You all are in trouble, because I am home tonight from ten weeks on the road and am taking the night for myself, writing about one of the Very Cool Things I learned in my travels. I expect there will be more stories along these lines in the next several weeks.
My great aunt was a WPA artist in Oregon. She was one of the artists who did weaving and other work on Timberline Lodge in Oregon. While in college, I did a paper on this amazing program and interviewed several artists about the tremendous impact on their lives. These programs are important. They help feed our souls. Thanks Heather for telling a piece of the story.
Yes “feed souls” and we need this badly. Civilian Conservation Corps and WPA and the Peace Corps were all PEOPLE HELPING PEOPLE projects. Not the government helping corporations in the hope (?) that they ( now that they are persons) will trickle down some benefit to some people. And keep in mind that these corporations must do their best to benefit shareholders. What nonsense. Everywhere you look people are the victims of our sclerotic system being used by sclerotic legislatures controlled by a sclerotic group of politicians all for the benefit of the few. And BTW I am thrilled that President Biden is calling out Trump. It is about time because although we all would like a quitter and more gentle discourse , this is not the time . Lastly if women (and men) all over America don’t see the application of ridiculous abortion laws (Texas for example) as a threat to themselves and their daughters and sisters then we real are in trouble in this coming election. All must come out and vote.
Politics and politicians have recently been occupying too much of our daily lives; we need a quieter America - “walk softly and carry a big stick” approach ... so “don’t boo - VOTE”!!!
I will never understand how some Congressmen can support legislation that will hurt their own families, not to mention the constituents they are supposed to represent!
Innocent people would suffer but...follow my logic. Representatives are voted by the people to represent them. This means they vote for what the people want. When politicians vote no, they are saying that the people in their state do not want WiFi, improvements on their airports, ports, roads, decaying bridges ( 50 year life span on those), clean water, child care ( a bit of a stretch). They should get none. This is what their people want.( Ironically it seems that the red states need the most help). It should be made abundantly clear that this is what their elected representing them voted for. Maybe this would make people see that they better check out platforms. Look at the abortion issue. The majority of people are pro choice, yet their representatives voted prolife.
That's something that trump would do but I prefer the idea of our government trying to help everyone. I'm hoping that the people who voted for republicans and against Biden will see that what he's doing is helping them. And we need to make sure they realize it.
Don’t forget about gerrymandering which is rampant and decidedly limiting the power of voting in many states, not to mention the interference of private big money (ie, corporate) PACS impacting elections nationwide on ebery level, and last but not least - huge disinformation and election rigging efforts by many destructive interests - not only Americans but Russian, Chinese and North Korean to name some big ones. People who are voting are not always “getting what the deserve” nowadays. And to say so is insultingly shortsighted and unrealistic, not to mention unfair. Not one person impacted by mass scale hog farming living in those NC areas “wanted” or voted for that monstrous unfairness - but state legislators who benefited financially did vote for it and gerrymandered voting districts to keep voting for it. Just one of many examples of corrupt pols changing the weight of one person-one vote dynamics in devastating fashion. In my view, things are not as simple as you suggest.
Well frankly, being elected to Congress, Is more of a function of being able to raise money, and lying your a** off, rather than being intelligent. Susan, have a great day.
I don't either. I was just thinking, wait a minute, these things being done & promised by a dangerous minority aren't even remotely in line with representing citizens or democracy, they are the very thing that they are saying is a threat, an autocracy. Of course we can't understand this level of delusion, there is no understanding crazy.
George, excellent post. And now we have the state Supreme Court in Texas issuing a stay on the abortion case when each and every day the situation becomes more threatening to this woman's life and her ability to bear other children.
Shocking is the reaction I had, too. The ruling perfectly encapsulates the nightmare that Republicans have wrought. Let's hope it further invigorates the voters to rise up and end this dystopian madness.
Kate Cox is a victim of tyranny from an unholy alliance of radical religion and authoritarian government.
Careful, that is my home state. Ok, I admit that the state is trying to get back to 1836 when they got their freedom from Mexico. Only because the Mexican Army was asleep and got surprised. But aside from that, the state is trying to make sure that everyone understand that women are no more than just your everyday piece of luggage Just baby carriers. That is it. Once the baby is born, the state loses interest in the child. That is why we rank in the bottom third in schools, first in uninsured kids, no Medicaid, and on and on. The attorney General is as rotten as a 6 month old Apple. I I were a woman, I would be gone.
How does the US maternal mortality rate compared to the world?
The U.S. rate for 2021 was 32.9 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births, which is more than ten times the estimated rates of some other high income countries, including Australia, Austria, Israel, Japan and Spain which all hovered between 2 and 3 deaths per 100,000 in 2020.Mar 16, 2023
When I click on the 3 dots to the far right below my comment, I have two choices: Edit or Delete. Do you have the 3 dots? A few people have mentioned that they don't, on their phone (I think iPhones). The 3 dots are there for me be it on laptop or cellphone. Don't know what to tell you but I'm sure everyone else understood you meant "quieter" even if they did the same double-take I did - I only commented because it's such an unfortunate typo for the context.
What a great legacy. As someone who grew up east of the Rockies, I fell in love with the Timberline Lodge.when I first visited in the eighties. I was staggered that trees could be so big.
Timberline Lodge is a magical place! The andirons in the fireplaces, the carvings, textiles - wrought iron hinges on massive doors....The artists who shared their talents to create this exquisite place have left a magnificent legacy.
This lodge is magnificent. In the night, we left from this lodge to climb Mt Hood and we returned in the early morning. I feel so fortunate to have been there. It is similar to the lodge in Paradise, where we left from and returned to when climbing Mt Rainier, but much more awesome. CA needed one there at the base of Mt. Whitney. The ones in Glacier National Park are more chalets than lodges.
I too climbed Mt Hood in 1963 after taking a weeks long climbing class with the Mazamas, at the time the largest climbing club in the world, you had to climb a mountain with a glacier on it to become a member. We left Timberline at 1:00 AM to begin the climb, we stopped to watch the sun rise at 10,000’ and made the summit around 7 AM, we were back down to Timberline by noon. My high school winter’s were spent skiing ⛷️ out of Timberline, the place is a national treasure to be sure. In the summer you could take a snow cat up to the 10,000’ level where they would have a 1,200’ long Poma lift in place and you could ski there all day in shorts and t-shirts if you wanted before beginning a 3 mile run back down to Timberline, which is named of course for the elevation where trees stop growing in the Cascades. I have absolutely wonderful memories of that place.
You should visit Timberline today! I took the Mazama class and climbed Mt Hood as graduation in 1960. That Poma lift has been replaced with a chair lift and several others have been built as Timberline has adapted to become a year-round resort for all kinds of snow sports and summer biking and hiking.
Wow a fellow Mazama member, one of the things that I remember was just how hard it was to stop a lead climber fall with a belay, it felt like the rope was going to cut me in half, we didn’t have figure eights, just hand strength, that and practicing self arrest after pitching backwards down a steep slope and using an ice ax to arrest the tumble, that was the most terrifying thing I remember. It sounds like you did the course 2 years before me, I bet we had some of the same teachers, I took what I learned there into the Army, and Special Forces especially rope work, it’s probably why I’m still alive today. 🙏
Well, I was 15 at the time, and have lived in every west coast state since then.
But yes, I remember the shock of the rope going taught! I especially liked the rock climbing sessions at Horsethief Butte. In those days Highway 35 was closed in winter so from The Dalles we had to go almost to Maupin to get to Timberline. The Mazamas and The Mountaineers are still active and involved. As are the Crag Rats in Hood River.
Timberline has become even more important as it has kept up with the changes in recreation.
It is indeed beautiful. We took my sister and my niece up there when they were here. My sister, who lived in the midwest, was overwhelmed, especially by being so far up a mountain.
As our daughter and spouse move to Seattle, will add Timberline Lodge to the list of places to visit. The images look fantastic and remind me a little of The Ahwahnee in Yosemite. Thanks
And it's an ongoing legacy as those iron, wood, and textiles have been replaced by copies created in the same traditions as the originals have worn out.
What nobody but a few Oregonians know is that there is an old two-story guard station that was built by the same crew and with the same care, about twenty miles SE of Timberline Lodge at Clackamas Lake. I stayed there during the summer of 1969 while working for the Forest Service. It has a fireplace with a stone hearth where every stone is cut to fit with no visible mortar. The walls are made of wood paneling and not one of the panels has a knot in it. It is a beautiful building that can now be rented for overnight stays.
While I love New Deal art and the murals at Coit Tower, what has impressed me since I was a tot growing up in New York City were the stone bridges, the stone underpasses and overpasses, always the same style, immaculately cut and totally strong and practical.
It just amazed me ever more as I grew up that people had the skill set to fashion stones, heavy stones, that always fit perfectly and now have lasted 80 and 90 years.
They also used their amazing abilities to add stone ornamentation to buildings all over the city, for the high and mighty on Park Avenue and the growing middle class in the outer boroughs as well. No simple, repeated metallic fronts for them. Buildings needed that special extra touch, in stone of course, that made them works of art.
way out in here in CA on ling hiking trails in Yosemite National Park granite steps were 'perfectly' laid on steep trails.
OK, I am on the hunt for the for the WPA Masterpiece Stone Teachers.
Got it, the "rock work masons" identified at livingnewdeal.org. Crews of young people in the Civilian Conservation Corp (CCC) did all the rock work in Yosemite National Parl. [L]ivingnewdeal.org has media of Eleanor Roosevelt at Yosemite in 1938 with a CCC Crew. I guess that would be CCCC. CCC even laid sod for the abandoned Yosemite airport.
I was impressed by the stacked stone “guardrails” the CCC constructed along the highway running the length of the Smokey Mountain National Park. They were built by master craftsmen who carefully selected each stone to fit precisely with the others. There is no visible mortar. Years later more “guardrails” were built on additional curves and the lack of care and craftsmanship is obvious. The fitting is sloppy and the walls were heavily mortared together.
And just think, the stone masons of the middle ages constructed immense cathedrals from stone & a type of concrete that I learned not too long took 1,000 years to completely dry! Amazing what a person can do when given the opportunity to thrive & innovate. We see it today in many of our tech entrepeneurs. While not esspecailly artistic, still innovative & much of it helps everyone, not just the wealthym though many of them get more than their fair share of the benefits.
May well have been designed by the architect who developed all the National Park design guidelines in the 20's/30's. He also was commissioned to design park infrastructure for other agencies, mostly in the Arts & Crafts style that came out of UC Berkeley.
Apparently there was quite a brouhaha building about what Timberline was going to look like when the National Forest stepped in and said: " Leave it to us".
Your point about “what nobody knows” is so important! So many of us do not know anything about other states or what their contribution to greatness is. Perhaps we could have a plan to magnify each state concerning the great things that have come out of their particular borders. Then, musicians from all over the country could write compositions in honor of the state. Concentrate on the GOOD and beautiful that each state can be boastful about.
Then we Americans, can build the best fast speed rail systems crossing our great country so all of us can celebrate seeing the uniqueness of each state. Make us all proud to be from incredible places. There are many and we could focus on bringing one another together under one kaleidoscopic wonder( our America) the jewel it can be and is.
We could have a national contest of artists and musicians and workers who bring the magic to us in and through their work.
HCR, will you also be writing stories of the lives of Americans who have made and make into art the stuff of their often difficult lives? What of Hip-hop/rap; graffiti, breakdance...? It is not part of your life but might the subject be apt for an American historian? Might you invite others from their milieu and the artists to share this creative world with us?
That's so cool! Timberline Lodge is so amazing. I'm not a skier, but I love to visit Timberline and wander around. My sister and brother-in-law got married there.
Timberline Lodge and The Friends of Timberline Lodge have continued to employ and train artists in textiles, iron, and wood as they have maintained and restored the original works. Some of those outdoor woodcarvings have been replaced a dozen times. Timberline Lodge must be one of the most successful WPA projects; a legacy of Roosevelt's New Deal that we can all celebrate.
I have only been there to admire the lodge, have a meal, and enjoy being that high in the mountains. I can snowshoe, but that's it. I should say could, because days of hikes and snowshoeing are over for me. I did see that a couple places in the mountains have enough snow to open for skiing. I can remember having about five feet at a lower elevation place on Veteran's Day.
I agree with you! Wikipedia has a wonderful list of post office murals, by state with images of some included, and the title, year, and artist. I'm thinking this needs to be something I look for the next time I am on the road in the US.
Don’t forget, people: the MAGA Republicans don’t support Rump because of his political and economic successes (if there are any), they don’t care about that. Every scandal, every indictment, every accusation, it doesn’t turn them away, it just makes their support stronger. Why? They support him BECAUSE he is an asshole, and teaches them that it’s fully ok (or even admirable) to be a misogynistic, racist asshole themsleves. He teaches them to hate, and they love that - and cannot therefore be reasoned with anymore.
The big difference between Rump and Biden is that Rump doesn’t care about ordinary people at all; if he would have frescoes painted, they would be about him, him, and more him, probably portrayed in a white toga and a crown of laurel at that (or with a red cape toting a shot gun). But Biden _does_ care about ordinary people, and it shows. And I think it’s important to get _that_ message across - to ordinary people…
Put aside for the moment Trump's cozy relations with the Mob and "money pouring in from Russia". Robert Reich claims of Trump's mastery with his outsized inheritance:
"That just proves my point," said the Trump supporter. "He turned that $200 million into $4½ billion. Brilliant man."
"But if he had just put that $200 million into an index fund and reinvested the dividends, he'd be worth $12 billion today," I said.
Born on a mountain of cash Trump sort of cosplayed a businessman, an impresario, a airline owner, a casino operator, an educator, a president, it goes on. He is authentic a con man, distinguished by being exceptionally dangerous, but that's about it.
But Trump is so much more. He runs many of his businesses with undocumented aliens who he assists in obtaining fraudulent documents. And then he underpays them, because they can't go to the authorities. He does the same thing with H-2Bs. Why hire qualified Americans to work in your gold adorned businesses, when you can bring in Haitiians and pay them slave wages? And even when he cheats, grifts and defrauds he still loses money and is forced to declare bankruptcy. Everything he touches turns to crap. He is a born loser with a God complex.
Hi J L. "That just proves my point," said the Trump supporter. "He turned that $200 million into $4½ billion. Brilliant man."
What this proves is that the commenter knows zero about investing, business or finance. He’s using a simplistic yardstick with no concept of future values ie “4 billion better than 200 million and anyone who says different don’t know numbers”
Lord help us from the ignorant, cuz that’s what we’re dealing with
No, many of them support him because he gives the finger to other assholes, the elected officials in DC of both parties who have ignored them and made their lives miserable by legislating for monied interests at the expense of working people. Make no mistake, Trump is an asshole, a con man, and a grifter of the highest order. But his path to election has been his recognition that hooking your wagon to populist rage can work. Had Covid not happened, he would have won in ‘20, imo.
This is where the disconnect comes when talking about the economy, as everyone from Heather to Krugman continues to hammer away about the ‘good numbers’, and scold those who ‘don’t get it’. Every time this happens you get millions of Obama-Trump voters, who would potentially cast a vote for Biden, to become enraged at the economic disconnect coming from the elites, and think, screw it, I’m gonna vote for the guy giving the middle finger to the swamp.
You can call them deplorable, and stupid for not voting in their economic interest all you want, but that’s where people go when they are told the economy is great as they try to figure out whether to spend money at the grocery store or pharmacy this week.
Taibbi exposes the liberal class, Democratic Party economic gaslighting in the following YouTube clip. If the Dems really want Biden to win, they’d best take a different messaging tack when touting the economic numbers.
I posted this on November 14, so will post again. Nobel prize winning, NYT columnist Paul Krugman attempted to understand the gap between the reality of the economy and the perception of it by many Americans. These people are far more pessimistic than they should be compared to historical reality. Basically he states that what people feel about the economy has more to do of what they are told to feel about it by partisan organizations. To quote him “And it’s a running joke among economists I talk to that even mainstream news organizations apparently find it hard to say nice things about the Biden economy. When, say, a new employment report comes in, the headlines don’t usually say things like “Job growth comes in above expectations”; they’re more likely along the lines of, “Rapid job growth may slow soon, experts say, posing problems for Biden.”. “ So there you have it: by all facts inflation is down, wages up, gas prices down, and people are spending. As the actor in the movie “Cool Hand Luke” said, “What we've got here is failure to communicate.”
Sorry, I don’t at all agree with Krugman. Prices went up with inflation, but only in a few instances have they come down as fuel and raw materials costs have declined. Some of that is a spike in wage costs as wages went up pretty steeply (at the lower end of the wage scale).
Manufacturing costs and shipping delays have eased a lot, but their prices have not declined. For those utilities whose regulators allowed it, fuel surcharges were imposed, but will be removed long after fuel prices have eased.
In other words corporate greed pushed prices higher than necessary while inflation was high. But you will see few price rollbacks to match declining costs.
Notice that corporate profits were up sharply while corporate spokespersons lied that prices were up solely due to inflation. They sort of left out the part about opportunistic price gouging.
I hope the Biden Administration starts a long and very loud process of jawboning businesses to ease prices as their underlying costs go down.
Greedy corporations respond best to public shaming.
In many sectors corporate profits have reached near-record levels, yet companies still increased prices. In many cases the profits enabled major stock buy-backs that ended up lining the pockets of high-level executives. Shameless.
Welcome to America, the Land of Unregulated Capitalism and Runaway Greed.
Valid point Michael; the data you cite is 'out there' for the reading. The rosy 'academic' points of view provided by some news outlets, provided by economists of various persuasion, fails terribly by way of presenting sterile data absent greater explanation required by the greater masses. Academia has glaring 'blind spots' that despite high education, fail to see; and fail to see 'their part' in all the confusion; hence they are called 'blind spots.' For instance, when they cite broadly and generally that inflation is slowing, they are 'not' saying "Mission Accomplished." They are saying the 'rate of gain' is faltering. They also fail to present an accompanying worry called 'disinflation' and why that would be a bad trend too, although most would cheer to see for instance, to see the energy barons suffer disinflation. Japan has been suffering disinflation for over a decade now I think; and only now seeing peeks at normalizing - whatever normal is.
Good points. Excessive price hikes using inflation as cover aren't tracked and tallied, obviously, so we end up with anecdotal examples that don't get media traction. And in this era of huge cutbacks in media staffing, I'm skeptical that many outlets are eager to report on corporate greed. And disinflation? I hope it doesn't become pervasive.
As a young kid in the early 1960s it was $0.29. That’s 10 times higher in 60 years with cars that get much higher MPG. And it’s down more than a dollar from its high.
The US produces more oil that Saudi Arabia and Russia. Not necessarily a good thing but our large land base and suburbanization currently relies on gasoline.
Trump just repeats old phrases like “drill, baby, drill” to applause, slamming Obamacare and promising to replace it, and lying about all the infrastructure he built. Biden is counterpunching. Christie is the only primary opponent that calls Trump the liar an criminal that he is.
In short, Biden isn’t gaslighting average Americans. He appreciates their situation and is working to improve it. Trump’s the one gaslighting.
But it is a point well taken that we need to respect the feelings of voters and I do fear that those struggling financially, or oppose providing the bombs decimating Gaza (many young people feel this way), or think their votes have been taken for granted won’t care about the bigger picture of protecting democracy.
I still believe it wasn’t on Hillary and it won’t be on Biden if Trump wins. It will be on any American that doesn’t vote for Biden.
We don’t have a democracy to protect. The corporate coup was successfully put in place years ago.
It most certainly was on Hillary, and it will most certainly be on Biden if he loses.
If a far more talented team, with a better coach, as a prohibitive favorite, loses to an underdog with no business being on the same field, whose fault is that?
The Dems need to start owning their own incompetence when they lose elections that have no business even being close.
No offense, but your analogy is misplaced. This isn’t a game, it is people’s lives, the direction of human history.
So much for personal responsibility in a democracy. Blame the individuals actually in the arena working to advance the country forward.
We have a conservative supreme court because too many on the Left, that I have been a part of for 50 years, needed to feel morally superior to Hillary Clinton and demonized her, didn’t vote for her or both.
Yes, the Democrats have plenty of faults but the 2016, 2020, and 2024 presidential elections were/will be binary choices. Those that don’t understand that can bask in their moral superiority while Americans suffer the consequences.
It's interesting how Fox News has denigrated Krugman many times over the years and yet he still has a huge following. I love how he has followed the recession predictions and fully admits when and how he was mistaken.
I was shocked to read in the HCR newsletter- "Today, on the Fox News Channel, personality Maria Bartiromo noted that “the economy is a lot stronger than anyone understands.” " (How the heck do you punctuate a quote within a quote?)
Is this from her sane twin sister? The shock was because it is 1) true, 2) is diametrically opposed to everything she has said over the past 7 years.
The Biden Administration is communicating. People have been conditioned not to hear good news about anything the government does. We have to turn that around.
Have to thank HCR. IF Trump were not the big news item, noise from the deposed administration, the loud lost backbencher, perhaps Americans would be engaged in and talking about the policies of Mr Biden that are working for them. Almost all of the big kitchen table issues are problems for all major economies. His solutions are reversing the consequences of world-wide inflation brought on by Covid and the collapse of supply changes by means available to tighten credit (spending) and builld from the bottom up (infrastructure, costs of core goods, supply changes, health, jobs, training, wage and benefit protections). I don't know a out your communities, but here in Western Wisconsin, rural as can be, multifamily home construction, fiber optics, electric grids and clean energy projects, new manufacturing are going gangbusters. I was shocked at how much is going on. My favorite electrician (he fixes what I do poorly without laughing) told me this week that they are exhausted trying to keep up with all the work. No slow downs in early spring to catch up, 6-days a week and in better grade homes in the past two years. And two of the area plumbing contractors we deal with have opened major new locations and are hiring at a pace not seen in a long time. All this in the last two years, belying the pessimism that feds aren't spending in rural areas or that they are give aways to big companies. I wish my MAGA neighbors could look see and turn off Fox and Newsmax. Our economy is doing well and people are confident enough that borrowing to invest in a future is worth the interest rates, knowing returns will be high enough in longer term and rates to borrow will decline as they have once the Fed Reserve loosens grip on the economy.
Thanks Fred. Somewhere, on one of the many sites I read someone made an astute point wherein they summarized that "We also have to 'see' what's going right." It would be helpful if broadcast media would exercise some responsibility.
Good points; and hopefully Biden's team is taking notes regarding "failure to communicate." Let's hope team Biden takes heed and employs all the communications abilities they must be able to muster, even taking pages from others I'm coming to admire. For instance, there's a brilliant lady running in California for a senate seat that has my attention and support, even though I can't vote for her from Ohio. Her name is Katy Porter. She widely makes use of 'white boards' when explaining complex issues, connecting 'dots'. I rather find that brilliant.
I wouldn't call speaking of the economy in a positive way "gaslighting". The positive stats about unemployment and new job opportunities are something to crow about. We should be touting the good stuff. But we also need to find Americans where they are - how they live.
And we need to remind them that it was Democrats who were trying to help the average family with child care, health care, student loans, etc. REPUBLICANS blocked the BBB. Democrats make their share of mistakes. Hardly innocent. But the difference between Joe Biden and the entire MAGA monstrosity couldn't be more stark.
However, in another way...your economic point here is well taken. If I were a younger person with a family, this is what I would be facing:
1. The cost of child care (if I could find it!) would prohibit one of us from working. Cutting our income in half.
2. Our student debt repayment has effectively replaced what would be a mortgage payment.
3. Even if we had enough for a down payment, Powell's interest rate hikes have made home ownership impossible.
4. And even if we had that down payment and figured a way to make that 7% mortgage payment, the cost of housing stock is so high as to be a sick joke. Even a fixer upper dump is over priced. And because local zoning often prohibits it, even more affordable "cluster housing" isn't being built.
5. So which one of us will stay home and sacrifice "career ranking"? The decision will be made for us. It will be the one with the lesser health insurance policy.
6. Speaking of which, while the ACA has made health "insurance" more available to many, we fell into that donut hole of health insurance hell. We make too much to qualify for Medicaid. And we make too little to afford a good comprehensive policy. Therefore, we end up with a "catastrophic coverage" policy. We are one small accident away from bankruptcy.
7. We watch and read financial news that tells us we should be planning for our kids college expenses and that we are already behind in our retirement planning. What a sick dark joke that is. We are shopping for the best price on hamburger and deciding which bill to pay late or at all...
We need to explain that efforts by Democrats to assist families are being thwarted by the MAGA Republicans whose focus is on the theft of more than the National Treasure (and giving it to the Oligarchs) is just as outrageous as their theft of a woman's reproductive rights.
I'm not talking about these families as "deplorable" or "stupid". I am stating that they are desperate. And it ain't Joe Biden's fault. It's the fault of the entire Republican/Federalist/MAGA/FakeReligion Oligarchal feudal power structure. The policies of REPUBLICANS that have given the morbidly rich more money. Since Reagan sold the American people his BS about economics, trillions have been sent to the Oligarchs and it has been funded by the working poor and our national debt.
Time for Democrats to empathize with families and explain who their enemy really is. It's the Republican "nobles" and it's time for a peaceful but dramatic economic revolution. Time for the redistribution of wealth. I would suggest my Senator Elizabeth Warren as the administrator of the program.
Tom, we probably all agree that Democrats have made many mistakes. I have my list. But targeting them now aids and abets the real enemies of democracy and economic justice.
Lakoff nailed it. We are in this endless loop of expecting that our fellow citizens would be on board "if only they understood". We live politically on an elitist (not intentionally) philosophical cloud. The pain and the answers to that pain are right down in the dirt where we live. Yes. The DNC and the WH need new "Framers". Ironic word, eh?
Bill, I love you man, and understand your pov, and know that it is heartfelt. Your bullet points about what our nation’s youth are facing are spot on. The lemmings like Kitterman and Jeri below aren’t worth my time.
Taibbi hits the point at the end of the link I shared that I think is your blind spot. When he talks about the reason that the Clintons, Krugmans, and yes, Bidens, etc. can’t admit their own culpability for our mess, forget the relative blame vs. the GOP (and you already know I place that blame much closer in degree than most of the commenters here), because to do so makes them appear stupid, or, gasp!, deplorable.
Much of this is Joe Biden’s fault, from mass incarceration to financial fraud to endless war to, hell, having Clarence Thomas sitting on the Supreme Court. There are Democratic fingerprints all over the Republican/Federalist/Fake Religion/Oligarchal feudal power structure you describe.
The Democrats can ‘empathize’ with families all they want. Words mean nothing to those who have been hammered by neoliberal economics over the past fifty years, and feel more betrayed by Democrats, because that is the party that used to align itself with working people. I target whoever I feel undercuts the working class. I don’t need to do that with the GOP here, amongst the fervent denizens of Team Blue. Whenever I have the opportunity to engage with a MAGA type, and I probably do that far more than most here whose only encounters are probably via relatives, I explain to them the fraud that is Trump and the GOP. But I get nowhere with them unless I acknowledge that the Democrats are a big part of the problem.
He could 1) admit and apologize for his role in that. 2) push for legislation to provide total, and I mean total, financial transparency and strict ethical codes for all members of the SCOTUS, and hell, while we’re at it, for Congress and the executive branch as well. 3) give a vigorous critique of corporate rule, support HJR-54, and threaten to pack the court unless corporate-friendly decisions end.
2) We lost our way, and paid more attention to our corporate donors, than to you, the people.
3) We pledge to never again accept corporate donations, dark money, and will heretofore always vote in the people’s interests.
4) We will fight to decrease the influence of the military industrial complex, and will stop weapons sales to other nations in pursuit of American hegemony.
5) We will ignore the threat of capital strikes, and work to provide a single-payer health care system for all Americans.
6) We will ignore the threat of capital strikes, and support policies that end the reign of the fossil fuel economy, and pledge a carbon neutral economy within a decade.
7) We will thwart any and all attempts at government censorship of the internet; the First Amendment, and freedom of speech, is the backbone of any democracy.
Taibbi? Really? That’s your reference? He’s entertaining, often, but hardly unbiased. I DO call your friends DEPLORABLE because they are ungrateful, entitled, traitors; they don’t think critically; they aren’t involved to solve problems; for MAGAts, it’s all about “Poor Pitiful ME.” They resent paying taxes, so they give billionaires luxury tax breaks--the same billionaires who invested overseas and promised their wealth would magically “trickle down” to them. You talk about swamp--take a look at the Puppet Masters of the Organized Crime Syndicate aka the RNC.
It is interesting to me how thin-skinned those residing in tribal silos are.
Taibbi, Hedges, Johnstone, Blumenthal, Mate, Halper, Lawrence, Gray, Dore, Greenwald, etc. all send the Team Blue lemmings such as yourself running for the Xanax every time they post a critique of governmental or liberal class orthodoxy that doesn’t align with lesser evil psychology. Sad, but also funny.
Ah . . . Typical shitLib: When self-reflection fails them, they resort to self-righteous, condescending, hyperbolic, faux gotcha spear chucking at the ‘other’. You’re just stupid.
In Bawcomville, Louisiana they had their annual Redneck Christmas Parade. Bawcomville can be described as a 'third world country'. Over 30% live below the poverty level. Drug and alcohol addiction are prevalent. This state loves Agent Orange. But why? This state lives at the bottom of all demographics. They absolutely get the shit they vote for. But, over 40% of the people who live in poverty do not vote at all. Republicans depend on these non voters to keep them in office. If you keep entire state poor, desperate and uneducated it's a win for the party of oppressors. Democrats are run out of town. In 1937 minimum wage was 25 cent an hour. In 2023 in 21 states its $7.50 an hour. Wow, that only took 96 years. Republicans protect property. Democrats protect people.
Why does a union member vote Republican? The very party that if they had their way unions would be nonexistent. Alabama is defying the courts with Republicans gerrymandering. We have the Newt Gingrich's of the country trying to tear it all apart.
When I make my phone calls for elections. The first question I ask is, "what keeps you up at night". And I take it from there. They need validation.
Who IS this Taibbi? He may be smart, but he offers no solutions. He has figured out how to play populist angst for profit. His message is useful, though. I give him a solid C for effort and an A for cleverness. He would get an A for effort if he'd try to provide solutions, instead of playing the outraged intellectual but sympathetic journalist.
Thank you Jerry. The metaverse is full of Taibbis, stoking fear and anger, all for the $$$. Seems whining about the mistakes of the past gives some no ability to see that we can be on the precipice of great strides forward. I’m sick of cynicism. I much prefer optimism!
Taibbi is a journalist. It is not the job of a journalist to provide solutions; politicians and policy wonks do that. Taibbi doesn’t play populist angst, he reports on it.
Jerry, none, I repeat, none of the writers I follow give rat’s ass about getting the most online views. I’m going to give you two links here. The first is a snippet from a Glenn Greenwald interview in which he specifically addresses the subject of audience capture, which is what you tangentially allege Taibbi was doing. The second link is the entire Taibbi interview. It’s long, but you can watch if you wish and then see if you think your clickbait criticism is valid.
In 1999 our usually reasonable State (Minnesota) elected Jesse “The Body” Ventura Governor. IMO this was also a middle finger to some of those who later would joyously embrace MAGA. The attitude: politicians don’t do anything so we might as well have some fun. One of this former wrestler’s first acts was to reduce the taxes on license plates for luxury vehicles.....including his own, of course.
You're making the economy the main point, but I don't think it is. Because, let's face it, other than building walls, Rump has no idea how to actually rebuild the American economy - except perhaps making his Repub friends and himself pay even less taxes. That way, if you're interested in your own wallet, you'd be stupid to vote for Rump.
No, it's not that. The main point is that his followers love Rump because he says it's ok to hate. It's ok to hate LGBTQ people, it's ok to make fun of disabled people, it's ok to hate your black neighbours and even their babies - why? Just because they're black. It's ok to say "fuck you Greta" because it's your gahdamn right to own a huge-ass pickup-truck and a heap of assault rifles. Fuck Nature and climate because that's just pussy liberal snow flake stuff. Do with women as you please, fuck equal rights, just grab 'em by the pussy, that's feminism for ya! THAT's why the followers of Rump are voting for him. It's the boiling racism, misogyny and hate that has been festering inside these people for as long as the Confederacy lost the Civil War, and now, finally, someone has come to set that anger and that rampant egoism free. THAT is why they are voting for him, not because of the economy.
Yeppers. Not gonna lie, I'm a hardliner there: if you vote for a fascist, you are a fascist. And the MAGAts know damn well what they are voting for: Rump is very clear about what he plans to do.
Hi Tom: As usual you make some pretty good points, and I for one appreciate not only your points, but also the differing views they can arouse. I have defined 'OiDs (orange il duce) brilliance' or attraction very similarly.
Artist Salley Mavor did "3 Branches of US Government" using a wee folk figure she created. It shows tfg reflected in mirrors for the 3 Branches. An exhibit of her work is at Southern Vermont Art Center in Manchester, Vt. A photo of this work is in this old article from the Cape Cod Times. Salley's art became more political after 2016.
Down in the Villages of The Damned (Florida) the misogynistic bigoted men and their wives that carry their misogyny flags for them, report that Agent Orange is payback for Obama. They told me that in 2016. They use the n-word when describing their feelings for non whites. The highest level of government granted them a voice for hate. And they love it. I ask where the colored bathrooms are located in every restaurant. Especially in Sarasota. I have family there. I do my best to avoid them.
Dutch Mike, yes, absolutely. Could you imagine what the images on the buildings would look like? A few stories high with his face? There would need to be barf bags placed strategically around the buildings.
Since Strump’s recent brag that he will be a dictator, I see his acolytes reasoning that he will get rid of everyone who disagrees with anything he says and leave his loyal followers “on top” at last, where they’ve never been. It will be a short celebration, however. After their dear dictator runs out of his perceived enemies, he will have to keep the rage, the projections, the show going and he will turn on them!
That's exactly the point those fascist-fans don't want to see. Heather has pointed that out repeatedly: if there is an "in" crowd and an "out" crowd, there's always a way that you can be thrown in the "out" crowd... Even people who aren't Muslim, Black or LGBTQ themselves ("he's a muslim-friend, I'm tellin' ya..." "yeah, let's report him!").
As a museum exhibit professional, I have experienced the genius of the Earth's peoples through working with their material culture. Art is not an add-on. The arts are integral to our beings and cultures. Thank you for highlighting this historic support for the creative minds and hands of our nation. I hope we can continue to support and encourage those whose work has artistic value even if it does not bring monetary riches. We would be in a very dull and static world without them.
I don't know if I'm right about this, but it seems to me that science (which I love) tries to see the world as we think it would still be if no one was here to see it. The arts deal with our experience of being human, even the most abstract and fanciful examples. It's mind play and and resonance with our feeling self. The world that only exists as long as there is a human to encounter it. I think the arts transmit insight, visceral and senses-based records and novel arrangement of experience, and cultural definition in ways that are likely far more part of who we are as individuals and and a culture than we realize or can pin down. People have been doing it since at least the stone age. It's not an add on, it's central.
Art is probably hard wired into our psyches. I just read a story about beautiful sand structures built by blowfish off Japan to attract a mate. Flowers and feathers are natures enduring art all of which give us joy in living.
Would love to post that pic on here. wasn't it Einstein who said that if you ask a fish to climb a ladder, it will think it's stupid. But they have skills that we never imagined.
In his essay on history, Emerson wrote: "Nature is an endless combination and repetition of a very few laws. She hums the old well-known air through innumerable variations. Nature is full of a sublime family likeness throughout her works... "
I agree with you description of art. But not of science.
As a scientist, I see beauty and glory in the understanding of the nature of the world that isn’t tarnished by our lust for exploitation. Just the pure understanding of it.
I fully agree, and in the end a cornerstone of my worldview is we are as trapped by some of the hard distinctions we make as we are informed by them, the universe is all one thing, literally "one turn". We learn when we "think outside the box". My Masters thesis was about how our assigned distinctions are fluid and change with context: To an architect, a wall is substance, and the building is form. To stone mason, a stone is a substance and the wall form. To a geologist or physicist, the substance is what? Strings? We're still working it, but my point is that we focus on different aspects of the one thing, and sometimes those distinctions start feeling like the real thing when they're only markers. It's not that cut and dried of course, but I think we are more inclined to divide or lump than comprehend (as in "prehensile", grasp) as a society , than pursuing whole connecting patterns. Look how climate science struggles to penetrate the din.
In any case I was both an art and science nerd, and wrote about kinship of each in high school. That said, I think that professional science is limited to what it can precisely reproduce and measure (statistically anyway) and the arts venture beyond that into our experience of being. I'm not at all sure that sentience requires DNA, but I think that at this point the Turing Test demonstrates more about human gullibility than the portability of consciousness. So far as I am aware, only living thing feel.
I think the arts and sciences overlap and complement, and that observational and logic skills are common to both. That said, science can clarify but not settle what in human terms, most "matters". We have to "soul search" and compare notes for that. Science can show us the ways of photons and wavelength but only a living nervous systems experiences some of those wavelengths as color. Einstein said “It would be possible to describe everything scientifically, but it would make no sense. It would be a description without meaning—as if you described a Beethoven symphony as a variation of wave pressure.”
The experience of a Beethoven symphony (and I was a classical music nerd by the age of 5) can be discussed and broken down is all sorts of ways, but the "feeling" of it occurs only in a living body, and I think the arts reach and evoke those internal experiences even when particularly abstract. Sometimes I sometimes cry a bit at the beauty of the concepts in science films; as we are part and parcel of the physics of the universe, but as conscious beings, reflect all that, from a rose to those "deep field" space shots where galaxies look like snowflakes, in our sharable yet unique, individual ways. As a kid I wept to Ode to Joy. I still might.
I'll also say, since it's come to the surface (I don't know whether anyone will see this of not), that I was deeply moved by Handel's "Ode to St. Cecilia's Day. Handle's work full of musical contrasts and words by Dryden. His 1687 poem begins:
From harmony, from Heav'nly harmony
This universal frame began.
When Nature underneath a heap
Of jarring atoms lay,
And could not heave her head,
The tuneful voice was heard from high,
Arise ye more than dead.
Then cold, and hot, and moist, and dry,
In order to their stations leap,
And music's pow'r obey.
From harmony, from Heav'nly harmony
This universal frame began:
From harmony to harmony
Through all the compass of the notes it ran,
The diapason closing full in man.
Putting aside his antiquated language, his Greek-informed worldview seems remarkably prescient. My quarrel with it is that I see the inherent qualities of matter/energy and space/time as the source of that awaking, not a solitary conductor commanding the elements; the all of it. Put vinegar and soda in a drinking glass and watch matter (chemically) self-assemble.
Dryden goes on to illustrate the impact of music on our lives and passions. I prefer the Leonard Bernstein recording of Handel's orchestration, which is less dry than a strictly Baroque interpretation. I especially love the lilting counterpoint that dances lightly and gracefully around the choral recitation after (I think) "moist and dry".
Ok. What an uplifting letter HCR has written us today.
My parents worked together first in NYC, then in DC for the WPA. I recall my Dad proposed to my CA born & raised Mother by telegram from Telegraph Hill in ‘35. Now thanks to this wonderful post I realize it must have been Coit Tower.
Btwn all of us I keep thinking what if we actually met? Maybe state by state? I’m betting these groups could forge a powerful creative edge with fresh ideas and most importantly Actions.
As an artist I couldn’t agree more. It opens young minds and lights the imagination. Putting art and music back into the school curriculum would help a lot and it costs so little.
My favorite art teacher (high school, a print of his is central on my living-room wall) used to say repeatedly "Art is learning to see". I think that's part of it, and of science as well. That's the big sense of "see", of course, that is a metaphor for all our senses. That's what makes us alive, and it's both native and a discovered skill.
And then there is creative use of expression. Even words can ignite experiential richness beyond their semantic meaning, as in poetry. A line in a 80's popular song comes to mind; "When the stars and the signs and the streetlights light up the town". It paints a scenario in a single line, as well as evoking an ineffable sense of presence. Isadora Duncan said “If I could tell you what it meant, there would be no point in dancing it." It seems to me that in our neglect, the arts are being honed to manipulate us rather than to liberate us; owned from above, rather than a currency of culture.
I don't think we grasp how deeply the arts are part and parcel of what defines and transmits out humanity. I get some sense of it, but it seems to me the treads run very deep indeed. I think a major challenge to our entire culture is the degree to which we have allowed commercial media to dominate our artistic sphere. There is less room for arts from the bottom up, the arts of the people. I also watch neighborhoods of the city I once lived in transformed in into the plainest, cheapest looking boxes, no more aesthetic than warehouses, but minimally decorated with cursory geometric applique, with pricey "luxury" apartments within. To me it looks like "community be damned". I am not a world traveler, but have seen enough of Japan and Europe to marvel at some of the creativity and whimsy that defines some of the public spaces. Many of our community spaces look desiccated by comparison. It's not that we, as a nation, can't afford it.
Yes, J. L. -- "we have allowed commercial media to dominate our artistic sphere."
In the schools -- all K-12 -- the commercial interests that killed off the humanities are called standardized testing: for the sake of the billionaire classes, number, quantify, package, rank-&-file all life, as if there were no other life.
Like factories, billionaires what schools to be producing standardized, interchangeable, disposable parts for their operations. To borrow a phase from the former CEO of CBS, “It (Trump) may not be good for America, but It’s damn good for CBS”, a Reaganomic spirit that has been warping education. If the plutocratic "Powers That Be" could replace workers with robots and AI, they would, and we might see a trend emerging. This is not your granddad's automation. Do we talk about this from a planning mindset, or do we let it (and many concerning other things) drift to wherever they end up?
I agree Phil. I think, emphasis and elevation of grades and rankings is like kudzu--overwhelming education. It is being overwhelmed because a quantifiable return on investment (a mindset suited to for profit business but not such things as education) is now the operating paradigm in almost everything. The humanities are being overwhelmed by the focus on return on investment--education is becoming a money-making opportunity. Education has to directly lead to a good paying job or it is not of value. Why else do parents spend time helping their children do their homework (as though their children will not learn otherwise)? They are seeking a return on their investment. They are being forced to do this really, because of the way our society is built (make money or you are worthless). They know our winner obsessed society could leave their child in the dust. It is everywhere-- that paradigm--overwhelming everything. We are ceding everything to profit-takers I think.
How depressed I was to learn that The junk bond king (Michael. Milkin, out of prison and cancer-free, I think) turned his genius for using money as a weapon, on schools. His online learning was a corporate raid on education. Described by some as a for-profit fleece on the tax payers.
Very well put. "Arts" also includes sounds as well as physical objects. There has been such an amazing variety of music written and performed in our lifetimes by myriad talented artists. Thanks to all of the musicians that enrich our lives.
While spending time in Poland as a private English tutor, I saw some of the most beautiful murals on the post war concrete apartment buildings. Creative and uplifting!
It all begins with art. Every conversation, blueprint, and hierophany. The story of humans is really the story of art, which is the way we lonely beings share our deepest selves with each other. In this sense, we are all artists.
When we look back on ancient civilizations it is often their art work that has survived. The decorated buildings and tombs often tell us more about ancient cultures than the study of their government structures.
I feel the same, Gwen! Coit Tower is so iconically San Francisco - not just the incredible murals. You probably know, but others may not - the money to build it and the dedication to firefighters came from heiress and living San Francisco legend Lily Hitchcock Coit, who developed a mad fetish for fires and firefighters at the age of 15 when a horse-drawn fire carriage stalled on one of SF's hills and schoolgirl Lily rallied the men and helped them push it uphill herself. One of SF's most eccentric eccentrics!
Thanks for that story. Where have all of the rich eccentrics gone? I'm sure they are still around, but Elon Musk, TFFG and a few others get the headlines and feel good stories don't bring in the ad dollars.
Several years ago I was talking with a local philanthropist in Maine. He was in his early eighties at that time. We were raising money for a local project and he was one of the go to people that would always help out.
He was concerned that the number of local philanthropists was diminishing due to attrition as several had recently passed away.
But when the local food bank had a major capital project to expand their outreach it took only 6 months to raise the money for the project. They had planned for it to take 5 years. They now serve over 3000 families a month up from 1000 pre-pandemic.
5 donors gave over $100,000 each and hundreds of others gave as well. There are so many generous people out there. Our community is very fortunate to have so many people that watch out for their neighbors.
Thanks Alexandra for the story and thanks for all of the generous people unconditionally willing to help their neighbors.
Glad to pass it on, Gary, and thanks for your inspiring philanthropic story. Totally agree.
Lily Hitchcock wasn't all good intentions. She also was such a vocal Confederate sympathizer as a teen her mother took her off to Europe during the Civil War to keep her from getting herself into real trouble in pro-Union San Francisco. But she definitely had her moments. Dressed in men's clothing, gambled with the firemen, lived her best life in a time when so few women could break out that way.
"Eccentric" used to be the definition of a San Franciscan!
I lived in Davis, CA for a couple of years in the late 1970's and we used to go to Santa Clara quite often to hang out with friends. Most of them worked for Intel as either EEs or Software Engineers. They were all nerds but very very smart. One of them was from Kentucky and his name was Elmer Clay Buchanan III. We dubbed him ECB3. ECB3 looked at everything differently from the way the rest of us did. When we all went to see a movie it was like he went to a totally different movie.
I absolutely love the Bay Area but I especially love the eccentrics.
I've been called weird and a nerd also, but I just don't see it. /S
Great reminder that good government supports the voice of the people. Among those receiving WPA funding for the arts was writer and Songwriter Woody Guthrie, though he actually started with the WPA building projects. Another was Meridel LeSeuer, one of the outstanding writers of feminist and environmental matters of our time, and a long term President of the International Women’s League for Peace and Justice. Interestingly, Woody and Meridel were friends, and many a night was spent discussing issues while their children listened. Meridel’s daughter Rachel met Kenneth Tilsen on a picket line protesting segregation at the Prom Ballroom in St. Paul. They married and had a long life of activism including legal defense of the Morrill Hall Eight, Dennis Banks, Leonard Peltier, and the Native Americans in the FBI siege of Wounded Knee. Meridel’s great grandson Nick Tilsen today heads the NDN Collective, working for sustainable solutions on Indigenous terms. Bottom line: preserving the people’s voice through art echoes long, not just as artifact but as it molds our history. I was fortunate to meet Meridel, who was still writing in the 1990s, through Rachel, my good friend.
KEM, Thank you for sharing regards to Woody and Meridel via Meridel's daughter and the venues they used to share their lives....their gifts.... to lift up our fellowmen/women.
We need to read about and to be exposed to more such stories. These stories can motivate each of us to act in ways that will build up our nation and draw us together.
Stories are part of what shapes our view of the world. Can you think of any (fact of fiction) that influenced you? Books, lectures, visual art or music? Movies? Something read or remembered at someone's knee?
A series of books written by C.A. Stephens about 6 cousins, Civil War orphans, who go to live with their paternal grandparents at "The Old Squire's Farm" in Maine. My Dad read them in his early teens; I have the books now. Their original publish dates are from 1910-1915 or thereabouts.
Then there's music. My Dad was a huge classical music fan, my Mom was a folk fan; both encouraged my participation in band when I was in grade school, and while I did not make it my life's work, music has been (and continues to be) an integral part of my life.
Music somehow shapes and binds societies. Some think we evolved specialized musical capacity in our brains. I suspect this is so, or something like it. We often treat it as decorative, but I think it goes to the heart. It seems common if not universal that nations rally around a national anthem. Many societies attach cultural meaning to traditional dance. I think far more is shaping us than we ordinarily pay attention to.
I have read, BTW, that at one point in American history, people used to line up to get the latest sheet music of a new popular song. How common this was, I don't know, but sheet music would involve a piano, or some means of performance, and likely an audience, if only around the living room. It's great to get some of the best performances ever from the Internet, or perhaps a concert, but once again, it's more top down. The standard of "best" dampens grass root participation, not for all, but as a broad public phenomenon.
While on a work detail to Washington, D.C., in the early 70s, I worked in the Interior Building and was able to see the WPA works in what was at one time a cafeteria on the upper floor. Also all the wonderful things Mary Barber spoke of in Timberline Lodge!
Maine is one of 27 states that has an active "percent for art" program.
Since 1979, Maine has had a law which decrees that 1% minimum of the budget for construction or renovation costs of buildings funded through taxpayer dollars is to be appropriated for acquiring works of art.
"Each project is developed in cooperation with professionals in the local community and installed permanently on the site of the capital project. Since 1982, this program has generated approx. $7,824,373 for public art in Maine."
And so many writers. Wikipedia currently lists 102 novelists. Many more authors have their own Wikipedia page like Dr. Heather Cox Richardson but aren't in the lists.
You are so right. Biden is a true New Dealer. He is definitely working to enhance and protect the lives of middle and working class Americans. He is restoring the Democratic Party legacy. I give him a lot of credit, despite my hesitancy to offer unfettered political support. Good job, Joe!
We cannot love everything the party/politicians do that we support, just as we cannot love our friends or family every day. And that’s okay. It’s super, super, super important that we vote though.
The racist, sexist megalomaniac liar cheated on all 3 of his wives, mismanaged the pandemic and made it political causing the death of millions and has no redeeming value as a human being. Send him and his gangs of bullies back under their rocks. Joe Biden and his administration are doing an excellent job. Like Annie says, it’s SUPER IMPORTANT that he remains in office. No other Democrat comes close. Plan to vote in the primaries.
I agree with your NO and YES. But if the central theme of the comments today is ART, then it seems that artists are creative people. Republicans seem to be devoid of creativity. They tried to repeal the ACA but between 50+ Senators and 200 Congresscritters NONE of them could come up with a plan to replace the ACA. NONE, ZERO, ZILCH. So the party of NO is also the party of NO IDEAs. Which party came up with MEDICARE, MEDICAID, SOCIAL SECURITY, ACA and so on? The GOP is so much more than NO WE WON'T because they also CAN'T.
Right Annie! No Question with that statement, but perhaps you will allow me here to come back to a theme I have raised several times in my comments?
Be PREPARED for the Mango Muffin to announce that he has won early, and again try to stage a coup. There is no doubt in my mind that if he figures he is losing, he will put in motion what they have been working on so diligently. What do we do? All fly to DC to protect the Capitol? Go through our neighborhoods with a big stick? I just don't know, and we need someone to stand up and tell us who isn't a micro fish like me. What's the plan?
That said, I doubt that Trump will win the popular vote, but the electoral vote will be very close. What do we do to prevent a dictator then! 'Cause the electoral voting does not reflect my understanding of what democracy is, today. Again, What's the plan?
I am an sick, old man, but I am not ready to live under a Trump Dictatorship. My wife and I just will not!
Brings to mind the contrast between Jan. 6th and the women's march. 45 has threatened to use the military to suppress any demonstrations after his next election, but did nothing to stop armed violent rioters at the capitol. We must not go there.
No worries. I'm as anti-Trump as you can get. Which is why I worry about Joe. But if that's what we've got, I'm all in. (It's not Joe's fault. The body politic only seems to like entertainers.)
They like entertainers because they use politics to entertain themselves and to feather their own nests. They constantly only game the system for themselves and refuse to understand anything about the common good. Being fair is impossible for them and it should not be that hard.
I do love a column about artists! My spouse is one, and I am a writer. Thank you, Heather. The arts are often an under appreciated part of the economy.
They are also Mind Washed by their 'C'hristian Nationalist church leaders. They will never be "well" again. If our speaker (M. Johnson) says he is called to be the second Moses, and his people applaud him, then it's no wonder that so many MAGAts believe the Mango Muffin is actually the Orange Jesus, the 'Massiochist of the Apocalypse' leading four 'Pale Fascists' (S. Miller, S. Bannon, K. Patel, M. Meadows) and their unholy hordes of MAGAts.
So glad you found Coit Tower, hidden in the Library of Congress are the files, documents, photos, posters of the WPA art project. The sheer amounts of negatives (located in a digital archive) allows for visual time travel to the US in the 1930s. Everyday life is recorded across the breadth of the country. Reminding us of the poverty, but also the tremendous resiliency of the citizens. Also evidence of all the people, not just white people.
Of course, you are correct, further, I was incorrect in attributing this collection to the WPA, it actually is part of the prints and photographs collections in the LOC. "The photographs of the Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection form an extensive pictorial record of American life between 1935 and 1944.."
But many people do not know that these thousands of photographs (actually to be completely accurate, there are 175,000 black-and-white negatives and more than 107,000 photographic prints) that were taken by the many FSA-hired photographers (eg Doretha Lange) during the 1930s even exist, and are available digitally for free, and reproductions/prints for a small fee. Here is the link to the collection: https://www.loc.gov/collections/fsa-owi-black-and-white-negatives/about-this-collection/.
I had the pleasure of spending an afternoon going through some of the photographs when visiting Washington DC and going to the LOC FSA-OWI Reading Room. "After the photographic prints were microfilmed as "LOTs," they were reorganized by geographic region and subject and put into file cabinets according to a classification scheme devised by Paul Vanderbilt. The Reading Room File is available to researchers in the Prints and Photographs Division Reading Room."
Joel, thank you for this - I am so jealous! I was also a teacher and took 8th graders from Texas on trips to DC. I’ve been to the LOC, but to do research there is a dream that, at age 70, will likely remain unrealized. Congratulations!
You’re absolutely correct, as I can attest as a retired K-12 librarian and 7-12 history teacher. Just seems unlikely from here in Florida, north of Tampa. If I ever get to the LOC, I’ll let you know!
It's rare that any of us would ever take exception to something in an HCR post. Yet, I must do this tonight. I must disagree that "(we) all are in trouble". I submit we are in your Debt, Professor.
For many here you are the main, if not single source of our factual news since MSM cannot seem to do it. You are a virtual one-person fact-based media outlet while the multi-billion $ stations have hundreds of staff and just can't (or won't) put out honest news. I, for one, am grateful for that.
As to the right-wing cult pretending to be a political party whose focus remains "owning the libs" instead of governing,...they have Failed. Instead they have inspired new groups armed in facts and ready to take them on. My personal fav: Dems Against MAGA Nutjobs,....(D.A.M.N.)....edit per Gus!
Anyone who uses HCR as a main/single source for news is, to put it gently, both lazy and siloed. A better silo than Fox/MSNBC, to be sure, but that’s a low bar to step over.
Anyone who uses anyone or sources like Wikipedia as a single source is taking extreme short cuts, but they can be main sources to look for other links for connections most would never find on their own. The 20 or more links found in each letter and the many more thoughtful commenters expand the views so much more and allow fresh connections to old memories to explore the truer picture of what people were thinking or doing that would otherwise not be able to be found, much less used to help us form more knowledgeable opinions and plans of interaction.
HCR's letters are the best trail markers and notes, along with lots of other contributors to add to, or correct, what I knew or thought I knew.
They enable as much productive searching as I can manage in the trails I am most interested in following, along with awareness of other important considerations of others.
Historical fiction is useful, but I prefer historical facts.
As a humble fan of James Michener, I appreciated his "historical fiction" despite name changes to avoid having to defend every imagined deviation from a real person's "true" history, which I imagine also allowed combining actual histories of a few people into a single character, as I noticed in the movie versions of Hawaii and The Longest Day (based on Cornnelius Ryan’s non-fiction book of the same title).
Michener's “Hawaii” came out between the time I was a military dependent there and when my wife and I were assigned there in the 70s. His “Centennial” (about Colorado) conveniently came out before we were reassigned to Colorado.
I am even more impressed with Tersia d’Elgin’s “The Man who thought he owned Water” since the first half is very much as interesting reading as Michener, in his style, except she uses the real names of those involved, and uses the back half as an exhaustive description of the complexities of water use and laws developed in the state where so many major rivers headwaters originate. It is hard to match for entertainment and deeply informative facts on important issues.
I do believe HCR could go as deeply into issues as d’Elgin did, but I much more appreciate the breadth of issues and history that leaves it to individuals to explore and share what they find interesting.
HCR’s links are much too mainstream for my taste, and I think it prevents her from straying too far from U.S. government narrative/propaganda. I enjoy her historical perspective; her forays into current political policy analysis, not so much.
I’m going to offer up a few sites/ writers I visit regularly, just as an fyi. All are leftist, none are obsessed with Trump, but you will get more honest critique of U.S. government policy, both foreign and domestic, than anywhere on the television, or in mainstream periodicals ranging from the NYT/WaPo to neocon/neoliberal sites like The Atlantic/New Yorker, etc.
You can Google any of the names here and get the website addresses.
The three curated sites I visit daily are Scheerpost, Consortium News, and Counterpunch.
Writers I follow are Chris Hedges, Patrick Lawrence, Caitlin Johnstone, Glenn Greenwald, Matt Taibbi, Max Blumenthal, Aaron Mate, Matt Stoller, and Katie Halper. Most all of these writers have video channels where they supplement their writing with video interviews of experts you don’t see on mainstream media, on topics ranging from Gaza to censorship to economics.
Thanks for reminding me of several I read more from in the past. I appreciate those who still raise issues we seem to be unable to make much progress on, HCR has been covering parts of history very close to some of the my old party's honest agents who now seem shunned out o the party I left in 1996 (about the same time I believe Elizabeth Warren left, though I became independent). I left when it became clear the party leaders were going to keep redoubling efforts (instead of totally rejecting), the tactics described in the newt Gingrich/Frank Luntz GoPac memo, "Language: A Key Mechanism of Control." I'm more interested in reversing catastrophic losses like not finding a legislative answer immune to any misinterpretation or malicious SCOTUS actions like the Citizens United Decision that leaves us at the mercy of those who can "buy the pot" any and every time they want to.
I most appreciated Rep John Sarbanes listening to us in ways we appreciated in the passage of H.R.1 For the People Act, though it seems still has just enough opposition in the Senate keep it possible for money to be used so corruptly to thwart the will of the people.
All the other problems are important, but to me, the Citizens United decision has to be overcome before we will get a fair chance to make so many of the other changes.
Comment rec'd and taken, Tom and true. It could have been better stated, for sure. In my own case, I read even more now than I used do but, more so from the authors such as in the Atlantic (Frum), New Yorker, and many others via Apple One. It is not hard to see that MSM, even MSNBC are using their hour to regurgitate the same story over and over for ad clicks. So, there is really not much "news" coming via cable and certainly almost none from Fox / OAN / Newsmax, etc. It's all opinion designed to keep one tuned in which sadly is almost all negative. Very little on the actual and promising accomplishments of the current admin or the polls when results show Biden ahead.
So, in that regard what is so revealing and refreshing about HCR's blog is how she manages to cover the (yes, selectively curated) events of the (previous) day in a rather concise and well-written way. Following the links then leads one deeper, if desired as well-stated by Jim (below).
The members of this blog are pretty well educated (and mannered) as blogs these days go. And as Jim says, often there are links from readers' posts to additional sources beyond one's typical sources. So, thanks for the reminder that a one-sentence comment can be misleading.
I lived in the North Beach/Telegraph Hill neighborhood of San Francisco for many years. Coit Tower was my back yard. I viewed the murals many, many times and saw something new almost every time. They are indeed a national treasure that every visitor to San Francisco should take the time to see. Skip waiting in line for a cable car ride and go to Coit Tower instead. The view of the bay from there is as magnificent as the artwork just inside the door. Take the 37 bus from Washington Square in North Beach if you don’t want to walk up Lombard St to the top of Telegraph Hill. (Sorry, I digress. The memories from the 1970’s and 80’s are pouring out of my head right now.)
The Rincon Annex post office in San Francisco at Mission St and the Embarcadero I hope still has impressive WPA frescoe murals on its walls as well.
Both are examples of the many economic, social, and cultural treasures that emerged from the New Deal that have endured to enrich our country to this very day.
Next November we vote on whether to continue and add to that legacy or destroy it. As Woody Guthrie said way back then; “Which side are you on, boy…”
Bruce, I do the Art Fair pretty regularly - my Mom's favorite field trip! I've also done the Pageant of the Masters. ONLY someone on acid could've come up with that one. Do you have a website?
That's cool, and yes from what I heard, when I was younger Roy Ropp may have been the acid forerunner in Laguna. But, I always questioned that because it was so long ago.
Thanks for your interest in my paintings, but I took the site down when I came to Europe a while back because almost everything was sold, and I was only getting too many commissions (which I hated doing). I only have my personal favs left from that time and what I am painting for myself now. I'll send you a couple of Photos, but I am running out of time. Off to the North Sea Isles to look for ancestors first.
What a wonderful report! Government support for the arts matters! Art feeds our souls. We need a government that recognizes that without art America will literally become a soulless nation.
Which reminds me, I recently watched Joe Biden welcome this year’s Kennedy Center Honorees to the White House... a truly heart warming evening. I can’t wait to watch the actual event when it’s broadcast on TV! Here’s the White House welcoming ceremony...
So different from the one in 2017, which was to be held at the WH with the Trumps. Only the honorees all said no, and then DumpsterFire and Melanoma bailed too.
Yes, I didn't want to get into the contrast. But since you did, I don't think Trump knows what "support the arts" even means... because if people aren't celebrating him he has no interest in what's going on. By the way, I see the video I shared only showed Joe Biden speaking. Here's the event video that shows the faces of the honorees while President Biden was speaking too. I've edited my original comment to use this video instead https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9A9HAwBYQU
Thank you for sharing the welcoming ceremony! I LOVED seeing President Biden honor such important artists. His bearing contains humanity and Presidential dignity -- and he’s funny and can poke fun at himself. Never mind Billy Crystal, Renée Fleming, Barry Gibbs, Queen Latifah, and Dionne Warwick -- I learned more about their own humanity in President Biden’s warm tribute to such deservedly famous individuals.
I'm happy you enjoyed watching the ceremony as much as I did. Joe Biden will never be a "polished" public speaker because of his life-long struggle with stuttering. But what he says comes from the heart. And I'll take humanity over presentation every day of the week! By the way, I see the video I shared only showed Joe Biden speaking. Here's the event video that shows the faces of the honorees while President Biden was speaking too. I've edited my original comment to use this video instead https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9A9HAwBYQU
By the way, I see the video I shared only showed Joe Biden speaking. Here's the event video that shows the faces of the honorees while President Biden was speaking too. I've edited my original comment to use this video instead https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9A9HAwBYQU
Have been seeking reports and postings on Biden Admin accomplishments. Thank you for honoring the past and our present in a positive essay. Journalism has been reduced to doom, soundbites and misinformation as the main attraction.
I always love seeing the efforts of that period in our history at the Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood. It's such a beautiful example of what you write about here and the short video there describes it so well. As for the second part of your letter today, almost everything about the economy is doing well and when the dissatisfaction is covered, no one ever attributes the reason for this as the media bubbles we live in. This is such an important factor in how people feel about pretty much everything. So many Americans are doing well right now but they're upset about the cost of eggs because their media is telling them to be upset. Their own experiences don't supersede their media messaging. That's just too scary. Every pollster should ask the media question and put it out there for the public.
My great aunt was a WPA artist in Oregon. She was one of the artists who did weaving and other work on Timberline Lodge in Oregon. While in college, I did a paper on this amazing program and interviewed several artists about the tremendous impact on their lives. These programs are important. They help feed our souls. Thanks Heather for telling a piece of the story.
Yes “feed souls” and we need this badly. Civilian Conservation Corps and WPA and the Peace Corps were all PEOPLE HELPING PEOPLE projects. Not the government helping corporations in the hope (?) that they ( now that they are persons) will trickle down some benefit to some people. And keep in mind that these corporations must do their best to benefit shareholders. What nonsense. Everywhere you look people are the victims of our sclerotic system being used by sclerotic legislatures controlled by a sclerotic group of politicians all for the benefit of the few. And BTW I am thrilled that President Biden is calling out Trump. It is about time because although we all would like a quitter and more gentle discourse , this is not the time . Lastly if women (and men) all over America don’t see the application of ridiculous abortion laws (Texas for example) as a threat to themselves and their daughters and sisters then we real are in trouble in this coming election. All must come out and vote.
Politics and politicians have recently been occupying too much of our daily lives; we need a quieter America - “walk softly and carry a big stick” approach ... so “don’t boo - VOTE”!!!
I will never understand how some Congressmen can support legislation that will hurt their own families, not to mention the constituents they are supposed to represent!
They are paid shills. The problems they create for the rest of us do not touch their families.
Innocent people would suffer but...follow my logic. Representatives are voted by the people to represent them. This means they vote for what the people want. When politicians vote no, they are saying that the people in their state do not want WiFi, improvements on their airports, ports, roads, decaying bridges ( 50 year life span on those), clean water, child care ( a bit of a stretch). They should get none. This is what their people want.( Ironically it seems that the red states need the most help). It should be made abundantly clear that this is what their elected representing them voted for. Maybe this would make people see that they better check out platforms. Look at the abortion issue. The majority of people are pro choice, yet their representatives voted prolife.
But anti-abortion is not “pro-life.” As we are learning, it is killing women and discouraging the study of obstetrics.
That's something that trump would do but I prefer the idea of our government trying to help everyone. I'm hoping that the people who voted for republicans and against Biden will see that what he's doing is helping them. And we need to make sure they realize it.
Don’t forget about gerrymandering which is rampant and decidedly limiting the power of voting in many states, not to mention the interference of private big money (ie, corporate) PACS impacting elections nationwide on ebery level, and last but not least - huge disinformation and election rigging efforts by many destructive interests - not only Americans but Russian, Chinese and North Korean to name some big ones. People who are voting are not always “getting what the deserve” nowadays. And to say so is insultingly shortsighted and unrealistic, not to mention unfair. Not one person impacted by mass scale hog farming living in those NC areas “wanted” or voted for that monstrous unfairness - but state legislators who benefited financially did vote for it and gerrymandered voting districts to keep voting for it. Just one of many examples of corrupt pols changing the weight of one person-one vote dynamics in devastating fashion. In my view, things are not as simple as you suggest.
Well frankly, being elected to Congress, Is more of a function of being able to raise money, and lying your a** off, rather than being intelligent. Susan, have a great day.
And those grossly unintelligent ones have loudly made themselves known!!
I think they have it on their id badge. The letters are … DAGS..Dumb as George Santos.
"A clown with a flame thrower still has a flame thrower.'
Simple GOP (god awful party)
... how bout God O-awful Party?
Any way you say it is cOrrect.😎
I don't either. I was just thinking, wait a minute, these things being done & promised by a dangerous minority aren't even remotely in line with representing citizens or democracy, they are the very thing that they are saying is a threat, an autocracy. Of course we can't understand this level of delusion, there is no understanding crazy.
George, excellent post. And now we have the state Supreme Court in Texas issuing a stay on the abortion case when each and every day the situation becomes more threatening to this woman's life and her ability to bear other children.
Shocking is the reaction I had, too. The ruling perfectly encapsulates the nightmare that Republicans have wrought. Let's hope it further invigorates the voters to rise up and end this dystopian madness.
Kate Cox is a victim of tyranny from an unholy alliance of radical religion and authoritarian government.
Just read about that. Whenever I think they couldn't get any worse, they lower the bar yet again.
Talk about not dealing with the facts in the case.....and totally obvious to her ordeal and as cold hearted as hell.
'Oblivious', not 'obvious'. A little Saturday nitpicking.
Yes, but sometimes even if I have the correct word in mind, autocorrect types in something else. I don't always review my posts and i should.
Careful, that is my home state. Ok, I admit that the state is trying to get back to 1836 when they got their freedom from Mexico. Only because the Mexican Army was asleep and got surprised. But aside from that, the state is trying to make sure that everyone understand that women are no more than just your everyday piece of luggage Just baby carriers. That is it. Once the baby is born, the state loses interest in the child. That is why we rank in the bottom third in schools, first in uninsured kids, no Medicaid, and on and on. The attorney General is as rotten as a 6 month old Apple. I I were a woman, I would be gone.
How does the US maternal mortality rate compared to the world?
The U.S. rate for 2021 was 32.9 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births, which is more than ten times the estimated rates of some other high income countries, including Australia, Austria, Israel, Japan and Spain which all hovered between 2 and 3 deaths per 100,000 in 2020.Mar 16, 2023
I found the state to state comparisons interesting as well. https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/maternal-mortality-rate-by-state
I'm sure you meant to write 'quieter' not 'quitter'. You can fix it using the Edit function in the 3 dots at the right margin.
There’s no “edit” in the three dots in my comments
When I click on the 3 dots to the far right below my comment, I have two choices: Edit or Delete. Do you have the 3 dots? A few people have mentioned that they don't, on their phone (I think iPhones). The 3 dots are there for me be it on laptop or cellphone. Don't know what to tell you but I'm sure everyone else understood you meant "quieter" even if they did the same double-take I did - I only commented because it's such an unfortunate typo for the context.
My three dots are "share link to comment" "hide comment" and "report comment." Guess I'd really better copyedit my comments better before posting!
My father was in the CCC. I doubt the family could have made it without these programs.
The reality that a Texas woman had to seek political asylum in another state to save her life is heinous.
Thanks, George, for the perfect word to describe the condition that ails the nation, thanks mostly to Republicans and their business allies.
What a great legacy. As someone who grew up east of the Rockies, I fell in love with the Timberline Lodge.when I first visited in the eighties. I was staggered that trees could be so big.
It is a remarkable building, isn’t it.
Timberline Lodge is a magical place! The andirons in the fireplaces, the carvings, textiles - wrought iron hinges on massive doors....The artists who shared their talents to create this exquisite place have left a magnificent legacy.
This lodge is magnificent. In the night, we left from this lodge to climb Mt Hood and we returned in the early morning. I feel so fortunate to have been there. It is similar to the lodge in Paradise, where we left from and returned to when climbing Mt Rainier, but much more awesome. CA needed one there at the base of Mt. Whitney. The ones in Glacier National Park are more chalets than lodges.
I too climbed Mt Hood in 1963 after taking a weeks long climbing class with the Mazamas, at the time the largest climbing club in the world, you had to climb a mountain with a glacier on it to become a member. We left Timberline at 1:00 AM to begin the climb, we stopped to watch the sun rise at 10,000’ and made the summit around 7 AM, we were back down to Timberline by noon. My high school winter’s were spent skiing ⛷️ out of Timberline, the place is a national treasure to be sure. In the summer you could take a snow cat up to the 10,000’ level where they would have a 1,200’ long Poma lift in place and you could ski there all day in shorts and t-shirts if you wanted before beginning a 3 mile run back down to Timberline, which is named of course for the elevation where trees stop growing in the Cascades. I have absolutely wonderful memories of that place.
You should visit Timberline today! I took the Mazama class and climbed Mt Hood as graduation in 1960. That Poma lift has been replaced with a chair lift and several others have been built as Timberline has adapted to become a year-round resort for all kinds of snow sports and summer biking and hiking.
Wow a fellow Mazama member, one of the things that I remember was just how hard it was to stop a lead climber fall with a belay, it felt like the rope was going to cut me in half, we didn’t have figure eights, just hand strength, that and practicing self arrest after pitching backwards down a steep slope and using an ice ax to arrest the tumble, that was the most terrifying thing I remember. It sounds like you did the course 2 years before me, I bet we had some of the same teachers, I took what I learned there into the Army, and Special Forces especially rope work, it’s probably why I’m still alive today. 🙏
Well, I was 15 at the time, and have lived in every west coast state since then.
But yes, I remember the shock of the rope going taught! I especially liked the rock climbing sessions at Horsethief Butte. In those days Highway 35 was closed in winter so from The Dalles we had to go almost to Maupin to get to Timberline. The Mazamas and The Mountaineers are still active and involved. As are the Crag Rats in Hood River.
Timberline has become even more important as it has kept up with the changes in recreation.
It is indeed beautiful. We took my sister and my niece up there when they were here. My sister, who lived in the midwest, was overwhelmed, especially by being so far up a mountain.
We visited Mt Hood many years ago and were amazed at this place! It really made that part of history come alive for us.
As our daughter and spouse move to Seattle, will add Timberline Lodge to the list of places to visit. The images look fantastic and remind me a little of The Ahwahnee in Yosemite. Thanks
The Ahwahnee was designed by the same architects working for National Park Service.
I hope your daughter & spouse are moving CLOSER to you!
I visited Yosemite a couple of years ago with my husband. He'd practically grew up there and worked at the site when he was a young adult.
It too is a magical place! (Too many people - but awe-inspiring nonetheless!)
And it's an ongoing legacy as those iron, wood, and textiles have been replaced by copies created in the same traditions as the originals have worn out.
What nobody but a few Oregonians know is that there is an old two-story guard station that was built by the same crew and with the same care, about twenty miles SE of Timberline Lodge at Clackamas Lake. I stayed there during the summer of 1969 while working for the Forest Service. It has a fireplace with a stone hearth where every stone is cut to fit with no visible mortar. The walls are made of wood paneling and not one of the panels has a knot in it. It is a beautiful building that can now be rented for overnight stays.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clackamas_Lake_Ranger_Station_Historic_District
While I love New Deal art and the murals at Coit Tower, what has impressed me since I was a tot growing up in New York City were the stone bridges, the stone underpasses and overpasses, always the same style, immaculately cut and totally strong and practical.
It just amazed me ever more as I grew up that people had the skill set to fashion stones, heavy stones, that always fit perfectly and now have lasted 80 and 90 years.
They also used their amazing abilities to add stone ornamentation to buildings all over the city, for the high and mighty on Park Avenue and the growing middle class in the outer boroughs as well. No simple, repeated metallic fronts for them. Buildings needed that special extra touch, in stone of course, that made them works of art.
way out in here in CA on ling hiking trails in Yosemite National Park granite steps were 'perfectly' laid on steep trails.
OK, I am on the hunt for the for the WPA Masterpiece Stone Teachers.
Got it, the "rock work masons" identified at livingnewdeal.org. Crews of young people in the Civilian Conservation Corp (CCC) did all the rock work in Yosemite National Parl. [L]ivingnewdeal.org has media of Eleanor Roosevelt at Yosemite in 1938 with a CCC Crew. I guess that would be CCCC. CCC even laid sod for the abandoned Yosemite airport.
We could use a CCC II in 2024 & beyond.
I was impressed by the stacked stone “guardrails” the CCC constructed along the highway running the length of the Smokey Mountain National Park. They were built by master craftsmen who carefully selected each stone to fit precisely with the others. There is no visible mortar. Years later more “guardrails” were built on additional curves and the lack of care and craftsmanship is obvious. The fitting is sloppy and the walls were heavily mortared together.
And just think, the stone masons of the middle ages constructed immense cathedrals from stone & a type of concrete that I learned not too long took 1,000 years to completely dry! Amazing what a person can do when given the opportunity to thrive & innovate. We see it today in many of our tech entrepeneurs. While not esspecailly artistic, still innovative & much of it helps everyone, not just the wealthym though many of them get more than their fair share of the benefits.
This Oregonian didn't know that. I didn't even know there was a Clackamas Lake.
I learned that there was a Clackamas Lake this summer. But now i know of a place where I can spend the night. https://www.oregonhikers.org/field_guide/Clackamas_Lake_Ranger_Station
I guess i can give the excuse that I am not native to Oregon, Ally, But I have never heard my hubby mention this cabin or Clackamas Lake.
May well have been designed by the architect who developed all the National Park design guidelines in the 20's/30's. He also was commissioned to design park infrastructure for other agencies, mostly in the Arts & Crafts style that came out of UC Berkeley.
Apparently there was quite a brouhaha building about what Timberline was going to look like when the National Forest stepped in and said: " Leave it to us".
Do you know the name of the architect? Are the guidelines available online?
Herbert Maier
https://livingnewdeal.org/herbert-maier-parkitecture-1930s/
I attended a truly fine presentation by Grey Brechin, author of the post linked above, and Historian Emeritus of the State of California.
Park Structures & Facilities is the book.
http://npshistory.com/publications/park_structures_facilities/index.htm
Excellent! Looking forward to the read.
Another bit I did not know, thank you ...we lived in No CA until recently, but husband’s family all from OR
Dear Bob,
Your point about “what nobody knows” is so important! So many of us do not know anything about other states or what their contribution to greatness is. Perhaps we could have a plan to magnify each state concerning the great things that have come out of their particular borders. Then, musicians from all over the country could write compositions in honor of the state. Concentrate on the GOOD and beautiful that each state can be boastful about.
Then we Americans, can build the best fast speed rail systems crossing our great country so all of us can celebrate seeing the uniqueness of each state. Make us all proud to be from incredible places. There are many and we could focus on bringing one another together under one kaleidoscopic wonder( our America) the jewel it can be and is.
We could have a national contest of artists and musicians and workers who bring the magic to us in and through their work.
Choose a state: what makes it miraculous?
Yes, exactly!
Thank you oh thank you Heather for this wonderful picture of real life, then and now.
For noticing and observing and sharing its spirit with us.
susan murphy
HCR, will you also be writing stories of the lives of Americans who have made and make into art the stuff of their often difficult lives? What of Hip-hop/rap; graffiti, breakdance...? It is not part of your life but might the subject be apt for an American historian? Might you invite others from their milieu and the artists to share this creative world with us?
Yes, Fern!
That's so cool! Timberline Lodge is so amazing. I'm not a skier, but I love to visit Timberline and wander around. My sister and brother-in-law got married there.
Timberline Lodge and The Friends of Timberline Lodge have continued to employ and train artists in textiles, iron, and wood as they have maintained and restored the original works. Some of those outdoor woodcarvings have been replaced a dozen times. Timberline Lodge must be one of the most successful WPA projects; a legacy of Roosevelt's New Deal that we can all celebrate.
I live in Oregon and love the lodge at Timberline. Brava to your aunt, Mary, and all the other artists.
I do as well. We learned to ski there and have so many wonderful memories of time there.
I have only been there to admire the lodge, have a meal, and enjoy being that high in the mountains. I can snowshoe, but that's it. I should say could, because days of hikes and snowshoeing are over for me. I did see that a couple places in the mountains have enough snow to open for skiing. I can remember having about five feet at a lower elevation place on Veteran's Day.
The art integrated into this lodge is simply wonderful.
I graduated from Reed College and have been to Timberline.
I’d like to see more of these murals. What a great part of history and inclusion of ALL workers.
I agree with you! Wikipedia has a wonderful list of post office murals, by state with images of some included, and the title, year, and artist. I'm thinking this needs to be something I look for the next time I am on the road in the US.
Wow! How wonderful!
Don’t forget, people: the MAGA Republicans don’t support Rump because of his political and economic successes (if there are any), they don’t care about that. Every scandal, every indictment, every accusation, it doesn’t turn them away, it just makes their support stronger. Why? They support him BECAUSE he is an asshole, and teaches them that it’s fully ok (or even admirable) to be a misogynistic, racist asshole themsleves. He teaches them to hate, and they love that - and cannot therefore be reasoned with anymore.
The big difference between Rump and Biden is that Rump doesn’t care about ordinary people at all; if he would have frescoes painted, they would be about him, him, and more him, probably portrayed in a white toga and a crown of laurel at that (or with a red cape toting a shot gun). But Biden _does_ care about ordinary people, and it shows. And I think it’s important to get _that_ message across - to ordinary people…
Put aside for the moment Trump's cozy relations with the Mob and "money pouring in from Russia". Robert Reich claims of Trump's mastery with his outsized inheritance:
"That just proves my point," said the Trump supporter. "He turned that $200 million into $4½ billion. Brilliant man."
"But if he had just put that $200 million into an index fund and reinvested the dividends, he'd be worth $12 billion today," I said.
https://www.newsweek.com/robert-reich-what-i-told-trump-supporter-500656
Born on a mountain of cash Trump sort of cosplayed a businessman, an impresario, a airline owner, a casino operator, an educator, a president, it goes on. He is authentic a con man, distinguished by being exceptionally dangerous, but that's about it.
But Trump is so much more. He runs many of his businesses with undocumented aliens who he assists in obtaining fraudulent documents. And then he underpays them, because they can't go to the authorities. He does the same thing with H-2Bs. Why hire qualified Americans to work in your gold adorned businesses, when you can bring in Haitiians and pay them slave wages? And even when he cheats, grifts and defrauds he still loses money and is forced to declare bankruptcy. Everything he touches turns to crap. He is a born loser with a God complex.
His wifey is also an illegitimate immigrant, with her chain migrating family.
And her anchor baby.
The very same chain migration he says he will stop!
And a cult following for disciples. The very definition of weaponized lunacy
I like your last line
A malignant narcissist.
Hi J L. "That just proves my point," said the Trump supporter. "He turned that $200 million into $4½ billion. Brilliant man."
What this proves is that the commenter knows zero about investing, business or finance. He’s using a simplistic yardstick with no concept of future values ie “4 billion better than 200 million and anyone who says different don’t know numbers”
Lord help us from the ignorant, cuz that’s what we’re dealing with
If anyone has an hour to spare, I highly suggest this interview of Robert Reich!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLv9PZajR6U
Amen!!!!
His biographer JJ Schwartz pointed out that rump is not just a narcissist, he’s the most mentally ill kind.
He is a sociopath.
And those who admire him are mentally ill themselves . Or getting there.
Let’s hope this nightmare fever dream is banished.
No, many of them support him because he gives the finger to other assholes, the elected officials in DC of both parties who have ignored them and made their lives miserable by legislating for monied interests at the expense of working people. Make no mistake, Trump is an asshole, a con man, and a grifter of the highest order. But his path to election has been his recognition that hooking your wagon to populist rage can work. Had Covid not happened, he would have won in ‘20, imo.
This is where the disconnect comes when talking about the economy, as everyone from Heather to Krugman continues to hammer away about the ‘good numbers’, and scold those who ‘don’t get it’. Every time this happens you get millions of Obama-Trump voters, who would potentially cast a vote for Biden, to become enraged at the economic disconnect coming from the elites, and think, screw it, I’m gonna vote for the guy giving the middle finger to the swamp.
You can call them deplorable, and stupid for not voting in their economic interest all you want, but that’s where people go when they are told the economy is great as they try to figure out whether to spend money at the grocery store or pharmacy this week.
Taibbi exposes the liberal class, Democratic Party economic gaslighting in the following YouTube clip. If the Dems really want Biden to win, they’d best take a different messaging tack when touting the economic numbers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BkdZh8u0_4&t=19s
I posted this on November 14, so will post again. Nobel prize winning, NYT columnist Paul Krugman attempted to understand the gap between the reality of the economy and the perception of it by many Americans. These people are far more pessimistic than they should be compared to historical reality. Basically he states that what people feel about the economy has more to do of what they are told to feel about it by partisan organizations. To quote him “And it’s a running joke among economists I talk to that even mainstream news organizations apparently find it hard to say nice things about the Biden economy. When, say, a new employment report comes in, the headlines don’t usually say things like “Job growth comes in above expectations”; they’re more likely along the lines of, “Rapid job growth may slow soon, experts say, posing problems for Biden.”. “ So there you have it: by all facts inflation is down, wages up, gas prices down, and people are spending. As the actor in the movie “Cool Hand Luke” said, “What we've got here is failure to communicate.”
Sorry, I don’t at all agree with Krugman. Prices went up with inflation, but only in a few instances have they come down as fuel and raw materials costs have declined. Some of that is a spike in wage costs as wages went up pretty steeply (at the lower end of the wage scale).
Manufacturing costs and shipping delays have eased a lot, but their prices have not declined. For those utilities whose regulators allowed it, fuel surcharges were imposed, but will be removed long after fuel prices have eased.
In other words corporate greed pushed prices higher than necessary while inflation was high. But you will see few price rollbacks to match declining costs.
Notice that corporate profits were up sharply while corporate spokespersons lied that prices were up solely due to inflation. They sort of left out the part about opportunistic price gouging.
I hope the Biden Administration starts a long and very loud process of jawboning businesses to ease prices as their underlying costs go down.
Greedy corporations respond best to public shaming.
In many sectors corporate profits have reached near-record levels, yet companies still increased prices. In many cases the profits enabled major stock buy-backs that ended up lining the pockets of high-level executives. Shameless.
Welcome to America, the Land of Unregulated Capitalism and Runaway Greed.
Valid point Michael; the data you cite is 'out there' for the reading. The rosy 'academic' points of view provided by some news outlets, provided by economists of various persuasion, fails terribly by way of presenting sterile data absent greater explanation required by the greater masses. Academia has glaring 'blind spots' that despite high education, fail to see; and fail to see 'their part' in all the confusion; hence they are called 'blind spots.' For instance, when they cite broadly and generally that inflation is slowing, they are 'not' saying "Mission Accomplished." They are saying the 'rate of gain' is faltering. They also fail to present an accompanying worry called 'disinflation' and why that would be a bad trend too, although most would cheer to see for instance, to see the energy barons suffer disinflation. Japan has been suffering disinflation for over a decade now I think; and only now seeing peeks at normalizing - whatever normal is.
Good points. Excessive price hikes using inflation as cover aren't tracked and tallied, obviously, so we end up with anecdotal examples that don't get media traction. And in this era of huge cutbacks in media staffing, I'm skeptical that many outlets are eager to report on corporate greed. And disinflation? I hope it doesn't become pervasive.
Thank you for the extended analysis. Perhaps post this on Mr. Krugman's comment site.
Gas price at my rural Maryland station is $2.99.
As a young kid in the early 1960s it was $0.29. That’s 10 times higher in 60 years with cars that get much higher MPG. And it’s down more than a dollar from its high.
The US produces more oil that Saudi Arabia and Russia. Not necessarily a good thing but our large land base and suburbanization currently relies on gasoline.
Trump just repeats old phrases like “drill, baby, drill” to applause, slamming Obamacare and promising to replace it, and lying about all the infrastructure he built. Biden is counterpunching. Christie is the only primary opponent that calls Trump the liar an criminal that he is.
In short, Biden isn’t gaslighting average Americans. He appreciates their situation and is working to improve it. Trump’s the one gaslighting.
But it is a point well taken that we need to respect the feelings of voters and I do fear that those struggling financially, or oppose providing the bombs decimating Gaza (many young people feel this way), or think their votes have been taken for granted won’t care about the bigger picture of protecting democracy.
I still believe it wasn’t on Hillary and it won’t be on Biden if Trump wins. It will be on any American that doesn’t vote for Biden.
We don’t have a democracy to protect. The corporate coup was successfully put in place years ago.
It most certainly was on Hillary, and it will most certainly be on Biden if he loses.
If a far more talented team, with a better coach, as a prohibitive favorite, loses to an underdog with no business being on the same field, whose fault is that?
The Dems need to start owning their own incompetence when they lose elections that have no business even being close.
No offense, but your analogy is misplaced. This isn’t a game, it is people’s lives, the direction of human history.
So much for personal responsibility in a democracy. Blame the individuals actually in the arena working to advance the country forward.
We have a conservative supreme court because too many on the Left, that I have been a part of for 50 years, needed to feel morally superior to Hillary Clinton and demonized her, didn’t vote for her or both.
Yes, the Democrats have plenty of faults but the 2016, 2020, and 2024 presidential elections were/will be binary choices. Those that don’t understand that can bask in their moral superiority while Americans suffer the consequences.
It's interesting how Fox News has denigrated Krugman many times over the years and yet he still has a huge following. I love how he has followed the recession predictions and fully admits when and how he was mistaken.
I was shocked to read in the HCR newsletter- "Today, on the Fox News Channel, personality Maria Bartiromo noted that “the economy is a lot stronger than anyone understands.” " (How the heck do you punctuate a quote within a quote?)
Is this from her sane twin sister? The shock was because it is 1) true, 2) is diametrically opposed to everything she has said over the past 7 years.
Grammar Police checking in. Per "Grammarly":
"In American English, use double quotation marks for quotations and single quotation marks for quotations within quotations.
In British English, use single quotation marks for quotations and double quotation marks for quotations within quotations."
Lol Ally....
I was too...now she will say that Fox misquoted her and is full of lies. :)
The Biden Administration is communicating. People have been conditioned not to hear good news about anything the government does. We have to turn that around.
Right. It is the media that fails to communicate...
Susan, scroll down in this link, past the first section, to the +++. Below that begins a thread on Biden, the economy, and people’s reaction to it.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2023/12/08/roaming-charges-107/
Have to thank HCR. IF Trump were not the big news item, noise from the deposed administration, the loud lost backbencher, perhaps Americans would be engaged in and talking about the policies of Mr Biden that are working for them. Almost all of the big kitchen table issues are problems for all major economies. His solutions are reversing the consequences of world-wide inflation brought on by Covid and the collapse of supply changes by means available to tighten credit (spending) and builld from the bottom up (infrastructure, costs of core goods, supply changes, health, jobs, training, wage and benefit protections). I don't know a out your communities, but here in Western Wisconsin, rural as can be, multifamily home construction, fiber optics, electric grids and clean energy projects, new manufacturing are going gangbusters. I was shocked at how much is going on. My favorite electrician (he fixes what I do poorly without laughing) told me this week that they are exhausted trying to keep up with all the work. No slow downs in early spring to catch up, 6-days a week and in better grade homes in the past two years. And two of the area plumbing contractors we deal with have opened major new locations and are hiring at a pace not seen in a long time. All this in the last two years, belying the pessimism that feds aren't spending in rural areas or that they are give aways to big companies. I wish my MAGA neighbors could look see and turn off Fox and Newsmax. Our economy is doing well and people are confident enough that borrowing to invest in a future is worth the interest rates, knowing returns will be high enough in longer term and rates to borrow will decline as they have once the Fed Reserve loosens grip on the economy.
Thanks Fred. Somewhere, on one of the many sites I read someone made an astute point wherein they summarized that "We also have to 'see' what's going right." It would be helpful if broadcast media would exercise some responsibility.
I'm going to. Celebrate success in this holiday season. And pick up the thee in late summer.
?
Good points; and hopefully Biden's team is taking notes regarding "failure to communicate." Let's hope team Biden takes heed and employs all the communications abilities they must be able to muster, even taking pages from others I'm coming to admire. For instance, there's a brilliant lady running in California for a senate seat that has my attention and support, even though I can't vote for her from Ohio. Her name is Katy Porter. She widely makes use of 'white boards' when explaining complex issues, connecting 'dots'. I rather find that brilliant.
I wouldn't call speaking of the economy in a positive way "gaslighting". The positive stats about unemployment and new job opportunities are something to crow about. We should be touting the good stuff. But we also need to find Americans where they are - how they live.
And we need to remind them that it was Democrats who were trying to help the average family with child care, health care, student loans, etc. REPUBLICANS blocked the BBB. Democrats make their share of mistakes. Hardly innocent. But the difference between Joe Biden and the entire MAGA monstrosity couldn't be more stark.
However, in another way...your economic point here is well taken. If I were a younger person with a family, this is what I would be facing:
1. The cost of child care (if I could find it!) would prohibit one of us from working. Cutting our income in half.
2. Our student debt repayment has effectively replaced what would be a mortgage payment.
3. Even if we had enough for a down payment, Powell's interest rate hikes have made home ownership impossible.
4. And even if we had that down payment and figured a way to make that 7% mortgage payment, the cost of housing stock is so high as to be a sick joke. Even a fixer upper dump is over priced. And because local zoning often prohibits it, even more affordable "cluster housing" isn't being built.
5. So which one of us will stay home and sacrifice "career ranking"? The decision will be made for us. It will be the one with the lesser health insurance policy.
6. Speaking of which, while the ACA has made health "insurance" more available to many, we fell into that donut hole of health insurance hell. We make too much to qualify for Medicaid. And we make too little to afford a good comprehensive policy. Therefore, we end up with a "catastrophic coverage" policy. We are one small accident away from bankruptcy.
7. We watch and read financial news that tells us we should be planning for our kids college expenses and that we are already behind in our retirement planning. What a sick dark joke that is. We are shopping for the best price on hamburger and deciding which bill to pay late or at all...
We need to explain that efforts by Democrats to assist families are being thwarted by the MAGA Republicans whose focus is on the theft of more than the National Treasure (and giving it to the Oligarchs) is just as outrageous as their theft of a woman's reproductive rights.
I'm not talking about these families as "deplorable" or "stupid". I am stating that they are desperate. And it ain't Joe Biden's fault. It's the fault of the entire Republican/Federalist/MAGA/FakeReligion Oligarchal feudal power structure. The policies of REPUBLICANS that have given the morbidly rich more money. Since Reagan sold the American people his BS about economics, trillions have been sent to the Oligarchs and it has been funded by the working poor and our national debt.
Time for Democrats to empathize with families and explain who their enemy really is. It's the Republican "nobles" and it's time for a peaceful but dramatic economic revolution. Time for the redistribution of wealth. I would suggest my Senator Elizabeth Warren as the administrator of the program.
Tom, we probably all agree that Democrats have made many mistakes. I have my list. But targeting them now aids and abets the real enemies of democracy and economic justice.
A revised linguistic approach. Need to get smarter Frame the debate. George Lakoff?
Yes! Thank you.
Lakoff nailed it. We are in this endless loop of expecting that our fellow citizens would be on board "if only they understood". We live politically on an elitist (not intentionally) philosophical cloud. The pain and the answers to that pain are right down in the dirt where we live. Yes. The DNC and the WH need new "Framers". Ironic word, eh?
Bill, I love you man, and understand your pov, and know that it is heartfelt. Your bullet points about what our nation’s youth are facing are spot on. The lemmings like Kitterman and Jeri below aren’t worth my time.
Taibbi hits the point at the end of the link I shared that I think is your blind spot. When he talks about the reason that the Clintons, Krugmans, and yes, Bidens, etc. can’t admit their own culpability for our mess, forget the relative blame vs. the GOP (and you already know I place that blame much closer in degree than most of the commenters here), because to do so makes them appear stupid, or, gasp!, deplorable.
Much of this is Joe Biden’s fault, from mass incarceration to financial fraud to endless war to, hell, having Clarence Thomas sitting on the Supreme Court. There are Democratic fingerprints all over the Republican/Federalist/Fake Religion/Oligarchal feudal power structure you describe.
The Democrats can ‘empathize’ with families all they want. Words mean nothing to those who have been hammered by neoliberal economics over the past fifty years, and feel more betrayed by Democrats, because that is the party that used to align itself with working people. I target whoever I feel undercuts the working class. I don’t need to do that with the GOP here, amongst the fervent denizens of Team Blue. Whenever I have the opportunity to engage with a MAGA type, and I probably do that far more than most here whose only encounters are probably via relatives, I explain to them the fraud that is Trump and the GOP. But I get nowhere with them unless I acknowledge that the Democrats are a big part of the problem.
Exactly what can President Biden do about Clarence Thomas sitting on the Supreme Court ?
Biden helped put Thomas there.
He could 1) admit and apologize for his role in that. 2) push for legislation to provide total, and I mean total, financial transparency and strict ethical codes for all members of the SCOTUS, and hell, while we’re at it, for Congress and the executive branch as well. 3) give a vigorous critique of corporate rule, support HJR-54, and threaten to pack the court unless corporate-friendly decisions end.
Don’t hold your breath.
You've named what you think is the problem. What is the right message/solution for this campaign cycle and current events?
1) We failed you.
2) We lost our way, and paid more attention to our corporate donors, than to you, the people.
3) We pledge to never again accept corporate donations, dark money, and will heretofore always vote in the people’s interests.
4) We will fight to decrease the influence of the military industrial complex, and will stop weapons sales to other nations in pursuit of American hegemony.
5) We will ignore the threat of capital strikes, and work to provide a single-payer health care system for all Americans.
6) We will ignore the threat of capital strikes, and support policies that end the reign of the fossil fuel economy, and pledge a carbon neutral economy within a decade.
7) We will thwart any and all attempts at government censorship of the internet; the First Amendment, and freedom of speech, is the backbone of any democracy.
Brilliant Bill ! Thank you.
I think you nailed it. I especially like the part about “fake religion.” That sums it up perfectly.
Taibbi? Really? That’s your reference? He’s entertaining, often, but hardly unbiased. I DO call your friends DEPLORABLE because they are ungrateful, entitled, traitors; they don’t think critically; they aren’t involved to solve problems; for MAGAts, it’s all about “Poor Pitiful ME.” They resent paying taxes, so they give billionaires luxury tax breaks--the same billionaires who invested overseas and promised their wealth would magically “trickle down” to them. You talk about swamp--take a look at the Puppet Masters of the Organized Crime Syndicate aka the RNC.
Yes. Really. Are you unbiased?
It is interesting to me how thin-skinned those residing in tribal silos are.
Taibbi, Hedges, Johnstone, Blumenthal, Mate, Halper, Lawrence, Gray, Dore, Greenwald, etc. all send the Team Blue lemmings such as yourself running for the Xanax every time they post a critique of governmental or liberal class orthodoxy that doesn’t align with lesser evil psychology. Sad, but also funny.
Ah . . . Typical MAGAt: When facts fail them, they resort to character assassination and lengthy lists with vague innuendo. You’re not even clever.
Ouch! I’ll play.
Ah . . . Typical shitLib: When self-reflection fails them, they resort to self-righteous, condescending, hyperbolic, faux gotcha spear chucking at the ‘other’. You’re just stupid.
Please, go back to sleep, or your coma, Tom.
Double that
In Bawcomville, Louisiana they had their annual Redneck Christmas Parade. Bawcomville can be described as a 'third world country'. Over 30% live below the poverty level. Drug and alcohol addiction are prevalent. This state loves Agent Orange. But why? This state lives at the bottom of all demographics. They absolutely get the shit they vote for. But, over 40% of the people who live in poverty do not vote at all. Republicans depend on these non voters to keep them in office. If you keep entire state poor, desperate and uneducated it's a win for the party of oppressors. Democrats are run out of town. In 1937 minimum wage was 25 cent an hour. In 2023 in 21 states its $7.50 an hour. Wow, that only took 96 years. Republicans protect property. Democrats protect people.
If Democrats protected people, they would be kicking GOP ass in most every election, just like they did from WWII until the late 60s.
Why does a union member vote Republican? The very party that if they had their way unions would be nonexistent. Alabama is defying the courts with Republicans gerrymandering. We have the Newt Gingrich's of the country trying to tear it all apart.
When I make my phone calls for elections. The first question I ask is, "what keeps you up at night". And I take it from there. They need validation.
Who IS this Taibbi? He may be smart, but he offers no solutions. He has figured out how to play populist angst for profit. His message is useful, though. I give him a solid C for effort and an A for cleverness. He would get an A for effort if he'd try to provide solutions, instead of playing the outraged intellectual but sympathetic journalist.
Thank you Jerry. The metaverse is full of Taibbis, stoking fear and anger, all for the $$$. Seems whining about the mistakes of the past gives some no ability to see that we can be on the precipice of great strides forward. I’m sick of cynicism. I much prefer optimism!
Taibbi is a journalist. It is not the job of a journalist to provide solutions; politicians and policy wonks do that. Taibbi doesn’t play populist angst, he reports on it.
Try to keep up.
His criticisms are quite valid, but sure expressed his opinions in the linked video. They are valid opinions, true
But the job of a journalist is to give the whole picture and not just focus on what will get the most views online.
I keep up pretty well. Thanks for your concern.
Jerry, none, I repeat, none of the writers I follow give rat’s ass about getting the most online views. I’m going to give you two links here. The first is a snippet from a Glenn Greenwald interview in which he specifically addresses the subject of audience capture, which is what you tangentially allege Taibbi was doing. The second link is the entire Taibbi interview. It’s long, but you can watch if you wish and then see if you think your clickbait criticism is valid.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvqWvZi74tk&t=100s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUhAAZSxDmc
Ahhh. Propagating the problem, Tom.
In 1999 our usually reasonable State (Minnesota) elected Jesse “The Body” Ventura Governor. IMO this was also a middle finger to some of those who later would joyously embrace MAGA. The attitude: politicians don’t do anything so we might as well have some fun. One of this former wrestler’s first acts was to reduce the taxes on license plates for luxury vehicles.....including his own, of course.
I miss Paul Wellstone.
SO much
You're making the economy the main point, but I don't think it is. Because, let's face it, other than building walls, Rump has no idea how to actually rebuild the American economy - except perhaps making his Repub friends and himself pay even less taxes. That way, if you're interested in your own wallet, you'd be stupid to vote for Rump.
No, it's not that. The main point is that his followers love Rump because he says it's ok to hate. It's ok to hate LGBTQ people, it's ok to make fun of disabled people, it's ok to hate your black neighbours and even their babies - why? Just because they're black. It's ok to say "fuck you Greta" because it's your gahdamn right to own a huge-ass pickup-truck and a heap of assault rifles. Fuck Nature and climate because that's just pussy liberal snow flake stuff. Do with women as you please, fuck equal rights, just grab 'em by the pussy, that's feminism for ya! THAT's why the followers of Rump are voting for him. It's the boiling racism, misogyny and hate that has been festering inside these people for as long as the Confederacy lost the Civil War, and now, finally, someone has come to set that anger and that rampant egoism free. THAT is why they are voting for him, not because of the economy.
Excellent absurd use of stereotype. So ‘they’ are all the same. Gotcha.
Yes, the MAGAts are. They are racists and bigots. Just read Lisa59's posts, among others.
No, they aren’t. But you do you.
Yeppers. Not gonna lie, I'm a hardliner there: if you vote for a fascist, you are a fascist. And the MAGAts know damn well what they are voting for: Rump is very clear about what he plans to do.
Hi Tom: As usual you make some pretty good points, and I for one appreciate not only your points, but also the differing views they can arouse. I have defined 'OiDs (orange il duce) brilliance' or attraction very similarly.
Kinda like this, Dutch Mike!
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/donald-trump-99-digital-trading-191700879.html
🤦🏽♀️🤮🤯
I simply cannot "like" that one... Ohmagerd...
Artist Salley Mavor did "3 Branches of US Government" using a wee folk figure she created. It shows tfg reflected in mirrors for the 3 Branches. An exhibit of her work is at Southern Vermont Art Center in Manchester, Vt. A photo of this work is in this old article from the Cape Cod Times. Salley's art became more political after 2016.
https://weefolkstudio.com/2017/02/08/civics-lesson/
Bingo! Dutch Mike. Trump gives them permission to be angry and they express that anger through ugly, dangerous rhetoric and actions.
Down in the Villages of The Damned (Florida) the misogynistic bigoted men and their wives that carry their misogyny flags for them, report that Agent Orange is payback for Obama. They told me that in 2016. They use the n-word when describing their feelings for non whites. The highest level of government granted them a voice for hate. And they love it. I ask where the colored bathrooms are located in every restaurant. Especially in Sarasota. I have family there. I do my best to avoid them.
Dutch Mike, yes, absolutely. Could you imagine what the images on the buildings would look like? A few stories high with his face? There would need to be barf bags placed strategically around the buildings.
Since Strump’s recent brag that he will be a dictator, I see his acolytes reasoning that he will get rid of everyone who disagrees with anything he says and leave his loyal followers “on top” at last, where they’ve never been. It will be a short celebration, however. After their dear dictator runs out of his perceived enemies, he will have to keep the rage, the projections, the show going and he will turn on them!
That's exactly the point those fascist-fans don't want to see. Heather has pointed that out repeatedly: if there is an "in" crowd and an "out" crowd, there's always a way that you can be thrown in the "out" crowd... Even people who aren't Muslim, Black or LGBTQ themselves ("he's a muslim-friend, I'm tellin' ya..." "yeah, let's report him!").
The great mystery and tragedy is that something so obvious can be ignored by so many people.
An excellent summary Dutch Mike.
Here's an article describing Salley Mavor's meticulous artistry which I meant to include earlier.
https://www.capenews.net/arts_and_entertainment/much-to-appreciate-and-much-to-think-about-in-mavor-show/article_bb7f1a29-c6f1-5965-b912-ba5bac646c64.html
Add to that a long white robe and a halo around his head!
I think that is probably the most important message to get across to ordinary Americans of all.
As a museum exhibit professional, I have experienced the genius of the Earth's peoples through working with their material culture. Art is not an add-on. The arts are integral to our beings and cultures. Thank you for highlighting this historic support for the creative minds and hands of our nation. I hope we can continue to support and encourage those whose work has artistic value even if it does not bring monetary riches. We would be in a very dull and static world without them.
"Art is not an add-on." I like this!
I don't know if I'm right about this, but it seems to me that science (which I love) tries to see the world as we think it would still be if no one was here to see it. The arts deal with our experience of being human, even the most abstract and fanciful examples. It's mind play and and resonance with our feeling self. The world that only exists as long as there is a human to encounter it. I think the arts transmit insight, visceral and senses-based records and novel arrangement of experience, and cultural definition in ways that are likely far more part of who we are as individuals and and a culture than we realize or can pin down. People have been doing it since at least the stone age. It's not an add on, it's central.
Art is probably hard wired into our psyches. I just read a story about beautiful sand structures built by blowfish off Japan to attract a mate. Flowers and feathers are natures enduring art all of which give us joy in living.
Saw such a pic, who knew. Incredible
Me too!!
Would love to post that pic on here. wasn't it Einstein who said that if you ask a fish to climb a ladder, it will think it's stupid. But they have skills that we never imagined.
In his essay on history, Emerson wrote: "Nature is an endless combination and repetition of a very few laws. She hums the old well-known air through innumerable variations. Nature is full of a sublime family likeness throughout her works... "
I agree with you description of art. But not of science.
As a scientist, I see beauty and glory in the understanding of the nature of the world that isn’t tarnished by our lust for exploitation. Just the pure understanding of it.
It is art also.
I fully agree, and in the end a cornerstone of my worldview is we are as trapped by some of the hard distinctions we make as we are informed by them, the universe is all one thing, literally "one turn". We learn when we "think outside the box". My Masters thesis was about how our assigned distinctions are fluid and change with context: To an architect, a wall is substance, and the building is form. To stone mason, a stone is a substance and the wall form. To a geologist or physicist, the substance is what? Strings? We're still working it, but my point is that we focus on different aspects of the one thing, and sometimes those distinctions start feeling like the real thing when they're only markers. It's not that cut and dried of course, but I think we are more inclined to divide or lump than comprehend (as in "prehensile", grasp) as a society , than pursuing whole connecting patterns. Look how climate science struggles to penetrate the din.
In any case I was both an art and science nerd, and wrote about kinship of each in high school. That said, I think that professional science is limited to what it can precisely reproduce and measure (statistically anyway) and the arts venture beyond that into our experience of being. I'm not at all sure that sentience requires DNA, but I think that at this point the Turing Test demonstrates more about human gullibility than the portability of consciousness. So far as I am aware, only living thing feel.
I think the arts and sciences overlap and complement, and that observational and logic skills are common to both. That said, science can clarify but not settle what in human terms, most "matters". We have to "soul search" and compare notes for that. Science can show us the ways of photons and wavelength but only a living nervous systems experiences some of those wavelengths as color. Einstein said “It would be possible to describe everything scientifically, but it would make no sense. It would be a description without meaning—as if you described a Beethoven symphony as a variation of wave pressure.”
The experience of a Beethoven symphony (and I was a classical music nerd by the age of 5) can be discussed and broken down is all sorts of ways, but the "feeling" of it occurs only in a living body, and I think the arts reach and evoke those internal experiences even when particularly abstract. Sometimes I sometimes cry a bit at the beauty of the concepts in science films; as we are part and parcel of the physics of the universe, but as conscious beings, reflect all that, from a rose to those "deep field" space shots where galaxies look like snowflakes, in our sharable yet unique, individual ways. As a kid I wept to Ode to Joy. I still might.
I'll also say, since it's come to the surface (I don't know whether anyone will see this of not), that I was deeply moved by Handel's "Ode to St. Cecilia's Day. Handle's work full of musical contrasts and words by Dryden. His 1687 poem begins:
From harmony, from Heav'nly harmony
This universal frame began.
When Nature underneath a heap
Of jarring atoms lay,
And could not heave her head,
The tuneful voice was heard from high,
Arise ye more than dead.
Then cold, and hot, and moist, and dry,
In order to their stations leap,
And music's pow'r obey.
From harmony, from Heav'nly harmony
This universal frame began:
From harmony to harmony
Through all the compass of the notes it ran,
The diapason closing full in man.
Putting aside his antiquated language, his Greek-informed worldview seems remarkably prescient. My quarrel with it is that I see the inherent qualities of matter/energy and space/time as the source of that awaking, not a solitary conductor commanding the elements; the all of it. Put vinegar and soda in a drinking glass and watch matter (chemically) self-assemble.
Dryden goes on to illustrate the impact of music on our lives and passions. I prefer the Leonard Bernstein recording of Handel's orchestration, which is less dry than a strictly Baroque interpretation. I especially love the lilting counterpoint that dances lightly and gracefully around the choral recitation after (I think) "moist and dry".
How much I miss by seeing letter in early am. Glad I was able to catch this.
How beautifully said
Ok. What an uplifting letter HCR has written us today.
My parents worked together first in NYC, then in DC for the WPA. I recall my Dad proposed to my CA born & raised Mother by telegram from Telegraph Hill in ‘35. Now thanks to this wonderful post I realize it must have been Coit Tower.
Btwn all of us I keep thinking what if we actually met? Maybe state by state? I’m betting these groups could forge a powerful creative edge with fresh ideas and most importantly Actions.
As an artist I couldn’t agree more. It opens young minds and lights the imagination. Putting art and music back into the school curriculum would help a lot and it costs so little.
My favorite art teacher (high school, a print of his is central on my living-room wall) used to say repeatedly "Art is learning to see". I think that's part of it, and of science as well. That's the big sense of "see", of course, that is a metaphor for all our senses. That's what makes us alive, and it's both native and a discovered skill.
And then there is creative use of expression. Even words can ignite experiential richness beyond their semantic meaning, as in poetry. A line in a 80's popular song comes to mind; "When the stars and the signs and the streetlights light up the town". It paints a scenario in a single line, as well as evoking an ineffable sense of presence. Isadora Duncan said “If I could tell you what it meant, there would be no point in dancing it." It seems to me that in our neglect, the arts are being honed to manipulate us rather than to liberate us; owned from above, rather than a currency of culture.
Bingo HCR and Susan Troy !!
I don't think we grasp how deeply the arts are part and parcel of what defines and transmits out humanity. I get some sense of it, but it seems to me the treads run very deep indeed. I think a major challenge to our entire culture is the degree to which we have allowed commercial media to dominate our artistic sphere. There is less room for arts from the bottom up, the arts of the people. I also watch neighborhoods of the city I once lived in transformed in into the plainest, cheapest looking boxes, no more aesthetic than warehouses, but minimally decorated with cursory geometric applique, with pricey "luxury" apartments within. To me it looks like "community be damned". I am not a world traveler, but have seen enough of Japan and Europe to marvel at some of the creativity and whimsy that defines some of the public spaces. Many of our community spaces look desiccated by comparison. It's not that we, as a nation, can't afford it.
Yes, J. L. -- "we have allowed commercial media to dominate our artistic sphere."
In the schools -- all K-12 -- the commercial interests that killed off the humanities are called standardized testing: for the sake of the billionaire classes, number, quantify, package, rank-&-file all life, as if there were no other life.
Like factories, billionaires what schools to be producing standardized, interchangeable, disposable parts for their operations. To borrow a phase from the former CEO of CBS, “It (Trump) may not be good for America, but It’s damn good for CBS”, a Reaganomic spirit that has been warping education. If the plutocratic "Powers That Be" could replace workers with robots and AI, they would, and we might see a trend emerging. This is not your granddad's automation. Do we talk about this from a planning mindset, or do we let it (and many concerning other things) drift to wherever they end up?
I agree Phil. I think, emphasis and elevation of grades and rankings is like kudzu--overwhelming education. It is being overwhelmed because a quantifiable return on investment (a mindset suited to for profit business but not such things as education) is now the operating paradigm in almost everything. The humanities are being overwhelmed by the focus on return on investment--education is becoming a money-making opportunity. Education has to directly lead to a good paying job or it is not of value. Why else do parents spend time helping their children do their homework (as though their children will not learn otherwise)? They are seeking a return on their investment. They are being forced to do this really, because of the way our society is built (make money or you are worthless). They know our winner obsessed society could leave their child in the dust. It is everywhere-- that paradigm--overwhelming everything. We are ceding everything to profit-takers I think.
How depressed I was to learn that The junk bond king (Michael. Milkin, out of prison and cancer-free, I think) turned his genius for using money as a weapon, on schools. His online learning was a corporate raid on education. Described by some as a for-profit fleece on the tax payers.
Very well put. "Arts" also includes sounds as well as physical objects. There has been such an amazing variety of music written and performed in our lifetimes by myriad talented artists. Thanks to all of the musicians that enrich our lives.
While spending time in Poland as a private English tutor, I saw some of the most beautiful murals on the post war concrete apartment buildings. Creative and uplifting!
It all begins with art. Every conversation, blueprint, and hierophany. The story of humans is really the story of art, which is the way we lonely beings share our deepest selves with each other. In this sense, we are all artists.
Joseph Campbell. "The Hero with a Thousand Faces".
So true. Don't know where you work, but anything we do to bring art and people together is vital.
https://www.yesmagazine.org/health-happiness/2021/12/06/public-art-cities
Great read, Kathy! Thanks for the link.
That article was very interesting. Thanks.
When we look back on ancient civilizations it is often their art work that has survived. The decorated buildings and tombs often tell us more about ancient cultures than the study of their government structures.
Thank you for this, Heather. Such a positive and hopeful piece tonight, incorporating art, San Francisco and progress which are all dear to my heart.
I feel the same, Gwen! Coit Tower is so iconically San Francisco - not just the incredible murals. You probably know, but others may not - the money to build it and the dedication to firefighters came from heiress and living San Francisco legend Lily Hitchcock Coit, who developed a mad fetish for fires and firefighters at the age of 15 when a horse-drawn fire carriage stalled on one of SF's hills and schoolgirl Lily rallied the men and helped them push it uphill herself. One of SF's most eccentric eccentrics!
Thanks for that story. Where have all of the rich eccentrics gone? I'm sure they are still around, but Elon Musk, TFFG and a few others get the headlines and feel good stories don't bring in the ad dollars.
Several years ago I was talking with a local philanthropist in Maine. He was in his early eighties at that time. We were raising money for a local project and he was one of the go to people that would always help out.
He was concerned that the number of local philanthropists was diminishing due to attrition as several had recently passed away.
But when the local food bank had a major capital project to expand their outreach it took only 6 months to raise the money for the project. They had planned for it to take 5 years. They now serve over 3000 families a month up from 1000 pre-pandemic.
5 donors gave over $100,000 each and hundreds of others gave as well. There are so many generous people out there. Our community is very fortunate to have so many people that watch out for their neighbors.
Thanks Alexandra for the story and thanks for all of the generous people unconditionally willing to help their neighbors.
Glad to pass it on, Gary, and thanks for your inspiring philanthropic story. Totally agree.
Lily Hitchcock wasn't all good intentions. She also was such a vocal Confederate sympathizer as a teen her mother took her off to Europe during the Civil War to keep her from getting herself into real trouble in pro-Union San Francisco. But she definitely had her moments. Dressed in men's clothing, gambled with the firemen, lived her best life in a time when so few women could break out that way.
"Eccentric" used to be the definition of a San Franciscan!
I lived in Davis, CA for a couple of years in the late 1970's and we used to go to Santa Clara quite often to hang out with friends. Most of them worked for Intel as either EEs or Software Engineers. They were all nerds but very very smart. One of them was from Kentucky and his name was Elmer Clay Buchanan III. We dubbed him ECB3. ECB3 looked at everything differently from the way the rest of us did. When we all went to see a movie it was like he went to a totally different movie.
I absolutely love the Bay Area but I especially love the eccentrics.
I've been called weird and a nerd also, but I just don't see it. /S
Great reminder that good government supports the voice of the people. Among those receiving WPA funding for the arts was writer and Songwriter Woody Guthrie, though he actually started with the WPA building projects. Another was Meridel LeSeuer, one of the outstanding writers of feminist and environmental matters of our time, and a long term President of the International Women’s League for Peace and Justice. Interestingly, Woody and Meridel were friends, and many a night was spent discussing issues while their children listened. Meridel’s daughter Rachel met Kenneth Tilsen on a picket line protesting segregation at the Prom Ballroom in St. Paul. They married and had a long life of activism including legal defense of the Morrill Hall Eight, Dennis Banks, Leonard Peltier, and the Native Americans in the FBI siege of Wounded Knee. Meridel’s great grandson Nick Tilsen today heads the NDN Collective, working for sustainable solutions on Indigenous terms. Bottom line: preserving the people’s voice through art echoes long, not just as artifact but as it molds our history. I was fortunate to meet Meridel, who was still writing in the 1990s, through Rachel, my good friend.
This is a lovely story, KEM. Thanks for sharing it.
KEM, Thank you for sharing regards to Woody and Meridel via Meridel's daughter and the venues they used to share their lives....their gifts.... to lift up our fellowmen/women.
We need to read about and to be exposed to more such stories. These stories can motivate each of us to act in ways that will build up our nation and draw us together.
Stories are part of what shapes our view of the world. Can you think of any (fact of fiction) that influenced you? Books, lectures, visual art or music? Movies? Something read or remembered at someone's knee?
A series of books written by C.A. Stephens about 6 cousins, Civil War orphans, who go to live with their paternal grandparents at "The Old Squire's Farm" in Maine. My Dad read them in his early teens; I have the books now. Their original publish dates are from 1910-1915 or thereabouts.
Then there's music. My Dad was a huge classical music fan, my Mom was a folk fan; both encouraged my participation in band when I was in grade school, and while I did not make it my life's work, music has been (and continues to be) an integral part of my life.
Music somehow shapes and binds societies. Some think we evolved specialized musical capacity in our brains. I suspect this is so, or something like it. We often treat it as decorative, but I think it goes to the heart. It seems common if not universal that nations rally around a national anthem. Many societies attach cultural meaning to traditional dance. I think far more is shaping us than we ordinarily pay attention to.
I have read, BTW, that at one point in American history, people used to line up to get the latest sheet music of a new popular song. How common this was, I don't know, but sheet music would involve a piano, or some means of performance, and likely an audience, if only around the living room. It's great to get some of the best performances ever from the Internet, or perhaps a concert, but once again, it's more top down. The standard of "best" dampens grass root participation, not for all, but as a broad public phenomenon.
While on a work detail to Washington, D.C., in the early 70s, I worked in the Interior Building and was able to see the WPA works in what was at one time a cafeteria on the upper floor. Also all the wonderful things Mary Barber spoke of in Timberline Lodge!
A wonderful program, time for a reboot!
That’s cool! They did some wonderful work. More importantly at the time, helped people survive.
I had learned that a lot of the artists of the Harlem Renaissance were funded by the WPA.
https://livingnewdeal.org/the-harlem-renaissance-and-the-new-deal/
https://fdr4freedoms.org/wp-content/themes/fdf4fdr/DownloadablePDFs/II_HopeRecoveryReform/13_AfricanAmericansandtheNewDeal.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Writers%27_Project
Maine is one of 27 states that has an active "percent for art" program.
Since 1979, Maine has had a law which decrees that 1% minimum of the budget for construction or renovation costs of buildings funded through taxpayer dollars is to be appropriated for acquiring works of art.
"Each project is developed in cooperation with professionals in the local community and installed permanently on the site of the capital project. Since 1982, this program has generated approx. $7,824,373 for public art in Maine."
https://mainearts.maine.gov
And so many writers. Wikipedia currently lists 102 novelists. Many more authors have their own Wikipedia page like Dr. Heather Cox Richardson but aren't in the lists.
Thanks for the links. : )
You are so right. Biden is a true New Dealer. He is definitely working to enhance and protect the lives of middle and working class Americans. He is restoring the Democratic Party legacy. I give him a lot of credit, despite my hesitancy to offer unfettered political support. Good job, Joe!
We cannot love everything the party/politicians do that we support, just as we cannot love our friends or family every day. And that’s okay. It’s super, super, super important that we vote though.
No Truth.
No Respect.
No Understanding.
No Manners.
NO PRESIDENCY!!💩🤡
The racist, sexist megalomaniac liar cheated on all 3 of his wives, mismanaged the pandemic and made it political causing the death of millions and has no redeeming value as a human being. Send him and his gangs of bullies back under their rocks. Joe Biden and his administration are doing an excellent job. Like Annie says, it’s SUPER IMPORTANT that he remains in office. No other Democrat comes close. Plan to vote in the primaries.
We need more rocks, bigger rocks, really BIG rocks!...
Send fascism back to the fringe.
The repub party is the party of NO.
The Democratic Party is the party YES.
YES WE CAN vs NO WE WON’T.
*A banner?
What do you think?
(At least It’s easy to understand)
I agree with your NO and YES. But if the central theme of the comments today is ART, then it seems that artists are creative people. Republicans seem to be devoid of creativity. They tried to repeal the ACA but between 50+ Senators and 200 Congresscritters NONE of them could come up with a plan to replace the ACA. NONE, ZERO, ZILCH. So the party of NO is also the party of NO IDEAs. Which party came up with MEDICARE, MEDICAID, SOCIAL SECURITY, ACA and so on? The GOP is so much more than NO WE WON'T because they also CAN'T.
Right Annie! No Question with that statement, but perhaps you will allow me here to come back to a theme I have raised several times in my comments?
Be PREPARED for the Mango Muffin to announce that he has won early, and again try to stage a coup. There is no doubt in my mind that if he figures he is losing, he will put in motion what they have been working on so diligently. What do we do? All fly to DC to protect the Capitol? Go through our neighborhoods with a big stick? I just don't know, and we need someone to stand up and tell us who isn't a micro fish like me. What's the plan?
That said, I doubt that Trump will win the popular vote, but the electoral vote will be very close. What do we do to prevent a dictator then! 'Cause the electoral voting does not reflect my understanding of what democracy is, today. Again, What's the plan?
I am an sick, old man, but I am not ready to live under a Trump Dictatorship. My wife and I just will not!
Brings to mind the contrast between Jan. 6th and the women's march. 45 has threatened to use the military to suppress any demonstrations after his next election, but did nothing to stop armed violent rioters at the capitol. We must not go there.
I've had enough of "GOP" Bad Deals for one lifetime.
As say I
Agreed!
You might want to consider unfettering your support or trump will be back.
No worries. I'm as anti-Trump as you can get. Which is why I worry about Joe. But if that's what we've got, I'm all in. (It's not Joe's fault. The body politic only seems to like entertainers.)
They like entertainers because they use politics to entertain themselves and to feather their own nests. They constantly only game the system for themselves and refuse to understand anything about the common good. Being fair is impossible for them and it should not be that hard.
Bigotry runs deep and doesn’t always disclose itself. Trump has allowed people to show their sad selves. And they like it.
I do love a column about artists! My spouse is one, and I am a writer. Thank you, Heather. The arts are often an under appreciated part of the economy.
This author agrees with you.
They are also Mind Washed by their 'C'hristian Nationalist church leaders. They will never be "well" again. If our speaker (M. Johnson) says he is called to be the second Moses, and his people applaud him, then it's no wonder that so many MAGAts believe the Mango Muffin is actually the Orange Jesus, the 'Massiochist of the Apocalypse' leading four 'Pale Fascists' (S. Miller, S. Bannon, K. Patel, M. Meadows) and their unholy hordes of MAGAts.
We need more stories from your new adventure to reinvigorate us to face the work ahead. More please!
You have been quite the dynamo.
Agree, Ransom...more stories, please!
Morning, Lynell! I agree. More stories of US. All of US this time.
Morning, Ally!
So glad you found Coit Tower, hidden in the Library of Congress are the files, documents, photos, posters of the WPA art project. The sheer amounts of negatives (located in a digital archive) allows for visual time travel to the US in the 1930s. Everyday life is recorded across the breadth of the country. Reminding us of the poverty, but also the tremendous resiliency of the citizens. Also evidence of all the people, not just white people.
Ummm, Joel, as a librarian may I say that things are not hidden in the LOC. 😉 They are catalogued and accessible to all.
Thank you for being a librarian. You hold the keys to the gateway of knowledge.
Of course, you are correct, further, I was incorrect in attributing this collection to the WPA, it actually is part of the prints and photographs collections in the LOC. "The photographs of the Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection form an extensive pictorial record of American life between 1935 and 1944.."
But many people do not know that these thousands of photographs (actually to be completely accurate, there are 175,000 black-and-white negatives and more than 107,000 photographic prints) that were taken by the many FSA-hired photographers (eg Doretha Lange) during the 1930s even exist, and are available digitally for free, and reproductions/prints for a small fee. Here is the link to the collection: https://www.loc.gov/collections/fsa-owi-black-and-white-negatives/about-this-collection/.
I had the pleasure of spending an afternoon going through some of the photographs when visiting Washington DC and going to the LOC FSA-OWI Reading Room. "After the photographic prints were microfilmed as "LOTs," they were reorganized by geographic region and subject and put into file cabinets according to a classification scheme devised by Paul Vanderbilt. The Reading Room File is available to researchers in the Prints and Photographs Division Reading Room."
With the help of the librarians, of course.
Joel, thank you for this - I am so jealous! I was also a teacher and took 8th graders from Texas on trips to DC. I’ve been to the LOC, but to do research there is a dream that, at age 70, will likely remain unrealized. Congratulations!
I am 69, and you are never 'too old' to visit libraries and research the past. Libraries are feasts for the soul.
You’re absolutely correct, as I can attest as a retired K-12 librarian and 7-12 history teacher. Just seems unlikely from here in Florida, north of Tampa. If I ever get to the LOC, I’ll let you know!
A magical time!! Art to not merely decorate, but to inspire.
It's rare that any of us would ever take exception to something in an HCR post. Yet, I must do this tonight. I must disagree that "(we) all are in trouble". I submit we are in your Debt, Professor.
For many here you are the main, if not single source of our factual news since MSM cannot seem to do it. You are a virtual one-person fact-based media outlet while the multi-billion $ stations have hundreds of staff and just can't (or won't) put out honest news. I, for one, am grateful for that.
As to the right-wing cult pretending to be a political party whose focus remains "owning the libs" instead of governing,...they have Failed. Instead they have inspired new groups armed in facts and ready to take them on. My personal fav: Dems Against MAGA Nutjobs,....(D.A.M.N.)....edit per Gus!
BK, great comment, especially about the media. I like your bumper sticker! Suggest D.A.M.N.
Thank you....
So true. Your comment made me remember a quote by the author & social critic Neil Postman, who wrote the book entitled "Amusing Ourselves to Death".
Postman said, "When news is packaged as entertainment, that is the inevitable result."
Anyone who uses HCR as a main/single source for news is, to put it gently, both lazy and siloed. A better silo than Fox/MSNBC, to be sure, but that’s a low bar to step over.
Anyone who uses anyone or sources like Wikipedia as a single source is taking extreme short cuts, but they can be main sources to look for other links for connections most would never find on their own. The 20 or more links found in each letter and the many more thoughtful commenters expand the views so much more and allow fresh connections to old memories to explore the truer picture of what people were thinking or doing that would otherwise not be able to be found, much less used to help us form more knowledgeable opinions and plans of interaction.
HCR's letters are the best trail markers and notes, along with lots of other contributors to add to, or correct, what I knew or thought I knew.
They enable as much productive searching as I can manage in the trails I am most interested in following, along with awareness of other important considerations of others.
Historical fiction is useful, but I prefer historical facts.
As a humble fan of James Michener, I appreciated his "historical fiction" despite name changes to avoid having to defend every imagined deviation from a real person's "true" history, which I imagine also allowed combining actual histories of a few people into a single character, as I noticed in the movie versions of Hawaii and The Longest Day (based on Cornnelius Ryan’s non-fiction book of the same title).
Michener's “Hawaii” came out between the time I was a military dependent there and when my wife and I were assigned there in the 70s. His “Centennial” (about Colorado) conveniently came out before we were reassigned to Colorado.
I am even more impressed with Tersia d’Elgin’s “The Man who thought he owned Water” since the first half is very much as interesting reading as Michener, in his style, except she uses the real names of those involved, and uses the back half as an exhaustive description of the complexities of water use and laws developed in the state where so many major rivers headwaters originate. It is hard to match for entertainment and deeply informative facts on important issues.
I do believe HCR could go as deeply into issues as d’Elgin did, but I much more appreciate the breadth of issues and history that leaves it to individuals to explore and share what they find interesting.
HCR’s links are much too mainstream for my taste, and I think it prevents her from straying too far from U.S. government narrative/propaganda. I enjoy her historical perspective; her forays into current political policy analysis, not so much.
I’m going to offer up a few sites/ writers I visit regularly, just as an fyi. All are leftist, none are obsessed with Trump, but you will get more honest critique of U.S. government policy, both foreign and domestic, than anywhere on the television, or in mainstream periodicals ranging from the NYT/WaPo to neocon/neoliberal sites like The Atlantic/New Yorker, etc.
You can Google any of the names here and get the website addresses.
The three curated sites I visit daily are Scheerpost, Consortium News, and Counterpunch.
Writers I follow are Chris Hedges, Patrick Lawrence, Caitlin Johnstone, Glenn Greenwald, Matt Taibbi, Max Blumenthal, Aaron Mate, Matt Stoller, and Katie Halper. Most all of these writers have video channels where they supplement their writing with video interviews of experts you don’t see on mainstream media, on topics ranging from Gaza to censorship to economics.
Thanks for reminding me of several I read more from in the past. I appreciate those who still raise issues we seem to be unable to make much progress on, HCR has been covering parts of history very close to some of the my old party's honest agents who now seem shunned out o the party I left in 1996 (about the same time I believe Elizabeth Warren left, though I became independent). I left when it became clear the party leaders were going to keep redoubling efforts (instead of totally rejecting), the tactics described in the newt Gingrich/Frank Luntz GoPac memo, "Language: A Key Mechanism of Control." I'm more interested in reversing catastrophic losses like not finding a legislative answer immune to any misinterpretation or malicious SCOTUS actions like the Citizens United Decision that leaves us at the mercy of those who can "buy the pot" any and every time they want to.
I most appreciated Rep John Sarbanes listening to us in ways we appreciated in the passage of H.R.1 For the People Act, though it seems still has just enough opposition in the Senate keep it possible for money to be used so corruptly to thwart the will of the people.
All the other problems are important, but to me, the Citizens United decision has to be overcome before we will get a fair chance to make so many of the other changes.
Comment rec'd and taken, Tom and true. It could have been better stated, for sure. In my own case, I read even more now than I used do but, more so from the authors such as in the Atlantic (Frum), New Yorker, and many others via Apple One. It is not hard to see that MSM, even MSNBC are using their hour to regurgitate the same story over and over for ad clicks. So, there is really not much "news" coming via cable and certainly almost none from Fox / OAN / Newsmax, etc. It's all opinion designed to keep one tuned in which sadly is almost all negative. Very little on the actual and promising accomplishments of the current admin or the polls when results show Biden ahead.
So, in that regard what is so revealing and refreshing about HCR's blog is how she manages to cover the (yes, selectively curated) events of the (previous) day in a rather concise and well-written way. Following the links then leads one deeper, if desired as well-stated by Jim (below).
The members of this blog are pretty well educated (and mannered) as blogs these days go. And as Jim says, often there are links from readers' posts to additional sources beyond one's typical sources. So, thanks for the reminder that a one-sentence comment can be misleading.
See my response to Jim below. Peace, t
I lived in the North Beach/Telegraph Hill neighborhood of San Francisco for many years. Coit Tower was my back yard. I viewed the murals many, many times and saw something new almost every time. They are indeed a national treasure that every visitor to San Francisco should take the time to see. Skip waiting in line for a cable car ride and go to Coit Tower instead. The view of the bay from there is as magnificent as the artwork just inside the door. Take the 37 bus from Washington Square in North Beach if you don’t want to walk up Lombard St to the top of Telegraph Hill. (Sorry, I digress. The memories from the 1970’s and 80’s are pouring out of my head right now.)
The Rincon Annex post office in San Francisco at Mission St and the Embarcadero I hope still has impressive WPA frescoe murals on its walls as well.
Both are examples of the many economic, social, and cultural treasures that emerged from the New Deal that have endured to enrich our country to this very day.
Next November we vote on whether to continue and add to that legacy or destroy it. As Woody Guthrie said way back then; “Which side are you on, boy…”
Great memories. My mom had us going to the murals practically as soon as we could walk.
I'm from Laguna Beach, where Art is installed into all of us from day one.
Laguna is awesome that way! You've got me hankering to visit, now.
Go in August and get front row...or up to 30 back at the Art Pageant Festival of the Masters. Here is the Ticket site, https://foapom.evenue.net/cgi-bin/ncommerce3/SEGetGroupList?groupCode=FOA&linkID=foa&shopperContext=&caller=&appCode=. Tickets went on sale Dec. 01, so you might still get decent ones. And if you haven't yet, go the Art Fair.. I love the Art Glass Blowing. Can't see any of my paintings there though, I've moved on. 🤙🏻 Shakalaka
Bruce, I do the Art Fair pretty regularly - my Mom's favorite field trip! I've also done the Pageant of the Masters. ONLY someone on acid could've come up with that one. Do you have a website?
Alexandra, please Look on my Facebook Page Bruce Klassen. here https://www.facebook.com/bruce.klassen.9/photos_albums. or
on my page, Photos, Albums, Old Oil, Paintings
That's cool, and yes from what I heard, when I was younger Roy Ropp may have been the acid forerunner in Laguna. But, I always questioned that because it was so long ago.
Thanks for your interest in my paintings, but I took the site down when I came to Europe a while back because almost everything was sold, and I was only getting too many commissions (which I hated doing). I only have my personal favs left from that time and what I am painting for myself now. I'll send you a couple of Photos, but I am running out of time. Off to the North Sea Isles to look for ancestors first.
Got myself hankering to visit. Can't yet, maybe 2025. Missing Los Serranos and all the other dives.
What a wonderful report! Government support for the arts matters! Art feeds our souls. We need a government that recognizes that without art America will literally become a soulless nation.
Which reminds me, I recently watched Joe Biden welcome this year’s Kennedy Center Honorees to the White House... a truly heart warming evening. I can’t wait to watch the actual event when it’s broadcast on TV! Here’s the White House welcoming ceremony...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9A9HAwBYQU
So different from the one in 2017, which was to be held at the WH with the Trumps. Only the honorees all said no, and then DumpsterFire and Melanoma bailed too.
Yes, I didn't want to get into the contrast. But since you did, I don't think Trump knows what "support the arts" even means... because if people aren't celebrating him he has no interest in what's going on. By the way, I see the video I shared only showed Joe Biden speaking. Here's the event video that shows the faces of the honorees while President Biden was speaking too. I've edited my original comment to use this video instead https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9A9HAwBYQU
Thank you for sharing the welcoming ceremony! I LOVED seeing President Biden honor such important artists. His bearing contains humanity and Presidential dignity -- and he’s funny and can poke fun at himself. Never mind Billy Crystal, Renée Fleming, Barry Gibbs, Queen Latifah, and Dionne Warwick -- I learned more about their own humanity in President Biden’s warm tribute to such deservedly famous individuals.
I'm happy you enjoyed watching the ceremony as much as I did. Joe Biden will never be a "polished" public speaker because of his life-long struggle with stuttering. But what he says comes from the heart. And I'll take humanity over presentation every day of the week! By the way, I see the video I shared only showed Joe Biden speaking. Here's the event video that shows the faces of the honorees while President Biden was speaking too. I've edited my original comment to use this video instead https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9A9HAwBYQU
Me, too, Steven. If fact, his control of his stutter fills me with deeper admiration of him.
"The very soul of our nation." Beautiful! Thank You, Steven!
By the way, I see the video I shared only showed Joe Biden speaking. Here's the event video that shows the faces of the honorees while President Biden was speaking too. I've edited my original comment to use this video instead https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_9A9HAwBYQU
You're welcome!
Bravo HCR - I needed this tonight. Thank you.
Have been seeking reports and postings on Biden Admin accomplishments. Thank you for honoring the past and our present in a positive essay. Journalism has been reduced to doom, soundbites and misinformation as the main attraction.
I always love seeing the efforts of that period in our history at the Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood. It's such a beautiful example of what you write about here and the short video there describes it so well. As for the second part of your letter today, almost everything about the economy is doing well and when the dissatisfaction is covered, no one ever attributes the reason for this as the media bubbles we live in. This is such an important factor in how people feel about pretty much everything. So many Americans are doing well right now but they're upset about the cost of eggs because their media is telling them to be upset. Their own experiences don't supersede their media messaging. That's just too scary. Every pollster should ask the media question and put it out there for the public.