via:
Saturday, October 7, 2023
What the Heck Happened in 2012?
Image: via
[ed. Wierd. I've felt for a long time that 2012 was a watershed year too, but just assumed it was me. I lost my mother, my partner, and the place I'd been living in for most of my adult life (Alaska - relocating to Washington state). Apparently there were other significant things happening around that time too.]
Friday, October 6, 2023
Swiftology
July 7 has arrived, the sun has risen, and Kansas City is waking to the Taypocalypse.
The economic and cultural juggernaut that is Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour has thundered into town for two long-awaited shows at Arrowhead Stadium. My 14-year-old daughter is out of bed shockingly early for a high school student on summer break—especially considering that last night, at 11 p.m., Swift dropped her latest album, the rerecorded Taylor’s Version of her 2010 LP “Speak Now,” the most recent flex in the 33-year-old global pop star’s ongoing power move to reclaim control of her back catalog by releasing note-for-note reconstructions of early albums whose master tapes were sold against her wishes. Any new music release—even new old music—is a major happening for millions of Swifties (as the worldwide community of hardcore Taylor Swift fans call themselves) who analyze and debate every song lyric, Instagram photo, tweet and snippet of stage patter like scripture.
The buzz this morning, my daughter tells me, is that Swift changed a lyric in one of her “Speak Now” songs that some fans and critics had deemed sexist. This development is not entirely surprising, but still thrilling for the Swiftie legions who stayed up half the night playing, deconstructing and discussing the new release. This is the first of what will be many news flashes today. My daughter, against all odds, has landed tickets to one of the Kansas City shows, defying scalper bots and Ticketmaster’s meltdown, thanks to the help of her mother, aunt and cousin, who spent hours online during the Nov. 15 presale. It takes a village to raise a Swiftie.
The economic and cultural juggernaut that is Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour has thundered into town for two long-awaited shows at Arrowhead Stadium. My 14-year-old daughter is out of bed shockingly early for a high school student on summer break—especially considering that last night, at 11 p.m., Swift dropped her latest album, the rerecorded Taylor’s Version of her 2010 LP “Speak Now,” the most recent flex in the 33-year-old global pop star’s ongoing power move to reclaim control of her back catalog by releasing note-for-note reconstructions of early albums whose master tapes were sold against her wishes. Any new music release—even new old music—is a major happening for millions of Swifties (as the worldwide community of hardcore Taylor Swift fans call themselves) who analyze and debate every song lyric, Instagram photo, tweet and snippet of stage patter like scripture.
The Eras Tour will inject around $4.6 billion into the U.S. economy and is expected to propel Swift herself to billionaire status. More than 110,000 ticket holders will pack Arrowhead for the Friday and Saturday night concerts, and many of them will be screaming teenage girls. But not all. Also out in force will be Taylor mamas introducing their daughters to Swiftie culture, Swiftie dads gamely sporting themed T-shirts emblazoned with song lyrics, college students attending their third or fourth show in the retrospective journey through the singer’s 17-year career, plus Gaylors, OG Swifties and a host of other subgroups that defy the common stereotype that the obsession with all things Taylor is exclusively a teen mania.
Among them will be a 51-year-old KU sociology professor whose scholarship and award-winning teaching focus largely on cultural sociology, which is concerned with the study of societal institutions, norms and practices. The author of three books that have peered into popular culture’s seedier corners, Brian Donovan will bring to his first Taylor Swift show the dual interests of a social scientist and a fan. Thanks to a research pivot that has its roots in the COVID-19 pandemic, the professor and self-described Swiftie is now concentrating his teaching and scholarship on the entertainment icon—in particular, on a product of her music and the community around it that is more difficult to quantify than tax revenue and other economic boosts, but that is essential for human well-being:
Joy.
Donovan joined the KU sociology faculty in 2001 and for two decades has taught the department’s class in cultural sociology. The class explores popular culture, and in the past few years the professor noticed that students often mentioned Taylor Swift in class discussions. Those references increased during the pandemic, which coincided with an uptick in Donovan’s own interest in Swift’s music.
He has considered himself a “low-key” fan since 2014, having bought Swift’s fifth album when it came out.
“I was really late to the party, but I fell in love with ‘1989,’” Donovan says. “I thought it was a perfect pop album. But I didn’t consider myself a Swiftie.”
He listened to her next album, “Reputation,” and followed the celebrity news about her feud with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. A documentary on Swift, “Miss Americana,” provided a glimpse into her private life and hinted at a greater depth lurking behind her public persona.
But it was the pandemic that moved Donovan from casual fan to Swiftie. In 2020, while presumably on lockdown like many of her fans, Swift made two spare, folk-influenced albums. As families coped with isolation and schoolchildren’s relationships with friends and teachers suddenly narrowed to computer screens, Swift’s “Folklore” and “Evermore” arrived like a double shot of hope. Hearing her music ringing out during breaks from Zoom school offered consolation that at least some of the traditional delights of childhood were still there for the taking.
“When she released those two albums and I heard the song ‘The Last Great American Dynasty,’ something just clicked,” Donovan says. “That song seemed so brilliant to me that I just fell down the rabbit hole. I was listening to her back catalog and realizing I’d had a lot of preconceptions about her as a musician. I realized what a genius she was.
“I can claim that I was a fan during the ‘1989’ era, which is true, but like a lot of men my age, I only started to identify as a Swiftie in the ‘Folklore’ era.” (...)
Thus was born The Sociology of Taylor Swift, an honors seminar that (according to the syllabus) uses the pop supernova’s life and career “as a mirrorball to reflect on large-scale processes like the culture industry, celebrity, fandom, and the intersection of race, gender, and sexuality in contemporary American life.” The class, new this fall, will explore many of the cultural sociology topics Donovan normally teaches, such as the construction of authenticity, symbolic boundaries and gatekeeping, fandom and fan labor, and celebrity politics. “We will also use recent controversies and legal conflicts involving Swift,” the syllabus continues, “to examine questions about intellectual property, copyright, and the economics of creative industries.”
by Steven Hill, Kansas Alumni | Read more:
Among them will be a 51-year-old KU sociology professor whose scholarship and award-winning teaching focus largely on cultural sociology, which is concerned with the study of societal institutions, norms and practices. The author of three books that have peered into popular culture’s seedier corners, Brian Donovan will bring to his first Taylor Swift show the dual interests of a social scientist and a fan. Thanks to a research pivot that has its roots in the COVID-19 pandemic, the professor and self-described Swiftie is now concentrating his teaching and scholarship on the entertainment icon—in particular, on a product of her music and the community around it that is more difficult to quantify than tax revenue and other economic boosts, but that is essential for human well-being:
Joy.
Donovan joined the KU sociology faculty in 2001 and for two decades has taught the department’s class in cultural sociology. The class explores popular culture, and in the past few years the professor noticed that students often mentioned Taylor Swift in class discussions. Those references increased during the pandemic, which coincided with an uptick in Donovan’s own interest in Swift’s music.
He has considered himself a “low-key” fan since 2014, having bought Swift’s fifth album when it came out.
“I was really late to the party, but I fell in love with ‘1989,’” Donovan says. “I thought it was a perfect pop album. But I didn’t consider myself a Swiftie.”
He listened to her next album, “Reputation,” and followed the celebrity news about her feud with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian. A documentary on Swift, “Miss Americana,” provided a glimpse into her private life and hinted at a greater depth lurking behind her public persona.
But it was the pandemic that moved Donovan from casual fan to Swiftie. In 2020, while presumably on lockdown like many of her fans, Swift made two spare, folk-influenced albums. As families coped with isolation and schoolchildren’s relationships with friends and teachers suddenly narrowed to computer screens, Swift’s “Folklore” and “Evermore” arrived like a double shot of hope. Hearing her music ringing out during breaks from Zoom school offered consolation that at least some of the traditional delights of childhood were still there for the taking.
“When she released those two albums and I heard the song ‘The Last Great American Dynasty,’ something just clicked,” Donovan says. “That song seemed so brilliant to me that I just fell down the rabbit hole. I was listening to her back catalog and realizing I’d had a lot of preconceptions about her as a musician. I realized what a genius she was.
“I can claim that I was a fan during the ‘1989’ era, which is true, but like a lot of men my age, I only started to identify as a Swiftie in the ‘Folklore’ era.” (...)
Thus was born The Sociology of Taylor Swift, an honors seminar that (according to the syllabus) uses the pop supernova’s life and career “as a mirrorball to reflect on large-scale processes like the culture industry, celebrity, fandom, and the intersection of race, gender, and sexuality in contemporary American life.” The class, new this fall, will explore many of the cultural sociology topics Donovan normally teaches, such as the construction of authenticity, symbolic boundaries and gatekeeping, fandom and fan labor, and celebrity politics. “We will also use recent controversies and legal conflicts involving Swift,” the syllabus continues, “to examine questions about intellectual property, copyright, and the economics of creative industries.”
by Steven Hill, Kansas Alumni | Read more:
Image: uncredited
[ed. Same with me, when I heard The Last Great American Dynasty I became a believer - just the casual and matter of fact statement "... then it was bought by me". Wow. As evocative a story as Eleanor Rigby.]
Thursday, October 5, 2023
David (Foster) Wallace's Syllabus
etc.
by Sophia, À LA SOPHIA | Read more: (pdf)
Images: DFW/Pomona College 2005
[ed. Now this is how you write a course syllabus (and I'd be suitably terrified). It also says a lot about the instructor.]
via:
These classical projections, and something from the fire, suddenly suggested Poussin's scene in which the Seasons, hand in hand and facing outward, tread in rhythm to the notes of the lyre that the winged and naked greybeard plays. The image of Time brought thoughts of mortality: of human beings, facing outward like the Seasons, moving hand in hand in intricate measure, stepping slowly, methodically sometimes a trifle awkwardly, in evolutions that take recognisable shape: or breaking into seemingly meaningless gyrations, while partners disappear only to reappear again, once more giving pattern to the spectacle: unable to control the melody, unable, perhaps, to control the steps of the dance.
Do (Some) Women See More Colors Than Men?
Based on Dr. Neitz's estimates, there could be 99 million women in the world with true four-color vision. However, before they pat themselves on the back for their superior evolution, he said, it is important to note that humans are just getting back to where birds, amphibians and reptiles have been for eons.
Do Women see More Colors than Men? (Sciplanet)Those creatures have long had four-color vision, but a main difference is that their fourth type of color detector is in the high-frequency ultraviolet range, beyond where humans can see. In fact, that conclusion allowed scientists to figure out recently why the males of some species of birds did not appear to have brighter plumage than the females, Dr. Neitz said.
The problem was in the observers, not the birds, he said. When those species were viewed through ultraviolet detectors, the males had markedly different feathers than the females.
Fear not men! For despite being excluded from the beautiful colors the rest of the animal kingdom has access to, you can see (again, on average) motion better than your opposite sex. This is why it is the fate of all men to march about oblivious, existing solely in a gray world without color, sensitive only to motion, lumbering around like the Tyrannosauruses in Jurassic Park as our faces become distended, our skin scaly and rough, our arms becoming tinier as our legs and bellies grow huge, and all the while we glare beadily out of our cavernous eye sockets so we can catch, at a glimmer, the smallest of movements. It is only when activated by such a tick of motion that we come alive and can speedily shift our bulk into a killing blow dealt with lethal grace. An athleticism now mostly reserved for flies that get into the house. (via)
Image: Tetrachromacy/Wikipedia
Wednesday, October 4, 2023
Nothing Is Better Than This
The Oral History of ‘Stop Making Sense’
“A normal floor lamp is meant to go alongside a chair,” he says, springing up and placing his hand on an imaginary object level with his seat. “So it would be about that high off the ground, which, if you’re standing, that’s not a good place for illumination of your face.” Then he points above his head. “We want it to be about here. So we had to artificially extend the lamp to still have it look like a floor lamp.”
Byrne’s Fred Astaire–esque, extra-tall light fixture routine, scored by “This Must Be the Place (Naive Melody),” is still understandably fresh in his memory. Four decades later, it’s one of the many surreal moments in Stop Making Sense that are impossible to shake. Shot over the course of a handful of Talking Heads concerts at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre, the late Jonathan Demme’s film is as transfixingly propulsive today as it was when it came out in 1984.
There are no interviews, no breaks, and no fooling around. It’s pure performance. But the way Byrne sees it, the show isn’t just a show. It’s a journey toward selflessness. “As the show builds, the music becomes funkier, and it becomes harder to maintain this self that’s outside of that,” he says. “You just have to surrender to it.”
The frontman starts out on a bare stage, alone with an acoustic guitar and a boom box, and ends up as part of a collective. “As a musician, you strive for that,” Harrison says. “You’re entirely in the moment of that music. You stop being self-conscious because you’re just all there.”
This month, Byrne is back jiggling around in his big suit on the big screen. Thanks to the discovery of the movie’s original negative, A24 is releasing a restored version of Stop Making Sense in 4K in IMAX and standard theaters. Years of tension led Byrne to officially break up the band in 1991, but the members of Talking Heads know that their film will always be around to bring the party. “We’re very proud that this is our legacy, that we have this,” says bassist Tina Weymouth, who’s been married to drummer Chris Frantz since 1977. “And we’re so grateful that Jonathan Demme was the one to approach us and say, ‘Hey, this needs to be shot.’”
Part 1: “What Is This Guy On?”
In the early 1980s, Jonathan Demme was still a decade out from receiving an Academy Award for directing The Silence of the Lambs, but he had already earned a reputation as an artful filmmaker. After his dramatic comedy Melvin and Howard won two Oscars, he was hired to make Swing Shift with Goldie Hawn, Kurt Russell, Christine Lahti, and Ed Harris. The production was a disaster: frustrated stars, rewrites, reshoots, and one miserable director. Demme needed a palate cleanser.
Around the same time, Talking Heads was preparing to go on the road to support its new album, Speaking in Tongues. The conceptual tour, which featured a series of slides and images on projection screens and an expanded lineup—including singers Ednah Holt and Lynn Mabry, keyboardist Bernie Worrell, guitarist Alex Weir, and percussionist Steve Scales—reflected Byrne and the band’s art school roots.
Adelle Lutz (creative consultant and Byrne’s former wife): The show had been on tour for quite a while. I’d been going to Lincoln Center, the Library for the Performing Arts, quite a bit. I said to Dave then, “Even if it’s only for our records, even if it’s only me with a VHS machine at the back of the theater, it should be documented for the library.” And so he said, “Well, let me talk to our manager.” Gary Kurfirst was everyone’s manager—the Clash, the Eurythmics, Ramones—and so David mentioned to Gary the possibility of filming this. And one of his ideas was “Let me talk to MTV.”
And so David said, “Before you talk to them, I have to watch concert movies on TV.” And so he watched everything. All we had was this little Sony Trinitron. And it had my sticker on it that said, “Kill Your TV.” It was seriously puny. And nothing looked good. Altamont didn’t look good. The Last Waltz didn’t look good. And then he saw Neil Young’s Rust Never Sleeps. All of a sudden, he knew that it was possible to do a show and film it and project it.
Sandy McLeod (visual consultant): David actually made a concert tour that had a narrative to it, which was pretty unusual. (...)
Byrne: I’m surprised that a lot of people don’t realize this, that the film is basically a document of the tour that we were doing but with a few songs cut out to streamline it a bit. So it’s not like Jonathan came in with the concept. It was there. That’s not to take anything away from what he did, but what you see is what we were doing, and what he did was to bring out the relationships and interactions between all the band members throughout the show and the characters of each, as if it was acting, as if it was a story.
McLeod: Even though it’s very subtle and not a narrative in any traditional sense, it still has this story that evolves with the lighting effects, the music, and the stories that David tells of the songs. I think Jonathan really got that, loved it, appreciated it, and helped bring that forward.
Byrne: That’s what he saw, and I thought, “That’s not something I would’ve seen.”
Jerry Harrison (guitar and keys): It brought an intimacy to it. The camera blows up interactions that you wouldn’t see. (...)
Ednah Holt (backing vocals): I can tell you that I’m getting chills as I talk to you. This is years later, and I still get the chills.
Lynn Mabry (backing vocals): It was really a collective, of course. David being front and center—I think his take on his own style and music and the way he delivered it, or at least shared it with the audience, was very unique and very entertaining. Then you had the band, you had the musicians, and us, the singers, and we added a new flavor. It was a mixture of retro pop and rock ’n’ roll, and then you had R&B in there. It was soulful. (...)
Steve Scales (percussion): We rehearsed, and we rehearsed, and we rehearsed, but nobody inside quite could get what the heck the picture was in David’s head.
Mabry: At rehearsal I would be watching David performing, and then watch him in front of a mirror, coming up with all of those crazy moves. That was weird. It was like, “What is this guy on?” And he was completely straight. He never drank. He never smoked. Water and clean food.
Scales: He would be in my room at night, or somebody else’s room, doing these crazy little things. We said, “Man, you should do that in the show.” And he would do that in the show. He put it in. (...)
Scales: When we did Forest Hills, Mick Jagger changed his seat five times trying to figure out what the hell we were doing.
Weymouth: This stuff does make you scratch your head. Why choose this? And it’s just sort of like, “Well, it doesn’t matter, does it? It’s just part of the entertainment factor.” And so we just thought, “The people who are working with us, they liked it. The crew liked it. We liked it. Hopefully the fans will like it.”
Scales: The first show we did was in Hampton, Virginia. When we finished playing, we were in the dressing room for at least an hour, and the crew said, “You got to come out and see this.” The upper deck of this arena, one side of it was still there, still singing.
Holt: We had fun every night. Every night. It was so much fun that I actually said, “We’re going to die. This is it. This is our last gig.” (...)
Harrison: David was in the challenging position of having to not only be the performer and play his own parts, but also having to run out all the time and see what it looked like.
McLeod: One of the backup singers decided to get her hair cut for the show, and, of course, their hair was really important in the movement in the show.
Holt: I don’t even know what I was thinking. I had no idea that would be important for the movie.
Lisa Day (editor): David was so beside himself.
Holt: David was real nice. He never showed me that side, but he said, “I think it’d be best if you put your hair back. Because it really worked.” I said, “OK.” He had Lynn find a hairdresser to match what we had.
McLeod: That’s an incredibly laborious situation, to replace the missing locs. It didn’t seem to impair her energy at all. She was incredibly vivacious on stage.
McLeod: One of the backup singers decided to get her hair cut for the show, and, of course, their hair was really important in the movement in the show.
Holt: I don’t even know what I was thinking. I had no idea that would be important for the movie.
Lisa Day (editor): David was so beside himself.
Holt: David was real nice. He never showed me that side, but he said, “I think it’d be best if you put your hair back. Because it really worked.” I said, “OK.” He had Lynn find a hairdresser to match what we had.
McLeod: That’s an incredibly laborious situation, to replace the missing locs. It didn’t seem to impair her energy at all. She was incredibly vivacious on stage.
by Alan Siegel, The Ringer | Read more:
Image: Stop Making Sense via
Lou Reed
Lou Reed: ‘I Don’t Want to Be Erased’ (Vulture)
[ed. As one commenter puts it, there's a reason this song never gets covered... it can't be improved. Dick Wagner & Steve Hunter on guitars.]
Why We’ll Never Live in Space
"Human bodies really can't handle space. Spaceflight damages DNA, changes the microbiome, disrupts circadian rhythms, impairs vision, increases the risk of cancer, causes muscle and bone loss, inhibits the immune system, weakens the heart, and shifts fluids toward the head, which may be pathological for the brain over the long term—among other things. (...)
Perhaps the most significant concern about bodies in space, though, is radiation, something that is manageable for today's astronauts flying in low-Earth orbit but would be a bigger deal for people traveling farther and for longer. Some of it comes from the sun, which spews naked protons that can damage DNA, particularly during solar storms. (...)
Even if most of the body's issues can be fixed, the brain remains a problem. A 2021 review paper in Clinical Neuropsychiatry laid out the psychological risks that astronauts face on their journey, according to existing research on spacefarers and analog astronauts: poor emotional regulation, reduced resilience, increased anxiety and depression, communication problems within the team, sleep disturbances, and decreased cognitive and motor functioning brought on by stress. To imagine why these issues arise, picture yourself in a tin can with a small crew, a deadly environment outside, a monotonous schedule, an unnatural daytime-nighttime cycle and mission controllers constantly on your case.
Physical and mental health problems—though dire—aren't even necessarily the most immediate hurdles to making a space settlement happen. The larger issue is the cost. And who's going to pay for it?"
Perhaps the most significant concern about bodies in space, though, is radiation, something that is manageable for today's astronauts flying in low-Earth orbit but would be a bigger deal for people traveling farther and for longer. Some of it comes from the sun, which spews naked protons that can damage DNA, particularly during solar storms. (...)
Even if most of the body's issues can be fixed, the brain remains a problem. A 2021 review paper in Clinical Neuropsychiatry laid out the psychological risks that astronauts face on their journey, according to existing research on spacefarers and analog astronauts: poor emotional regulation, reduced resilience, increased anxiety and depression, communication problems within the team, sleep disturbances, and decreased cognitive and motor functioning brought on by stress. To imagine why these issues arise, picture yourself in a tin can with a small crew, a deadly environment outside, a monotonous schedule, an unnatural daytime-nighttime cycle and mission controllers constantly on your case.
Physical and mental health problems—though dire—aren't even necessarily the most immediate hurdles to making a space settlement happen. The larger issue is the cost. And who's going to pay for it?"
by Sarah Scoles, Scientific American | Read more:
Image: Tavis Coburn[ed. Maybe not physically, but perhaps something something something combined... AI, transhumanism, robotics, metaverse, time and evolution? No idea.]
The College Backlash Is Going Too Far
Americans are losing their faith in higher education. In a recent Wall Street Journal poll, more than half of respondents said that a bachelor’s degree isn’t worth the cost. Young people were the most skeptical. As a recent New York Times Magazine cover story put it, “For most people, the new economics of higher ed make going to college a risky bet.” The article drew heavily on research from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, which found that rising student-loan burdens have lowered the value proposition of a four-year degree.
American higher education certainly has its problems. But the bad vibes around college threaten to obscure an important economic reality: Most young people are still far better off with a four-year college degree than without one.
Historically, analysis of higher education’s value tends to focus on the so-called college wage premium. That premium has always been massive—college graduates earn much more than people without a degree, on average—but it doesn’t take into account the cost of getting a degree. So the St. Louis Fed researchers devised a new metric, the college wealth premium, to try to get a more complete picture. They compared the wealth premium of people born in the 1980s with that enjoyed by earlier cohorts. Because those earlier generations have been alive longer and thus have had more time to build wealth, the researchers projected out the future earnings of the younger cohort. They found that the lifetime wealth premium will be lower for people born in the 1980s than for any previous generation.
That analysis, however, suffers from a key oversight. In estimating the lifetime earnings for people who are now in their 30s and early 40s, the researchers assumed that the college wage premium will stay constant throughout their life. In fact, it almost surely will not. For Baby Boomers, Gen Xers, and older Millennials, the college wage premium has more than doubled between the ages of 25 and 50, from less than 40 percent to nearly 80 percent. Likewise, the college wealth premium for past generations was initially very small but grew rapidly after age 40. History tells us that the best is yet to come for today’s recent graduates.
Wages grow faster for more-educated workers because college is a gateway to professional occupations, such as business and engineering, in which workers learn new skills, get promoted, and gain managerial experience. Most noncollege workers, in contrast, end up in personal services and blue-collar occupations, for which wages tend to stagnate over time.
For example, truck drivers in the U.S. earn an average annual salary of about $48,700, according to my analysis of data from the American Community Survey. (Full-time unionized drivers can make much more, but they’re in the minority.) That’s close to the average annual income for four-year college graduates working full-time at age 24. It’s easy to see why some young people might look at those numbers and opt against borrowing money to attend a four-year college. Yet the math will be very different a decade later. For example, average earnings in business occupations, where almost everyone has a four-year degree, are about $50,000 at age 24, but double to $100,000 by age 50. Average earnings for truck drivers grow from about $36,000 to only about $51,000 over the same period. The earnings advantage for college graduates increases steadily with work experience, until eventually they are earning nearly twice as much as workers with only a high-school degree.
The debt timeline is basically the reverse. Most federal student loans have a repayment period of only 10 years, which begins shortly after graduation. (The exception is income-based and income-driven repayment loans, which charge a share of borrowers’ discretionary income for 20 to 25 years. These are about a quarter of all loans today and were less common several years ago. Private loans vary in term length, but most are about 10 years.) This means that the typical college graduate must completely repay their loans by their mid-30s. In other words, the earnings premium from a bachelor’s degree is smallest in the years when graduates are also paying down their debts. We are effectively asking a 17-year-old high-school student to delay gratification until age 35 or later—longer than they have been alive. But the rewards are worth it. (...)
American higher education certainly has its problems. But the bad vibes around college threaten to obscure an important economic reality: Most young people are still far better off with a four-year college degree than without one.
That analysis, however, suffers from a key oversight. In estimating the lifetime earnings for people who are now in their 30s and early 40s, the researchers assumed that the college wage premium will stay constant throughout their life. In fact, it almost surely will not. For Baby Boomers, Gen Xers, and older Millennials, the college wage premium has more than doubled between the ages of 25 and 50, from less than 40 percent to nearly 80 percent. Likewise, the college wealth premium for past generations was initially very small but grew rapidly after age 40. History tells us that the best is yet to come for today’s recent graduates.
Wages grow faster for more-educated workers because college is a gateway to professional occupations, such as business and engineering, in which workers learn new skills, get promoted, and gain managerial experience. Most noncollege workers, in contrast, end up in personal services and blue-collar occupations, for which wages tend to stagnate over time.
For example, truck drivers in the U.S. earn an average annual salary of about $48,700, according to my analysis of data from the American Community Survey. (Full-time unionized drivers can make much more, but they’re in the minority.) That’s close to the average annual income for four-year college graduates working full-time at age 24. It’s easy to see why some young people might look at those numbers and opt against borrowing money to attend a four-year college. Yet the math will be very different a decade later. For example, average earnings in business occupations, where almost everyone has a four-year degree, are about $50,000 at age 24, but double to $100,000 by age 50. Average earnings for truck drivers grow from about $36,000 to only about $51,000 over the same period. The earnings advantage for college graduates increases steadily with work experience, until eventually they are earning nearly twice as much as workers with only a high-school degree.
The debt timeline is basically the reverse. Most federal student loans have a repayment period of only 10 years, which begins shortly after graduation. (The exception is income-based and income-driven repayment loans, which charge a share of borrowers’ discretionary income for 20 to 25 years. These are about a quarter of all loans today and were less common several years ago. Private loans vary in term length, but most are about 10 years.) This means that the typical college graduate must completely repay their loans by their mid-30s. In other words, the earnings premium from a bachelor’s degree is smallest in the years when graduates are also paying down their debts. We are effectively asking a 17-year-old high-school student to delay gratification until age 35 or later—longer than they have been alive. But the rewards are worth it. (...)
Negative public sentiment might dissuade some people from going to college when it is in their long-run interest to do so. The potential harm is greatest for low- and middle-income students, for whom college costs are most salient. Wealthy families will continue to send their kids to four-year colleges, footing the bill and setting their children up for long-term success.
Indeed, highly educated elites in journalism, business, and academia are among those most likely to question the value of a four-year degree, even if their life choices don’t reflect that skepticism. In a recent New America poll, only 38 percent of respondents with household incomes greater than $100,000 said a bachelor’s degree was necessary for adults in the U.S to be financially secure. When asked about their own family members, however, that number jumped to 58 percent.
Indeed, highly educated elites in journalism, business, and academia are among those most likely to question the value of a four-year degree, even if their life choices don’t reflect that skepticism. In a recent New America poll, only 38 percent of respondents with household incomes greater than $100,000 said a bachelor’s degree was necessary for adults in the U.S to be financially secure. When asked about their own family members, however, that number jumped to 58 percent.
[ed. And, of course, the benefits of being surrounded by people who, like you, are all experiencing a critical time in their transition to adulthood with different life strategies and perspectives.]
Tuesday, October 3, 2023
What Was In It For Them?
John Kelly, the longest-serving White House chief of staff for Donald Trump, offered his harshest criticism yet of the former president in an exclusive statement to CNN.
Kelly set the record straight with on-the-record confirmation of a number of damning stories about statements Trump made behind closed doors attacking US service members and veterans, listing a number of objectionable comments Kelly witnessed Trump make firsthand.
“What can I add that has not already been said?” Kelly said, when asked if he wanted to weigh in on his former boss in light of recent comments made by other former Trump officials. “A person that thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat, or spend years being tortured as POWs are all ‘suckers’ because ‘there is nothing in it for them.’ A person that did not want to be seen in the presence of military amputees because ‘it doesn’t look good for me.’ A person who demonstrated open contempt for a Gold Star family – for all Gold Star families – on TV during the 2016 campaign, and rants that our most precious heroes who gave their lives in America’s defense are ‘losers’ and wouldn’t visit their graves in France.
“A person who is not truthful regarding his position on the protection of unborn life, on women, on minorities, on evangelical Christians, on Jews, on working men and women,” Kelly continued. “A person that has no idea what America stands for and has no idea what America is all about. A person who cavalierly suggests that a selfless warrior who has served his country for 40 years in peacetime and war should lose his life for treason – in expectation that someone will take action. A person who admires autocrats and murderous dictators. A person that has nothing but contempt for our democratic institutions, our Constitution, and the rule of law.
“There is nothing more that can be said,” Kelly concluded. “God help us.”
In the statement, Kelly is confirming, on the record, a number of details in a 2020 story in The Atlantic by editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg, including Trump turning to Kelly on Memorial Day 2017, as they stood among those killed in Afghanistan and Iraq in Section 60 at Arlington National Cemetery, and saying, “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?”
Those details also include Trump’s inability to understand why the American public respects former prisoners of war and those shot down in combat. Then-candidate Trump of course said in front of a crowd in 2015 that former Vietnam POW Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican, was “not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.” But behind closed doors, sources told Goldberg, this lack of understanding went on to cause Trump to repeatedly call McCain a “loser” and to refer to former President George H. W. Bush, who was also shot down as a Navy pilot in World War II, as a “loser.”
CNN reached out to the Trump campaign Monday afternoon, telling officials there that a former administration official had confirmed, on the record, a number of details about the 2020 Atlantic story, without naming Kelly, and seeking comment. The Trump campaign responded by insulting the character and credibility of retired Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Mark Milley, who had nothing to do with this story. An updated statement from a Trump campaign spokesperson on Tuesday said, “John Kelly has totally clowned himself with these debunked stories he’s made up because he didn’t serve his president well while working as chief of staff.”
The Atlantic article also described Trump’s 2018 visit to France for the centennial anniversary of the end of World War I, where, according to several senior staff members, Trump said he did not want to visit the graves of American soldiers buried in the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris because, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” During that same trip to France, the article reported, Trump said the 1,800 US Marines killed in the Belleau Wood were “suckers” for getting killed.
And Kelly’s statement adds context to a story in the book “The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021,” by Susan Glasser and Peter Baker, in which Trump, after a separate trip to France in 2017, tells Kelly he wants no wounded veterans in a military parade he’s trying to have planned in his honor. Inspired by the Bastille Day parade, except for the section of the parade featuring wounded French veterans in wheelchairs, Trump tells Kelly, “Look, I don’t want any wounded guys in the parade.”
“Those are the heroes,” Kelly said. “In our society, there’s only one group of people who are more heroic than they are – and they are buried over in Arlington.”
“I don’t want them,” Trump said. “It doesn’t look good for me.”
Kelly set the record straight with on-the-record confirmation of a number of damning stories about statements Trump made behind closed doors attacking US service members and veterans, listing a number of objectionable comments Kelly witnessed Trump make firsthand.
“What can I add that has not already been said?” Kelly said, when asked if he wanted to weigh in on his former boss in light of recent comments made by other former Trump officials. “A person that thinks those who defend their country in uniform, or are shot down or seriously wounded in combat, or spend years being tortured as POWs are all ‘suckers’ because ‘there is nothing in it for them.’ A person that did not want to be seen in the presence of military amputees because ‘it doesn’t look good for me.’ A person who demonstrated open contempt for a Gold Star family – for all Gold Star families – on TV during the 2016 campaign, and rants that our most precious heroes who gave their lives in America’s defense are ‘losers’ and wouldn’t visit their graves in France.
“There is nothing more that can be said,” Kelly concluded. “God help us.”
In the statement, Kelly is confirming, on the record, a number of details in a 2020 story in The Atlantic by editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg, including Trump turning to Kelly on Memorial Day 2017, as they stood among those killed in Afghanistan and Iraq in Section 60 at Arlington National Cemetery, and saying, “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?”
Those details also include Trump’s inability to understand why the American public respects former prisoners of war and those shot down in combat. Then-candidate Trump of course said in front of a crowd in 2015 that former Vietnam POW Sen. John McCain, an Arizona Republican, was “not a war hero. He was a war hero because he was captured. I like people who weren’t captured.” But behind closed doors, sources told Goldberg, this lack of understanding went on to cause Trump to repeatedly call McCain a “loser” and to refer to former President George H. W. Bush, who was also shot down as a Navy pilot in World War II, as a “loser.”
CNN reached out to the Trump campaign Monday afternoon, telling officials there that a former administration official had confirmed, on the record, a number of details about the 2020 Atlantic story, without naming Kelly, and seeking comment. The Trump campaign responded by insulting the character and credibility of retired Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Mark Milley, who had nothing to do with this story. An updated statement from a Trump campaign spokesperson on Tuesday said, “John Kelly has totally clowned himself with these debunked stories he’s made up because he didn’t serve his president well while working as chief of staff.”
The Atlantic article also described Trump’s 2018 visit to France for the centennial anniversary of the end of World War I, where, according to several senior staff members, Trump said he did not want to visit the graves of American soldiers buried in the Aisne-Marne American Cemetery near Paris because, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” During that same trip to France, the article reported, Trump said the 1,800 US Marines killed in the Belleau Wood were “suckers” for getting killed.
And Kelly’s statement adds context to a story in the book “The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021,” by Susan Glasser and Peter Baker, in which Trump, after a separate trip to France in 2017, tells Kelly he wants no wounded veterans in a military parade he’s trying to have planned in his honor. Inspired by the Bastille Day parade, except for the section of the parade featuring wounded French veterans in wheelchairs, Trump tells Kelly, “Look, I don’t want any wounded guys in the parade.”
“Those are the heroes,” Kelly said. “In our society, there’s only one group of people who are more heroic than they are – and they are buried over in Arlington.”
“I don’t want them,” Trump said. “It doesn’t look good for me.”
by Jake Tapper, CNN | Read more:
Image: Aaron P. Bernstein /Getty/ via People[ed. The title of this essay could be addressed to anyone who went to work in the Trump administration. Kelly was an enabler who hardly covered himself in glory while working there (even while listening to all this). Too late now. But hey Trump "patriots" (ha!), always nice to know what your leader is 'thinking' (yeah... fake news).]
Monday, October 2, 2023
Inside the Cult of Buc-ee’s
How a Texas gas station became the people’s pump.
A trip to the gas station usually warrants more of a hurried waddle to the bathroom than a commemorative TikTok. But most gas stations are not Buc-ee’s.
The Texas-based (and Texas-supersized) gas and convenience store chain offers much more than a place to fuel up and grab a bag of chips. Its devoted fans make regular pilgrimages, sometimes driving hundreds of miles, to stock up on Beaver Nuggets and brisket and merch with its bucktoothed mascot’s smiling face. Even its restrooms are award-winning.
Dylan and Shelby Reese, a husband-and-wife TikTok team, have been loyal Buc-ee’s customers since the chain first arrived in Alabama in 2019, opening its first location outside of Texas. In a June video that’s been viewed more than 6.7 million times, Shelby filmed her delighted husband nearly skipping into Buc-ee’s, fawning over its famous brisket — “meat for days!” — and a beaver-branded leopard print swimsuit while juggling coffee and sandwiches in both hands.
“Florida has Disney World — we have Buc-ee’s,” Dylan said, with deep conviction, in the video. (Florida also has two Buc-ee’s locations.)
Less than 24 hours after their filmed visit, they returned to do it all over again.
There are other regional convenience chains that inspire similar fervor among fans: Wawa has its hoagie enthusiasts, Maverik its Western-inspired architecture and in-house restaurant. But Buc-ee’s is the biggest of them all — world-record-breakingly big — and it’s regularly named one of the cleanest, tastiest and overall best places to stop for gas in the country. And now, its fanbase is surging among non-Texans and young people who’ve discovered the spot on TikTok and document their first visits for hundreds of millions of viewers.
How does a gas station cultivate such a devoted following? Buc-ee’s spokesman and general counsel Jeff Nadalo said the brand keeps it simple: “Buc-ee’s has remained committed to providing award-winning clean restrooms, freshly prepared food, cheap gas, and outstanding customer service.”
It’s a simple-enough recipe for success, and yet Buc-ee’s is still one-of-a-kind among competitors. Here’s what experts, some of whom are Buc-ee’s regulars themselves, say sets the Texas chain apart and turned it into a phenomenon.
Buc-ee’s turns a necessity into an adventure
Buc-ee’s turns what would be a quick trip anywhere else into mid-road trip adventure, said Jeff Lenard, spokesperson for the National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS).
Buc-ee’s provides those necessities — food, fuel, restrooms — in such overwhelming quantities that a trip might extend a drive by 30 minutes to an hour, Lenard said. Its biggest store in Sevierville, Tennessee, is also the world’s largest convenience store at 74,707 square feet — almost 30 times the size of the industry average of 2,500 square feet, per NACS. It advertises its pristine bathrooms for hundreds of miles along interstates and delivers, too — Buc-ee’s bathrooms have won awards for their otherworldly cleanliness. And its food selection is more comparable to a Trader Joe’s than a vending machine, with a bakery, an entire wall of bagged jerky of varying flavors and a brisket station manned by employees in straw hats who holler every time a new hot slab of beef is ready for chopping.
“That’s the great innovation of Buc-ee’s,” said Eric Benson, a journalist and Texas transplant who wrote about Buc-ee’s path to “world domination” for Texas Monthly in 2019. “It took this thing people have to do, which is stop on these 200-mile car trips between cities, and make it into just a little bit of an experience.”
The evolution of Buc-ee’s into a Texas-sized gas station superstore with a cult following started off slowly, Benson wrote. Arch “Beaver” Aplin opened the first Buc-ee’s in 1982, in the small town of Lake Jackson, Texas. That first store was only 3,000 square feet and offered a few gas pumps and a modest selection of snacks, though it was built with brass ceiling fans and cedar wall accents for a slightly more upscale feel on the inside, wrote Benson. It wasn’t until 2012, when Aplin opened a 56,000-square-foot Buc-ee’s in Bastrop, a small city 30-plus miles outside of Austin, that the chain became known for its massive highway stops.
And in the 11 years since, as it’s expanded beyond the largest state in the lower 48, Buc-ee’s has become a must-stop, one-stop-shop for road trippers who want to do their business and grab a meal with the promise of quality.
“Buc-ee’s is a place where you get to see a real cross-section of society,” Benson told CNN. “Everyone drives. And everyone who’s driving has to stop somewhere to fill up their gas, go to the bathroom and get something to eat. Buc-ee’s is kind of the best place to do it.”
Don’t underestimate the power of a clean bathroom
Convenience stores across the country may tout their toilets’ cleanliness on billboards. But most of them don’t have dozens of stalls like Buc-ee’s does, nor do they advertise their facilities as “world famous.”
But the bathrooms at Buc-ee’s are the real deal, fans say. The Reeses told CNN that from the outside, it’s easy to assume based on the line of dozens of cars waiting for their chance to explore Buc-ee’s, one might expect the wait for a bathroom stall to be interminable. But one would be wrong, they said — “there are almost more stalls than gas pumps!”
Bathrooms are the “most important” component of the convenience store experience to nail if a business wants repeat customers, Lenard said. They’re often a customer’s first stop, and if the restroom is filthy, that customer is more likely to run back to the comfort of their car than wander the store for a few minutes afterwards. But if they’re pristine, like Buc-ee’s claims its bathrooms are, then that impressed patron’s curiosity is piqued, and they might spend more time perusing.
“They are so clean you could eat a sliced brisket sandwich off of them,” the Reeses told CNN, though they wouldn’t exactly recommend noshing on brisket in the bathroom.
At the biggest Buc-ee’s stores, there are countless aisles for customers to get lost in. There’s seasonal merchandise that dresses the Buc-ee’s beaver in a Santa costume or throws his gaping maw on a tie-dye T-shirt, along with far more expensive fare — Lenard said he’s spotted a gas grill worth more than $1,400 on sale at Buc-ee’s.
“It starts with the bathroom,” Lenard said. “Stellar bathrooms can sell an awful lot of product.”
The Texas-based (and Texas-supersized) gas and convenience store chain offers much more than a place to fuel up and grab a bag of chips. Its devoted fans make regular pilgrimages, sometimes driving hundreds of miles, to stock up on Beaver Nuggets and brisket and merch with its bucktoothed mascot’s smiling face. Even its restrooms are award-winning.
Dylan and Shelby Reese, a husband-and-wife TikTok team, have been loyal Buc-ee’s customers since the chain first arrived in Alabama in 2019, opening its first location outside of Texas. In a June video that’s been viewed more than 6.7 million times, Shelby filmed her delighted husband nearly skipping into Buc-ee’s, fawning over its famous brisket — “meat for days!” — and a beaver-branded leopard print swimsuit while juggling coffee and sandwiches in both hands.
“Florida has Disney World — we have Buc-ee’s,” Dylan said, with deep conviction, in the video. (Florida also has two Buc-ee’s locations.)
Less than 24 hours after their filmed visit, they returned to do it all over again.
There are other regional convenience chains that inspire similar fervor among fans: Wawa has its hoagie enthusiasts, Maverik its Western-inspired architecture and in-house restaurant. But Buc-ee’s is the biggest of them all — world-record-breakingly big — and it’s regularly named one of the cleanest, tastiest and overall best places to stop for gas in the country. And now, its fanbase is surging among non-Texans and young people who’ve discovered the spot on TikTok and document their first visits for hundreds of millions of viewers.
How does a gas station cultivate such a devoted following? Buc-ee’s spokesman and general counsel Jeff Nadalo said the brand keeps it simple: “Buc-ee’s has remained committed to providing award-winning clean restrooms, freshly prepared food, cheap gas, and outstanding customer service.”
It’s a simple-enough recipe for success, and yet Buc-ee’s is still one-of-a-kind among competitors. Here’s what experts, some of whom are Buc-ee’s regulars themselves, say sets the Texas chain apart and turned it into a phenomenon.
Buc-ee’s turns a necessity into an adventure
Buc-ee’s turns what would be a quick trip anywhere else into mid-road trip adventure, said Jeff Lenard, spokesperson for the National Association of Convenience Stores (NACS).
Buc-ee’s provides those necessities — food, fuel, restrooms — in such overwhelming quantities that a trip might extend a drive by 30 minutes to an hour, Lenard said. Its biggest store in Sevierville, Tennessee, is also the world’s largest convenience store at 74,707 square feet — almost 30 times the size of the industry average of 2,500 square feet, per NACS. It advertises its pristine bathrooms for hundreds of miles along interstates and delivers, too — Buc-ee’s bathrooms have won awards for their otherworldly cleanliness. And its food selection is more comparable to a Trader Joe’s than a vending machine, with a bakery, an entire wall of bagged jerky of varying flavors and a brisket station manned by employees in straw hats who holler every time a new hot slab of beef is ready for chopping.
The evolution of Buc-ee’s into a Texas-sized gas station superstore with a cult following started off slowly, Benson wrote. Arch “Beaver” Aplin opened the first Buc-ee’s in 1982, in the small town of Lake Jackson, Texas. That first store was only 3,000 square feet and offered a few gas pumps and a modest selection of snacks, though it was built with brass ceiling fans and cedar wall accents for a slightly more upscale feel on the inside, wrote Benson. It wasn’t until 2012, when Aplin opened a 56,000-square-foot Buc-ee’s in Bastrop, a small city 30-plus miles outside of Austin, that the chain became known for its massive highway stops.
And in the 11 years since, as it’s expanded beyond the largest state in the lower 48, Buc-ee’s has become a must-stop, one-stop-shop for road trippers who want to do their business and grab a meal with the promise of quality.
“Buc-ee’s is a place where you get to see a real cross-section of society,” Benson told CNN. “Everyone drives. And everyone who’s driving has to stop somewhere to fill up their gas, go to the bathroom and get something to eat. Buc-ee’s is kind of the best place to do it.”
Don’t underestimate the power of a clean bathroom
Convenience stores across the country may tout their toilets’ cleanliness on billboards. But most of them don’t have dozens of stalls like Buc-ee’s does, nor do they advertise their facilities as “world famous.”
But the bathrooms at Buc-ee’s are the real deal, fans say. The Reeses told CNN that from the outside, it’s easy to assume based on the line of dozens of cars waiting for their chance to explore Buc-ee’s, one might expect the wait for a bathroom stall to be interminable. But one would be wrong, they said — “there are almost more stalls than gas pumps!”
Bathrooms are the “most important” component of the convenience store experience to nail if a business wants repeat customers, Lenard said. They’re often a customer’s first stop, and if the restroom is filthy, that customer is more likely to run back to the comfort of their car than wander the store for a few minutes afterwards. But if they’re pristine, like Buc-ee’s claims its bathrooms are, then that impressed patron’s curiosity is piqued, and they might spend more time perusing.
“They are so clean you could eat a sliced brisket sandwich off of them,” the Reeses told CNN, though they wouldn’t exactly recommend noshing on brisket in the bathroom.
At the biggest Buc-ee’s stores, there are countless aisles for customers to get lost in. There’s seasonal merchandise that dresses the Buc-ee’s beaver in a Santa costume or throws his gaping maw on a tie-dye T-shirt, along with far more expensive fare — Lenard said he’s spotted a gas grill worth more than $1,400 on sale at Buc-ee’s.
“It starts with the bathroom,” Lenard said. “Stellar bathrooms can sell an awful lot of product.”
by Scottie Andrew, CNN | Read more:
Image: Buc-ee's[ed. For my Texas friend Jerry, who loves Buc-ee's. See also: Buc-ee’s: The Path to World Domination (Texas Monthly):]
"Buc-ee’s pays its employees well above market rate; cashiers start at $14 per hour in most locations and get three weeks’ paid vacation and a 401(k) plan, in an industry where it’s common for cashiers to make minimum wage, about half as much. Aplin expects smiles and attentive service in exchange. There’s no sitting on the job and no using cellphones. Like cast members in an elaborate theatrical production, employees also must adhere to certain wardrobe and grooming standards. They are not allowed to display visible tattoos or body piercings. Men are prohibited from having long hair; nobody can have unnaturally colored hair. There are no open-toed shoes, no torn or faded clothing.
Buc-ee’s employees who buy into this don’t just love their jobs, they tend to become evangelists. (...)
Still, Buc-ee’s has a tiny footprint in the national convenience-store landscape. The industry leader, 7-Eleven, has more than 9,000 locations nationwide. Circle K, running a close second, has nearly 8,500. Buc-ee’s has 34 stores total.
But Buc-ee’s has a reputation far greater than its store count. It has become the rare brand—like Apple and Costco—that inspires loyalty that goes well beyond rational consumer calculations. People love Buc-ee’s, and they like to talk about how much they love Buc-ee’s."
"Buc-ee’s pays its employees well above market rate; cashiers start at $14 per hour in most locations and get three weeks’ paid vacation and a 401(k) plan, in an industry where it’s common for cashiers to make minimum wage, about half as much. Aplin expects smiles and attentive service in exchange. There’s no sitting on the job and no using cellphones. Like cast members in an elaborate theatrical production, employees also must adhere to certain wardrobe and grooming standards. They are not allowed to display visible tattoos or body piercings. Men are prohibited from having long hair; nobody can have unnaturally colored hair. There are no open-toed shoes, no torn or faded clothing.
Buc-ee’s employees who buy into this don’t just love their jobs, they tend to become evangelists. (...)
Still, Buc-ee’s has a tiny footprint in the national convenience-store landscape. The industry leader, 7-Eleven, has more than 9,000 locations nationwide. Circle K, running a close second, has nearly 8,500. Buc-ee’s has 34 stores total.
But Buc-ee’s has a reputation far greater than its store count. It has become the rare brand—like Apple and Costco—that inspires loyalty that goes well beyond rational consumer calculations. People love Buc-ee’s, and they like to talk about how much they love Buc-ee’s."
The Illegal French Delicacy: Ortolan
If you saw a group of people with napkins on their head at the dinner table, what might you think? You’d be forgiven to think it was some strange Hollywood ritual. But the real reason is, they’re eating a french delicacy called Ortolan.
Hannibal, Billions, Succession, American Dad — all feature this absurd, and illegal practice. I shared a video about this on my TikTok account and this practice clearly struck a nerve, garnering close to 400K views. One of the most common comments I got was, “I saw this on American Dad — but thought this was a joke?”
No my friends, consuming Ortolan is not a joke — in fact the practice is said to date back to ancient Romans living in the South of France who would breed calling birds to attract and bait unsuspecting wild Ortolan into their traps.
In modern preperations, the small bird is caught at night in nets during their migratory period as they head south towards Africa. They’re then kept in covered cages. The dark encourages them to gorge themselves, fattening them up on grains like Hansel and Gretel until they’re nice and plump (nearly two times their size!) Once they’re sitting fat and pretty, they are thrown into a container of Armagnac liquor where they drowned and marinate.
The birds are roasted for eight minutes until they quote “sing” and are plucked before service. The diner places the napkin over their head and eats the bird whole, feet first, tiny bones and all.
“I bring my molars down and through my bird’s rib cage with a wet crunch and am rewarded with a scalding hot rush of burning fat and guts down my throat. Rarely have pain and delight combined so well. I’m giddily uncomfortable, breathing in short, controlled gasps as I continue slowly — ever so slowly — to chew. With every bite, as the thin bones and layers of fat, meat, skin, and organs compact in on themselves, there are sublime dribbles of varied and wondrous ancient flavors: figs, Armagnac, dark flesh slightly infused with the salty taste of my own blood as my mouth is pricked by the sharp bones. As I swallow, I draw in the head and beak, which, until now, have been hanging from my lips, and blithely crush the skull.”
Like a kid who has been told legendary tales of a unicorn his whole life and the mystical creature finally appears — his reaction is giddy at the opportunity and rarity of the moment, but also feels a tinge of guilt.
There is another famous reference to ortolan in the HBO show Succession. Where the ritual serves as a way for the wealthy 1%ers to set themselves apart from the rest of the world. Sure, maybe there’s some good flavor with the Ortolan but can crunching bones and spurting juices really be better than say some smoked brisket, a nice burger, or steak? Or is it really about the rarity and privilege of the opportunity? The social capital that comes with being of means to obtain the forbidden fruit? (...)
Okay, but why the napkin over the head? There are several possibilities a diner might choose to do this.
The first is shame.
Historically they would put the napkin over their head to protect their sins from god, with the napkin on, they believed god couldn’t witness their sin.
The second is sensory.
By putting the napkin over the diner’s head, they are able to trap and continually inhale the rich aromas.
Lastly, is decorum (if you can call it such).
With all of the crunching of bones and beak, spurting, and removal of the larger bones — the scene can be quite unsavory and appetite suppressing.
Today, eating of Ortolan is now outlawed — it was so widely consumed at one point its population dropped by an estimated 40% and in 1999 France put a stop to its consumption and again in 2007 with even stronger legal measures.
But where there’s demand, there’s supply — and the practice still continues underground with each bird fetching nearly 200 euros. It’s estimated some 30,000 birds are still eaten annually.
by Austin Miller, Medium | Read more:Images: uncredited/MaxPPP/Roger Tidman/Corbis/Guardian
[ed. What a world. See also: Why French chefs want us to eat this bird – head, bones, beak and all. (Telegraph); and, A French delicacy being eaten to death (Cosmos).]
Hannibal, Billions, Succession, American Dad — all feature this absurd, and illegal practice. I shared a video about this on my TikTok account and this practice clearly struck a nerve, garnering close to 400K views. One of the most common comments I got was, “I saw this on American Dad — but thought this was a joke?”
In modern preperations, the small bird is caught at night in nets during their migratory period as they head south towards Africa. They’re then kept in covered cages. The dark encourages them to gorge themselves, fattening them up on grains like Hansel and Gretel until they’re nice and plump (nearly two times their size!) Once they’re sitting fat and pretty, they are thrown into a container of Armagnac liquor where they drowned and marinate.
The birds are roasted for eight minutes until they quote “sing” and are plucked before service. The diner places the napkin over their head and eats the bird whole, feet first, tiny bones and all.
Crunch Crunch.
The bigger bones are removed and placed neatly on the plate.
Chef (and personal hero) Anthony Bourdain had a secret night of dining with other chefs where he partook in this ritual. In his book, Medium Raw, he writes:
The bigger bones are removed and placed neatly on the plate.
Chef (and personal hero) Anthony Bourdain had a secret night of dining with other chefs where he partook in this ritual. In his book, Medium Raw, he writes:
Like a kid who has been told legendary tales of a unicorn his whole life and the mystical creature finally appears — his reaction is giddy at the opportunity and rarity of the moment, but also feels a tinge of guilt.
Okay, but why the napkin over the head? There are several possibilities a diner might choose to do this.
The first is shame.
Historically they would put the napkin over their head to protect their sins from god, with the napkin on, they believed god couldn’t witness their sin.
The second is sensory.
By putting the napkin over the diner’s head, they are able to trap and continually inhale the rich aromas.
Lastly, is decorum (if you can call it such).
With all of the crunching of bones and beak, spurting, and removal of the larger bones — the scene can be quite unsavory and appetite suppressing.
Today, eating of Ortolan is now outlawed — it was so widely consumed at one point its population dropped by an estimated 40% and in 1999 France put a stop to its consumption and again in 2007 with even stronger legal measures.
But where there’s demand, there’s supply — and the practice still continues underground with each bird fetching nearly 200 euros. It’s estimated some 30,000 birds are still eaten annually.
by Austin Miller, Medium | Read more:
[ed. What a world. See also: Why French chefs want us to eat this bird – head, bones, beak and all. (Telegraph); and, A French delicacy being eaten to death (Cosmos).]
Sunday, October 1, 2023
DIY Geoengineering: The Whitepaper
This past summer didn’t just break temperature records in the US and Europe, it was an unprecedented increase from previous years. Climate change explains why temperatures are going up in general, but not why the rate of change increased so much this summer in particular, or why it was centered on the North Atlantic. The explanation there might be a ban on sulfur emissions from container ships. Although sulfur has various bad environmental effects, it also blocks sunlight and cools the ocean; removing that effect caused a one-time large temperature increase. So should we start emitting sulfur again? Do more deliberate geoengineering?
It hit 96 degrees when I started writing this post (that’s about 35.5C for the rest of you)—in the DC area, in September—so let’s talk geoengineering (the how more than the why). This post is intended as something of a sequel to/commentary on Casey Handmer’s post We should not let the Earth overheat! from a couple months ago, and/or a summary/crystallization of some Twitter discussion from a few weeks ago. If you haven’t read Casey’s post, it’s strongly recommended.
Why should we geoengineer?
Because I don’t like the idea of dying in a 120-degree heat wave and degrowth means the worst depression in the history of industrial civilization. Next question?
I don’t think we have enough data to know that this is safe.
Nobody seemed to care very much about the potential consequences when we suddenly phased out sulfur emissions in shipping. Here’s what we’ve seen since then:
Were “stakeholders” consulted? No, we just went ahead and did it.
So we shouldn’t have phased out sulfur emissions in shipping?
I’m saying that tradeoffs exist for any policy action taken, and pausing/reversing global warming is no exception. Geoengineering will have side effects. Institutional paralysis (i.e., hand-wringing about the potential side effects of geoengineering until we’re at 2C above preindustrial levels and have no choice) will have worse side effects.
(There are, of course, reasonable concerns about the correct approach that we’ll look at later in this white paper. My point is that I’m not interested in engaging with people whose answer to every problem is to drown potential solutions in paperwork and “community input” meetings.)
This doesn’t abolish capitalism.
And thank goodness.
My two previous main post series, on Anki use and hydrogen generation, started from the basics and worked their way up to the solution. The results were pretty long-winded, so I'm going to do the reverse for this white paper by presenting a solution and then dissecting it. The solution is this:
Global warming is quickly and cheaply reversed by ejecting calcite nanoparticles into the stratosphere.
This is an approach known as stratospheric aerososol injection, or SAI. Essentially, the Earth is absorbing too much electromagnetic radiation from the sun due to increased concentrations of carbon dioxide and other gases (which you knew). One way to fix this (which we'll need to do long-term) is to sequester atmospheric CO₂ somewhere other than the air (I wrote a long article for Works in Progress on my preferred approach, which involves grinding and milling silicate rocks into silt and dumping them in ocean water). But sequestering enough CO₂ to make a serious dent in the amount we've added since 1750 is an expensive, long-term project (on the order of trillions, over several decades), and until we can get that up and running, we'll need to keep a lid on global temperature rise.
So in the immediate term, rather than drawing down carbon to decrease the amount of energy absorbed, we'll need to decrease the amount of energy that hits the atmosphere in the first place. That's where SAI comes in: use particles of a highly reflective substance to bounce light back into space.
Why calcite, and why an average radius of 90 nanometers?
Calcite is the most common form of calcium carbonate (CaCO₃), which you may recognize from the white cliffs of Dover or a pack of sidewalk chalk.
Why should we geoengineer?
Because I don’t like the idea of dying in a 120-degree heat wave and degrowth means the worst depression in the history of industrial civilization. Next question?
I don’t think we have enough data to know that this is safe.
Nobody seemed to care very much about the potential consequences when we suddenly phased out sulfur emissions in shipping. Here’s what we’ve seen since then:
Crisscrossing clouds known as ship tracks can be seen off the coast of Spain in this 2003 satellite image
Were “stakeholders” consulted? No, we just went ahead and did it.
So we shouldn’t have phased out sulfur emissions in shipping?
I’m saying that tradeoffs exist for any policy action taken, and pausing/reversing global warming is no exception. Geoengineering will have side effects. Institutional paralysis (i.e., hand-wringing about the potential side effects of geoengineering until we’re at 2C above preindustrial levels and have no choice) will have worse side effects.
(There are, of course, reasonable concerns about the correct approach that we’ll look at later in this white paper. My point is that I’m not interested in engaging with people whose answer to every problem is to drown potential solutions in paperwork and “community input” meetings.)
This doesn’t abolish capitalism.
And thank goodness.
My two previous main post series, on Anki use and hydrogen generation, started from the basics and worked their way up to the solution. The results were pretty long-winded, so I'm going to do the reverse for this white paper by presenting a solution and then dissecting it. The solution is this:
Global warming, though not ocean acidification, is quickly and cheaply reversed by ejecting calcite nanoparticles (with an average radius in the ~90nm range) into the stratosphere, using a propeller-based system to prevent particle clumping. The particles should be carried up by hydrogen balloons, and very preferably released over the tropics. The total amount needed will be on the order of several hundred kilotons yearly, and the total cost should be somewhere between $1B and $5B yearly.Let's go through this piece by piece.
Global warming is quickly and cheaply reversed by ejecting calcite nanoparticles into the stratosphere.
This is an approach known as stratospheric aerososol injection, or SAI. Essentially, the Earth is absorbing too much electromagnetic radiation from the sun due to increased concentrations of carbon dioxide and other gases (which you knew). One way to fix this (which we'll need to do long-term) is to sequester atmospheric CO₂ somewhere other than the air (I wrote a long article for Works in Progress on my preferred approach, which involves grinding and milling silicate rocks into silt and dumping them in ocean water). But sequestering enough CO₂ to make a serious dent in the amount we've added since 1750 is an expensive, long-term project (on the order of trillions, over several decades), and until we can get that up and running, we'll need to keep a lid on global temperature rise.
So in the immediate term, rather than drawing down carbon to decrease the amount of energy absorbed, we'll need to decrease the amount of energy that hits the atmosphere in the first place. That's where SAI comes in: use particles of a highly reflective substance to bounce light back into space.
Why calcite, and why an average radius of 90 nanometers?
Calcite is the most common form of calcium carbonate (CaCO₃), which you may recognize from the white cliffs of Dover or a pack of sidewalk chalk.
by Nephew Jonathan | Read more:
Images and sources: NOAA; Acques Descloitres/Modis Land Rapid Response Team; Mark Gray/Modus; Astral Codex Ten[ed. So, I guess this goes on... forever? Then what, something else? Will AI eventually come up with better predictive modeling for mitigating unanticipated collateral impacts? IBG/YBG. See also: ‘We’re changing the clouds.’ An unintended test of geoengineering is fueling record ocean warmth (Science).]
Saturday, September 30, 2023
Thursday, September 28, 2023
The Least Bad Choice
I have been watching various sentiment polls and Right/Wrong Track questionnaires with detached bemusement. Bemused because they are so silly, and detached because I know I can’t change human nature. What I can do is share a few modest insights; hopefully, these will allow you to gain a fresh perspective you might not have otherwise considered or perhaps even garner a better understanding of what is happening right here and now.
As we have discussed, in ordinary times, sentiment polls tend to be problematic: But these do not seem to be ordinary times. We are in a post-pandemic, popular-uprising environment. I wouldn’t call these issues unprecedented, but they are somewhat unusual.
People are unaware of what they believe, they have no idea what is going to happen in the future. Their expectations as to what will make them happy or satisfied in life are often misguided. This is why asking people what they will do, think, or feel in the future, or how they might behave is a nearly impossible task.
Since the worst of the pandemic began to wind down last year, we have been wrestling with two key issues: 1) Inflation, or the rate at which prices are rising; and 2) Costs, meaning the absolute level of prices.
Even as inflation peaked in June of 2022 and fell from 9% to 3%, people remained angry. The rate of change may have fallen, but everything remains more expensive. Absolute price levels are now 10-20% higher on everything from cars to houses to energy to rent. No wonder people whose wages rose a fraction of that are pissed off.
Now for the shocker: As bad as that sounds, the alternatives were much worse.
The nuanced, counterintuitive truth is that the pandemic presented policymakers with a series of terrible options. To their credit, they made the least bad choice. Those choices are still resonating today, impacting stock markets, bonds, inflation, and as we saw at the GOP debate last night, politics. The public wants someone (anyone!) to blame, but I want to suggest that the 2021-22 Inflation surge and resulting higher prices were the cost of avoiding a different fate. Had policymakers chosen differently, the net result would have been much, much worse.
Let’s consider a few potential counterfactuals.
Without funding for vaccines, treatments, or tests, COVID-19 would have spread like wildfire, with no way to stop it. And without those government-ordered mitigation measures, cases and deaths would have surged uncontrollably. The entire overwhelmed healthcare system would have collapsed, making the debacle even worse. Total US death count: 10 or 20 million.
Oh, and the economy would have hurtled into the worst depression since the Great Depression of 1929. Recall that the Atlanta Fed’s GDP Now in June 2020 showed the economy had been cut in half, down -52.8%. Major industries – Travel & Hospitality, Retail, Entertainment, and Services – would have completely broken down. Companies would disappear, and the bankruptcy courts would have spent the next decade unraveling up the mess.
Had the government done appreciably less, the results would have been disproportionately worse. It would have been a blood bath…
The Fed began its policy of ZIRP and QE while Congress put forth a puny extension of unemployment insurance and a modest temporary tax cut. A tiny infrastructure build was also included. Net result: more than 90% of the stimulus was monetary and appreciably less than 10% was fiscal.
The result of this emphasis on low rates helped capital owners; anything priced in dollars and credit soared, while those that did not have portfolios filled with stocks, bonds, real estate or businesses (e.g., middle and lower classes) struggled. Job creation was soft, wage gains nonexistent, consumer spending was punk, durable goods sales far below average.
It was a weak recovery, made all the worse because Congress elected to skip the textbook Keynesian stimulus such as we saw following 9/11 or the Pandemic. The entire post-GFC economy was poor; no wonder it set up an environment for a populist uprising in the United States.
The reality is the world is nuanced and complex, and simple answers to complicated questions are usually neither precise nor accurate.
As we have discussed, in ordinary times, sentiment polls tend to be problematic: But these do not seem to be ordinary times. We are in a post-pandemic, popular-uprising environment. I wouldn’t call these issues unprecedented, but they are somewhat unusual.
Since the worst of the pandemic began to wind down last year, we have been wrestling with two key issues: 1) Inflation, or the rate at which prices are rising; and 2) Costs, meaning the absolute level of prices.
Even as inflation peaked in June of 2022 and fell from 9% to 3%, people remained angry. The rate of change may have fallen, but everything remains more expensive. Absolute price levels are now 10-20% higher on everything from cars to houses to energy to rent. No wonder people whose wages rose a fraction of that are pissed off.
Now for the shocker: As bad as that sounds, the alternatives were much worse.
The nuanced, counterintuitive truth is that the pandemic presented policymakers with a series of terrible options. To their credit, they made the least bad choice. Those choices are still resonating today, impacting stock markets, bonds, inflation, and as we saw at the GOP debate last night, politics. The public wants someone (anyone!) to blame, but I want to suggest that the 2021-22 Inflation surge and resulting higher prices were the cost of avoiding a different fate. Had policymakers chosen differently, the net result would have been much, much worse.
~~~
Recall the situation 42 or so months ago. Covid-19 was running amuck, and nobody had the slightest clue what was going on. We were washing our grocery deliveries to stop the spread of a respiratory disease. Flying blind, with things about to get much worse, the government responses were: 1) Operation Warp Speed, a commitment to getting a COVID vaccine ready; 2) CARES Act 1, a $2.2 trillion fiscal stimulus putting cash into the bank accounts of 100 million families; 3) CARES Act II & III, another $1.8 trillion in spending, plus a focus on testing and vaccination, eviction halts.Let’s consider a few potential counterfactuals.
- Scenario 1: Do nothing: Don’t snicker, there were people who suggested that as an option. The claim was the free market would sort out personal protective equipment (PPE) andother supply chain issues. No state authorized lockdowns, just allow the virus to “burn itself out” after it infected 80% of the population. “Herd Immunity” was the watchword.
- Scenario 2: Go small: Extend unemployment benefits for 3 or 6 months. Support vaccinations but don’t mandate them or masks or state lockdowns. Revisit to see if we need to repeat.
- Scenario 3: CARES Act 1 but not 2 or 3: Do a big initial fiscal spend to get the problem down to a manageable size, then let the private sector do what it does best.
Without funding for vaccines, treatments, or tests, COVID-19 would have spread like wildfire, with no way to stop it. And without those government-ordered mitigation measures, cases and deaths would have surged uncontrollably. The entire overwhelmed healthcare system would have collapsed, making the debacle even worse. Total US death count: 10 or 20 million.
Oh, and the economy would have hurtled into the worst depression since the Great Depression of 1929. Recall that the Atlanta Fed’s GDP Now in June 2020 showed the economy had been cut in half, down -52.8%. Major industries – Travel & Hospitality, Retail, Entertainment, and Services – would have completely broken down. Companies would disappear, and the bankruptcy courts would have spent the next decade unraveling up the mess.
Had the government done appreciably less, the results would have been disproportionately worse. It would have been a blood bath…
~~~
You don’t need to do a thought experiment to see what happens when the government elects to skip fiscal stimulus during or after a financial crisis. Look no further than the response to the Great Financial Crisis — nearly all monetary and almost no fiscal stimulus. [ed. fiscal stimulus = help for general public vs. monetary stimulus = help for banks.]The Fed began its policy of ZIRP and QE while Congress put forth a puny extension of unemployment insurance and a modest temporary tax cut. A tiny infrastructure build was also included. Net result: more than 90% of the stimulus was monetary and appreciably less than 10% was fiscal.
The result of this emphasis on low rates helped capital owners; anything priced in dollars and credit soared, while those that did not have portfolios filled with stocks, bonds, real estate or businesses (e.g., middle and lower classes) struggled. Job creation was soft, wage gains nonexistent, consumer spending was punk, durable goods sales far below average.
It was a weak recovery, made all the worse because Congress elected to skip the textbook Keynesian stimulus such as we saw following 9/11 or the Pandemic. The entire post-GFC economy was poor; no wonder it set up an environment for a populist uprising in the United States.
~~~
The public tends not to do thought exercises like counterfactuals. They like things simple, perhaps even oversimplified to black-and-white options. They point fingers, demand that heads roll. This is how crowds operate, and it is why they can become so dangerous.The reality is the world is nuanced and complex, and simple answers to complicated questions are usually neither precise nor accurate.
by Barry Ritholtz, The Big Picture | Read more:
Image: uncredited
[ed. I've been waiting for someone to connect the dots/put it all together in a way that's easily understandable. Finally someone has (with counterfactuals). But notice, it's not by anyone running for political office. Why aren't more politicians using this messaging (especially Democrats)?]
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