus one half. So for these, we fix a choice of K to the half. There's 2 to a 2g choices of K to the half. We just fix one and then we let the vector bundle be that. Now our Higgs field, we're going to be doing a lot of linear algebra this week because as you can see we're talking about vector bundles which locally are vector spaces and maps between them will be locally matrices. So the Higgs field goes from E to E tensored with K. So K to the half plus K to the minus a half to K to the half plus K to the minus a half tensored with K. So this is a line bundle and a line bundle is a rank 2 bundle. So our Higgs field will be a 2 by 2 matrix. And the way that I want to do it, I want to have a 2 by 2 matrix which is of diagonal. And let's think about the entries. And what are the entries here? So this matrix when applied to this pair is going to go from K to the minus a half to K to the half to K. And so I'm going to put an omega here. And if we think just like we were doing here, alternating between vector bundles and sections of bundles and maps between bundles, a map which is from K to the minus a half to a half to K can be thought as a map omega which is a section on the Riemann surface. And what we do, just like we did in that side, we put this one, this degree in the opposite sign and we sum them to those ones. So K to the one half plus one half plus one plus two. So it's really a quadratic differential. So now we can look at the same thing for the other entry. This entry goes from K to the half to K to the minus a half to K. So they cancel out and it's going to be just the identity on K. So the identity. So what we have here is a family of Higgs bundles parameterized by quadratic differentials. So family of rank two Higgs bundles, rank two Higgs bundles parameterized by omega, quadratic differentials omega. This family we'll see later on that when considering an appropriate modulate space of Higgs bundles for some groups, this becomes a component. And this is what's known as the hitching component for rank two. So we'll come back to this example because it gives a lot of information later on in 92 hitching. For instance, when studying hitching components, he showed that it parameterized TecMuller space inside the modulate space of Higgs bundles. So I want to try and use the same conditions that we had for stability for vector bundles to try and construct the modulate space of Higgs bundles. Here we've added a condition. We've added the Higgs field. And so we should put some condition of stability which involves the Higgs field. And the more structure we add to a Higgs bundle, the more we have to add to the stability condition. So the stability condition to build the modulate space, we need stability conditions. We need stability. Define it following this definition here, but only asking for the condition for bundles that are preserved by the Higgs field. So not everyone matters for us now. We have a Higgs field. So it should only matter for those that are preserved. So we say a sap bundle inside E is preserved by phi is preserved by phi. Or, equivalently, we say that it's phi invariant. What do you expect happens? So if when applied to the sap bundle, we come back to it, tensor with F. So it's inside the image inside F tensored with K. Those are going to be phi invariant. And now we can do the stability definition. So we say that a Higgs bundle is stable. We say E phi is stable or semi-stable just like we did there. If for every sap bundle F inside E, which is phi invariant, so which is phi invariant, we have mu of F is less or less or equal for semi-stable than mu of E. So it's exactly the same condition, but we relaxed the number of vector bundles we're going to use. We're not going to use every vector bundle. We're only going to look at those that are preserved. So for instance, what happens if your Higgs field doesn't preserve anyone, then you're stable, automatically stable. And when you're trying to look at preserved bundles, remember the Higgs field is a matrix, really point-wise is a matrix. And it has a structure, and when you're trying to see which bundles are preserved or if anyone can be preserved, you can look at the matrix and see would it be preserving any of the sap bundles that you have. So we can come back to this example. Let me just erase. Erase in this case, we know that this is the quadratic differential, so we had omega quadratic differential. And you can ask, is there any bundle that is preserved? So from this matrix, can I come back if I apply this Higgs field to any sap bundle, in particular to k to the half and k to the minus the half, can I be preserved? So for omega different than zero, for our differential form, different than zero, no one is preserved because it's mixing them, the two bundles together. So no sap bundle preserved. So it's automatically stable. There's no one to check. But when omega is zero, who is preserved? Well, k to the minus the half, because it was sending me k to the minus the half, to k to the half to k, and that's going to be inside the image. So k to the minus the half is preserved. When we look at what is the degree and the slope of this, so what is the slope of k to the minus the half? Mu of k to the minus the half is the degree over the rank. The degree we said for k is 2g minus 2. So for k to the half is g minus one, but with negative. So it's minus g plus one, minus g plus one, and the rank is one, it's a line bundle. So the slope for this one is minus is negative because g is at least two. So this is negative. And what is the slope for our big Higgs field? So for our original pair, e phi, the degree of this bundle is a rank to a bundle who is the sum of a line bundle and its dual. So the degree is zero, it cancels out. So this is always less than zero, which is the slope of e. Hence our family of, this is of rank to stable Higgs bundles. It's not just Higgs bundles, it's stable Higgs bundles that we're looking at here. The same that we were talking about vector bundles when the rank and the degree are co-prime. Once we form the moduli space, it'll be smooth when they are co-prime. But there's one stability more that I want to tell you just in case it appears when looking at parable Higgs bundles, which is poly stability. So we say that it's poly stable if we can write it as a sum of Higgs bundles, which have the same slope as e. So if we can write e phi as a sum of say f1, phi1 plus dot dot dot plus fk, phik. So these are smaller Higgs bundles such that the slope of fi is equal to the slope of e. Yes, thank you. Yes, thank you. Okay, so we want to look at this moduli space. Now that we have the stability conditions, we're going to call it, so we're going to look at m. And so if the rank, I'm going to be switching between rank, I'm going to put n for rank. Sorry, people. Now let's just do it before. And d, the moduli space of isomorphism classes of semi stable Higgs bundles. Of fixed rank and degree. So we want to fix both things, the rank and the degree, just like we did before. So this moduli space, now we are not constructing it really. I'm telling you it can be constructed under these stability conditions. You can look at hypercalor equations to construct it from these pairs. And you can also consider the appearance through Hitching's equation. So self-duality equations on Riemann surfaces. And what Hitching was able to show is that the existence of a solution corresponded to having this moduli space. So a point in this moduli space. I want to say a few properties that this moduli space has. And then we're going to come back to the example. One of the properties that it has, and that is a remark that is very useful. We are not going to use it very much, but many authors in the area actually use this action. So I want to make sure that you know that it exists. So if we have a stable Higgs bundle, so if I is stable, then if I multiply by a non-zero complex number, the Higgs field, then I remain stable. So then e lambda phi for lambda and non-zero complex number is stable. I can also look at an automorphism of e and pull the Higgs field back by it. And that's also stable. So e and then let's call it alpha pullback of phi is, so for alpha automorphism of e is stable. So it has to be holomorphic. Remember, we're looking at holomorphic bundle, so holomorphic. And this is what's known as the c star action of the moduli space. So c star action of m. So once we fix rank and degree, we just call it m. This moduli space has a few properties that are going to be useful. It's a quasi-projective scheme and we've said it's smooth when rank and degree are called prime. And also it has a hypercalor structure that we're going to come back, so we're not going to talk much today, but it has a lot of geometry appearing. So let me just keep the Riemann surface since that's the one thing that we have fixed for now. And let me tell you a bit more about other Higgs bundles that we can define. Are there any questions? These are just the definitions. You have to forgive me that I have to go through the definitions at the beginning, but it's going to get interesting once we start looking at the geometry. And I want to give you a few, yes, yes, it's for the whole moduli space. So people will look at isomorphism classes of semi-stable bundles and they'll have a c star action. And this c star action will allow you to look at things like more theory for the moduli space. Yes, please. Yes, it should still be there. So whenever I talk about Higgs bundles, you should be considering it traceless. Yes, it wasn't. No, actually it wasn't in definition, so that's true. I told you when I was constructing it from vector bundles, we used traceless. I'll show you how it appears in traceless condition. So for the definition, we don't need it to be traceless. And what we're actually getting is what we call GL and C, so general linear group Higgs bundles. Once we start putting other groups, we'll come back. That's a great point. So let's do that. Let's take a look at some generalizations of Higgs bundles. And I want to before, let's do one generalization. And before we go into more, let me try to convince you that it's an interesting subject. So let me do that. And then I'll give you a map of interesting questions that we'll be touching during the other lectures, just to make sure I keep you interested. So the same way that you can generalize a vector bundle to a principal bundle by asking for the fibers to have the structure group of a complex lig group, for instance, we can do the same for Higgs bundles. So we can put a structure of lig groups. So let me put GC, a complex lig group. You might want to put some extra conditions to this, but later we'll see that we can define them for almost every or all of complex lig groups. So let me just put GC, a complex lig group. Let's try to define what Higgs bundles are for a complex lig group. So we'll come back to the space. So definition. We're going to do the same that we do for vector bundles, but for Higgs bundles in terms of principal GC bundles. So GC Higgs bundle, P Phi is a pair for which, so it's formed a principal GC bundle and Phi, a holomorphic section of that joint bundle to P tensor with K. So Phi, a holomorphic section of at P tensor with K. So we're using the joint representation of P to do that. And we're going to take that as the definition for principal Higgs bundles, but you could use other representations. This definition comes also from 87, from Hitching Second Paper, where he was looking at different groups. And the most interesting part from our perspective in this week is that even though this might seem a bit too lithoretic, because now we're getting into principal bundles, for classical, so a remark, for groups GC, which are GL, or groups of type A, B, C, D. So for SL, for SP, and for SO of any rank, this definition can be put in terms of our all definition of vector bundles. So GC Higgs bundle can be expressed if I, as before, plus conditions reflecting the nature of the group, the nature of the group. What do we mean by this? Let's put an example here. If you take SL, and then we'll get to your question about the trace. So for example, example, if we take GC to be SL and C, then we have then an SL and C Higgs bundle.


really are. We were here on Tuesday, usually that's when we go live, but our order hadn't come yet. So I don't know if you remember all of that from Tuesday, but it's here. If you regularly join us. Yes. But it came later that day, just later than we wanted it to. And then we waited and today is the day. I didn't even open the box till today. I was really proud of myself. I'm very proud of you. That takes a lot of self-control. Self-control, yes. So we are gonna share with you some of our favorite items. And Beth said we couldn't show the whole box, so we're gonna show what we held time for. Well, we don't want to be here for an entire hour, although some people might like that. But we're gonna show you some of our favorites. Do you want to go first? Sure. Okay. Which one? Should I do my first? Yes. Yes, should be one. Okay, this is my very favorite of the catalog. I always am drawn to the autumn colors and the autumn sets. So this is the suite. It's called All About Autumn. And I'm gonna show you like everything because I want to. So it has a ribbon pack. It comes with these two ribbons. This one is like a really pretty... It's double-sided. It's copper clay, but it's like a shimmery, shiny. And then this one's more of that craft linen texture, but they are super pretty together. Here's the accessories in there. These are speckled, I think they're called speckled dots. Adhesive-backed speckled dots. Really cute. So they have that copper clay. This is kind of just a craft color. Then the moody mauve and the green, the mossy meadow. That looks awesome. They're super cute. And then, of course, the stamp set and dyes. Autumn leaves bundle. Can I show open that up because it's so much bigger than the actual... Well, yeah. I don't have the... I'm using them so they're not in there, but you can see... They're all blocks. Yeah. But those are the actual size. That's what they look like. And then the dyes are fun. They have the ones that actually cut out, but then there's these littler ones that you can cut out that aren't, don't go with a stamp. And then you can see... Let's see. There's also these really fun kind of label-y ones. For the same. And this one I haven't used yet, but it indents, like embosses onto paper. It's like dots. So that's really fun. And then the paper. The paper is always one of my favorites. So the designer series paper is called All About Autumn. And it's specialty. So one side has this really pretty foil copper kind of that goes throughout the different paper. But it's so pretty. And the other side is... Photorealism? Yeah. So it has the different... Like there's a cool little fall scene, some wood, trees, and just some really cool textures. Those pumpkins are so fun. The leaves, that leather chair that looks actually really cozy. And like I want to just cuddle up with a book on it. And some more books. And then it also has, this is called Oxidized Copper Paper. So you can see it has this copper clay color. And then the island, or no, pretty peacock color with it. So super pretty. That is the suite that I was most drawn to. So I was playing a little bit with it this morning. You can see. So there's that really pretty ribbon and the shimmer that it has. And then on this one, I stamped right onto that designer series paper. And just such a cool... Yeah, it looks like you made your own designer series paper, right? In the vanilla. Right. So that's just this paper. But I stamped on it. Direct. And it kept the ink in everything. Yeah. Yeah, it was gorgeous. Really pretty. I love how you use the vines in here. I don't know if you could tilt it a little bit. Yeah, you can see. The vines in the actual leaf. On here. Yeah. It's also out of the... Yeah. So it... The paper. So, so fun. So that is that suite. Why don't you show your suite? I'm gonna use the Oh Holy Night suite. And because I know we've got a ways for Christmas. But to me, it was just like this amazing suite to go ahead and work with. It comes with two stamp sets. If you order the whole suite. And these zanes are awesome because they're big.  Oh, Holy Night. We've got and the stars are brightly shining. And then also glory to God in the highest. The Lord is my shepherd and joy in peace. So it's just got a great amount of zanes. And they're nice and big. Yeah. So I was playing with this one and with the dies this morning. And that comes and then I use also the designer series paper, which does not have any bling on it. But they do have specialty paper that coordinates with this. So the nice thing about these is you can always use this for scrapbooking because they've got the big pieces for scrapbooking. Okay. And then they also have, so there's another scrapbooking, but they also have the smaller ones. So you've got this background here. You can just use it for the background of a card. I just love this. And I love the blues in there because it kind of looks like a winter night or the starry night. So I love how they have all the stars. So it can go for both the nativity set right here. And it also can go for stars at night, which is the other stamp set and dies. And I haven't had a chance to play with this particular side of the stamp set, but I like how it has for a saying and the big stars.  And then that's a hybrid one. Yes. This is a hybrid where the actual dies fit inside of here too. I don't know if they can see that. So the dies will fit inside. It will cut that out and emboss it at the same time if you want to use it. I went ahead and stamped this particular one with the gold. And I just used the embossing folder on the inside to give it that texture on the inside. And what I do is I would mount a little thing here that I would put a saying on, but that's one. And this is amazing. Look at that up there. But I love glitter and this is called Glittered Ribbon. And it's Night of Navy, the gold. It's so pretty. Just gorgeous. I have to use that on everything. And I think I did use that on everyone. This particular card is just done with the dies.  These cards are the gold cards and envelopes. So they come as a set and I think I'm going to have a lot of fun playing with these. But that's what I did with this particular one. And I didn't know if it would take the ink, but it showed right through. The gold showed right through. So I thought that that was nice just with the Night of Navy and stamping the Oh Holy Night right on top of the gold. So that actually worked. Very pretty. So that's that particular sample. And this is done with the Koresh cut out and just the glory to God in the highest. So just not playing with that one. Playing with that whole sweep. Okay. Oh, oh, you have one more. Oh, one more. Okay. These wonderful stars. Okay, I'll bring your next. Okay. So the next thing that I'm very excited about is this sparkling snowflakes stamp set. Well, this is a bundle. So sparkling snowflakes bundle. So this is the stamps set. I haven't played with it yet. But I always love a good snowflake set. And bundled with it is this really cute punch. So you can see it's, it cuts out this snowflake, but it does kind of a negative positive look there. And I think that could be a really fun border on the card. So it just goes in and punches kind of that topper. You could do a belly band. I know how you see that. You see that wrapped around with the whoop. Yeah. And you could do like oh, and then you could connect these. Anyway, so many fun ideas. But yeah, that's the next one I'm very excited about. And this is the snowflake magic designer series paper, the specialty paper. And it is gorgeous too. Yes. So this is with another bundle or sweet in the catalog, but it would go so well. Right. We just looked at both of them and I was like, okay, this can go with both. Yeah. And those colors are so cute. I'm guessing Bermuda Bay and Lost Lagoon. Does it say what the colors are in there? It does. Let's see. No, it doesn't. But no, it does say Lost Lagoon. Just Lost Lagoon. So just a different shade of Lost Lagoon. Oh, let's see. Felicia says, are the cards with the envelopes better quality than the paper pumpkin cards? Oh, yes. Yes. I think so. They're, they're pretty thick. Yeah. Yeah, that they are. Yeah, they're really nice. And this one that I'm holding and the envelopes are really nice and thick. And I love how it's got the brush mark on the front. So it's like finished your whole envelope. So yeah, it's really pretty. Okay, so that and do you have any others? Okay, next I'll show some more designer series paper. This is one. I love this fun bright paper. This is called the Mary Bold and Bright DSP. And it actually goes with a suite of products too. But I didn't grab the whole suite. So you'll just get a taster. And it is just this really fun and gorgeous designer series paper. So it is Christmas, but it's kind of on that bright side. So the stamp set that goes has like these cute lights, Christmas lights in it and different stuff like that. So that's a fun one. I'm excited to kind of do some kind of reminds you of a lollipop or those peppermints that are all those different colors. Yeah, yeah, that'd be fun little gift to be cute for kids. We're doing our Christmas party for our church. Whoville themed. So that's when I look at that. I'm like, I want to use that all the breakers and like yeah looks like cool. Yeah, I think you could use it. Oh my goodness. Yeah, yeah, that'll be perfect. It's got the the pink the pink. Yeah. Okay, this is a called the Christmas tidings little folder here. And it's not a 3d. It's a regular one. But the cool thing about it is is I think it could go with anything in this whole catalog. Yeah, you know, it's got the cutesy, but just like that one that you're using, but it's got the same. So I just did it in red. Yeah. So just a cool folder to be used for that. And Robert, you want to talk about this? Yeah, yeah, I can go ahead. Okay, so this is another one, the Marius trees bundle. This one is really cute. It has that Christmas tree in it. But one of my favorite features of this die that coordinates and bundles with it. Yeah, you can see how much bigger that stamp is. Maybe. Yeah, there you go. And it looks. But the cool thing is that it has all these Christmas tree dies. So this one can cut out the whole tree, but then it has a size down for each of them. So you can make the tree all of these different sizes or you can do different colors. Yeah, you can layer it. Can you see it layered? Yeah, so cute. Imagine how many dimensionals you can make. Oh, so many dimensionals. So cute. But then there's also this like cute tag in here. And this goes around each layer, the little berries or little, what are those called? Garland? The garland. Yeah, that's like little pearls or and a little Christmas tree stand down here. Oh, it's amazing. Let's see. Monique says, oh, good evening from the Netherlands. Oh, awesome. All right, so yeah, that one will be really fun to play with too. We wish you a Merry Christmas. I love that. Oh, yeah, that's the shape of a tree in the shape of a tree. So you can put it right on top of your tree. Yeah. Okay, I've got one more. Are you going one more? Can I do mine? Yes, you can. This one's not a holiday one, but it's just a different occasion one that's in that mini catalog. I love that this kind of it reminds me of like a 80s kind of feel retro retro. So we've got a disco ball, roller skate, the cute little, what are these slug bug car? And then it has these cute little sayings in it. And this punch that coordinates is a curved punch. And you'll see in the catalog, I can't show you, but they did samples with like the car driving in the little curve on the. So this will make it a spinner. Yes, a spinner card or like a movement to it. So stay tuned for video. This will be a really fun video to do one way. So I'm excited about that one too. There's so many that we're excited about because there are so many wonderful things in the actual mini that we loved. And this sending cheer was fun because it's got a tag in it. And it's got the present. So it's got, you can stamp it or you can punch this out to make it stand up. But look how cute this is. It's actual, you know, the size of the stamp too. And a Santa hat. So that's not even on the actual, you know, this part, but you can make a fun Santa hat. So I'm really looking forward to making those three tags. Like here's one tag, second tag, third, fourth, fifth, I think that there's five or six tags. So that's going to be a fun one to play with too. So is that what's on top of the ginger bread man's head? It's like a thing you can tie something onto like a tag. Yes. Yes. Yes. So that's so you can stamp your gingerbread with the face right here. And then you can punch out the actual tag, but it's got a little loopy thing there. So all these are tags, even that little one right there has a loop on it. And the hat has a loop on it. So super fun. So I think we're going to have a lot of fun with making some different things with these shapes. Yes. And that's, I think this little loop is also for a tag. Yeah. So I think so. So here, if you do not have one of the catalogs, let's see, I'm upside down. You and you don't have a demonstrator where you're working with and you live in the United States, we can send you one of these.  So let us know if you need a new mini catalog. We can't open this up, sorry, till it goes live. We can just show you this cute front. Yes. But and we have this stamp set too. We just, that's another one. Yes. So yeah. So Felicia said some of those from that tags that would make cute ornaments. Oh yeah. So true. Very cute. I can even see like a little pocket to stick something in.  I know. You can also put a little message in each side of the tag. Oh, or a banner. Or a little banner of garland around it.  Oh yeah. All around the tree. So how would you do that? The thoughts are flowing. You just fold it so that they all connect to the back and forth. That wouldn't be a lot of work. No, but it's something I would try. We'll put it on Atalisa's list. Of course we'll try it. Just kidding. And we'll do a video so you can see if it works. Yeah. All right. Well those are some of our favorites. There's lots to play with. We have lots more and we'd like to share them all, but this is a little taste. Yes. So again, if you don't have a demonstrator and you're in the US, we would be happy to send you a catalog. Just comment below or you can email us at sudemonstrator at gmail.com and say goodbye to Aubrey and Jill.


The U.S. has a standing policy of ignoring the human rights violations of its allies. U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan has been repeatedly refusing to tell the press whether he believes Israel has been following the laws of war. Here's a transcript from an exchange with the Hills Nile Stenage at a White House press conference on Tuesday, quote, Stenage, you said today, as you've said a number of times, about the importance of the laws of war being upheld. Israel has killed around 11,000 Palestinians, around two-thirds of those were women and children. The situation in the hospitals is dire. Israel has dropped an astronomical amount of ordinance in very built-up areas. Is Israel, in your view, abiding by the laws of war? And if it is, how do you come to that conclusion? Sullivan. Well, as I said yesterday, I, Jake Sullivan, standing here, am not in a position to be judge and jury and make that determination. It's a legal determination. What I can do is state for you the clear policy of the Biden administration, which we have been unequivocal about from the beginning of this conflict. And that is that even though Hamas is using civilians as human shields, is burrowing into civilian areas with its rocket emplacements that they are continuing to launch every single day at civilian areas in Israel. That puts an added burden on the IDF, but it does not lessen their responsibility to act in ways that separate terrorists from civilians and does everything in their power to protect civilian lives. Stenage, but the, Sullivan. That is, that was the case. That remains the case today. That is the message that we've sent publicly and we communicate to our Israeli counterparts privately. Stenage, but Sullivan. And we do that on a daily basis. Stenage. I'm just trying to be clear, though. The administration's view is that the IDF is doing that? Sullivan. What I've told you is that I am not in a position to give you a legal determination to your question. I am not in a position to do that. What I'm in a position to do is state the U.S. government position on how Israeli operations should be conducted. And that is what I have done. That is what I will continue to do. That is what I can do from this podium, end quote. Sullivan performed the same evasive dance routine during an appearance on CNN's State of the Union on Sunday, telling host Dana Bash, I'm not going to sit here and play judge or jury on that question when asked if Israel is operating according to the rules of war. It was funny because Bash's question arose from Sullivan's own assertion that Israel has a responsibility to operate according to the rules of war. Sullivan asserted that this was Israel's responsibility on his own, but then immediately refused to say whether or not that was actually happening. Of course, Sullivan has only been performing these freak show contortions with regard to questions about the criminality of governments which align themselves with the interests of Washington. He's been directly and repeatedly accusing Russia of war crimes in Ukraine without the slightest bit of hesitation from the early days of the conflict. You see this glaring inconsistency over and over again in U.S. foreign policy, regardless of who sits in the Oval Office or which party is in control. The criminality of U.S. allies gets ignored, downplayed, and frantically obfuscated, while the criminality of U.S. enemies gets spotlighted, exaggerated, and pushed to the forefront of international attention. We're seeing this inconsistency illustrated today by Hillary Clinton, who just published a think piece with the Atlantic war propaganda outlet forcefully defending Israel's mass atrocities in Gaza after spending the last two years tweeting things like, If Russian leadership would rather not be accused of committing war crimes, they should stop bombing hospitals. Speaking of former U.S. secretaries of state, it's probably worth mentioning here that a leaked 2017 State Department memo addressed to then Secretary of State Rex Tillerson explained that this inconsistency regarding the criminality of U.S. allies versus U.S. enemies is actually a standing policy within the inner workings of the U.S. government. The leaked memo from the early days of the Trump administration showed neo-conservative empire manager Brian Hook teaching the political neo-fight Tillerson that for the U.S. government, human rights are only a weapon to be used for keeping other nations in line. In a remarkable insight into the cynical nature of imperial narrative management, Hook told Tillerson that it is U.S. policy to overlook human rights abuses committed by nations aligned with U.S. interests, while exploiting and weaponizing them against nations who aren't. In the case of U.S. allies such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the Philippines, the administration is fully justified in emphasizing good relations for a variety of important reasons, including counter-terrorism, and in honestly facing up to the difficult trade-offs with regard to human rights. Hook explained in the memo, One useful guideline for a realistic and successful foreign policy is that allies should be treated differently and better than adversaries, Hook wrote, We do not look to bolster America's adversaries overseas. We look to pressure, compete with, and outmaneuver them. For this reason, we should consider human rights as an important issue in regard to U.S. relations with China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran. And this is not only because of moral concern for practices inside those countries. It is also because pressing those regimes on human rights is one way to impose costs, apply counter-pressure, and regain the initiative from them strategically. So if it sometimes seems as though the U.S. has no actual morals or values regarding human rights, it's because that is precisely the case. You see things like White House spokesman John Kirby crying about civilians dying in Ukraine, yet shrugging indifferently at civilians dying in Gaza, because his tears are cynical weapons used to advance U.S. interests on the world stage, not a normal, empathetic response to human suffering. The U.S. Empire stands for nothing, believes in nothing, and values nothing apart from its own power. Those who understand and align with this reality find themselves elevated to the highest echelons of power within the U.S. Empire. While those with normal human empathy centers in their brains find nothing but locked doors past a certain point in government. The U.S. Empire is a psychopathic killer wearing a plastic smiling mask of compassion and humanitarianism. But if you look closely, it's not hard to catch a glimpse of the snarling, blood-spattered face underneath.