Screenshot lifted from NM Sen. Martin Heinrich’s website.
Another day, another steaming heap of some punk-ass shit.
Dr. Carla D. Hayden — the first woman and first African-American to head the Library of Congress — got the ol’ heave-ho yesterday in a curt, two-sentence email from Trent Morse, deputy director of White House personnel (see above).
New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Subcommittee on the Legislative Branch, hit the high points of the doctor’s curriculum vitae for us and had a few thoughts of his own on her unceremonious dismissal:
“President Trump fired our nation’s Librarian, Dr. Carla Hayden, by email at 6:56pm tonight, taking his assault on America’s libraries to a new level.
“Over the course of her tenure, Dr. Hayden brought the Library of Congress to the people, with initiatives that reached into rural communities and made the Library accessible to all Americans, in person and online.
“While President Trump wants to ban books and tell Americans what to read – or not to read at all, Dr. Hayden has devoted her career to making reading and the pursuit of knowledge available to everyone.
“Be like Dr. Hayden.”
I can’t wait for the day when we get to give the shove to these chickenshit vandals. Two sentences? Try two words: “Fuck off.”
In the meantime, I suppose we can look forward to seeing Enrique Tarrio sworn in as Dr. Hayden’s replacement. The recently pardoned seditionist needs a job of work, and who knows? He may have checked out a few “Punisher” comic books from the prison library when he wasn’t busy finking for the John Laws.
Q. Is it not obvious to anyone that the Empire is as strong as it ever was?
A. The appearance of strength is all about you. It would seem to last forever. However, Mr. Advocate, the rotten tree-trunk, until the very moment when the storm-blast breaks it in two, has all the appearance of might it ever had. The storm-blast whistles through the branches of the Empire even now. Listen with the ears of psychohistory, and you will hear the creaking. — Hari Seldon fencing with the prosecutor while on trial for disturbing the peace of the Emperor’s realm, in the first book of Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation” series
Confirmation bias is real, and not always self-inflicted.
Case in point: Last night some of us were gnawing on current events in an email chain when in a fit of grim despair I wrote the following:
• • •
Call me cynical, but I think the idea of reviving manufacturing in the United States is a pipe dream, pure and simple.
Americans crave cheap shit, and they want to be paid top dollar for doing … something fun. Not living in a city-sized factory cranking out the iPhones and watching their bunkmates jump off the roof when it all gets to be too much. Being an “influencer” means you never have to jump off a roof unless you really need the clicks and there’s some drone down there with a net to catch you.
What are Americans qualified to manufacture in the near future that their fellow Americans (or anyone else) want to buy? Who’s gonna risk their capital building factories, arranging supply lines, finding/marketing to customers? The long view meets the short attention span and the minimalist skillset. Hilarity ensues. Or not.
The developing world is busy making and selling us shit in hopes of becoming us someday so their kids don’t have to work as hard as their folks did.
I can see small-scale stuff happening here. High-priced bespoke artisanal products (Moots comes to mind).
But most of what I see right now, day to day, is white collar and service industries, and a big, big gap between the two.
Also, consider A.I. and the increasing use of robotics in everything from package delivery to surgical procedures. Any domestic manufacturing developing in the next few decades might need humans only to troubleshoot/reboot the System from time to time and calibrate/lubricate the machinery. Until It figures out how to service Itself without the expense and hassle of the dwindling, unreliable and tiresome human element.
• • •
Well. How d’ye like them apples? Mighty pleased with myself I was, too. Especially after I read this analysis by Binyamin Appelbaum this morning in The New York Times. (The link is a gift; no need to subscribe.)
Appelbaum, the lead writer on economics and business for the NYT’s editorial board, did the heavy lifting to confirm my shoot-from-the-lip bias. Well done indeed, Binjy old scout.
He cites French historian Fernand Braudel, who examined the rise and fall of titans like Amsterdam, London, and yes, New York, taking the long view “because he didn’t want to make too much of short-term pain or setbacks.” Appelbaum explains: “It was an approach that he said he developed to maintain his equanimity during the five years that he spent in German prisoner-of-war camps during World War II, refusing to make too much of ‘daily misery’ or the latest scraps of news.”
Back in the Day™, according to Braudel, finance replaced manufacturing and merchants became bankers — ““a society of rentier investors on the lookout for anything that would guarantee a quiet and privileged life” — moving hither and yon in search of return on investment, regardless of whichever Napoleon of the moment sat squawking on his papier-mâché throne.
And they didn’t bring everyone along for the ride.
Appelbaum gives a light backhand to the latest monarch who wants the rubes to think he can turn back time with a wave of his scepter: “Expanding manufacturing is a goal increasingly shared by elected officials across the political spectrum, but Trump is trying to overhaul the rules of global trade with all the finesse of a do-it-yourselfer living in a house while renovating it, and the disruptions are shaking the global economy. “
And then from beyond the grave Braudel steps forward to give Beelzebozo the coup de grâce, patting him on that ridiculous combover, shaking his head with a smile, and murmuring, “Putz.”
Again, Appelbaum:
“Braudel, who died in 1985, probably would have regarded the president as nothing more than a cork bobbing on the currents of history. If he was right, no matter the president or policies, America’s era of economic domination is ending and its political hegemony is unsustainable. If he was right, it’s time to accept that our second-rate status is inevitable and irreversible.”
Thus we recall another wise fellow, George Santayana, who in “The Life of Reason” wrote: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
Looked like the Martians were working out on Cedar Crest last night.
It was fury in the foothills most of yesterday and well into the night.
The rain started as I was driving home after dropping Herself at the Sunport. Then came the wind, a few rounds of dime-sized hail shotgunning the backyard maple (which shed leaves and one sizable dead limb) and the roses (still plenty of them left for the deer to eat), and more rain.
And finally the light show captured above.
Herself’s flight to Maine was not without drama. First Southwest couldn’t fuel her plane because of lightning. Then the fuel truck didn’t have enough go-juice to top off the tanks, so another had to be pressed into service.
By the time she got off the tarmac an hour late it was clear that making her connecting flight in Baltimore was going to be iffy. The plan had been to grab a bite to eat and chill a bit between planes, but you know what they say about plans.
So Herself touches down with just enough time to hit the bathroom, join the queue for boarding, and find her seat … after which there was another extended wait for a couple dozen passengers who had been delayed for reason(s) unknown. She could’ve had a sitdown meal, an adult beverage, and a nap, but nooooo. …
The long and the short of it? A flight that was supposed to arrive at stupid-thirty in Portland instead touched down at extra-double-stupid thirty.
And it’s raining there, too.
I stayed up way past my bedtime to provide moral support encoded in bad language. Once Herself was finally settling into her hotel room I turned out the light and … and then Thor turned it back on, as you see.
The flickering electrical display that brought me out of a fitful doze was utterly silent. No thunder at all. Thor was pulling his punches. Or maybe Mjölnir needed recharging. Odin knows I do. And Herself still faces a couple hours in a car this morning before she reaches what the airlines like to call her “final destination.”
Whenever the Thunder God gets his iHammer back up to four bars maybe he can have a couple swings at Beelzebozo. The senile old fool currently propped up as “president” of the “United States” doesn’t know what the Declaration of Independence means or what the Constitution requires of him.
Herself had just returned from a nine-day trip, so she got caught up on her trail running and weight training while I settled for smashing a few climbs on the Soma Pescadero in my best socialist-red cycling kit.
I feel some remorse over not making our local May Day march, which drew either hundreds or thousands of people, depending upon your news source.
But I’m certain there will be other opportunities to hit the streets for a cause instead of just ’cause. I mean, fascists gonna fascist, amirite? We will not lack for opportunity.
The number of containers scheduled to arrive at the Port of Los Angeles is anticipated to drop more than 35 percent next week compared with the same period last year, data from the port shows. And a quarter of the ships that had been scheduled for May have canceled because of light volume, said Gene Seroka, the port’s executive director.
This is how the recession begins. In Seattle, cargo shipments are down 60 percent. Los Angeles will be next. The recession will make its way east from Seattle and Los Angeles as trucks and freight trains carry less cargo overland.
More companies are starting to warn that they will have to pass on higher costs to American consumers, raising prices for products like strollers, mattresses, power tools and cast-iron cookware as President Trump’s tariffs take hold.
One thing I keep seeing in stories like these is the shock — shock! — among Beelzebozo Believers that they will be among those assuming the position as his “deals” go down.
Consider Michelle Hall, a 48-year-old secretary in Snohomish, Wash. She found shopping online with Temu “addicting and fun” — until she noticed the “import charges” piling up.
She voted for Mr. Trump in November, initially thinking his trade policies could help reduce the deficit, create manufacturing jobs and make the nation less dependent on foreign countries.
Ms. Hall said she never thought her own costs would increase, and she originally hoped that Mr. Trump would quickly bring prices down.
“I wanted to have faith,” she said. “I don’t have that faith anymore.”
See you on the barricades, Michelle. I’ll take a day off the bike if you’ll take a day off from shopping.
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