Melinda Gates gives Trump administration ‘D-minus’ for coronavirus response.
More Evidence of Grade Inflation
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Thursday Assorted Links
1. Why I’m Learning More With Distance Learning Than I Do In School. By Veronique Mintz, 13 years old. Starts strong.
“Talking out of turn. Destroying classroom materials. Disrespecting teachers. Blurting out answers during tests. Students pushing, kicking, hitting one another and even rolling on the ground. This is what happens in my school every single day. . . . Based on my peers’ behavior, you might guess that I’m in second or fourth grade. But I’m actually about to enter high school in New York City, and, during my three years of middle school, these sorts of disruptions occurred repeatedly in any given 42-minute class period.
2. Don’t forget the other pandemic killing thousands of Americans.
3. How Yukon’s ‘one caribou apart’ physical distancing campaign became a sensation. I really miss Canada.
4. Was Donald Trump good at baseball? I couldn’t help but smile throughout this one.
Trump said he shoulda, coulda, woulda gone pro, but an intrepid reporter dug deep into the archives only to find:
“Combined, the nine box scores I unearthed give Trump a 4 for 29 batting record in his sophomore, junior, and senior seasons, with three runs batted in and a single run scored. Trump’s batting average in those nine games: an underwhelming .138.”
Then the reporter asked Keith Law, a senior baseball writer for the Athletic and author of The Inside Game who covers the MLB draft, if Trump’s numbers sounded like those of a pro prospect.
“‘There’s no chance,’ said Law, who once worked in the front office of the Toronto Blue Jays assessing high school players. ‘You don’t hit .138 for some podunk, cold-weather high school playing the worst competition you could possibly imagine. You wouldn’t even get recruited for Division I baseball programs, let alone by pro teams. That’s totally unthinkable. It’s absolutely laughable. He hit .138—he couldn’t fucking hit, that’s pretty clear.'”
That may be my favorite quote about Trump of all time. Just flip the bat and touch em’ all.
My Republican Friends Are Right
They tell me life is filled with risks. People die all the time from lots of different things. So why shutdown the economy over a stinkin’ virus.
I didn’t realize their amazing insight until today when I hit the yard HARD. Trimmed trees and bushes. Mowed. Edged. Blowed. Don’t hate me because the place looks so good.
Some of the bushes are twice my height necessitating a ladder. When working on parts of the bushes, I don’t have sufficient space to spread the legs properly so I simply lean the ladder against the bush. “Friends” who sometimes call me Slip because of my propensity to fall while running on ice in the winter, know where this is going. At one point, a bush I was leaning too heavily against gave out and TIMBER! Somehow I survived the fall but not without scaring The Good Wife who came running from the house fretting who she’d get to trim the bushes next year.
A little rain and lasagna later, I was mowing the steep short hill in the backyard overlooking the Salish Sea. Surprise, surprise, I slipped, this time going down faster than a Porsche Taycan. Total yard sale. Somehow, like an elite cowboy, I held on to the mower keeping it from disappearing over the bluff. And even though no one was watching, I immediately bounced up like Marshawn Lynch after a hard tackle.
Fast forward four hours. I thought I was done with dinner, but The Gal Pal requested “one more egg”. Well, of course, but plugging the cord back into the skillet is hard ya’ll. Burned my middle finger. I’d show you a picture, but I respect you too much.
The plan from here is to watch a little t.v., read in the tub, and ever so slowly climb into bed to fight another day. On second thought, the tub requires two big steps, so maybe a shower.
Trump’s Second Term
Sunday night, after the rain clouds parted, Blanca and I headed due West like we were shot out of a cannon. Up and over the 4th St Bridge, she wanted to see Oyster Bay. We added on Ellison Loop NW for a little more climbing. That wall at the very end is a bitch, but I digress.
A beautiful night for a fling with your gfriend. Until we saw FOUR houses in a row with Trump/Pence signs. Trump’s gonna carry Oyster Bay?
No big deal you say, Washington is dark blue, no reason to let a few right wing nutters ruin a glorious ride.
But then, after we ducked into the driveway right before sunset, I finished reading Evan Osnos’s smartly written, “How Greenwich Republicans Learned to Love Trump.”
Which is filled with insights into things I don’t understand. Like this:
“The (college) admissions case reminded me of the rationale I kept hearing for looking past Trump’s behavior toward women, minorities, immigrants, war heroes, the F.B.I., democracy, and the truth, not to mention his request that Ukraine “do us a favor” by investigating his political opponents: a conviction that, ultimately, nothing matters more than cutting taxes and regulations and slowing immigration.”
Osnos disabuses people like me that Trump’s base is just gun-toting, stay-at-home protesting, working class, modestly educated, rural people. Trump has massive support among the ultra wealthy, like Michael Mason, a mover and shaker in Greenwich, Connecticut, probably the wealthiest enclave in the (dis)United States:
“Mason knows that the President’s ‘culture’ still upsets many people in Greenwich. But, he said, ‘his policies over the last three years have gained more attention and probably more support.’ He predicts that the trauma of the pandemic will persuade some voters that Trump was right to want to cut immigration and lure back industries from abroad. ‘He had policies that he wanted to change on our borders, on immigration. I certainly think people in this country now are worried about that.'”
The Resistance is deluded to think this pandemic shitshow is going to ruin his chance at re-election.
Another depressing insight:
“If you are among the Greenwich élite, whether you love Trump or hate him, it is easy to count the ways that he has oriented his Administration to help people like you. When Trump introduced his tax bill, he called it a gift to ‘the folks who work in the mail rooms and the machine shops of America.’ That was absurd. The bill cut the corporate tax rate by fourteen per cent, and most of the windfall went to investors in the form of dividends and stock buybacks. . . . Though he limited the deductions for state and local taxes, wealthy citizens were compensated by new tax breaks, including some specifically for the commercial-real-estate industry and for wealthy heirs. On average, Trump gave households in the top one per cent a forty-eight-thousand-dollar tax cut, while those in the bottom twenty per cent received a hundred and twenty dollars, according to the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a nonpartisan think tank. Jim Campbell, the Republican organizer who embraced Trump early in 2016, told me recently, ‘I don’t know anyone who voted for Donald Trump in 2016 and won’t vote for him again. In Greenwich, he’ll probably pick up some votes.'”
I never thought the country would elect Trump president. Since 2016, his supporters have become less afraid, less self conscious, and more outspoken. Now, for the first time, I’m bracing myself for the fact that my friend, who promises “100% that Trump is going to be reelected”, may very well be right.
Thanks for that Osnos.
Two Kinds of Bad Bosses
One-third of the country readily buys whatever President Trump is selling day-to-day. This is about the two-thirds of us who think Snake Oil salesman is far too kind a description.
We act like his Presidency is unprecedented because in many ways it is. We’ve never had a President pay so little regard to the truth. And it’s not even close. But anyone 30 years old or older has had at least one bad boss, and if you’re my advanced age, probably many bad bosses.
So it’s not completely unchartered territory.
There are two kinds of bad bosses. The kind that knows they’re in way over their head and bide their time by disappearing into the background. Hoping against hope that they can mask their incompetence indefinitely.
Trump is the exact other kind. The kind that has no idea they’re in way over their head and has to be front and center all of the time. The technical term is narcissism. Even when Trump’s aides tell him his daily press conferences are hurting him, he continues with them in slightly different form. A certifiable media whore. So we can’t sidestep his lying, incompetence, lack of empathy, and general destructiveness.
And yet, we’ve survived lots of bad bosses, both kinds, because our organizations have been filled with caring, competent people who collectively compensated for the poor leadership at the top.
And we always outlast them because we’re resilient. And we’ll outlast this one too if enough of us turn out to say “You’re fired!” on November 3, 2020.
A Legend In My Own Mind
Hafthor Bjornsson breaks world record with 1,104-pound deadlift.
Hafthor is 6’9″, 425 pounds, I’m 6’2″, 170. But remember, it’s not the size of the dog in the fight.
I was close to deadlifting similar weight right before my gym closed, now whenever it reopens, I’ll probably have to start over with just the 45 pound bar. Oh well.
And I wonder if I can swim across Ward Lake without drowning. All 500-600 yards of it. The wetsuit will save my life. If I scream loud enough, Scottie, Kris, or Dean will save me. Right?
Friday Assorted Links
1. At virtual Family Chapel, the ‘spiritual but not religious’ find community during pandemic. Eldest is featured, making me even more famous.
2. Why Trump Was Deaf To All The Warnings He Received. Incuriosity and paranoia.
3. Colleges could lose up to 20 percent of students.
“Ten percent of college-bound seniors who had planned to enroll at a four-year college before the COVID-19 outbreak have already made alternative plans. Fourteen percent of college students said they were unlikely to return to their current college or university in the fall, or it was “too soon to tell.” Exactly three weeks later, in mid-April, that figure had gone up to 26 percent. Gap years may be gaining in popularity. While hard to track, there are estimates that 3 percent of freshmen take a gap year. Since the pandemic, internet searches for gap years have skyrocketed. College students do not like the online education they have been receiving. To finish their degrees, 85 percent want to go back to campus, but 15 percent want to finish online.”
4. The Grumpy Economist on University finances, particularly endowments. Sign of the seriousness of things, belt tightening ahead even for the uber wealthy.
“University endowment practices are quite a puzzle. . . . Why are they invested in obscure, illiquid, hard to value, assets, with at least two layers of high fees (university management + asset managers) rather than, say, have one part-time employee and put the whole business into Vanguard total market for about 10 basis points? Why do they leverage with short-term municipal debt which must be rolled over at the most inconvenient times? Why do university presidents seem to glory in great endowment returns in good times, but these occasional liquidity crunches are seen simply as acts of nature, not preventable with a nice pile of liquid assets? Why do donors put up with this — why do donors give money that will be managed in obscure high fee investments, rather than demand low-fee transparent investment, or even set up separate trusts, transparently managed, to benefit their alma maters?”
A flurry of great questions. The short answer to the first question I suspect is because investment managers’ think they’re smart enough to pick stock winners when history suggests otherwise.
An addendum suggests I’ve nailed it:
“Where are the trustees? Well, I speculated to one correspondent, there is a natural selection bias. How do you get to be a university trustee? 1) Make a ton of money as a (lucky) active asset manager, especially on trades and investments that come from college contacts; 2) Collect a lot of fees; 3) Persuade yourself how smart you are and how easy the alpha game is 4) Desire to socialize with the people who run universities. This is hardly likely to produce contrarians, fans of scientifically validated, quantitative, low-fee investment strategies.”
5. The Real Story Behind That Viral Photo of President Johnson During the Vietnam War. In praise of thoroughness and media literacy.
“. . . President Johnson wasn’t crying over thousands of dead American soldiers in the photo. Johnson is actually listening to an audio tape that was created by Captain Charles “Chuck” Robb, his son-in-law. That detail would allow the casual viewer to assume that LBJ was distressed to hear the recording, but it seems that so many of the documentary filmmakers who use this image haven’t bothered to look at the other photos taken during that same time in the White House.”
Being Twenty Something Right Now
Empathy for our young adult friends and children is in order. Imagine being them and trying to:
- cultivate a sense of purpose
- find a job that contributes to the common good, pays a livable wage, and comes with medical benefits
- find an affordable place of your own to live
- afford a car or other forms of reliable transportation
- get out of debt
- save some money each month
- develop the self discipline and knowledge to smartly invest for future expenses
- find a caring, loving, compatible partner with whom to be intimate
- decide whether to marry and have children
- decide whether to commit to a faith community, if so, finding a compelling one
- contend with friends and acquaintances inauthentic, curated selves on-line
- create a close circle of friends who aren’t so overwhelmed with all above that they have the energy and desire to spend time together
- worry about growing social inequities and the fate of the natural world
- cultivate the discipline to eat well, exercise, and maintain decent physical health
- manage your anxieties about all of the above and maintain good mental health
In the context of a global pandemic about which so much is unknown. How bad will it get? When will it end? How should we “reopen”? What exactly will the “new normal” be?
This pandemic presents unique challenges to many twenty somethings, whom for whatever reasons, already struggle with anxiety, depression, and related mental health challenges.
Extra patience and kindness with our young adult friends and children are in order.
But What If?
Can’t you see aides coaching Trump like attorneys prepping a client before taking the witness stand.
“One person is too many.” Again, “One person is too many.” Again, “One person is too many.” Good, again, “One person is too many.”
- But what if that one person is a DoNothing Democrat?
- What if that one person happens to be an immigrant, say from a shithole country?
- What if that one person was a prisoner of war?
- What if that one person happens to be differently abled?
- What if that one person is a journalist for CNN, MSNBC, the AP, or ABC news?
- What if that one person is African American and takes a knee during the National Anthem?
- What if that one person is a Senator from Utah who voted for impeachment?
- What if that one person used to be the President of the United States?
- What if that one person is an actor who occasionally impersonates the President on Saturday Night Live?
- What if that one person used to be the mayor of New York City or is currently?
- What if that one person is the Governor of Washington State? or Michigan? Or Illinois? Or Maryland?
- What if that one person is an environmentalist?
- What if that one person is a late night television host?
- What if that one person works at the State Department? or the Department of Justice?
- What if that one person said #MeToo about the President?
- What if that one person happened to be Hillary Clinton?
Even then?
260,000 Words Later
The New York Times has analyzed every word the President has uttered during his daily press conferences/campaign rallies. Equivalent to a 700-page book.
Some context from Charles Duhigg in The New Yorker:
“During the H1N1 outbreak of 2009—which caused some twelve thousand American deaths, infections in every state, and seven hundred school closings—Besser and his successor at the C.D.C., Dr. Tom Frieden, gave more than a hundred press briefings. President Barack Obama spoke publicly about the outbreak only a few times, and generally limited himself to telling people to heed scientific experts and promising not to let politics distort the government’s response. ‘The Bush Administration did a good job of creating the infrastructure so that we can respond,’ Obama said. . . . At no time did Obama recommend particular medical treatments, nor did he forecast specifics about when the pandemic would end.”
One of The Times conclusions:
“. . . the self-aggrandizement is singular for an American leader. But his approach is even more extraordinary because he is taking credit and demanding affirmation while he asks people to look beyond themselves and bear considerable hardship to help slow the spread of the virus.
“He doesn’t speak the language of transcendence, what we have in common,” said Jennifer Mercieca, a historian of American political rhetoric at Texas A&M University. Instead, Dr. Mercieca said, he falls back on a vocabulary he developed over decades promoting himself and his business.
“Trump’s primary goal is to spread good news and information and market the Trump brand: ‘Trump is great. The Trump brand is great. The Trump presidency is great,’ she said. “It’s not the right time or place to do that.”
“Transcendence”, shit, the nation would settle for silence.
Another:
“The coronavirus briefings have often contained the same phrases and themes that he used in his 2016 race.
“It’s consistent with the way he campaigned when he said, ‘I alone can fix it,’” said John Murphy, a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who studies the rhetoric of American presidents and politicians.
Dr. Murphy said that most presidents avoid taking personal credit because they appreciate the fact that Americans can draw the connection themselves between presidential leadership and the country’s successes.
With Mr. Trump, there is no such subtlety. “The level of self-congratulations that occurs every day at these press conferences is unprecedented,” Dr. Murphy added.”
I’ve been wondering, what would my dad think about the President? He was a free-market capitalist, a successful businessperson, lived in Florida, and leaned right. Despite all of that, I’m convinced he’d be damn near as critical of him as me because he couldn’t stand self-promoters.
He grew up poor, during the Depression, in Eastern Montana. Sometimes in the West self-promoters are said to be,”All hat, no cattle.” Dad was “All cattle, no hat.”
When I was a young professor, the President at my college resigned. He wrote a letter for the campus community that detailed his accomplishments. I was impressed, dad was anything but. Why? Because of John Murphy’s insight—he trusted that people could draw the connections themselves between leadership and a business’s or university’s success.
Pressing Pause 