Here are links to my latest work, Daily Posts from the archives (April 7-11) in case you missed them, and some interesting articles from around the internet. You can follow me on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook (I am not accepting new friends on the last platform, but you can use the “follow” option).
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Hello, hello, HELLO!
Are you well? Of course not. Who can be even just okay, in these times, with dumpster fires everywhere and tariffs whizzing back and forth from slingshots across the globe? People are still being disappeared because, well, why not repeat the worst parts of history? Bodies are blown up into the sky, and others are burnt alive. This has not been a good week, no period of time in the past many years has really been good, and here we are, and I honestly don’t know if any time will be good, and there is blood and brokenness and sadness everywhere, and it seems like it will never end because the billionaires love this stuff, this shit that gets all the prices way down so they can swoop right in, and “economists” claim it was all part of the plan, the plan, don’t you know, haha, it was all part of the plan. (No, it wasn’t, not ever.)
A breather, a breather. I finally watched all of White Lotus, season three. After last season’s slow-as-molasses non-events (nothing happened, but we got a lot of shots of water at the beach), I decided to wait until this third set of episodes was over before I started watching. This way, I could back out quickly after the first or second episode, without feeling compelled to be part of the FOMO conversation (I am gullible like that.) Well, it was better than the last one, and very pretty (the prettiest of them all, I think), with some star turns by monkeys, due to some excellent editing. I was struck by how much of the plot turns on the incredibly stupid decisions made by unthinking and incompetent people (if you know, you know). And I think the biggest takeaway ought to be: teach your boy-children to clean up after themselves (again, if you know, you know). Still, though it was better, I’m not sure where it can go next and the whole premise is getting tiring. As my brill friend W. put it, “I’m getting the sense of a formula in search of ideas rather than the reverse, which is why the first season may remain the best if this goes on.”
We all need breaks, but I fear that at the rate we’re going—with egg prices still high, despite a break in bird flu rate and a drop in inflation—most of us will have a hard time putting together a picnic basket for a day at the beach. Well, we can dream. And keep watching shows like White Lotus. If you’d like a change of pace, I also recommend Midsummer Murders (set in bucolic parts of the English countryside) and Doc Martin (shot in Cornwall, but only during the summer, so it’s always sunny and glorious).
NEW WORK!
“The Child in Wartime.” I have been thinking about children and wartime and, really, the very concept of a “child” for a long time now, and a recent death in Gaza prompted me to collect some of my thoughts in this essay.
“Kamala Harris and the Art of Losing.” I really was not planning on a Part II to my famous and prescient “Kamala Harris Will Lose,” but the news is too silly and this whole endeavour needs to be nipped in the bud.
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FROM THE ARCHIVES!
What else? “Kamala Harris Will Lose.” Don’t make me say it again, people.
“On the Psychic Terror of Raids.”
“On Class, Identity, and the Working Class.”
“The Masalafication of Everything.”
ELSEWHERE ON THE WEB!
Nathan J. Robinson wrote about the Lucy Letby case for Current Affairs, in “Lucy Letby Should Be Released Immediately.”
Nate Bear points out that maybe all the talk about students and reading comprehension are missing the point, in “Generation Smug.”
The director of ICE thinks it would be nifty if we could create a really efficient system for depression, like Prime, but for people.
At The Nation, Jeet Heer points out that “The New McCarthyism Was Started by Liberals.” This is the kind of analysis you should be reading and absorbing, not the liberal pablum offered by Heather Cox Richardson (see my earlier update for an essay on the problems with “resistance historians.”)
The Trump administration would like to make it impossible for migrants to, well, feed, house, or clothe themselves, by taking away their Social Security numbers (which will mean a complete lack of access to banking, and create dangerous underground economies).
Besides the sheer inhumanity of it all: undocumented immigrants paid $100 billion in taxes in 2022 alone. They “contributed $25.7 billion to Social Security in 2022,” according to Labor Notes, but do not receive any money towards retirement. Contrary to what MAGA crowds have been led to believe, they do not receive any benefits in return—historically, the IRS has given them individual taxpayer identification numbers, or ITIN, to file their taxes. “As of January 2021, there were an estimated 5.4 million active ITINs,” according to this report. Trump and Musk have gained an agreement from the IRS that it will now share such information, making millions vulnerable to exposure. The more you know.
All the talk of bringing factories and labour back to America ignores the fact that it will take, at a minimum, decades for the country to recreate the same manufacturing industries it saw in the 1950s. In the meantime, there will probably be a spike in prison labour. (Added later on April 11: many thanks to @mo_journeys for reminding us of this.)
Ali Abunimah reports, “Key 7 October ‘mass rapes’ witness denounced as liar by Israeli reporter,” in Electronic Intifada.
Shut up, “‘MAGA Lefty’ Is Not A Thing,” as Kyle Kulinksi and Nathan J. Robinson point out, in Current Affairs.
“What about the capitalists?” Sean Crawford asks that straightforward question in this episode of Democracy Now, about solidarity between autoworkers in the U.S and Mexico.
“COVID didn’t end. Its story just stopped being told.” This is a Canadian story, by Flannery Dean, but very relevant to the U.S.
Dire Wolves may be returning? I’m not sure that’s a good thing? Here’s an older article by Brandon Keim, in Nautilus: “To Bring Back Extinct Species, We’ll Need to Change Our Own.”
More recently, Marina Bolotnikova writes, in Vox, “These fluffy white wolves explain everything wrong with bringing back extinct animals.”
We warned you that penguins would get their revenge, and one just caused a plane to crash. (The penguin was not hurt, and nor were the people.)
Over on Facebook (you should be able to read this, even without an account), the For Fox Sake Wildlife Rescue writes that their posts and images are being stolen by other orgs and even a wildlife veterinarian Kelli LeVan. These plagiarists have been montesing FSWR’s free and beautifully crafted content, without sending a cent to the nonprofit. This has always been part of my point about plagiarism, and something I’ll expand on in future work: it extends far beyond academia, and is an economically exploitative act.
As for FSWR: their posts are beautifully written. My favourite (and that of many other readers!) is this one, about a crabby rescue snapping turtle named Audacity. He had his beak clipped by a car, and they write, “Based on his personality, we have to assume that he was trying to pick a fight with it.” Also, “He is fueled by pure, unadulterated chutzpah, and if Death tries to come for him, he will bite.”
For the usual bizarre reason (liberals’ fascination with Barack Obama), there’s been all this chatter about our last Democratic president’s dignity and grace and all that crap. Many thanks to Danny Spitzberg, who reminded us of the classic “Soup Boys,” by Heems.
It’s snowing in Chicago. Here’s Prince, with “Sometimes It Snows in April.”
I don’t know what the world holds for us, my darlings. I hope I will see you all somewhere, someday. I wish I could be cheerier. Check up on your friends, who might be dying from fear.
Here’s last week’s Update. And you can find all my previous Updates here.
I’ll see you next week.
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Image: Two Figures, Pablo Picasso, 1904
