All hail the Flashback quiz! Again!

As I said previously

I only have one beef about it… they’re supposed to be sending me emails to let me know when it comes out, and this week they didn’t. I had to think of it, and go hunt it down.

And then, I slew it!

I confess I have not thoroughly slain it every week since I discovered it. A couple of times there have been two events that I knew happened in something B.C., and I failed to get them in the right order. And this time, I might easily have gotten confused about which of these came first — Althea Gibson winning the U.S. Open, and Ike visiting India — but I didn’t. So there.

I was particularly glad to find it because Slate has made its weekly quiz less accessible. Today I couldn’t even find it. Other days they wanted me to pay for Slate, which I’m not going to do. I pay for too many things already.

Speaking of paying — I hope you try this, because I want to find out whether you have to access to do so. I don’t know what is allowed to nonsubscribers. I hope you can, and that you have fun with it.

Now that I’ve thoroughly boasted and bragged and otherwise enjoyed this one, I’ll sit in dread for the other weekly NYT quiz, which comes out on Fridays, and pretty much always defeats me…

Hey, UAW and Big Three — how about us consumers?

Yep, these are USED. Note that I blocked out the dealer’s name, because it would be unfair to suggest this dealer is the problem. These are quite typical.

You know — the hundreds of millions of people who will be affected by what y’all come up with…

I’m being a little facetious here, but it’s in service of a larger point. So bear with me. Let’s start with the news. And in keeping with my new resolution to link, as often as possible, to things you don’t have to subscription to read or hear, I’ll refer you to NPR:

With less than 24 hours left before current strikes expire, the United Auto Workers’ union and the Detroit Big 3 automakers have not yet reached a deal.

The companies say it’s still possible to work out a viable compromise before 11:59 p.m. on Thursday. The union, meanwhile, has started laying out its strike plan – an unusual one, at that….

Follow the link for the rest.

I’ve been watching this in recent days, while I’ve also been doing something else. My youngest daughter has just moved home from Dominica, and started a new job a week ago. She’s been driving to work in our 1998 Volvo, which, let’s say, is not in what you’d call tip-top condition. So she’s been trying to buy a decent, reliable used vehicle that she can afford. And I’ve been trying — so far unsuccessfully — to help her, which is what made me think to post this about these labor negotiations:

OK, I was kidding there — a little. I’m not asking that the interests of the companies and the workers — be subordinated to Brad’s interests. Anyway, no matter what they do, I expect decent used cars will continue to cost more than I paid the last time I bought a new car. (After all, I’ve only bought used ones since 1986.)

But I was thinking that there’s ONE way for the union and the companies to get everything they want — to jack up prices even further, and by a LOT. And I was thinking there are a LOT more consumers who would be paying for that than there are auto workers or corporate executives combined.

Consider this just another blow struck for thinking about issues in something other than binary, one-and-zeroes terms.

As for the two parties we’re all focusing on… For my part, I’d like to see both sides get what they want, to the extent possible. This country needs a thriving auto industry, and the workers deserve a square deal.

What we don’t need, in my view, is CEO’s making $29 million a year. Nor do we need workers to continue to be paid, for decades, to show up at a plant that’s been shut down, and sit around playing checkers. This is called a “jobs bank,” and after wisely giving them up to keep the industry in business the UAW has recently talked about wanting this arrangement back.

Maybe somewhere in there, y’all can find a way to get what you both actually deserve, and maybe give the rest of us a break, too. Or at least not make the price situation worse.

Anyway, good luck with your confrontation, folks. Here’s hoping that after all the rhetoric and posturing — and probably suffering before it’s all over — you work out something fair to all…

Open Thread for Wednesday, September 13, 2023

The thing that happened in Portugal…

Just a few quick ones here:

  1. An inside account of devastation and survival in the Libya floods — Talk about the last thing you expect in a place like that. It has to feel, to survivors, like the end of the world.
  2. Tim Scott’s girlfriend — An interesting topic, interestingly presented. Sorry that you have to subscribe to The Washington Post to read it, but if it makes you feel better, the story — while interesting — doesn’t tell you much about her. I just mention it to say, it’s fine with me for Sen. Scott to be private about private matters. Any beefs I have with him have to do with other things.
  3. Earth ‘well outside safe operating space for humanity’, scientists find — Just a heads-up. If you’re friends with Ford Prefect, you might want to go find him and get him to activate his Electronic Thumb.
  4. Cascades of red wine flood a city’s streets in Portugal after huge tanks rupture — I don’t enjoy wine as much as I used to, but if there’s ever going to be a flood like this of beer in Bavaria, I want to know ahead of time.
  5. Romney to Retire, Calling for a ‘New Generation’ — Ah, but here’s the problem: Where’s this new generation coming from? In his party, the “new generation” is Matt Gaetz, George Santos and Marjorie Taylor Greene. So basically, the country needs Romney over on his side, and Joe Biden on the other, to stick around as long as possible, until a few more grownups emerge to run things.
  6. Is math real? And other existential questions — You might want to give this a listen. It’s pretty interesting. And since it’s NPR, it’s free — unlike those NYT podcasts I keep talking about.
  7. The dumbest day in Congress in 2023 was building for a while — In case you can’t tell, this is about something Speaker McCarthy did in Washington yesterday. Bottom line is, don’t expect rational behavior from a guy whose tenure depends upon placating lunatics.  That’s from the Globe; I just liked the headline. Here’s something you might find it easier to read, although it’s more vanilla.

Yeah, I know — not very satisfying. I just wanted to give y’all something. I’ll try to be more thoughtful tomorrow…

 

I’d mention 9/11 today, but I don’t want to show my age

Hey, remember when this old movie came out? It was the same year the Iraq War started — and yet it was in COLOR!

Yes, you are meant to laugh at that headline. I certainly did, at the thing that made me write it.

I’m not used to laughing right out loud while walking down a quiet street, but this time I did.

Speaking again of NYT podcasts, I’m also fond of Ezra Klein’s programs, and had fallen behind on them. So while walking in the neighborhood a couple of days ago, I listened to this one from Aug. 15: “This Conservative Thinks America’s Institutions ‘Earned’ the G.O.P.’s Distrust.”

It was pretty good, and most of it wasn’t funny. But part of it was.

Remember my recent post about the accelerating acceleration of our sense of time as we grow older? I was trying at that time to remember some examples of the absurd (to me, and what other perspective do I have?) things I hear young people say. I wish I’d had this one to mention.

Ezra was out, and his substitute was Jane Coaston, who is currently the host of a podcast I used to listen to, “The Argument.” And she did fine, until she got to the point of saying something about recent current events.

What she said began with, “I’m old enough to recall the events that led up to the Iraq War…”

I didn’t just laugh out loud when that came through my hearing aids (which Bluetooth allows me to use like earbuds), it was a kind of sharp, piercing sound that carries. I stopped immediately, and glanced about to see if I had any neighbors standing stock-still out in their yards, staring at the demented hyena.

Fortunately, I did not.

When I was listening, I didn’t realize who the substitute interviewer was. When I looked back at the transcript just now to see, I thought I would check out Jane Coaston’s LInkedIn page, and while I don’t know her age, she received her bachelor’s degree in the same year that my newspaper career ended after 35 years. (For the sake of you young folks, that was about four years after I started this blog.)

So the difference in time perception is perfectly understandable. And as I say, she did a fine job overall. But she would have done better not to have expressed the reference to her memory quite that way. Usually people use that rhetorical construction when they mean, “I remember back this far, so you should trust my experience and wisdom.” But what she communicated was, This kid is so young she thinks that was a long time ago…

Anyway, if anyone wants to offer memories of 9/11 today, you could do it here. But beware — if you have personal memories of it, that might make you even older than Jane, and folks may start offering to help you cross the street….

Yes, this is what governors should do

I’ve mentioned before, I think, that one of a number of reasons I enjoy reading The Boston Globe is that it tells stories about serious people dealing with real issues in ways I don’t find morally and intellectually offensive and painful to read.

I saw that in the lede story in the paper a couple of days back, headlined, “Healey tells Biden administration Mass. has ‘desperate need’ for faster work authorizations for migrants.” That was the online headline. As you can see above the print version was shorter — print headlines require greater discipline. There are no space constraints to speak of on a web page.

An excerpt:

Governor Maura Healey on Thursday implored the Biden administration to quickly grant work permits to the thousands of migrants who have overwhelmed the state’s shelter system in recent months.

“The significant influx of new arrivals . . . shows no sign of abating,” Healey wrote in a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. Massachusetts, she added, faces a “desperate need” for federal funding, changes to federal immigration policy, and, most urgent of all, faster processing of work authorizations for migrants who are legally present in the state’s shelters but not allowed to work.

The firmly worded letter followed an August meeting between Healey and Mayorkas about the state’s escalating migration crisis, which has led the governor to declare a state of emergency and to deploy the National Guard in recent weeks…

Of course. Speed up the work permits. It’s absurd to hold desperate people indefinitely and not let them do what they came here to do: work. Especially when your state needs the workers, as the governor went on to explain in the press release about all this:

“Massachusetts has stepped up to address what has been a federal crisis of inaction many years in the making. Communities, service providers, and our National Guard are going above and beyond to ensure that families arriving in Massachusetts have a safe place to sleep and their basic needs met,” said Governor Healey. “We are grateful to Secretary Mayorkas and his team for meeting with us to hear about the emergency we are facing and the help we need from our federal government. This letter memorializes our requests for additional federal funding and changes to the work authorization process that would support families, reduce the burden on our shelter system, and help us address our state’s workforce needs.”

“Massachusetts is facing twin crises that aren’t unique to our state – we have rapidly rising numbers of migrant families arriving here who want to work but can’t get their work authorizations, and we are facing severe workforce shortages in all industries,” said Lieutenant Governor Driscoll. “We have the opportunity to not only address both of these issues, but also to grow our economy and strengthen our communities in the long run. We are hopeful that the federal government will take these requests into serious consideration.”…

Now, I don’t know this Governor Healey at all. Maybe the next 10 things she does and says will be idiotic. But she certainly makes sense on this, in this particular instance. And I’m not used to it. I see too much of governors doing things such as this. Or this.

Immigration is a federal matter. And when the feds aren’t doing the job right, and you’re a governor whose state is being affected, get on them about it, and tell them what you need.

But get on them for the right things. Speeding up the process of letting these folks work is a good place to start.

You don’t wish the migrants hadn’t come, and shake your fist at the heavens — or worse, endanger the lives of people determined to come to America and make a better life. And you don’t ignore the problem. You look for practical ways to address the challenges, and they are indeed many…

A great extended quote from ‘Matter of Opinion’

Y’all may remember that years ago — like, pre-COVID — I happily shared with y’all the fact that I had finally figured out something painfully obvious: that the best time to listen to podcasts, which I had been meaning to do, was during my long walks each day.

Anyway, at the time, I mentioned that one of my favorites up to that point was “The Argument,” a New York Times podcast. In fact, I linked to a specific episode from those days. That program was very good when it featured David Leonhardt, Ross Douthat and Michelle Goldberg. Then those people started falling away from it, and the topics started to be things that didn’t interest me, and I got out of the habit.

I’m only recently discovered an adequate substitute for it. It’s called “Matter of Opinion,” with Michelle Cottle, Ross Douthat, Carlos Lozada and Lydia Polgreen. It has only one former Argument participant — Douthat — but it very much has the same kind of thoughtfulness and intellectual heft that The Argument once had. And it has one other essential ingredient: civility. Here are people who are about as wide apart as you can get on issue after issue, and yet they not only discuss these differences in a civil manner, but they enjoy each other’s company. It’s rather like another NYT feature in that regard: “The Conversation,” featuring Gail Collins and Bret Stephens.

In other words, it offers the kind of vibe I am determined to have on this blog.

Anyway, the most recent one was headlined, “The Woke Burnout Is Real — and Politics Is Catching Up.” I frankly did not fully understand the phrase “woke burnout” at first, partly because it didn’t start with any sort of formal statement of the topic. Who was burned out? The right? The left? And why? (I very much hoped it would be for good reasons.) But I think what is meant is what is said in the subhed, “It’s time to start asking if the culture wars actually matter to voters.”

Then, when I looked at it on my PC — seeking the transcript — I found this intro:

Classrooms have been a key battleground in the so-called woke wars for years now. But could the debate over how schools teach history, race, gender and sexuality be coming to an end?

That explained it.

And part of it was wonderful. Especially when Carlos Lozada said that:

… for the last couple of days I’ve had this deep dread and despair weighing on me, knowing we were going to talk about this. The discussions over woke, and anti-woke, and culture wars are soul sucking to me. I think it’s good to have specific debates over affirmative action in college admissions, the problems with boys, the way we teach history. I mean, that’s terrific. And we’ve had that on this podcast, and we should continue to have it. But when we talk about the culture war, that’s not about debating issues. The culture war is about joining a side. It is about picking a team. And the problem with picking a team in the culture wars is that you inevitably end up with lunatics on your team. And the craziest ones are often the captains of the team. And they may want to go much further than you might want to go.

Carlos Lozada

But you’re on the team, and you don’t want the other side to win. So you end up supporting what the team is defending. So you end up fighting vociferously over things you may not know a lot about. You end up policing language and dogma with the zeal of the convert.

And you end up speaking not just for yourself, but for this amorphous community that never necessarily granted you the rights to speak for it. There’s so many great writers and thinkers who get baited into this, and then they have difficulty writing about anything else because they’re no longer making an argument or exploring an issue. They are defending turf.

The irony of the culture war is that the purpose of the war is not to win it. It is to continue to wage it. You are never going to hear a culture war activist saying, you know what? The cause is won. The fight is over. Let’s close up shop. I don’t need any more funding. It’s like a business lobbyist saying, our profits are pretty healthy. I don’t need more loopholes in the tax code. That’s not a thing that happens in a culture war. The fight is never over. The stakes are always rising. There’s a new front, a new trench you have to dig, a new hill you have to die on.

And it becomes a reason for being. It becomes your emotional, and your financial, and your intellectual sustenance. And that’s why I limit the amount of time I write about this or think about this because it is incredibly frustrating to me…

I heard all that as I was arriving back at my house from a walk, so I didn’t hear the rest of the podcast. I need to go back and do so, but there are so many things in the world I keep saying that I need to go back and do that I may not.

But before this fades from my memory, I wanted to share with you what Lozada said. Almost every line of it is a view I deeply hold, and it goes to the heart of why I say so many things I say on this blog. In fact, these ideas are pretty central to why the blog exists. So I wanted to make sure I shared them with you, before I move on to the next subject…

This situation is wrong, and dangerous for the world

You might have expected a picture of Elon Musk, but here’s another guy…

A few months ago, when everyone was having a cow over Elon Musk buying Twitter — and that’s what we call it, Twitter — I didn’t say a lot. I figured as long as it kept functioning, that was good, and we would see.

Also, I didn’t want to write anything about Elon Musk, in part because I think he enjoys having people write about him.

But in recent days, prompted by a gradual awakening I see out there among major media, I’ve been reading and hearing more about Starlink… and about other things. I had just mentioned that again, in an Open Thread on Thursday, when I saw more on the same subject, and tweeted this:

This is no longer about some social medium I enjoy but we can all live without, or absurdly expensive electric cars, or even (more seriously) our nation’s increasing dependence upon Space X. This is about national security. It is about whether Vladimir Putin will succeed in crushing a neighboring country into nonexistence, or be stopped by the collective efforts of NATO, the United States, and the brave people of Ukraine.

And that cannot be allowed to hang on the flighty moods of one demonstrably unstable man, who likes to buddy up to Putin, and is entangled with the oppressive Chinese regime.

But what, you ask, are we to do? The guy OWNS most of the satellites in space, so our hands are tied, right? No. Sometimes a nation realizes that there are more important considerations than private ownership of … land, railroads, oil, coal mines, satellites, or whatever.

I point to the trust-busting steps taken by Theodore Roosevelt and others in response to the ill effects of J.P. Morgan and others (such as Mr. E. H. Harriman of the Union Pacific Railroad) owning too many things of critical national importance.

I don’t want to kick off another big ideological argument about wealth between the social democrats and the Ayn Randians. I’m a pragmatist. I’m a guy who has no problem with the “billionayuhs” Bernie likes to rant about. In a free country, some people will always have more money than other people.

Aside from that, J.P. Morgan did a lot for this country, and the world. In the First World War, he kept the Allies afloat until this country could shake off its usual habitual isolationism.

But sometimes, a trust just needs bustin’. Seriously, folks — Teddy Roosevelt got along fine with J.P. Morgan much of the time. T.R. was no Marxist. He was a rich guy, who was comfortable with other rich guys. But when a different course was needed for the sake of the nation, he went that way.

This world isn’t about following absolute, ideological precepts. (Or, as I like to say, ones and zeroes.) It’s about looking at a situation, and deciding what would make it better. And this situation isn’t about an immature man wanting to call Twitter something other than what it is. Lives are at stake. Something needs to be done.

Yeah, I was wondering about Lindsey…

When Trump and 18 others were indicted in Atlanta, I immediately wondered, “Where’s Lindsey Graham’s name?”

After all, remember all that fuss about him being subpoenaed to testify over there, and before that, his calls to Brad Raffensberger? I mean, after Trump himself, I sort of expected him to be the next guy on prosecutors’ list. Or maybe third, after Rudy.

Well, now we get some of the story:

ATLANTA — An Atlanta-area special grand jury that spent months investigating alleged 2020 election interference in Georgia by Donald Trump and his allies agreed that the former president should be indicted in the case and also recommended charging one of Trump’s closest associates, Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.), and 37 other people — a far larger group than a prosecutor ultimately charged.

The recommendations were contained in a 26-page final report presented in January to Fulton County District Attorney Fani T. Willis (D) and made public by a judge Friday….

The document offered some rare insight into parts of an investigation typically marked by secrecy — not just on those who were indicted but also those who weren’t. But the report, which is not legally binding, does not include the evidence or reasoning behind the grand jury’s thinking, though testimony transcripts and evidence are likely to emerge as part of the criminal proceedings against those who were ultimately charged in the case….

I wonder why they didn’t press charges against Lindsey…

Here are 9 things I prefer to watch. How about you?

This image was under the headline. It’s not nice to call people ‘things.’ Anyway, there are only 5…

By now, you know from all the unending coverage that this is an election year, and a biggie.

Except that it isn’t. The election everyone is so worked up about is next year — in fact, at the end of next year, And the result will depend — to the extent that it is influenced by reality in any way — will depend on what’s happening then, not what’s happening now.

So, when The Washington Post wanted me to read something headlined, “9 things to watch as the 2024 presidential campaign heats up,” I responded this way:

Here are my 9:

1. My grandchildren

2. The seasons changing

3. The AL playoffs

4. The NL playoffs

5. The World Series

6. The last 3 next year, too

7. Detective shows on Britbox

8. My diet and workout routine

9. Pretty much anything but football.

I didn’t have room to elaborate, because that used all 280 characters that Twitter allows.

If I’d had more room, I would have of course mentioned my kids and all the other people with whom I choose to spend most of my time. They’re all way more interesting, and enjoyable, than, say, Vivek Ramaswamy. And I’d have explained that I don’t just watch English murder mysteries. I also enjoy Scottish, Welsh, Swedish, German and French detective shows. And I would have mentioned books, but you don’t “watch” books; you read them. And I’d have put quotes around “diet and workout routine,” to be more honest about it. But there just wasn’t room.

Anyway, what are your favorite things to watch rather than campaigns for next year’s presidential election?

 

Going by my family tree, I must be getting old…

Why did I write that post about time moving so much faster as we age? Well, I’ve been thinking lately about writing more often about that phenomenon. I mean about aging, not time. So that was an initial installment, I guess.

You can ignore them, if you prefer. I write posts such as this one mostly for my kids and grandkids, assuming the posts are still available if and when they wonder about these things. (Which may be a lot to assume.)

One thing that has put this stuff more on my mind lately is that a couple of weeks before I wrote that, I realized I had now outlived three of my four grandparents.

I had been anticipating this one. That’s because a couple of years back, I passed my maternal grandfather. That one sort of snuck up on me. I had long been used to the knowledge that I had outlived my maternal grandmother. She died when she was only 61. I was 15 at the time, so it was a lot of years before I realized how shockingly early that was.

At that point, I was shaken by the loss, but I also tended to think, Well, grandparents are really old, right? So I guess we have to accept that this might happen.

Then, in September 2021, it hit me that just a few days before, I had passed my Mom’s father as well. Both had died earlier than you would have expected, after medical incidents that one might normally expect to have gone much better than they did — especially today. Their deaths were far from inevitable, under the conditions. They did not “die of old age.”

To ease the formality… I called them “Nana” and “Pop,” and I was still a kid when we lost them. Their names were Nathalie Smith Pace and Walker Heyward Collins.

After I realized I had passed Pop, I checked the family tree and saw the date was not far off when I would pass my paternal grandfather, Gerald Harvey Warthen. He died on July 10, 1958, a couple of months short of his 70th birthday, when I was 4. (Yes, those grandparents were a good bit older than the other set. My Dad was the youngest of five.)

And now, I will reach the threescore-and-ten mark in less than… four weeks. So, another milestone.

I should point out that Granddad Warthen should have lived longer, too. He had lung cancer, which is not surprising when you see how many pictures we have of him with a cigarette, a cigar or a pipe. I was an accomplice in this. I remember him taking me on walks to a nearby shop and buying me candy cigarettes when he bought his real ones. I very much enjoyed them, but I would have much more enjoyed having my grandfather around while I was growing up.

My paternal Grandma, Mary Shiland Bradley, lived to the age of 95. That’s a high bar to reach for, and beyond most people’s expectations. Of course, my Dad lived to just short of turning 93, and my Mom is 92, and much healthier than Dad had been for several years at that age.

No sense making predictions, though. I could check out before I finish this post. If you’re reading it, though, I guess I didn’t.

But I am trying, in fits and starts, to make better use of each day. That’s a struggle for me, as it was when I was in my 20s. I am known to my intimates as being bad at quite a few things, and one of them is time management…

Open Thread for Thursday, September 7, 2023

Several things from recent days:

  1. Elon Musk’s Shadow Rule — Remember how I told you that 4,500 of the 8,000 satellites orbiting the Earth at this moment belong to Elon Musk? And that the web access his Starlink network makes possible saved Ukraine’s bacon early on in the present war? Only, the Ukrainians stay nervous because Elon is way ambivalent about wanting to keep helping? Well, if you can possibly read, or listen to, this story, you need to. (I’m never sure how many things, if any, nonsubscribers are allowed to read.) It’s a more extended piece, by Ronan Farrow, that provides a kind of scary picture of this guy that so many people on this planet are now depending on.
  2. Ukrainians Embrace Cluster Munitions, but Are They Helping? — And while we’re at it, how about those depleted uranium shells, which are so effective at penetrating those tanks the Russians keep throwing at them? Oh, the answer to that question in the headline is, that they’re no magic wand, “but some Ukrainian troops say they are making a difference in fighting Russian forces.”
  3. Mysterious ‘skin-like’ golden orb found on ocean floor off Alaska coast — This was weird. To me, it looks human-made — like a broken Christmas tree decoration. But scientists seem to think it’s natural. See the picture above. And here’s a video.
  4. American conservatives are not more Catholic than the pope — I just shared this because that headline made me tweet, “Isn’t it bizarre that we live in a world so messed up that someone would feel the need to say that?” Unfortunately, we do.
  5. The sexually explicit welcome-to-NC State package — This was interesting to me because you know how right-wing groups are always complaining that the “liberal media” are suppressing news that would support the right’s perception of things? This may be a case of that, sort of. I got this in an email from such a group, and went looking for actual news stories about it, all I found was some local TV news coverage. I don’t know for sure what happened. I only know we didn’t get packages like that when I started college. But you could go into the drug store at Cornell Arms and buy products that said, “Our Cocks are Always Game.”
  6. What about that Burning Man thing? — My daughter wanted to go to Burning Man, but it didn’t work out. Her good friend of many years did go, and has told her the coverage of all the problems was ridiculous; she had no trouble leaving. I’m glad to hear it. But what I want to ask y’all is, have any of y’all been to anything like this? And why? I’m pretty sure that from the moment I arrived at something like this, even if everything went as planned, I’d feel trapped, and want to go home. A big mass of people? Outside? I don’t think so.

It’s Twitter, so let’s just call it that

OK, I’ve had it with the stupid phrase. Some examples:

Thank you for that last one. I appreciate the explanation. I understand. The AP says write it this way, so all journalists do. If you search for the exact phrase “formerly known as Twitter” on Google, you get 123,000 hits. (Actually, that’s what you get under the subheading “News,” which is the way I usually search. If you switch to “All,” you get 6,190,000.)

What is this, the 1980s, when we had to endure “the artist formerly known as Prince” over and over and over on MTV? Until Logo. Hollow circle above downward arrow crossed with a curlicued horn-shaped symbol and then a short bar  finally decided to be sensible and went back to “Prince,” which I actually did not expect him to do, but appreciated.

I don’t expect Elon Musk to come to his senses, either. Maybe he will, even though he seems to be even less grounded than Prince. I just listened to an audio version of Ronan Farrow’s piece about him in The New Yorker. Yikes.

So let’s just call it what it is — Twitter. Or, since it’s officially been stripped of its name, maybe just twitter. That way, we can use it in Scrabble. No more proper name. Just people calling a thing what it is.

“X” does have one slight advantage over the Prince symbol. At least you can say it. That was the challenge facing those veejays back in the ”80s — they had to say it, and the new “name” couldn’t be said. But although you can say it, “X” is not a name. It’s the negation of a name. Brand X. The thing illiterates scrawl when they can’t write their, you know, names.

Why do people have to write “formerly known as Twitter” after “X?” Because “X” is meaningless, and does not communicate what you are attempting to identify to a reader. You have to explain it. It would be nice to do it more honestly. Just call it “Twitter,” or “twitter,” or if you feel somehow obligated to obey Musk, write “X (Twitter).”

Or how about “Twitter, which one guy on the planet calls X?”

People who use it every day have to call it something. We are a verbalizing species.

So let’s call it what we know it to be: Twitter.

Top 17 Best Songs (With Parentheses in the Titles)

What, indeed, IS so funny ’bout it?

I was trying to clean out my email a few days ago, but got distracted by this fun item the NYT was promoting. (Seems like the Times is just going out of its way to tempt me away from actual work these days, huh? First Wordle, then Spelling Bee, then this thing I had written about the same day I saw this…)

The Times called it “13 (great) songs with parenthetical titles.” Of course, it’s a rather silly category. One song with parentheses has nothing in common with other songs with parentheses, aside from that punctuational quirk. All it tells you is that the songwriter was engaging in an affectation, trying to say, Look, I’m deep. This song is written on multiple levels — including parenthetical!

Of course, I had to step in and correct it — narrowing the list to those that are actually good, if not necessarily great, and then expanding it to bring in equally good songs that the NYT left out. The proper thing to do then, of course, would have been to whittle the result down to a true Top Five list, but I didn’t want to spend days on the silly thing.

So here’s my Top 16 Best Songs (With Parentheses in the Titles). They aren’t in order with the best at the top, or anything. The first six are from the NYT list, the other 10 are ones I added. You may offer whatever suggestions occur to you:

  1. (Sittin’ on) The Dock of the Bay” — I agree to include this with mixed feelings. I love the song — it’s one that truly does rise to “great” — and let always feel kind of ignorant and out of it because for many years, this somewhat uncharacteristic number was all I knew about Otis Redding, the man who really knew HOW to express a lack of Satisfaction. I am wiser now.
  2. I Would Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)” — I agreed on this one, if only to give a nod to the late Meat Loaf, to make up for the fact that this is one of only two songs of his (the other being…) I can recall. And it really is a pretty decent song.
  3. (You Make Me Feel Like) a Natural Woman” — The NYT was confused, citing the Aretha Franklin version. But I’m not as big a fan of Aretha as lots of other folks are, and so I prefer Otis Reading’s version of “R.E.S.P.E.C.T.” And on this, I have to give the credit to the woman who actually wrote the song, Carole King.
  4. It’s Only Rock ’n’ Roll (But I Like It)” — This is far — very, very far — from bring among the Rolling Stones’ greatest songs, but it meets the criterion, and they’re the greatest rock and roll band in the world, so let’s include it.
  5. It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” — Not only the best R.E.M. song, but probably the best use of parentheses on the NYT list.
  6. I Wanna Dance with Somebody (Who Loves Me)” — A weaker use of parentheses than, say, R.E.M.’s, but a nice song, and it’s nice to contemplate something from when that lovely young woman was so full of promise, before her life started falling apart.
  7. It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)” — This is a slight correction to the NYT list, which mistakenly chose “I Don’t Believe You (She Acts Like We Have Never Met).” To its credit, that list also mention this one, and “One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later).” That third one — the one from Blonde on Blonde (What? You don’t have Blonde on Blonde?), is the best song of the three. But “It’s Alright, Ma” is the one with the punchiest use of parentheses.
  8. (What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding” — My fave of all of these. It’s an enigma: How can it sound like the quintessential Elvis Costello song when Nick Lowe wrote it? And how could the NYT have left it out?
  9. December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night)” —  Yeah, what you thought was the title is completely contained in the parentheses. This is Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons being… I don’t know what.
  10. Double Shot (Of My Baby’s Love)” — Another of mine, as a way of getting a South Carolina band on the list. I lived in New Orleans when this was first big, and it was years before I knew that it and I were born in the same place.
  11. (Don’t Fear) The Reaper” — Of course, we need to hear it through the SNL skit.
  12. Mr. President (Have Pity on the Working Man)” I threw in this one because it is my considered opinion that Randy Newman doesn’t get enough attention. He would probably agree. And it comes from a truly great album that you will never heard fully played on the radio because, you know. It’s a shame “Louisiana 1927” didn’t have some parentheses.
  13. Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)” — Maybe the person who compiled the NYT list isn’t old enough to remember Kenny Rogers & the First Edition playing it on a variety show, back when those existed.
  14. She Got the Goldmine (I Got the Shaft)” — You have to be in a certain sort of mood, I suppose, to enjoy Jerry Reed. I include this in case you’ve feeling that way. I’m not…
  15. Don’t Come Home A-Drinkin’ (With Lovin’ On Your Mind)” — This Loretta Lynn number is probably the one item on this list that is truly a classic.
  16. I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” — You thought I was going to forget the Fab Four? Perish the thought.

I miss the whited sepulchers

Of course, ol’ St, Jerome would be unhappy that we’re not using his Latin version…

You know, I appreciate the efforts of various people to make Holy Scripture accessible to modern people. I do; it’s a noble motivation.

But sometimes it just leaves me flat, and I regret the poetry that has been lost.

Here is the opening of today’s Gospel reading, in the Catholic Church’s official New American Bible:

Jesus said,
“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites.
You are like whitewashed tombs, which appear beautiful on the outside,
but inside are full of dead men’s bones and every kind of filth.
Even so, on the outside you appear righteous,
but inside you are filled with hypocrisy and evildoing….

I’m not trying to make any theological point, much less a political one. In fact, as I suggested above, I suppose the correct theological point is to make the Word more accessible.

But it does bother me a little to imagine future generations missing out on the old wording. It survived to be a secular cliche because it had a certain power to it. You call somebody a “whited sepulcher,” and most people with even a modicum of cultural education will get it.

So for fun, and to gratify the esthetic part of the soul, here’s the old King James version (you know, the Protestant version):

Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness.

Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity…

Meanwhile, I’ll sit here and worry about the editors of the next edition of the NAB deciding to ditch “Woe to you…” because it “sounds like Yoda or something…”

I mean, they already got rid of the “unto”…

 

Open Thread for Tuesday, August 29, 2023

What the…?

A few things I’ve run across…

  1. The universe poses a question — Have you heard about the question mark in space? Since it’s oriented so as to be readable on our planet, I sort of expect it won’t be long before a “WTF” appears to the left of it. News of how messed up we are has apparently spread across the galaxy. In case you can’t read the NYT version I linked to, try the NPR version.
  2. Record 14-foot monster alligator caught in Mississippi — In case you thought you were wrestling with some messy problems… This sucker weighed 802.5 pounds. Lately, we’ve been reading a good bit about “Proud Boys.” Well, I suppose you could say this is a picture of some proud boys of the generic kind…
  3. Sorry to hear the news about Tough Guy Bob Barker — I held back from posting the first thing that occurred to me when I got the news — his famous scene in “Happy Gilmore.” But then after that, The Washington Post did a whole story just about that — which I very much enjoyed. It told how Bob insisted on doing his own stunts, because his neighbor Chuck Norris had been coaching him. Much later, he supposedly told Rob Schneider, “I moved to Hollywood to be an actor, and the only person who ever let me do it was Adam Sandler!” Well, he took his shot, and scored. Watch the full fight scene here.
  4. Idalia expected to dump half-foot of rain on us — Yeah, like we needed that. And oh yes, it’s now a hurricane. I need to find us some good news…
  5. Watch ‘Breaking Away’ for free! — And here it is! This is to make up for all the things I link to that require subscriptions. I just discovered that YouTube is showing it for free! If you’ve never seen it, go watch it right now — subito! (As the protagonist would say — I think.) I already gave Scott Hogan a heads-up via twitter. He was our campaign manager back in 2018, and he’s from Bloomington, making him the only actual Cutter I know.
  6. Joe moves to cut some drug prices — Even better news. You go, Joe! I need to tell my wife he’s going after Eliquis, which she’s had to take since her mini-strokes, and the price on it is absurd. The link above is to The Guardian, which is free to read. Let’s see if they managed to write about it without a tone of disbelief at the problems we have over here paying for basic medical care…

 

Hey, this is Civility Month. Who could tell, huh?

Check out those dates. We’ve been discussing this for awhile, eh?

Hey, did ya know this was National Civility Month? Here it is almost over, and I didn’t know until this morning. Here’s what it’s about:

People being civil to other people is what makes the world a whole lot better and is the key focus of National Civility Month, which is held in August each year. This holiday was founded to help the world remember to treat others the way we wish to be treated ourselves — with kindness, empathy, and respect. This month follows a common theme like other similar awareness months centered around civility, including National Win With Civility Month, International Civility Awareness Month, and more.

It appears to have escaped the attention of some of my readers as well. I just looked at the latest 10 comments awaiting moderation, and only approved one of them. I think maybe that’s a record. Just not one worth celebrating.

Of course, it “helped” that four of them were from our old friend SDII, using his latest pseudonym (I think — I’m not going to take the trouble to try to trace it back). He knows I’m not going to approve his comments, so they’ve gotten increasingly gross and obscene. Which doesn’t matter, since I trash them as soon as I see them, but he’s been unusually active lately.

The rest were from folks I’ve recently tried for about the thousandth time to engage regarding what this month was supposed to be about, explaining why I had not approved previous comments of theirs. Their responses essentially amounted to a middle finger raised high, so I guess I only succeeded in irritating them.

I’ll stop doing that, going forward. From this moment on, I’m just going to approve comments that add to the blog without dissing others here. Beyond that, things that don’t create a drip, drip, drip of negativity that makes the comments section a drag for others to read.

And what sorts of comments meet that standard? Well, here are some people I’ve never had reason to disapprove (Or rather, almost never. Occasionally, they’ve been dragged into scuffles with other folks, and I’ve just trashed the whole conversation.) The first few who come to mind, in alphabetical order:

  1. Phillip Bush
  2. Bryan Caskey
  3. Dave Crockett
  4. James Edward Cross
  5. Paul DeMarco
  6. Ralph Hightower
  7. Sally Huguley
  8. Norm Ivey
  9. Mark Stewart
  10. Clark Surratt
  11. Lynn Teague

OK, now: I hope those 12 won’t mind being named. If anyone does, I’ll remove you from the list. And no one who isn’t on the list should resent it. I was just choosing among people who’ve made civil contributions in the recent past, and have done so regularly over the years, and have used their full names.

For instance, I was delighted to hear from “Scout” recently. It had been awhile, and I hope she resumes regular participation. But I didn’t include her, since she uses a pseudonym. Of course, there are quite a few people who identify themselves fully and accurately, but haven’t commented lately. I’m afraid some of those were run off by the finger-flipping folk. People get tired of reading that stuff, very quickly.

Why provide a list at all? Well, I thought it better to celebrate the good than pick on those who fall short. Also, the finger-flippers who insist on believing that the standard is “you have to agree with that stupid jerk Brad” will be able to see that’s not true. Actually, I’m almost certain (after all this time) that they won’t see it, but they will have the opportunity.

Note that I provided a link to one comment from each of those folks. There’s nothing particularly special about those comments — it’s not a “greatest hits” list. I just looked for something reasonably, thoughtful (some agreeing with me or someone else, others not) and particularly ones that added something that wouldn’t have been here otherwise. And I did it very quickly.

And now, on to other things.

America finally has its long-awaited mug shot

From the Fulton County Sheriff’s Office

Well, here it is.

Note that after the NYT reported that his cohorts were smiling brightly in theirs, Trump rejected that sissy notion, opting to go full surly thug. By comparison, Al Capone was Mr. Sunshine.

No orange jumpsuit, but a mug shot.

See what I meant about Trump knowing how to upstage a dumb ol’ debate?

Thoughts on the ‘debate’ last night?

Actually, the first thing I’d like to know is how many of you watched it.

I didn’t. Well, I tried — about a half-hour into it — and I couldn’t. I mean, technically couldn’t get it on my TV. You see, this wasn’t an event for the American people; it was an event for Fox News. It was only available if you had cable, which I don’t. It certainly wasn’t on WACH-Fox 57, which I can get. Oh, I watched for a few minutes by a path that looked like a workaround, but it only offered me 10 free minutes, and at least half of that was commercials.

Of course, I’ve read various accounts of it, and listened to the “The Daily” podcast this morning, which was devoted entirely to it. So I have some thoughts. Those of you who watched the whole sorry spectacle (and I feel for you) may have a great deal of, um, enlightenment to add. If you’re not in a coma or something.

Here’s what I have:

What passes for a ‘profile in courage’ in the GOP — It’s been many, many years since we’ve seen anything we could call an actual presidential debate — you know, something that sheds light on the degree to which the candidates possess qualities that it would be useful for a POTUS to have — instead of a circus contest to see how many clowns can crowd onto a stage, while trying to goad each other into gaffes. It’s about as dignified as the Three Stooges. We reached a new low last night (really, in the parts I heard, Quemoy and Matsu weren’t mentioned even once), and possibly the lowest point was when the participants were asked whether they’d support Trump if he were both convicted of a crime, and nominated. The three hands on the right shot up, with Vivek Ramaswamy succeeding in his mission to convey the greatest enthusiasm. DeSantis, in the middle, looked to both his left and right before deciding he’d better put his up his, too. Then Pence did. Christie started to raise his, then shook his head, pointing his finger downward and twitching it back and forth. Asked to clarify his gestures (I think it was a form of New Jersey Sign Language), he hemmed and hawed and said “someone’s got to stop normalizing this conduct,” and overall gave the impression he’d never given the question a moment’s thought, and was trying to think what to say as he said it. And yet this was the closest anyone came to answering negatively, making his performance a Republican Profile in Courage, 2023 edition. How do I know all this, since I didn’t watch? Here’s the video.

Calling the kettle black — Nikki Haley was exactly right when she said to Ramaswamy, “You have no foreign policy experience and it shows.” And the rest of us were right when we said that about her when Donald Trump named her to be ambassador to the U.N. And if you think he did that because he thought she had such experience, you’re as wrong as you can be. He did it to make his buddy Henry McMaster governor. You know, the first statewide elected official in the country to ditch Reaganism and support the abasement of the country.

That said, did Nikki have a big night? Lots of observers think so. — Of course, it depends on how you’re scoring it. A number of people made the observation that she was the one person up there who was campaigning for the general election instead of the primaries. That means speaking in terms that are less objectionable to rational human beings. And she was rewarded with a lot of praise for that modest achievement — she was the consensus star of the evening, for instance, among NYT opinion writers. And David Brooks out-and-out said, “Nikki Haley Is the Best Trump Alternative.” That’s pretty clear. He adds, “She seems to be one of the few candidates who understands that to run against Trump you have to run against Trump.” Maybe so. As a big Brooks fan, I’m listening…

Trump showed them all up, and stole the spotlight — He did this by traveling to Atlanta this evening and turning himself in at the jail. America eagerly awaits the mug shot. But wait, you know what? I remember hearing before all this that he was supposed to be doing something with Tucker Carlson. Did that happen?

That’s probably enough to get us started. Thoughts?

“No, I was doin’ dis…”

Did y’all get this in the mail, too?

My reaction of course is, Well, let’s certainly hope it would be my man Joe’s “ticket to another four years.”

Of course, I fervently hope we’ll have the same result even if any of these jokers — the ones having a “debate” tonight — turns out to be the nominee.

Obviously, that’s not what Americans for Prosperity — that’s the Koch brothers’ group — is hoping. They want one of those other Republicans to be nominated, and then beat Joe! (Shudder.)

I’m just curious about who got it, and who didn’t. I probably got it because, living in Lexington County — where the GOP nominee always gets elected — I’ve voted in quite a few GOP primaries. Or maybe it’s just that this is Lexington County. Or maybe, with all that Koch money to spend, everybody got it.

So… who got it, and who didn’t?

 

The accelerating acceleration of time…

So Rip Van Winkle took a nap? Big deal…

Rip Van Winkle fell asleep for 20 years? Big deal. I take a lot of naps myself, since my stroke.

Also, I’m older than Rip was when he woke up, near as I can figure. And this gives a very, very different conception of what constitutes a “long time.” This was on display in a response I gave to a Doug Ross comment earlier this week. But let’s not talk about that. The exchange was about one of the least interesting subjects in the known universe — interest rates. (He was impressed by a 21-year high. I was not.)

And I want to talk about time.

You may think this a subject that’s been done to death, too, and you’d be right, up to a point. I mean, we all know that time speeds up as we get older. I knew full well when I was 40 that a year went by a LOT faster than it did when I was, say, 10. You’ve all experienced it, even you youngsters.

But after that, time accelerates at an accelerating pace. And now that I’m a very few weeks away from turning 70, I can tell you that I’m experiencing something like Ludicrous Speed, and I’m in a new dimension, or something.

And the only way I can measure the change is to compare it to the ways I perceived time in the past — which seem, well, ludicrous to me now. Examples:

  1. I’m jealous of my children and grandchildren because they learned about the Second World War, the event that loomed over my childhood, in history class. I had to read up on it myself. I was born eight years after 1945, and when I was a kid, I figured that had been plenty of time to document it fully in the textbooks. And it DID appear, as a sort of epilogue, in some of my books. But my teachers never got that far by the end of the term. I was an adult before I understood that it was so recent that it was hard for adults to wrap their heads around the idea that it was history. They saw it as current events. How could we not know all about it? Anyway, I felt really left out, because my world was full of indications that this monumental thing had happened just before I was born, and my elders knew all about it, but they weren’t sharing. I spent a lot of time, whenever I was in the school library, looking at those LIFE magazine coffee-table books full of pictures from that period. By high school, I was devouring adult novels set in the period, and then got into the actual history books
  2. In my senior year of high school, I wrote a research paper for my civics class (a course with one of those faddish names like “Problems in American Democracy”) about Robert F. Kennedy — not the one who’s running quixotically for president now, but his Dad, who was not crazy, and was a contender if not the favorite back in ’68. Of course, I didn’t write the paper until the night before it was due — an all-nighter, since I had to type it after writing it longhand (I lacked skills I later took for granted). But I had been reading up on him for some time — at least one book covering his whole life, and a bunch of magazine articles. I really, truly had a strong sense that I was writing about a figure from way back in history; I remember this clearly. I had known next to nothing about him when he was alive, so I was learning about the distant past. But he had been assassinated only three years before! Had he survived, and won the 1968 election, he would still have been in his first term when I was writing it! It was like — the 2020 election, looked back upon now.
  3. That one reminds of an incident illustrating how clueless I still was well into my 30s. When I was the news editor of The Wichita Eagle-Beacon, from 1985-87, I was asked to help with the screening of a candidate for assistant metro editor. Before meeting her, I read through her clips from her reporting days, and was deeply impressed by one of her stories: It was about the spontaneous speech RFK gave to a crowd in Indianapolis upon learning of the assassination of Martin Luther King. It was a profoundly great speech, and if you’ve never heard it, go listen. This was two months before he himself was killed. It was an amazing story, and she did a good job with it. But what I remember thinking was, She was there? She was an actual working journalist way back in history like that? I wasn’t used to dealing with anyone that old. And when I met her, she actually had gray hair! (Mind you, it was only as far back as… well, this blog is older than that.) But ancient as she was, we hired her, and I really liked her. Old people can be interesting.
  4. Just one more, and this is the one that really gets my head spinning. As I said, as a kid, WWII was history, even though by an adult perspective, it had just happened. The 1930s — the days of Prohibition and Al Capone and the Great Depression — that was way back when my parents were little kids, and they were antediluvian, right? In the Roaring ’20s, my mom hadn’t even been born. The First World War? I didn’t know anybody who had served in that, although I heard legends about an uncle who had been gassed, and always had poor health, and died long before I came along. To me, it was like hearing about Henry V at Agincourt.

Let’s break down that last bullet, from an adult perspective. Let’s compare perceptions of time in 1963 — the year I turned 10 — to today:

  • In 1963, the end of the war was no more distant than 2005 is now. You know, the year I started this blog. Which just happened, right?
  • Al Capone had gone to prison for tax evasion in 1932. That was the same distance back as 1992. According to Wikipedia, some of the top movies of that year were “Lethal Weapon 3” (not 1 or 2), “A Few Good Men” (yay, Aaron Sorkin), “Sister Act,” and “Wayne’s World.” If you think those are old films, you and I might have trouble communicating.
  • This month in 1927, President Coolidge proposed federal funding for the planned sculptures on Mount Rushmore. And my Dad wasn’t born yet. That same distance back from now, I became the governmental affairs editor of The State, after having been a supervising editor at other newspapers for seven years.
  • Now it really gets creepy. In 1963, the start of the Great War, the War to End All Wars — which would lead to the ends of the Russian, Hapsburg and Ottoman empires — was 49 years back. But I have realized that this wasn’t the same as Agincourt. My wife and I celebrated our 49th anniversary on Friday.

Never mind stuff I can still remember. These books I’ve often mentioned recently expanding the notion of “history” to way before the dawn of writing have expanded my concept of time to what most Americans who know who the Kardashians would consider… ludicrous.

I’m reminded of a conversation I overheard on the USC campus back when I worked in an office, and took long daily walks around the campus and downtown area. These two boys were walking behind me, and one of them was bitching about having to take a course in stupid history — as if anybody cared about that.

His friend, however, protested that learning history was important to understanding our world, and he got the first kid to agree, reluctantly. I almost applauded, but in keeping with my lifelong habit of hanging back and observing, I didn’t (anyway, they may have found that a bit… condescending).

But then I heard the first kid say, “Yeah, OK. But this was, like, 500 years back! Who needs to know about that?”

The friend felt compelled to walk back his position: “Well, maybe not 500 years! Let’s not be ridiculous…”

I just kept walking.

Five hundred years ago, what we call the Modern Era had already begun. The Roman Empire, which kinda got Western civilization all going and organized, had collapsed more than a thousand years earlier.

As old as I may look, boys, I don’t personally remember those things. But come on…

Ferdinand and Isabella? That was, like, 500 years ago! Who cares?