You Shouldn't Believe Eveything You Read

Bill,

Lot's of scary things are happening in the world, but I'm here to reassure (or is it just to disagree with?) you that biased journalism isn't one of them. You, the true historian in this conversation, can no doubt cite endless examples of one-sided, distorted, mendacious, bigoted, sinister-purposed and violence-inciting reportage since the birth of the Republic. The media's earnest and self-congratulatory insistence that it seeks objective truth  is a polite fiction at best and a laughable delusion at worst. Even if  I can't watch it for more than 30 seconds, Fox News is important. Not because it's "fair and balanced" (it's not) but because it tells different stories from different points of view than the "fake news" your faithful correspondent holds so dear.

The Founders believed that as long as everyone gets their say the truth will eventually emerge. I believe they had it right. Fox, Sinclair Broadcasting, the Wall Street Journal, National Review, Commentary, the American Spectator (I could go on but you get the point) certainly aren't ignoring the President's voice. The President, who can't stand any coverage that doesn't obsequiously flatter him, has other ideas. If, in some apocalyptic alternate universe, Trump could have his way with the 1st Amendment, he's given us a pretty idea of what he' do with it.

Several billion citizens around the world would gladly trade their fake news for ours. The folks who ought to be scared, and yet who somehow are not, are the journalists who try to report in such times from such places.

Eli

Well That's Scary

Eli,

I saw this headline, "Social media outpaces print newspapers in the U.S. as a news source," and thought, well, that's scary. Then I read the story and saw how many people get their news from TV and thought, well, that's scary. Then I thought about how many people get their news from the NY Times and thought, well, that's scary. Then I remembered how the PBS Newshour has become, "The world is on fire because of climate change and its all Donald Trump's fault," and thought, well that's scary. Mrs. Knabe remarked to me last night she was tired of the PBS Newshour routine. She's the moderate one in our union.

One of the (many) odd things about Trump is his ability to identify a serious issue, then distort the hell out of it. In my mind there is a serious credibility issue for the US media and our President has identified this and vocalized it loudly and the fact that he distorts the issue seems to give the residents of the media-industrial complex  leave to ignore his, and mine, and Mrs. Knabe's, concerns. I'm going to guess we will all regret their inability to self-examine.

Bill

Alaska Oil Production

Eli,

In the space of 10 years the US has become the #1 producer of oil in the world. More than Saudi Arabia. More than Russia.

The failing NY Times has an article on the 30+ year attempt to open up drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). I was a little disappointed by a lack of context about the US oil industry.

Here's a chart from EIA, showing oil production since 1973. Prudhoe Bay was discovered in 1968 and starting producing meaningful amounts of oil in 1978. Production at Prudhoe peaked in 1988 at 1.6 million barrels per day, about 25% of US oil production. US and Alaska production declined through 2008 when friend of the oil industry, Barack Obama, was elected President. Since then US oil production has doubled to almost 9 million barrels a day in 2017 and will be almost 12 million barrels a day in 2019. Total Alaska production is now less than 500 thousand barrels a day, less than 5% of total US production.

The US is now the swing producer of oil, displacing Saudi Arabia in that role. Increased prices results in rapid increases in US production, pushing down prices, until US producers can't make their required rate of return, and drilling and completions decline, or rise at a slower rate, and supply contracts.

ANWR used to be a much bigger deal. 30 years ago, no one thought there would be a technological breakthrough in hydraulic fracturing so drilling in ANWR was considered more important. The decline in US production also resulted in much greater government mandated conservation efforts, which I believe were futile. Letting prices clear results in the all the supply/demand adjustments that are necessary.

Maybe ANWR can fill the unused capacity of the Alaskan pipeline, but in terms of overall US production the real action is in Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Utah, Wyoming and North Dakota.

Bill

Cowardice and Sloth Attracts Amazon to New York

Eli,

My favorite part from this story on Amazon's choice of New York as one of its new headquarters:

Gov. Andrew Cuomo defended the deal, arguing that New York has to offer incentives because of its comparatively high taxes. At 6.5 percent, New York’s corporate income-tax rate is only modestly higher than Virginia’s 6 percent, according to the Tax Foundation. But other business and individual taxes are higher in New York.

“It’s not a level playing field to begin with,” Mr. Cuomo said in an interview Tuesday. “All things being equal, if we do nothing, they’re going to Texas.”

If taxes are too high to attract Amazon, I'm guessing they are too high for everyone. And if that's the case I'm not sure why Amazon deserves to be subsidized by everyone else. Usually the response to that question is as inane as Cuomo's.

Kevin Williamson had this take, which I totally agree with

If New York City can only hope to attract a firm like Amazon by essentially bribing (in an entirely legal fashion!) its shareholders, then what does that say about New York City? A New York City with excellent schools, a first-rate mass-transit system, a sensible tax and regulatory environment, and better public sanitation might not have to pay off corporate shareholders — no, that kind of New York City would have the confidence to say: “This is New York. Lots of people want to be here. You’re welcome to join us, and we’ll provide the best municipal services we can, but don’t act like you’re doing us a favor. We were a big deal before you came along, guys.” But fixing the schools and subways is hard work, and doing it economically is even harder. You know what isn’t hard work? Giving somebody else’s money to a third party from whom you want something. That isn’t leadership. It’s cowardice and sloth.

Many (not me) bemoan the partisanship and tribalism of our current politics (I think it's healthy and normal) so many are probably applauding the cowardice and sloth of politicians on both sides that bribe companies to come to their communities rather than engaging in the hard work of government.

Bill

Happy Thanksgiving

Plastic Bags- An Inconvenient Truth

Eli,
Thanks for proving my point about plastic bags. The only argument I've heard goes like the one you implied: Plastic is bad, it ends up in the oceans and kills turtles, which isn't really an argument. It's more like a concatenation of evidence-less assertions.

This from Science Magazine by way of National Geographic,

In 2010, eight million tons of plastic trash ended up in the ocean from coastal countries—far more than the total that has been measured floating on the surface in the ocean's "garbage patches."

From the Earth Policy Institute:

Currently 100 billion plastic bags pass through the hands of U.S. consumers every year—almost one bag per person each day.

A plastic bag weighs 4 grams, let's say 8 for the sake of argument. 8 x 100 billion = 800 billion grams, which is 1.7 billion pounds, which is 850 thousand tonnes, or 10% of total plastics ending up in the ocean IF EVERY SINGLE BAG ENDS UP IN THE OCEAN. Not hardly.

So sure, ban bags. But I think it's moral preening, not a realistic policy.

Bill

There's A Great Furture In Plastics

Bill,

I can't resist. I know you'll forgive me. Here's the critical exchange from that unforgettable scene in the Graduate that has proved so prescient.

Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Benjamin: Yes, sir.

Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?

Benjamin: Yes, I am.

Mr. McGuire: Plastics.

Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?

Mr. McGuire: There's a great future in plastics. Think about it. Will you think about it?

And here is what the future has brought to us


.


Eli

Trump Is Good For Democracy

Bill,


Coming from me, that's a headline that might surprise you. I've resisted the temptation to vent about the current president in our shared forum. To do so might make me feel better, but it would accomplish little else, and would compromise our mission. Besides, others have already done this with far greater elegance, skill, and vitriol  than I.


But I will say this about him. He has energized the electorate in a way that might not have seemed possible a short time ago. I have my hopes for the outcome, but I don't know what will happen today. One thing however is certain. More Americans are going to vote in a midterm election than have done so in a very long time. And that's good for the country


Eli

We Have All Been Here Before and Will Be Again

Eli,

I'll have to take a look at The American Experience: The Eugenics Crusade.

I read a book called "Illiberal Reformers," by Thomas Leonard that explores various aspects of the Progressive movement's involvement in immigration  and eugenics.

Leonard writes:

Hostility to immigrants, like race prejudice, was nothing new in America. As Rogers Smith, Gary Gerstle, Desmond King, and other scholars remind us, American nativism, like American racism and sexism, was not the occasional mild fever. It was a chronic, debilitating illness. [5]

America had a long and ignominious tradition of nativist intolerance, dating to the short—lived Aliens Act of 1798, which empowered the president to arrest or deport any alien deemed dangerous. In the 1840s and 1850s, the Know Nothings of the American Party gained widespread political support by vilifying Irish immigrants fleeing famine and German immigrants fleeing revolution as un—American threats to the nation.

What did change, beginning in the 1880s, was the role of the administrative state in immigration regulation and government’s use of social scientific expertise to investigate and advise on immigration policy.

One of the tools proposed to restrict immigration was the minimum wage law:

A legal minimum wage, applied to immigrants and those already working in America, ensured that only the productive workers were employed. The economically unproductive, those whose labor was worth less than the legal minimum, would be denied entry, or, if already employed, would be idled. For economic reformers who regarded inferior workers as a threat, the minimum wage provided an invaluable service. It identified inferior workers by idling them. So identified, they could be dealt with. The unemployable would be would be removed to institutions, or to celibate labor colonies. The inferior immigrant would be removed back to the old country or to retirement. The woman, as we shall in Chapter 10, would be removed to the home, where she could meet her obligations to family and race.

The whole book is worth a read but it is uncomforatble reading for today's Progressives.

Bill

Carbon dioxide emissions from the U.S. power sector have declined 28% since 2005

Eli,

This from the EIA (US Energy Information Administration)

U.S. electric power sector carbon dioxide emissions (CO2) have declined 28% since 2005 because of slower electricity demand growth and changes in the mix of fuels used to generate electricity. EIA has calculated that CO2 emissions from the electric power sector totaled 1,744 million metric tons (MMmt) in 2017, the lowest level since 1987.

The graph accompanying the story:

The biggest drop is from a less energy intensive economy, then fuel switching: from coal to natural gas. And the technology behind the switch is hydraulic fracturing which results in low natural gas prices relative to coal.

One of the great dilemmas faced by those most worried by global warming is  the best way to address higher carbon emissions  is to  encourage hydraulic fracturing. Gas has half the carbon emissions per BTU as coal. Cheaper, cleaner, less carbon. What's not to like?

In some ways it's like the plastic bag ban. My town is contemplating a plastic bag ban. They admit paper is worse for the environment but justify the ban by hoping consumers will opt for reusable bags. This despite ample evidence consumers do not desire reusable bags. So the bag banners are willing to accept more pollution to satisfy their quixotic war on plastic bags. And those, like Andrew Cuomo, are willing to accept more carbon in order to justify tilting at the fracturing windmill.

It's a shame the party of science ignores the science and rejects the answer to their concerns about carbon.

Bill

We Have All Been Here Before

Bill,


With the demise of Late Night With Charlie Rose, I'd been casting about for something else to watch while I ride the exercise bike before work. Good leftie that I am, I looked to other shows on PBS as possibilities. One has to be careful about that. There is a an unmistakable sky-is-falling quality to shows such as Frontline; even the opening drums and trumpet theme lets you know there's trouble ahead. If all you ever watched was Frontline you'd never believe that for most of the people in the country and the world, as you've recently pointed out, things are better than they've ever been.


Still I had to find something, so I settled on The American Experience, a cultural history show that runs every few weeks or so. I'm working my way through an episode called The Eugenics Crusade. As its title suggests, the show details the long and sordid history of the Eugenics movement in the United States, from its misinterpretation of Mendel's laws of inheritance at the turn of the 1890s to its capture of the public imagination at its height in the 20s, and on to its ignominious end in disgrace, as the logical implications of the movement were so capably demonstrated by the Nazis in the 30s and early 40s.


There's no question of the sincerity of the founders and promulgators of the movement, and their unshakable certainty that they were engaged in the use of science for the public good. This was not some fringe idea supported by a bunch of racist crackpots. The notion that one could improve the human race through selective breeding of favorable traits in the white Protestant individuals who displayed them, and eliminate unfavorable traits by reducing breeding in the foreign, criminal, or poor individuals who displayed them, was a broadly held cultural meme that affected public policy. Fear of foreign contamination was a major impetus for the Johnson Reed Act of 1924, which dramatically reduced incoming numbers of inferior races such as Slavs Italians and Jews, and excluded Japanese immigrants altogether. More than 30 states passed forced sterilization laws. Before the practice ended more than 60,000 American went under the knife.


Parts of this are hard to watch. I try, mostly without success, to withhold judgment about the vile nature of such a movement, and the nativism and xenophobia that fueled it. At least that's how I see it. Not so for a minority of our countrymen, for whom not much as changed when it comes to anxiety about those who are different from themselves, and the ability of  a leader with just the right talent to stoke those fears for his own advantage. The irony that most of our ancestor immigrants were treated with the same degree of scorn  is apparently lost upon them.


Its easy to predict what the historical and popular judgment will be about the current anti immigrant craze We have been here before, alas and we will undoubtedly be here again.


Eli           

My Brother Is Dead

Bill,


They found him in Sheepshead Bay. A pleasure boat cruising by bumped into him. The key to his room at the local assisted living facility where he was living  was in his pocket, so he was readily identified. He had gone out for a walk. One can surmise with a good deal of certainty that he jumped from somewhere. News of most deaths comes to us from a doctor or family member. This death was a police matter, and so my sister received a phone call from a New York City detective. I was out to lunch with an old friend when the phone rang with my sisters name and I knew, in that terrible and certain way that one knows, what she had called to tell me. 


He had been mentally ill for very long time, at least since his teenage years and possibly even longer. He was blessed with a superior intelligence, and cursed with an uncanny capacity for alienating almost everyone who might have cared about him. He graduated from an elite, albeit eccentric college and seven years later washed out of graduate school in clinical psychology when his supervisors realized he was unfit to treat patients. He never married. He spent the remaining 40 years  living in a rent controlled apartment in Brooklyn, working occasionally, living more or less in poverty, borrowing money from all of our relatives until they grew tired of him. From time to time my sister would get a phone call  telling her he was hospitalized. She did what she could for him, although he wore her out too.


He was 7 1/2 years older than me, and he was very kind and protective of me when we were young. As adults however, we became estranged. I hadn't spoken to him in years until I called him at the psych ward some months ago after he slit his wrists. We shared a few polite words of conversation. He remembered that I have 2 children but didn't remember their names. He thanked me for calling but asked me not call again, and that is the last I ever spoke to him. From my sister's account it is not clear how much he knew reality at the end, but the suffering of a 71 year man so utterly alone without even the barest memories of some happier time is reality enough for the choice he made.    


He did not have good parents, and he blamed them throughout his life for his misfortune. I of course had the same parents. By the time I came along his relentless resistance had diminished their  virulence, and I owe him for that. He first ran away from home at 16. My mother read the note he wrote to her sisters over the telephone. I wish I still had it. He told them what he thought of them. It felt awful to hear at the age of nine but now it feels like an extraordinary act of courage. The state cops found him hitchhiking 4 days later on the thruway in Buffalo. My parents went out to fetch him, but he never stopped running after that for long. After a while they just him go. That was easier than trying to fix him. He had this weird romantic notion about the West, and being a cowboy, and would regularly wire for money from some Western Union in Laredo, or Santa Fe, or some such place.


Why I had the ability/fortune to forge ahead in life and he did not is a mystery to me. Mostly I feel grateful and undeserving. I've had a lot of time in the last few weeks to think about whether I could have a made a difference, whether I could have altered the arc of his terribly sad and unbearably lonely time on this planet. Maybe its an excuse to let myself off the hook, but I don't think so. He was inept at most things, but singularly skilled at pushing away anyone who ever loved him.


Right now the medical examiner is dithering over what to do with his body. This being New York, the bizarre, remote possibility of foul play is probably on the ME's mind. Drowning will surely be listed as the cause of death but my sister and I know better. Something essential in him died long ago. Once he's cremated his ashes will be returned to me. I'll hold onto them until this all settles inside me. That will take a while.


Eli

Of Course You Can Watch Football

Bill,

Have you noticed just how much the New York Times is channeling us with its dueling columnist conversations?

Of course you can just watch football! That's not the time or place to worry about the social ills,  so don't. But why do I get the sense that you are asking yourself that question as much as you are asking me?

Everything in America does not boil down to race or gender. You and are not culture warriors. We get up in the morning put on our clothes, go to work, come home to our families, live our lives, and try to do the right thing as we see it. But we are engaged citizens, with a sense of responsibility toward our country, which has given both of us so much. Otherwise we wouldn't write this blog. We see a lot of things differently, but we don't look away (at least when not watching football).   

The country has made real progress toward accepting its African American citizens as equal members of society; so says the nation’s first African American President. But discrimination on the basis of race has not been erased from the American landscape. That's a belief shared by a majority of Americans (although not by most Republicans).

 We can't erase prejudice from person’s heart. Only they can do that for themselves. But we can honor, in ways large and small, the words engraved on the front of the Supreme Court.

Eli

Can't I Just Watch Football

Eli,

I largely agreed with your "The American Experience Depends on How You Got Here." So I read it again. Then again. And after reading it again, I thought to myself, Does everything have to come down to race? Easy for me to say since I'm the stereotypical privileged white male.

Still, is everything about race, or gender?  Can't I just watch football?

Bill

Of Polls and Policy

Bill

I read with interest your post on the Gallup Poll report the increasing popularity of the Republican Party over the last decade, and I share you caution about the meaning of such a sampling device. After all, think about what America might look like if the following popular opinions were translated into public policy:

1) Percentage of Americans who believe Justice Kavanaugh should not have been confirmed-51 (CNN)

2) Percentage  of Americans who favor federally sponsored healthcare for all Americans-56 (Gallup)

3) Percentage of Americans who believe laws regulating guns should be more strict than they are now-67 ((Gallup).

4) Percentage of Americans who believe that global warming is caused by human activity-67 (Gallup)

5) Percentage of Americans who believe that DACA immigrants should be allowed to become citizens 83 (Gallup)


I could go on, but I'm sure you get my point by now. Somewhere, perhaps, James Madison is smiling.

Eli

The American Experience Depends on How You Got Here

Bill,


Forgive my lack of response to you recent string of impressive posts. I've been on service seeing patients and then traveling. Let me take a minute to try and respond some of your insightful, and occasionally provocative observations.


First the easiest. Serena William's outburst at the during the Open Championship was inexcusable, as several of her peers in the tennis world have pointed out. It had nothing to do with sexism, and everything to do with the difficulty of a great champion accepting her own inevitable decline. Like most champions she found it impossible to accept  that she was losing. It was a classless moment that robbed her gifted and compelling opponent, Naomi Osaka, of what should have been the moment of a lifetime.


But her performance does not justify the obscene photograph that one of my colleagues decided was appropriate to slyly show me while on rounds in the intensive care unit. The photoshopped image of a donkey's genitals attached to Serena's bottom is far too disgusting to duplicate here even if I could find it. Such an image follows a century's old meme that portrays African Americans as less than human. Think about this for minute Bill. This man, a senior distinguished doctor, thinks it's appropriate to carry this picture around on his phone and show it to people. I was ashamed that I lacked the courage to confront him. But I forget: racism is dead in America.


The NFL protesters are intentionally using their celebrity and privilege to point out social and political behavior that they consider to be unjust. Lots of viewers find this annoying. The viewer-in-chief, who values no one's opinion but his own, deems it unpatriotic. Others find it heroic. Either way, such protest honors a core American value, and is likely to be effective in achieving its goals. Our history is full of examples too numerous to mention.


Our ancestors, yours and mine, came from two distinct ethnic/religious groups who eventually earned an honored and privileged place in our country. We left behind appalling political and economic persecution to encounter scorn, bigotry, discrimination and eventually, legal exclusion. Still, we came from great cultures, with century's' old traditions of scholarship and achievement. We came from intact families. When we built families of our own no one periodically separated us. When the dominant institutions excluded us we built our own hospitals, places of worship, charities and universities. Today, 5 Supreme Court justices are descended from our 2 groups.


We came voluntarily. Our journey in America was mostly free of violence. But violence has been the central feature of the African American experience. As our guide on the recent slave tour of Monticello pointed out, violence underpinned every aspect of an enslaved persons life from the moment they were kidnapped and transported in chains. Even after slavery ended, African Americans in the South and elsewhere lived in what essentially was a terror state. The last lynching in America took place in 1981. Unlike the Germans, who spent several generations atoning in front of the world for their Nazi past, Americans don't seem to feel we owe our Black citizens anything, not even a fair shake. Indeed we seem to be heading in the opposite direction. Still, they are succeeding.


I like football too as you know. I certainly will be watching my beloved Patriots take on the Chiefs on Sunday. If a player or 2 takes a knee and pisses off Trump's buddy Bob Kraft, it will be fine with me.       
  
Eli

A global tipping point: Half the world is now middle class or wealthier

Eli,

Every night I ask the Mrs. if she would like to watch the latest edition of, "Trump is Awful and He's Ruining the World," aka, The PBS NewsHour. I suppose it should be uplifting to get re-educated every night, with teachable moments on how people feel, but I must admit it does bring me down to hear about the descent into chaos, facism and authoritarianism we have brought on ourselves. So it's always nice to see some counter-programming.

I was surprised to see this from Brookings, which I regard as a center-left publication, "A global tipping point: Half the world is now middle class or wealthier."

For the first time since agriculture-based civilization began 10,000 years ago, the majority of humankind is no longer poor or vulnerable to falling into poverty. By our calculations, as of this month, just over 50 percent of the world’s population, or some 3.8 billion people, live in households with enough discretionary expenditure to be considered “middle class” or “rich.”

The authors predict it will get even better in the next 10 years. In 2020 half the world was either "poor" or "vulnerable," while in 2030 that falls to 32% of the total world population. Even more impressive, in 2020 the authors estimate 3.8 billion people are poor or vulnerable. By 2030 they estimate 2.7 billion are in those categories. That is an astounding result.

 

At times I read (and hear) from the younger generation criticism of "the mess" we are leaving them. I beg to differ. We are leaving them an extraordinary world, drowning in riches.

I couldn't get data on these classifications for the US, which is unfortunate. Because I'd like to know how many of the 200 million "rich" reside in the US. I can't imagine less than half of the 200 million rich in the world are in the US, or 100 million. Since there are 300 million people in the US, that's about 1/3. Another (made-up) data point suggesting the 1% rhetoric is pure bullshit.

Bill

Republican Party Favorability Highest in Seven Years

Eli,

"Republican Party Favorability Highest in Seven Years," is the title of a September 24 news release from Gallup. It was a strange headline to see since the failing NY Times keeps telling me the only supporters of Republicans are racists, homophobes and sexists.

The release has this graph showing favorability ratings going back to 2008.

Polls, like scientific papers, can be fabrications of the author's imagination, so I don't want to make too much of this. That said, it's a curious result.

Bill

PS. This poll was before the Kavanaugh smearing, which NPR thinks helped Republicans also.

Bees, Ants, the French Revolution, Kavanugh, the Democrats and Trump

Eli,

Bear with me.

Apologies to apiarists and myrmecologists. My impression on how bees and ants find food is they all indvidiually set out sort of randomly. One finds something, others follow, until the food runs out or someone randomly finds a better supply and they all follow to that new supply.

I thing much of capitalism operates this way and it explains the boom/bust nature of markets.

The French Revolution operated somewhat similarly. Adopting an increasing revolutionary position worked until it didn't. Kind of like the ants/bees/capitalism metaphor.

Seems to me that is what is happening with the Kavanaugh accusations. Some of them the charges seem absurd but as long as they are having an impact the ants will throw them out.

My theory also explains the path of the Democratic party towards Democratic Socialism. If something is working, why not try the next logical step. Worked for the Dems right up until the point of 1972: Nixon-Everything, McGovern-Nothing.

Trump is the peripatetic ant, always shouting to the group: Hey, there's another food pile right here! Everyone follows, but he's only there long enough to spot another food pile and tweet to everyone to follow.

The press are, of course, the useful idiots (emphasis on idiots) in this game.

Bill

Jags 31 NE 20

Eli,

I don't know when I flipped past the NE game. I just remember the score was Jags big, NE little. "That's too bad," I thought,  "Maybe because the defensive coach with the beard is gone," and flipped.

Mabye I'm just bored with football and the way the rules have become so complex. Could be since I've deliberately cut my cable bills by eliminating premium channels including ESPN and NFL channel I'm unable to watch games I want to watch. Since I'm a Bronco fan, I'm bound to have less interest unless the Broncos are on. Maybe the NFL is still caught in delivery mechanisms from the prior century. That is, when I want to watch a TV show, I don't wait for it to be aired, I log on the internet and watch it. The NFL is getting there, but isn't there yet. All of those reasons would reduce my interest in football.

The kneeling has an impact as well.

I get a certain amount of enjoyment from football and am willing to pay a certain price (dollars and time). The NFL has been reducing my enjoyment with the rule complexity and kneeling and increasing the cost by sticking to a traditional distribution method.

I was thinking about this when Serena Williams went through her melt-down at the US Open. Her behavior reduced my enjoyment of the game. I had the exact same reaction when McEnroe, Connors and Nastase had their meltdowns during matches. I simply enjoy the game less and because of that am unwilling to pay the same price, in time and dollars, as previously.

Management and laobr of the NFL and the USTA have made decisions about the product they are asking me to buy and increasingly I'm saying, "no thanks." It has nothing to do with Black Lives Matter, or Trump or MeToo of Sexism or the Patriarchy. I just want to watch football and tennis. If you start throwing extraneous, to me, issues into it, my enjoyment diminishes and I'll pay less.


Bill

Poverty and Politics

Eli,
Thanks for sharing the  The 2017 Distressed Communities  report with me. It's a fascinating report and a touches on a few topics I am particularly interested in.

One of the things that struck me, maybe not what the authors wanted me to focus on, is how prosperous most of the country is. If I listened to the Failing New York Times and other mouthpieces of the Liberal Industrial Establishment I'd come to believe there are only two types of people in the US: the 1% lighting up their cigars with $100 bills and the rest of us living in a neo-Dickensian nightmare. But then there is this, from the report:

 

I recognize 110 million people "at risk" or "distressed" is a lot. 150 million prosperous and comfortable is a country that is sharing the wealth to much greater extent than the Occupy crowd pules about.

It reminded me of this chart I grabbed from AEI. The author admits the middle class is shrinking. Because more of the middle class are moving to the upper classed. Seems to be a similar take by the Distressed Community crowd.

 

I'm also fascinated by the reduced mobility in the US. Famously, in the 1800's, Georgians wanting to escape their creditors would place a sign on their empty house "GTT," Gone to Texas.  We like to think of ourselves as a nation of immigrants. First we immigrated from the old world for a better life here and we move within the US seeking out a better place. That tendency seems to be less these days.

The report states:

Prosperous zip codes may contain 32.5 million more Americans than distressed zip codes, but distressed ones contain three times as many people receiving SNAP and other cash public assistance benefits—14.3 million compared to 4.7 million. With people less likely than ever to move—and with low income people some of the least able to afford the costs and risks of moving—there is a compelling public policy rationale for investing in the economic development of the places where public assistance beneficiaries are concentrated.

I have an unproven thesis that one of the reasons for the reduced mobility is the increased SNAP and public assistance benefits, so cause, not effect. And I wonder why we want to build up dying towns. Why not a GTT voucher?

I subscribe to a newsletter called Granola Shotgun that discusses many housing issues in America. This post in particular was interesting: Beginnings, Middles, and Ends. The author talks about the great migration west but everything has a beginning middle and end, including towns:

But everything has a beginning, a middle, and an end. After decades of rapid rural population growth and relative prosperity circumstances conspired to dismantle small family farms. The mechanization of agriculture, the rise of industrial cities, boom and bust economic cycles, and the deployment of young people during the First and Second World Wars all gradually depopulated the countryside. The final nail in the coffin struck when U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Earl Butz radically altered federal policy in the early 1970s toward heavily subsidize large scale vertically integrated corporate agribusiness. “Get big, or get out.” Commodity crops are now cheaper and more plentiful than ever as a result, but much of what was left of the rural landscape was eviscerated.

Migration from farms to cities decimated the rural life and migration from cities to suburbs decimated some cities:

As downtowns all across the country began to fail in the mid twentieth century newly built suburbs were thriving. Society decided it was easier to create new places than fix what was wrong with the old ones. A whole host of federal legislation such as the National Housing Act of 1934, the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, and the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 provided the government subsidies and legal mechanisms that promoted suburban development. And for the last several decades these places have been the economic, cultural, and political center of American life. It’s the only landscape many people have ever known.

Granola followed up with this post  The Sacred Cul-de-Sac: Lakewood, which is well worth 5 minutes of your time.

One of the themes Granola focuses on is the impact government policies have. Many policies, restrictive zoning for instance, or many of the wetlands regulations, benefit the well-off by making it more expensive to build housing. San Francisco is one of Granola's favorite subjects with regard to zoning regulations. And it seems to contradict his "Beginning, Middle, End" thesis which seems more deterministic.

I saw another chart in the Distressed report that caught my eye:

 I have a couple of converging theories on calories and weight gain in the US.  I maintain the market system has been incredibly successful in lowering the price of a calorie. The US food industry has also been particularly good at creating yummy calories at a very low price point. 240 calories for a Payday candy bar, 240 for 1.75 ounce bag of Doritos Nacho Cheese chips and 150 from a can of Pepsi gets me to 30% of my RDA. But it's not just calories, its bad calories, chock full of carbs/sugar, which I think keeps you hungry and results in greater diabetes. So we have low price per calorie, or low price per gram of carbs, which results in poor health outcomes. [One of the many issues I had with the assumptions on Obamacare was assuming poor health outcomes were a function of poorly delivered health care. Maybe our health outcomes has more to do with our lifestyle choices including fast cars, guns and carbs.] Why the distribution shown in the Distressed report slopes the way it slopes I'll leave to someone else.

Bill

Poverty and Politics Are An Unpredictable Mix

Bill,


A DC think tank recently published an interesting report titled The 2017 Distressed Communities Index. With a lot of fancy animated maps and graphs ( which you know I like), the report documents the demography of poverty across the United States, documenting the difference between rich and poor in terms of location, education, employment and various other indicators of economic success or failure. Among the chief take home points is the observation that prosperity is widely distributed but poverty is not, with a disproportionate concentration of distressed communities found in the South and Southwest. Furthermore, distressed  cities notwithstanding (we're talking about you Cleveland), there is high correlation between population density and prosperity; the more people in a given place, the better off they seem to be.


I'm way not smart enough to figure out what these data might mean in terms of potential solutions,  either from the top down or bottom up, for the 17% of Americans who live in distressed communities, As a political junkie, I find the data fascinating in terms of the weak correlation between the economic status of these areas and how they vote. Here is deeply prosperous and deeply blue Virginia (distress rate 17%) side by side with deeply distressed and deeply red West Virginia (distressed rate 34%). Poor New Mexico (29%) votes blue, while more prosperous Texas (22%) remains deeply red. These data, it seems it me, say something powerful about the limitations of an economic message as a tool to attract voters. The Republicans, it seems, have already absorbed that lesson


Eli   

The Man In The Arena

Bill

"As a boy, my family legacy, as fascinating as it was to me, often felt like an imposition, I knew from a very early age that I was destined for Annapolis and a career in the Navy. In reaction, I often rebelled in small and petty ways to what I perceived as an encroachment on my free will.

I concede that I remember with affection the unruly passions of youth, and how they governed my immature sense of honor and self-respect. As I grew older, and the challenges to my self-respect grew more varied and serious, I was surprised to discover that while my sense of honor had matured, its defense mattered even more to me than it did when it was such a vulnerable thing that any empty challenge threatened it."

"Like most people, when I reflect on the adventures and joys of youth, I feel a longing for what is lost and cannot be restored. But though the happy pursuits of the young prove ephemeral, something better can endure, and endure until our last moment of life. And that is the honor we earn and the love we give when we work and sacrifice with others for a cause greater than our self-interest. For me that cause has long been our country. I am a lucky, lucky man to have found it, and am forever grateful to those who showed me the way. What they gave me was much more valuable and lasting than the tribute I once paid to vanity.

I am the son and grandson of admirals, My grandfather was an aviator; my father a submariner. They were my first heroes, and their respect for me has been one of the most lasting ambitions of my life. They gave their lives to their country, and taught me lessons about honor, courage, duty, perseverance and leadership that I didn't fully grasp until later in life, but remembered when I needed them most. I have been an imperfect servant of my country for many years. But I am their son, and they showed me how to love my country, and that has made all the difference for me, my friends, all the difference in the world.''

-John McCain-Meridian Mississippi March 31, 2008

As an adult, there was not a man in public life whom I admired more.

Eli

Everything before the word "but" is horse shit.

Eli,

The Washington Post reports on Elizabeth Warren:

The Massachusetts Democrat unveiled a proposal Wednesday aimed at fundamentally recalibrating the mission of the biggest corporations, pushing them away from maximizing immediate returns for shareholders and executives and toward investing in longer-term value and sharing gains with workers.

In an interview with CNBC's John Harwood she states:

“I am a capitalist,” she told Harwood. “I love what markets can do, I love what functioning economies can do. They are what make us rich, they are what create opportunity. But only fair markets, markets with rules.”

There's a line in "Game of Thrones," from Jon Snow:

Sansa Stark: They respect you, they really do, but you have to... Why are you laughing?

Jon Snow: What did father use to say? Everything before the word "but" is horse shit.

Bill

State of CT

Eli,

Can CT go Republican? Until Trump I thought it was a certainty. Not so sure now since we in CT like to sneer at New Yorkers, particularly those from Queens.

In 2009-10 the Dems had a 114-37 advantage in the State House and an 24-12 advantage in the Senate.
By 2017-18 the lead had dropped to 80-71 in the House and tied in the Senate 18-18.
Of course, the entire Congressional delegation is Democratic, which has to be the result of gerrymandering; there couldn't possibly be another explanation.

Malloy is one of the most hated governors in the US, the CT economy seems stuck in neutral, and the pension liability is a killer. [Speaking of that, isn't the first rule of holes, 1) When you are stuck in a hole, stop digging.? So why would the state continue to use pensions? I have a 401K. Why not switch all new workers to 401K's and migrate current workers to 401Ks?] Can all of that overcome our Yankee distaste for the boorishness of Mr. Trump? It would be very interesting to see CT turn Red at the state level, at least in the Governor's office and Senate.

I'm not registered with either party, so I won't be able to join the primary fun. I'm amused by the Dem's choice for Governor: The rich guy who is the descendant of one of the principals of JP Morgan or the guy who's the criminal. Frankly I'm confused who is running on the Republican side. I'm not a fan of business people running for office thinking they are going to apply their magical business skills to government. My impression, working with businessmen for many years, is they are not as smart as they think. And government is much different than business.

Bill

My Primary Ballot

Bill,


The missus and I are headed to the Canadian Rockies for our annual August walk up-and-down the mountain. I'm hoping they let us in without having to apply for refugee status, and that they don't deport us at least until vacation is over. We'll be away during the August primary, and so, faithful voters that we are, have our absentee ballots in hand. Here are this Democrat's choices to meet their
Republican opponents in the general election.


Governor-Ned Lamont. An easy choice. Don't know what I'll do if Joe Ganim gets the nod. I've voted for a lot of Republican governors, but if the choice ends up between a crook and a Trumpist I might have to sit that one out.


Lieutenant Governor-Eva Zimmerman-this choice will have you rolling your eyes I am sure. Her politics are undoubtedly to the left of mine. Like my grandfather, she is a labor organizer, so there is a tug of the heartstrings. She is well spoken and seems reasonably bright. Her opponent, Susan Bysiewicz is a hack in the classic mold. The deal she made with Lamont to withdraw from the governor's race in exchange for his support is classic backroom stuff (and certainly no credit to Lamont).  Besides, how much damage can a lieutenant governor do? I know you'll remind me of that statement if she ever ascends to the top office.


For Congress in the Fighting Fifth-Mary Glassman. Here I get to do what I am well known and justifiably criticized for, which is to take the opposite side of the argument I just made for Eva Zimmerman. Glassman is a run-of-the-mill candidate, with middle-of-the-road (or what passes for middle-of-the-road nowadays) Democratic positions, and seems reasonably capable. Jahana Hayes? Where do I begin? A loudmouthed, deeply stupid candidate who has no idea how governing works and will accomplish nothing except to make the House more polarized. She and those like her represent the Democratic equivalent of the Tea Party wing on the other side, with all its attendant ills. What's worse, a Hayes candidacy will make this race much more competitive against whatever Trump fanatic ends up on the other side.


For Attorney General-William Kim. The son of immigrants. A University of Chicago Law grad. Best equipped to carry on the fight.




 Eli

Congrats. You Win Gerrymandering

Eli,

Shame on me. I clinked on the link about the Colorado re-districting commission, read a bit, sighed and stopped. I never got to the punch line on how it was organized. I, like our President, refuse to accept blame. I blame the author. If someone doesn’t tell me exactly what they want in about 2 paragraphs I assume what they are going to say. Or I move on.

Interesting take on incumbency. I go back and forth on this. If you have a good congressperson why shouldn’t they stay a long time? I’d still be skeptical of this commission solving that. Would (woudn’t) Dems and Repubs do their darndest to draw the districts to keep them in office. That leaves the independents to keep everyone honest, so why not just use the indies. Now we’re back to the experts.

Sigh.

Bill

Why Did The Russians Interfere In the 2016 Election?

Bill,


I don't know of course, since Vladimir Putin hasn't been talking to me lately. Even though the net effect of their activity may have been to provide a small advantage to Trump, I am dubious that their primary intent was to actually help him win, since no one thought he would. Not you or me, not Hillary, and certainly not Donald Trump. And I don't think they were particularly invested in damaging American democracy whatever that means. American democracy is way too resilient for their shenanigans to have much of a lasting or powerful effect.


My guess is that they saw their efforts as an instrument to limit the effects of American power. Russia is a 3rd rate nation, with a miserable economy that functions slightly above third world levels, a pathetic standard of living, limited life expectancy and host of social ills. No one after all. is clamoring to emigrate to Novosibirsk. It is in John McCain's memorable phrase, a gas station masquerading as a country. Russia is not, and never will be, on the same playing field as the United States in economic productivity, education, innovation, quality of life, culture, and host of other arenas that I can't think of at the moment. 


What Russia does have is a robust state-of-the-art community of intelligence services and great cyber espionage capabilities. That's hardly a surprise, since it's run by a spy. So if it can't compete in an equal and transparent way with American influence, the answer is to bring America down to its level. And the easiest way to do weaken Americans' faith in their government and in each other, to sow discord within the body politic, limit unity of purpose, promote paralysis, and weaken resolve. With regards to those goals, one would have to acknowledge, they've been pretty effective at what they set out to do.


Bill  
     

Abolish Gerrrymandering

Bill


I am in fact strongly in favor of abolishing gerrymandering entirely, and have been for as long as I can remember understanding what it is. The problem for me is not that gerrymandering benefits Democrats or Republican since both sides, as you point out, do it. The problem is that it benefits incumbents. It turns democracy on its head, allowing legislators to pick their own votes, and diminishes the power of voters to remove them from office. Most damaging in my opinion, it increases polarization (on both sides). and limits the potential for compromise.


The Colorado reform law and similar laws in Arizona, Utah and elsewhere, doesn't rely on a panel of experts to draw districts. It relies on a mixture or Democrats, Republicans and Independents (to insure that  Dems and Repubs don't collude together). The law emerged after an endless series of bitter fights resolved only after the courts intervened. One analysis suggests that the Colorado law will likely erode the Democratic advantage in the legislature. As far as minority-majority districts created under the Voting Rights act, it can be argued that under many circumstances they dilute the power of minority voters by packing them into gerrymandered districts.


Eli
   

Experts are Humans Too

Eli,

I’m amused by what sets people off, including what I thought was a benign comment that I have less faith than you in the expertise of experts. To me it’s a rather mundane belief that experts don’t set aside their human failings while being experts. I know I don’t. My job requires me to evaluate businesses,  plans, valuation, competition and personnel. The hardest part is keeping emotion out of it because so often I don’t want something to succeed because of some offense I’ve taken. Pure emotion overrides my analytical expertise. Happens often. I don’t think I’m that different than the average person, or expert, in that respect. There are parts that are mechanical, less subject to emotion, and that aspect, sure, experts are marvelous.

This exchange arose because I questioned a Colorado proposal to give the power to draw representative districts to an expert commission. Giving polticial power to a group is dangerous, why would I just hop on board becasue they are “experts?”  Plus, it seems the Dems (you) only really cared about gerrymandering when the GOP won. Maybe not, maybe you think all gerrymandering should be eliminated. Are you willing to argue the majority-minority districts should be part of that elimination? After all, they are court ordered gerrymandering. Will the experts be allowed to exclude those when they un-gerrymander? And if so, how will they treat the changing aspects of the special districts. And I’m willing to be convinced, but  not convinced currently, that gerrymandering is worse now than it was at any other time in our history or results in an unrepresentative House. The last time I checked if a party wins about 50% of the vote they get about 55% of the reps, and that’s kind of where we are now.

So not only do I still have less faith in the expertise of experts, but I’m not convinced gerrymandering is such a vital issue that only exerts can solve.

Bill

What's Wrong With Expertise?

Bill,

The current cultural tide against expertise continues to rise. I freely confess that I don't understand it. I'm an expert at what I do. So are you. Expertise informs almost every aspect of our daily lives. Expertise  ensure that our buildings don't collapse, that our food is safe to eat and our water safe to drink (oops, on second thought not so much). We no longer explain natural phenomena as the work of the gods, or use haruspices  to predict the future (at least most of us don't).

Experts are frequently wrong to be sure. Just consider the previous example. What appears to be true can and does change. In the world I know best, the long running debate over coffee is a salient example. But accumulated knowledge counts for something. And most experts, like you and me, are trying to do the best they can, day after day, with the tools that they have accumulated , and to change their opinions as the facts around them change. Usually that something boils down to health, safety and emotional well being. Ignoring or denigrating expertise has consequences. Just ask the Somali residents of Minneapolis  or the citizens of Miami Beach.


Eli

We He Goes Dumb, We Go Dumber

Eli,

I've always found Michelle Obama's "When they go low, we go high," amusing. I guess accusing Mitt Romney of murder and Paul Ryan of pushing old people off the cliff were grandfathered in.

The slogan of the Trump opponents is, "When he goes dumb, we go dumber." Given all the dumb things Trump says there is a constant race to the dumbest. The latest dumb Trump statements about Russia and hacking Clinton, the DNC and DCCC were mind-numbing idiocy and infuriating as well.

Not to be outdone: Former CIA head John Brennan:

Donald Trump’s press conference performance in Helsinki rises to & exceeds the threshold of “high crimes & misdemeanors.” It was nothing short of treasonous. Not only were Trump’s comments imbecilic, he is wholly in the pocket of Putin. Republican Patriots: Where are you???

A Democratic representative from Tennessee I've never heard of (the congressman, not the state) said this:

Where are our military folks ? The Commander in Chief is in the hands of our enemy!

He then claimed he wasn't calling for a military coup. OK sport.

I didn't vote in the 2016 election because I found both candidates foul and loathsome. And I thought maybe the Dems would try to put up a reasonable alternatives for the midterms and for 2020, but it doesn't look that way. Instead it looks like Gresham's Law being applied to the political markets.

Very depressing.

Bill

Idiot In Chief

Bill,


I've been a missing partner in our ongoing conversation for a long time and I offer my apologies. Like many Americans of my political sensibility, I've witnessed the last year and a half with increasing dismay, and have had to work hard to overcome that dismay and continue to oppose the policies  I disagree with.  Much of what has occurred (deregulation, tax reduction, half hearted and unsuccessful attempts to reduce the size of the welfare state, repeated attempts to inject Christian religious preference into public policy etc) would be expected of any contemporary Republican administration, so I may not like it, but can I can hardly be surprised it or view it as something novel. And I can continue to take the long view that the much of the nativism and bigotry on display is also nothing new; from the Chinese Exclusion Act (in force for 60 years)  to the Immigration Law of 1924 (not repealed until 1965) to the general disdain and prejudice exhibited against your ancestors and mine, resistance to the arrival of new Americans is bred into the country's DNA.


What I can't absorb(along with every major economist and the Chamber of Commerce)  is the raw stupidity of so much of what passes for policy coming from the White House. So much of what is touted as economic wisdom seems to violate every principle of how to grow an economy. A trade war looms. Trumps coal obsession is the ultimate picking winners and losers.


Meanwhile, while the longest expansion in modern US economic history continues, storm clouds are gathering. I don't think this ends well. And when the consequence of Administration policy finally unfold, the Idiot-in-Chief will blame everyone else but himself.


Eli   

Dueling Know Nothings

Eli,

This article, "Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Ambitious Plan to Save the Planet," on the new darling of the Left,  had this rather typical ambition for many of Malthus/Tarbell/Ehrlich/Hansen/Gore/Mann crowd:

... she has proposed implementing what she calls a “Green New Deal,” a Franklin Delano Roosevelt–like plan to spur “the investment of trillions of dollars and the creation of millions of high-wage jobs,” according to her official website. “The Green New Deal we are proposing will be similar in scale to the mobilization efforts seen in World War II or the Marshall Plan,” she told HuffPost last week. “We must again invest in the development, manufacturing, deployment, and distribution of energy, but this time green energy.”

Riddle me this: How is it Trump, for instance, is a buffoon for wanting to use the power of government to tip the market in coal's favor but Cortez is sage beyond her years for wanting to use the power of government to tip the market in wind and solar's favor? From my perspective they are both economic know-nothings.

Bill

Descent Into Darkness

Bill,


The death of Anthony Bourdain has led to an unexpected chain of emotions from your faithful correspondent, some welcome, some not. I just read Kitchen Confidential. It's an extraordinary memoir, filled with wet-your-pants humor, masterful showmanship and searing honesty. It's dirty and soaring and sobering. He writes with a clarity and punch that I can only envy. You feel like you are sitting across the table (eating great food of course) as he recounts outrageous anecdote after anecdote, all connected to his deep love of cooking and his unblinking self awareness of the chaos and failed chances within his own life. He never imagined that Kitchen Confidential would transform his life that it did, catapulting him into the inner circle of the cooking world and turning him into an international celebrity. Despite his success and fame, he never lost his humility. He never reneged on his acceptance of responsibility for the crap he did and the people he harmed. He gave himself minimal credit for his deep respect for his comrades-in-arms in the kitchen, especially the mostly Black and Brown line cooks, dishwashers, busboys, and night porters. He never made himself out to be more than the journeyman chef he was, and he accepted that as the inevitable consequence of the choices that he alone made . Reading the book in the aftermath of his suicide, one could see hints of  despair lurking underneath the machismo. He tells a chilling story of an incompetent cook who hangs himself a week after being fired that feels clairvoyant. His excellence as a writer and his lust for life that shines throughout the book makes his own irreversible descent into darkness all the more incomprehensible.


But that is not true. Not for this writer. In the fall of 2015, as the buzzing in my  head grew  louder and more intolerable, I begin planning. The 7th floor of the parking lot looked inviting. But that would make a mess, and a spectacle, and I might end up alive but paralyzed, so perhaps a long swim out into the cove from our summer home would work, and might be constructed as an accident,. In that case I figured, the harm, the irreversible across-the-generations  damage to my family that I knew death would cause would somehow be lessened. Finally I settled on the garage. I would sit in my car with the door closed and wonder how long it would take, who would find me in cold and still in my improvised  gas chamber. I was sure I was done for. I was certain I couldn't function with the tinnitus for which there was no cure or relief . I was diminished, hopeless. and angry. I sought help from a psychologist and then a psychiatrist, both of whom turned out to be blaming and inept. After a particularly bad weekend I drove into work knowing that if I returned home alone I would kill myself. I paged the liaison psychiatrist and told him so.


They took my belt and shoes, and after they let me call my wife, my cell phone  The doctor came in and took a long and careful history of the progression of my tinnitus and depression and then left. The emergency room physician couldn't quite believe that there was nothing with the brain of this 60 something year old physician with no history of mental illness, and so ordered a useless )and expensive) MRI. Finally they loaded me into an ambulance and brought me to a locked unit  75 miles away. Golden Valley we can call it. I spent the next five days in oversized sweat pants in the company of the 15 most disconnected human beings I've ever encountered. Disconnected from each other, from themselves, and often from reality. I read books and wondered whether how the hell any of this would make any difference


Like any savvy inmate I learned the rules. No complaining to or about the sadistic bitch of an aide, not if you wanted to get out and not be sent back once you were. No razor, no nail clipper, no dental floss? No problem! Even though the possibility was still quite real I knew had to promise I wouldn't harm myself  before they would let me go, and so I did. In the entire time I spent there I saw 2 different bored looking shrinks for exactly five minutes apiece. For those five days they kept me alive. I'll give them credit for that. I'll also give them credit for making it so unpleasant that I would never, ever go back. 


A different, better psychologist there told me story about a famous Napa restaurant called the French Laundry. Despite the bizarre cost of a meal (think 4 figures for 2) it's impossible to get in as my wife and I learned during a trip through wine country some years back. But this guy had lived there and had buddies and so got a res with no trouble . Something came up, he had to cancel but his pals told him not to worry, the res would remain available any time he wanted. Suicidal ideation is like that. Something about your life sucks; your marriage or your kids, your job, your financial situation, your health. It doesn'1t matter what the particular suck is. Suicide is a solution, and as long as you keep that reservation open it's available, waiting  for you. So you after cancel that reservation. That story was the beginning of the journey out.


My daughter, my wife, my ex-wife,  and one gifted psychiatric social worker saved my life. "I need you Dad" my daughter said to me during her visit to Golden Valley, and that settled that. If she needed me to be around I would goddamn be around, buzz in my head or no. After discharge I entered an old fashioned psychotherapeutically oriented day program. There you create the most intimate relationships you will ever have with folks you have never met before and will never see again. You listen to and tell each other stuff you would never tell anyone else. And you root for each other get well. 


During one particularly bad morning with the tinnitus at full blast. the social worker said to me. "You  know Eli. you don't sound like someone who can't think straight. You sound  like yourself" So the buzzing was unpleasant for sure, but not disabling. It wouldn't kill me. Only I could do that.  An old fashioned no nonsense master-of-psychiatry took me on. I left the day program went back to work. Everybody acted liked I'd never left. Lots of meds off and on with wonderful side effects like night sweats and anorgasmia.  Lots of trips to Brooklyn to see a 90 year old ENT doc who for some reason has spent his life treating a problem  that affects 50 million American and that almost no one  is interested in. My wife was scared shitless through the whole thing but (almost) never showed it. We learned to meditate together (the biggest thing)  I returned to a lot of undeserved love and a life worth living.


I don't think much about my trip through the dark side. But I don't forget about it either. I have a little scout up in the front of my brain peering through the twilight for trouble, and a firmly honed commitment to snuff it out. And if I had some cosmic power for a do over, I would say to Anthony Bourdain, or anyone else, Give someone who cares about you a day. 1 day, And then another day after that, and another. Until you can look out of your hole and see the light that will surely come.  


Eli